The Steamboat Symphony Orchestra will celebrate iconic cellist John Sant’Ambrogio as a part of its annual spring concert April 4-5 at the Strings Music Pavilion.

“John is one of the most important mentors in my life, and there’s a long line of people who will say that. He’s the one that brought me to Steamboat for the first time, and he lives a life that is about the joy of music and the joy of passing on that joy to other people,” said Ernest Richardson, music director and conductor for the Steamboat Symphony Orchestra.

“He was critical to a very important time in the orchestra’s development, and I can say without any fear of contradiction that I always do my best work when he’s at my side, either as a player or as my friend. I love that we get to put together a program to celebrate the music that he loves and to celebrate his favorite cellist in the world,” added Richardson.

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The Steamboat Symphony’s spring concert, Celebrating Sant’Ambrogio, will hold performances April 4 at 7 p.m., and a second at 7 p.m. on April 5 at the Strings Music Pavilion. The event is a tribute to Sant’Ambrogio, who has been a part of the Steamboat community since the 1980s.

Before arriving in Steamboat, Sant’Ambrogio was the principal cellist with the U.S. Seventh Army Symphony Orchestra. He then played with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and was a cellist with the Boston Piano Trio. He was principal cellist with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra from 1968 to 2005 under music directors Walter Susskind, Jerzy Semkow, and Leonard Slatkin.

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Sant’Ambrogio has played cello with the St. Louis String Quartet, the Giavanni String Quartet, and Washington University’s Eliot Trio. He has also been cellist with the Zimbler Sinfonietta, and was once principal cellist with the Boston Ballet Orchestra.

In Steamboat Springs he was founder and artistic director of the Arts for the Soul Summer Vacation Retreat.

“He’s quite a character and embraces what Steamboat is about. Even though he had a flourishing career in Boston and other big cities, he really loves the mountains,” said Lara Craig, board chair for the Steamboat Symphony Orchestra.  

The April performances are led by Richardson and will highlight Sant’Ambrogio’s daughter, Sara, who is also an internationally renowned cellist in her own right. The performances will embrace Sant’Ambrogio’s favorite symphonies including the overtures by Gioachino Rossini’s, Elgar’s Cello Concerto, performed by Sara, and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4.

“When I was talking to Sara originally about this idea, I asked her what is John’s favorite symphony?'” said Richardson. “She’s like, ‘He loves the Tchaikovsky symphony No. 4, No. 5 and No. 6’, and I also love No. 4, so that’s how we end.”

Richardson also asked Sara what she thought her dad would want to hear her play at the performances. Her answer: Elgar’s Cello Concerto.

“Sara has an amazing recording of this concerto, but she said John has not had a chance to see her perform it live recently,” Richardson said. “She said that would be great, which I think is great. We open with the Rossini’s overture to William Tell that starts off with a cello choir and has three of the most famous sections of music that has been in television shows and cartoons and everything you can imagine, but rarely heard the way it was originally intended.”

Sara has been immersed in music from an early age when she studied with her father. She was invited to study with David Soyer at the Curtis Institute of Music at the age of 16, and three years later Leonard Rose invited her to study at the Juilliard School of Music. She immediately won the Gioachino Schumann Concerto competition and was featured in a Lincoln Center concert in New York City.

She won the bronze medal at the 1986 International Tchaikovsky Violoncello Competition in Moscow and was invited to play at Carnegie Hall — a recital that aired nationally on CBS — and has performed with singers Sting, Rufus Wainwright and Angela McCluskey and has recorded with alternative rock group, VAST.

“My dad has been such a big part of the musical community in Steamboat. I participated with him performing at Strings (Music Festival) when he first started it, and I have played with the orchestra several times,” Sara said. “I know so many people in the community it is just such a unique community. Every time I come and play, it just feels like I’m coming home. I love it.”

Sara said she is looking forward to the performances, and excited about the Steamboat Symphony Orchestra’s spring concerts despite a busy schedule that includes performances and masterclasses in New York and Seattle, recitals in San Francisco, the Napa Valley and Mount Kisco, New York and the chance to get back into the studio to record a new album.

“To have a night where we’re playing some of his favorite pieces and honoring him just it makes my heart swell up. I just love it,” Sara said.  “I love that at the end of the concert, my father and I are going to play a beautiful duet by (Léo) Delibes with Ernest and the orchestra and called the Flower Duet I arranged for two cellos. It’s originally for two sopranos, but it’s more beautiful with two cellos, because everything is more beautiful on cello.”

Sant’Ambrogio, who splits his time between Santa Barbara in California and Steamboat Springs, has long been an advocate for music in the Yampa Valley.

He has been a longtime supporter of the Steamboat Symphony Orchestra. Back in the late 1980s and early 1990s helped the Strings Music Festival get off the ground along with other community members including Betse Grasby, Kay Clagett and Mary Beth Norris.

“It was by the grace of God that Strings got started. Betse Grasbe, who was an unbelievable administrator, could administer and run all the very small and big things that had to be involved in running a festival, and then Kay Clagett was incredible as far as fundraising,” Sant’Ambrogio said.

“The truth is that it was the three of us. It wasn’t one of us. We all worked together, and I am so grateful to them for their work and all the did to pull it us together,” he added.

This April, Sant’Ambrogio will have a chance to step onto the stage, and take a bow for his contributions to the development of the Strings Music Festival and his passion for the Steamboat Symphony Orchestra.

“I really look forward to the performances  because it happens that Earnest is one of my favorite conductors. He is terrific, and I just love the way he can talk to the audience and educate them to what’s going to happen. He talks about it in a way that every single person can get enjoyment out of it and understanding out of it,” Sant’Ambrogio said.  “… and then, of course, I’m excited to be able to play with my daughter.”