To close out its 44th year of bringing classical music to the ears of local residents, the Greeley Chamber Orchestra will bring a renowned, melodious family to the stage.
The Greeley Chamber Orchestra’s final concert of the 44th season begins at 7:30 p.m. Friday at the Trinity Episcopal Church, 3800 W. 20th St., Greeley. The orchestra’s founder, Dan Frantz, called the upcoming concert “a special show for the orchestra, community and Pfund family.”
Calvin Pfund, the featured soloist, comes from a long line of musicians who have performed with the Greeley Chamber Orchestra since its early days. But now it’s his time to shine.
He will play the piccolo trumpet alongside the Greeley Chamber Choir to perform classical music pieces like “Sermon of Saint Francis to the Birds” by Franz Liszt, “Upon Hearing the First Cuckoo of Spring” by Frederick Delius, Cantata 191 “Gloria in excelsis Deo” by Johann Sebastian Bach and more.
The celebration will showcase the Pfund family’s talent as well as their love for the arts, music and each other, according to Calvin’s 81-year-old grandfather, William “Bill” Pfund.
Local music history
Calvin’s connection to the Northern Colorado music scene started with his grandparents, Bill and Sue, champions of music for more than 50 years in Greeley.
That’s where the “Pfund” begins.
William “Bill” Pfund, a trumpet player in the Greeley Chamber Orchestra. (Greeley Chamber Orchestra/Courtesy)In the early ’70s, Bill joined the University of Northern Colorado’s School of Music as a trumpet professor, where he taught for 34 years. Sue played the organ for more than 50 years at the First Presbyterian Church in Greeley.
The couple eventually moved to a farm in Eaton in the mid-1970s and remain there to this day. Both continue to teach their musical expertise to people in Northern Colorado.
Nearly 10 years after the Pfund’s arrival, one of Bill’s music students, Frantz, founded the Greeley Chamber Orchestra as the first and only orchestra conductor.
Bill has been an instrumental part of the Greeley Chamber Orchestra’s wind section and has been featured as a soloist “probably more times than anyone else” over the 44-year history, according to Frantz. As a professor, Bill would also help Frantz find rising trumpet players to play in the orchestra.
Since 1981, the orchestra, which consists of volunteer musicians from Northern Colorado and southern Wyoming, has put on a five-concert season between September and April each year, Frantz said. The orchestra has performed Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos and Orchestral Suites in addition to symphonies composed by Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert.
Most notably, each performance spotlights soloists like Bill, who are active talents in Greeley, or like Calvin, a part of the local music history.
“We just enjoy featuring our homegrown talent at our concerts,” Frantz said. “It’s hard to bring a group of folks together to make music, and it is a pleasure when it happens, and it only happens because everybody works so hard.”
Since 1982, the Greeley Chamber Choir has combined forces with the orchestra twice each year to collaborate on pieces by Beethoven, Schubert, Faure and more.
Both musical groups bring in community members who, outside of music, work as teachers, nurses, dentists, physicians, homemakers, salespersons, managers and students.
The Pfund family has been featured throughout the years, from parents who passed on a love for music to their children, to today, a passion that persists through a grandchild following in his grandfather’s footsteps.
“There’s not much more magic than that,” Frantz said.
A bundle of Pfund
Bill and Sue raised two children, Christopher and Linda, who both went on to become accomplished musicians.
Linda, who plays the violin professionally and teaches the instrument, has performed the violin in the section and as a soloist with the Greeley Chamber Orchestra. Christopher, a trumpet player and singer, has also sung with the orchestra.
In 1991, the entire Pfund family flaunted their harmonious knack for classic music at a Greely Chamber Orchestra concert. Each generation of the Pfunds has passed down a knowledge and adoration for the arts, which has included family performances, trips to study music abroad, catching shows together all over the world and supporting each other’s music careers.
A 1991 Greeley Tribune article about the Pfund family’s Greeley Chamber Orchestra concert joint performance. (Dan Frantz/Courtesy)The clan will make another appearance once more with Calvin’s solo act. This time, both of Calvin’s parents, Christopher and his wife, Lynette, professors of voice at the University of Florida, will join. Christopher’s career has taken him across the world to sing professionally, with a “one-of-a-kind” high voice, according to his father, Bill.
Their budding trumpet player, Calvin, studies music at Michigan State University and plays with the MSU Symphony Orchestra. He was recently a semifinalist in the International Trumpet Guild Orchestral Excerpts competition held in Anaheim, California.
Calvin, who looks up to his grandfather as “a legendary trumpet master,” hopes to become an international trumpet soloist.
Bill calls Calvin an “unbelievable player” with a strong drive. He joked that his grandson is trying to “copy” him because they share similar traits and have such a tight-knit relationship, usually talking on the phone one to three times each day.
Audience members can catch Calvin’s “very demanding concerto” in the first half of the concert before he takes a seat beside his grandfather in the trumpet section on Friday, according to Frantz. In addition to Bill and Calvin, the concert will showcase the entire trumpet section.
Christopher and Lynette will later join the pair to sing solos and tell a compelling musical story with a happy ending.
“They’re coming out to be in the audience, and they’re gonna end up on stage,” Frantz said.
Those interested in witnessing a night to remember in music can purchase tickets at the door. General admission tickets cost $15 for adults and $5 for college students. Youth 18 and younger get in free.
Frantz said the beloved orchestra has already begun preparations for the 45th season. For more information about the Greeley Chamber Orchestra, go to greeleychamberorchestra.org.
“It’s a celebration of our family … (and) the joy we get from sharing music with others,” Bill said about Friday’s show.
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