Opening Night Celebration
Kick-off your summer with some of CMNW’s most beloved musicians — David Shifrin, Jennifer Frautschi, Fred Sherry, Paul Neubauer, Gloria Chien, and more — with this delectable three-course musical feast!
Sponsors: Bill & Diana Dameron
CATCH the pre-concert prelude inside with the Young Artists Institute musicians at 6:30pm!
COME EARLY to picnic beforehand—BYOP or pick up nosh from Bon Appétit.
Reed College, Kaul Auditorium
Monday, 6/27 • 8:00 pm PT
Program
Click on any piece of music below to learn more about it.
- BEETHOVEN Kakadu Variations in G Major, Op. 121a
BEETHOVEN Piano Trio Kakadu Variations in G Major, Op. 121a, 10 Variations on “Ich bin der Schneider Kakadu” (1803, rev. 1816) (20’)
I. Introduction: Adagio assai
II. Theme: Allegretto
III. Variation I
IV. Variation 2
V. Variation 3
VI. Variation 4
VII. Variation 5
VIII. Variation 6
IX. Variation 7
X. Variation 8
XI. Variation 9: Adagio espressivo
XII. Variation 10: Presto
XIII. Coda: AllegrettoIn 1803, Beethoven selected another well-known melody as the theme for a piano trio titled Ten Variations on ‘Ich bin der Schneider Kakadu,’ Op. 121a. The name of the song, written by prolific opera composer Wenzel Müller, translates amusingly as “I Am the Tailor Cockatoo.”
Beethoven initially shelved the trio, but dusted it off again in 1816 for some revisions in hopes of publishing it to alleviate his mounting financial woes. Describing it to his publisher as “one of my early works” and “not poor stuff,” he finally succeeded in getting it published in 1824.
Beethoven begins with a little joke on the listener by opening the trio with a self-important, serious introduction in G minor. When Müller’s carefree theme finally emerges, it thus seems comically simplistic by comparison. Beethoven’s variations on the melody gradually expand in depth, giving each instrumentalist many moments in the spotlight—with a few twittering cockatoo flourishes for good measure.
In the spring of 1810, Beethoven decided the time had come to finally get married. Unfortunately, he chose to propose to a woman 20 years younger than him—who also happened to be his doctor’s niece.
She rejected his proposal, and Beethoven moved for the summer to Baden, where he worked his feelings out with two of the masterpieces of his middle period—the “Serioso” Quartet, Op. 95, and the Piano Trio in B-flat Major, Op. 97 (“Archduke”).
©— Ethan Allred
- MAURICE RAVEL ‘Introduction & Allegro’
MAURICE RAVEL (1874- 1937) Introduction and Allegro, M. 46 (1905)
Introduction: Trés lent
AllegroBy 1905, the thirty-year-old Maurice Ravel had established himself as the leading composer of his generation, the successor to Claude Debussy. Yet one key marker of success eluded him: the Prix de Rome, a highly respected prize identifying the best young composer in France, which he had failed to win four times.
He tried one last time in 1905, just before reaching the age limit. This time, he did not even pass the first round of examination. A public scandal erupted, as Gabriel Fauré and many others called the system a disgrace, if it could not recognize Ravel’s talent, and demanded reform.
In the wake of the scandal, Ravel wrote the Introduction et Allegro, just before embarking on a yacht vacation. As this miniature harp concerto shows, Ravel actually enjoyed writing in the academic forms tested by the Prix de Rome, but he could not help but expand the harmonic and expressive language used within them. The brief Introduction sets the impressionistic tone with lush harmonies, swelling glissandos, and gentle melodies. The sonata-form Allegro, on the other hand, shows off the harp as an instrument – the piece was commissioned by a harp builder. Its rolling rhythms and sumptuous textures set up a splendid cadenza at the end of the development section, after which the recapitulation gracefully brings the sonata form to a close.
—© Ethan Allred
- ERNÖ DOHNÁNYI Sextet in C Major, Op. 37
ERNÖ DOHNÁNYI
Sextet in C Major, Op. 37I. Allegro appassionata
II. Intermezzo: Adagio
III. Allegro con sentimento
IV. Finale: Allegro vivace, giocosoIf you heard Ernö Dohnányi’s Sextet in C Major, Op. 37 without knowing its author, you might think at first you were listening to Brahms, a comparison Dohnányi would have welcomed. Brahms was an early admirer of Dohnányi’s music, and for most of his life, Dohnányi’s style reflected the rich, lush Romantic harmonies and rapturous melodies of the late 19th century, even though he lived well into the 20th.
