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Harp/Flute Featured at Final Fusion Concert

published April 3, 2012

Harp/Flute Featured at Final Fusion Concert

The Fusion concert series at Highland Community College will close its 2011-12 season with a harp and flute duo on Tuesday, April 10, at 7:30 pm in the Highland United Methodist Presbyterian Church across the street from the Highland campus.  Tickets are still available for this performance for $10 by contacting Samantha Baker at sbaker@highlandcc.edu or 785.442. 6026.

Harpist Tabitha Reist Steiner began her musical studies at the Mount St. Scholastica Conservatory of Music at age four in piano and at age eight in harp.  She has since become in demand in the Midwest as a soloist, chamber musician, and teacher.  Her playing was lauded as “…some of the most precise and beautifully inflected harp playing….” by the Kansas City Star, and the Topeka Capital-Journal said, “She played the harp beautifully.”  In 2004, Steiner was a featured Kansan by Emmy-Award-Winning Broadcast Journalist Larry Hatteberg. 

Steiner currently performs as principal harpist with the Topeka Symphony Orchestra.  She is former principal harpist of the Chamber Music Society of Kansas City, the Tulsa Symphony Orchestra, the Tulsa Opera Orchestra, and the Wichita Grand Opera Orchestra.  In addition, she has performed with the Kansas City Symphony, Summerfest Chamber Music Festival, Kansas City Chorale, Sunflower Music Festival, Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra and the Washington, D.C. Summer Opera Orchestra.  In addition to a busy performance schedule, Steiner holds an adjunct faculty position at Washburn University while maintaining a private teaching studio.  Her solo CD, Summer Past, was released in 2000 on Earthstar Recordings and Publications.  She can also be heard on pianist Julie Rivers’ CD, Christmastide.  Steiner earned a master of music degree from the Peabody Conservatory of the Johns Hopkins University and a bachelor of music degree from Washburn University.  She has studied with world-renowned harpist Alice Chalifoux at the Salzedo Summer Harp Colony in Camden, ME.  Other primary teachers include harpists Jeanne Chalifoux, Dr. Deborah Wells Clark, and Sister Joachim Holthaus, OSB.   

Flutist Christina Webster maintains an active and varied career as orchestral musician, recital soloist, chamber player, and teacher, and has performed throughout the U.S. and Europe.  She earned her D.M.A. in Flute Performance at the Conservatory of Music and Dance of the University of Missouri-Kansas City (UMKC), where she studied with Mary Posses.  Winner of a Fulbright Award, she earned a Postgraduate Performance Diploma with Merit at the Royal Academy of Music (London), where she studied with William Bennett and Kate Hill.  She was awarded UMKC’s Graduate Woodwind Quintet Fellowship and performed with that group for three years. 

Webster has been Co-Principal Flute of the UMKC Conservatory Orchestra, UMKC Chamber Orchestra, UMKC Wind Symphony, and Musica Nova, the Conservatory’s new music ensemble. She has held other orchestral positions, including Interim Second Flute with the Topeka Symphony Orchestra, and Principal Flute and Assistant Principal Flute/Piccolo with the Kansas City Civic Opera Orchestra.  She holds the permanent position of Second Flute with the Wichita Symphony Orchestra, has performed as Guest Principal Flute with the Saint Joseph Symphony, and is currently Principal Flute of the Kansas City Chamber Orchestra and a substitute/extra flute for the Kansas City Symphony. 

Webster earned a Master of Music in Flute Performance from the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance, and a Bachelor of Music in Flute and Piano Performance, summa cum laude, from the University of Kansas.  Previous teachers include John Boulton, Shannon Finney, Judy Johnson, and Geri Turvey. Webster is a native of Topeka, KS.

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