Insider Interview with author Edward Klorman

In a new book about Bach’s Cello Suites, award-winning author Edward Klorman dives deep into both the culture and history of the iconic works. Bach: The Cello Suites is published by Cambridge University Press on September 1, 2025. In this insider interview, we spoke with Klorman about the surprising history of the suites, the challenges of writing for a diverse range of readers who might end up reading the forthcoming book, and one thing he wishes he could have left in the book.

What made you so curious about Bach’s Cello Suites that you wanted to write a book?

A century ago, the Cello Suites were not very widely known. But now, you hear them all the time, not only in concerts, but also in films, on Netflix series, pop covers, in subway stations—you name it! I was curious how this music went from being so obscure to so ubiquitous and iconic, and I was eager to tell that story.

There are so many questions about them that resist straightforward answers. For instance, at which point in his careerdid he compose them? Did he write them for (or with) a particular cellist? Was Bach familiar with any other solo-cello music that may have inspired him? I wanted to try to get to the bottom of these questions as much as possible. 

You are a violist. What was your experience with these suites for cello over the years?

Like many violists, I began on violin taking Suzuki lessons. The Suzuki violin books include four movements transcribed from the Cello Suites, so my first exposure to this music would have been in elementary school. But once I switched to viola in high school, I began learning one suite every year. The viola is tuned just like the cello, only an octave higher, so the suites adapt very well for the viola. In recent years, I’ve been lucky to play on a beautiful baroque viola with gut strings and a period-style bow, so it’s been an interesting challenge to relearn the suites in a different style.

According to his son C. P. E. Bach, J. S. Bach loved to play the viola, so sometimes we violists like to imagine that he might have used a viola to compose or perform the cello suites—but that is just conjecture!

What were some of the biggest challenges to writing the book?

A big challenge was writing for the diverse range of the readers. 

This book is part of the New Cambridge Music Handbooks series. Each book explores a single piece for many kinds of readers, ranging from musicians and musicologists to musical audiences of all stripes. I try to keep the writing light and engaging for casual readers looking for an all-around guide to this wonderful music.

Then for cellists and cello teachers who played this music for decades, I provide detailed explanations of some thorny questions, like how do we know we are playing the notes, ornaments, and articulations Bach intended. (The answer is, it’s sometimes very difficult to know!) For these readers, I explain what evidence points me to various conclusions. By “showing my work,” I hope readers will come to feel that they can trust me and that they are welcome to re-evaluate sources to come to their own conclusions.

What's the one of the most surprising things you learned from the process?

Let’s start with the question, “what is a cello”? During Bach’s lifetime, instruments called “violoncello” came in many sizes and formats, some with more than four strings. Some were even held at the chest or shoulder, with the support of a strap. Many cellists in Bach’s orbit would have used an underhand bow hold, which is very different from the overhand hold used today.

It’s impossible to know precisely which kind of instrument or playing style Bach might have had in mind (or if he even had a specific approach in mind). In the book, I tell the story of musicians beginning to rediscover the Cello Suites starting around the 1860s. As I researched their performance history, I’m struck how musicians have constantly reinvented new ways they can sound and different ideas for approaching them. For instance, many nineteenth-century musicians added piano accompaniment to “update” Bach’s music to suite their audience’s tastes!

Were there any tidbits that did not make it into the final manuscript that you’d like to share? 

There’s a very evocative description of a solo dancer dancing a sarabande that was published in a 1671 French–Latin dictionary by the Jesuit scholar François Pomey. It has been cited a lot because it’s such an uncommonly rich account, describing the dancer’s dramatic facial expressions, gestures, and so on. But in the course of my research, I learned that the musicologist Rose A. Pruiksma has discovered that this description was not based on an actual dancer witnessed by Pomey. Rather, it was plagiarized from a 1661 French novel by George de Scudéry.

Then there is the whole “controversy” about the claim that the Cello Suites were composed by J. S. Bach’s second wife, Anna Magdalena Bach, who was the scribe of an important manuscript copy of both the Cello Suites and the Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin. That claim got a lot of attention about a decade ago, but it’s been thoroughly debunked. Sometimes when you can run the risk of the so-called “boomerang effect, where fact checking a conspiracy theory can perversely have the effect of further spreading the conspiracy. So I left that out of the book and put my energy instead into highlighting the important roles many women have played in the history of the Cello Suites—as performers, transcribers, and teachers, just not as the composer!

Insider interview with pianist Kariné Poghosyan

On June 10, the award-winning Armenian-American pianist Kariné Poghosyan performs an all-Khachaturian recital at Carnegie Hall presented by the presented by The Permanent Mission of the Republic of Armenia to the United Nations. We spoke with her about the significance of Khachaturian’s music, her live-streamed recital series that earned her a loyal world-wide following, and more. Tickets to her June 10 recital are available at CarnegieHall.org.

You are performing a program entirely of music by the Armenian composer Aram Khachaturian on June 10 at Carnegie Hall. Tell us about the significance of his music in both his homeland and in 20th century music in general?

Aram Khachaturian once remarked “My whole life, everything that I have created belongs to the Armenian people.” To this day, he remains the heart of the musical life of my homeland! Our greatest concert hall in the capital Yerevan is named after him. He appears on postage stamps and banknotes. His music is an inseparable part of the Armenian DNA. Surprisingly (or perhaps not so surprisingly), I resisted his music while I was living in Yerevan up to the age of 18. I did not truly appreciate something that was just so very close by.

It was not until my mid- 20s in New York in fact, when I had to choose a topic for my doctoral thesis at the Manhattan School of Music, that I felt a calling to explore the rich world of Khachaturian’s music. Needless to say, I was swept off my feet and simply could not get enough of his work! After writing my thesis on Khachaturian’s Piano Works (which I soon hope to publish), I was engaged by the Naxos label to record my first commercial recording with his solo piano works and ballet transcriptions. What attracted me personally to his piano music is the fact that, unlike Chopin, Liszt or Rachmaninoff, not only was Khachaturian the dictionary definition of a late-bloomer, but he was never known as a particularly gifted pianist. And yet, he had such a phenomenal natural instinct for the instrument that his piano works feel so comfortable to play. In “pianist shop talk,” we simply would say, “it just feels good under the fingers.”

In spite of much hardship endured because of the Soviet government's restrictions and at times punishments, Khachaturian rose to the status of a global celebrity, traveling the world, having his work celebrated by the greatest orchestras and on the greatest stages, receiving the deep admiration from legends like Hemingway, Salvador Dali, and Charlie Chaplin. 

Khachaturian's story is that of a life-affirming optimist, whose music has filled listeners all around the world with his own joie de vivre. And for all Armenians around the world, he is a role model - a heroic and inspiring survivor, who made the world richer with his timeless work.

As an Armenian-American pianist, what special insights do you bring to this music? You regularly perform Khachaturian’s music around the world. Tell us how his music is received in different parts of the world.

It has been an absolute joy to see the warmest response to the piano music of Khachaturian wherever I have performed it around the world. He is truly a universal composer - his writing is so intuitive, so human, allowing the listener to reconnect to something very core-level within them, whether it is their most vulnerable gentleness or deep inner rigor and power! I have seen audiences of every imaginable origin truly connect to this music and then react with such energy at the end, which has only inspired me to pursue the goal to play incredible music more and more, in as many different parts of the world as I possibly can!

Your repertoire goes far beyond Khachaturian’s music, of course, covering the range of Baroque to 20th-century eras. This year you are in the midst of a monthly recital series with a brilliant concept: Each month your program focuses on a different key; twelve notes, twelve months. Tell us how you came up with this idea and how the series evolves as the year progresses.

This truly groundbreaking project began as a small-scale, exclusively virtual performance for my Patreon members, a global audience tuning in live on Zoom. The very first broadcast in January 2021 was a humble endeavor from my New York apartment, on my 100-year-old Boston Chickering piano, the only technology being my own MacBook Air. I had invested in a proper microphone, but in the hurry of preparations, I used the wrong USB cord and later discovered to my horror that I had plugged in the printer and not the microphone. Thankfully, the grateful audience forgave the technical limitations, and with each recital my monthly viewership grew. 

In 2023, I upgraded the broadcasts to performances from various small concert venues around the city, and since 2024, thanks to securing the support and funding from AGBU and Seta Nazarian, who is supporting the concert series in memory of her mother Artemis Nazarian, as well as Marlene Yerevanian, I was able to accomplish an extraordinary dream and reformat the series into full-scale multi-camera professional broadcasts with top sound engineers.

Without a doubt, my monthly concert series are one of my proudest artistic achievements. These inspirational, innovative monthly events bring together music-lovers for three different experiences – the unique live performances, a chance to learn more about the music and composers, but above all, the feeling of togetherness as they connect with each other in the community. In my own way, I wanted to create a similar experience to Leonard Bernstein’s Young Peoples’ Concerts, except mine would be for people of all ages and backgrounds, tuning in on Zoom from all over the world on the last Sunday each month to experience the joy of live music. My vision is to expand their reach and perhaps be able to present them via PBS or NPR one day.

One of the most inspiring aspects of my monthly series is the degree of artistic freedom and creativity I get to have. I choose a unique fascinating theme each year. In 2022 the theme was Musical Time Travels, inspired by my own geeky sci-fi interests and a book/film script I am working on. Last year, I did several mini-series including a 4-concert “Vienna” series with Schubert, Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven programs in each, and then followed by a 4-concert “Chopin” series. This year, I feel had a particularly inspired theme with my “12 Notes!” The amount of music I prepare and therefore the amount of work I have to put in to not only practice and perform, but also coordinate and curate all of the production elements sometimes feels nearly superhuman. Yet, on June 27, 2025 I am preparing to perform my 53rd consecutive monthly recital broadcast, and I cannot be more excited!

During your journey as a concert pianist, what has been a particularly inspiring vision or motto you have come back to?

I was interviewed by The Washington Post a few years back, in which I shared a very special memory from my childhood in Yerevan. As a little girl at around the age of 6, I would place one of my doll cases just so I could see my fingers moving in the reflection of the piano and then ask my Mom to put on an old LP record of the legendary Emil Gilels playing the Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven. I would then proceed to pretend to play it myself, as I would mimic the finger movements I imagined Gilels making during his performance. 

Every time in my life when I have a tough day, and my self-belief is extra low, I remind myself of this really peculiar but - what I later came to realize- rather extraordinary phenomenon! There were no pianists in my family! No one was forcing me as a little girl to do this, in fact I had not even started serious piano studies at this point. Yet, I just somehow had the inner need to do these “pretend” performances....really, the very definition of a “Calling”. Then I see that little 6-year-old Kariné look at all the amazing things I am doing now as a pianist and just be over-the-moon happy! 

Insider interview with Jumaane Smith

Baruch Performing Arts Center is in the final stretch of its wide-ranging 2024-25 concert season. On May 16, 2025 at 7:30 pm, jazz trumpeter, vocalist, and composer Jumaane Smith brings his quartet to the hall David Letterman once called "delightful." Smith has performed on 5 GRAMMY-winning records (selling more than 60 million copies), 2 Emmy-nominated TV performances, the GRAMMY Awards with Stevie Wonder, in Steven Spielberg’s "West Side Story," and more. For the last 18 years, he's toured with Michael Bublé as lead trumpeter and featured vocalist.

In this insider interview, we spoke to Smith about studying with Wynton Marsalis, working with legendary artists, and more.

Tell us a bit about your early musical experiences, growing up in Seattle. How did that inform the musician you are today?

