Aug 30: Danish String Quartet's New Album Keel Road Out on ECM New Series

ECM New Series Releases

Danish String Quartet
Keel Road

Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen, violin; Frederik Øland, violin; Asbjørn Nørgaard, viola; Fredrik Schøyen Sjölin, violoncello

“Folk tunes are not just a part of our repertoire, but an important element of our identity as musicians” – The Danish String Quartet

Release Date: August 30, 2024
ECM New Series 2785

Press downloads available upon request.

Keel Road is the latest chapter in the Danish String Quartet’s reckoning with music from – or inspired by – northern folk and traditional sources, rounding off a decade of sustained engagement with the genre. Wood Works, issued in 2014 on the Danish Dacapo label gave notice of the extent of the DSQ’s commitment to folk, explored in parallel with their classical activities, and Last Leaf, released in 2017 on ECM New Series took the story further. A resounding success with press and public, Last Leaf ranked high amongst albums of the year at NPR, The New York Times and Gramophone, the latter magazine suggesting this might be “the best album of folk ditties from a string quartet you’ll ever hear,” an assertion now challenged by Keel Road.

Once again, the group casts its associative net wide: “We set out on a musical journey that traverses the North Sea. For centuries, the main communication channel of Northern Europe, the highway and the internet of bygone eras. And even though known for its swift upsurges and strong gales, brave sailors would again and again travel the keel road, enabling a continuous exchange of goods, culture and music. The musical keel road of this album will take us from Denmark and Norway to shores far away: to the Faroe Islands, to Ireland and England.” The journey illuminates musical affinities as well as distinctions. “While folk music represents local traditions and local stories, it is also the music of everywhere and everyone. At the end of the day, our stories and our music remain closely connected.”

Amid the traditional pieces, Keel Road subtly interweaves compositions by Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen and Fredrik Schøyen Sjölin, which eloquently convey a “folk” spirit. A brief excerpt from a field recording of the Danish traditional “En Skomager Har Jeg Været” (A cobbler I was) precedes Sørensen’s reflective tune “Once A Shoemaker."

With characteristic attention to detail, the Danish String Quartet creatively colour the album’s arrangements with the addition of instruments including spinet, harmonium, bass and clog fiddle. Guest musicians Ale Carr (cittern) and Nikolaj Busk (piano), meanwhile, both members, with Rune, of the folk trio Dreamers’ Circus join the DSQ for a performance of Carr’s “Stormpolskan."

Keel Road’s musical stopover in Ireland proves particularly productive, as the quartet interprets pieces composed by Turlough O’Carolan (1670-1738), the legendary harpist from County Meath. Unusual among the itinerant harpists of his day, O’Carolan drew influence not only from local tradition but also from then-contemporary European composers including Vivaldi and Corelli, intuitively seeking his own blend of form and folk spontaneity.

For the Danish String Quartet traditional music has been part of the group’s story since their early days: “As we came together to form the quartet, folk melodies naturally blended into our rehearsals. We were experimenting with lots of different tunes, each of us adding a personal touch. This evolved into a serious endeavour over time.”

*

Now widely recognized as one of the most adventurous string quartets, the Danish String Quartet celebrated their 20th anniversary in the 2022/3 season. 2023 also saw the completion of their five volume PRISM series on ECM, which explored musical and contextual relationships between Bach fugues, Beethoven string quartets and works by Shostakovich, Schnittke, Bartók, Mendelssohn, and Webern.

The group made their ECM debut in 2016 with music of Thomas Adès, Per Nørgård & Hans Abrahamsen, reflecting their special affinity for contemporary composition.

“What they do know is how to be an exceptional quartet, whatever repertory they play.” — Anthony Tommasini, The New York Times

*

Keel Road was recorded at Copenhagen’s Village Recording Studio in November 2022, and mixed at Munich’s Bavaria Musikstudios in March 2024.

The Danish String Quartet celebrates the release of Keel Road with concerts in the US and Europe. Further details and information at www.danishquartet.com and www.ecmrecords.com 

July 12: Summer Night Concert 2024 – The Vienna Philharmonic Conducted by Andris Nelsons with Soprano Lise Davidsen

Summer Night Concert 2024 
The Vienna Philharmonic
Conducted by Andris Nelsons with Soprano Lise Davidsen

Album Release Date: Friday, July 12, 2024
Pre-Order Available Now

Sony Classical is proud to announce the release of this year’s Summer Night Concert 2024 with the Vienna Philharmonic, conducted by Andris Nelsons with soprano Lise Davidsen. The unique concert experience will be available on CD, DVD, Blu-ray as well as digitally on July 12, 2024. Pre-order is available now.

The Summer Night Concert was performed this year on June 7, 2024. It is an annual open-air event, which has been held since 2004 in the magical setting of Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna/Austria. The illustrious conductors who have previously led the orchestra at this event are Georges Prêtre, Daniel Barenboim, Franz Welser-Möst, Lorin Maazel, Christoph Eschenbach, Zubin Mehta, Semyon Bychkov, Gustavo Dudamel, Daniel Harding, Yannick Nézet-Séguin and Andris Nelsons.

Thanks to its UNESCO World Heritage setting in the Baroque Park of Schönbrunn with the palace as a backdrop, the Summer Night Concert adds great visual charm to its superb musical quality. The idea of making classical music at its very best available for everyone and thus giving a gift to all music lovers still characterizes the event today. Millions of viewers and listeners in more than 80 countries can follow the concert online, on TV and radio.

The focus of this year’s program was on popular works from the 19th and 20th centuries from Europe’s rich musical heritage. Bedřich Smetana, one of the most important Czech composers, was honored with three works to mark the 200th anniversary of his birth. Andris Nelsons conducted the concert for the second time, while Norwegian opera and lieder singer Lise Davidsen made her début with the orchestra. She sang two arias – from Richard Wagner’s Tannhäuser and Giuseppe Verdi’s La forza del destino.

Norwegian soprano Lise Davidsen burst onto the international stage in 2015 by winning multiple prizes at the Operalia, Queen Sonja and Hans Gabor Belvedere competitions. These were swiftly followed by triumphant débuts at the Metropolitan Opera, Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Teatro alla Scala, Milan, Bayerische Staatsoper, Wiener Staatsoper, and the Aix-en-Provence, and Glyndebourne Festivals. In summer 2021 she appeared in two productions at the Bayreuth Festival (Elisabeth in Tannhäuser and Sieglinde in Die Walküre). In the same year she was awarded Female Singer of the Year by the International Opera Awards. A frequent recitalist and concert performer, Davidsen has toured with many of the world’s leading orchestras and conductors. In March this year, Lise Davidsen made her acclaimed role début at the Metropolitan Opera as Leonora in La forza del destino.

Andris Nelsons is Music Director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Gewandhauskapellmeister in Leipzig. These two positions, in addition to his leadership of a pioneering alliance between both institutions, have firmly established Grammy Award-winning Nelsons as one of the most renowned and innovative conductors on the international scene today, with engagements with the world’s most important orchestras and opera houses. Born in Riga in 1978 into a family of musicians, Andris Nelsons began his career as a trumpeter in the Latvian National Opera Orchestra whilst studying conducting. He was Music Director of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra 2008–2015, Principal Conductor of the Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie in Herford, Germany 2006–2009 and Music Director of the Latvian National Opera 2003–2007. In 2020, Nelsons was also the celebrated conductor of the Vienna Philharmonic’s legendary New Year’s Concert.

The 182-year old tradition of the Vienna Philharmonic goes back to 1842, when Otto Nicolai conducted a Grand Concert with all members of the imperial “Hof-Operntheater”. This event was originally called “Philharmonic Academy” and is regarded as the origin of the orchestra. Since its founding, the orchestra has been managed by the administrative committee – a democratically elected body – and works with artistic, organizational and financial autonomy. All decisions are reached on a democratic basis during the general meeting of all members.

Program:

1 Richard Wagner Die Walküre: Der Walkürenritt
2 Richard Wagner Tannhäuser: Dich, Teure Halle, Grüß Ich Wieder
3 Bedřich Smetana The Moldau
4 Bedřich Smetana The Two Widows: Polka
5 Bedřich Smetana The Bartered Bride: Dance Of The Comedians
6–7 Giuseppe Verdi La Forza Del Destino: Overture – Pace, Pace, Mio Dio!
8 Augusta Holmès La Nuit et L’amour
9 Aram Khachaturian Sabre Dance
10 Dmitri Shostakovich Suite For Variety Orchestra: Waltz No. 2

July 5: GRAMMY®-Nominated Neave Trio Announces New Chandos Records Album: Rooted – Featuring the Music of Bedřich Smetana, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Josef Suk, and Frank Martin

GRAMMY®-Nominated Neave Trio Announces
New Chandos Records Album: Rooted

Featuring the Music of Bedřich Smetana,
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Josef Suk, and Frank Martin

Worldwide Release: July 5, 2024

Downloads and CDs available to press on request

“[T]he Neave Trio delivers perceptively characterised interpretations that are by turns individual and blended, supported by a pleasingly warm recording.” – The Strad

www.neavetrio.com | www.chandos.net

The GRAMMY®-nominated Neave Trio (violinist Anna Williams, cellist Mikhail Veselov, and pianist Eri Nakamura), announces its latest album, Rooted, which will be released worldwide on July 5, 2024. The Neave Trio’s sixth album for Chandos Records, Rooted will feature Piano Trio, Op. 15 in G minor (1855, revised 1857) by Bedřich Smetana; Five Negro Melodies from Twenty-four Negro Melodies, Op. 59 No. 1, for Solo Piano (c. 1905) by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor; Petit Trio, Op. 2 in C minor (1889, revised 1890 – 91) by Josef Suk; and Trio sur des mélodies populaires irlandaises (on Popular Irish Melodies) (1925) by Frank Martin.

Rooted follows A Room of Her Own, the Neave Trio’s fifth from Chandos released earlier this year to high praise and wide international acclaim. The Times, which called the recording “a richly rewarding disc,” also included the record in its roundup of ”the best albums of 2024 so far.” The Strad praised the disc’s “illustrious performances,” while Stereophile called the album “a must,” for those wanting to “spread your wings beyond the giant [composers] of the [canon].” Prior to A Room of Her Own, in 2022, the Neave Trio released their album Musical Remembrances, which was nominated for a GRAMMY® in the Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble category.

Rooted features a range of works centered around folk music. Smetana’s distinctive nationalistic style was largely based on the inclusion of bohemian rhythmic and melodic elements, and he was acclaimed in his native Bohemia as the father of Czech music. His Trio in G minor was composed in 1855 as a response to the death of his four-year-old daughter and shows the influence of Liszt. Josef Suk was a favorite pupil of Antonin Dvořák’s, and his early Piano Trio, while shorter in length and less intense than Smetana’s, is embedded in that Czech tradition. Also deeply influenced by Dvořák, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor was inspired by his African heritage, and his Twenty-Four Negro Melodies for Piano was a prime example of his research. He subsequently arranged five of these pieces into the suite for piano trio that we hear on this album. The album concludes with Frank Martin’s Trio from 1925, which is based on several well-known traditional Irish melodies.

Of the new album, the Neave Trio writes:

“We are thrilled to introduce Rooted, our new album featuring trios by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Bedřich Smetana, Joseph Suk, and Frank Martin. Each composer drew deeply from their personal lives and cultural roots, creating musical stories that are both universal and intimate. Working on these pieces has inspired us to reflect on our own stories and how our roots shape us artistically and beyond.

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor's trio reflects his journey of navigating and embracing his dual heritage. Bedřich Smetana's trio is a passionate response to personal tragedy and his deep love for his homeland. Joseph Suk's music is intimately tied to his personal relationships and the broader Romantic tradition. Frank Martin's Trio sur des mélodies populaires irlandaises (on Popular Irish Melodies) captures the essence of Irish melodies, showcasing his fascination with folk music and its timeless appeal.

We would like to dedicate the performance of Martin’s Trio sur des mélodies populaires irlandaises to the memory of Ms. Mary Brosnan and Mr. Brian O’Donovan, two individuals who shared a deep appreciation for Irish music and culture. Their passion and support have profoundly influenced our understanding and interpretation of these melodies, and this dedication is a heartfelt tribute to their enduring legacy.

Through Rooted, we aim to honor the personal stories and emotions that shaped these remarkable compositions. We hope this album allows listeners to connect with the profound human experiences embedded within the music. We all come from somewhere, shaped by our backgrounds, influences and significant experiences. This album seeks to explore and celebrate that very human journey, revealing the unique insights our roots provide.”

Hailed by BBC Music Magazine for its "generous and warm-hearted, utterly beguiling playing, the Neave Trio has emerged as one of the finest young ensembles of its generation. It has been praised by WQXR Radio in New York City, with the station noting the alignment of the trio’s unique name and exemplary musicality: “'Neave' is actually a Gaelic name meaning 'bright' and 'radiant', both of which certainly apply to this trio's music making." The trio is also described by The Strad as having "elegant phrasing and deft control of textures," and praised by The New York Times for its "excellent performances."

Previous albums include Musical Remembrances (Chandos, 2022), which features Rachmaninoff’s Trio élégiaque No. 1, Brahms’ Piano Trio No. 1, Op. 8, and Ravel’s Piano Trio in A minor, Op. 67; the highly celebrated Her Voice (Chandos, 2019), which features the works of women composers ​​Louise Farrenc, Amy Beach, and Rebecca Clarke; French Moments (Chandos, 2018), which includes the only known piano trios by Debussy, Fauré, and Roussel; and Neave’s Chandos debut, American Moments (2016), featuring works by Korngold, Foote, and Bernstein. In 2018, Neave Trio also released its critically acclaimed album, Celebrating Piazzolla (Azica Records, 2018), featuring mezzo-soprano Carla Jablonski.

Formed in 2010, the Neave Trio – currently the inaugural Ensemble-in-Residence at Virginia Commonwealth University for the 2023-24 season – strives to champion new works by living composers, regularly collaborating with artists of all mediums. These collaborations include the premiere of Robert Paterson’s Triple Concerto with the Mostly Modern Orchestra under the direction of JoAnn Falletta; D-Cell: an Exhibition & Durational Performance, conceived and directed by multi-disciplinary visual artist David Michalek; as well as performances with the Blythe Barton Dance Company; with dance collective BodySonnet; with projection designer Ryan Brady; in the interactive concert series “STEIN2.0,” with composer Amanuel Zarzowski; in the premiere of Klee Musings by acclaimed American composer Augusta Read Thomas; in the premiere of Eric Nathan’s Missing Words V, sponsored by Coretet; in Leah Reid’s Cloud Burst for piano trio and electronics; in Dale Trumbore’s Another Chance; and in a music video by filmmaker Amanda Alvarez Díaz of Astor Piazzolla’s "Otoño Porteño.” During the 2024-25 season, the Neave Trio will collaborate with Pigeonwing Dance, composer Robert Sirota, and choreographer Gabrielle Lamb to perform Rising, an evening-length work which meditates not only on rising temperatures and sea levels, but also on humanity’s rising awareness of our connection to and dependence on the Earth’s oceans.

For more information, visit www.neavetrio.com.

