Classical guitarist João Vitor highlights the start of the Yellow Moon Gyroid Concert Series on Sept. 26 at SIU Carbondale’s Morris Library. (Photo provided)
September 19, 2025
Classical guitar to be featured in next Yellow Moon Gyroid concert at SIU
CARBONDALE, Ill. — The Yellow Moon Gyroid Concert Series kicks off its second season on Friday, Sept. 26, featuring recent Southern Illinois University Carbondale master’s degree graduate João Vitor.
The free, public program, “Classical Guitar,” will also feature guitar student Alexandria Alyse Cutting, a Carbondale Community High School freshman who studies guitar with Vitor. The program begins at 4 p.m. in Morris Library’s third-floor rotunda.
Vitor earned his master’s degree in guitar performance from SIU Carbondale under Isaac Lausell, an associate professor in the SIU School of Music. He is a doctoral candidate at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music.
Reiko Schoen, one of the series co-directors, said the program “will bring a classical guitar world filled with Spanish, Argentina and Brazilian composers and pieces.”
A QR code and a limited number of full concert programs will be available at the concert.
Schoen and cellist William Cernota, an assistant lecturer in the SIU School of Music, began the concert series in fall 2024 in honor of Schoen’s late husband, Alan Schoen, who discovered the gyroid. Reiko Schoen is a member of the Federation of National Music Clubs and retired in May 2025 as a piano teacher of the Musical Sprouts piano studio in Carbondale for 31 years.
“I have known João since he was an SIU student,” she said. “He is very happy to come back and to perform at his favored campus.”
Schoen added that she is grateful to Morris Library for hosting this concert series, and to Richard Kelley, director of the School of Music, and community supporters for the programs.
She also appreciates last season’s performers, which included SIU School of Music faculty and students and community musicians.
“The teamwork and enthusiastic response from the concert audience, both regular and new visitors, have helped in establishing this unique concert series,” she said.
The rotunda is home to Yellow Moon Gyroid made by algorithmic artist Jesse Louis-Rosenberg, honoring Schoen’s 1968 discovery while working for NASA.
A gyroid is an infinitely connected periodic minimal surface with no straight lines; a minimal surface has the smallest area possible within a given boundary. Schoen, a physicist, mathematician and computer scientist, taught at SIU Carbondale from 1973 to 1996.
For information regarding the performance, contact Reiko Schoen at reikotaka@gmail.com. For information about the School of Music, visit the School of Music website.
(Editor’s note: João is pronounced zhoo-OWN)