KU News Release

German Guitar Orchestra to perform at KU, Lawrence on U.S. tour

Guitar Orchestra of Eutin

LAWRENCE-The 20-member Guitar Orchestra of Eutin, Germany, will present a free public concert at 3:30 p.m. Monday, April 2, at the Oread Bookstore in the Kansas Union, one of four performances scheduled April 1-2 in Lawrence, Eutin's sister city since 1989.

Other performances during the group's first visit to the United States will be at 8 p.m. Sunday, April 1, at Liberty Hall, which is also free and open to the public, and, on Monday, April 2, at 8:05 a.m. at Lawrence Free State High School and at 9:55 a.m. at Southwest Junior High School. The concerts at the Oread Bookstore, Lawrence Free State High School, and Southwest Junior High School are expected to last about 30 minutes; the Liberty Hall concert is expected to last about an hour-and-a-half.

Their program of both classical and contemporary selections will include compositions by Marc Antoine Charpentier, Johann Sebastian Bach, Fernando Sor, Edvard Grieg, and Maria Linnemann, some for the full orchestra and others for solos or ensemble groups.

The orchestra group coming to Lawrence consists of 19 students from the regional music school at Eutin, 11 between the ages of 13 and 18, and an adult ensemble of eight, plus the director, Andreas van Zoest.

The KU visit is being coordinated through its Max Kade Center for German-American Studies, the Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures, and Friends of Eutin. During the Lawrence visit, the Eutin guests will take a guided tour of the KU Lawrence campus and the Natural History Museum and Biodiversity Center. They will also meet with KU students and faculty in the Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures. The department has had a study abroad program with the City of Eutin since 1964 when it was begun by Helmut E. Huelsbergen, KU professor emeritus of Germanic languages and literatures.

The guitar orchestra's U.S. tour is a celebration of the 750th birthday of the city of Eutin. Because of the sister-city relationship with Lawrence, orchestra members plan to spend more time in Lawrence than at any tour stop. They plan to arrive March 30 and depart April 3, and will stay with host families in the area. Their itinerary includes visits to the Kansas City area, citywide tours of Lawrence and observing historic re-enactments at Blanton's Crossing in rural Douglas County. Other stops scheduled on their March 24-April 16 U.S. trip include Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, New York and Washington, D.C.

The adult ensemble of the Guitar Orchestra of Eutin was founded in 1997, and the student group has been organized since 2002. They have performed at concert tours in Ireland in 2005 and Norway in 2006, as well as in concert halls, schools and churches, including benefits for UNICEF and other charities.

For more information about the KU Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures, the Max Kade Center for German-American Studies and a chronological background of KU-Eutin exchanges, go to http://www2.ku.edu/~germanic/

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