Rooted | Neave Trio | Chandos Records
Release Date: July 5, 2024 (Worldwide)
Recorded May 8-10, 2023 at Potton Hall, Dunwich, Suffolk, England

Bedřich Smetana (1824 – 1884): Piano Trio, Op. 15 in G minor (1855, revised 1857) [27:40]

[1] Moderato assai [11:18]
[2] Allegro, ma non agitato [7:36]
[3] Finale. Presto [8:46]

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875 – 1912): Five Negro Melodies for Piano Trio from Twenty-four Negro Melodies, Op. 59 No. 1, for Solo Piano (c. 1905) [15:55]

[4] 1. Sometimes I feel like a motherless child (No. 22) [3:58]
[5] 2. I was way down a-yonder (No. 15) [3:24]
[6] 3. Didn’t my Lord deliver Daniel? (No. 11) [1:24]
[7] 4. They will not lend me a child (No. 4) [4:53]
[8] 5. My Lord delivered Daniel (No. 18) [2:14]

Josef Suk (1874 – 1935): Petit Trio, Op. 2 in C minor for Piano, Violin, and Cello (1889, revised 1890 – 91) [15:54]
Karlu Steckerovi

[9] I Allegro [6:24]
[10] II Andante – Adagio [3:48]
[11] III Vivace [5:41]

Frank Martin (1890 – 1974): Trio sur des mélodies populaires irlandaises (on Popular Irish Melodies) for Piano, Violin, and Cello (1925) [16:13]

[12] Allegro moderato [4:34]
[13] Adagio [5:56]
[14] Gigue. Allegro [5:42]

Total Time: [76:04]

Recording producer: Jonathan Cooper
Sound engineer: Jonathan Cooper
Editor: Jonathan Cooper
Chandos Records Ltd, Colchester, Essex CO2 8HX, England

July 6: Telegraph Quartet Presented by Mohawk Trail Concerts – Performing the Music of Ludwig van Beethoven, Kenji Bunch, and Antonin Dvořák

Photo of the Telegraph Quartet by Lisa Marie Mazzucco available in high resolution here.

Telegraph Quartet Presented by Mohawk Trail Concerts

Performing the Music of
Ludwig van Beethoven, Kenji Bunch, and Antonin Dvořák

Saturday, July 6, 2024 at 5pm
Charlemont Federated Church | 175 Main St. | Charlemont, MA
Tickets and More information

“full of elegance and pinpoint control” – The New York Times

www.TelegraphQuartet.com

Charlemont, MA – On Saturday, July 6, 2024 at 5pm, the San Francisco-based Telegraph Quartet (Eric Chin and Joseph Maile, violins; Pei-Ling Lin, viola; Jeremiah Shaw, cello), a group described by The Strad as having "precise tuning, textural variety and impassioned communication,” will be presented in concert by Mohawk Trail Concerts at Charlemont Federated Church (175 Main St.) performing the music of Ludwig van Beethoven, Kenji Bunch, and Antonin Dvořák.

The Telegraph Quartet formed in 2013 with an equal passion for standard and contemporary chamber music repertoire. Described by the San Francisco Chronicle as, “an incredibly valuable addition to the cultural landscape” and “powerfully adept… with a combination of brilliance and subtlety,” the Telegraph Quartet was awarded the prestigious 2016 Walter W. Naumburg Chamber Music Award and the Grand Prize at the 2014 Fischoff Chamber Music Competition.

For this performance, the award-winning quartet will perform an array of works shaped by a mix of personal relationships, cultural experiences, and stylistic adventurousness. The last of Beethoven’s first six string quartets owes its wit, levity, and exploratory nature to Beethoven’s teacher Josef Haydn, the grandfather of the quartet. Though Beethoven and Haydn often clashed over their styles, later in life, Beethoven would acknowledge his musical debt to Haydn and the evolution of his quartets from their Haydn-esque beginnings. American composer Kenji Bunch’s third string quartet, Apocryphal Dances, is inspired by 17th century French dance music but the 12 minute work is not written with ardent fixation on the style. Bunch’s intent is for a light and lively experience between the performance of the quartet and the listening audience. Shifts in the melody, chord progressions, and rhythmic structure lead the work to reflect qualities of various musical styles. Dvořák crafted his String Quartet No. 14 in A flat-major –– his final chamber piece –– in two stages: starting around March 1895 when he was scheduled to depart the United States to return to his homeland and then revisiting the work in December 1895, after writing his Quartet in G Major. He finished the A flat-major in just under three weeks and the music largely reflects Dvořák’s spiritual temperament during this time, which was one of uplifting positivity and joy.

The Telegraph Quartet’s latest album, 20th Century Vantage Points: Divergent Paths, was released on in 2023 on Azica Records. The first in the Telegraph’s three-album series focused on string quartets of the first half of the 20th century, Divergent Paths explores the bewildering and unbridled creativity of the period through the music of Arnold Schoenberg and Maurice Ravel, whose music on this album weaves threads of great contrast and surprising similarity. The album has been met with critical acclaim, with The New York Times reporting, “[I]n the Schoenberg, they achieve something truly special, meticulously guiding its often wayward progress. At times Schoenberg makes the four strings sound almost orchestral, but the Telegraph players can also make his contrapuntal tangles radiantly clear. Every minute of their account sounds gripping and purposeful, which is one of the highest compliments you can pay the piece.”

More about Telegraph Quartet: The Telegraph Quartet has performed in New York City’s Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, San Francisco’s Herbst Theatre, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music’s Chamber Masters Series, and at festivals including the Chautauqua Institute, Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festival, and the Emilia Romagna Festival. They have collaborated with pianists Leon Fleisher and Simone Dinnerstein; cellists Norman Fischer and Bonnie Hampton; violinist Ian Swensen; composer-vocalist Theo Bleckmann; St. Lawrence Quartet, and the Henschel Quartett. A fervent champion of 20th- and 21st-century repertoire, the Telegraph Quartet has premiered works by John Harbison, Osvaldo Golijov, Robert Sirota, and Richard Festinger. In 2018 the Quartet released its debut album, Into the Light, featuring works by Anton Webern, Benjamin Britten, and Leon Kirchner on the Centaur label. The Telegraph Quartet released its new album, 20th Century Vantage Points: Divergent Paths––which features Ravel’s renowned quartet and Schoenberg’s first quartet––on August 25 via Azica Records.

Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, the Quartet is currently on the chamber music faculty at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music as the Quartet-in-Residence and has given master classes at the SFCM Collegiate and Pre-College Divisions, through the Morrison Artist Series at San Francisco State University, and abroad at the Taipei National University of the Arts, National Taiwan Normal University, and in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Telegraph has also served as artists-in-residence at the Interlochen Adult Chamber Music Camp, SoCal Chamber Music Workshop, and Crowden Music Center Chamber Music Workshop. In November 2020, the Telegraph Quartet launched ChamberFEAST!, a chamber music workshop in Taiwan and in fall 2020, Telegraph launched an online video project called TeleLab, in which the ensemble collectively breaks down the components of a movement from various works for quartet.

For more information, visit www.telegraphquartet.com.

For Calendar Editors:

Concert details:
Who: Telegraph Quartet
Presented by Mohawk Trail Concerts
What: Music by Ludwig van Beethoven, Kenji Bunch, and Antonin Dvořák
When: Saturday, July 6, 2024 at 5:00pm
Where: Charlemont Federated Church, 175 Main St., Charlemont, MA 01339
Tickets and information: www.mohawktrailconcerts.org/2024-season

Description: The award-winning Telegraph Quartet, described by The New York Times as being “full of elegance and pinpoint control,” is presented in concert by Mohawk Trail Concerts on Saturday, July 6, 2024 at 5pm. The Bay Area ensemble will perform a concert program featuring works that are greatly shaped by the composers’ personal experiences and relationships, written from the 19th to the 21st centuries: Ludwig van Beethoven’s String Quartet No. 6 in B-flat Major, Op. 18 No. 6 (1798-1800), Kenji Bunch’s String Quartet No. 3 (2017), and Antonin Dvořák’s String Quartet No. 14 in A-flat Major, Op. 105 B. 193 (1895).\

Short description: The Telegraph Quartet, which is described as “full of elegance and pinpoint control” (The New York Times), is presented in concert by Mohawk Trail Concerts on Saturday, July 6, 2024 at 5pm. The ensemble will perform the music of Ludwig van Beethoven, Kenji Bunch, and Antonin Dvořák.

August 17: Newport Classical Announces Children's Concert Featuring WindSync in Peter and the Wolf

Photo by Carlin Ma available in high resolution here.

Newport Classical Expands Community Concerts Series with Children’s Concert on August 17

WindSync performs Peter and the Wolf

Saturday, August 17, 2024 at 4:00 PM
Newport County YMCA | 792 Valley Rd | Middletown, RI
Free Registration Encouraged

 “revolutionary chamber musicians” – The Houston Chronicle

Newport, RI – Newport Classical is proud to expand its Community Concerts Series, presented by BankNewport, into the month of August with a free Children’s Concert featuring WindSync at the Newport County YMCA on Saturday, August 17 at 4 pm. This new partnership with the Newport County YMCA strengthens Newport Classical’s mission to provide free access to classical music to Aquidneck Island children and families. 

“We are proud to have provided concerts and programming to our Newport community throughout all twelve months of our 2023-24 season,” says Newport Classical Executive Director, Gillian Fox. “We are delighted to partner with the incredible team at the YMCA for this Children’s Concert, continuing our commitment to provide our community with meaningful access to classical music throughout the year.”

Windsync (Garret Hudson, flute; Emily Tsai, oboe; Graeme Steele Johnson, clarinet; Kara LaMoure, bassoon; Anni Hochhalter, horn) will perform Prokofiev's famous Peter and the Wolf for Newport Classical’s inaugural Children’s Concert. With each group of instruments representing a different character, Peter and the Wolf remains a timelessly charming introduction to the orchestra for children of all ages. The free, educational, family-friendly show helps nurture an appreciation for classical music with a concert that brings it to life. Complete with costumes and choreography, this engaging performance introduces the five wind instruments of the orchestra and concludes with an exciting retelling of Peter and the Wolf by Sergei Prokofiev. 

Cori Kilzi, Associate Executive Director of Newport County YMCA, says, “We are excited to join forces with Newport Classical for this Children's Concert on August 17. This partnership provides a wonderful opportunity to spark a passion for music in young audiences, offering memorable experiences that both inspire and educate. We hope you join us for this family friendly event.”

In addition to WindSync’s thrilling retelling of Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf, this fun, casual, afternoon concert is accompanied by on-site activities, including an instrument petting zoo that provides a hands-on opportunity to get up-close and personal with different instruments of the orchestra, local food trucks, and opportunities to sign up for programs through Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library and the YMCA. 

This concert is made possible through the generous support of Randy and Becky Johnson in honor of their granddaughter Schuyler Madison and is presented as part of the BankNewport Community Concerts Series.

About WindSync: 

Versatile and vibrant, the musicians of WindSync “play many idioms authoritatively, elegantly, with adroit technique, and with great fun” (All About the Arts), showing off the uniquely wide-ranging sonorities of the wind quintet. The group’s charismatic and personal performance style, combined with a three-pronged mission of artistry, education, and community-building, lends WindSync its reputation as ”a group of virtuosos who are also wonderful people, too" (Alison Young, Classical MPR).

WindSync launched an international touring career after winning the 2012 Concert Artists Guild Victor Elmaleh Competition and the 2016 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition. WindSync has appeared in concert at Ravinia, the Met Museum, Shanghai Oriental Arts Center, the Library of Congress, and Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall. Building a new repertoire driven by purpose and growing from close collaboration, WindSync’s recent premieres include works by Marc Mellits, Ivan Trevino, Mason Bynes, Nathalie Joachim, and Pulitzer finalist Michael Gilbertson. 

In demand for their ability to embed in communities, WindSync has served in residencies with the Grand Teton Music Festival, Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival, and the Lied Center. Winner of the 2022 Fischoff Ann Divine Educator Award, the ensemble regularly coaches at training programs nationwide, collaborates with youth orchestras, and performs for thousands of young people each year.

On the heels of “All Worlds, All Times,” WindSync’s Billboard chart-topping 2022 release that “will make you want to get up and dance” (The Whole Note), the quintet’s second commercial album, recorded with composer Miguel del Aguila at Abbey Road Studios, releases in 2024.

More about WindSync: https://www.windsync.org/about.html

About Newport Classical: 

Newport Classical is a premier performing arts organization that welcomes people of every age, culture, and background to intimate, immersive musical experiences. The organization presents world-renowned and up-and-coming artistic talents at stunning, storied venues across Newport – an internationally sought-after cultural and recreational destination.

Originally founded in 1969 as Rhode Island Arts Foundation at Newport, Inc. and previously known as Newport Music Festival, Newport Classical has a rich legacy of musical curiosity having presented the American debuts of hundreds of international artists and is most well-known for hosting three weeks of concerts in the summer in the historic mansions throughout Newport and Aquidneck Island. In the 55 years since, Newport Classical has become the most active year-round presenter of music on Aquidneck Island, and an essential pillar of Rhode Island’s cultural landscape, welcoming thousands of patrons all year long.

Newport Classical invests in the future of classical music as a diverse, relevant, and ever-evolving art form through its four core programs – the one-of-a-kind Music Festival; the Chamber Series in the Newport Classical Recital Hall; the free, family-friendly Community Concerts Series; and the Music Education and Engagement Initiative that inspires students in local schools to become the arts advocates and music lovers of tomorrow. These programs illustrate the organization’s ongoing commitment to presenting “timeless music for today.”

In 2021, the organization launched a new commissioning initiative – each year, Newport Classical will commission a new work by a Black, Indigenous, person of color, or woman composer as a commitment to the future of classical music. To date, Newport Classical has commissioned and presented the world premiere of works by Stacy Garrop, Shawn Okpebholo, Curtis Stewart, and Clarice Assad.

For Newport Classical’s complete concert calendar, visit www.newportclassical.org/concerts

July 11: Telegraph Quartet Performs on Morris Museum’s Celebrated Lot of Strings Music Festival – Part of Morris Museum’s Summer Outdoor Concerts on the Back Deck Series

Available in high resolution at: www.jensenartists.com/artists-profiles/telegraph-quartet

Telegraph Quartet Performs on
Morris Museum’s Celebrated Lot of Strings Music Festival

Part of Morris Museum’s
Summer Outdoor Concerts on the Back Deck Series

Thursday, July 11, 2024 at 7:30pm
Morris Museum’s Outdoor Concerts on the Back Deck
6 Normandy Heights Road | Morristown, NJ

Tickets and More information

“soulfulness, tonal beauty and intelligent attention to detail ... an incredibly valuable addition to the cultural landscape.” – San Francisco Chronicle

www.TelegraphQuartet.com

Morristown, NJ – On Thursday, July 11, 2024 at 7:30pm, the San Francisco-based Telegraph Quartet (Eric Chin and Joseph Maile, violins; Pei-Ling Lin, viola; Jeremiah Shaw, cello), a group described by The Strad as having "precise tuning, textural variety and impassioned communication,” returns to the Morris Museum (6 Normandy Heights) to perform on the Museum’s celebrated Lot of Strings Music Festival, part of its annual Outdoor Concerts on the Back Deck series, in music by Ludwig van Beethoven, Kenji Bunch, and Antonin Dvořák. Patrons are invited to bring their chairs and picnics to the Morris Museum’s elevated parking deck, and find out why The New York Times said it made it “Joyous to be in Jersey” as they watch the sunset on the hills of Morris County during the concert. Guests may arrive at 6pm to set up and enjoy their refreshments.

The Telegraph Quartet, which last performed as part of the Lot of Strings Music Festival in 2022, formed in 2013 with an equal passion for standard and contemporary chamber music repertoire. Described by the San Francisco Chronicle as, “an incredibly valuable addition to the cultural landscape” and “powerfully adept… with a combination of brilliance and subtlety,” the Telegraph Quartet was awarded the prestigious 2016 Walter W. Naumburg Chamber Music Award and the Grand Prize at the 2014 Fischoff Chamber Music Competition.

At the Morris Museum, the award-winning quartet will perform an array of works shaped by a mix of personal relationships, cultural experiences, and stylistic adventurousness. The last of Beethoven’s first six string quartets owes its wit, levity, and exploratory nature to Beethoven’s teacher Josef Haydn, the grandfather of the quartet. Though Beethoven and Haydn often clashed over their styles, later in life, Beethoven would acknowledge his musical debt to Haydn and the evolution of his quartets from their Haydn-esque beginnings. American composer Kenji Bunch’s third string quartet, Apocryphal Dances, is inspired by 17th century French dance music but the twelve minute work is not written with ardent fixation on the style. Bunch’s intent is for a light and lively experience between the performance of the quartet and the listening audience. Shifts in the melody, chord progressions, and rhythmic structure lead the work to reflect qualities of various musical styles. Dvořák crafted his String Quartet No. 14 in A flat-major –– his final chamber piece –– in two stages: starting around March 1895 when he was scheduled to depart the United States to return to his homeland and then revisiting the work in December 1895, after writing his Quartet in G Major. He finished the A flat-major in just under three weeks and the music largely reflects Dvořák’s spiritual temperament during this time, which was one of uplifting positivity and joy.

