The Center For The Arts | Orchestral Program

ORCHESTRAL PROGRAM 2009-2010

CSA String Improv Ensemble

(now accepting new students, and can be joined at any time)

Isaac Watras, Director

The CSA String Improv Ensemble is an opportunity for string players with a variety of experience levels to come together and make music that is fun, exhilerating, and challenging. Students work from a basic song format, and are coached to improvise in that format to the height of their skill level. While beginners are taught to create simple improvisations, intermediate and advanced students are challenged to reach their maximum creative and technical potential as the whole group crafts pieces that are never the same twice!

ALERT: No class Wednesday October 14, 2009

Performance Schedule: 4 concerts performed at Westin Art Gallery - Times will be posted soon. Recital at the Center Outreach concerts scheduled throughout the school year.

Concert Dress: White top, Black bottom, Nice shoes.

Second Recital: Sunday 2pm November 15, 2009, Westin Art Gallery Aronoff Center for the Arts (Downtown Cincinnati on the corner of 7th and Walnut) 650 Walnut Street Cincinnati, Ohio 45202 Get ready time is 1:30pm. Ensemble will perform Swallow Tail Jig.

Featured Artist: Trillium Quartet, Kirstin Greenlaw and Sujean Kim, violins, Belinda Reuning Burge, viola, and Christina Coletta, cello.

Upcoming recital dates: November 15, February 28, May 23 at 2pm. More details to come.

All students should purchase the following Music Book: Fiddlers Philharmonic Traditional Fiddling in the String Orchestra Authors: Andrew H. Dobczynski and Bob Phillips Publisher: Alfred Publishing It comes in versions for the violin, viola, cello, and bass.

Orchestra Students, if you need to contact Mr. Watras, click here to email.

Mr. Isaac Watras is the director of the SCA String Improv Ensemble. He has many years of experience working with children and is currently a music director at St. Xavier High. One of the features of the String Improvisation Ensemble will be composing of several level-appropriate pieces which will come about by creative input from the students themselves. These new pieces will be performed at the regularly scheduled Orchestra Concerts. Our students will also perform at the concert series of the Contemporary Performer’s Workshop, a non-profit organization that explores and promotes the use of new music in beginning string education.

Rehearsals on Wednesdays from 6:05-7:05pm in the Ballroom. ( - Now accepting new students - )

First rehearsal: September 9, 2009.

Click here to fill out our email registration form

Current Students: CLICK HERE for the charts of all the tunes we are playing.

The Cincinnati String Academy Orchestral Program, housed in The Center for the Arts in Wyoming, was instituted in 1996 by Paul Bartel, former President of the (CFTA) Board of Directors. This program grew from the first Summer String Fling Orchestra Camp Program, which began in the summer of 1996. For the first time, we are now pleased to offer opportunies for our students to play in a variety of venues in Cincinnati.

Faculty Biographies

Isaac Watras is the Strings Director at St. Xavier High School in Cincinnati. He is also a Suzuki certified cello teacher in Books I and II. His previous engagements were as the principal cellist of the Springfield Symphony Orchestra, and Mr. Watras has appeared in performance at the Playhouse in the Park, with the Cincinnati Ballet as well as many other groups and venues. Mr. Watras also directs the Contemporary Performers Workshop, a non-profit organization that explores and promotes the use of new music in beginning string education. Holding a Masters in Music Composition from Indiana University, Bloomington IN,and Bachelors in Music Composition from the University of Dayton in Dayton OH. Mr. Watras has completed several composition commissions including pieces written for orchestra, chamber ensembles, theater and film. Mr. Watras principal cello instructors were Yehuda Hannai and Jane Katsuyama.