Chamber Music
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Wednesday, October 12, 8:00 p.m.
Orpheus, with violinist Gil Shaham, $29
7:00 p.m. Composer’s Chat with Cynthia Wong
J. Mahlon and Grace Buck Concert
Our 25th season with Orpheus opens with a collaboration between the orchestra and superstar violinist Gil Shaham: Johannes Brahms’ monumental Violin Concerto in D Major.
With this concert, Orpheus launches its Project 440, honoring four young American composers with commissioning awards, in anticipation of Orpheus’ 40th anniversary season in 2012–2013. Lafayette will hear the world premiere of the first of these new works, by Cynthia Wong.
Also on the program are Haydn’s Symphony No. 73, “La Chasse,” (with its jaunty galloping finale evoking the hunt) and Mendelssohn’s Fair Melusine, a musical portrait of the fairy tale mermaid figure.
Tuesday, November 15, 8:00 p.m.
Calder Quartet and So Percussion, $18
7:00 p.m. Composers’ Chat with Jason Trueting and Tristan Perich
Dr. Aaron S. Litwak ’42 Concert
Two of America’s boldest and most authoritative ensembles join forces in this rare collaboration. Since coming together at the Yale School of Music in 1999, So Percussion has been creating music that is at turns raucous and touching, barbarous and heartfelt. Called “astonishing and entrancing” by Billboard magazine and “brilliant” by the New York Times, the Brooklyn-based quartet’s innovative work with today’s most exciting composers and their own original music has quickly helped them forge a unique and diverse career.
The Calder Quartet (inspired by the innovative American artist Alexander Calder) was awarded the 2009 ASCAP Adventurous Programming Award in recognition of its exciting programming and collaborations.
This concert features works for each group, including Steve Reich’s brilliant new Mallet Music, written for So, as well as two works especially created for the combined ensembles by Jason Trueting and Tristan Perich.
Read the program notes: http://williamscenter.lafayette.edu/performance-series-2/chamber-music/calderso-program-notes/
Friday, December 2, 8:00 p.m.
Orpheus, with oboist Albrecht Mayer, $27
7:00 p.m. Composer’s Chat with Andrew Norman
Along with his solo projects (with Claudio Abbado, Sir Simon Rattle and Nikolaus Harnoncourt), oboist Albrecht Mayer performs regularly with partners such as pianist Hélène Grimaud, Leif Ove Andsnes, and bass-baritone Thomas Quasthoff, with whom he recorded a CD of Bach cantatas.
From his position as principal oboist with the Berlin Philharmonic, Mayer is regarded as the dean of European oboists, as concerto soloist and recitalist. Orpheus features him in Bach’s meltingly beautiful A Major Concerto for Oboe d’Amore and Mozart’s Andante in C Major.
The program also includes Haydn’s spirited Symphony No. 103, the “Drumroll,” and two contemporary works: Paul Hindemith’s epoch-making Kammermusik No. 1 (1922) and the year’s second Project 440 commission, by young American composer Andrew Norman.
Read the program notes: http://williamscenter.lafayette.edu/performance-series-2/chamber-music/orpheus-with-albrecht-mayer-program-notes/
Tuesday, January 31, 8:00 p.m.
Les Violons du Roy, with Maurice Steger, Recorder, $20
This 15-member group, founded in 1984 by music director Bernard Labadie, specializes in the vast repertoire of music for chamber orchestra, performed in the stylistic manner most appropriate to each era. The orchestra has been widely acclaimed for the exceptional energy, brilliance, and vitality of its performances.
Joining this tour is Swiss recorder virtuoso Maurice Steger, praised by The Telegraph’s Ivan Hewett for “the amazing virtuosity that soared above the instrument’s limitations with rapid passagework…so crystal-clear that it pushed through the orchestral sound without difficulty.”
The program offers a virtual banquet of Baroque goodies by J.S. Bach, Telemann, Vivaldi, Scarlatti, and Geminiani.
Read the program notes here: http://williamscenter.lafayette.edu/performance-series-2/chamber-music/violons-du-roy-program-notes/
Thursday, February 9, 8:00 p.m.
Cantus, $18
With its vigorous schedule of national tours, subscription concerts in its home of Minneapolis–St. Paul, and recordings, Cantus, often considered the country’s definitive male a cappella chorus, routinely garners praise such as this from American Record Guide: “The amazing men of Cantus weave their usual spell, with singing of unimaginable precision, sensitivity and deep emotional power.”
The ensemble is known for adventurous programming spanning many periods and genres, including chant, Renaissance music, contemporary works, art song, folk, spirituals, world music, and pop.
Its 2012 On the Shoulders of Giants tour offers listeners an extraordinary anthology of great choral works, from Renaissance masters (Palestrina, Tallis, and Byrd) to the great “Lieder” tradition of the 19th century (Schubert, Mendelssohn, Grieg, and Wagner), to contemporary settings by such diverse composers as Zoltan Kodaly and Randall Thompson, and pop masters Paul Simon and Lennon and McCartney.
Read the program notes here: http://williamscenter.lafayette.edu/performance-series-2/chamber-music/cantus-program-notes/
Thursday, March 22, 8:00 p.m.
Orpheus, with Chris Thile, mandolin, $27
7:00 p.m. Composer’s Chat with Clint Needham
Croasdale Concert
Best known for his work with the Grammy-nominated Punch Brothers band and Grammy-winning bluegrass band Nickel Creek, as well as his frequent collaborations with such crossover legends as Edgar Meyer, Béla Fleck, and Yo-Yo Ma (with whom he appears on the new CD The Goat Rodeo Sessions), Chris Thile joins Orpheus as soloist and composer in his bristling and fresh Mandolin Concerto.
Also on this all-American program are Aaron Copland’s masterpiece, Appalachian Spring (1944), and an exciting orchestral excursion into the musical wealth of Leonard Bernstein’s landmark Trouble in Tahiti (1952), in an arrangement by Paul Chihara.
The season’s third Project 440 composer is Clint Needham, whose work has been recognized with two ASCAP Morton Gould Awards, the William Schuman Prize/BMI Student Composer Award, and the Aspen Music Festival’s Jacob Druckman Prize.
Read the program notes here: http://williamscenter.lafayette.edu/performance-series-2/chamber-music/orpheus-with-chris-thile-program-notes/
