Church Street United Methodist Church will welcome two world-renowned musicians to the stage Sunday.

The church will host Russian-born cellist Alexei Romanenko and Canadian pianist Christine Yoshikawa for the morning service and an afternoon concert.

Yoshikawa, music director Gordon Welch said, will join the morning church service for two selections and Romanenko will arrive to perform a 2 p.m. concert.

Both, Welch said, performed at the church last year and were eager to return.

“They felt such a warm reception from Selma and the congregation they wanted to come back,” he said. “They are an outstanding duo and they work together and play together so well. We are really looking forward to having them back.”

Welch said there is no charge, but a love offering will be taken for the two musicians.

Romanenko has authored cadenzas for numerous cello concerti and unaccompanied cello compositions and arrangements. His arrangement of J.S. Bach’s Chaconne from Partita No. 2 for violin was featured in his recital at the 2003 Myra Hess Memorial Concert Series. He was also invited to perform a gala concert at the Berlin Brandenburg Gates under the direction of Maestro M. Rostropovich in 2000 and performed for President Clinton during his presidential visit to the New England Conservatory as part of Clinton’s farewell tour in January 2001.

In 2009, he appeared in concert with cellist Matt Haimovitz to perform Vivaldi’s Concerto for Two Cellos  in the “Cellobration” concert presented by the Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra. In recent seasons, he has performed in such venues as Boston’s Jordan Hall, Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall and the Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C. and has been heard on the international broadcast of “Voice of America” in Russia, Atlanta’s WABE, and Boston’s WGBH Radio “Classical Performances”.

In 2005, he was the featured soloist in a performance of Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations during the “Greenhouse Celebration” dedicated to the 90th birthday of legendary American cellist, Bernard Greenhouse.
Yoshikawa is considered one of Canada’s most sought-after young pianists.

She has won many national and international competitions including the Grand Prize winner and Laureate of the Kromeriz International Piano Festival Competition, Canadian Music Competitions, Ehrhart International Competition, and second-prize winner of the Yakov Flier International Piano Competition, she was awarded the Mary Louise Remy Endowed PEO Scholar for her doctoral research on the music of Sergei Rachmaninoff — a recognition reserved for the top two of just 85 Research Scholars selected from over 600 nominations in the United States and Canada.

Additional awards include the prestigious Kieckhefer Doctoral Dissertation Award, the Aiken-Rockefeller Concert Artist Career Grant and Medallion and the President’s Scholar Award amongst others.