AT-HOME: English Expressions
Elgar’s bold tunes, striking color effects, and epic themes capture all the expanse and exhilaration of the English countryside. Then, our 2022 Protégé Composer Alistair Coleman takes us on a musical journey of his own with the world premiere of his equally soaring flute quintet.
Dedicated in memory of David Tallman, our long-time Patron Services Manager, and a beloved member of our CMNW family.
NOTE: I-Jung Huang appears with Chamber Music Northwest courtesy of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. Special thanks to the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra for I-Jung Huang’s appearance in this concert.
Online Virtual Concert
Friday, 7/15 • 7:00 pm PT
Available through Thursday, 9/1 • 11:59 pm PT
Program
Click on any piece of music below to learn more about it.
- BOCCHERINI Flute Quintet No. 2 in G Major, G. 438
LUIGI BOCCHERINI
Flute Quintet No. 2 in G Major, G. 438I. Allegro
II. Adagio non tanto
III. Andante con variazioniAt age 23, Italian composer Luigi Boccherini set out on a life-changing journey. Thinking he might end up in London, he first visited Genoa, Nice, and Paris. But when an alluring opportunity presented itself in Madrid, Boccherini changed course for the city that would become his new home.
Within a few years, Boccherini had secured a long-term contract with the Spanish Infante Luis de Borbón, younger brother of King Charles III. His job description: write 18 pieces of chamber music per year (other duties as assigned).
The only existing source regarding the Flute Quintet No. 2 in G Major, G. 438, is a set of anonymous handwritten parts located in the Royal Palace Archive in Madrid. In fact, no definitive evidence demonstrates that Boccherini even wrote the quintets in this collection, and his own meticulous musical catalogue makes no mention of them. However, their unusual instrumentation (with two cellos rather than two violins) hints that Boccherini, a virtuoso cellist himself, may indeed be their true composer. On the other hand, none of Boccherini’s other flute quintets include a second cello part, so it’s certainly open for debate.
The Quintet No. 2 in G Major consists of three delightful movements: a sprightly Allegro, an austere Adagio, and a playful theme and variations. One cello holds down the harmonic backbone of the piece, while the other (perhaps originally performed by Boccherini himself) is free to engage in a spirited melodic back-and-forth with the other musical voices.
— © Ethan Allred- ALISTAIR COLEMAN ‘Broadacre City’ for Flute Quintet WORLD PREMIERE
ALISTAIR COLEMAN (b. 1998)
Broadacre City for Flute Quintet WORLD PREMIEREGlass-enclosed dwellings, endless horizon lines, UFO-like helicopters, and three-wheeled automobiles were among many characteristics of “Broadacre City,” Frank Lloyd Wright’s idealized American suburbia. Wright, considered one of the most influential architects in American history, was a proponent of ‘organic architecture’ a style in which homes and buildings are in dialogue with their natural surroundings. Broadacre City was the apotheosis of this philosophy: each American household, regardless of socioeconomic status, would be entitled to one acre of land for a home that would embrace an open terrain.
The Broadacre City concept was meant to be impractical, a dream to which architects and city planners could aspire. It was one of six hundred Wright designs that were unrealized or unfinished — over half of his entire output. At Columbia University’s Avery Architecture Library, I was overwhelmed by the countless beautiful, and sometimes deranged designs that, for whatever reason, were commissioned but never built.
In my new flute quintet, Broadacre City, commissioned by CMNW, I try to capture the aspiration of Broadacre City and other unbuilt projects that only exist on-paper. Fleeting flourishes catalyze a relentless, driving section filled with rhythmic momentum, and intensity. Over time, this musical “machine” begins to break down with the material slowly disintegrating to complete stasis. Remnants of the machine flow in and out of focus, as a ghost of what it once was. Slowly, those remnants find a footing and breathe life into new ideas and different musical contexts — all of which are trying to capture the effect these radical designs had on the consciousness and craft of their creators.
— © Alistair Coleman
- ELGAR Piano Quintet in A Minor, Op. 84
EDWARD ELGAR (1857-1934)
Piano Quintet in A Minor, Op. 84I. Moderato - Allegro
II. Adagio
III. Andante - Allegro
The Edward Elgar who wrote the Piano Quintet in A Minor, Op. 84, just after the end of World War I was a very different man from the composer of the Enigma Variations of 1899. The Elgar of Enigma was a man in mid-life, who had striven for years to achieve recognition in his own country, much less internationally. He was ambitious and insecure about his social status in the rigid class-bound world of Victorian England. The fame that followed Enigma’s premiere did much to reassure Elgar; freed from worries about his worth as a composer, Elgar spent the two decades after Enigma creating an enduring legacy of works.
