Marina Alexandra has established herself as a dynamic performer with a powerful stage presence. Finger Style Guitar Magazine described her as an “amazing player that commands the guitar with world-class technique and musicianship that is uncommon.” Marina Alexandra was listed by the Aaron Shearer Foundation as one of the most influential female classical guitarist in America.

Open to all university students and faculty interested in learning and performing chamber music, the University String Ensemble members meet for weekly rehearsals during Fall and Spring academic semesters, giving public recitals and accompanying other campus ensembles.

The FMU Chamber Jazz Ensemble allows students in a small group setting to learn and hone improvisational skills within the the jazz idiom. Works have been selected from music by Corea, Glasper, Shorter, and more.

Open to all university students, the University Concert Choir has an average enrollment of between 35 and 45 students. This group has sung in numerous area churches and has also performed with the Florence Symphony Orchestra. They have performed such major choral works as the “Polovetzian Dance and Chorus” of Alexander Borodin, the “Schicksalslied” of Johannes Brahms, and the Ninth Symphony of Ludwig van Beethoven. Recently their concerts have included selections accompanied by the newly formed Francis Marion string ensemble.

Evgenia Pirshina was born in Moscow, Russia. She graduated in piano from the Emil Gilels School of Music and in piano and vocal from Moscow State Pedagogical University. She has also participated in masterclasses by Robert Desimone (Britain) and Elizabeth Bice Cavalli (Austria).

From 2006 to 2015 Evgenia worked in the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Academic Musical Theater. She has been guest soloist of Opera Panama and in 2018 became a soloist at the Chicago Opera Theater.

Songwriter Jimmy Webb has had chart-topping hits in a unique range of genres over the last 50 years, from country to pop to disco, with songs including “Worst That Could Happen,” “The Highway Man,” “Up, Up and Away” and “MacArthur Park.” But perhaps the most enduring partnership out of all those memorable songs is his musical brotherhood with Glen Campbell. Jimmy Webb: The Glen Campbell Years highlights some of the 100+ recordings from the Webb/Campbell songbook, pulling the audience in…

Andrew Drannon is a writer and composer based in New York. He hails from Memphis, Tennessee, where he worked as Professor of Music Technology and Composition at Rhodes College. He holds an MFA from NYU’s Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program and was a composer fellow at the Bang on a Can Summer Festival. In 2018, he formed Awen Productions, an arts organization dedicated to innovative new work that helps people connect.