Friends of Music is pleased to present /än ′ sämbəl/ II on Saturday, February 11 at 7:30 p.m. Like last season’s “ensemble” program, this innovative concert utilizes Pasadena Presbyterian Church’s iconic Aeolian-Skinner pipe organ as a member of several ensembles. As with all of Friends of Music’s concert offerings, the program is FREE and open to the public.

This season’s program features two works for organ and brass, one for organ and strings, and one for choir, soloists, organ, harp and percussion.

PPC Director of Music Timothy Howard says PPC’s pipe organ is ideally suited for ensemble work. “It’s big, so it can compete with a brass quintet. But it’s not so big that it can’t be subtle, especially with a string instrument ensemble.”

The program opens with “Prelude and Exultation” for organ, brass quintet and percussion, dating from 2007. Mr. Phillips is a nationally recognized composer, and is Director of Music at All Saints’ Episcopal Church in Beverly Hills. The brass return later in the program to play Carlyle Sharpe’s “Prelude, Elegy and Scherzo” for organ and brass quintet, with PPC’s Associate Organist Meaghan King at the organ. Mr. Sharpe teaches at Drury University in Springfield, Missouri.

In between the two brass offerings, a string ensemble takes the stage to join Dr. Howard for an organ concerto by Italian composer Giuseppe Sammartini, a near-contemporary of Johann Sebastian Bach George Frideric Handel. Sammartini spent much of his creative life in England, where he absorbed Handel’s style, especially evident in the keyboard concertos, Op. 9. Dr. Howard notes that “in the Handelian four movement structure, the piece provides an opportunity to show the more delicate site of the PPC organ.”

The program continues with harpist Maria Casale joining Dr. Howard for “Aria in Classic Style” by Marcel Grandjany. “It’s kind of a ‘palette cleanser’ following the big brass music,” Dr. Howard notes, adding “Maria and I have played the piece a number of times in the last 20 years, and it’s always a pleasure.”

The program concludes with Leonard Bernstein’s “Chichester Psalms,” in its small ensemble version: choir, vocal soloists, organ, harp and percussion. Mr. Bernstein wrote the piece in 1965. The text is sung in Hebrew, and he specified that the second movement solo be sung by a boy treble. “For our performance, I’m delighted to have engaged the services of Ari Friedman,” says Dr. Howard. “Ari has worked diligently on the solo, and I’m greatly looking forward to hearing him with the rest of the musicians.”

Learn more about the program, the composers, and the performers here.