By the time the war ended, however, much had changed. Exhausted by the chaos, horror, and loss caused by four years of war, Elgar and his wife Alice left London for the quiet countryside of Sussex. Their cottage came with a picturesque ghost story: a grove of dead, gnarled trees stood nearby, supposedly the remains of medieval Spanish monks struck by lightning as punishment for engaging in sacrilegious rites. The ghostly forms of the trees, along with Elgar’s prevailing mood, lend a haunted ethereality to the sound of the Quintet. Another recurring idea heard first in the piano’s opening notes of the Moderato, is the plainchant Salve Regina. The eerie atmosphere, supported by unexpected harmonic movement, is juxtaposed with wistful romanticism; together, both lend the Quintet a uniquely beautiful poignancy.
— © Elizabeth Schwartz
Artists
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Tara Helen O’Connor
Flute
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Tara Helen O’Connor, who Art Mag has said “so embodies perfection on the flute that you’ll forget she is human,” is an Avery Fisher Career Grant recipient, a two-time Grammy Award nominee, and a recipient of the Walter W. Naumburg Chamber Music Award. A Wm.S. Haynes artist, she is a season artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. She is professor of flute at the Yale School of Music and is the Artistic Director of the “Music from Angel Fire” Festival and in 2026, the Essex Winter Series.
Tara has also appeared on numerous film and television soundtracks including Barbie, Respect, The Joker, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Only Murders in the Building, and Schmigadoon! Festival appearances include the Bravo! Vail festival, Chamber Music Northwest, Music@Menlo, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Rockport Music, the Great Mountains Music Festival, and Chesapeake Chamber Music Festival.
A charismatic performer noted for her artistic depth, brilliant technique and colorful tone spanning every musical era, O’Connor has collaborated with such distinguished artists as vocalists Jennifer Johnson Cano, Susanna Phillips and Dawn Upshaw, violinist Jaime Laredo, clarinetist David Shifrin, guitarist Eliot Fisk, and pianists Jeremy Denk, Peter Serkin, and Stephen Prutsman, and with such revered ensembles as the Emerson, Orion, and St. Lawrence string quartets.
Tara has appeared on A&E’s Breakfast with the Arts, PBS’ Live from Lincoln Center and has recorded for Deutsche Grammophon, EMI Classics, Koch International, CMS Studio Recordings and Bridge Records.
Upcoming Concerts & Events
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Zlatomir Fung
Cello
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Cellist Zlatomir Fung burst onto the scene as the first American in four decades (and youngest musician ever) to win First Prize at the International Tchaikovsky Competition Cello Division. Subsequent accolades, critical acclaim, and standing ovations at performances around the world have established him as one of the preeminent cellists of our time. Astounding audiences with his boundless virtuosity and exquisite sensitivity, the 25-year-old has already proven himself a star among the next generation of world-class musicians.
In the 2024–2025 season, Fung gives recitals in New York City, Boston, and St. Louis, and performs the complete Bach Cello Suites at Mechanics Hall in Worcester, Massachusetts and in Arcata, California, following summer appearances at the Aspen and Ravinia Festivals. He joins orchestras in Rochester, San Antonio, and Billings, among others. Internationally, he performs in Europe and Asia with the London Philharmonic, Barcelona Symphony, and others, and offers a recital tour of Italy. In January 2025, Signum Records released Fung’s debut album, a collection of opera fantasies and transcriptions for cello and piano.
Fung served as Artist-in-Residence with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra for the 2023–2024 season; recent debut appearances include the New York Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, Orchestre National de Lille, and BBC Philharmonic, as well as Baltimore, Dallas, Detroit, Seattle, and Kansas City Symphonies.
Fung made his recital debut at Carnegie Hall in 2021 and was described by Bachtrack as “one of those rare musicians with a Midas touch: he quickly envelopes every score he plays in an almost palpable golden aura.” Fung was a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship Winner in 2022.
Upcoming Concerts & Events
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Sophie Shao
Cello
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Cellist Sophie Shao, winner of the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant and top prizes at the Rostropovich and Tchaikovsky competitions, is a versatile and passionate artist whose performances the New York Times has described as “eloquent, powerful,” “beautifully phrased and interestingly textured,” the LA Times noted as “impressive” and the Washington Post called “deeply satisfying.”
Shao has appeared as soloist to critical acclaim throughout the United States and has premiered Howard Shore’s cello concerto Mythic Gardens with Leon Botstein and the American Symphony Orchestra, the UK premiere with Keith Lockhart and the BBC Concert Orchestra, and European premiere with Ludwig Wicki and the 21st Century Orchestra at the KKL in Lucerne. She also premiered Richard Wilson’s The Cello Has Many Secrets with the American Symphony Orchestra.
