chamber music | MEMETERIA

August 17, 2023 • 11:40 pm Comments Off on Music on the Strait: 2023 Edition

Music on the Strait: 2023 Edition

This summer’s Music on the Strait summer festival of chamber music (19-27 August) opens on Saturday, 19 August, at the newly opened Field Arts & Events Hall in Port Angeles, WA. The opening night concert in the 500-seat Donna Morris Auditorium begins at 7pm and features Garrick Ohlsson and the Takács Quartet in a program of Brahms and Amy Beach, as well as the world premiere of a new work for violin and viola by 2023 composer-in-residence Lembit Beecher, which was written for Artistic Directors James Garlick and Richard O’Neill. It was inspired in part by the transformation of the Elwha River. This will be one of the first performances at the Field Arts and Events Hall .

The 19 August opening concert will be livestreamed here and on Music on the Strait’s homepage; you can also watch the concerts on 25 August and 27 August (check MotS’ homepage).

On 26 August at 7pm, also at Field Hall, Jeremy Denk performs Bach’s Complete Partitas; the students of the Olympic Strings Workshop will present a showcase at 6.15pm. For the festival finale on 27 August at 2pm, Jeremy Denk & Friends will play music by Clara Schumann, Robert Schumann, and Johannes Brahms.

Other events will take place at Maier Hall at Peninsula College in Port Angeles:

On Sunday 20 August at 2pm, Takács plays Haydn, Beethoven, and Bartók, and on Friday 25 August at 7pm, Noah Geller, Seattle Symphony’s concertmaster, makes his Music on the Strait debut together with James Garlick, Richard O’Neill, and Ani Aznavoorian in Grieg’s String Quartet in G minor and shares the stage with percussionist Mari Yoshinaga in Anton Prischepa’s Based on Actual Events for Violin and Marimba. The quartet will also perform Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate’s Pisashi for string quartet.

Filed under: chamber music, music news, Music on the Strait

July 6, 2023 • 9:42 am Comments Off on Triplet of Trios Sets the Tone for Seattle’s Summer of Chamber Music

Triplet of Trios Sets the Tone for Seattle’s Summer of Chamber Music

Steven Osborne, James Ehnes and Alisa Weilerstein; (c)Jenna Poppe

Seattle Chamber Music Society’s 2023 Summer Festival is now in full swing. My review of the opening night concert:

Opening night concerts can be an invitation to default to lightweight programming, letting extramusical distractions become the focus. Not so at Seattle Chamber Music Society. The 2023 Summer Festival kicked off with a concert that kept the audience’s attention avidly fixed on the music at hand…

continue

Filed under: chamber music, James Ehnes, Maurice Ravel, review, Seattle Chamber Music Society

May 10, 2023 • 2:36 am Comments Off on Thibaudet and the Colburn Ensemble in Berlin

Thibaudet and the Colburn Ensemble in Berlin

Jean-Yves Thibaudet and an ensemble from the Colburn School perform a chamber program this evening at Boulez-Saal in Berlin.

Frank Gehry, architect of Boulez-Saal and a friend of Daniel Barenboim, has also designed a 100,000 square-foot expansion of the Colburn School campus in downtown LA, including a 1,000-seat, in-the-round performance space, a studio theater, dance studios, and public gardens and green spaces. Reuniting with Gehry for that project is another name familiar to Berliners: Yasuhisa Toyota of Nagata Acoustics, who served as acoustician for Boulez-Saal (along with other Gehry buildings, including Disney Concert Hall). The new Colburn performance hall, expected to open to the public in 2025, will have parallels with Boulez-Saal.

I wrote about tonight’s program here.

Filed under: architecture, chamber music, music news, Pierre Boulez Saal

February 8, 2023 • 9:38 am Comments Off on West-Eastern Divan Ensemble Tonight in Berlin

West-Eastern Divan Ensemble Tonight in Berlin

Here’s a video of the West-Eastern Divan Ensemble performing Mendelssohn’s Octet at Boulez-Saal in 2021.

On the agenda at the Boulez-Saal in Berlin tonight is this program by the West-Eastern Divan Ensemble. It’s an interesting mix of Jörg Widmann, Dvořák, Hindemith, and Enescu. My program notes here.

Filed under: chamber music, Pierre Boulez Saal

January 28, 2023 • 6:41 am Comments Off on SCMS Winter Festival 2023

SCMS Winter Festival 2023

Seattle Chamber Music Society’s 2023 edition of the Winter Festival has started, presenting two weekends of chamber music by Beethoven, Fanny Mendelssohn, Ravel, William Grant Still, Julia Perry, et al. plus a new work by contemporary American composer Jeremy Turner, who is especially known for his TV and stage scores.

The second weekend of concerts includes the local premiere (Feb. 3) of Turner’s Six Mile House for clarinet, violin, piano, and cello. which was inspired by the Charleston, SC-based urban legend about Sweeney Todd-ish murders said to have been committed by an evil innkeeper couple.