The Telegraph Quartet’s latest album, 20th Century Vantage Points: Divergent Paths, was released in 2023 on Azica Records. The first in the Telegraph’s three-album series focused on string quartets of the first half of the 20th century, Divergent Paths explores the bewildering and unbridled creativity of the period through the music of Arnold Schoenberg and Maurice Ravel, whose music on this album weaves threads of great contrast and surprising similarity. The album has been met with critical acclaim, with The New York Times reporting, “[I]n the Schoenberg, they achieve something truly special, meticulously guiding its often wayward progress. At times Schoenberg makes the four strings sound almost orchestral, but the Telegraph players can also make his contrapuntal tangles radiantly clear. Every minute of their account sounds gripping and purposeful, which is one of the highest compliments you can pay the piece.”

More about Telegraph Quartet: The Telegraph Quartet has performed in New York City’s Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, San Francisco’s Herbst Theatre, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music’s Chamber Masters Series, and at festivals including the Chautauqua Institute, Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festival, and the Emilia Romagna Festival. They have collaborated with pianists Leon Fleisher and Simone Dinnerstein; cellists Norman Fischer and Bonnie Hampton; violinist Ian Swensen; composer-vocalist Theo Bleckmann; St. Lawrence Quartet, and the Henschel Quartett. A fervent champion of 20th- and 21st-century repertoire, the Telegraph Quartet has premiered works by John Harbison, Osvaldo Golijov, Robert Sirota, and Richard Festinger. In 2018 the Quartet released its debut album, Into the Light, featuring works by Anton Webern, Benjamin Britten, and Leon Kirchner on the Centaur label. The Telegraph Quartet released its new album, 20th Century Vantage Points: Divergent Paths––which features Ravel’s renowned quartet and Schoenberg’s first quartet––on August 25 via Azica Records.

Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, the Quartet is currently on the chamber music faculty at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music as the Quartet-in-Residence and has given master classes at the SFCM Collegiate and Pre-College Divisions, through the Morrison Artist Series at San Francisco State University, and abroad at the Taipei National University of the Arts, National Taiwan Normal University, and in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Telegraph has also served as artists-in-residence at the Interlochen Adult Chamber Music Camp, SoCal Chamber Music Workshop, and Crowden Music Center Chamber Music Workshop. In November 2020, the Telegraph Quartet launched ChamberFEAST!, a chamber music workshop in Taiwan and in fall 2020, Telegraph launched an online video project called TeleLab, in which the ensemble collectively breaks down the components of a movement from various works for quartet.

For more information, visit www.telegraphquartet.com.

For Calendar Editors:

Concert details:
Who: Telegraph Quartet
Presented by Morris Museum’s Lot of Strings Music Festival
What: Music by Ludwig van Beethoven, Kenji Bunch, and Antonin Dvořák
When: Thursday, July 11, 2024 at 7:30pm
Where: Outdoors on the Morris Museum’s elevated parking deck, 6 Normandy Heights Road, Morristown, NJ
Tickets and information: morrismuseum.org/telegraph

Description: The award-winning Telegraph Quartet, described by The New York Times as being “full of elegance and pinpoint control,” is presented by the Morris Museum, as part of its Lot of Strings Music Festival and annual Back Deck outdoor concert series, on Thursday, July 11, 2024 at 7:30pm. The Bay Area ensemble will perform an outdoor concert featuring works that are greatly shaped by the composers’ personal experiences and relationships, written from the 19th to the 21st centuries: Ludwig van Beethoven’s String Quartet No. 6 in B-flat Major, Op. 18 No. 6 (1798-1800), Kenji Bunch’s String Quartet No. 3 (2017), and Antonin Dvořák’s String Quartet No. 14 in A-flat Major, Op. 105 B. 193 (1895).

Short description: The Telegraph Quartet, which is described as “full of elegance and pinpoint control” (The New York Times), is presented by the Morris Museum for The Back Deck Series as part of its Lot of Strings Music Festival, on Thursday, July 11, 2024 at 7:30pm. The ensemble will perform the music of Ludwig van Beethoven, Kenji Bunch, and Antonin Dvořák.

July 20: Newport Classical Music Festival Presents World Premiere by Clarice Assad Featuring PUBLIQuartet & Renée Rapier

(clockwise) Clarice Assad, PUBLIQuartet, Renée Rapier. Photo available in high resolution here.

Newport Classical Music Festival Presents the World Premiere of 
Clarice Assad’s Chronicles of Ghosts: “Whispers from the Pirate Queen”
Featuring PUBLIQuartet and Mezzo-Soprano Renée Rapier

Saturday, July 20, 2024 at 8:00 PM
The Breakers | 44 Ochre Point Ave | Newport, RI
Tickets and Information

Plus Composer Talk with Clarice Assad at 11:00 AM
Newport Classical Recital Hall  | 42 Dearborn St | Newport, RI
Free Registration

“a thrilling immediacy to the playing…boldly imaginative” – BBC Music Magazine

Newport, RI – Celebrating its 55th Anniversary, the 2024 Newport Classical Music Festival (July 4-21) presents the world premiere of GRAMMY®-nominated Brazilian-American powerhouse composer Clarice Assad’s “Whispers from the Pirate Queen'' performed by multi-GRAMMY®-nominated PUBLIQuartet and GRAMMY®-winning mezzo-soprano Renée Rapier on Saturday, July 20, 2024 at 8:00pm at The Breakers (44 Ochre Point Ave). The concert also features PUBLIQuartet’s What is American, the intrepid ensemble’s improvisation on Antonin Dvořák’s String Quartet No. 12 in F Major, known as his “American” String Quartet; as well as contemporary works including Jessie Montgomery’s Voodoo Dolls, Fodé Lassana Diabaté’s Sunjata’s Time, Vijay Iyer's Dig the Say, Duke Ellington’s Come Sunday for string quartet and mezzo-soprano, Julia Perry’s Prelude (arr. by Hamilton Berry), and PUBLIQuartet’s MIND | THE | GAP: Wild Women, improvisations on the music of Tina Turner, Betty Davis, Alice Coltrane, and Ida Cox. The performance explores the resonance between contemporary, blues, jazz, free, and rock-inflected music – all of which trace their roots back to the Black and Indigenous music that inspired Dvořák’s “American” String Quartet.

A powerful communicator renowned for her musical scope and versatility, Clarice Assad is a significant artistic voice in the classical, world music, pop, and jazz genres. The composer, celebrated pianist, inventive vocalist, and educator is acclaimed for her evocative colors, rich textures, and diverse stylistic range. With her talent sought after by artists and organizations worldwide, the polyglot musician continues to attract new audiences both onstage and off.

Assad’s new piece “Whispers from the Pirate Queen” was commissioned by Newport Classical. The work is part of Assad’s series Chronicles of Ghosts, which explore the lives of extraordinary but often unsung women throughout history, showcasing their feats and biographical details as recorded in history. “Whispers from the Pirate Queen” dramatizes the imagined bond between two remarkable women transcending time and place: Grace O’Malley, the legendary 16th-century Irish pirate queen, and Anne Hutchinson, the influential Puritan spiritual leader and pioneer of the 17th century, who lived in what is now Rhode Island in the 1630s.

Assad explains, "Through a series of mystical encounters and dreams, Grace O'Malley's spirit reaches across time to guide, inspire, and empower Anne Hutchinson in her journey of courage and resilience. The story weaves together fact and fiction, history and fantasy to create a multi-layered narrative that speaks to the enduring power of female strength, solidarity, and legacy. As Grace O'Malley's whispers echo through the ages, she symbolizes the unbreakable spirit of women who dare to challenge societal norms and fight for their convictions.”

“Whispers from the Pirate Queen” was commissioned by Newport Classical as part of its ongoing initiative, which launched in 2021, to commission a new work by a Black, Indigenous, person of color, or woman composer as a commitment to the future of classical music. In addition to Assad, Newport Classical has commissioned and presented the world premiere of works by Stacy Garrop, Shawn Okpebholo, and Curtis Stewart.

Set against the picturesque backdrop of the City-by-the-Sea, the Newport Classical Music Festival presents 27 concerts held in 11 historic venues over 18 days from July 4-21, featuring a total of 120 musicians from around the world. Patrons can easily craft a Festival itinerary tailored to their preferences – be it the discovery of a new composer, the rhythm of percussion, or revisiting a beloved work with a fresh perspective. For 55 years, Newport Classical has been a beacon for artistry, drawing in countless concertgoers to revel in exceptional performances within unique and intimate settings.

Highlights include Opening Night with the dynamic and inspiring Sphinx Virtuosi and cello soloist Thomas Mesa; the return to Newport of Chanticleer, Canadian Brass, and A Far Cry with special guests Kinan Azmeh and Dinuk Wijeratne; the Music Festival debut of the storied Handel and Haydn Society; two enchanting evenings with Tony Award-winning Broadway star Laura Benanti; plus performances by star pianists Lara Downes, Joyce Yang, Llewellyn Sánchez-Werner, Drew Petersen, and Daniel del Pino; and appearances by numerous celebrated chamber ensembles including the Isidore String Quartet; PUBLIQuartet; Duo Kayo; Lincoln Trio; Poulenc Trio with accordionist Hanzhi Wang; and Sō Percussion with vocalist and Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Caroline Shaw.

About Clarice Assad: www.clariceassad.com

About PUBLIQuartet: www.publiquartet.com

About Renée Rapier: www.reneerapiermezzo.com

About Newport Classical:
Newport Classical is a premier performing arts organization that welcomes people of every age, culture, and background to intimate, immersive musical experiences. The organization presents world-renowned and up-and-coming artistic talents at stunning, storied venues across Newport – an internationally sought-after cultural and recreational destination.

Originally founded in 1969 as Rhode Island Arts Foundation at Newport, Inc. and previously known as Newport Music Festival, Newport Classical has a rich legacy of musical curiosity having presented the American debuts of hundreds of international artists and is most well-known for hosting three weeks of concerts in the summer in the historic mansions throughout Newport and Aquidneck Island. In the 55 years since, Newport Classical has become the most active year-round presenter of music on Aquidneck Island, and an essential pillar of Rhode Island’s cultural landscape, welcoming thousands of patrons all year long.

Newport Classical invests in the future of classical music as a diverse, relevant, and ever-evolving art form through its four core programs – the one-of-a-kind Music Festival; the Chamber Series in the Newport Classical Recital Hall; the free, family-friendly Community Concerts Series; and the Music Education and Engagement Initiative that inspires students in local schools to become the arts advocates and music lovers of tomorrow. These programs illustrate the organization’s ongoing commitment to presenting “timeless music for today.”

In 2021, the organization launched a new commissioning initiative – each year, Newport Classical will commission a new work by a Black, Indigenous, person of color, or woman composer as a commitment to the future of classical music. To date, Newport Classical has commissioned and presented the world premiere of works by Stacy Garrop, Shawn Okpebholo, Curtis Stewart, and Clarice Assad.

For Newport Classical’s complete concert calendar, visit www.newportclassical.org/concerts 

Oct. 4: Sony Classical Announces New Recording by Igor Levit, Christian Thielemann & The Vienna Philharmonic Featuring Brahms’ Two Piano Concertos

Sony Classical Announces the New Recording by
Igor Levit, Christian Thielemann & The Vienna Philharmonic
Brahms’ Two Piano Concertos

“Andante” Piano Concerto No. 2 In B-Flat Major Op. 83
Out Now - Listen Here

The Triple Album Features Levit’s Long-Anticipated Recording Of Brahms’ Late Solo Piano Works And A Special Encore Of Levit And Thielemann Playing A Brahms Waltz Together

Album Release Date: October 4, 2024
Pre-Order Available Now

“Feel-good vibes effervesced, while applause resounded around the stage: that’s amore!” This is how the Viennese newspaper Der Standard described the audience’s enthusiastic reaction after Igor Levit, Christian Thielemann, and the Vienna Philharmonic performed Brahms’ First Piano Concerto at Vienna’s famous Musikverein in April 2024: “During these fifty minutes, an irresistible dose of emotion was conveyed – but at the same time the sophisticated structure of Brahms’ masterpiece remained crystal-clear.” Levit and Thielemann had already performed the Second Piano Concerto with the same orchestra in December 2023; the headline in Die Presse at the time ran: “Igor Levit sets a new gold standard for Brahms.”

These two concertos make up the first joint recording by Levit and Thielemann, which will be released on Sony Classical as a triple album on October 4, 2024 with Levit’s recording of Brahms’s well-known solo works opp. 116–119. Pre-order is available now. Levit’s and Thielemann’s first meeting was quite unplanned, although both had been curious about each other for a long time. In 2015, Levit spontaneously stepped in for a colleague who had fallen ill and performed Mozart’s C major Concerto K 467 with Thielemann and the Staatskapelle Dresden in Munich. Despite an extremely short rehearsal period, the two hit it off straight away: “We have such a similar way of thinking that it is not necessary to discuss many things,” says Thielemann. And Levit adds: “When the piece begins, I simply have complete confidence in you. I know I can’t take a wrong turn. Having such unconditional trust is extraordinary.”

The two do not have to discuss individual passages – a common understanding is attained without the need for words, simply through listening and responding. Instead, they prefer to talk about performers and composers. And they are always amazed to discover how similarly they perceive so many things. Sometime after their initial meeting, it was during a walk together near Berlin that the conversation turned to Brahms – and thus they conceived the plan to record the two piano concertos as part of an upcoming Brahms cycle with Thielemann and the Vienna Philharmonic. “I’ve known the Wiener Philharmoniker for thirty-five years,” says Thielemann, and adds: “I’ve always been fascinated by how this orchestra can react to conductors and assimilate even the smallest details. And then there is the concert hall, the Wiener Musikverein, with its acoustic properties that Brahms knew so well.” “And what a sound!” Levit exclaims. “I was sitting in the first rehearsal and the horn began to play. You do not really want to start playing, but rather to say to the hornist: Can you please play that again? It was so beautiful.”

For Levit the addition of Brahms’ beloved solo works opp. 116–119 on the album just felt right. Levit says: “Brahms’ music cannot leave you untouched. It’s just physically and emotionally not possible. Take op. 118 no. 2, for example, it’s like an arrow shot straight into your heart. It’s simply the most beautiful, touching, and tender music imaginable.”

The album concludes with a special encore – the four-hand rendition of Brahms’ charming Waltz op. 39 no. 15 played by Levit and Thielemann. Levit explains: “It’s taken me some years to get to the point of having the courage to play and record this music, and Christian Thielemann has been instrumental in getting me here. Unlike Beethoven’s music, where you go emotionally from peak to bottom almost continuously, here Brahms is often the steadiest of music, with very long breaths and a steady heartbeat. Now that I feel right, placed with this music, you couldn’t find me happier than I am right now.”

TRACKLIST:

Johannes Brahms

Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor Op. 15
Piano Concerto No. 2 in B-flat major Op. 83

• Igor Levit, Christian Thielemann & the Vienna Philharmonic

7 Fantasias Op. 116  
3 Intermezzi Op. 117
6 Piano Pieces Op. 118
4 Piano Pieces Op. 119
Waltz op. 39 no. 15 (version for piano 4-hands with Christian Thielemann)

• Igor Levit

Sony Music Masterworks comprises Masterworks, Sony Classical, Milan Records, XXIM Records, and Masterworks Broadway imprints. For email updates and information please visit www.sonymusicmasterworks.com/.

