Gifted Cellist Brings Her Talent to Pepperdine

Pepperdine’s Lisa Smith Wengler Center for the Arts ends its 2014-2015 Recital Series with a special performance by the international-prize-winning cellist Christine Lamprea in Raitt Recital Hall at 2 p.m. on Sunday, Feb. 22. 

The program includes Luigi Boccherini's Cello Sonata in G Major, Bach's Solo Cello in C Major, Jeffrey Mumford's amid fleeting pockets of billowing radiance, and Brahms' Cello Santa in F Major.

Lamprea has performed across the country, appearing as a soloist with the Houston Symphony, New Jersey Symphony, and Hilton Head Symphony Orchestra. The Colombian-American has toured with the Sphinx Virtuosi in such venues as Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center. Lamprea was the first prize winner of the 2013 Sphinx Competition and solos through the organization with major orchestras worldwide.

A winner of Astral Artists’ 2013 National Auditions, Lamprea has also received awards from the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts, the Young Texas Artists’ Competition and captured First Prize at the 2013 Schadt National String Competition.

An avid chamber musician, Lamprea has participated in the Kneisel Hall Chamber Music School, Perlman Music Program, the Banff Centre, and Yellow Barn Chamber Music Festival, performing alongside such esteemed musicians as Mark Hill, Maria Lambros, Nicholas Mann, Itzhak Perlman, Roger Tapping, and Carol Wincenc.

Lamprea strives to expand her musical boundaries by exploring many genres of music as well as non-traditional venues for performance and teaching. She has worked with members of Baroque ensemble Les Arts Florissants, and studied sonatas with fortepiano with Audrey Axinn. She has premiered several works by composers at The Juilliard School and the New England Conservatory. She was a member of a small ensemble that worked with jazz musician Anthony Coleman on avant-garde composer John Zorn’s game piece Cobra, for musical improvisers and prompter.

A passionate teacher, Lamprea worked with Ecuadorian youth in the cities of Quito and Guayaquil, as part of a residency between The Juilliard School and “Sinfonia Por La Vida,” a social inclusion program modeled after Venezuela’s El Sistema program. She continued to pursue musical outreach as a Gluck Community Service Fellow at Juilliard, performing in hospitals and nursing homes in and around New York City as part of a mixed ensemble of dancers, actors, and musicians.

Lamprea is the recipient of a Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans. She studied with Bonnie Hampton at The Juilliard School and holds a Master’s degree from the New England Conservatory.

In 2016, she premieres Jeffrey Mumford’s Cello Concerto with both the Detroit Symphony Orchestra and the San Antonio Symphony.

Tickets are $22 for the public and $10 for full-time Pepperdine students. For more information, call (310) 506-4522 ,or visit the Center for the Arts website.