My early musical experiences not only shaped the musician I am today, but it’s safe to say that it shaped the person I’ve become and provided refuge at a time when it was most needed. There was a strong musical community in Seattle, particularly where jazz is concerned. My high school had an incredible jazz program and that is how I found the trumpet, and a passion that was much needed during some difficult times.

You went on to study under Wynton Marsalis with a full scholarship to Juilliard’s jazz studies program. What was the biggest lesson you learned studying with him?

Wynton was one of those teachers – very tough, but in the best way. I learned discipline, for sure. There’s no putting into words the level of craft that he showed me as well.

They say don’t meet your heroes, but with the list of names you’ve performed with - including Stevie Wonder, Quincy Jones, and Aretha Franklin – it’s possible that you have had this experience many of times. How do you prepare for something like that?

The best thing I can say is the best way to prepare for something like that is…to prepare! Nothing impresses people more than showing respect for their work. I remember coming to a rehearsal with Stevie Wonder and he was sure we were going to need a long rehearsal to get the music right. The musicians came so prepared that we went through it once and he was so surprised to say we were ready!

How would you describe the style of your own projects and compositions? Who are your influences?

I enjoy playing so many styles of music, but my 2024 album, “Come on Home,” comprised mostly of my original tunes, has a souljazz and funk sound, with a good dose of the blues. That’s what I’m feeling right now and I’m getting some great feedback on it. I love to listen to a wide range of artists but I’ll stick with the ones you might expect for my main influences! Louis Armstrong, Nat King Cole, Ray Charles…

Insider interview with Grammy award winning fiddler Mark O'Connor

On April 25, the three-time Grammy-award winning multi-instrumentalist Mark O’Connor brings his “Beethoven and Bluegrass” program to Carnegie Hall. Joining him onstage are the Vega Quartet and bluegrass musician Maggie O’Connor. The Vega Quartet performs Beethoven’s String Quartet Op. 95 and O’Connor’s String Quartet No. 2; Mark and Maggie play bluegrass duos; and all six string players come together to play O’Connor’s famous “Appalachia Waltz.”

We spoke to him about this special program, composing a modern-day classic, and so much more. Tickets to the April 25 concert at Carnegie Hall, presented by Emory Chamber Music Society of Atlanta, available here.

You’re well known as a fiddler, and you’re also a composer of concert music. Tell us a bit about your training. Which genre came first and how do you balance the two?  

This answer will be nearly as complex as your question! In brief, I began with classical guitar instruction at six and studied in this manner until adding fiddle instruction five years later at age 11. I delved into all of the bluegrass instruments as a multi-instrumentalist at that time, including the change from classical finger-style on a nylon-string guitar, to steel-string with a flat-pick. By age 14, I added jazz music studies and began to compose progressive string band type music. After stints with great internationally-known instrumental bands and a session-playing career in Nashville on the fiddle, guitar and mandolin, I returned to the classical music setting for my compositional output wholeheartedly. I composed string quartets, trios, duos, solos, piano trios, orchestral symphonies, suites, nine concertos and more.

How does Beethoven fit into the “Beethoven and Bluegrass” program? That is, how is his music complementary to bluegrass music?

The 11th string quartet (Op. 95) by Beethoven will be performed, as well as my own 2nd string quartet subtitled “bluegrass.” These two pieces will make up half of the program, performed by the wonderful Vega Quartet. The connection of Beethoven to bluegrass music here is principally through my string quartet compositions—with Beethoven being the key inspiration to my own quartet writing even though my music is wholly American music. Mine takes the form of a new style and sound that listeners will not have heard before, but its compositional complexity in form, texture and characteristic setting makes for a remarkable pairing that surprises most everyone by how well it works. To this day, it even surprises me frankly as we’ve repeated the program many times because audiences have loved this unique offering. Rather than a classical music style of string-playing that Beethoven’s music demands, my quartet music compels the musicians to utilize a modernistic musical language and playing techniques that I uncover from my own progressive bluegrass music experiences. This kind of playing instructs my themes and development in the compositions. Audiences pick up on an exciting contrast that exists across 200 years and 2 continents, played by exactly the same four instruments.

Part of this program features you performing duos with your wife Maggie. What are the challenges (and rewards!) of performing as a duo, without a band?  

The duo with my wife Maggie is something we’ve been honing since we met 10 years ago. It first began with just the two fiddles performing my duo compositions. We created an electrifying blend on the originals and for my arrangements of American classics. Given our predisposition for musical exploration, we began to reach further within our duo setting, and this was the challenge you ask about. We wanted to keep growing the duo. We added back into the picture my guitar and mandolin playing I had ignored for years. Then we began to sing more. Maggie’s is an authentic Americana story-telling voice, so it inspired me to write more music. Not just string music but vocal songs. Maggie even plays hand percussion on one of our tunes, and her percussive “chopping” on the violin feels like a whole rhythm section when I solo. We’ve quite literally created a full band out of our duo in performance. For us and our audiences, it is quite the musical journey we’ve taken together across these last ten years. We just kept reaching for more.

The program ends with you and Maggie joining forces with the Vega Quartet for your work “Appalachia Waltz.” This piece is your timeless modern-day classic you composed for Yo-Yo Ma. You must have played this one a thousand times by now.

Likely more than that. “Appalachia Waltz” is now 30-years-old, and I don’t doubt I’ve performed it a hundred times a year. So try three-thousand times! Yo-Yo himself may have played it a thousand times by now! He loves to play this music. Yes, it is extremely lucky that my most famous piece, is also my favorite to play. With composers and songwriters, it is sometimes not the case! But for me, it’s special each time. There is a sense of mystery or intrigue about the music that people pick up on. Where is it coming from, is a common response I think. It sounds to some like a modern-day spiritual. And I think there is a bridge that connects, because you can’t help but feel both nostalgic and optimistic at the same time. It’s quite a splendid moment to hear the Vega string quartet join us for this rendition in the program. Sometimes we’ll comment on how emotional it makes us feel. But most of the time, we just let the music fill the air and see the audience welcome what they hear and take this sensitivity home with them.

Insider Interview with Polish Chamber Orchestra manager Janusz Marynowski

The Polish Chamber Orchestra is on tour across the United States with versatile violinist Daniel Hope, "the most exciting British string player since Jacqueline du Pré" (New York Times). The "Journey to Mozart" program includes violin concertos by Haydn and Mozart, Haydn's Symphony No. 49 in F minor 'La passione,' and works by Gluck and the Polish composer Wojciech Kilar. Performances are February 23-March 2 in Vero Beach, FL; West Palm Beach, FL; Atlanta, GA; and Beaver Creek, CO. We spoke with PCO manager Janusz Marynowski about the orchestra’s rich history, the upcoming tour, Polish culture, and more.

As manager of Polish Chamber Orchestra, what are your primary duties and/or goals?

The Polish Chamber Orchestra is an orchestra of great tradition, and as the manager of this ensemble, I consider it my primary task to nurture its 50-year heritage, always ensuring projects and performances of the highest artistic standard. We are a large, independent cultural institution of the capital city of Warsaw, the heart of which is the Sinfonia Varsovia symphony orchestra formed by extending the PCO's chamber ensemble. In addition, we manage several chamber ensembles made up of the orchestra's musicians. However, our activities do not end there. We run an orchestra academy for young musicians, implement a number of educational programmes for little music lovers, organise activities for the local community, and host two major music festivals in Warsaw: La Folle Journée de Varsovie and Sinfonia Varsovia To Its City. The orchestra is very active in Poland and abroad, playing around 70 concerts a year, more than half of them outside Poland. We also make recordings, with over 340 albums in our catalogue of excellent labels. Sinfonia Varsovia is also an investor in the construction of a music complex in Warsaw with the largest concert hall in Poland. Ultimately, we will have four concert halls: the main hall with 1,877 seats, smaller hall with 400 seats and two chamber halls, as well as several halls for educational activities.

Tell me how your role with the orchestra has changed over the years, from your time as a performer to now as the manager.

I started working there in 1987, as a double bass musician. At the time, my job was solely to play the double bass. I remember this period as a period of eternal happiness, because being on stage and performing pieces of music together with my orchestra was the greatest form of expression possible for me, it was one hundred per cent artistic freedom on stage. 21 years ago, the orchestra offered me the position of orchestra manager, and after a year of holding the position of both a musician and a manager, I had to decide to devote all my time to the role of a manager. Since then, I have been involved in administering the institution and charting new courses of action. As a result, I unfortunately no longer have time to play the instrument. My life made a 180° turn and sometimes I really miss being a musician, playing in an orchestra. 

How do the Polish Chamber Orchestra musicians, repertoire and performances reflect Polish culture?

From its first concert, the orchestra's repertoire included works by Polish composers such as Grażyna Bacewicz and Andrzej Panufnik. We continue this tradition of performing works by Polish composers. This is a very important part of our repertoire, as the orchestra considers itself to be an ambassador of Polish culture around the world. We are happy to have the chance to present during our upcoming US tour an absolutely phenomenal piece: "Orawa" by Wojciech Kilar, which was written specifically for the Polish Chamber Orchestra. He is a composer known in the US rather as the creator of soundtracks for films such as "Dracula" and "The Pianist". We hope that this piece by a Polish composer in particular will appeal to American audiences. Poland has a long and turbulent revolutionary history, as evidenced by names such as Pułaski and Kościuszko, who also had their contributions to US history. In the world of classical music, the PCO managed by Jerzy Maksymiuk was at its beginnings an equally revolutionary phenomenon, playing expressively and quickly, with the highest technical precision. This was before the wider public got accustomed to playing this way.

Polish Chamber Orchestra has not toured the United States in nearly 20 years.

• What are you most looking forward to on this tour?

• What do you expect to be challenging or difficult about this tour? 

• How do you expect it will be different than your last U.S. tour in 2006?

Twenty years is a long time, many young musicians have joined the ensemble, some have retired. This has a huge impact on the sound of the ensemble, on its identity. We hope, however, that we have retained that original energy and style. I wish for it to sit well with audiences who, after all, have also changed a lot over the years and have a different sensibility. Above all, we are looking forward to meeting them, the wonderful American listeners who have given us such an excellent reception in the past.

I see one particular difficulty this tour faces. I mean the concert in Beaver Creek, which is about 2,500 m above sea level, and in Warsaw we are not used to such high altitudes. Rysy, Poland's highest peak, is exactly 2499 m above sea level. I even found out that special oxygen bottles are being sold at the Beaver Creek shops to help with the symptoms of altitude sickness. We need to investigate this matter thoroughly, as our oboists have reported that there may be problems with their reeds at such a high altitude. 

We are very happy to be performing with such a great artist as Daniel Hope, I have known him for three decades by the way.
He is a world-class artist who belongs among the great stars playing with the Polish Chamber Orchestra, such as Yehudi Menuhin, James Galway, Gidon Kremer, Maxim Vengerov....

What else would you like us to know about you and the PCO?

As for me, I have been in love with the orchestra for 38 years. It used to be my dream to exchange at least a few words with a musician of this very orchestra, so I am very proud to come to you with this ensemble. The Polish Chamber Orchestra has always prided itself on the highest quality of artistic performance, the precision of chamber music. The credit goes, of course, to its creator, the legendary Jerzy Maksymiuk. 

What is coming up next for the Polish Chamber Orchestra?

On our return from the USA with the full symphonic ensemble, Sinfonia Varsovia, we will perform at the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg and in Istanbul with the legendary violinist Pinchas Zukerman, with whom we have the pleasure of working recently. And in the autumn, a tour in Japan with the legendary Marta Argerich and Ivo Pogorelić.