SCMS Artistic Director James Ehnes will be onstage for the three concerts of the second weekend, playing works by Brahms, Shostakovich, and César Franck. And a free prelude recital is open to the public before each concert — no ticket required. Here’s the free prelude lineup:

January 27 – 6:30PM
Richard Strauss: Violin Sonata, Op.18
Arnaud Sussmann, violin
Jeewon Park, piano

January 28 – 6:30PM
Franz Schubert: Fantasie in F minor, D. 940
Dmitri Shostakovich: Piano Trio No. 2 in E minor, Op. 67
SCMS Academy Musicians

January 29 – 2:00PM
Sergei Prokofiev: Piano Sonata No. 6, Op. 82
Adam Neiman, piano

February 3 – 6:30PM
Julia Perry: Prelude
William Grant Still: Three Visions
George Gershwin: Rhapsody in Blue, solo version 1924
Andrew Armstrong, piano

February 4 – 6:30PM
Ludwig van Beethoven: Piano Trio in C minor, Op. 1 No. 3
SCMS Academy Musicians

February 5 – 2:00PM
Franz Joseph Haydn: String Quartet in F minor, Op. 20, No. 5
James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti, violins;
Che-Yen Chen, viola; Edward Arron, cello

Filed under: chamber music, James Ehnes, Seattle Chamber Music Society

December 27, 2022 • 2:38 pm Comments Off on Byron Schenkman & Friends: Beethoven, Carlos Simon, and more

Byron Schenkman & Friends: Beethoven, Carlos Simon, and more

Byron Schenkman & Friends continue their 10th-anniversary season with a program on Thursday, 29 December (at 7pm at Benaroya Hall), juxtaposing the piano trio format with lieder. Beethoven’s Archduke Trio, a pinnacle of the piano trio from 1810-11, will be heard alongside 2021 Sphinx Medal of Excellence winner Carlos Simon‘s luminous be still and know, a composition from 2015 inspired by an interview with Oprah Winfrey. Filling out the program are songs by Beethoven, Mozart, and Schubert featuring vocalist Martin Bakari, winner of the 2018 George London Competition.

The complete program is as follows:

Carlos Simon (b. 1986):

be still and know for piano trio

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791):

Abendempfindung (“Evening Thoughts”) (K. 523)
Zufriedenheit (“Contentment”) (K. 473)

Franz Schubert (1979-1828):

Du bist die Ruh (“You are Repose”) (D. 776)

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827):

Adelaide, op. 46

Ludwig van Beethoven:

Trio in B-flat, op. 97

Allegro moderato
Scherzo
Andante cantabile, ma però con moto
Allegro moderato

Filed under: Byron Schenkman, chamber music

August 28, 2022 • 11:33 am Comments Off on Music on the Strait 2022

Music on the Strait 2022

Music on the Strait 2022 Opening Night: Demarre McGill and Jeremy Denk play Beach and Franck

The 2022 Music on the Strait season began on Friday (see above) with a spotlight on the extraordinary flutist Demarre McGill, who was featured in works by Debussy and Amy Beach in the opening night program. Joining McGill were violinists Elisa Barston and James Garlick (Music on the Strait’s co-artistic director) violist David Auerbach, cellist Efe Baltacıgil, and pianist Jeremy Denk (2022 special guest artist), who will perform César Franck’s Piano Quintet in F minor.

The festival takes place on Washington’s beautiful Olympic Peninsula over two weekends, from 26 August to 3 September:

August 26: Opening Night with virtuoso flautist Demarre McGill
August 27: Efe Baltacıgil and Jeremy Denk play Beethoven
August 28: Every Good Boy Does Fine: Jeremy Denk in Recital and Conversation
September 2: Shostakovich’s Eighth String Quartet
September 3: Festival Finale: A World Premiere by Paul Chihara

ROSTER OF 2022 ARTISTS:

VIOLIN: Elisa Barston, Kyu-Young Kim, James Garlick

VIOLA: David Auerbach, Richard O’Neill

CELLO: Efe Baltacıgil, Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir

FLUTE: Demarre McGill

PIANO: Jeremy Denk, George Li

COMPOSER-IN-RESIDENCE: Paul Chihara

Filed under: chamber music, music news, Music on the Strait

July 26, 2022 • 10:53 am Comments Off on Chamber Music at Bravo! Vail

Chamber Music at Bravo! Vail

Verona Quartet with Anne-Marie McDermott, photo (c) Jorge Gustavo Elias

Last night I got my first sample of the chamber side of Bravo! Vail Music Festival with a smart program featuring the Verona Quartet and Artistic Director Anne-Marie McDermott at the keyboard. Puccini’s early “Crisantemi” and the first of Beethoven’s Op. 18 string quartets revealed a flair for finely calibrated ensemble balance and color, with a cross-connection of moods traced between Beethoven’s Adagio and the elegiac Puccini miniature.

