MUSICIAN BIOGRAPHIES Bernard Mindich Bernard Lisa-Marie Mazzucco
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS AT PENN STATE ONSTAGE ANI KAVAFIAN, violin Bernard Mindich DAVID SHIFRIN, clarinet MIHAI MARICA, cello , viola TARA HELEN O’CONNOR, flute PAUL NEUBAUER YURA LEE, viola Lisa-Marie Mazzucco Bernard Mindich Lisa-Marie Mazzucco ARNAUD SUSSMANN, violin © 2007 NyghtFalcon All Rights Reserved Today’s performance is sponsored by Tom and Mary Ellen Litzinger COMMUNITY ADVISORY COUNCIL The Community Advisory Council is dedicated to strengthening the relationship between the Center for the Performing Arts and the community. Council members participate in a range of activities in support of this objective. Nancy VanLandingham, chair Mary Ellen Litzinger Lam Hood, vice chair Bonnie Marshall Pieter Ouwehand William Asbury Melinda Stearns Patricia Best Susan Steinberg Lynn Sidehamer Brown Lillian Upcraft Philip Burlingame Pat Williams Alfred Jones Jr. Nina Woskob Deb Latta Eileen Leibowitz student representative Ellie Lewis Jesse Scott Christine Lichtig CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS AT PENN STATE presents The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center Tara Helen O’Connor, flute David Shifrin, clarinet Ani Kavafian, violin Arnaud Sussmann, violin Yura Lee, viola Paul Neubauer, viola Mihai Marica, cello 7:30 p.m. Thursday, November 20, 2014 Schwab Auditorium The performance includes one intermission. This presentation is a component of the Center for the Performing Arts Classical Music Project. With support from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the project provides opportunities to engage students, faculty, and the community with classical music artists and programs. Marica Tacconi, Penn State professor of musicology, and Carrie Jackson, Penn State associate professor of German and linguistics, provide faculty leadership for the curriculum and academic components of the grant project. sponsors Tom and Mary Ellen Litzinger support provided by John L. Brown Jr. and Marlynn Steele Sidehamer media sponsor WPSU The Center for the Performing Arts at Penn State receives state arts funding support through a grant from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, a state agency funded by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency. PROGRAM Quartet in A Major for flute, violin, viola, and cello, K. 298 (1786) Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791) Andantino con variazioni Menuetto Rondo: Allegretto grazioso Tara Helen O’Connor, flute Arnaud Sussmann, violin Yura Lee, viola Mihai Marica, cello Duo No. 2 in B-flat Major for violin and viola, K. 424 (1783) Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791) Adagio—Allegro Andante cantabile Thema con variazioni: Andante grazioso Ani Kavafian, violin Paul Neubauer, viola Parallel Worlds for flute, two violins, viola, and cello (2013) Co-commissioned by The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Center for the Performing Arts at Penn State Sebastian Currier (b. 1959) Expressive Animated Sustained Pulsing Tara Helen O’Connor, flute Arnaud Sussmann, violin Ani Kavafian, violin Yura Lee, viola Mihai Marica, cello INTERMISSION Quintet in A Major for clarinet, two violins, viola, and cello, K. 581 (1789) Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791) Allegro Larghetto Menuetto Allegretto con variazioni David Shifrin, clarinet Ani Kavafian, violin Arnaud Sussmann, violin Paul Neubauer, viola Mihai Marica, cello The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Center for the Performing Arts at Penn State are proud members of Music Accord, a national consortium of classical music presenting organizations that commissioned Parallel Worlds. The Chamber Music Society’s touring program is made possible in part by the Lila Acheson and DeWitt Wallace Endowment Fund. Please turn off cell phones and other electronic devices. Photographing, sound recording, or videotaping this performance is prohibited. been a joyous friendship. The music is PROGRAM NOTES playful throughout, unruffled by a slow BY DR. RICHARD E. RODDA movement. The opening movement is a set of variations based on a song “An Quartet in A Major for flute, die Natur” attributed to the contempo- violin, viola, and cello, K. 298 rary Viennese composer and publisher Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Franz Anton Hoffmeister—the flute introduces the subject and takes the Among Mozart’s most loyal friends first variation, after which the violin, during his last years in Vienna were viola, and cello, in turn, provide their the members of the Jacquin family. own embroidery upon the tune. The The paterfamilias, Nikolaus Joseph von central trio section of the diminutive Jacquin, was a distinguished botanist Menuetto recalls an old French song and professor of chemistry at Vienna titled “Il a des bottes, des bottes, Bas- University who instilled the love of tien” (The Boots, the Boots, Bastien). music in his children, Joseph Franz (21 Mozart, a