Insider Interview with Vision Duo

Vision Duo (violinist Ariel Horowitz and percussionist Britton-René Collins) perform classical works with a contemporary twist. On March 5, 2025 the duo makes their Baruch PAC recital debut with a wide-ranging program that includes Bizet/Hubay’s Carmen Fantasy, Misty by the jazz pianist Erroll Garner, music by Piazzolla, Vision’s own Horowitz, and others. We spoke to Horowitz and Collins about the unique combination of violin and marimba, the upcoming program, and expanding their repertoire. 

I can’t think of a single piece of classical music written for your unique combination of instruments. What the heck were you thinking when you created this duo? 

Britton-René Collins: Our duo was formed during the pandemic, at a time where many musicians were experimenting and planning for the return of live music performance. We had only known each other through social media, and admired one another’s work. It just made sense for us, as like-minded creatives, to join together and collaborate in a meaningful way. 

How do you balance the difference in timbres and volume between the violin and percussion?  

Ariel Horowitz: We love the dichotomy between the instruments and their vastly different soundworlds, and we enjoy leaning into that – a violin will never sound like a marimba, and vice versa, so it’s very fun to enjoy all of the variety of soundworlds that we can craft together.  

BRC: Although the pairing of a western classical instrument with a modern percussion instrument originating from West Africa could be considered atypical, the violin and marimba blend seamlessly together. Many existing works in the violin/marimba duo repertoire were commissioned by the group “Marimolin” over the span of several decades. Having commissioned, composed, and premiered new works for our duo’s instrumentation together, we share a passion for contributing to the growing body of violin and percussion repertoire. 

Tell us about your program at Baruch PAC? There are many new works, some arrangements and a work by you, Ariel. How did you put together this program?  

AH: We’re so excited for our program at Baruch PAC! Our program, Moxie, is kind of like a musical charcuterie board: we hope there can be something for everyone. We enjoy a variety of styles of music, both as performers and listeners, so our programming reflects our eclectic tastes. You’ll hear music from Blues to Jazz to Opera to Baroque Classical to Indie, and you might even hear some music that we improvise together on the spot: another great passion of ours.  

BRC: The inspiration behind our program came naturally, as our friendship formed through our shared love of multi-genre music. Through our versatile programming, we hope that audiences of all demographics might be able to identify and connect with our performances. 

It appears that all the works that weren’t written for you are an arrangement. What’s your process for picking pieces and making these arrangements? 

AH: Britt and I have a ton of songs that we love for various reasons – musically, lyrically, aesthetically, or the song is significant to one or the other of us (often both)! Usually, from there, we start from improvisation – we rarely write down our arrangements, but enjoy coming up with our tunes through a collaborative jam session.  

Ariel, could you tell us a bit about your work? 

AH: Solitude is a song I originally created back in my own college days, so it feels quite fitting to be able to share it for students in that stage of early adulthood at Baruch PAC. I was quite lonely in those days, though I was surrounded constantly by lots of people. A lot was going wrong in my life at the time, too, so I came up with a mantra: “I am in Solitude but I’m not lonely”. I was improvising a lot on my own in private those days, and singing a lot by myself, too. Through a lot of improvisation processes, including a rather public one in front of a panel at an audition (a story for another time, haha!), the song evolved into what it is now. I’m so glad to get to share this song with my dearest friend Britt as a duo, now, and this song features on my recently released album, Hearth!  

Insider Interview with soprano/pianist Chelsea Guo

On March 6, Baruch Performing Arts Center presents the award-winning musician Chelsea Guo. Equally talented as both a pianist and soprano, Guo will accompany herself in a program that features arias by Rossini, Donizetti, Chopin, and more. We spoke to her about the upcoming recital program, self-accompaniment, and future engagements (including time in Vienna!).

Very few artists can competently accompany themselves on piano. What are the challenges for you to play piano while singing? What are the rewards?

Performing songs self-accompanied feels like a privilege every time I have the chance to do it onstage. It allows me complete spontaneity, flexibility of breath, and freedom for phrasing and expression. Of course, it comes with many technical challenges, the biggest one being independence of the vocal and pianistic mechanisms. While they move together, I need to take special care to preserve the technical aspects that keep the voice supported while also leaning into my finger/foot muscle memory to make sure I'm bringing the right touch and sound to the piano (especially because I can't hear the piano very well while I'm singing). There's a verticality to the physical action of playing the piano that both needs to counteract and support the spin of the voice. But, once all that gets worked through in practice, the result is always worth it to me.

When learning a new piece do you start by learning the vocal part, or the piano part?

I start learning a self-accompanied song by learning both parts completely independently - as if I'm preparing to sing or play them alone. 

You perform a wide variety of styles of music. How do you go about constructing a program?

Constructing programs is the most exciting and most challenging part. There is so much crossover between the vocal and piano literature - so many ideas and connections to explore. The challenge is that I can get a bit too excited about a concept and have to remind myself to keep the audience experience in mind. When I'm programming many styles of music in one concert, I try to keep a common thread going, so either a personal narrative or a musical or intellectual connection.

How did you first get interested in music? At what point did you realize it would be your career?

I was always enamored with music and loved my piano lessons as a kid. I especially loved the storytelling aspect of music, as my mother would come up with narratives to connect me to the piano pieces I was learning. I told her around the age of 11 that I wanted to be a concert pianist. Eventually, I started taking voice lessons to better improve my understanding of piano music, and that ended up becoming part of my path as well. It's been an incredible journey that has led me to a deeper love of this art form every day that I do it!

Later this season, you’ll be spending some time in Vienna as a studio member of the Volksoper Wien. How did this opportunity come about? What you expect you’ll experience while you are there?

This past summer, I was in the studio of Wolf Trap Opera, getting my first taste of opera, when I received an email from the head of the studio at Volksoper Wien. I genuinely thought it was a spam email (why would they know about me?) until I re-read it and it hit me that it was real - they had heard of my name through a wonderful cellist I had worked with previously, seen my videos online, and were inviting me to come audition in Vienna. One thing led to another, and I'm moving there shortly after I perform at Baruch PAC! I'm really excited for my first role there, which is as Mab/Adelaide in The Enchanted Pig by Jonathan Dove, and some others coming up include Papagena in Die Zauberflöte, Barbarina in Le Nozze di Figaro, and Frasquita in Carmen, among other fun assignments. I expect it will be very busy time and a totally new experience, but I'll still be coming back in between productions to perform recitals and concerts in the States. 

Insider interview with percussionist Michael Yeung

Percussionist Michael Yeung is winner of the prestigious Susan Wadsworth International Auditions by Young Concert Artists. He has toured the world as a soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral performer. On January 27 at Baruch Performing Arts Center in Manhattan, Yeung performs a solo recital with an adventurous program featuring arrangements of classics including Debussy's Rêverie and a lute suite by J.S. Bach to Xenakis' 20th-century solo percussion staple Rebonds A and B. We spoke with Yeung about the upcoming recital, the history of the marimba, note perfect performances, and why Georges Aperghis’s Le Corps à Corp is a one-of-a-kind experience for both performer and listener.

How did you choose percussion as your primary instrument?  

“This kid has good rhythm,” – a chance comment my mother overheard from my kindergarten piano teacher. The Hong Kong Percussion Center had just opened in the same year, led by the then recently retired principal percussionist of the Hong Kong Philharmonic, Dr. Lung Heung-wing. That was how things fell into place. Every Saturday evening from the time I was age 6 to 16, I would head to Wan Chai, walk 15 minutes from the subway station, and be in sort of Percussive Disneyland for an hour.  

Against a corner of the room, two rows of djembes lined the bottom of a long shelf, the top of which was crowded with various sound-making knick-knacks: Agogo bells, whirly tubes, caxixis, tuned desk bells, and on and on. In another corner was a phalanx of keyboards: a xylophone, a glockenspiel, a vibraphone, and above all the marimba, which was a Yamaha YM-6100, a glorious five octave instrument with a luxurious sound. I treasured my time there every week. There were no questions asked when, later on, I dropped piano for percussion.  

At what point did you realize that you were interested in music as a career?  

Well, I was always intrigued and interested by the idea (who wouldn’t be if you lived in a Percussive Disneyland every Saturday?), but it was two very difficult pieces that I came across in secondary school that gave me the confidence to keep pursuing music. The first was the xylophone part in James L. Hosay’s Persis Overture, notorious for having the xylophone double the woodwinds in passages with continuous strings of sixteenth notes. So many notes, coming at you so quickly, which you would have to execute without room for error – the xylophone could be heard very prominently over the top of the band. I felt peer-pressured into perfection. The recording of one of our performances is still up on YouTube – to this day more than a decade later, it is still one of the remarkably few “note perfect” performances in my life.   

A few years later, Joseph Schwantner’s Velocities was pretty much the same thing – a continuous string of sixteenth notes – but nine minutes long, four mallets instead of two, and everything dialed up to eleven. I reveled in the challenge and absorbed the piece like a fish in water. Looking back, both these experiences really were as simple as they were formative – proof that I was good at what I do.  

What are the challenges of programming and playing a solo percussion recital?  

A big challenge is that there simply has not been as much music written for us in comparison with say, the piano or the violin. Let’s take marimba music as an example. Some of our oldest pieces came from Japan, commissioned and premiered by the legendary Keiko Abe, over the course of three marimba recitals between 1968-71. That’s just a half century ago. In the States, the National Endowment for the Arts’ solo marimba commission in 1986, merely four decades ago, bore fruit three of the very first and very best pieces for the instrument – one of which was Velocities. And so, nearly all the repertoire for a concert marimbist (besides arrangements) comes from the 21st or the second half of the 20th century – there is no “classical” or “romantic” “tradition” to speak of for the marimba. We face similar challenges to a classical saxophonist. 

1986 was also the year when the modern concert marimba, in its five-octave incarnation, was first built. It was in Japan, by the Yamaha company with guidance from Abe herself. Yamaha, of course, also makes pianos, so imagine if the first grand piano Yamaha made was not in 1902, but three quarters of a century later. In fact, the concept of a “concert marimba” arguably only came up when Guatemalan marimbas attracted the attention of American instrument makers in the Panama International Exposition of 1915 in San Francisco. Another analogy is to imagine Cristofori’s invention of the fortepiano not in 1700, but in 1900; the piano world would be two centuries behind where it is currently. Hopefully this gives an idea of how much the percussion profession is still in its nascency. 

Tell us more about your program at Baruch PAC. How did you select this music, and what connects the pieces?  

I am bringing a healthy mixture of the classical and the contemporary. Again, much of percussion music comes from modern times, and these pieces by Xenakis, Hurel, and Aperghis act as the backbone of my program and an authentic overview to my profession. Interspersed are arrangements of Bach, Debussy, and John Cage, and I use these pieces from the canon of classical music to display the capabilities of keyboard percussion as a fresh, new canvas for these familiar works. 

One idiosyncrasy for percussion programming is that we need to consider not only the music itself, but also the flexibility and ease of the set up for all the equipment that would have to be on stage. Part of what I love about the second half in this program is the simplicity of accomplishing that goal, of connecting each piece with the next with a subtle and elegant walk towards each next instrument, in hopes of never distracting the audience from the music-making experience.   

Your program ends with Georges Aperghis’s Le Corps à Corps, which features vocals. Could you tell us about that piece? What’s it like to perform? What are the lyrics about?  

