Pianist Simone Dinnerstein Presented by Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center Performing Music by From her Album Undersong
Photo of Simone Dinnerstein by Tanya Braganti available in high resolution at: https://jensen-artists.squarespace.com/artists-profiles/simone-dinnerstein
Pianist Simone Dinnerstein Presented by
Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center
Performing Music by Couperin, Schumann, Glass, and Satie From her Album Undersong
Wednesday, November 8, 2023 at 7pm
Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center
120 College Street | Asheville, NC
Tickets and information: www.blackmountaincollege.org/simone-dinnerstein/
“an artist of strikingly original ideas and irrefutable integrity”
– The Washington Post
Simone Dinnerstein: www.simonedinnerstein.com
Asheville, NC – GRAMMY-nominated pianist Simone Dinnerstein, described by The Washington Post as an “an artist of strikingly original ideas and irrefutable integrity,” is presented in concert November 8, 2023 at Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center (120 College Street).
Dinnerstein, who is heralded for her distinctive musical voice and commitment to sharing classical music with everyone, will perform several selections found on her 2022 Orange Mountain Music album Undersong –– the final installment in a trilogy of albums recorded at her home in Brooklyn during the pandemic between 2020 and 2022, which also includes A Character of Quiet (Orange Mountain Music, 2020) and Richard Danielpour’s An American Mosaic (Supertrain Records, 2021). The latter surpassed two million streams on Apple Music and was nominated for a 2021 Grammy Award in the category of Best Classical Instrumental Solo. The concert program will include: Robert Schumann’s Arabesque, in C Major, Op. 18 and Kreisleriana, Op. 16; François Couperin’s Les Barricades Mysterieuses and Tic-Toc-Choc; Philip Glass’s Mad Rush; and Erik Satie’s Gnossienne No. 3.
Dinnerstein explains of Undersong’s title: “Undersong is an archaic term for a song with a refrain, and to me it also suggests a hidden text. Glass, Schumann, Couperin and Satie all seem to be attempting to find what they want to say through repetition, as though their constant change and recycling will focus the ear and the mind. This time has been one of reflection and reconsidering for many of us, and this music speaks to the process of revisiting and searching for the meaning beneath the notes, of the undersong.”
Reflecting on Schumann’s Arabesque, in C Major, Op. 18, Dinnerstein explains that it’s “a very beautiful, poetic piece of music but it ends with a separate type of epilogue that's something different from the piece and modern in a way. There's a rest before you play it and the rest serves as a bridge to Philip Glass’s Mad Rush. It's unclear to the listener whether it's Schumann or Glass. I really like that blurring of the composer's languages with each other."
Dinnerstein offers this connective observation between Schumann’s Kreisleriana, Op. 16 and Schumann’s, Arabesque “The Arabesque has some quick changes in mood and the most breathtaking coda at the end that completely takes it someplace else, written in Schumann’s music language but sounding absolutely contemporary. In comparison, Kreisleriana changes on a dime. Suddenly, you’ll be in a completely different headspace. I think that’s as much about Schumann himself, as about his love for Clara.”
Sequenza21 describes Dinnerstein’s approach to Couperin’s Les Barricades Mysterieuses as “sonorous [and] eschewing ornamentation in favor of unadorned, shapely melodies.” Meanwhile, the tempo of Couperin’s Tic-Toc-Choc is thought to mirror the rhythmic precision of a clock and the full title (Le Tic-Toc-Choc, ou Les Maillotins), references little hammers or mallets. The San Francisco Classical Voice says Dinnerstein’s performance of the piece makes it appear as if she “magically transform[s] the piano into a harpsichord.”
With its distinctly repetitious compositional structure, Philip Glass’s Mad Rush, a piece originally composed for organ at New York City’s St. John the Divine, underscores the collectively seamless nature of this program’s repertoire. The New Criterion describes Dinnerstein’s performance of the piece as “transcendent – the picture of introspection interrupted by unexpected vision.”
Of Erik Satie’s Gnossienne No. 3, Dinnerstein says, “Erik Satie published three Gymnopédie and three Gnossienne together, though he eventually wrote more Gnossienne, a fantastical term that he came up with. The markings in the score for Gnossienne No. 3 are bizarre: “Plan carefully”; “Provide yourself with clear sightedness”; “Alone for a moment”; “So as to get a hollow”; “Quite lost”; “Carry this further”; “Open your mind”. These are written right over the notes. The commentary is dada-esque.”
