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April 14, 2019: Anne Akiko Meyers, violin; Jason Vieaux, guitar ASTOR PIAZZOLLA (1921-1992) Histoire du Tango, arr. by Dmitriy Varelas April 14, 2019: Anne Akiko Meyers, violin; Jason Vieaux, guitar The tango, which originated in late nineteenth-century Buenos Aires in brothels and urban courtyards, gained ballroom status through its seductive powers, spreading to Paris and other European centers in the early twentieth century. Tangos traditionally featured not only couples dancing in tight embrace with almost violent leg motions, but also melodramatic poetry sung to the accompaniment of solo guitar; or a trio of flute, violin, and guitar (or bandoneon, a square, button-operated accordion); or larger ensembles of strings, bandoneon, and piano. Piazzolla infused the tango with new life following the Second World War, though he was criticized by traditionalists for adding dissonance and extended rhythmic techniques. His style, called nuevo tango, bears certain similarities to bebop and bossa nova, while largely avoiding the improvisations of jazz. Piazzolla helped bring about the even more recent tango renaissance through his many performances and recordings with his own Quinteto Nuevo Tango, which frequently joined with jazz ensembles, chamber groups, and orchestras across the globe. Piazzolla’s tangos are often soulful, expressive pieces that retain a certain melancholy even in their most lively passages. Along the way, delightful little surprises occur, such as bits of counterpoint, glissandos, harmonics, hesitations, a suddenly sweet sonority, a jaunty rhythm, and bursts of improvisatory-sounding but carefully written out figuration. Well aware of how much the tango had changed during his lifetime, Piazzolla composed Histoire du tango in 1985 to celebrate the dance in four different eras. He intended the four movements—Bordel 1900, Café 1930, Night Club 1960, and Concert d’aujourd’hui (Modern-day concert)—to be abstractions rather than music for dancing. The premiere by flutist Marc Grauwels and guitarist Guy Lukowski took place in March 1985 at the Fifth International Guitar Festival in Liège, where Piazzolla was also premiering his Concerto for Bandoneon, Guitar, and Strings. Histoire du tango has since been arranged for various instrumental combinations and has become one of Piazzolla’s most frequently performed works. The exuberant Bordel 1900 reflects the tango’s earliest years. Wrote Piazzolla, “The tango originated in Buenos Aires in 1882. . . . This music is full of grace and liveliness. It paints a picture of the good-natured chatter of the French, Italian, and Spanish women who peopled those bordellos as they teased the policemen, thieves, sailors, and riffraff who came to see them. This is a high-spirited tango.” Piazzolla’s lively outer sections frame a middle section that shows his wealth of figuration and sequencing ideas while maintaining the breakneck pace. The more sultry Café 1930 represents the period when, said Piazzolla, “people stopped dancing it as they did in 1900, preferring instead simply to listen to it. It became more musical, and more romantic. This tango has undergone total transformation: the movements are slower, with new and often melancholy harmonies.” A contemplative guitar introduction brings on one of Piazzolla’s most soulful melodies. Nevertheless, he can’t resist the tango’s typical inclusion of contrasting sections—in this case an active interruption and a sweet major-mode interlude before returning to the melancholy opening. The rowdy Night Club 1960 incorporates the influence of the bossa nova craze that took the world by storm and helped catapult Piazzolla to fame. “This is a time of rapidly expanding international exchange,” he wrote, “and the tango evolves again as Brazil and Argentina come together in Buenos Aires. The bossa nova and the new tango are moving to the same beat. Audiences rush to the night clubs to listen earnestly to the new tango. This marks a revolution and a profound alteration in some of the original tango forms.” Piazzolla casts his lively rhythmic sections into high relief by contrasting them with poignant passages from his never-ending supply of expressive melodic ideas. In the jaunty Concert d’aujourd’hui (Modern-day concert), Piazzolla shows how far the tango influence has spread, now invading the most sophisticated concert halls. “Certain concepts in tango music become intertwined with modern music,” he said.. “Bartók, Stravinsky, and other composers reminisce to the tune of tango music. This [is] today’s tango, and the tango of the future as well.” Piazzolla’s careful study of these composers’ music turns up in his textures, harmonies, and rhythmic devices. An impish virtuosic burst rounds off his captivating retrospective. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