Connect With Igor Levit
Website | Instagram | YouTube

Aug. 30: Sony Classical Presents Paul Robeson Voice of Freedom – The Complete Columbia, RCA, HMV, and Victor Recordings

© Johanna Berghorn/Sony Classical

Sony Classical Presents
Paul Robeson - Voice of Freedom

The Complete Columbia, RCA, HMV, and Victor Recordings

Album Release Date: August 30, 2024
Reviewer Rate: $55.16 + shipping/handling fees
Pre-Order Available Now

Paul Robeson—African-American bass-baritone, stage and film actor, All-American football player, lawyer, and advocate for civil rights—was outspoken against racism, colonialism, and social injustice. Rutgers graduate, scholar of world cultures, and speaker of more than 20 languages, he worked tirelessly to break down political and racial barriers, and to build bridges between the peoples of this world. However, with the advent of the Cold War and the Red Scare following World War II, the political climate changed. Doors began to close for Robeson as concert halls and radio stations shut him out. In July 1950, the US State Department revoked the blacklisted artist’s passport thus preventing him from pursuing his successful international career as a singer and actor. But international audiences continued to honor and call out for him, and he found technologically advanced and effective ways to reach his communities all over the world.

Today, his remarkable voice and unrivaled stage presence live on in sound recordings and films. This 14-CD edition on Sony Classical, is the first ever release of his complete Columbia, HMV and Victor recordings from 1925 to 1947. All of his American recordings have been meticulously restored from the original master discs and tapes, and 25 studio recordings—as well as his complete historic New York and London recitals from 1958—are presented here for the first time on CD. The richly illustrated 160-page book, with essays by Shana L. Redmond and Susan Robeson, pays tribute to a cultural icon of the 20th century.

• Blacklisted and erased from American history, many of Robeson’s recordings in the U.S. remained unreleased – until now

• Special 14-CD edition, documenting his complete major-label discography, recorded 1925–1947

• First release of Robeson’s groundbreaking Victor recordings on CD, 16 recordings reissued for the first time, 5 previously unreleased

• First restoration of Robeson’s famous 1944 Othello stage production with Uta Hagen and José Ferrer from the original 33 master disc sides

• His complete remastered Columbia albums (Songs of Free Men, Popular Favorites, Spirituals)

• First release of his historic 1958 recitals at Mother A.M.E. Zion Church, New York, and Royal Albert Hall, with 30 previously unissued recordings

• Richly illustrated 160-page book with essays by Shana L. Redmond and Susan Robeson, a wealth of photos and facsimiles from the archives of The Paul Robeson Trust, the Academy of the  Arts, Berlin, and Columbia Records, plus complete discographical notes

Paul Leroy Robeson (April 9, 1898 – January 23, 1976) was an American bass baritone concert artist and stage and film actor who became famous both for his work as singer and actor and for his political activism.

Robeson attended Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J., where he was an All-American football player. Upon graduating from Rutgers at the head of his class, he rejected a career as a professional athlete and instead entered Columbia University. He obtained a law degree in 1923, but, because of the lack of opportunity for blacks in the legal profession, he drifted to the stage, making a London debut in 1922. He joined the Provincetown Players, a New York theatre group that included playwright Eugene O’Neill, and appeared in O’Neill’s play All God’s Chillun Got Wings in 1924. His subsequent appearance in the title role of O’Neill’s The Emperor Jones caused a sensation in New York City (1924) and London (1925). He also starred in the film version of the play (1933).

In addition to his other talents, Robeson had a superb bass-baritone singing voice and studied more than 20 languages. In 1925 he gave his first vocal recital of African American spirituals in Greenwich Village, New York City, and he became world famous as Joe in the musical play Show Boat with his version of “Ol’ Man River.” His characterization of the title role in Othello in London (1930) won high praise, as did the Broadway production (1943), which set an all-time record run for a Shakespearean play on Broadway.

Robeson’s recorded repertoire spanned many styles, including Americana, popular standards, classical music, European folk songs, political songs, poetry and spoken excerpts from plays.

Returning to the United States in 1939, during World War II Robeson supported the American and Allied war efforts. However, his history of supporting civil rights causes and pro-Soviet policies brought scrutiny from the FBI.

In 1949, a concert, organized as a benefit for the Civil Rights Congress, was scheduled to take place on August 27 in Lakeland Acres, just north of Peekskill, New York. Before Robeson arrived, a mob of locals attacked concertgoers with baseball bats and rocks. The local police arrived hours later and did little to intervene. Thirteen people were seriously injured, Robeson was lynched in effigy and a cross seen burning on an adjacent hillside. The concert was then postponed until September 4. Following the concert, request for Klan memberships from the Peekskill area numbered 748 persons.

Paul Robeson moved to Harlem and from 1950 to 1955 published a periodical called Freedom which was critical of United States policies.

In the McCarthy era, Robeson's passport was revoked, his records disappeared from stores, his name was blacklisted, which equated to a ban on performing in the United States. International committees were formed demanding freedom for Robeson to travel, particularly in Britain. In May 1957, members of the British House of Commons organized a "transnational" concert by telephone in London's St. Pancras Town Hall. He was only allowed to leave the U.S.A. again in 1958 as a result of a 1958 United States Supreme Court decision.

In the early 1960s he retired and lived the remaining years of his life privately in Philadelphia.

Robeson became the main mentor to the young Harry Belafonte, who became one of the most popular black entertainment stars of the early 1950s, but also a protagonist of the African American civil rights movement. Belafonte referred to Robeson both artistically and politically.

SET CONTENTS

DISC 1: THE EARLY VICTOR AND RCA RECORDINGS 1925–1940

Spirituals · Ol’ Man River · Ballad for Americans
16 recordings restored for the first time from the original masters, 5 recordings previously unreleased, all others newly remastered

DISCs 2–8: THE HMV RECORDINGS 1928–1939

DISC 9: THE COLUMBIA MASTERWORKS RECORDINGS 1942/1947

Songs of Free Men · Popular · Favorites · Joe Louis Blues
All recordings newly remastered · 1 recording previously unreleased

DISC 10: THE COLUMBIA MASTERWORKS RECORDINGS 1945/1947

Go Down, Moses · Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, and 22 more spirituals
All recordings newly remastered

DISC 11: LIVE IN NEW YORK, JUNE 1, 1958

Spirituals · Arias · Folk Songs · Ode to Joy

First restoration of the historic recital at Mother A.M.E. Zion Church
14 recordings previously unreleased

DISC 12: LIVE IN LONDON, AUGUST 10, 1958

First restoration of Robeson’s return to Royal Albert Hall
16 recordings previously unreleased

DISCs 13/14: SHAKESPEARE: OTHELLO (1944)

Columbia Masterworks’ first album of an entire stage production, restored from the original 33 disc sides

June 21: ECM New Series Releases Delian Quartett's New Album Im wachen Traume

ECM New Series Releases

Delian Quartett
Im wachen Traume

Schumann / Reimann, Byrd / Pierini, Purcell 

Delian Quartett
Adrian Pinzaru, violin; Andreas Moscho, violin; Lara Albesano, viola; Hendrik Blumenroth violoncello 

Claudia Barainsky, soprano
Mikhail Timoshenko, baritone

Matthias Lingenfelder, viola
Andreas Arndt, violoncello

ECM New Series 2743
CD: 0289 4875875 3
Release Date: June 21, 2024

Press downloads available upon request.

Named after a lyric from the first piece in Schumann’s Frauenliebe und Leben song cycle, the Delian Quartett’s programme of Im wachen Traume combines said cycle – in a new arrangement for soprano and string quartet by the late Aribert Reimann – with music by Renaissance composer William Byrd and Baroque composer Henry Purcell. Most of the works appears in world premiere recordings here. The earlier English repertory bookends the album, framing Frauenliebe und Leben in a thematic embrace and, as the quartet’s violinist Andreas Moscho puts it, “in dazzling harmonies, that colour the musical span from the bliss of the moment to the end of things”.

Much has been said about Frauenliebe und Leben, from 1840 based on the poetry cycle by Adelbert von Chamisso, and many interpretations and versions of it uttered. This remodelling, however, conceived specifically for the Delian Quartett and soprano Claudia Barainsky, opens up truly new perspectives that seem to have been lying dormant within the original score all along. By transferring the piano part to four voices, Reimann dresses the cycle in an entirely new guise – one that builds on the sustained quality of the strings and utilizes both the art of reduction, to a concentrated and minimalist end, and embellishment, in form of vibratos, pizzicati and harmonic flourishes, for the purpose of emotional emphasis of both music and lyrics.

“Music and poetry have ever been acknowledg’d Sisters, which walking hand in hand, support each other; As Poetry is the harmony of Words, so Musick is that of Notes; and as Poetry is a Rise above Prose and Oratory, so is Musick the exaltation of Poetry. Both of them may excel apart, but sure they are most excellent when they are join’d…” Henry Purcell wrote this in 1650 – in a way, predicting the significant role poetry would play in Romantic music almost two centuries later.

Claudia Barainsky, one of the foremost interpreters of Reimann’s music, is a striking presence throughout the programme and especially expressive in the Schumann cycle, delivering the story of an enamoured woman, from her first meeting with her love, through marriage, to his death and after, with conviction and a keen sense for the text’s emotional delivery. The piano’s uniquely independent voice-leading from the original score is expanded upon in this arrangement for string quartet, with inspired translation choices made regarding range, drone-passages and how repetitive piano motifs here are cleverly spread across the two violins, viola and cello. 

Andreas Moscho introduces the project in his performer’s note: “Two powers continue to overcome the changes of our fast-paced world. They have inspired human existence since forever: death, which limits us, and love, which carries us beyond our end. They also echo in the history of music. Under their influence, composers of all eras have bequeathed us with their most stirring moments. Some of them are brought together on his album. It traverses the space between light and shadow, between sorrow and joy, laying out new paths along the way: None of the works selected here were originally conceived for string quartet. In all of them, however, the string quartet seems to return home.”

All Byrd and Purcell pieces appear in arrangements by Italian composer Stefano Pierini, except for the Purcell instrumentals, “Pavane” and “Chaconne”, which are rendered in their original shape. More than mere reiterations, these Renaissance and Baroque reinterpretations inspire spirited performances by the quartet and soprano. Joining the ensemble on Byrd’s “Lullaby, my sweet little baby” and the programme-concluding Purcell piece “Hear my prayer, O Lord” is baritone Mikhail Timoshenko. Additional viola and violoncello parts on the last piece are contributed by Matthias Lingenfelder and Andreas Arndt.

As with Schumann, the synergy of poem and music comes to play here as well, in Byrd’s “Jhon come kiss me now”, which, in the version of Pierini, is based on the 1792 poem by Scottish lyricist Robert Burns. Word and song are entwined throughout Im wachen Traume, and the Delian Quartett’s impassioned performances together with Claudia Barainsky confirm Purcell when he suggests that they are indeed “most excellent when they are join’d”. 

*

Since its inception in 2007 the Delian Quartett has gained widespread international attention, performing on major stages and festivals in Europe and alongside various important figures in the classical world. The German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung has praised the quartet’s “wonderful sonority and striking plasticity of structures”. Previous recordings, among them performances of Schumann and Haydn, have been met with acclaim and garnered award nominations. One of the Delian Quartett’s main emphases is the expansion of its repertory to include the works of contemporary composers, such as Alberto Colla, Per Arne Glorvigen, Gabriel Iranyi, Christian Jost, Uljas Pulkkis and the in this album included Stefano Pierini and Aribert Reimann. Most of them have written music specifically for the ensemble.

The late German pianist and composer Aribert Reimann (4 March 1936 – 13 March 2024), known especially for his literary operas, was specialized in the contemporary Lied (art song) – he was a professor of the contemporary Lied in Hamburg and Berlin. Among his most well-known works are the operas Ein Traumspiel, Lear (based on Shakespeare’s play) and Medea. As recounted in this album’s liner note, Reimann conceived his arrangement of Schumann’s Frauenliebe und Leben after having dreamt about a version of the cycle performed by strings. This was in 2018 – he completed the score within two months of the dream.

Claudia Barainsky studied at the Hochschule der Künste in her home city of Berlin with Ingrid Figur, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Aribert Reimann and is internationally regarded as one of the most versatile singers of her time due to her wide-ranging repertory. She made her debut with the title role in Aribert Reimann's Melusine and was awarded the German Theater Prize "DER FAUST" for her outstanding interpretation and portrayal of the title role in Aribert Reimann's German premiere of Medea at the Frankfurt Opera. Barainsky has worked with some of the world’s leading orchestras and conductors – chamber music being her speciality. 

July 10-31: California Symphony Presents Fresh Look – The Symphony Exposed

July 10-31: California Symphony Presents Fresh Look – The Symphony Exposed

Four Wednesday Evening Classes from July 10-31, 2024, 6:30-8pm
Hosted by Award-Winning Instructor Scott Foglesong

Don Tatzin Community Hall at Lafayette Library 
3491 Mt. Diablo Blvd. | Lafayette, CA
Registration $30 for 4 Classes: www.californiasymphony.org/fresh-look 

“the most forward-looking organization around” –Mercury News

www.californiasymphony.org 

WALNUT CREEK, CA –  California Symphony presents Fresh Look: The Symphony Exposed this July, expanding access to music education and offering a fun and informative introduction to classical music for “classically curious” adults in the Bay Area. Hosted by award-winning instructor Scott Foglesong, the four-part summer lecture series will be held on Wednesdays, July 10, 17, 24, and 31, 2024 from 6:30-8pm at Lafayette Library and Learning Center Foundation (3491 Mt. Diablo Blvd., Lafayette, CA). Fresh Look provides an introduction to classical music and the rich offerings of California Symphony, making classical music and the orchestra accessible to a broader audience.

Previous participants of the program have described the course as “most enjoyable, very accessible to all, and PACKED with good info and good listening!” and called Scott Foglesong “knowledgeable and enthusiastic” with a “sense of humor and breadth of knowledge.” Scott Foglesong has been lecturing about music since 2011, first as a Professor of Music for the University of San Francisco’s Fromm Institute, followed by posts at the University of California, Berkeley, and, most recently, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. He has also served as pre-concert lecturer for the San Francisco Symphony, the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, and California Symphony.

The Fresh Look curriculum – which was developed by Scott Foglesong, California Symphony Music and Artistic Director Donato Cabrera, and General Manager Sunshine Deffner – explores the instruments of the orchestra, different musical periods and styles — including one class that focuses almost exclusively on Beethoven — and the state of classical music today. As a special end-of-course treat, the final class includes a live performance and Q&A with California Symphony musicians.

Since its initial launch in partnership with the Walnut Creek Library in 2018, the course has developed steady participation and interest among the Walnut Creek community. With a target of 25 participants, the 2018 pilot series attracted 63 individuals. In 2019, the course attracted 105 attendees – a 67% increase over the pilot year. The third course, offered in July 2020, was presented entirely online due to COVID, and it attracted 300 participants. The most recent in-person class in summer 2023 reached venue capacity with 160 people enjoying the course.

Fresh Look is a prime example of California Symphony’s dedication to strengthening music education and access within their local community. Of the Symphony’s many nationally recognized education and community programs – including their acclaimed Young American Composer-in-Residence program, the nationally recognized Sound Minds program for underserved local students, and new Education Concerts initiative – California Symphony is committed to providing diverse programming that provides an accessible entry point to top-tier classical music for all age groups and education levels.

The fee for Fresh Look: The Symphony Exposed is $30 for the entire course, which can be redeemed toward the purchase of any adult-price California Symphony ticket for a 2024-25 season concert. California Symphony also offers an online version of the series for year-round on-demand viewing.