Le corps is wonderful! I cannot exaggerate how much I swear by this work, it is truly a one-of-a-kind experience both for the performer and the listener. Its text seemingly describes a scene of a horrific accident at a motorcycle race, in a stream-of-consciousness retelling that blurs and disorients the listener’s perception of the tale. To perform Le corps is to be both the story’s narrator and its protagonist, to pour blood, sweat, and tears into a maximally physical effort – it is a virtuosic agility course for my voice, for my body, and of course for my fingers on the zarb, a Persian goblet drum that I had to learn from scratch for this piece, a drum that frames the entire affair. So much drama is drawn from this instrument, and the musical score itself is already an exercise in coordination and concentration. You will see and hear me flitting between playing my zarb, conveying Aperghis’ text, enacting the drama, and diverting the attention of the audience, towards and between these many different moving parts. It is always incredibly rewarding, and incredibly exhausting. I hope people like it. 

Tickets for the January 27 concert are available bpac.baruch.cuny.edu.

Insider Interview with Edward Smaldone

Composer Edward Smaldone blends influences from the worlds of twelve tone music, jazz, and extramusical realms like architecture and poetry. His new album of world premiere recordings “What no one else sees…” (New Focus #fcr425) is performed by some top European ensembles, including the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Denmark's Royal Life Guards Music Band, the Brno Philharmonic, and Opus Zoo. The album features two programmatic orchestral works, a clarinet concerto, piano concerto, and a woodwind quintet.

In this extensive interview with the composer, we spoke with Smaldone about the new album, his journey from playing in professional rock bands to writing for top European ensembles, first impressions, and so much more.

The works on this album are performed entirely by European artists. How did you first connect with the Scottish RSO, the pianist Niklas Sivelöv and some of the others? 

There were two “threads” that lead to this CD being completely performed by European artists.  The first was a Student Exchange program I arranged with the Royal Danish Conservatory of Music in Copenhagen, while I was Director of the Copland School of Music in New York. There were visits from students and faculty in both directions, and I got to know both Søren-Filip Brix Hansen and Niklas Sivelöv. 

In 2010  Søren-Filip Brix Hansen was an exchange student, studying clarinet at the Aaron Copland School of Music (with Charlies Neidich). It was soon after Søren-Filip returned to Copenhagen that he was named the concertmaster of the Royal Lifeguard Ensemble.  We stayed in touch (I had written other pieces for him) and we hit upon the idea of a concerto for him to celebrate his new appointment. Covid delayed the premiere, (originally scheduled for March 2020!)  but we finally gave the premiere as part of the KLANG! Festival in Copenhagen, in June 2021 (under rather strict Covid conditions). We recorded it at that time, and it was the first piece of the puzzle.

Niklas Sivelöv was another contact I had made during various visits to Copenhagen. I was invited to compose a new piece for the League of Composers Orchestra for a New York Premiere at the Miller Theater at Columbia University.  I had suggested once to Niklas that “I should write you a concerto” and he foolishly answered “Sure.”   I wrote the piece in 2019 and 2020, but that performance was also delayed by Covid. The premiere was in New York City in May 2023 and we recorded it in Glasgow in 2024.

The second thread extends from Douglas Knehans and Mikel Toms, two wonderful musicians I have known for a while.  Douglas Knehans is a fine composer and good friend I have known for 30 years.  When he started his record label (Albaze) I was happy to participate in several recording sessions in Brno and Glasgow. Among these were Beauty of Innuendo in Brno  and June 2011 in Glasgow, both of which were previously released on compilations on Ablaze.  I’m re-issuing them here so that they are on this album with the two new concerti.

The final work on the CD comes from another offhand comment, this time by Søren-Filip, who asked “do you have anything for woodwind quintet?” There is nothing a composer likes more than being “asked to dance.”  I wrote the piece for his group in 2023, they performed it about a half-dozen times in Denmark and in New York, and then recorded a live performance in Denmark in 2024, which we have included on the CD. 

Having assembled all these European performances, (the last one in May 2024), I brought all the music to the Westchester studio of the incomparable Grammy winning recording engineer and editor Silas Brown) in Summer 2024, and made ready for release in December on New Focus.

In short, the European threads were like a series of long fishing lines laid out over a number of years, that finally came together back in New York!

You wrote your piano concerto Prendendo Fuoco (Catching Fire) specifically for the Swedish pianist, Niklas Sivelöv as soloist. The Danish clarinetist Søren-Filip Brix Hansen was the inspiration for your concerto for clarinet and wind orchestra Murmurations.  

What are the rewards – and challenges – of writing a work with a specific artist in mind; and for these artists specifically?

These two concerti are among four I have written, each time for a specific soloist.  I have also been fortunate to have written quite a number of chamber pieces where I have known exactly for whom I am writing.  This is my preferred way of working.  (Actually, I can’t think of a single piece I have ever written that was not for a specific performance and performers in mind.) 

When the musicians are both close colleagues and friends I have the opportunity to “customize” the piece in ways that fit both the personality of the performer and the special strengths that each one has.  In the case of Søren-Filip, he has a beautiful sound and can play meltingly seductive lines. He is also able to play brilliant rhythmic lines and generate excitement.  I sought to capture both of these qualities in the piece.

Niklas Sivelöv is a brilliant technician, and also a master improviser. I wanted to give him plenty to chew on (I was astounded when first hearing him play some of the passages.  In some cases, which I thought were near the edge of playability, he just tossed them off like it was nothing.)  But I also wanted to give him passages where he could “bend” things a bit, to make it sound like he was actually improvising (though, I assure you, every note is written out!). There are quite a few places in the piece where there are complex rhythms and challenging ensemble coordination. The idea was to create the kind of rhythmic fluidity that one often finds in improvised textures.  Niklas had no trouble navigating these moments.   

These two musicians did an amazing job, but there is always the challenge that these “bespoke” pieces might not fit the skill set of other musicians.  We’ll see!  I’m hopeful that we’ll get additional performances as time goes by, and I’ll be happy to hear other musicians put a personal stamp on them. In a sense I’m like a tailor who gets out his scissors as soon as there is a customer in the store.

Talk about the title track, What no one else sees … for woodwind quintet. To me, it has the most programmatic-sounding title on the album, yet it’s the only composition on the collection that you say is completely abstract. 

I write music as an abstract expression.  In fact, in every case, the titles of these compositions (and all of my others!) were decided sometime in the midst of composition.  There are not any of my compositions where I start with a non-musical idea, and then write the piece.  It is always the other way around. I know there are composers who can decide “I’m writing about a particular character, or story,” and then set to work.  I don’t.

The way I work is by manipulating sound (harmonies, rhythms, melodies, instrumentation, tempo, etc.) most often through improvisation at the piano or the guitar.  When I find something I like I write it down. Sometimes I record my improvisations so I can go back and “mine” them for good ideas, without breaking the flow of improvisation.  

Once I find something useful, (a chord, a rhythm, a melody, a gesture) and write it down, I can determine the structural details of an improvisatory fragment and find the building blocks that will allow it to grow into an actual musical idea and ultimately grow into a piece.  In this process, the creation is quite intuitive and abstract and only much later does a title emerge.

Each of the pieces on this CD (and most of my compositions, in general) got their titles when the piece was more than 50% completed. While I was composing the Woodwind Quintet, for example,  I was also reading a book about creativity by the pop music producer, Rick Rubin. The music Rubin is known for producing is vastly different from what I do, but his book was an interesting stream of consciousness manifesto of ideas about music and creativity.  There was an idea in the book I came upon that articulated something I have acknowledged for a long time: until the creative artist makes the thing, the thing does not exist. (Yes, obvious, I know…)  As Ruben expressed it, the creative artist needs to see “What no one else sees.”  I decided to let this title stand as an expression of the spirit of how I create. To me, the musical materials and how they interact make a fascinating story all their own and don’t need a programmatic “meaning” to justify them.  I’m a big fan of abstract art: (color, line, contrast, perspective, but no story!) and this piece celebrates the abstract elements of music (melody, rhythm, harmony, dynamics, register, articulation, etc.) in their purest form.

You recently retired after 35 years on faculty at the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College. How does the academic side of your career inform the composition side; and vice versa? 

The academic side of my career was primarily taken up with teaching music theory, ear training, music appreciation, and orchestration, with a few composition students and classes sprinkled in along the way.  I love talking about the intricacies of music so I really loved my time in the classroom. It was a joy to be the person who opened the ears and minds of students, hearing and understanding the mechanics of music for the first time. 

I always felt that my compositions were a combination of intense “technical” aspects of combining sounds (like the things one discusses in Theory Class), the nitty gritty details “under the hood” that make the music of the masters “click.”  But composing is not the same as analyzing.  You can’t get bogged down with these details.  Like someone who designs a sports car,  you need to know the mechanics and engineering at every level, or the car won’t work.  But you also need to understand the end user experience, or the car won’t be fun to drive. I think these different aspects are equally important for me as an artist. I have spent a great deal of time fussing over the minutiae of music theory at every level, and I often spend a long time trying to find just the right chord, melody or musical gesture for a moment in a piece.  But all that matters once a piece of music starts to fill the air is that end user experience.  The sports car driver (like the listener) does not need to understand the mechanics of engineering, but it is those mechanics (and a little magic) that brings it all together.

Another important part of my academic career came from the rewarding experiences as the leader of 7 different Study Abroad projects.  These were in England and Italy and were primarily focused on composition and performance projects.  In each case, we landed in a foreign country, started writing music, and gave a concert 3 or 4 weeks later, featuring our own performances of that original music. In each case, the students wrote music for the instruments we had among the students taking the course. It was a joyous microcosm of the working composer’s life: get a date, pick the musicians you are writing for, and then make it happen.  I’m still in touch with some of those students who tell me how instructive those experiences were. (One of them is writing operas and ballets across Europe at the moment!)

Tell us about your roots as a rock musician, and how that influences your work as a composer of concert music.  

My journey from rock musician to concert music composer happened over the course of 12 years, from the time I was a Freshman in College to earning a Ph.D.  Prior to college and during my undergraduate days, I played guitar and sang in several professional rock bands playing the music of the Allman Brothers, Chicago, Blood Sweat and Tears, Tower of Power and others. I later played in wedding bands (with an array of astounding New York freelance musicians) playing the popular music of the 1930s through the 1970s.  When I arrived at College, despite all this experience, I could barely read music.  The time I spent as an improvising musician, figuring things out by ear, following other musicians and playing without a score, did much to inform the musician I became as I later learned the specifics of music theory, analysis, notation, and music history in College. I have been convinced for a long time that the intuitive skills I leaned on at the beginning are still an essential part of my profile as a composer.   The music I write relies both on the technical things I learned as a music student and the intuitive musician I have always been. I remember learning that one of the things that Schenker admired was the “sweep of improvisation.” It was through this that a notated composition achieved unity.  The ability to make something that is so carefully prepared seem like it just sprang from the air is the magic of a great composition, like the way that the very best acting, be it on the stage or on film, simply convinces you that the characters are real and living each moment in real time.  I keep trying to achieve that

What else would you like us to know about you? 