PAQUITO D’RIVERA, SAXOPHONE Paquito D’Rivera defies categorization. The winner of twelve Grammy Awards, he is celebrated both for his artistry in Latin jazz and his achievements as a classical composer. Born in Havana, Cuba, he performed at age 10 with the National Theater Orchestra, studied at the Havana Conservatory of Music and, at 17, became a featured soloist with the Cuban National Symphony. As a founding member of the Orquesta Cubana de Musica Moderna, he directed that group for two years, while at the same time playing both the clarinet and saxophone with the Cuban National Symphony Orchestra. He eventually went on to premier several works by notable Cuban composers with the same orchestra. Additionally, he was a founding member and co-director of the innovative musical ensemble Irakere. With its explosive mixture of jazz, rock, classical, and traditional Cuban music never before heard, Irakere toured extensively throughout America and Europe, won several Grammy nominations (1979, 1980) and a Grammy (1979). His numerous recordings include more than 30 solo albums. In 1988, he was a founding member of the United Nation Orchestra, a 15-piece ensemble organized by Dizzy Gillespie to showcase the fusion of Latin and Caribbean influences with jazz. D’Rivera continues to appear as guest conductor. A Grammy was awarded the United Nation Orchestra in 1991, the same year D’Rivera received a Lifetime Achievement Award from Carnegie Hall for his contributions to Latin music. Additionally, D’Rivera’s highly acclaimed ensembles—the Chamber Jazz Ensemble, the Paquito D’Rivera Big Band, and the Paquito D’Rivera Quintet—are in great demand worldwide. While Paquito D’Rivera’s discography reflects a dedication and enthusiasm for jazz, bebop, and Latin music, his contributions to classical music are impressive. They include solo performances with the London Philharmonic, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra, the Baltimore Symphony, the Florida Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Brooklyn Philharmonic. He has also performed with the Puerto Rico Symphony Orchestra, the Costa Rica National Symphony, the Simon Bolivar Symphony Orchestra, the Bronx Arts Ensemble, and the St. Luke’s Chamber Orchestra, among others. In his passion to bring Latin repertoire to greater prominence, Mr. D’Rivera has successfully created, championed, and promoted all types of classical compositions, including his three chamber compositions recorded live in concert with distinguished cellist Yo-Yo Ma in September 2003. The chamber work “Merengue,” from that live concert at Zankel Hall, was released by Sony Records and garnered Paquito his 7th Grammy as Best Instrumental Composition 2004. In addition to his extraordinary performing career as an instrumentalist, Mr. D’Rivera has rapidly gained a reputation as an accomplished composer. The prestigious music house, Boosey and Hawkes, is the exclusive publisher of Mr. D’Rivera’s compositions. Recent recognition of his compositional skills came with the award of a 2007 John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship in Music Composition, and the 2007–2008 appointment as Composer-in-Residence at the Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s. As part of the Caramoor Latin American music initiative, Sonidos Latinos, D’Rivera’s new concerto for double bass and clarinet/saxophone, “Conversations with Cachao,” pays tribute to Cuba’s legendary bass player, Israel “Cachao” Lopez. D’Rivera’s works often reveal his widespread and eclectic musical interests, which range from Afro-Cuban rhythms and melodies, including influences encountered in his many travels, and back to his classical origins. Inspiration for another recent composition, “The Cape Cod Files,” comes from such disparate sources as Benny Goodman’s intro to the Eubie Blake popular song “Memories of You,” Argentinean Milonga, improvisations on the music of Cuban composer Ernesto Lecuona, and North American boogie-woogie. His numerous commissions include compositions for Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Library of Congress, the National Symphony Orchestra, Rotterdam Philharmonic, the Turtle Island String Quartet, Ying String Quartet, the International Double Reed Society, Syracuse University, Montreal’s Gerald Danovich Saxophone Quartet, and the Grant Park Music Festival. Another commission came about through ensemble Opus 21′s interest in building bridges between audiences of different backgrounds. Dedicated to the works and art music of the 21st century, Opus 21 commissioned “The Chaser” and premiered it in May 2006. In 2005, Imani Winds, a woodwind quintet committed to the exploration of diverse world music traditions and the broadening of the traditional wind quintet literature, commissioned “Kites.” This work personifies freedom and the vision that liberty and independence have a foundation through culture and music. Just as a kite may fly freely, its path continues to be bound to the earth—its foundation, by the string. Regarding his 2002 commission for the National Symphony Orchestra and Rotterdam Philharmonic, critics had this to say about the flute concerto performed by Marina Piccinini with the