About Scott Foglesong: Scott Foglesong is a pianist, musician, teacher, writer, cat-lover, music history devotée, occasional computer geek and sometime programmer. He has been on the faculty of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music since 1978; nowadays he serves as a department chair in addition to enjoying the honor of educating some of today's most promising young musicians. In 2008 he was named recipient of the Sarlo Family Foundation Award for excellence in teaching. He has taught Music 27 (Introduction to Music) for the Fall Freshman program at UC Berkeley since 1991, is associated with the San Francisco Symphony, both as a Contributing Writer and as an "Inside Music" lecturer for the Symphony's weekly subscription concerts, and is Program Annotator for the California Symphony, after formerly serving in the same capacity for the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, New Hampshire Music Festival, and Las Vegas Philharmonic Orchestra. Professor Foglesong was formally educated at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore and the San Francisco Conservatory, but his informal education continues everywhere, without cease.

About California Symphony: Founded in 1986, California Symphony has been led by Donato Cabrera since 2013. It is distinguished by its vibrant concert programs that span the breadth of orchestral repertoire, including works by American composers and by living composers. Its concert season at the Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek, California serves a growing number of music lovers from across the Bay Area. California Symphony believes that the concert experience should be fun and inviting, and its mission is to create a welcoming, engaging, and inclusive environment for the entire community. Through this commitment to community, imaginative programming, and its support of emerging composers, California Symphony is a leader among orchestras in California and a model for regional orchestras everywhere. 

June 14: ECM New Series Releases Pianist Anna Gourari's Recording of Hindemith and Schnittke

ECM New Series Releases

Paul Hindemith | Alfred Schnittke

Anna Gourari, Piano
Orchestra Della Svizerra Italiana
Markus Poschner, Conductor

ECM New Series 2752
CD: 0289 4875453 3
Release Date: June 14, 2024

Press downloads available upon request.

After three acclaimed solo piano programmes for the label, here Anna Gourari widens the instrumental spectrum with the Lugano-based Orchestra Della Svizzera Italiana under Markus Poschner’s direction in striking performances of Alfred Schnittke’s Concerto for Piano and String Orchestra and Paul Hindemith’s The Four Temperaments.

Gourari’s pianistic command is one of “virtuoso polish and with flawless action,” to quote the German daily Süddeutsche Zeitung, and her holistic, wide-reaching grasp of the instrument is on full display in Schnittke’s shape-bending polystylistic concerto. The orchestra furthermore shines in a powerful interpretation of Hindemith’s Symphony Mathis der Maler. 

Contrasts emerge not only through the juxtaposition of the three works but from within the pieces, which have fiery temperaments and technically demanding scores in common.

Recorded at the Auditorio Stelio Molo in Lugano in December 2021, the album was produced by Manfred Eicher.

July 26: Tina Davidson's New Album Barefoot featuring Jasper String Quartet and Natalie Zhu out on New Focus Recordings

Composer Tina Davidson Announces New Album Barefoot
Featuring the Jasper String Quartet and Pianist Natalie Zhu

“vivid ear for harmony and colors” – The New York Times

Release Date: July 26, 2024
New Focus Recordings

CDs or press downloads available upon request.

www.tinadavidson.com | www.newfocusrecordings.com | www.jasperquartet.com

Composer Tina Davidson will release her next album, Barefoot, on July 26, 2024 on New Focus Recordings. Davidson is a highly regarded American composer who creates music that stands out for its emotional depth and lyrical dignity. Lauded for her authentic voice, The New York Times has praised her “vivid ear for harmony and colors.” Opera News describes her music as "transfigured beauty.” Tina Davidson has been commissioned and performed by leading ensembles and artists including the National Symphony Orchestra, The Philadelphia Orchestra, American Composers Orchestra, OperaDelaware, VocalEssence, Kronos Quartet, Cassatt Quartet, and GRAMMY® Award-winner Hilary Hahn. Barefoot features a selection of her chamber music performed by the Jasper String Quartet (violinists J Freivogel and Karen Kim, violist Andrew Gonzalez, and cellist Rachel Henderson Freivogel) and pianist Natalie Zhu.

The new album highlights five of Davidson’s chamber music pieces for varying combinations of strings and piano, composed over the past decade, including Tremble (2013) for violin, cello and piano; the title track Barefoot (2011) for violin, cello, viola, and piano; Wēpan (2014) for string quartet and piano; Hush (2017) for violin and piano; and Leap (2021) for violin, cello, viola, and piano.

All of the works are deeply personal for Davidson. She explains in her note for the album:

I am a composer who writes about where I am at that moment. For years I composed about a sense of connectedness to something larger than myself. But in this decade of life, I find myself returning to quieter issues. I have softened and come home to myself.

The works on this album are about personal thoughts and feelings. Barefoot is that urge to be outside and have contact with the earth; the urge to dance and turn and spin before God. Tremble is the sense of excitement, fear or love—the thing that causes the body to resonate in anticipation. Leap, written during the Covid pandemic, is where I found myself when I was pushed off the edge by circumstance. Hush is the remembrance of soothing a child. “Hush,” I say, “Hush, hush.”

Wēpan is just weeping; endless weeping. 

I am, I suppose, always looking to understand myself. I pry into these words, digging deeper into what it is for me to tremble, weep or leap – how I see myself, now, as I move forward.

Barefoot follows the publication last year of Davidson’s memoir Let Your Heart Be Broken (Boyle & Dalton), which was praised in The Marginalian as “a consummate read in its entirety,” written with “uncommon sensitivity and poetic insight.” Let Your Heart Be Broken traces Davidson’s extraordinary life in equally lyrical language, juxtaposing memories, journal entries, notes on compositions in progress, and insights into the life of an artist – and a mother – at work. VAN Magazine calls the book, "an unequivocally poetic memoir on love, loss, and music." Review copies of Davidson’s memoir are available upon request.

About Tina Davidson: Over her forty-five-year career, Tina Davidson has been commissioned by well-known ensembles such as National Symphony Orchestra, OperaDelaware, Roanoke Symphony, VocalEssence, Kronos Quartet, Cassatt Quartet, and public television (WHYY-TV). Her music has been widely performed by many orchestras and ensembles, including The Philadelphia Orchestra, American Composers Orchestra, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Relâche Ensemble, and Orchestra 2001. Davidson was commissioned by GRAMMY® Award-winning violinist Hilary Hahn as part of her 27 Encores project. The work, Blue Curve of the Earth, was released on Deutsche Grammophon in 2013, and again in 2018 on Hahn’s new album, Retrospective.

Long-term residencies play a major role in Davidson’s career. As composer-in-residence with the Fleisher Art Memorial (1998-2001), she was commissioned to write for the Cassatt Quartet, Voces Novae et Antiquae, and members of the Philadelphia Orchestra. She also created the city-wide Young Composers program to teach inner city children how to write music through instrument building, improvisation, and graphic notation. She was composer-in-residence as part of the innovative Meet The Composer “New Residencies” with OperaDelaware, the Newark Symphony and the YWCA in Delaware (1994-97). During this residency, she wrote the critically acclaimed full-length opera, Billy and Zelda, as well as created community partner programs for homeless women, and with students at a local elementary school.

 The recipient of numerous prestigious grants and fellowships, Davidson was the first classical composer to receive a $50,000 Pew Fellowship. She has been awarded four Artist’s Fellowships from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, CAP grants from the American Music Center and numerous Meet the Composer grants. Her work, Transparent Victims, was selected by the American Public Radio as part of the International Rostrum of Composers, held at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris.

Born in Stockholm, Sweden, Tina Davidson grew up in Oneonta, NY and Pittsburgh, PA. She received her BA in piano and composition from Bennington College in 1976 where she studied with Henry Brant, Louis Calabro, Vivian Fine and Lionel Nowak. She currently lives in Lancaster PA.

About the Jasper String Quartet: Celebrated as one of the preeminent American string quartets of the twenty-first century, the prizewinning Jasper String Quartet (J Freivogel and Karen Kim, violins; Andrew Gonzalez, viola; Rachel Henderson Freivogel, cello) is hailed as being “flawless in ensemble and intonation, expressively assured and beautifully balanced” (Gramophone). The Quartet is highly regarded for its “programming savvy” (Cleveland Classical) which strives to evocatively connect the music of underrepresented and living composers to the canonical repertoire through thoughtful programs that appeal to a wide variety of audiences.

A recipient of Chamber Music America’s prestigious Cleveland Quartet Award (2012), the Quartet’s playing has been described as “sonically delightful and expressively compelling” (The Strad). The ensemble has released eight albums, including its most recent release, Insects and Machines: Quartets of Vivian Fung (2023) which Strings Magazine praised as being “intensely dramatic throughout demonstrating both their advocacy of new music and their transcendent mastery.” The Quartet’s 2017 release, Unbound, was named by The New York Times as one of the year’s 25 Best Classical Recordings.

The Quartet regularly collaborates with some of today’s leading artists, including tenor Nicholas Phan, clarinetist Derek Bermel, pianists Amy Yang, Natalie Zhu and Myra Huang, and the Jupiter String Quartet. Collaborations and commissions with living composers include Lera Auerbach, Derek Bermel, Patrick Castillo, Vivian Fung, Brittany J. Green, Aaron Jay Kernis, Akira Nishimura, Reinaldo Moya, Michelle Ross, Caroline Shaw and Joan Tower.

The Jasper String Quartet is named after Jasper National Park in Alberta, Canada and is represented by Suòno Artist Management.

About Natalie Zhu: Known for captivating interpretations of a wide repertoire, pianist Natalie Zhu is the recipient of the Avery Fisher Career Grant, Musical Fund Society Advancement Award, the Andrew Wolf Memorial Chamber Music Award, and Astral Artists Award. The Philadelphia Inquirer heralded Zhu in recital as a display of “emotional and pianistic pyrotechnics”. Selections from her live performances are frequently broadcasted on Performance Today.

Natalie Zhu has performed throughout North America, Europe, and Asia as a soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician. She has given solo recitals at the Carnegie Hall in New York City, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Seattle Chamber Music Society, New York’s Steinway Hall and Merkin Hall, Portland Piano Festival in Oregon, Munich’s Herkulessaal in Germany and Beijing and Shanghai Concert Hall in China. Zhu has performed with the Daedalus, Dover, Miami, Vermeer Quartets, and collaborated with members of the Guarneri, Orion, Mendelssohn, Ying Quartets, as well as the Beaux Arts Trio and Time for Three. She has been a touring recital partner with renowned violinist Hilary Hahn, including recording Mozart’s Violin Sonatas for Deutsche Grammophon. In 2023,  Ms. Zhu recorded with cellist Clancy Newman on the Albany album “From Method to Madness: American Sound.”

As an active chamber musician, she has appeared in Marlboro Music Festival, Tanglewood Music Festival, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Curtis-On-Tour, Seattle Chamber Music Society, Maestro Foundation Concert Series, Skaneateles Festival, Amelia Island Chamber Music Festival, Bay Chamber Concerts, Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival, Chicago Chamber Musicians. Since 2009, she has been the artistic director of the Kingston Chamber Music Festival in Rhode Island. 

Natalie Zhu began her piano studies with Xiao-Cheng Liu at the age of six in her native China and made her first public appearance at age nine in Beijing. At eleven she emigrated with her family to Los Angeles, and studied with Robert Turner and Ming-Qiang Li. By age fifteen she was enrolled at the Curtis Institute of Music where she received the prestigious Rachmaninoff Award and studied with Gary Graffman. She received both a Master of Music degree and Artist Diploma from the Yale School of Music where she studied with the late Claude Frank. Natalie Zhu lives in the Philadelphia suburbs with her husband and daughter. 

Track List:

Barefoot
Music by Tina Davidson

The Jasper String Quartet | Natalie Zhu, Piano
New Focus Recordings | Release Date: July 26, 2024

1. Tremble (2013) for violin, cello and piano [9:49]
J Freivogel, violin; Rachel Henderson Freivogel; cello; Natalie Zhu, piano

2. Barefoot (2011) for violin, cello, viola and piano [10:13]
J Freivogel, violin; Andrew Gonzalez, viola; Rachel Henderson Freivogel; cello; Natalie Zhu, piano 

3. Wēpan (2014) for string quartet and piano [9:16]  
J Freivogel, violin; Karen Kim, violin; Andrew Gonzalez, viola; Rachel Henderson Freivogel; cello; Natalie Zhu, piano

4. Hush (2017) for violin and piano [9:18]
J Freivogel, violin; Natalie Zhu, piano 

Leap (2021) for violin, cello, viola and piano
5. I.  Uncertain Ground [5:16]
6. II. Sudden Passage [5:51]
J Freivogel, violin; Andrew Gonzalez, viola; Rachel Henderson Freivogel; cello; Natalie Zhu, piano

Total: 50:13 

Recorded at Gore recital Hall, University of Delaware, September 16-17, 2023
Recording Producer & Engineer: Andreas K. Meyer
Assistant Engineer: Ben Hadley
Post Production & Mastering at Swan Studios, NYC (www.swanstudios.nyc) 

Photo credits:
Tina Davidson © Nora Stultz
Jasper String Quartet  © Lisa-Marie Mazzucco
Natalie Zhu by Joie Elie Photography 

Art for Cover: Tina Davidson, tinadavidson.com
Cover Design: Shane Keaney, shanekeaney.com
Layout & typography: Marc Wolf, marcjwolf.com

Commissions: Leap was commissioned by The Nioka Trust.

June 12: John Malkovich & Aleksey Igudesman in The Music Critic at The Symphony - North American Orchestra Premiere with the Oregon Symphony in Portland

John Malkovich in The Music Critic at The Symphony
Written, conceived, and conducted by Aleksey Igudesman

North American Premiere with the Oregon Symphony on June 12 

Wednesday, June 12, 2024 at 7:30pm
Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall | 1037 SW Broadway | Portland, OR
Tickets & Information 

More information: www.themusiccritic.com

John Malkovich stars in The Music Critic at the Symphony – a show in which classical music, theater, and comedy collide – written, conceived, and conducted by Aleksey Igudesman, with the Oregon Symphony on Wednesday, June 12, 2024 at 7:30pm at Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall (1037 SW Broadway). This performance follows their highly successful cross-country U.S. tour of The Music Critic for chamber ensemble, and marks the first time the duo will perform the show with an orchestra in North America.

In The Music Critic, writer and composer Aleksey Igudesman fuses the sardonic and straight-faced humor for which legendary actor John Malkovich is renowned with his own slapstick and out-of-the-box zaniness. Equipped with a frivolous potpourri of musical insults, Malkovich slips into the role of the evil critic who believes the music of Beethoven, Debussy, Brahms, Ravel and the like to be weary and dreary. Aleksey Igudesman and the Oregon Symphony beg to differ and fight back, determined to avenge some of the most brilliant pieces of music which were railed and reviled by critics at their premieres, in this evening-length show.

As the Music Critic, John Malkovich batters, insults, and laughs at the music of composers like Rachmaninoff, Schumann, Dvořák and more, whose works premiered to jeers and negative press for performers and composers alike. Malkovich even attempts to take over the conductor‘s baton, claiming that conducting is a profession for charlatans. The fun doesn‘t end there, as the audience then experiences The Malkovich Torment, a piece that Igudesman wrote based on a truly horrific review – of none other than John Malkovich himself.

John Malkovich says, “I have always loved the opportunity to collaborate on The Music Critic with Aleksey Igudesman and many other gifted and thoughtful musicians. We are happy to present an evening which consists of some of the greatest compositions in the history of classical music, paired with the perhaps rather unexpected initial reactions those compositions elicited from some of the world’s renowned music critics, along with some other surprises.”

Aleksey Igudesman says, “The Music Critic is a project very close to my heart and bringing the orchestral version to the U.S. is something I dreamed of since its inception. My dear friend John Malkovich in the role of the evil critic is despicable and lovable at the same time and evokes the critic in every one of us.”

