This Sunday afternoon, November 4 at 3 PM, Parlance Chamber Concerts will present a Family Concert featuring the charismatic piano duo Alessio Bax and Lucille Chung with eight leading members of the New York Philharmonic. The concert will take place in the acoustically superb sanctuary of West Side Presbyterian Church.
The program will include zoological favorites by Vivaldi, Musorgsky, and Tchaikovsky. The climax of the afternoon will be Camille Saint-Saëns’ beloved children’s classic, Carnival of the Animals.
Pianists Alessio Bax and Lucille Chung
Alessio and Lucille’s musical marriage has been poetically described as one “of wondrous colors and dextrous aplomb, subtly balanced to make a musical performance sound as one.” They are individually extraordinary artists who each enjoy successful solo, chamber, and duo-recital careers. Alessio has appeared as a concerto soloist with over 100 orchestras in the major musical capitals of the world. Lucille’s career is equally multifaceted and far-flung. As a recitalist, she has performed in more than 30 countries; as a concerto soloist, she has collaborated with many of the most renowned conductors of our time. On Sunday afternoon, they will be featured in solo and chamber settings and as the duo-piano stars of Carnival of the Animals.
Members of the New York Philharmonic
Sunday afternoon’s concert will also spotlight leading members of the New York Philharmonic. The program will take flight with flutist Yoobin Son’s glittering performance of Antonio Vivaldi’s “Goldfinch” Concerto. Later, violinist Sheryl Staples, the Philharmonic’s brilliant principal associate concertmaster, will be the graceful soloist in Tchaikovsky’s musical depiction of the “White Swan” from his timeless ballet score Swan Lake.
Focusing on the underlying theme of musical friendship, the charismatic clarinetist Pascual Martínez-Forteza and the Philharmonic’s celebrated principal violist Cynthia Phelps will collaborate with Alessio Bax in Mozart’s Kegelstatt Trio for clarinet, viola, and piano. Mozart composed this warmhearted Trio in a mood of collegial intimacy for himself to perform on viola with two of his closest friends, the pianist Franziska Jacquin and the legendary clarinetist Anton Stadler.
Camille Saint-Saëns’ Carnival of the Animals
The second half will showcase each member of the ensemble in Saint-Saëns’ “Grand Zoological Fantasy.” As with Mozart’s Kegelstatt Trio, Saint-Saëns created his famous musical menagerie in the spirit of warm, good-humored collegiality. He composed the suite in only two days as an amusement for his friends, never suspecting that it would go on to become his most widely loved work!
Each movement portrays a different animal, with the double bass as a lumbering, dancing elephant, the flute as a twittering bird, and the violins, in a sly dig at Saint-Säens’ ever-nattering critics, representing two abrasively braying donkeys. Subtle musical jokes abound, as in Saint-Säens’ indelible portrait of the tortoise. Here, the ancient creature kicks up it heels in a lugubrious parody of Jacques Offenbach’s famous Can-Can.
The musical high point of Carnival of the Animals is the exquisite cello solo, The Swan, which will be soulfully performed by the New York Philharmonic’s assistant principal cellist Eileen Moon.
Bring your entire family to hear Saint-Saëns’ zoological classic!
Complete program and ticket information for Sunday afternoon’s concert can be found here.
The performance will take place on Sunday, November 4, from 3:00 PM to approximately 5:00 PM.
The event will take place at West Side Presbyterian Church, 6 South Monroe Street, Ridgewood. Free parking and childcare for children 3 to 6. Tickets at the door: Adults $40; Seniors (65+): $30; Young Adults (21 – 39): $20; Students (under 21): $10