For me the highlight was an impassioned performance of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s Piano Quintet in G minor, Op. 1 — also a youthful work, in fact written when he was only 18 — for which McDermott joined the Veronese to play the taxing, ever-present piano part with power and poise. Together they made a brilliant case for this shamefully long ignored gem, obviously enjoying the fecundity of Coleridge-Taylor’s imagination. Captivating from start to finish, this is the kind of performance that thankfully is reclaiming his work the repertoire.

Filed under: Beethoven, Bravo! Vail Music Festival, chamber music, Puccini, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor

July 1, 2022 • 1:35 am Comments Off on A Double Portrait: Johannes Brahms & Jonathan Woody

A Double Portrait: Johannes Brahms & Jonathan Woody

Here’s an online concert well worth taking the time to enjoy. Byron Schenkman & Friends, presents A Double Portrait: Johannes Brahms & Jonathan Woody, a program that includes the world premiere of Jonathan Woody’s nor shape of today to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community (first performed on 22 May 2022).

Also the first commission by Byron Schenkman & Friends, Woody composed nor shape of today to a text by Raquel Salas Rivera, a queer Puerto Rican and Philadelphian of non-binary gender. His new work is a response or companion piece to Brahms’s Op. 91 songs for alto, viola, and piano.

Jonathan Woodley has provided this commentary on his new work: “In composing this piece, I very much wanted to consider it a companion to Johannes Brahms’s Two Songs for Voice, Viola and Piano, op. 91. The Brahms songs deal with longing–the longing for stillness, for respite from the tormented mind, and in the case of the second Brahms song, Geistliches Wiegenlied (Sacred Lullaby), the longing of Mary to protect her child from the tribulations he eventually must face. In our twenty-first century existence, many individuals still experience a longing for a place to belong, and I was struck by the similarity between these Romantic sentiments and the experience of trans and non-binary individuals, who face relentless pressure to conform to outdated norms surrounding gender and identity in our supposedly modern world. The poet Raquel Salas Rivera writes in a deeply moving and eloquent way about these experiences, and his poetry struck me as perfectly situated to answer the Brahms songs on poems by Rückert and Geibel (a paraphrase of a poem originally in Spanish by Lope de Vega). Rivera writes in both English and Spanish, and the fluidity between the two languages was an inspiration to me in creating this song. I attempt to emulate Salas Rivera’s fluidity in gender and language by incorporating a fluidity in musical idiomatic expression; at times nor shape of today sounds like Romantic music, like Baroque music, and like music of the 21st century. While I don’t share the experience of those with trans and non-binary identities, I hoped to capture the sense of longing that so many human beings feel to belong, to be loved, and to be safe.”

Complete Program:

Intro 1:10 – Jonathan Woody: stone and steel 8:45 – Johannes Brahms: Sapphic Ode, Op. 94, no. 4 11:53 – Franz Schubert: Song of Old Age, D. 778 17:20 – Johannes Brahms: Intermezzo in A, Op. 118, no. 2 24:01 – Johannes Brahms: Lullaby, Op. 49, no. 4, for voice and piano 26:21 – Johannes Brahms: Two Songs for voice, viola, and piano 39:14 – Jonathan Woody: nor shape of today.

Filed under: Byron Schenkman, chamber music, commissions

March 19, 2022 • 1:28 pm Comments Off on Les Six-and-a-Half: Chamber Concert

Les Six-and-a-Half: Chamber Concert

On 23 March 2022, Orca Concerts series presents an evening of French and Brazilian chamber music featuring clarinetist Sean Osborn, pianist Angela Draghicescu, and Seattle Symphony musicians Ben Hausmann (oboe) and Luke Fieweger (bassoon). Titled Les Six-and-a-Half, it’s quite an interesting program: Germaine Tailleferre: Sonata champêtre (1972); Heitor Villa-Lobos: Trio for Oboe, Clarinet, and Bassoon (1921); Darius Milhaud: Duo concertante (1956); and Francis Poulenc: Trio pour hautbois, basson, et piano, FP 43 (1926).

The performance will be at the Chapel Performance Space at the Good Shepherd Center at 4649 Sunnyside Ave. N. in Seattle. Tickets General: $30, Senior: $20, Student and Under 19: FREE.

From the press release: “Les Six was a collective of composers in France in the early 20th-century, organized in part by philosopher Jean Cocteau and composer Erik Satie. Their neo-classic style of composition embraced lightness, charm, melody, and was also a reaction to the excesses of Wagner and Impressionists like Debussy. Heitor Villa-Lobos’s Trio from 1921 employs sophisticated overlapping rhythms, ostinato, and melodic fragments for an otherworldly sense of place.”

Filed under: chamber music, music news

« Previous Next »

MEMETERIA