Tanja Dorn, Principal of Dorn Music, which is exclusively managing and booking the project, says, “We are thrilled to finally be bringing this insightful and hilarious show in its version with orchestra to audiences in the United States. Aleksey and John have created a brilliantly witty and creative evening of comedy and music making.”Official Trailer:

Press Room: https://bit.ly/TheMusicCriticPressRoom

 Exclusive Worldwide Management and Booking for “The Music Critic:”
Tanja Dorn & Anthony Acocella, Dorn Music LLC www.dornmusic.com

July 12: Pianist David Kaplan Releases Debut Solo Album - New Dances of the League of David - on New Focus Recordings

Pianist David Kaplan Announces New Album
New Dances of the League of David

15 New Piano Miniatures Interwoven with Robert Schumann’s Davidsbündlertanze Op. 6

“striking imagination and creativity” – The New York Times 

Release Date: July 12, 2024
New Focus Recordings 

CDs or press downloads available upon request.

www.davidkaplanpiano.com | www.newfocusrecordings.com

Pianist David Kaplan will release his debut solo album, New Dances of the League of David, on July 12, 2024 on New Focus Recordings. New Dances of the League of David features fifteen new piano miniatures commissioned by Kaplan between 2013 and 2015 from some of today’s leading American composers, interwoven with Robert Schumann’s Davidsbündlertanze, Op. 6. The commissioned composers are Augusta Read Thomas, Martin Bresnick, Michael Stephen Brown, Marcos Balter, Gabriel Kahane, Timo Andres, Andrew Norman, Han Lash, Michael Gandolfi, Ted Hearne, Samuel Carl Adams, Mark Carlson, Ryan Francis, Caroline Shaw, and Caleb Burhans.

Schumann’s Davidsbündlertanze is a collection of 18 short works from the 1830s, which the composer described as dances of the “League of David,” a musical society he created consisting of both real and imagined members – including the fictional characters Florestan and Eusebius, representing the two extremes of his own personality. The collection was dedicated to Robert Schumann’s wife, the composer and pianist Clara Wieck Schumann, and a mazurka she composed serves as its point of departure. Kaplan writes in the album’s liner notes, “Literary meanings, multiple personalities, and the border between reality and imagination aside, the Davidsbündlertänze is in purely musical terms a masterwork of startling originality; its genre simply has no precedent. . . The Davidsbündlertänze innovate in the contradiction between their apparent disjointedness and their stealthy, mysterious unity: pieces in different keys, with different affects, characters, tempi, lengths, and forms play on the same essential motives, and coexist with unlikely apposition. In a way, the young Schumann had invented the mixtape.”

Each 21st century commissioned composer contributed a work that is their own but remains in dialogue with Schumann. Kaplan requested that they write short pieces meant as interruptions or interludes to the Davidsbündlertänze, with each focusing on a different movement. “Each of the fifteen contemporary composers’ pieces . . . offers a unique statement of style, beauty, and wit; yet they are unified by their engagement with the spirit of Schumann,” Kaplan writes. “The composers all revel in rapid character shifts, multilayered rhythmic textures, and poignant eloquence.”

For David Kaplan, the new album is the culmination of a fascination with Schumann that began while he was still a child – at ten years old, he performed some of Schumann’s music for children at the Bard Festival. Since then, he has continued to explore the mercurial composer’s work in all its configurations – songs, chamber music, concertos, and solo pieces. He also became fascinated with creating concerts that juxtaposed short movements and pieces of larger works in a “tasting menu” approach, and became a close collaborator with living composers, counting them as colleagues and friends.

Kaplan’s premiere of New Dances of the League of David in New York in 2015 was named as one of the Best Classical Music Performances of the Year by The New York Times, with Anthony Tommasini reporting, “the excellent and adventurous young pianist David Kaplan paid tribute to that Schumann work by fashioning a contemporary equivalent with the help of [his] composer colleagues. Mr. Kaplan played New Dances of the League of David, a 60-minute suite that incorporates new miniatures by this 21st-century band of composers into Schumann’s Davidsbündlertänze, a project commissioned by Lyrica Chamber Music and Metropolis Ensemble. . . New Dances is no gimmick. Rather, reaching back to a time when borrowing a master’s music was a compliment . . . the composers honor Schumann by reacting to and even rewriting his music. And it was fascinating to hear Schumann through the ears of these perceptive, stylistically varied contemporary composers.”

Kaplan sums up his approach: “The result, fifteen new American piano works of diverse style and authorship, sometimes graffitiing the walls and sometimes painting inside the lines, is simply a bigger party; Schumann, the host, is always hovering with more champagne and hors d’oeuvres.” 

For more information on each of the commissioned composers and their works, read the album’s liner notes here. 

About David Kaplan: Pianist David Kaplan has been called “excellent and adventurous” by The New York Times, and praised by The Boston Globe for “grace and fire” at the keyboard. As orchestra soloist, he has appeared with the Britten Sinfonia at London’s Barbican and Das Sinfonie Orchester Berlin at the Philharmonie, and next year makes debuts with the  Symphony Orchestras of Hawaii and San Antonio. As recitalist, he has performed at the Ravinia Festival, Sarasota Opera House, Music on Main in Vancouver, Strathmore, Washington’s National Gallery, and New York’s Carnegie and Merkin Halls.

​Kaplan has consistently drawn critical acclaim for creative programs that interweave classical and contemporary repertoire, often featuring newly commissioned works. As a guest artist of Piano Spheres at Los Angeles’ Zipper Hall, he recently premiered “Quasi una Fantasia,” a program exploring the grey area between composition and improvisation through works by Anthony Cheung, Christopher Cerrone, and Andrea Casarrubios, together with Couperin, Beethoven, Schumann, Saariaho, Ligeti, and his own improvisations. 

Balancing solo performances with meaningful collaborations, Kaplan has played with the Attacca, Ariel, Enso, Hausman, and Tesla String Quartets. As a core member of Decoda, the Affiliate Ensemble of Carnegie Hall, he performs frequently in New York’s most exciting venues, from the Metropolitan Museum of Art to National Sawdust, as well as creating innovative residencies as far away as Abu Dhabi, Mexico, and Scotland. He is a veteran of numerous distinguished chamber music festivals and series, such as the Seattle Chamber Music, Bard, and Mostly Mozart Festivals, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Chamber Music Northwest, and Barge Music. He is an alumnus of Tanglewood and the Ravinia-Steans Institute, and performs regularly as an alumnus of the Perlman Music Program, including with Itzhak Perlman at Miami’s Arsht Center. He serves as Co-Artistic Director of Lyrica Chamber Music, a community series in Morris County, NJ currently in its 36th season.

​Kaplan has recorded for Naxos and Marquis Records, as well as for Nonesuch as part of his longstanding duo with pianist/composer Timo Andres. In September 2023, Bright Shiny Things released Vent, Kaplan’s debut album with his wife, flutist Catherine Gregory, including music by Gabriela Lena Frank, David Lang, Timo Andres, Schubert, and Prokofiev.

Kaplan was a student of the late Claude Frank, and previously studied with Walter Ponce and Miyoko Lotto. His mentors over the years have included Anton Kuerti, Richard Goode, and Emanuel Ax. He studied conducting at the Universität der Künste Berlin with Lutz Köhler, under the auspices of a Fulbright Fellowship from 2008-2010. The recipient of a DMA from Yale University in 2014, Kaplan earned his Bachelor from UCLA, where he has also served on the faculty since 2016, and now is the Assistant Professor and Inaugural Shapiro Family Chair in Piano Performance. He is proud to be a Yamaha/Bösendorfer Artist, and when at home in Los Angeles, he enjoys practicing on his childhood piano, a 1908 Hamburg Steinway model A.

Photos of David Kaplan by Titalayo Ayangade and Dario Acosta available in high resolution - download here. 

Track List:

New Dances of the League of David
David Kaplan, Piano

New Focus Recordings | Release Date: July 12, 2024

Robert Schumann (1810-1856)
Davidsbündlertänze, Op. 6
1 I. Lebhaft [1:39]
2 II. Innig [1:32] 

Augusta Read Thomas (b.1964)
3 Morse Code Fantasy – Hommage to Robert Schumann [4:01]
4 III. Mit Humor (Schumann) [1:25] 

Martin Bresnick (b. 1946)
5 Bundists (Robert, György and me) Etwas ungeduldig [1:43]

Michael Stephen Brown (b.1987)
6 IV. Ungeduldig [2:01] 

Marcos Balter (b.1974)
7 ★★★ [2:06] 

Gabriel Kahane (b. 1981)
8 No. 6 Sehr rasch und in sich hinein [3:03] 

Timo Andres (b. 1985)
9 VII. Saccades [4:12]
10 VIII. Frisch (Schumann) [1:02] 

Andrew Norman (b. 1979)
11 Vorspiel [4:01]

Han Lash (b. 1981)
12 Liebesbrief an Schumann [2:51] 

Michael James Gandolfi (b. 1956)
13 Mirrors and Sidesteps [0:59] 

Ted Hearne (b. 1982)
14 Tänze (with a sense of urgency) [3:14] 

Samuel Carl Adams (b.1985)
15 II. Quietly [2:31] 

Mark Carlson (b. 1952)
16 X. Sehr rasch [3:21]

17 XI. Balladenmässig. Sehr rasch (Schumann) [1:36]
18 XII. Mit Humor (Schumann) [0:36]
19 XIII. Wild und lustig (Schumann) [3:00]                          

Ryan Francis (b. 1981)
20 Reminiscence (Delicate, wandering) [1:35]
21 XIV. Zart und singend (Schumann) [2:34]
22 XV. Frisch (Schumann) [1:42]

Caroline Shaw (b. 1982)
23 XVI. (mit gutem Humor, un poco lol ma con serioso vibes) [1:45]
24 XVI. Mit gutem Humor (Schumann) [0:58]

Adams
25 XVII. (Quietly, from Afar) [4:57]
26 XVIII. Nicht schnell (Schumann) [1:33]

Encore Couplet

Caleb Burhans (b. 1980)
27 Leid mit Mut (Molto Rubato) [1:56]
28 V. Einfach (Schumann) [1:54]

Total time: 64:02 

Recorded at the Evelyn and Mo Ostin Recording Studio at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music, Los Angeles, CA, June 26-30, 2017.

Session co-producers: Benjamin Maas and Timo Andres

Sound engineer: Benjamin Maas

Producers: Benjamin Maas and David Kaplan

Editing, mix, and mastering: Benjamin Maas.

Yamaha DCFX piano preparation: Sean McLaughlin 

℗ & © 2024 David Kaplan 

Liner note author: David Kaplan
Liner note editor: Laura Hartenberger 

Cover Images: Synthesized images of Robert Schumann, using a 3d modeled/ computer rendered portrait of Robert Schumann by Hadi Karimi, and subsequently processed by Marc Wolf in Adobe Photoshop. hadikarimi.com/portfolio/robert-schumann-1850

Design, layout & typography: Marc Wolf, marcjwolf.com

Photos by Dario Acosta and Titilayo Ayangade

New Dances of the League of David graphic by Liana Finck, 2014

Aug. 24-Sept. 1: Composer Robert Sirota’s Muzzy Ridge Concerts Presents Fourth Season of Summer Performances in Searsmont, ME

L-R Larsen-Choi Duo (Cellist Benjamin Larsen, Pianist Hyungjin Choi);
Gossamer Trio (Flutist Carol Wincenc; Cellist Claire Marie Solomon, Harpist Nancy Allen),
Composer and Muzzy Ridge Founder, Robert Sirota

Composer Robert Sirota’s Muzzy Ridge Concerts Presents Fourth Season of Summer Performances in Searsmont, ME 

Saturday, August 24 and Sunday, August 25, 2024 at 3pm
Saturday, August 31 and Sunday, September 1, 2024 at 3pm
More Information 

“A unique and intimate concert experience” – The Republican Journal

robertsirota.com/muzzy-ridge-concerts

Searsmont, ME – Composer Robert Sirota’s annual Muzzy Ridge Concerts series returns for a fourth season in summer 2024. This year’s four performances are once again presented over two weekends on August 24-25 and August 31-September 1, all at 3pm.

On Saturday, August 24 and Sunday, August 25, 2024, the Larsen-Choi Duo – husband-and-wife-duo cellist Benjamin Larsen and pianist Hyungjin Choi – will perform a stylistically diverse program featuring music by Robert Sirota and Johannes Brahms, plus jazz improvisation by Choi. Over the following weekend – Saturday, August 31 and Sunday, September 1, 2024 – Muzzy Ridge Concerts will welcome the Gossamer Trio (GRAMMY®-nominated flutist Carol Wincenc; internationally-acclaimed cellist Claire Marie Solomon, and GRAMMY®- nominated New York Philharmonic principal harpist Nancy Allen). 

All the concerts will be presented in the Searsmont, Maine studio of series founder and Artistic Director Robert Sirota – the creative sanctuary where he has composed a great deal of his work throughout the past 35 years. Each of the concert programs performed on the two Saturdays will be repeated on the respective Sundays. Performances will run for approximately 60 minutes with no intermission. Indoor seating is limited to 50 patrons with an additional 20 outdoor seats.

On August 24 and 25, the Larsen-Choi Duo will shine a light on music across different historical eras and musical genres, performing Sirota’s Cello Sonata No. 2; Brahms’ Cello Sonata No. 2 in F Major, Op. 99; plus an original jazz improvisation by Hyungjin Choi. Written in 1886, Brahms’ Cello Sonata No. 2 evokes a sense of feisty passion intertwined with dark drama and slower contemplation over four movements. Robert Sirota composed his Sonata No. 2 for Cello and Piano specifically for Larsen and Choi in 2018, and conceived it as a companion piece for his Sonata No. 1 (which he wrote in 1988 for another married duo, cellist Norman Fischer and pianist Jeanne Kierman). Sirota describes the second sonata as having “architecture [that] mirrors and refracts the earlier piece.” Though Choi was classically trained from a young age, her added experience and training as a jazz pianist allows her to join together the beauty of these two genres in her performances and compositions, as shown through her original and improvisatory work.

Presented over the series’ second weekend, August 31 and September 1, the Gossamer Trio will perform an extensive program showcasing the works of several different composers and highlighting music from throughout the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries including Promenade Sentimentale (1904) by Théodore Dubois; Sleepers Awake (2020) and Folksong Suite by William Healy; Assobio A Jato, (The Jet Whistle) (1950) by Heitor Villa-Lobos, Sonatine En Trio (between 1903 & 1905) by Maurice Ravel, Après Un Reve (1878) and Morceau De Concours (1898) by Gabriel Fauré; and Romanian Folk Dances (1915) by Béla Bartók.

Tickets for all Muzzy Ridge Concerts performances are now on sale at www.robertsirota.com/muzzy-ridge-concerts.

About the Artists:

About Hyungjin Choi: A native of South Korea, Hyungjin Choi is a New York-based pianist covering a broad spectrum of genres. She has recorded and performed actively in many venues including Carnegie Hall, Merkin Hall, Le Poisson Rouge. With her husband, cellist Benjamin Larsen, she has been actively performing worldwide in the Larsen-Choi duo, covering a wide range of repertoire, including world premieres by notable composers such as Robert Sirota and Ke-chia Chen. Choi's debut album, Tales Of A Dreamer, was released on PND Records in March 2014. Her arranging work can be found in many records, including the Korean Music Award nominated, Coffee Calls for a Cigarette, and Lara Downes’ album Holes in the Sky, which was released on Sony Masterworks, and ranked number one on the Billboard chart. After training as a classical pianist from an early age, Choi graduated from the Seoul Institute of the Arts in 2006, and moved to New York in 2008 to attend the New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music, where she earned a BFA degree. She also holds a Master’s degree for collaborative piano at Manhattan School of Music, where she currently works as a staff pianist.