great lover of jokes and a in 1787), Gottfried (19), and Franzisca teaser of his friends, headed the clos- (18). Mozart was very fond of the Jac- ing Rondo, “Not too fast, but also not quins and he visited them frequently too slow—so-so—with much elegance to share their dinner, play his music for and expression,” and then went on to them, or keep Franzisca up with her spin one of his most beguiling cre- lessons when she proved to be one of ations from Paisiello’s operatic theme. his most talented piano students. For the entertainment of the household, Duo No. 2 in B-flat Major for Mozart composed a number of works, violin and viola, K. 424 including the delightful Flute Quartet in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart A Major (K. 298). During a visit to his hometown of It was long believed that this quartet Salzburg in 1782, Mozart planned to had been written in Paris in 1778 as a renew acquaintance with old friends, pendant to the three such works that including Michael Haydn, director of Mozart completed in Mannheim late the orchestra and composer in the the previous year for the local amateur archiepiscopal household, and the of the instrument Willem Britten de younger brother of Joseph Haydn of Jong, but this dating troubled those Esterházy. Upon his arrival in Salzburg, scholars who had difficulty explaining Mozart was distressed to find that how Mozart could have quoted an aria Haydn had fallen ill, especially since (“Chi mi mostra”—Who tells me where the archbishop had ordered a set of I can find love?) from Paisiello’s 1786 six duos for violin and viola from him opera buffa Le Gare generose (The and was threatening to dock Haydn’s Contests in Generosity, premiered in salary if the deadline for their delivery Naples and repeated almost immedi- was not met. Haydn had been able to ately in Vienna) in a work written eight finish only four of the pieces, so Mozart years before. The 1786 provenance of completed the assignment for him by the composition is also attested by the composing the remaining pair (K. 423 analysis of the composer’s handwriting and K. 424). All six duos were writ- and the paper upon which the music ten out in fair copy, inscribed with the was written, and by the fact that Baron name of Michael Haydn, and sent to the von Jacquin once owned the auto- archbishop with a flowery dedication. graph. This nice story (first recorded by two of Haydn’s students and repeated in the If the A Major Flute Quartet provides biography of Mozart by Georg Nissen, any indication of Mozart’s relationship Constanze Mozart’s second husband) with the Jacquin family, it must have has, however, been called into ques- tion by some scholars, including Alfred and Kronos string quartets. Currier’s Einstein, since it does not explain why Deep-Sky Objects, 15 Minutes, Quanta, Mozart twice asked his father to return Flow, Links, and Ringtone Variations the duos to him in December if he received world premieres during the intended to pass them off as the work 2012–2013 season. Highlights included of another composer. Perhaps, after the premieres of Cadence, Fugue, all, he wrote them simply because he Fade by the American Brass Quintet was intrigued by the novelty of Haydn’s and Artificial Memory by the Dresher duos and wanted to try his own hand Ensemble. His violin concerto Time at the genre. They were announced for Machines, commissioned by Anne- publication under their true author’s Sophie Mutter, was premiered by name in 1788, but did not appear in the New York Philharmonic in June print until 1792, a year after Mozart’s 2011, and a recording of the perfor- death. mance was released by Deutsche Grammophon the following September. Mozart’s string duos provide about as much delight as it is possible to derive Currier has received the Grawemeyer from just two melody instruments. The Award for the chamber piece Static; the B-flat Duo opens with a stately intro- Berlin Prize, Rome Prize, a Guggenheim duction in measured tempo that serves Fellowship, a fellowship from the as preface to the fully realized sonata National Endowment for the Arts, and form of the Allegro. The movement’s an Academy Award from the American development section is particularly Academy of Arts and Letters. He has notable for the masterful canonic dia- held residencies at the MacDowell and logues shared by the partnered instru- Yaddo colonies. He received a D.M.A. ments. The Andante is a movement of from The Juilliard School and taught at sweet, lyrical repose. The finale is an Columbia University from 1999–2007. infectious theme and variations. He is artist-in-residence at the Institute for Advanced Study and is published by Boosey & Hawkes. Parallel Worlds for flute, two violins, viola, and cello “The idea for Parallel Worlds started Sebastian Currier with the instrumental ensemble itself, Co-commissioned by the Chamber Music flute and string quartet,” Currier writes. Society of Lincoln Center and the Center “The string quartet has remained, over for the Performing Arts at Penn State.