About Simone Dinnerstein: American pianist Simone Dinnerstein has a distinctive musical voice. The Washington Post has called her “an artist of strikingly original ideas and irrefutable integrity.” She first came to wider public attention in 2007 through her recording of Bach’s Goldberg Variations, reflecting an aesthetic that was both deeply rooted in the score and profoundly idiosyncratic. She is, wrote The New York Times, “a unique voice in the forest of Bach interpretation.”
Dinnerstein has played with orchestras ranging from the New York Philharmonic and Montreal Symphony Orchestra to the London Symphony Orchestra and the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale Rai. She has performed in venues from Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center to the Berlin Philharmonie, the Vienna Konzerthaus, Seoul Arts Center and Sydney Opera House. She has made thirteen albums, all of which topped the Billboard charts. During the pandemic she recorded three albums which form a trilogy: A Character of Quiet, An American Mosaic, and Undersong. An American Mosaic was nominated for a Grammy.
In recent years, Dinnerstein has created projects that express her broad musical interests. She gave the world premiere of The Eye Is the First Circle at Montclair State University, the first multi-media production she conceived, created, and directed, which uses as source materials her father Simon Dinnerstein’s painting The Fulbright Triptych and Charles Ives’s Piano Sonata No. 2. She premiered Richard Danielpour’s An American Mosaic, a tribute to those affected by the pandemic, in a performance on multiple pianos throughout Brooklyn’s Green-Wood Cemetery. Following her recording Mozart in Havana, she brought the Havana Lyceum Orchestra from Cuba to the U.S. for the first time, performing eleven concerts. Philip Glass composed his Piano Concerto No. 3 for her, co-commissioned by twelve orchestras. Working with Renée Fleming and the Emerson String Quartet, she premiered André Previn and Tom Stoppard’s Penelope at the Tanglewood, Ravinia and Aspen music festivals, and performed it at Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center, and presented by LA Opera. Dinnerstein has also created her own ensemble, Baroklyn, which she directs. The Washington Post comments, “it is Dinnerstein’s unreserved identification with every note she plays that makes her performance so spellbinding.” In a world where music is everywhere, she hopes that it can still be transformative. www.simonedinnerstein.com
About Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center: The Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center (BMCM+AC) preserves and continues the legacy of educational and artistic innovation of Black Mountain College (BMC). We achieve our mission through collection, conservation, and educational activities including exhibitions, publications, and public programs. Arts advocate Mary Holden founded BMCM+AC in 1993 to celebrate the history of Black Mountain College as a forerunner in progressive interdisciplinary education and to explore its extraordinary impact on modern and contemporary art, dance, theater, music, and performance. Today, the museum remains committed to educating the public about BMC’s history and raising awareness of its extensive legacy. Our goal is to provide a gathering point for people from a variety of backgrounds to interact through art, ideas, and discourse.
For Calendar Editors:
Description: Pianist Simone Dinnerstein, described by The Washington Post as “an artist of strikingly original ideas and irrefutable integrity,” is presented in concert by Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center. Dinnerstein will perform several selections found on her 2022 Orange Mountain Music release, Undersong, including Robert Schumann’s Arabesque, in C Major, Op. 18 and Kreisleriana, Op. 16; François Couperin’s Les Barricades Mysterieuses and Tic-Toc-Choc; Philip Glass’s Mad Rush; and Erik Satie’s Gnossienne No. 3.
Short description: Pianist Simone Dinnerstein, described as an artist of “an artist of strikingly original ideas and irrefutable integrity” (The Washington Post) is presented in concert by Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, performing selections by François Couperin, Robert Schumann, Philip Glass, and Erik Satie from her 2022 album Undersong.
Concert details:
Who: Pianist Simone Dinnerstein and Caroga Arts Ensemble Conducted by Music Director Alexander Platt
Presented by Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center
What: Music by Music by François Couperin, Robert Schumann, Philip Glass, and Erik Satie
When: Wednesday, November 8, 2023 at 3pm
Where: 120 College St, Asheville, NC 28801
Tickets and information: www.blackmountaincollege.org/simone-dinnerstein/