Ms. Shao has given recitals in Suntory Hall in Tokyo, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Middlebury College, Phillips Collection, Walter Reade Theater, and Rose Studio in Lincoln Center, the complete Bach Suites at Union College, and in New York City. Her dedication to chamber music has conceived her popular “Sophie Shao and Friends” groups. She was a member of Chamber Music Society Two/Bowers Program, a young artist residency of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.
Ms. Shao’s recordings include the Complete Bach Suites, Andre Previn’s Reflections for Cello and English Horn and Orchestra on EMI Classics, Richard Wilson’s Diablerie and Brash Attacks and Barbara White’s My Barn Having Burned to the Ground, I Can Now See the Moon on Albany Records, Howard Shore’s original score for the movie The Betrayal on Howe Records, Marlboro Music Festival’s 50th Anniversary on Bridge Records, and Howard Shore’s Mythic Gardens on Sony Classical.
A native of Houston, Texas, Ms. Shao began playing the cello at age six and was a student of Shirley Trepel, the former principal cellist of the Houston Symphony. At age thirteen she enrolled at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, studying cello with David Soyer and chamber music with Felix Galimir. After graduating from the Curtis Institute, she continued her cello studies with Aldo Parisot at Yale University, receiving a B.A. in Religious Studies from Yale College and an M.M. from the Yale School of Music, where she was enrolled as a Paul and Daisy Soros Fellow. She is on the faculty of the University of Connecticut and is playing a Hieronymus Amati cello c.1700 on a generous loan.
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George Li
Piano
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Praised by The Washington Post for combining “staggering technical prowess, a sense of command and depth of expression,” pianist George Li possesses an effortless grace, poised authority, and brilliant virtuosity far beyond his years. Since winning the Silver Medal at the 2015 International Tchaikovsky Competition, Li has rapidly established a major international reputation and performs regularly with some of the world’s leading orchestras and conductors.
Li’s 2023-24 season begins with a recital at the Grand Teton Music Festival followed by his debut with the Aula Simfonia in Indonesia. He will tour China and Europe and will make his debut with the Prague Philharmonia. U.S. performances include the Cincinnati and Milwaukee Symphonies, Florida Orchestra, Oklahoma City Philharmonic, Chicago Sinfonietta, and recitals across the country. A committed collaborator, George returns to the ECHO series with the Dover Quartet and Davies Symphony Hall with violinist Stella Chen.
Li is an exclusive Warner Classics artist, with his debut recital album released in 2017. His second recording in 2019 featured Liszt solo works and Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1, recorded live with Vasily Petrenko and the London Philharmonic. His third album with the label will include solo pieces by Schumann, Ravel, and Stravinsky, and will be released in the spring of 2024.
Li gave his first public performance at Boston’s Steinway Hall at the age of ten, and in 2011 performed for President Obama at the White House in an evening honoring Chancellor Angela Merkel. Among Li’s many prizes, he was the recipient of the 2016 Avery Fisher Career Grant, the 2012 Gilmore Young Artist Award, and the First Prize winner of the 2010 Young Concert Artists International Auditions. He is currently pursuing an Artist Diploma at the New England Conservatory. When not playing piano, he is an avid reader and photographer, as well as a sports fanatic.
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Alexi Kenney
Violin
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Violinist Alexi Kenney is forging a career that defies categorization, following his interests, intuition, and heart. He is equally at home creating experimental programs and commissioning new works, soloing with major orchestras, and collaborating with some of the most celebrated artists and musicians of our time. Alexi is the recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant and a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award.
Alexi has performed as soloist with the Cleveland Orchestra, the San Francisco, Dallas, Pittsburgh, Detroit, and San Diego symphonies, l’Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Gulbenkian Orchestra, and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. This season, he plays the complete violin sonatas of Robert Schumann with Amy Yang on period instruments at the Frick Collection, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, and the Phillips Collection.
He continues to tour his project Shifting Ground in collaboration with the new media artist Xuan, which intersperses works for solo violin by J.S. Bach with pieces by Matthew Burtner, Mario Davidovsky, Salina Fisher, Nicola Matteis, Angélica Negrón, and Paul Wiancko.
Alexi is a founding member of the two-cello quartet Owls, hailed as a “dream group” by The New York Times. He regularly performs at chamber music festivals including Caramoor, ChamberFest Cleveland, Chamber Music Northwest, La Jolla, Ojai, Marlboro, Music@Menlo, Ravinia, Seattle, and Spoleto. He is an alum of the Bowers Program at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.