During his lifetime, Dohnányi was considered the preeminent Hungarian musician of his generation; a virtuoso pianist and conductor who led the Budapest Philharmonic, and a noted pedagogue and director of Hungary’s Academy of Music, whose students included conductor Georg Solti (he was also the grandfather of conductor Christoph von Dohnányi).
The Sextet is a later work, written when Dohnányi was recuperating from an illness in 1935. Over the course of its four movements, Dohnányi takes the listener on a musico-historic journey beginning in late 19th-century Vienna and ending in an American speakeasy full of smoky jazz. The Allegro appassionata lives up to its tempo markings with its soaring horn phrases and murmurous interludes. The Intermezzo alternates hushed, introverted episodes with a powerful, rhythmically stark theme. The “sentiment” of the Allegro con sentimento is lighthearted and the primary theme goes through a series of gentle variations. In the Finale, we hear Dohnányi’s interest in jazz music making its way across Europe during the 1920s and 30s. Its driving syncopations alternate with a dainty waltz straight out of a Viennese café, and it features an impishly high-spirited theme reflecting Dohnányi’s tongue-in-cheek sense of humor.
— © Elizabeth Schwartz
Artists
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Gloria Chien
Piano & Artistic Director
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Taiwanese-born pianist Gloria Chien has one of the most diverse musical lives as a noted performer, concert presenter, and educator. She made her orchestral debut at the age of sixteen with the Boston Symphony Orchestra with Thomas Dausgaard, and she performed again with the BSO with Keith Lockhart. She was subsequently selected by The Boston Globe as one of its Superior Pianists of the year, “who appears to excel in everything.” In recent seasons, she has performed as a recitalist and chamber musician at Alice Tully Hall, the Library of Congress, the Dresden Chamber Music Festival, and the National Concert Hall in Taiwan. She performs frequently with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. In 2009, she launched String Theory, a chamber music series in Chattanooga, Tennessee that has become one of the region’s premier classical music presenters. The following year she was appointed director of the Chamber Music Institute at Music@Menlo, a position she held for the next decade.
In 2017, she joined her husband, violinist Soovin Kim, as artistic director of the Lake Champlain Chamber Music Festival in Burlington, Vermont. The duo became artistic directors at Chamber Music Northwest in Portland, Oregon in 2020. They were named recipients of Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s Award for Extraordinary Service in 2021 for their efforts during the pandemic.
Most recently, Gloria was named Advisor of the newly launched Institute for Concert Artists at the New England Conservatory of Music. Gloria released two albums—her Gloria Chien LIVE from the Music@Menlo LIVE label and Here With You with acclaimed clarinetist Anthony McGill on Cedille Records.
Gloria received her bachelor, master’s, and doctoral degrees at the New England Conservatory of Music with Wha Kyung Byun and Russell Sherman. She is Artist-in-Residence at Lee University in Cleveland, Tennessee, and she is a Steinway Artist.
Upcoming Concerts & Events
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Nancy Allen
Harp
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Hailed by The New York Times as “a major artist” following her New York recital debut in 1975, Nancy Allen joined the New York Philharmonic in June of 1999 as Principal Harp. She maintains a busy international concert schedule as well as heading the harp departments of The Juilliard School and the Aspen Music Festival and School, and teaching at Stony Brook University. In addition, Ms. Allen appears regularly with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra.
Ms. Allen’s busy performing schedule includes solo appearances at major international festivals. She has appeared on PBS’s Live From Lincoln Center with The Chamber Music Society, as well as with Ms. Battle, and has performed as a recitalist for Music at the Supreme Court in Washington, D.C. Ms. Allen’s recording of Ravel’s Introduction and Allegro with the Tokyo Quartet, flutist Ransom Wilson, and clarinetist David Shifrin received a Grammy Award nomination; she can also be heard on Sony Classical, Deutsche Grammophon, and CRI.