National Symphony and the Baltimore Symphony: “…Best that night was Paquito D’Rivera’s, ‘Gran Danzon’ (The Bel Air Concerto) in its world premiere. A spiky and imaginatively colored piece of Latin American orchestral writing…” (Joe Banno, Washington Post, February 11, 2002) “…‘Gran Danzon’ …this dazzling work…reveals D’Rivera’s sophistication as a composer…” (L. Peat O’Neal, Washington Post, June 3, 2002) Paquito D’Rivera is the author of two books: My Sax Life, published by Northwestern University Press, and a novel, Oh, La Habana, published by MTeditores, Barcelona. He is the recipient of the NEA Jazz Masters Award 2005 and the National Medal of the Arts 2005, as well as the Living Jazz Legend Award from the Kennedy Center, Washington, D.C. in 2007. His numerous other honors include Doctorates Honoris Causa in Music (from the Berklee School of Music in Boston, the University of Pennsylvania), and the Jazz Journalist Association’s Clarinetist of the Year Award in both 2004 and 2006. In 2008, Mr. D’Rivera received the International Association for Jazz Education President’s Award and the Frankfurter Musikpreis in Germany, and the Medal of Honor from the National Arts Club in 2009. In 2010, he was named a Nelson A. Rockefeller Honoree and given the African-American Classical Music Award from Spelman College. He received his 10th and 11th Grammys this year for Panamericana Suite as Best Latin Album and Best Classical Contemporary Composition, adding to his previously awarded 8th and 9th Grammys for Riberas (Best Classical Recording) and Funk Tango (Best Latin Jazz Album 2008). Mr. D’Rivera is the first artist to win Latin Grammys in both Classical and Latin Jazz categories—for Stravinsky’s Historia del Soldado (L’Histoire du Soldat) and Brazilian Dreams with New York Voices. He has served as artistic director of jazz programming at the New Jersey Chamber Music Society and continues as Artistic Director of the famous world-class Festival Internacional de Jazz de Punta Del Este in Uruguay and the DC Jazz Festival in Washington, D.C., and add to that now in its second year, Jazz Patagonia 2013 in Chile. In 1999, and in celebration of its 500-year history, the Universidad de Alcala de Henares presented Paquito with a special award recognizing his contribution to the arts, his humane qualities, and his defense of rights and liberties of artists around the world. The National Endowment for the Arts website affirms “he has become the consummate multinational ambassador, creating and promoting a cross-culture of music that moves effortlessly among jazz, Latin, and Mozart.”

SHARON ISBIN, GUITAR Acclaimed for her extraordinary lyricism, technique, and versatility, multiple Grammy Award winner Sharon Isbin has been hailed as “the preeminent guitarist of our time.” She is also the winner of Guitar Player magazine’s “Best Classical Guitarist” award, and the Toronto and Madrid Queen Sofia competitions, and was the first guitarist ever to win the Munich Competition. She has appeared as soloist with over 170 orchestras and has given sold-out performances in the world’s finest halls, including New York’s Carnegie and Avery Fisher Halls, Boston’s Symphony Hall, Washington, D.C.’s Kennedy Center, London’s Barbican and Wigmore Halls, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Paris’ Châtelet, Vienna’s Musikverein, Munich’s Herkulessaal, Madrid’s Teatro Real, and many others. She has served as Artistic Director/Soloist of festivals she created for Carnegie Hall and the Ordway Music Theatre (St. Paul), her own series at New York’s 92nd Street Y, and the acclaimed national radio series Guitarjam. She is a frequent guest on national radio programs including All Things Considered and Garrison Keillor’s A Prairie Home Companion. She has been profiled on television throughout the world, including CBS Sunday Morning and A&E. She was a featured guest on Showtime Television’s hit series The L Word, and was the only classical artist to perform in the 2010 Grammy Awards. She performed as featured soloist on the soundtrack for Martin Scorsese’s Academy Award winning film, The Departed. Among her other career highlights, she performed at Ground Zero on September 11, 2002, for the internationally televised memorial, and in concert at the White House for President and Mrs. Obama in November 2009. She has been profiled in periodicals from People to Elle, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times, as well as on the cover of over 45 magazines. A one-hour documentary on her titled Sharon Isbin: Troubadour, produced by Susan Dangel, premieres in 2014. Ms. Isbin’s catalogue of over 25 recordings—from baroque, Spanish/Latin, and 20th century to crossover and jazz-fusion—reflects remarkable versatility. Her latest recording, Sharon Isbin & Friends: Guitar Passions (Sony) became a #1 bestseller on Amazon.com, and includes guest rock/jazz guitarists Steve Vai, Steve Morse, Nancy Wilson (Heart), Stanley Jordan, and Romero Lubambo. Her 2010 Grammy Award winning CD Journey to the New World includes