He plays a violin made in London by Stefan-Peter Greiner in 2009 and a bow made in Port Townsend, WA by Charles Espey in 2024.
Upcoming Concerts & Events
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Teng Li
Viola
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Teng Li is a diverse and dynamic performer internationally. Recently, she was appointed Principal Violist of the Los Angeles Philharmonic after more than a decade as Principal with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra.
Teng Li is also an active recitalist and chamber musician participating in the festivals of Marlboro, Santa Fe, Mostly Mozart, Music from Angel Fire, Rome, Moritzburg (Germany), and the Rising Stars Festival in Caramoor. She has performed with the Guarneri Quartet in New York, at Carnegie Hall (Weill Recital Hall), and with the 92nd Street “Y” Chamber Music Society. Teng was featured with the Guarneri Quartet in their last season (2009) and was also a member of the prestigious Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society Two program. She is a member of the Rosamunde Quartet (led by Noah Bendix-Balgley, Concertmaster of the Berlin Philharmonic) and the Toronto-based Arkel Trio.
Teng Li has been featured as soloist with the National Chamber Orchestra, the Santa Rosa Symphony, Munich Chamber Orchestra, Haddonfield Symphony, Shanghai Opera Orchestra, Canadian Sinfonietta, and Esprit Orchestra. Her performances have been broadcast on CBC Radio 2, National Public Radio, WQXR (New York), WHYY (Pennsylvania), WFMT (Chicago), and Bavarian Radio (Munich).
She has won top prizes at the Johanson International and the Holland-America Music Society competitions, the Primrose International Viola Competition, the Irving M. Klein International String Competition, and the ARD International Music Competition in Munich, Germany. She was also a winner of the Astral Artistic Services 2003 National Auditions.
Her discography includes a solo CD entitled 1939 with violinist Benjamin Bowman and pianist Meng-Chieh Liu (for Azica), along with many Toronto Symphony credits, most recently a Vaughan Williams disc featuring Teng Li performing Flos Campi (for Chandos).
Teng is a graduate of the Central Conservatory in Beijing, China, and the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.
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I-Jung Huang
Violin
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Appointed to the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra’s first violin section in 2020 by Stéphane Denève, Taiwanese violinist I-Jung Huang is a top prizewinner of the 2017 Ima Hogg Concerto Competition and the 2016 Hudson Valley String Competition; a Laureate of the 2015 Michael Hill International Violin Competition; a top prizewinner of the TSO “The Young Talent” competition; the Academy of Taiwan Strings Competition in Taiwan; and was the youngest musician selected at the Young Artist Taiwan Bank in 2011. She has appeared as a soloist with the Houston Symphony Orchestra, Hudson Valley Philharmonic, Taiwan Philharmonic, and Taipei Symphony Orchestra.
Huang has served as concertmaster at the Manhattan School of Music, The Juilliard School, and the New England Conservatory, working under conductors such as Bernard Labadie, David Loebel, and George Manahan. During the 2013-2014 academic year, she joined the Community Partnership Program at the New England Conservatory with the Gioviale Quartet. Her recent project “TwoBows,” a house concert fundraising project for Doctors Without Borders, received partial funding from the Juilliard Project Grants.
She has participated in several summer festivals and has received full scholarships, including the Perlman Music Program Chamber Music Workshop, Ravinia Festival, the Four Seasons Winter Workshop, Kneisel Hall, and Taos School of Music, where she worked with the members from the Guarneri Quartet, Borromeo Quartet, Shanghai Quartet, and Brentano Quartet. She has collaborated with Robert McDonald, Cynthia Phelps, Leila Josefowicz, Ronald Thomas, Peter Wiley, Merry Peckham, Zlatomir Fung, and Paul Biss. In addition, she has appeared in several organizations such as the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Jupiter Symphony Chamber Players, the New York Classical Players and the New Asia Chamber Music Society in New York City.
Huang received a Professional Studies Certificate Degree for the Orchestral Program at the Manhattan School of Music, where she studied with Glenn Dicterow and Lisa Kim. She received her Bachelor of Music Degree from New England Conservatory and Master of Music Degree from The Juilliard School, where she studied with Miriam Fried, Donald Weilerstein and Daniel Phillips. She was a grant recipient of The Juilliard Career Grant and has been awarded the 2018 Chimei Arts Awards and Young Artist “Music Star” award in Taiwan. Aside from her musical achievements, Huang is a passionate photographer.
NOTE: I-Jung Huang appears with Chamber Music Northwest courtesy of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. Special thanks to the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra for I-Jung Huang’s appearance in our 2022 Summer Festival.