Throughout my compositional career I have sought to create exciting and detailed musical landscapes. I am aware of the old adage that “you only get one chance to make a first impression.”  My goal is always to find a way to make that first impression one that draws in the listener. But an additional challenge is (in my opinion) to make things rich enough in detail, so that every detail is not obvious from a single hearing.  What I try to do is create an inviting surface that has lots of detail and invites additional listening.  I’m also a huge fan of architecture, so I want the large outlines of my music to be plain and clear.  I like strong cadences that divide the musical landscape into manageable “chunks” and then the “chunks” need to add up to a satisfying whole.  It is a tall order! It is especially difficult when it happens in a live performance, where both the players and the audience only get one shot.  I love the high wire act of live performance, and the excitement of live players adds a dimension that is irreplaceable.  but I’m glad to have the opportunity to fuss over the recordings on this CD and to make them available in the wonderful sonic world we live in.  I’m really hoping that some listeners will seek out the high-resolution recordings we have made available (they are on Bandcamp and on the New Focus Website.).  The streaming services are a wonderful way to share the music, but the tastiest listening is with the Hi-res files and pair of headphones!

Insider Interview with pianist Vedrana Subotic

Croatian American pianist Vedrana Subotić has released a fascinating album that combines the collection of her favorite traditional folk songs from the former Yugoslavia with Sonata in B Minor by Franz Liszt, a work that is deeply indebted to the composer’s Hungarian background and his Balkan roots. "Chiaroscuro” is available on Blue Griffin Recording (BGR673). We spoke to Subotić about the recent release, life as a classical musician in Utah, collaboration, and more.

What are the similarities and differences of the folk tunes you chose for this recording?

All of the songs are poignant reflections on life and its joys and sorrows. Some are exuberantly extroverted, featuring impassioned melodic virtuosity and lilting dance rhythms while others are intimate and quietly melancholy. The songs vary in the level of emotional intensity as well as in the musical character. Djelem, djelem (I went, I went), and Rujna Zora (Crimson Dawn) lament death and loneliness; Djelem explores influence of jazz on Romani music while Crimson Dawn makes use of extended piano techniques. Mujo Kuje Konja (Mujo Shoes His Horse) is a moody juxtaposition of two characters: Mother and Son. Each character is assigned a particular melodic content contrasted by “instrumental” interludes. Kad Ja Podjoh Na Bembašu (When I went to Bembaša) is styled as a berceuse, a quietly sad retrospective on lost love; and Makedonsko Devojče (Macedonian Girl) is a series of joyful dance variations in Balkan rhythms, comparing a young woman’s youth to a beautifully flower garden. 

The folk songs you commissioned arrangements for all come from the former Yugoslavia. Tell us how the different countries in the Balkans relate to one another?

The five songs come from different geographic regions of the former Yugoslavias; however, they aren’t really “Yugoslav” -- the country of Yugoslavia -- existed for a relatively short time, between 1918 and 1992. The five songs (with the exception of Macedonian Girl) all pre-date the formation of Yugoslavia in 1918, and continue to be a part of the Balkan cultural tradition, untouched by the political events in this region. The Bosnian melodies began to emerge during the Ottoman Empire reign in the early 16th century; the Montenegrin song first appeared during the time Montenegro was a Kingdom int he 19th century; and the Romani melody arrived to Serbia with the Romani peoples’ westward migrations from India which began in 15th century.

What made you choose to work with Christopher O’Riley and Igor Iachimciuc as arrangers for this collection of folk melodies?

I have collaborated with Igor on commissions for the Intermezzo Concert Series and have been consistently impressed with his musical imagination, depth, and skill. Igor was born in Moldova and is a virtuoso cymbalom player. Like me, he grew up listening to traditional Eastern European folk music and has a deep love for and understanding of that musical culture. His two compositions on this album, Crimson Dawn and Djelem, Djelem, are more than arrangements -- they are original compositions, reimagined with authenticity and true understanding of the traditional folk genre. 

Christopher and I collaborated on a project of teaching and performing the 48 Preludes and Fugues from J.S. Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier, in a series of masterclasses and concerts at the University of Utah. I had also heard him play his own arrangements of Bernard Herrmann’s score for the Hitchcock movie “Psycho” and that work stood out to me in particular -- it was meticulously detailed and true to the complex orchestra score. Christopher was the right person to faithfully translate the original folk material into a piano transcription/arrangement.  He was excited to give the Balkan songs a try and created these arrangements in a matter of days. Sometimes in just a few hours! 

How collaborative was the process as they arranged the works?

Very concentrated! To begin the process, I selected several performances of each of the songs by my favorite folk artists, and worked with both Igor and Christopher on finessing and polishing the content, texture, form, and details over a period of few months. The whole process was so natural between the three of us -- a true meeting of the minds. We were particularly concerned with capturing the authentic performance details in the arrangements -- the uniqueness of the metric patterns, the subtle variations of decorative patterns, expressive melodic inflections, vocal melismas, and the instrumental improvisation.  

Can you compare and contrast how you approach playing these newly arranged folk tunes to how you play the Liszt B minor Sonata that concludes the album?

The folk tunes are gorgeous and unique in many ways. They are formally uncomplicated. Their complexity lies almost solely in the poetry and not so much in the melodic and harmonic structure. This is the nature of “popular” music, whether ancient, or new -- simplicity and repetition. The exception to this perspective is the often spectacular and unique live improvisation by the legendary singers and instrumentalists -- this is what Igor, Christopher, and I tried to capture in the arrangements.

The Liszt Sonata in B Minor creates a complex narrative by means of formal and structural designs that stem from scholarly musical thought and tradition. The Sonata form itself is synonymous with multiple contrasting themes and involved harmonic structures - a polar opposite of the folk song genre. Yet, the B Minor Sonata’s heart and essence lie in the ideas sourced from the folk music, much in the same way in which Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsodies aren’t based on actual Hungarian tunes; instead, they are reimagined versions of Liszt’s exposure to the Hungarian musical traditions (a large portion of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was previously a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire). Likewise, the B Minor Sonata’s musical language is influenced and colored by Liszt’s innate understanding and love of the traditional Balkan music. 

Tell us a bit about your musical life in Utah.

Utah has an incredibly vibrant arts community -- we are home to the Utah Symphony and Opera, the Sundance Film Festival, the Shakespeare Festival, Ballet West, the Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir - the list goes on and on. I feel incredibly lucky to be surrounded by so much excellence and support for music and the arts. I am a Professor of Music at the University of Utah, where I teach a full studio of aspiring pianists and two courses in Career Development for musicians. I am also the Artistic Director for Intermezzo Concert Series which presents 15 concerts every year. As President of the Utah Chapter of the American Liszt Society, I also direct the Liszt Festival and Competition in Utah, and frequently perform as a concerto soloist, recitalist, and collaborative pianist.

Insider Interview with pianist Yukine Kuroki

On October 29, Japanese pianist Yukine Kuroki makes her Carnegie Hall debut with a recital presented by the Dublin International Competition. The program features music by Stravinsky, Rachmaninoff, Kapustin, Tokuyama, Schumann, Saint-Saëns and Debussy. We spoke to her about the upcoming recital, coming to NYC for the first time, winning the Dublin International Piano Competition and more.

How and when did you first become interested in music? What prompted you to begin playing piano, and when did you know you wanted to pursue a career as a concert pianist? 

I started to play piano when I was 3 years old. Because my mother was a piano teacher, there was a piano in my house. I started so naturally, because this piano was like my friend.

When I was 12 years old, I met my professor, Fumiko Eguchi. I was so thrilled that she really respects music and people. She is passionate and supports me so kindly.

I started to participate in junior international competitions all over the world. I met many amazing young pianists and professors, and I realized how beautiful music is. I wanted to learn more and more, so I practiced so hard every day and now it’s my job. I don’t think of it as “working” when I play the piano. I think I’m so lucky because for me, music is my life and my constant companion. So I’m really enjoying to have many concerts all over the world.

What did winning the Dublin International Piano Competition mean for you and your career? 

I was so thrilled to receive 1st prize in Dublin – it was my dream to win such a famous competition. After that, I won several other competitions but for me, Dublin was my first big win. It’s a really important prize and it has given me more confidence.  

After Dublin, my life has changed. I had many interviews in newspapers, articles and television, and have had many concert requests in Japan and Europe. This season I have several concerts in US and Canada. Thanks to the Dublin competition, I’m having a career as a pianist. 

The Carnegie Hall recital on October 29, 2024 is your first concert recital in the United States. What are you most looking forward to about performing in New York? 

It’ll be my first time to visit New York, so I’m curious how audiences will react there.

I remember performing in Fort Worth, Texas many years ago [as semi-finalist at the Cliburn Junior Competition]. I was thrilled that audiences had so much passion and they shouted ‘bravo’ so much. So I believe that in New York audiences will also be good. And of course I want to go sightseeing!

Tell us about your recital program. What brings these pieces together? 

I love all pieces that I’ll perform. First, Liszt is a special composer for me - when I was 10 years old, I played Liszt for the first time, and immediately fell in love with his music because it encompasses everything. Some people think his music is mainly technical. But I think he has passion, love, respect, a deep story and it’s very lyrical.  

Stravinsky’s Firebird is originally for orchestra, and in Agosti’s arrangement for piano you can hear all the orchestra sounds and colors which tell the story.

About Rachmaninov and Kapustin, it was my dream to play Rachmaninov Sonata No.2 and Kapustin Variations, I especially like its jazz rhythms. I chose Minako Tokuyama’s “Musica Nara” especially because the piece is really beautiful; it incorporates traditional Japanese melodies, evoking a smiling Budda, Japanese temple bells and jazz! How amazing that she mixed Japan and Jazz. I hope everyone will love this piece!

What is the next milestone in your career you’d like to achieve? 

 I’m happy now, so I want to keep my job as a concert pianist. I really love to perform in front of audiences, and I am most happy when I have a lot of concerts to play. I don’t even want to take a rest! 

I want to play some other big repertoire, and I like chamber music, concertos and solo piano music. I also would like to record a CD! I have so many options in front of me, so I want to keep trying everything!!

Insider Interview with pianist Sahan Arzruni

Armenian-American pianist Sahan Azruni is in the midst of recording a complete history of piano music from his homeland. The latest edition, “By Women,” (rel. July 26, 2024 by Armenian General Benevolent Union) features music by 8 different women, including 2024 Pulitzer Prize finalist Mary Kouyoumdjian, and nearly all works are world premiere recordings. We spoke to him about the forthcoming album, his early inspirations, working as a sidekick to Victor Borge, and more.  

What was it about the piano that first attracted you to play it, and what made you want to pursue a career in piano?  

I started playing the piano at the age of four at the encouragement of my maternal aunt who was a pianist and a composer.  When she discovered a superior gift in my “doodling,” she took me, at the age of six, to her Austrian teacher at the Istanbul Municipal Conservatory. He agreed to work with me as long as my aunt supervised my practicing. I made my first public appearance before I was five years old. 

It was not practical to make a living playing or teaching the piano in Istanbul. Thus, I entered Robert College to study chemistry. Unfortunately, I failed in English (all classes were taught in English) and I was let go. I then applied to Juilliard School, was accepted and came to New York in 1964. 

What inspired you to create this album?  

I am in the midst of recording the history of Armenian piano music. This is the fourth album. The sponsors asked me to devote this album to the music of Armenian women composers. Feminism is in, I hear! 

What elements – if any – might a listener identify as sounding like it was written by a woman; or sounding like it was written by someone of Armenian heritage?  

There is nothing special about women composers in general. The music is either good or bad. Whether they are composed by men or women, it’s irrelevant. The idea of women creating music was nothing new for me. My aunt was my first piano teacher. Also, I was a close friend of another Armenian woman composer in Istanbul, Koharik Gazarossian. In the States, I became friends with Louise Talma and Miriam Gideon and recorded many of their works. And now this collection. I have found 38 Armenian women composers so far! 

If you had to pick two pieces or composers to highlight for readers, which would you choose and why?  