Ms. Allen is a native of New York, where she studied with Pearl Chertok and undertook private lessons in piano and oboe. The summer of 1972 took her to Paris, where she studied with Lily Laskine. During that same year, she entered The Juilliard School to study with Marcel Grandjany. In 1973, Ms. Allen won the Fifth International Harp Competition, in Israel, and was later awarded a National Endowment for the Arts Solo Recitalist Award.
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Jennifer Frautschi
Violin
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Two-time Grammy nominee and Avery Fisher career grant recipient, violinist Jennifer Frautschi, has appeared as soloist with innumerable orchestras including the Cincinnati Symphony, Chicago Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Milwaukee Symphony, Minnesota Orchestra, and Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. As a chamber musician, she has performed with the Boston Chamber Music Society and Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and appeared at Chamber Music Northwest, La Jolla Summerfest, Music@Menlo, Tippet Rise Art Center, Toronto Summer Music, and the Bridgehampton, Charlottesville, Lake Champlain, Moab, Ojai, Santa Fe, Seattle, and Spoleto Music Festivals.
Her extensive discography includes several discs for Naxos: the Stravinsky Violin Concerto with the Philharmonia Orchestra of London, conducted by the legendary Robert Craft, and two Grammy-nominated recordings with the Fred Sherry Quartet of Schoenberg’s Concerto for String Quartet and Orchestra and the Schoenberg Third String Quartet. Her most recent releases are with pianist John Blacklow on Albany Records: the first devoted to the three sonatas of Robert Schumann; the second, American Duos, an exploration of recent additions to the violin and piano repertoire by contemporary American composers Barbara White, Steven Mackey, Elena Ruehr, Dan Coleman, and Stephen Hartke. She also recorded three widely praised CDs for Artek: an orchestral recording of the Prokofiev concerti with Gerard Schwarz and the Seattle Symphony; the violin music of Ravel and Stravinsky; and 20th-century works for solo violin. Other recordings include a disc of Romantic Horn Trios, with hornist Eric Ruske and pianist Stephen Prutsman, and the Stravinsky Duo Concertant with pianist Jeremy Denk.
Born in Pasadena, California, Ms. Frautschi attended the Colburn School, Harvard, the New England Conservatory, and the Juilliard School. She performs on a 1722 Antonio Stradivarius violin known as the “ex-Cadiz,” on generous loan from a private American foundation with support from Rare Violins In Consortium. She currently teaches in the graduate program at Stony Brook University.
Upcoming Concerts & Events
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Carmit Zori
Violin
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Violinist Carmit Zori is the recipient of a Leventritt Foundation Award, a Pro Musicis International Award, and the top prize in the Walter W. Naumburg International Violin Competition. She has appeared as a soloist with the New York Philharmonic, the Rochester Philharmonic, and the Philadelphia Orchestra, among many others, and has given solo recitals at Lincoln Center, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Isabella Stewart Gardener Museum in Boston, the Phillips Collection in Washington D.C., the Tel Aviv Museum and the Jerusalem Center for the Performing Arts.
Her performances have taken her throughout Latin America and Europe, as well as Israel, Japan, Taiwan, and Australia, where she premiered the Violin Concerto by Marc Neikrug. Ms. Zori appeared with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and has been a guest at chamber music festivals and concert series around the world, including the Chamber Music at the Y series, New York City, Festival Casals in Puerto Rico, Chesapeake Bay Music Festival, Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival, Bard Music Festival, Chamber Music Northwest, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, La Jolla Chamber music festival, Seattle Chamber Music Festival, Cape Cod Chamber Music Festival, BDDS chamber music festival Wisconsin, Orcas summer music festival, Peasmarsh music festival in the UK, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, as well as many other venues. Carmit Zori is a regular participant at the Marlboro Chamber Music Festival in Vermont.
Ms. Zori participated in concerts “Music for Food” an organization that leads initiatives with music for local hunger relief. She also participated in concerts for Project Music Heals Us a nonprofit organization that interacts through the communities with a focus on the elderly, and disabled.
Carmit is a member of the “Israeli Chamber Project”, an ensemble that performs chamber concerts in Israel and abroad as well as participates in educational outreach.
Ms. Zori, who for ten years was an artistic director at Bargemusic, founded the Brooklyn Chamber Music Society in 2002.She has recorded on the Arabesque, Koch International, and Elektra-Nonesuch labels.