About Benjamin Larsen: Cellist Benjamin Larsen made his solo debut in 1999 at the Merryall Center for the Arts, where critic for the Danbury News Times, Frank Merkling, called him “remarkably gifted,” with “a charming, warm tone.” He has performed in various venues in the Tri-State area, including concerto performances with the Hartford Symphony and Farmington Valley Symphony, and solo and chamber performances in Asia and Europe. He is an avid chamber musician, and is founder and artistic director of the Brooklyn chamber series, Concerts on the Slope.  He is on the faculty of the Music School of Westchester, Brooklyn Music School, Tian Song Musical Arts, has a private studio, and is an experienced chamber music coach. Larsen has performed at summer music festivals including the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, Castleman’s Quartet Program, Music@Menlo and Pacific Music Festival, and has won top prizes in several competitions. His chamber music mentors have included members of the Emerson, Tokyo, American and Keller String Quartets, as well as Robert Mann, Nicholas Mann, Peter Frankl, Andre Michel Schub, Daniel Epstein, and Sylvia Rosenberg.  Past teachers include Eric Dahlin, David Finckel, Julia Lichten, and Clive Greensmith, as well as lessons with Marta Casals Istomin and Bonnie Hampton. Larsen holds Bachelor and Master of Music degrees from Manhattan School of Music, where he was the recipient of the Hans and Klara Bauer Scholarship and the 2011 Pablo Casals Award. He plays on an anonymous 19th century cello.

About Carol Wincenc: Hailed "queen of the flute" by New York Magazine, flutist Carol Wincenc has appeared as soloist with major orchestras worldwide, including the Chicago, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Detroit, and London symphonies, the BBC, Warsaw, and Buffalo Philharmonics, as well as the Los Angeles, Stuttgart, and Saint Paul Chamber Orchestras. Ms. Wincenc has collaborated with such celebrated ensembles as the Emerson, Tokyo, Guarneri, Cleveland, Juilliard and Escher String Quartets, and performed with Jessye Norman, Emanuel Ax and Yo-Yo Ma. She plays with the New York Woodwind Quintet, Les Amies with New York Philharmonic Principals, harpist Nancy Allen and violist Cynthia Phelps, and The Gossamer Trio with cellist Claire Marie Solomon and harpist Nancy Allen. Her newest collaboration Duo Coquelicot is with the Boston-based cellist Velleda Miragias. Her solo career was launched in 1978 when she won the first prize at the prestigious Naumburg Competition for flute. Since that time she has garnered numerous awards including the Lifetime Achievement Awards from both the China and USA National Flute Associations, the National Society of Arts and Letters Gold Medal for Lifetime Achievement in Music, and Distinguished Alumni Awards from Brevard Music Center and Manhattan School of Music. In addition, she received a GRAMMY® nomination and a Diapason d'Or Award for her recording of the Christopher Rouse’s Flute Concerto with the Houston Symphony, a Recording of Special Merit Award with pianist András Schiff, and Gramophone magazine's "Pick of the Month" with the Buffalo Philharmonic. 

About Claire Marie Solomon: Claire Marie Solomon, cellist, is a dynamic chamber, solo and orchestral musician based in Charleston, SC. She performs regularly with the Charleston Symphony and the Sarasota Orchestra in Florida. She has toured with the Staatskapelle Weimar, and spent many summers performing at the Aspen Music Festival. Solomon is a graduate of the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University, where she won the 2017 Cello Competition performing Saint-Saens Cello Concerto No. 1. She earned a Bachelor’s degree in psychology from Yale University, where she served as principal of the orchestra and played and toured with Yale’s famed all-cello rock ensemble, Low Strung. Solomon has taught for over ten years maintaining a private studio as well as her popular online course, Hello Cello!. Passionate about all musical genres, she has produced covers and original music under the handle Clairemarie.cello. She recently founded a folk trio, Summerauer, with mandolinist Ben Somerville and guitarist Katelyn Fajardo. She studied primarily with Eric Kim, Wolfram Koessel, and Richard Aaron as well as piano with Hélène Jeanney. Solomon performs on a 2021 William Whedbee cello, and a 1840s Knopf-Bausch bow. 

About Nancy Allen: Nancy Allen has a solo career spanning 50 years. Principal harpist of the New York Philharmonic since 1999, Allen was the first prize winner of Israel’s Fifth International Harp Competition. She was sponsored by a National Endowment for the Arts Solo Recitalist Award, Affiliate Artists and the Pro Musicis Foundation. As an Angel/ EMI recording artist, her recording “The Music of Ravel and Debussy” earned a GRAMMY® nomination. A student in the last class of the legendary Marcel Grandjany, Allen also studied with Pearl Chertok, Lily Laskine, and with the renowned harpist Susann McDonald. Highlights of her career include performances for Music at the Supreme Court hosted by Justice Sandra Day O’Conner and for the 1986 opening of the Aspen Silverqueen Gondola at the top of Ajax Mountain along with singer John Denver. She has enjoyed close collaborations with soprano Kathleen Battle, guitarist Manuel Barrueco, flutists Carol Wincenc and Ransom Wilson, and with the Tokyo and American String Quartets. Nancy Allen has been head of the harp department of The Juilliard School since 1986. Her students hold major orchestral positions and prizes internationally. A veteran of summer music festivals, she has been a faculty/artist with the Aspen Music Festival since 1976.

About Robert Sirota: Over five decades, composer Robert Sirota has developed a distinctive voice, clearly discernible in all of his work – whether symphonic, choral, stage, or chamber music. Writing in the Portland Press Herald, Allan Kozinn asserts: “Sirota’s musical language is personal and undogmatic, in the sense that instead of aligning himself with any of the competing contemporary styles, he follows his own internal musical compass.”

Robert Sirota’s chamber works have been performed by Alarm Will Sound; Washington Square Contemporary Music Society; Sequitur; Sandbox Percussion; Yale Camerata; yMusic; pianist Jeffrey Kahane; TACTUS Ensemble; Chameleon Arts Ensemble; New Hudson Saxophone Quartet; Left Bank Concert Society; Dinosaur Annex; the Chiara, American, Telegraph, Ethel, Elmyr, and Blair String Quartets; the Peabody, Concord, and Webster Trios; and the Fischer Duo, and at festivals including the Tanglewood, Aspen, Yellow Barn, and Cooperstown music festivals; Bowdoin Gamper and Bowdoin International Music Festival; and Mizzou International Composers Festival. Orchestral performances include the Seattle, Vermont, Virginia, East Texas, Lincoln (NE), Meridian (MS), New Haven, Greater Bridgeport, Oradea (Romania) and Saint Petersburg (Russia) symphonies, as well as conservatory orchestras of Oberlin, Peabody, Manhattan School of Music, Toronto, and Singapore. He is currently at work on Rising, a dance piece in collaboration with the Neave Trio, Pigeonwing Dance, and choreographer Gabrielle Lamb. 

In 2021, Sirota launched the Muzzy Ridge Concerts series at his studio in Searsmont, Maine. Held in August each year, Muzzy Ridge Concerts is committed to presenting intimate performances by world-class musicians. Featured musicians have included the Fischer Duo, the Neave Trio, flutist Carol Wincenc, composer/pianist Nico Muhly, violist Nadia Sirota, violist Jonah Sirota, oboist Regina (Gigi) Brady, organist/pianist Victoria Sirota, cellist Velléda Miragias, violinist Laurie Carney, pianist David Friend. 

Recipient of grants from the Guggenheim and Watson Foundations, United States Information Agency, National Endowment for the Arts, Meet the Composer, and the American Music Center, Sirota’s works are recorded on Legacy Recordings, National Sawdust Tracks, and the Capstone, Albany, New Voice, Gasparo and Crystal labels. His music is published by Muzzy Ridge Music, Schott, Music Associates of New York, MorningStar, Theodore Presser, and To the Fore.

Before becoming Director of the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University in 1995, Sirota served as Chairman of the Department of Music and Performing Arts Professions at New York University and Director of Boston University's School of Music. From 2005-2012, he was the President of Manhattan School of Music, where he was also a member of the School’s composition faculty.

A native New Yorker, Sirota studied at Juilliard, Oberlin, and Harvard and divides his time between New York and Searsmont, Maine with his wife, Episcopal priest and organist Victoria Sirota. They frequently collaborate on new works, with Victoria as librettist and performer, at times also working with their children, Jonah and Nadia, both world-class violists.

May 30: San Francisco Girls Chorus Presents Chorus School Spring Concert featuring World Premiere by Composer-in-Residence Sabha Aminikia

Photos available in high resolution at www.sfgirlschorus.org/press-room.

The San Francisco Girls Chorus Presents its Chorus School Spring Concert

 Featuring World Premiere by SFGC Composer-in-Residence Sabha Aminikia

Thursday, May 30, 2024 at 7pm
Oakland Scottish Rite Center | 1547 Lakeside Drive | Oakland, CA
Tickets & Information: www.sfgirlschorus.org/performances

San Francisco, CA –The San Francisco Girls Chorus (SFGC) concludes its 2023-2024 season, celebrating 45 years of empowering young women, when the Chorus School will showcase singers from Levels I through IV at its annual Chorus School Spring Concert at the Oakland Scottish Rite Center (1547 Lakeside Drive, Oakland) on Thursday, May 30, 2024 at 7pm, coming together to celebrate their accomplishments this year individually and as a school.

A culmination of their studies, students will perform the repertoire they have worked on this season. On the program are works by Gabriel Fauré, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Earlene Rentz, Alberto Favero, Felix Mendelssohn, and more. The chorus school led by Level III Director Terry Alvord closes the concert with the world premiere of SFGC Composer-in-Residence Sahba Aminikia’s newest work, Woman, Life, Freedom, written for SFGC.

Aminikia describes Woman, Life, Freedom as a protest song and an homage to Iranian women, which sets text by 14th century Persian poet Hafez›. Aminikia explains, “‘Woman, Life, Freedom’” is a slogan that originated within the women-led Kurdish movements. However, after the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian woman who died in a hospital in Tehran, Iran under suspicious circumstances, this slogan became the name of the Iranian women's movement after September 2022. Prior to her death, Mahsa was detained by Tehran’s morality police for failing to properly cover her hair. Through the protests since then, 551 protestors were killed by security forces, including 502 men, 49 women, and 68 children in 26 provinces out of 31 provinces in Iran. The women’s rights movement in Iran originally initiated in the mid-19th century. However, the first official social movement emerged in 1910 after the Iranian constitutional revolution, leading to the establishment of societies and magazines shortly after, which continues until today.”

The San Francisco Girls Chorus School Composer-in-Residence program gives singers a chance to learn more about the process of creating new music, and to interact with a living composer over an extended period of time. During the year-long residency, the composer visits rehearsals, meets with Level Directors, and creates a new work expressly for the Chorus School, engaging each group at their own musical level, reaching out to musical minds spanning a broad age range. This program also encourages composers to consider the vast artistic potential of young girls' voices, finding new and colorful ways to bring this unique instrument into the broader musical life of the San Francisco Bay Area.

Since 1978, SFGC has provided girls and young women the unique opportunity not only to perform at the highest artistic caliber, but also to develop self-confidence, leadership skills, and an awareness of the role of the arts in civic engagement. A leader in the Bay Area and national music scenes, SFGC produces award-winning concerts, recordings and tours; empowers young women in music and other fields; and sets the international standard for the highest level of performance and education. SFGC has been recognized through numerous honors including five GRAMMY Awards, four ASCAP/Chorus America Awards for Adventurous Programming, and in 2002, becoming the first youth chorus to receive Chorus America's prestigious Margaret Hillis Achievement Award for Choral Excellence. Each year, hundreds of singers of diverse backgrounds from 45 Bay Area cities ranging in age from age four to eighteen participate in SFGC’s programs. The organization consists of a six-level Chorus School training program and the Premier Ensemble, a professional-level chorus of treble voices. 

Under the direction of Artistic Director Valérie Sainte-Agathe, SFGC has achieved an incomparable sound that underscores the unique clarity and force of impeccably trained treble voices fused with expressiveness and drama. As a result, the SFGC vibrantly performs 1,000 years of choral masterworks from plainchant to the most challenging and nuanced contemporary works, many created expressly for them, in programs that are as intelligently designed as they are enjoyable and revelatory to experience. 

Up next, on June 22 SFGC will perform at the Kronos Quartet’s 2024 Kronos Festival at SF Jazz. From June 8-22, Level IV Choristers will travel to Caen, France for a two-week intensive rehearsal and performance process culminating in the world premiere multi-disciplinary opera O Future by composer Thierry Pécou.  Later this summer, the SFGC Premier Ensemble embarks on a tour of South Africa from July 10-21, 2024.

More about the San Francisco Girls Chorus: www.sfgirlschorus.org/about

More about Valérie Sainte-Agathe: www.sfgirlschorus.org/valerie-sainte-agathe

The San Francisco Girls Chorus receives support from Grants for the Arts, The Kimball Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, Sequoia Trust, The Aaron Copland Fund for Music, Inc., The Sam Mazza Foundation, The Bernard Osher Foundation, and the Joseph and Vera Long Foundation.

Pianist Charlotte Hu (formerly Ching-Yun Hu) Announces New Name & New PENTATONE Album Liszt: Metamorphosis - Out July 19

Pianist Charlotte Hu (formerly Ching-Yun Hu) Announces New Name
& New PENTATONE Album Liszt: Metamorphosis

“first-class talent” – The Philadelphia Inquirer

Release Date: July 19, 2024 

Album Release Concert: July 27, 2024 at 7:30pm
Academy of Vocal Arts | 1920 Spruce St. | Philadelphia, PA
Tickets & Information

CDs or press downloads available upon request.

www.charlottehu.com | www.pentatonemusic.com

Pianist Charlotte Hu (formerly known as Ching-Yun Hu) will release her next album, Liszt: Metamorphosis, on July 19, 2024 – it will be her debut album for PENTATONE. On it, Charlotte explores Hungarian composer and virtuoso pianist Franz Liszt’s chameleonic and evolving approach to composing – the metamorphosis of his music spanning from his early works inspired by Beethoven to the abstract tonality of his later works, as well as his incredible ability to transcribe and transform the music of other composers he admired. Liszt: Metamorphosis includes Liszt’s Les jeux d'eau à la Villa d'Este (The Fountains of the Villa d’Este) from 1877; his Lieder Transcriptions of art songs by Schumann and Schubert from 1838 and 1848; Three Concert Études from 1845-49; and Rhapsodie espagnole (Spanish Rhapsody) from 1858. Charlotte Hu will celebrate the release of the album with a performance of the program on July 27, 2024 at the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia, PA for Opening Night of the PYPA Piano Festival (tickets and information).

Described as a “first-class talent” (Philadelphia Inquirer) possessing a “superstar quality – musical, energetic, and full of flair” (Jerusalem Post), Taiwanese-American pianist Charlotte Hu has been praised by audiences and critics across the globe for her dazzling virtuosity, captivating musicianship, and magnetic stage presence. As a soloist, she has astounded audiences across the U.S., Europe, and  Asia, performing sold-out concerts at many of the world’s most prestigious venues, including Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center, Wigmore Hall, the Concertgebouw, Taipei National Concert Hall, and Osaka’s Symphony Hall. She is a frequent guest at music festivals, such as the Aspen Music Festival, Ruhr-Klavier Festival, Oregon Bach Festival. Concerto engagements have included performances with the Philadelphia Orchestra, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, and Taiwan Philharmonic, among others. 

At the heart of her success is a story of strength, dedication, and resilience that has powered her dream of becoming a world-class artist. Moving to the United States from Taiwan at age 14 without her parents to begin studies at The Juilliard School was the first of many challenges Charlotte overcame in building her illustrious career – one that has included winning top prizes at the 12th Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Competition and the Concert Artists Guild Competition, performing on classical music’s biggest stages, and fostering the next generation of musicians as an advocate for classical music through entrepreneurial and philanthropic initiatives.

Today, in addition to her prolific performing career, Charlotte is the founder of two piano festivals across two continents: the Yun-Hsiang International Music Festival in Taipei and the PYPA Piano Festival in Philadelphia. Now in its 12th year, PYPA has become an important fixture in the classical music world, cultivating a deeper appreciation for classical music and serving as a bridge of cultural partnerships between West and East. A tireless advocate for humanity, Charlotte raised $27,000 for youth education charities through a Hope Charity Concert live-streamed on her Facebook page in June 2020. The online concert reached more than 140,000 people across the globe.