Alicia Terzian from Argentina is probably one of the most challenging Armenian woman composer. I have recorded almost all her piano compositions. Her works are mostly multi-media. Another woman composer would be Gayane Chebotaryan -- there is a polished finish to her compositions. They are highly pianistic and effective. 

You worked with Victor Borge for many years. How did you first meet him?

In the sixties when I was attending The Juilliard School of Music, to help students to find jobs there was an office named Placement Bureau. In April 1968, through PB I found out that pianist Leonid Hambro was looking for a student to replace him for a week as a musical sidekick to pianist and comedian Victor Borge. Although several students has applied for the position, I was chosen by Victor Borge to work with. There were only 10 days before a week-long concerts in Hamilton, Ontario. 

 What role did you play on stage? 

The half-hour portion I would be involved in not only included new music for two-pianos but also comedic antics with Borge. Borge and I hit it off right away, not only musically and comedically, but personally as well. Without Hambro’s knowledge Borge kept offering me additional dates. (Borge was paying me only 1/5 of what Hambro was charging.) Eventually, I replaced him as Borge’s stage partner. I was associated with Borge on and off until 1986.

 What did you enjoy about this type of work? 

In many ways, my association with Borge was a positive experience for I was exposed to huge audiences. Furthermore, playing some one hundred concerts a year was an immense exposure. And finally, expanding the idea of traditional recital – presenting just music – into music and talking was a unique approach.

 How did working with Borge for so many years inform your career as a recitalist? 

Working with Borge evolved my musical understanding, developed my relationship with audiences, and freed my artistic abstraction.  

Insider Interview with composer Karen Tanaka

Orli Shaham is pianist, narrator, and instructor in a new video series. The Adventures of Anya is a musical fairy tale with music and original story written for Shaham by Karen Tanaka, illustrated by Tiphanie Beeke. Originally published in the Japanese magazine Musica Nova, the series features 22 episodes with Shaham narrating the story, performing the music, and giving lessons on how to perform each of the corresponding compositions. (Full series available on Youtube)

In this interview with Tanaka, the composer talks about taking inspiration for her backyard, collaborating with Shaham and Beeke, and more.

What inspired you to write this story and its music? How did you come up with the idea for the story about Anya and her adventures?

The animals featured in this piano collection - the rabbit, small bird, and squirrel - visit the backyard of my home in Southern California, and they were the inspiration for this collection.  

In March 2021, the Tokyo-based music publisher Ongaku no Tomo commissioned me to compose a series of piano pieces for their magazine Musica Nova. With the series set to begin in June, I had to decide on the subject matter quickly. 

In my previous piano collection, I collaborated with the British picture book illustrator Tiphanie Beeke. When I received the new commission from Ongaku no Tomo, I emailed her again to request illustrations for this collection. After writing a rough story overnight, I sent it to her, and she agreed. Her picture books, filled with charming and adorable illustrations of animals, perfectly matched my ideas. Naturally, the main characters in "The Adventures of Anya" were animals, and I wanted to create an adventurous story infused with fantasy, love, and thrills. Each month, Tiphanie sent me a new illustration, which inspired and influenced my composing. Also, the story developed when I was working with her.

After completing the monthly series with Musica Nova, Schott Music in New York decided to publish "The Adventures of Anya" in two volumes with fully colored illustrations. Project Schott New York has published my recent chamber, orchestral, and choral works.

Tell me about your process collaborating with Orli? How did you adapt the music, knowing that you were writing specifically for her? How did she influence your composition and story?

In May 2021, the Juilliard Pre-College commissioned me a solo piano piece to be premiered by Orli Shaham. During our Zoom meeting that month, I mentioned that I was working on a new piano collection featuring animals and asked if she would be interested. Orli shared that she had a dog named Milo and sent me a picture. After our meeting, the idea of "Orli the Witch" came to mind. I shared a picture of Orli and Milo with Tiphanie Beeke, and she created an adorable illustration. 

Working with Orli Shaham was a delightful and joyful experience. She demonstrated deep insight and wonderfully expressed the composer's intentions through her piano performance. She is a natural storyteller, and her piano playing effortlessly evokes emotions beautifully, which I believe is a rare talent among pianists. Her narration was also incredible.  

 What age level is the music for players? For listeners?

I hope people of all ages will enjoy playing and listening to The Adventures of Anya.

Insider Interview with classical accordionist Hanzhi Wang

On April 19, Baruch Performing Arts Center presents classical accordionist Hanzhi Wang in recital. Acclaimed for her “staggering virtuosity,” Ms. Wang is the only accordionist to ever win the Young Concert Artists Susan Wadsworth International Auditions. Her wide-ranging recital features works by Piazzolla, Bach, Boulanger, Gubaidulina and others. We spoke with her about being a pioneer for her instrument, the differences between classical accordion and similar instruments, and the upcoming program at Baruch PAC. 

What first attracted you to the accordion? 

When I was around five years old, I had a chance encounter with an accordion while watching a classical Italian movie called "Cinema Paradiso" with my parents. The soundtrack immediately caught my attention and I noticed a unique sound that I had never heard before from any other classical musical instrument. I became intrigued and since then, I wanted to learn how to play the accordion.

How did you come to the unusual focus of classical music on your instrument?  Do you think of yourself as a classical musician who plays accordion, or as an accordionist who plays classical music? 

I consider myself a classical musician who plays the accordion. Unfortunately, the classical accordion is not yet commonly recognized in the US. I have noticed that the accordion is generally associated with folk music. However, the classical accordion has the potential to perform many types of music. The main difference between the classical accordion and the regular accordion is the left-hand part. While the regular accordion produces an "Oom-pa-pa" sound, the classical accordion has single tones in the left hand which allows us to perform polyphonic music such as Bach or any great classical composers.

What are the challenges of playing classical music on the accordion? How is your performance approach different from popular or folk music?

Playing the classical accordion can be quite challenging. The right-hand side has 107 buttons while the left-hand side has 120 buttons, none of which are visible while playing. Additionally, the player's left wrist and arm must control the compression and bellows turning. Therefore, there are technically three things going on simultaneously while performing.

Tell us about your instrument. Where's it from? What makes it unique? How long have you had it? 

For almost two decades, my accordion has been with me, its origins tracing back to the picturesque town of Castelfidardo in Italy - the "accordion city" situated along the stunning coast of Ancona. With every passing year, the sound of my instrument only gets better and better.

Pianist Inna Faliks: Insider Interview

The pianist Inna Faliks is gearing up for an action-packed year. Her forthcoming album Manuscripts Don’t Burn (Sono Luminus; rel. May 17, 2024) features world premiere recordings written for her by Clarice Assad, Mike Garson, Ljova Zhurbin, Maya Miro Johnson, and Veronika Krausas. Her memoir Weight in the Fingertips was released October 2023, and has been widely critically acclaimed, and this spring she performs the premiere of a piano concerto by Clarice Assad. We recently spoke to her about the forthcoming album, its connection to a cult Ukrainian novel, and more.

The centerpiece of the concept of your new album, Manuscripts Don’t Burn is the cult novel The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov, which the album’s title work by Maya Miro Johnson is based on. What is the significance of the book to you? 

This book is about so many things, and has so many layers. It is, fundamentally, about the power of art to survive, transcend evil regimes, in this case Stalin's totalitarian murderous Soviet Union. It is about censorship, it is also a great love story, a retelling of Faust and the story of Christ, all in one book. It is a book that many Russian speakers are obsessed with.

I first read it at age 10 and brought it with me through immigration. It had been banned in the USSR, and my grandfather had typed it out on his typewriter, a "Samizdat" thing. I had memorized the book, because I read it so many times. It is also a burlesque, magnificently funny and whimsical. It, in some ways, continues Nikolai Gogol's literary tradition, as far as its fantasy elements go. Bulgakov was born in Ukraine, as, of course, was Gogol. 

When at 15, I had won the Illinois Young Performers Competition and played with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, they made a short biographical clip about me , and in this clip,  I am reading the book out loud - and also playing Tchaikovsky Concerto # 1, 3rd movement, with Chicago Symphony.  

When my best friend from childhood, Misha, read the book as an adult, he remembered me. That made him want to find me. And now we are married and live in LA with our two kids. When my Mom had a stroke and I flew, during Covid, to help her regain language and movement skills (this was before we found out that she had brain cancer), I read the book to her out loud and she read it back to me.  

A film version of The Master and Margarita will be released in the US year. What do you make of that timing? 

It is completely coincidental but delightful. I had the luck to be at a screening and love what the director Michael Lockshin had done with the film - I think it is the first truly successful screen adaptation of the very complicated material. And, of course, politically it makes a stand. As the book did. 

How does the work by Johnson tie into the overall program of the new album?

It complements the other Master and Margarita piece on the disc - the Suite by Veronika Krausas. Maya's piece is wild, it imagines Margarita, the muse of the Master, in the moment that she has become a witch and is about to meet Woland the devil. The piece uses a lot of extended techniques and has me whisper a phrase from the novel, in Russian. In contrast, Veronika's Suite plays on the Baroque dance suite. It is very elegant, understated, extremely beautiful and evocative, powerful in its contained grace.

You recently premiered a piano concerto by Clarice Assad, called “Lilith” at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. Lilith is a primordial she-demon, and “The Master and Margarita” is essentially a retelling of Faust. Am I seeing a throughline? (Devil in literature, perhaps? Or, Famous Devils I have known?)

What can I say. Devils are fun! It somehow is a coincidence too, Lilith and Master and Margarita. In the novel, Satan actually saves the main character, the master. And, as Goethe says, "I am that power that always wishes for evil but ends up doing good." Bulgakov really plays on this phrase.

Chromic Duo Insider Interview

On March 5, Baruch Performing Arts Center presents Chromic Duo. Blending classical music, keyboards (including toy piano) and electronics into compelling genre-fluid performances and installation the duo - Lucy Yao and Dorothy Chan - will perform music by Ryuichi Sakamoto, Andy Akiho, Maurice Ravel and more. We spoke to them about their upcoming program, pushing genre, experimenting with multimedia, and more!

Classical Music Communications: How did you meet, and what prompted you to join together as a duo? 

Lucy Yao: We met in a hallway! I saw Dorothy carrying this huge case of what looked like a piano, except it was shrunken down. And from that day on, we started to ask ourselves, “why not?” and started to experiment with whatever instruments could make sound. From toy pianos, to electronics, to other art forms that weren’t as familiar to us, but could help us express ourselves, and collaborate to explore new ideas, like dance, film, and technology.

Dorothy Chan: Curiosity and our openness to experimentation really brought us together. In our journey we’ve found that the core of what makes us want to create and connect to the people and community is to look further inside. To find the little moments, the joys, the reckonings, and really capture and remember the importance of them. 

CMC: Why toy piano? What intrigues you about it? How do you manage the contrast in timbre and volume in a duet with toy piano and grand piano? 

DC: Did you know that toy pianos could be made out of a variety of materials, resulting in very different sounds and timbre? Metal rods, hollow rods, glass bars even (in the very early days), plastic hammers vs. wood hammers…It’s fascinating! The toy piano first captured my attention when I realized how this “toy” is considered an instrument and that there are numerous pieces written just for it. I was playing a lot of contemporary classical at the time, and discovering the toy piano was such a joyful moment — to see ‘serious’ music made on this ‘non-serious’ instrument, and how it breaks through traditional expectations and creates an accessibility through curiosity. 