Ms. Zori is a professor of violin at Bard college conservatory of music, Rutgers University, and at SUNY Purchase.After hearing the fifteen-year-old Ms. Zori, Isaac Stern arranged for her to come to the United States from her native Israel to study at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where her teachers included Ivan Galamian, Jaime Laredo, and Arnold Steinhardt.
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Paul Neubauer
Viola
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Violist Paul Neubauer’s exceptional musicality and effortless playing led The New York Times to call him “a master musician.” In 2025 he will release two albums for First Hand Records that feature the final works of two great composers: an all-Bartók album including the revised version of the viola concerto, and a Shostakovich recording including the monumental viola sonata.
At age 21, Mr. Neubauer was appointed principal violist of the New York Philharmonic, and he held that position for six years. He has appeared as soloist with over 100 orchestras including the New York, Los Angeles, and Helsinki philharmonics; Chicago, National, St. Louis, Detroit, Dallas, San Francisco, and Bournemouth symphonies; and Mariinsky, Santa Cecilia, English Chamber, and Beethovenhalle orchestras.
He has also premiered viola concertos by Béla Bartók (revised version of the Viola Concerto), Reinhold Glière, Gordon Jacob, Henri Lazarof, Robert Suter, Joel Phillip Friedman, Aaron Jay Kernis, Detlev Müller-Siemens, David Ott, Krzysztof Penderecki, Tobias Picker, and Joan Tower. He performs with SPA, a trio with soprano Susanna Phillips and pianist Anne-Marie McDermott, with a wide range of repertoire including salon style songs.
He has been featured on CBS’s Sunday Morning, A Prairie Home Companion, and in Strad, Strings, and People magazines. A two-time Grammy nominee, he has recorded on numerous labels including Decca, Deutsche Grammophon, RCA Red Seal, and Sony Classical.
Mr. Neubauer appears with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and is the artistic director of the Mostly Music series in New Jersey. He is on the faculty of The Juilliard School and Mannes College
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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Fred Sherry
Cello
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Fred Sherry has introduced audiences on five continents and all fifty United States to the music of our time for over five decades. He was a founding member of TASHI and Speculum Musicae, artistic director of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and has been a member of the Group for Contemporary Music, Berio’s Juilliard Ensemble and the Galimir String Quartet. He has also enjoyed a close collaboration with jazz pianist and composer Chick Corea.
Elliott Carter, Mario Davidovsky, Steve Mackey, David Rakowski, Somei Satoh, Charles Wuorinen, and John Zorn have written concertos for Sherry, and he has premiered solo and chamber works dedicated to him by Milton Babbitt, Derek Bermel, Jason Eckardt, Lukas Foss, Oliver Knussen, Peter Lieberson, Donald Martino, and Toru Takemitsu among others.
Fred Sherry’s vast discography encompasses a wide range of classic and modern repertoire; he has been soloist and “sideman” on hundreds of commercial and esoteric recordings. Mr. Sherry was the organizer for Robert Craft’s New York recording sessions from 1995-2012. Their longstanding collaboration produced celebrated performances of the Schoenberg Cello Concerto, all four String Quartets, and the String Quartet Concerto as well as major works by Stravinsky and Webern.
Mr. Sherry’s book 25 Bach Duets from the Cantatas was published by Boosey & Hawkes in 2011, the revised edition was released in 2019. C.F. Peters unveiled his treatise on contemporary string playing, A Grand Tour of Cello Technique, in 2018. He is a member of the cello faculty of The Juilliard School, The Mannes School of Music, and The Manhattan School of Music. -
Ransom Wilson
Flute
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Flutist/conductor Ransom Wilson has performed in concert with major orchestras the world over. As a flutist, he has recently launched an ongoing series of solo recordings on the Nimbus label in Europe. As a conductor, he is starting his third season as Music Director of the Redlands Symphony in Southern California, and he continues his positions with the Lar Lubovitch Dance Company and Le Train Bleu ensemble. He has led opera performances at the New York City Opera, and was for ten years an assistant conductor at the Metropolitan Opera. He has been a guest conductor of the London, Houston, KBS, Kraków, Denver, New Jersey, Hartford, and Berkeley symphonies; the Orchestra of St. Luke’s; the Philadelphia Chamber Orchestra; the Hallé Orchestra; and the chamber orchestras of St. Paul and Los Angeles. He has also appeared with the Glimmerglass Opera, Minnesota Opera, and the Opera of La Quinzena Musical in Spain. As an educator, he regularly leads masterclasses at the Paris Conservatory, Juilliard School, Moscow Conservatory, Cambridge University, and others. A graduate of The Juilliard School, he was an Atlantique Foundation scholar in Paris, where he studied privately with Jean-Pierre Rampal. His recording career, which includes three Grammy Award nominations, began in 1973 with Jean-Pierre Rampal and I Solisti Veneti. Since then he has recorded over 35 albums as flutist and/or conductor. Mr. Wilson is Professor of Flute at the Yale University School of Music, and has performed with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center since 1991.
