Swarthmore College Department of Music

02/26/2026

On Saturday, Feb. 28, at 8pm in Lang Concert Hall, Elijah Santos ‘26 invites you to an enchanted evening of Italian music and Shakespeare art songs. He will also perform Filipino music ranging from folk songs to ballads. Free and open to the public, no reservation required. More info here: https://swatcentral.swarthmore.edu/?trumbaEmbed=view%3Devent%26eventid%3D1351322677

02/25/2026

Join Duncan Wall '26 for a Senior Honors Horn Recital on Saturday, Feb. 28, at 3pm in Lang Concert Hall. Featuring works by Samuel Adler, Spencer Klaw Kennedy ‘27, Peter Peter Schickele, and more. Free and open to the public, no reservation required. More info here: https://swatcentral.swarthmore.edu/?trumbaEmbed=view%3Devent%26eventid%3D1347476737

02/24/2026

Nico Johnson's Senior Recital, takes place this Friday, 2/27 at 8pm in the Frear Ensemble Theater. Entitled "Way Back Home," the concert showcases Nico's original pop tunes. Complete with choreography and special effects, this show is the perfect winter pick-me-up. Open to all, pop lovers or otherwise! Free and open to the public, no reservation required. More info here: https://swatcentral.swarthmore.edu/?trumbaEmbed=view%3Devent%26eventid%3D1353363897

02/02/2026

The Gil and Mary Stott Masterclass Series presents a masterclass with Randy Garnder, French Horn, on Monday, February 2nd at 12 noon in the Lang Concert Hall. Randy C. Gardner is currently Artist-In-Residence at Temple University’s Boyer College of Music and Dance. Following a distinguished tenure as Professor of Horn and Chair of the Winds, Brass, and Percussion Department at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music (CCM), he was awarded the title of Professor Emeritus.

Free and open to the public, no reservation required.

01/27/2026

The Swarthmore College Department of Music presents Friday at Six: Mel Hsu, on Friday, January 30 at 6pm in Lang Concert Hall. The final Friday at Six installment features composer and multi-instrumentalist Mel Hsu. A sonic painter of worlds, Mel often ventures from her classical roots as a cellist into unexpected, cross-disciplinary collaborations. Mel composes and performs for film, theater, dance, and poetry.

01/14/2026

Please join Visiting Professor Quinn Collins on January 23 at 6pm in the LPAC cinema for an event celebrating the release of his new album, Precious and Intelligent Metal. The album will be played in full, followed by a short Q&A and reception.

Precious and Intelligent Metal is a piece for percussion quartet and pre-recorded electronics in five movements, a psychedelic tone poem which draws from Richard Brautigan’s novella Trout Fishing in America for structural cues and general inspiration. The piece is scored for glockenspiel, toy piano, vibraphone, hammered dulcimer, melodicas, tuned metal pipes and other pitched metals, simantra, and concert bass drum, augmented by electronic tracks consisting of retuned guitar amplifier noise and microtonal software synthesizers in the first and fourth movements.

The album was performed by percussionists David Degge, Mika Godbole, Yumi Tamashiro, and Frank Tyl, and recorded by the composer. All post-production audio work, including editing, mixing, and mastering, by Jascha Narveson. Artwork by Erik Ruin.

Free and open to the public, no reservation required.

More info here: https://swatcentral.swarthmore.edu/?trumbaEmbed=view%3Devent%26eventid%3D1347764853

12/06/2025

12/05/2025

Please join the Music Department in Lang Concert Hall this weekend for our final performances of the semester! All concerts are free and open to the public.

The Fetter Chamber Music Concert Series, Friday, December 5th, 8pm and Saturday, December 6th, 3pm, Lang Concert Hall - Multiple concerts featuring a vast array of chamber music groups performing classical, jazz, pop, and everything in between.

Swarthmore College Chinese Music Ensemble, Sunday, December 7, 3pm, Lang Concert Hall - Co-directed by Guowei Wang and Lei Ouyang, the ensemble performs traditional and contemporary music from different regions of China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and the Chinese Diaspora.

Swarthmore College Orchestra w/ David Kim, Sunday, December 7, 7:30pm, Lang Concert Hall - The Department of Music presents the Swarthmore College Orchestra, directed by Andrew Hauze. This program will include guest artist David Kim, Philadelphia Orchestra Concertmaster, on violin, as well as a performance of selections from Gustav Holst's The Planets, Op. 32.

Guitar Recital, Music 052: Class Study of Guitar, Monday, December 8, 2025, 10:30am, Lang Concert Hall - Students from Associate in Performance Kale Good's class will perform ensemble pieces for guitar in Lang Concert Hall.

12/02/2025

The Chinese Music Ensemble performs Sunday, December 7th at 3pm in Lang Concert Hall. Co-directed by Guowei Wang and Lei Ouyang, the ensemble performs traditional and contemporary music from different regions of China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and the Chinese Diaspora. Students perform on traditional Chinese instruments including the guzheng (zither), erhu (bowed fiddle), p**a (plucked lute), yangqin (hammered dulcimer), dizi (flute), and percussion. Free and open to the public, no reservation required.

11/23/2025

Tonight, Sunday, November 23rd at 7:30pm in Lang Concert Hall. Critical Mass is a medieval and renaissance vocal ensemble, directed by Robin Bier. This fall's concert is entitled "600 Year Smorgasbord." A time-traveling feast of western vocal music spanning the dawn of polyphony to the dawn of the baroque, with works from the Wi******er Troper, Berkeley Castle Roll, Machaut's Messe de nostre dame, Dunstaple, Isaac, Moreley's The Triumphs of Oriana, Victoria, Monteverdi's Il quarto libro di madrigali and Carissimi's Historia di Jephte.

Free and open to the public, no reservation required.