LY: That is what’s really exciting for me! The fact that you can reimagine the things that you would find in your everyday life, into new possibilities. With that, what else can be reimagined into new possibilities? What other things might we have overlooked in our everyday lives? How can we see things in a new light? 

It’s these kinds of questions that guide us in our work -  it could be anything from a performance, to an installation, to community engagement, where we find real joy and meaning in collaborating and listening to the stories of the communities we work with, and reimagine empathy and curiosity together. 

CMC: Electronics are a mainstay of your programs. How do you create these sounds, and how are they incorporated with the sound of the pianos? How much improvisation is involved?  

Chromic Duo: We started experimenting much more with electronics when the pandemic hit. We realized the limitations posed by the pandemic could actually be a place of opportunity for us to expand. We found that with electronics, as well as technology, we could tap into a different way of telling stories. Just like our soundwalk “Listen to Chinatown”– we interviewed mural artists, small business owners and community members in Chinatown, and integrated their stories to the work using spoken words and poetry, bringing users to behind-the-scenes stories, inspirations, and even food recommendations. This work also exists as a concert piece “Homecoming”, where we program for concert hall goers, revealing hidden stories that deserve to be heard on platforms that traditionally do not include them.  Storytelling never fails to be the heart of our work, and through that, we can reshape and rethink conversations to make them as accessible as possible to reach a wider spectrum of audiences.

CMC: The program also includes one of your own compositions. Tell us about this work, and about your composition process as a duo.

Chromic Duo: “From Roots We Carry” explores the complex intergenerational legacies that live inside of us. We interviewed community members and asked them - What do you carry? What have we inherited through familial bonds from the past generation? What are the legacies that we want to keep, and what are some that we want to shed? 

We collaborated with artist Amanda Phingbodhipakkiya to create a monument and performance ritual, which invites audiences to reflect on their own bonds with their past – both the gifts given to us by our ancestors and the heights and weight of those expectations we feel obligated to reach - and to choose what we want to keep carrying, and what to leave behind. Trailer linked here.

CMC: This concert is part of a larger series that Baruch College has started since just last October. You are also Artists-in-Residence at the Silberman Residency where you will talk to students majoring in a huge variety of fields, who are curious about your process. Can you tell us about how you are approaching engaging with the students? And how does your creative process link to that? 

Chromic Duo: When we first started working together in 2019, we struggled for so long to “define ourselves”, as musicians and artists. Music school, especially, has taught us to internalize a rigid way of thinking– you’re either this or that, successful or not, musician or composer– when it’s really not only about those labels. 

We’ve since broken out of those labels, these boxes, and in our work, you can see that it expands from events like a concert, that is accessible and meets audiences where they are at, to interactive installations focused on student health and wellness (recently at Purdue University), to Augmented Reality soundwalks– the medium and genre are always changing and flexible. But one thing we do want to make clear, in both our creative process, and in our engagement with the students at Baruch, is that you can rely on collaboration – you don’t have to be everything. You also don’t have to be just one thing. We believe that it’s super important to acknowledge that your voice is something that can be heard and celebrated. 

Cassatt String Quartet interview with violinist Dominique Valenzuela

Since 2005, the world-renowned Cassatt String Quartet has come to West Texas for a bi-annual residency. Cassatt in the Basin has enriched the lives of adults and students in the community through concerts, workshops and other music events across the region. On October 29 at 3 pm, the quartet performs at the Wagner Noël Performing Arts Center in Midland, Texas. Admission is free, details are here.

One of the alumni of Cassatt in the Basin programs, the violinist Dominique Valenzuela, recently conducted an interview with CSQ’s cellist Gwen Krosnick. The interview was for a community engagement class that is part of Valenzuela’s Master’s degree program at Juilliard. He gave the quartet permission to share the interview with the public.

Dominique Valenzuela wrote in an email to Gwen Krosnick, “As I was giving my presentation it made me realize the impact that the Cassatt has had on my life. To give a presentation on your quartet at the Juilliard School… I could have never imagined that it would be possible, and I am grateful beyond doubt. I am so grateful to have such wonderful role models in my life.”

Here is the interview, edited for context and clarity.

Dominique Valenzuela: What is the Cassatt String Quartet’s philosophy in presenting chamber music to the community?

Gwen Krosnick: Sharing what we do with different communities - from elementary schools to assisted-living communities and beyond - is centrally meaningful to the Cassatt Quartet! We treat these concerts with the respect and love that we bring to every concert we play. At each one we curate a program of music that we hope will allow these audiences to connect to this music we love.

DV: How does the Cassatt String Quartet see chamber music as a vehicle for social change?

GK: Chamber music is very literally an art form that hinges on our ability to connect with other people who have different backgrounds and different perspectives than our own - often wildly so! Our rehearsals and our concerts, and the way we interact with each other and the communities we play for, are a microcosm of listening to the ideas of others with generosity, thoughtfulness, and joy. For communities to engage with chamber music - which includes a great range of music across hundreds of years through today, gives us access to catharsis, meaning, and inspiration. This can only deepen the connections and strength of those community ties.

DV: What kinds of concerts does the CSQ present in the community?

GK: The Cassatt String Quartet has been on the roster of the New York State Council for the Arts (NYSCA) for years. That funding and other major grants from sources throughout the states of New York, Maine and Texas (for which my colleagues brilliantly write applications!) allow us to focus our community partnerships in these areas.

These three states have special personal and professional meaning to us: New York is where the CSQ is based (the quartet itself, and all our members live in the greater NYC area). Maine is the site of the Seal Bay Festival of American Chamber Music, at which the CSQ has been in residence every summer for 20 years. Texas is where Jennifer Leshnower, our second violinist, is from and where her non-profit organization, Cassatt in the Basin, brings us twice a year to work with string students in the Permian Basin.

In each of these areas - and very often at other series and residencies (such as through the Treetops Chamber Music Series in Stamford, CT, for instance) - we play concerts at assisted-living communities, schools, children's museums, community centers, and other venues that aren’t conventional spaces for live music-making.

DV: How do the Cassatts hope to impact communities in the future by building on your already-sturdy foundation?

GK: One thing I love about the CSQ is that we have built long-term relationships with the audiences and communities. I love playing for new audiences, too, in new places - we all do!

There is a real depth to the relationships built over time. This has been such an inspiration for me, both in West Texas with the string students and public school music teachers, and at retirement communities where the quartet plays every single summer in Maine. Returning again and again to places where the quartet has played for years has a deep resonance and opens a capacity for community-building that is even more meaningful.

DV: What is the Cassatt’s mission and hope for the world, especially given that the quartet is historically all-female?

GK: I'm not certain I can speak for the whole Cassatt String Quartet on a worldwide mission, given that I have been in the quartet for two years out of its forty! But I will say that my colleagues and I share a belief that art and music matter: that the arts provide something that the world and humanity need. The way music sparks conversation and gives us access to emotional places where we might not otherwise go is centrally and vitally important.

The fact that the Quartet, named for the 19th century American painter Mary Cassatt, has been comprised totally of women instrumentalists since 1985 is important to our story. We feel both a responsibility and a real pride in sharing music composed by a diverse range of American women. I hope that audiences will hear music by Dorothy Rudd Moore, Florence Price, Fanny Mendelssohn, Victoria Bond, Joan Tower, and Tania León (just a few of the women whose works we are performing this season!) and really understand that this art form of classical music, which has traditionally been so exclusionary and indeed prided itself on inaccessibility, in fact has the capacity to be wildly, celebratorily, and endlessly diverse. It is a living, breathing, ever-changing thing, chamber music!

The great music within the field of chamber music is made more profound by a wider and more diverse, passionate community of musicians, audiences, composers, and music lovers taking part in shaping its future.

DV: How do you curate a program for different audiences?

GK: For all our concerts, from our most convention and formal performances to outdoor parks and senior centers, we give our most passionate, personal playing. We offer repertoire that we cherish, including music that the audience may not have heard before, and we talk directly to audiences at each concert from the stage about what we love in the music we are about to share with them.

Sometimes presenters will ask for a specific piece, or for us to play with a specific collaborator, and of course that comes into our conversations about programming! But mainly we think about how different pieces of music will tell a story to an audience - an open-ended story so that each person can experience it in a different and personal way.

There are practical considerations, like how long is the concert at next week's assisted living community. How young are the kids at next month's childrens' concert - and therefore what are their attention spans? What works will be “in our fingers” for a given date, so that we can really play our best?. Once those factors are accounted for, we simply put together a program that we love, so that an audience member can feel the joy and love for this pouring off us and feel a connection to the music we share with them. I feel VERY strongly that this basic goal is not different for an elementary school audience or at the fanciest concert hall we play!

DV: How does engagement with audiences of various backgrounds further impact your greater mission as leader in the arts?

GK: In much the same way that we love playing chamber music BECAUSE of the access it gives us to different perspectives and different emotional places, it means a lot to us to play for audiences that show us – through their unique backgrounds and vantage points - new reactions, new insights, and new love for what we do and the music we play. For the Cassatt Quartet, getting to play for and connect with so many diverse kinds of audiences, each with its own energy, response, and chorus of reactions, makes us ever more motivated and committed to reflecting - in our programming, and in our mission - that diversity of energies, reactions, and voices. A musical field that reflects, echoes, and amplifies the communities for whom we play is more sustainable, more electrifying, and more profoundly meaningful as we step forward into the future.

Insider Interview with Georgina Rossi

The new album by violist Georgina Rossi and pianist Silvie Cheng is saturated with Brazil’s rich musical heritage. CHORINHO (Navona NV6537, released August 11, 2023) presents a slew of alluring yet under-recognized works for viola, including world-premiere recordings of works by João de Souza Lima, Lindembergue Cardoso, and Ernani Aguiar. We spoke with the violist about the recently released album, Brazilian music, and more.

The title of your album is Chorinho. What does it mean and why did you choose it?

The Choro (very roughly, lament) is a musical form that was developed organically in the streets of Rio in 19th century Brazil as musicians would gather to make music and improvise. They would draw on their own musical background and traditions but also were processing and stylizing multiple contemporary imported genres – waltz, tango, polka, ragtime. The choro’s character is usually melancholy, and improvisation is very key to its definition.

I chose the title Chorinho (little lament – after Souza Lima’s sole work for viola), because I wanted to clearly state “this is an album of viola music!”. We are so often the receivers of melancholia in music. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

You represent seven different Brazilian composers on this album. What similarities do you notice among their styles? What, if anything, in their music collectively demonstrates a “Brazilian sound”?

Brazilian modernists were very conscientious and determined in their efforts to develop a distinct Brazilian sound and style. They were intellectuals and saw their work as a vital patriotic service. Curiously (to us today) modernism and nationalism went hand in hand for the Brazilian Nationalist School, at the center of which was Osvaldo Lacerda’s composition teacher, M. Camargo Guarnieri, who in turn was mentored by the revered Mario de Andrade.

The nationalist school was very successful, and you can certainly hear that on this record – not a single one of the pieces strays far from that path. However, it is important to mention that the work of the Second Viennese School did have a big impact on the project of modernism in Brazil. In fact, the tension was such between the two ideologies of composition that a feud, manifested in published letters, was carried out in the 1950’s. Insults abounded and the two camps of composition clearly divided!

Villa-Lobos’s massive global success of course strengthened the nationalist school’s campaign.

Some listeners are familiar with Heitor Villa-Lobos, but most of the other names in this collection are unfamiliar to North American audiences. Which of these Brazilian composers are well known in their home country? Which do you feel deserve wider recognition?

