BELLOWS FALLS — Guitarist José Manuel Lezcano and harpist Franziska Huhn join forces for “Bards and Troubadors: Mostly Mediterranean Music,”
The show, a presentation of Stone Church Arts, is at Immanuel Episcopal Church, 20 Church St., on Saturday, Feb. 16. Doors open at 7 p.m., and the concert starts at 7:30.
Lezcano, a Cuban-born guitarist, composer, educator, and folklorist, has captivated audiences on four continents.
Described by Fanfare Magazine in 2012 as an excellent guitarist as well as an imaginative composer, Lezcano has earned numerous professional recognitions, including two Grammy Award nominations and the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts Individual Artist Fellowship. He was twice named NHMTA Composer of the Year, and earned a Distinguished Fulbright Award to visit Ecuador, where he performed as orchestral soloist and pursued research on indigenous guitar traditions.
More locally, Lezcano is professor of music at Keene State College, where he has taught since 1991. He coordinates and teaches in the guitar program, conducts the KSC Guitar Orchestra and Latin American ensembles, and gives courses in Latin American music, society, and culture.
He is also a popular lecturer for the New Hampshire Humanities Council with his talk, “The Guitar and the Devil: Music, Magic, and Ritual among Ecuadorean Indians,” illustrated with live music on guitar, charango, and pan flutes, all based on his Fulbright-funded research in Ecuador.
For her part, Huhn has participated in the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra, Japan's Pacific Music Festival, and Tanglewood Music Center in Lenox, Mass.
She returned to Tanglewood to perform contemporary music as a Fromm player and, since 2003, has been assistant director of the Boston University's Tanglewood Institute harp seminar.
Since 2007, she has been on the faculty at the Longy School of Music at Bard College in Cambridge and Boston's New England Conservatory.