With this album’s release, Charlotte Hu announces a metamorphosis of her own – a new name. She says, “When I came to America from Taiwan at the age of 14, my Chinese name was translated to Ching-Yun. Though musical sounding, the translation from Chinese did not reflect its origin. I've long felt the need to embrace my evolving identity. To better reflect this new direction, I have chosen Charlotte Hu as my new stage name. Having lived as Ching-Yun in the media for decades and through so many important life milestones, it was not an easy decision. However, with time, experience, and self-realization comes strength to embrace change. Charlotte, with French origins, means freedom. As a Taiwanese-American, Charlotte embodies the core of my personality and lifelong aspiration to have the courage to act, think, and speak without hindrance or restraint.” 

Charlotte Hu on the music featured on Liszt: Metamorphosis:

“Les jeux d'eau à la Villa d'Este presents Liszt as a composer of vivid, painterly impressions decades before the musical style made famous by Debussy and Ravel. With its waves of whispering and shimmering arpeggios gliding throughout the full range of the keyboard, this work immediately enchants listeners and draws them in.

A collection of five lieder transcriptions speak to a side of Liszt often forgotten – one rooted in his spirituality and deep love for German poetry. These Schubert and Schumann lieder are instantly recognizable to many listeners, and even without their texts, Liszt's mesmerizing transcriptions chart a journey of the heart – reflecting on love and longing, the passage of time, and the supernatural realm that lies beyond what our eyes can see.

The album’s second half offers some of Liszt's most colorful and spirited music. The Three Concert Études are scintillating tone poems that, in terms of cinematic scope, match the power of those he wrote for large orchestra. And the Rhapsodie espagnole brings a showstopping conclusion in an exhilarating celebration of Spanish culture, inspired by the composer's own travels to the Iberian Peninsula in 1845.”

More about Charlotte Hu: An active recording artist, Charlotte Hu’s debut album of Chopin works on ArchiMusic was named Best Classical Album of the Year by Taiwan’s prestigious Golden Melody Award, and recordings released on Naxos/CAG Records and BMOP/sound with Boston Modern Orchestra Project have received overwhelming critical acclaim. Her Rachmaninoff album on Centaur/Naxos received a five-star review by the U.K.’s Pianist magazine, which called it “essential listening for Rachmaninoff admirers.” 

With a dedication to making classical music more accessible, Charlotte Hu presents captivating programs that tell human stories inclusive of gender and race. By juxtaposing audience favorites with underperformed treasures and newly commissioned works, Charlotte’s recitals consistently offer musical and narrative contrasts that encourage people to listen deeply and discover anew the work of even the most well-known composers. 

A Steinway Artist, Charlotte Hu serves as an artist in residence at Temple University in Philadelphia, in addition to her busy performance schedule. She is a frequent guest artist, leading master classes and artist residencies at universities and music festivals worldwide. She holds degrees from The Juilliard School, Cleveland Institute of Music, and Germany’s Hanover University of Music, Drama, and Media, where she studied with Herbert Stessin, Sergei Babayan, and  Karl-Heinz Kammerling, respectively.

Track List: 

Liszt: Metamorphosis
Charlotte Hu, Piano

PENTATONE | Release Date: July 19, 2024

1. Les jeux d'eau à la Villa d'Este, from Années de pèlerinage – Troisième année [7:57]

[2-6] Five Lieder Transcriptions

2. Leise flehen meine Lieder (Schubert) [4:53]
3. Auf dem Wasser zu Singen (Schubert) [4:07]
4. Ave Maria (Schubert) [5:21]
5. Erlkönig (Schubert) [4:31]
6. Widmung (R. Schumann) [4:21]

[7-9] Three Concert Études

7. Il lamento [10:09]
8. La leggierrezza [5:47]
9. Un sospiro [6:13]

10. Rhapsodie espagnole [13:58]

June 8: GRAMMY®-Winning Flutist Brandon Patrick George Brings his Community Concerto Project to the Albany Symphony Led by Music Director David Alan Miller

Photo by Lauren Desberg available in hi-resolution here.

GRAMMY®-Winning Flutist Brandon Patrick George Brings his Community Concerto Project to the Albany Symphony

World Premiere of Flute Concerto by Michael Gilbertson Features
Brandon Patrick George, Albany Symphony, 
& Albany High School Chamber Choir

Saturday, June 8, 2024 at 7:30pm
EMPAC at RPI | 44 8th Street | Troy, NY

Tickets and More information

“a knockout musician with a gorgeous sound”
– The Philadelphia Inquirer

www.brandonpatrickgeorge.com

Albany, NY – GRAMMY®-winning flutist Brandon Patrick George – who has been praised as a “knockout musician with a gorgeous sound” by The Philadelphia Inquirer – brings the inaugural installment of his BPG: Community Concerto Project to the Albany Symphony, conducted by Music Director David Alan Miller, as part of the Symphony’s American Music Festival on Saturday, June 8, 2024 at 7:30pm at EMPAC at RPI (44 8th Street, Troy, NY). Through this ongoing initiative, which is supported by the Ford Foundation, Brandon is partnering with orchestras across the country to commission new flute concertos that involve orchestras' local communities by including students in the process and in the performance. For this partnership, the commissioned composer is Michael Gilbertson, who has written a flute concerto to be performed by Brandon with the Albany Symphony and students from the Albany High School Chamber Choir. The all-American concert program also features Joan Tower’s 1920/2019; the world premiere of Clarice Assad’s Flow, Suite for Piano and Orchestra with Assad as the piano soloist; and Christopher Theofanidis’ On the Bridge of the Eternal.

In November 2023, Brandon Patrick George visited the Albany High School Chamber Choir together with composer Michael Gilbertson, getting to know the students and hearing them perform. Brandon and Michael will also work with the students when they are in Albany during the week leading up to the performance, further solidifying the valuable aspect of mentorship which is a significant part of Brandon’s initiative.

Beginning in May 2020, Brandon Patrick George received frequent invitations to serve on panels about diversity in classical music, being repeatedly asked what institutions can do to support and reflect the communities they serve. These conversations, and desire to use his platform for change, inspired him to create BPG: The Community Concerto Project. Facilitating the creation of a new piece which tells the story of a community, while also representing the community on stage, illustrates Brandon’s vision of working with orchestras to deepen their connections with their audiences, inspire young musicians, and expand the repertoire with programming that reflects the community they serve.

Brandon says, “Community building through musical storytelling is at the core of my initiative. This new set of concertos, beginning with Michael Gilbertson’s, seeks to celebrate community, while supporting arts education, local music programs, and the creation of new music for flute and orchestra. With the flute as soloist, I am creating a new, hopeful story of the Pied Piper. In my version, the piper uses music as a force for change, inspires young people, and uplifts communities through new compositions that reflect their city.”

Michael Gilbertson’s new piece will reflect the sentiments he encountered when visiting students at Albany High School. “After visiting the Albany High School Chamber Choir with Brandon [Patrick George], I decided to adapt Rudyard Kipling's poem If, which is reminiscent of the thoughts expressed by the members of the choir,” he says. “A choral song based on Kipling's text begins the third movement and was the starting point for this work.”

About Brandon Patrick George: Brandon Patrick George is a leading flute soloist and GRAMMY-winning chamber musician whose repertoire extends from the Baroque era to today. He is the flutist of Imani Winds and has appeared as a soloist with the Atlanta, Baltimore, and Albany symphonies, American Composers Orchestra, and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, among others. He has been praised as “elegant” by The New York Times, as a “virtuoso” by The Washington Post.

Brandon has performed at the Elbphilharmonie, the Kennedy Center, the Dresden Music Festival, and the Prague Spring Festival. In addition to his work with Imani Winds, Brandon’s solo performances include appearances at Lincoln Center, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 92nd Street Y, Tippet Rise, and Maverick Concerts. Additional recent and upcoming performance highlights include concerts presented by the Dayton Philharmonic, Chamber Music Pittsburgh, Hancher Auditorium, Bard Music Festival, and Shriver Hall.

In 2021, Brandon was part of the inaugural class of WQXR’s Artist Propulsion Lab, a program designed to advance the careers of early and mid-career artists and support the future of classical music. During his yearlong residency at WQXR, Brandon guest hosted Evening Music, interviewed Ford Foundation president Darren Walker about diversity and equity in the performing arts, and recorded with pianist Aaron Diehl and harpist June Han.

Brandon's latest album Twofold was released on In a Circle Records in 2024. Twofold explores musical dialogues that transcend space, time, and identity by pairing canonical works for solo flute with new compositions and features music by C.P.E. Bach, Claude Debussy, Reena Esmail, Saad Haddad, Shawn E. Okpebholo, Ruth Crawford Seeger, and Toru Takemitsu. His debut solo album was released in 2020 on Haenssler Classics, and he was featured in The New York Times around the album’s release in an article titled “A Flutist Steps into the Solo Spotlight,” which described the album as “a program that showcases the flute in all its wit, warmth and brilliance."

Raised by a single mother in Dayton, OH, Brandon is the proud product of public arts education. He draws on his personal experiences in his commitment to educating the next generation, performing countless outreach concerts for school children every year, and mentoring young conservatory musicians of color embarking on performance careers. Brandon trained at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, the Conservatoire de Paris, and the Manhattan School of Music. He serves on the faculty of the Curtis Institute and the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. www.brandonpatrickgeorge.com

About Michael Gilbertson: The works of Michael Gilbertson have been described as “elegant” and “particularly beautiful” by The New York Times, “vivid, tightly woven” and “delectably subtle” by the Baltimore Sun, “genuinely moving” by The Washington Post, and “a compelling fusion of new and ancient” by The Philadelphia Inquirer. Michael served as BMI Composer in Residence with the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra, and joined the faculty of SFCM in 2017. He was one of three finalists for the 2018 Pulitzer Prize in Music for his Quartet.

Michael Gilbertson’s works have been programmed by the Minnesota Orchestra, Pittsburgh Symphony, Washington National Opera, Albany Symphony, New World Symphony, Cabrillo Festival Orchestra, Hong Kong Sinfonietta, Grand Rapids Symphony, and Santa Barbara Symphony, wind ensembles including The United States Marine Band, and professional choirs including Musica Sacra, The Crossing, Volti, Conspirare, The Swedish Radio Choir, and Yale Choral Artists. A graduate of Juilliard and Yale, he has been the recipient of the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Lieberson Fellowship, a Copland House Residency Award, five Morton Gould Awards from ASCAP, and a BMI Student Composer Award.

Michael Gilbertson’s one-act opera Breaking, a collaboration with playwright Caroline McGraw, was commissioned by the Washington National Opera and premiered at The Kennedy Center. He has twice composed and conducted original ballets for the New York City Ballet’s Choreographic Institute. His fifth ballet, a collaboration with choreographer Norbert De La Cruz, was premiered by the Aspen Santa Fe Ballet. From 2009-2021, Gilbertson served as director of ChamberFest Dubuque, an annual music festival that raised money for community music education in his hometown of Dubuque, Iowa. www.michaelgilbertson.net

For Calendar Editors:

Concert details:
Who: Flutist Brandon Patrick George Brings his BPG: Community Concerto Project to the Albany Symphony
What: World Premiere of Composer Michael Gilbertson’s Flute Concerto Plus Music by Joan Tower, Clarice Assad, and Christopher Theofanidis
When: Saturday, June 8, 2024 at 7:30pm
Where: EMPAC at RPI, 44 8th Street, Troy, NY, 12180
Tickets and information: www.albanysymphony.com/upcomingconcerts/2024/6/1/amf

Description: GRAMMY®-winning flutist Brandon Patrick George, praised as a “knockout musician with a gorgeous sound” by The Philadelphia Inquirer, brings the inaugural installment of his BPG: Community Concerto Project to the Albany Symphony as part of the Symphony’s American Music Festival, in the world premiere of a flute concerto by composer Michael Gilbertson, written for Brandon, the Albany Symphony, and the Albany High School Chamber Choir conducted by the Symphony’s Music Director David Alan Miller. The all-American concert program also features Joan Tower’s 1920/2019; the world premiere of Clarice Assad’s Flow, Suite for Piano and Orchestra with Assad as the piano soloist; and Christopher Theofanidis’ On the Bridge of the Eternal.

July 26: The Juilliard String Quartet Plays Schoenberg – The First Release of the Juilliard Quartet’s Complete 1975 Cycle of String Quartets on CD

The Juilliard String Quartet Plays Schoenberg
with the first release of the Juilliard Quartet’s
Complete 1975 Cycle of String Quartets on CD

Album Release Date: July 26, 2024
Reviewer Rate: $30.01 + shipping/handling fees 
Preorder Now

Schoenberg at 150 on Sony Classical

Arnold Schoenberg, one of the most influential musical figures of the 20th century, was born in Vienna in 1874. Sony Classical is celebrating the 150th anniversary of the great composer’s birth with the reissue of 20 CDs of recordings from CBS/American Columbia. The company was a pioneer in documenting Schoenberg’s achievements and already demonstrated that commitment during his lifetime (he died in 1952). In 1940, with the composer conducting, Columbia Masterworks produced the first recording of one of his most captivating and revolutionary works, Pierrot lunaire; and in the 1950s and 60s, the label undertook a ground-breaking multi-volume series entitled “The Music of Arnold Schoenberg”. But arguably no recordings have done more to further the cause of Schoenberg’s orchestral and vocal works than those of Pierre Boulez, while none have done more to promote his chamber music than those by the Juilliard Quartet. Sony Classical now presents all of Boulez’s Schoenberg for CBS/Columbia in a 13-CD box, and all of the Juilliard’s in a 7-disc set.

The Juilliard Quartet brought its “profoundly intelligent” Schoenberg interpretations (Gramophone) into the studio over an even longer span – four decades, beginning with its first traversal of the numbered string quartets in 1951/52 (“Magnificent recordings” – Gramophone). The Juilliard returned to Columbia’s 30th Street Studio in 1975 for a stereo remake of the four “official” quartets, now coupled with the ensemble’s first recording of the early D major Quartet – a charming student work that could almost be mistaken for Dvořák.

But it wasn’t only advances in technology that prompted the Juilliard Quartet to re-record Schoenberg after years of regularly performing the quartets in concert. In an interview about their evolving interpretations with the recording’s producer, the players spoke of an increasingly romantic approach, especially to Nos. 3 and 4, with less emphasis on rhythmic drive but greater emotional intensity. The set won them the 1977 Grammy for Best Chamber Music Performance.

The mono and stereo quartet cycles are both included in Sony Classical’s new 7-CD collection of the complete Juilliard Schoenberg recordings. And there are also two Juilliard versions for comparison – one from 1966 (the work’s LP premiere), the other from 1985 – of the extraordinarily intense String Trio which Schoenberg composed in the aftermath of a massive heart attack that caused his heart to stop beating. Something of that experience is reflected in the music. And, apropos comparison, the New York Philharmonic’s recording of Schoenberg’s sumptuous orchestral arrangement of his Verklärte Nacht in the Pierre Boulez collection is complemented here by the leaner original sextet version, with the Juilliard Quartet joined in 1991 by violist Walter Trampler and cellist Yo-Yo Ma.

SET CONTENTS - The Juilliard String Quartet Plays Schoenberg

DISC 1:

Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 1, Op. 7 (1952 recording)
Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 4, Op. 37 (1952 recording)

DISC 2:

Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 2 in F-Sharp Minor, Op. 10 (1951 recording)
Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 3, Op. 30 (1951 recording)

DISC 3:

Schoenberg: Trio for Violin, Viola and Cello, Op. 45
Schoenberg: Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte, Op. 41 with John Horton and Glenn Gould

DISC 4:

Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 1 in D Minor, Op. 7 (1975 recording)

DISC 5:

Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 2, Op. 10 (1975 recording)
Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 3, Op. 30 (1975 recording)

DISC 6:

Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 4, Op. 37 (1975 recording)
Schoenberg: String Quartet in D Major (1975 recording)

DISC 7:

Schoenberg: Verklärte Nacht, Op. 4 with Yo-Yo Ma
Schoenberg: String Trio, Op. 45 with Yo-Yo Ma