Brazil has very strong cultural institutions and does excellent work of archiving and celebrating the work it produces, so most composers on the record have been recognized and celebrated in their home. I would mention that Brenno Blauth is a bit of an outsider. He was never quite in the scene, and worked full time as a doctor for his entire life. I’m proud to have recorded his magnificent and very challenging viola sonata! As did the fabulous Barbara Westphal before me.

The final selection on the album is a song by Chiquinha Gonzaga, arranged by you and Silvie Cheng. What is significant about her, and why did you decide to include this particular song, Lua branca?

Chiquinha Gonzaga was a courageous musician in hostile circumstances– she abandoned an arranged marriage that threatened to forbid her musical activity and was disowned entirely by her family. But she was fearless and hard working and insanely talented. Her music–and she wrote a lot of it– was wildly successful, and with her financial success she fought for the abolitionist cause and worked to found the first artists copyright society.

Your previous recording with Silvie Cheng featured the music of Chile, this one Brazil. What’s next?

I have my eye on Argentina– and I want to focus more on contemporary works. I love the 20th century, but I’m very curious about what’s being written today for the viola in Buenos Aires.

Momenta Quartet Insider Interview - Momenta Festival VIII

On September 30-October 5 the Momenta Quartet presents the eighth edition of their annual Momenta Festival. Over four nights, each member curates a diverse chamber music program blending the old and new. In this insider interview, we spoke with each member of the quartet about highlights of the upcoming festival and what gets them excited about each of their programs.

“Looking Back” Curated by Michael Haas
September 30, 2023

Michael, your program is a collection of works that was inspired by the past. How does each piece achieve this?

The idea for this program came about last season when Momenta joined forces with composer Han Lash for a residency at the Eastman School of Music’s Institute for Music Leadership.

When we performed Han Lash’s Suite Remembered and Imagined last year, I was struck by how Lash uses their own 21st-century musical language to modernize a Baroque dance suite. I immediately saw a connection with a piece already in Momenta’s repertoire, More Venerable Canons by Matthew Greenbaum. In that piece, I have always seen parallels between its structure and that of suites by J. S. Bach.

Living composers are not the only ones who look back in time for inspiration! Haydn’s string quartet Op.  20 No. 5, while groundbreaking, concludes with a grand fugue, a style of writing that was no longer fashionable in Haydn’s lifetime.

The program concludes with Robert Schumann’s Piano Quintet, a composition which resulted from a burst of inspiration after he studied scores of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven.

“Earth and Ether” Curated by Emilie-Anne Gendron
October 1, 2023

Emilie, your program features the world premiere of a piece by Elizabeth Brown. Did you commission the work? How did this come about, and what would you like audiences to know about it in advance of the October 1 concert?

The formidably gifted and versatile composer-performer Elizabeth Brown is a longtime friend of Momenta, not to mention a Momenta Festival alumna as both a composer and performer. She is a professional flutist as well as a master of the shakuhachi, theremin, and dan bau; she teaches shakuhachi at Columbia University and Bard College, where she also teaches theremin.

I am excited to be giving the world premiere of her new solo violin work, "Firmament", on October 1. The piece came about a year ago when Elizabeth offered to write me a piece, as she had been mulling over several ideas by that point. Of course I was delighted and honored to be the recipient, and I knew just the right festival for the premiere.

Brown's musical inspiration often comes from literary sources, and this piece draws on two dystopian modern novels: The Wall (1963), by Austrian author Marlen Haushofer, in which a woman awakens while journeying in the wilderness to find herself separated from the rest of the world by an invisible wall; and Good Morning, Midnight (2016) by American writer Lily Brooks-Dalton, tracing in parallel the paths of an Arctic researcher and an astronaut, for both of whom external communication has been cut off. Brown envisions the violin’s voice as the protagonist navigating these new, suspended realities--aware of both its solitude as well as the firmament eternally surrounding our world.

Not only is the piece beautifully written for the violin, but it shows the composer's mastery of every nuance of texture, mood, and atmosphere. I’d like to add that the composer and critic Kyle Gann described Elizabeth's music as “elegant, quiet, thoughtful, well-crafted...and as bizarre as hell." I can think of no better fit for a Momenta program!

Tell us about the other works on your program.

I titled my program "Earth and Ether", and the other pieces also explore, in their own ways, the joy and pain of the human experience while also contemplating what lies around us and beyond. In addition to Brown’s premiere, I'll be giving the New York premiere of a fiery solo violin work, "Another Prayer" (2012), by the British composer Julian Anderson, inspired by the colors and timbres of Eastern European folk music. The remainder of the program features the entire Momenta Quartet. Jeffrey Mumford's newest quartet, the vividly imagined ...amid still and floating depths (2019) was composed for a consortium of quartets including Momenta; and the Mexican composer Julián Carrillo's String Quartet No. 2 "à Debussy" (1926). It’s an epic journey!

“Momenta à la Mode” Curated by Stephanie Griffin
October 4 2023

Why did you decide to base an entire program on the concept of scales? How does the music of Julián Carrillo fit into that theme?

The impetus behind my Momenta Festival concert was to build a program around Robert Morris’ monumental Carnatic String Quartet (2020), which is based on all 72 melakarta scales in the Carnatic musical tradition of Southern India. Momenta premiered it last year, and this will be its first performance in New York City. I decided to present it in the context of other works in which scales are not simply building blocks, but are truly thematic. 

Interestingly, Morris warns against any attempt of the performers to make the piece sound "Indian," although he acknowledges that some sections definitely have a more "Eastern" sound and feel. The greatness of his music comes from the level of imagination he applies to making original and unexpected music within these modes and his ability to spin them into a cohesive whole. 

No program centered around scales would be complete without the music of Julián Carrillo (1875 - 1965), the Mexican composer, conductor, violinist, music theorist, and microtonal music pioneer. His music figures prominently in Momenta's repertoire as we recently embarked on the project to record all 13 of his string quartets for Naxos!

I presented an all-Carrillo program on last year's Momenta Festival, about which I wrote, “Carrillo’s most distinguishing characteristic is his absolute obsession with scales. They are not just sets of pitches from which to build melodies; they are the melodies themselves!” This is especially true of his String Quartet No. 12, in which he builds an entire four-movement piece from a single six-note scale, which is literally the main melody of this monothematic work. It is a testament to Carrillo's great skill and imagination that he can evoke such a rich variety of colors and emotions through such simple means.

This past summer, the Momenta Quartet was in residence at the Avaloch Farm Music Institute alongside my friends Arun Ramamurthy and Trina Basu, two Carnatic and avant-jazz violinists. They were working on a new piece based on raga Hemavathi, which is the 58th melakarta scale and forms the basis of a section of Robert Morris' string quartet. I hadn’t originally planned to present Morris' quartet in a specifically Indian context, it’s a special treat to join Arun and Trina in the world premiere of a new trio version of their piece on my Momenta Festival program!

"Szene am Bach" Curated by Alex Shiozaki
October 5, 2023

Alex, your program centers around nature. How does Beethoven’s String Quartet Op. 18, No. 6 fit into the evening?

I had to give credit to Beethoven for providing me with the title to my evening: Szene am Bach, or “Scene by the Brook”. This phrase comes from the Sixth Symphony, where it is the title to the second movement. I already had two pieces in mind that painted the scene: Ileana Perez Velazquez's River of Life, and Somei Satoh's A White Heron. Also enjoying the “Bach” “bruch” play on words, I chose a violin solo that quotes a Bach partita: Eugène Ysaÿe's Sonata No. 2. 

Thus Beethoven’s Op. 18 No. 6 Quartet was last to the party, added on to the program to pay homage to the composer who graced us with this title. That said, it fits the bill. The exuberant first movement captures a scene full of life, and the many grace notes could be interpreted as the chirping of all sorts of birds. The tranquil second movement is closest in character to the symphonic Pastoral slow movement whose title we borrowed. The third movement is a scherzo with a real-world pulse, giving the illusion of steadiness while constantly skipping a beat from excitement--or panic! And the finale of the quartet--as well as of the evening and the entire Momenta Festival itself--begins with the famed “La Malinconia” (melancholy): a slow introduction that teases you with both sweetly consonant horn fifths and unexpected twists and turns of harmony. This brook moves both fast and slow, populated with small rapids and tranquil pools, with nature flitting and diving over and through its Classical waters. 

Yvonne Lam Insider Interview

Grammy Award-winner and former Eighth Blackbird violinist Yvonne Lam’s debut solo album features works for solo violin with electronics by six remarkable women. Released July 28, 2023 on Blue Griffin Recording, Watch Over Us has been praised for its “dazzling virtuosity and kaleidoscopic colors.” In our latest Insider Interview, we spoke with Lam about the recently released album and more.

You are best known for your work in the ensemble 8th Blackbird. How does that chamber ensemble experience compare with performing solo with electronic tape? How did it prepare you for this project?

It’s like apples and oranges. There was a lot of blood, sweat and tears invested into the music and business of running Eighth Blackbird. Working with five other musicians so closely for eight years was like being in a very intense family. Indeed, we saw more of each than we did our own families, and we got to know each other so well on many levels. We could adjust on the fly and almost knew what others were going to do musically before they did.

Performing solo with electronic tape is a little bit like trying to play with someone who can’t hear you. There’s zero “give” with fixed media, so you have to learn to adjust to it, to know where you have space and where you don’t. I was introduced to playing with tape during my time with Eighth Blackbird. That prepared me by helping me realize how much I didn’t know about the tech! Performing solo with tape live is always stressful because things can go wrong with the tech, but that’s not an issue when recording.

You specifically chose music by women for this collection. Were there other works by women that you had to leave out, for stylistic considerations, practical reasons, or time constraints?

I didn’t intentionally set out to choose only women composers. If you had asked me ten years ago to picture a composer who writes electronic music, it wouldn’t have been a woman. But in the process of discovering works, I kept running across fabulous composers who happened to be women. And then I had enough for an album.  

Were there one or more compositions by men that you considered including?

Oh, sure. There are so many great pieces out there! Maybe for the next album…

Tell us about your collaborations outside of classical music. For instance, your work with the jazz bassist and composer Matt Ulery, and with the exper­imental performance group Every House Has A Door.

Matt Ulery is a unique musician and a joy to collaborate with. I am not a jazz musician, not in the slightest, and working with Matt gave me such insight to just how different his skill set is. I keep telling myself that one day I will actually take lessons, but I do know that jazz is learned by doing, so I’ll have to commit myself to some serious doing.

Working with artists who aren’t musicians is illuminating. I love seeing performance through their eyes, which is often more holistic than the way musicians think. We don’t scrutinize our extra-musical movement, for example, or think about the intention our facial expression or eye focus projects. We also don’t place much importance on what happens in-between pieces, either, even though that’s still an integral part of the experience we shape for our audiences.

This fascinates me: When you first started playing violin as a young child, you thought it was a guitar. Why? And why was your interest in guitar so keen? Did you ever get to learn to play that instrument?

I wish I remembered what I was thinking at that age! My mother used to schlep me to my older sister’s piano lessons at a music store. While we waited for her, I would stare at the display cases, and my guess is I saw the violin but didn’t know the word “violin”. Or maybe I genuinely thought it was a guitar, since I had likely seen one on TV. No one near me played either instrument. In any case, I bugged her for a year (or so she says) before she finally gave in and found a teacher for me.

My husband, who is also a violinist, taught himself electric guitar before he started violin. So we have a couple of guitars in the house. I never learned to play, but not for lack of trying. I can play a few chords, but anything beyond that and my brain ties itself into knots.