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David Shifrin
Clarinet & Artistic Director Emeritus 1981–2020
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Clarinetist David Shifrin graduated from the Interlochen Arts Academy in 1967 and the Curtis Institute in 1971. He made his debut with the Philadelphia Orchestra having won the Orchestra’s Student Competition in 1969. He went on to receive numerous prizes and awards worldwide, including the Geneva and Munich International Competitions, the Concert Artists Guild auditions, and both the Avery Fisher Career Grant (1987) and the Avery Fisher Prize (2000).
Shifrin received Yale University’s Cultural Leadership Citation in 2014 and is currently the Samuel S. Sanford Professor in the Practice of Clarinet at the Yale School of Music where he teaches a studio of graduate-level clarinetists and coaches chamber music ensembles. He is also the artistic director of Yale’s Oneppo Chamber Music Society and the Yale in New York concert series. Shifrin previously served on the faculties of the Juilliard School, the University of Southern California, the University of Michigan, the Cleveland Institute of Music, and the University of Hawaii.
Shifrin served as artistic director of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center from 1992 to 2004 and Chamber Music Northwest in Portland, Oregon from 1981 to 2020. He has appeared as soloist with major orchestras in the United States and abroad and has served as Principal Clarinet with the Cleveland Orchestra, American Symphony Orchestra (under Stokowski), the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, and the Symphony Orchestras of New Haven, Honolulu, and Dallas. Shifrin also continues to broaden the clarinet repertoire by commissioning and championing more than 100 works of 20th and 21st century American composers. Shifrin’s recordings have consistently garnered praise and awards including three Grammy nominations and “Record of the Year” from Stereo Review.
Shifrin is represented by CM Artists in New York and performs on Backun clarinets and Légère reeds.
Upcoming Concerts & Events
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William Purvis
Horn
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William Purvis pursues a multifaceted career both in the U.S. and abroad as horn soloist, chamber musician, conductor, and educator. A passionate advocate of new music, he has participated in numerous premieres including horn concerti by Peter Lieberson, Bayan Northcott, Krzysztof Penderecki (New York premiere), and Paul Lansky; horn trios by Poul Ruders and Paul Lansky; Sonate en Forme de Préludes by Steven Stucky; and recent premieres by Elliott Carter, Retracing II for Solo Horn and Nine by Five with the New York Woodwind Quintet. He is a member of the New York Woodwind Quintet, the Yale Brass Trio, and the Triton Horn Trio, and is an emeritus member of the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s. Mr. Purvis has been a frequent guest artist with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Boston Chamber Music Society, and has collaborated with many of the world’s most esteemed string quartets, including the Juilliard, Tokyo, Orion, Brentano, Mendelssohn, Sibelius, Daedalus, and Fine Arts string quartets. Recent Festival appearances have included the Sarasota, Norfolk, Sebago Long Lake, Chestnut Hill, and Phoenix Chamber Music Festivals in the U.S., the Great Mountain, Busan and Gimhae Chamber Music Festivals in South Korea, and the Kitaruizawa Festival in Japan. He has participated in performances on historical instruments with the Smithsonian Chamber Players, and a recording of the Quintets for Piano and Winds will be released in Spring of 2020. He has recorded extensively on numerous labels including Deutsche Grammophon, Sony Classical, Naxos, Koch, and Bridge. Mr. Purvis is currently Professor in the Practice of Horn and Chamber Music at the Yale School of Music, where he is also coordinator of winds and brasses, and serves as Director of the Yale Collection of Musical Instruments.