guests Joan Baez and Mark O’Connor. Ranked as a #1 bestselling classical CD on Amazon.com and iTunes, it spent 63 consecutive weeks on the top Billboard charts. Her Dreams of a Worldsoared onto top classical Billboard charts, edging out The 3 Tenors, and earned her a 2001 Grammy for “Best Instrumental Soloist Performance,” making her the first classical guitarist to receive a Grammy in 28 years. Her world premiere recording of concerti written for her by Christopher Rouse and Tan Dun received a 2002 Grammy, as well as Germany’s prestigious Echo Klassik Award. She received a 2005 Latin Grammy nomination for “Best Classical Album” and a 2006 GLAAD Media Award nomination for “Outstanding Music Artist” (alongside Melissa Etheridge) for her Billboard Top 10 Classical disc with the New York Philharmonic of Joaquin Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez, and concerti by Ponce and Villa-Lobos. This marked the Philharmonic’s first-ever recording with guitar, and followed their Avery Fisher Hall performances with Ms. Isbin as their first guitar soloist in 26 years.Baroque Favorites for Guitar with the Zurich Chamber Orchestra remained on the Billboard Top 10 for 16 weeks, and her Journey to the Amazon with Brazilian percussionist Thiago de Mello and saxophonist Paul Winter, a bestseller in the U.S. and the U.K., received a 1999 Grammy nomination for “Best Classical Crossover Album.” She is also featured on Howard Shore’s 2008 Grammy-nominated soundtrack CD for The Departed. Her other CDs include Artist Profile, Wayfaring Stranger with mezzo-soprano Susanne Mentzer, Greatest Hits (EMI), and Aaron Jay Kernis’ Double Concerto with violinist Cho-Liang Lin and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra (SPCO), which received a 2000 Grammy nomination. Her eight best-selling titles for EMI include J.S. Bach Complete Lute Suites and concerti by Joaquin Rodrigo which the composer praised as “magnificent.” She is also featured on the Grammy Foundation’s Smart Symphonies CD distributed to over five million families. Her recordings have received many other awards, including “Critic’s Choice Recording of the Year” in bothGramophone and CD Review, “Recording of the Month” in Stereo Review, and “Album of the Year” in Guitar Player. Sharon Isbin has been acclaimed for expanding the guitar repertoire with some of the finest new works of the century. She has commissioned and premiered more concerti than any other guitarist, as well as numerous solo and chamber works. Her American Landscapes (EMI) is the first-ever recording of American guitar concerti and features works written for her by John Corigliano, Joseph Schwantner and Lukas Foss. (In November 1995, it was launched in the space shuttle Atlantis and presented to Russian cosmonauts during a rendezvous with Mir.) In January 2000, she premiered the ninth concerto written for her: Concert de Gaudí by Christopher Rouse with Christoph Eschenbach and the NDR Symphony, followed by the U.S. premiere with the Dallas Symphony. Among the many other composers who have written for her are Joan Tower, David Diamond, Aaron Jay Kernis, Leo Brouwer, Howard Shore, Steve Vai, and Ned Rorem. In 2003, she premiered John Duarte’s Joan Baez Suite, and in 2005 she premiered a duo by rock guitarist Steve Vai in their joint concert in Paris’ Théâtre du Châtelet. Upcoming premieres in 2015 include a work for guitar and orchestra by Chris Brubeck. Orchestra (throughout Austria including Vienna’s Musikverein) and Belgium’s Philharmonique de Liege, recitals and concerti in New York’s 92nd St Y and Carnegie Hall, Washington, D.C.’s Kennedy Center, a week of performances at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris, Filarmonica Toscanini in Milan, MIDEM Classical Awards in Cannes, and an Ms. Isbin’s recent highlights include tours with the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, Tonkünstler 18-city Guitar Passions tour with Stanley Jordan and Romero Lubambo in 2014. Ms. Isbin has toured Europe annually since she was seventeen, and appears as soloist with orchestras throughout the world, including the New York Philharmonic, National Symphony, Baltimore, Detroit, Houston, Dallas, Pittsburgh, Minnesota, St. Louis, Nashville, New Jersey, Louisville, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Phoenix, Buffalo, and Utah Symphonies; Saint Paul, Los Angeles, Zurich, Scottish, and Lausanne Chamber Orchestras; the London Symphony, Orchestre National de France; and BBC Scottish, Lisbon Gulbenkian, Prague, Milan Verdi, Mexico City, Jerusalem, and Tokyo Symphonies. Her festival appearances include Mostly Mozart, Aspen, Ravinia, Grant Park, Interlochen, Santa Fe, Mexico City, Bermuda, Hong Kong, Montreux, Strasbourg, Paris, Athens, Istanbul, Ravenna, Prague, and Budapest International Festivals. As a chamber musician, Ms. Isbin has performed with the Emerson String Quartet; the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center; a “Guitar Summit” tour with jazz greats Herb Ellis, Stanley Jordan and Michael Hedges; trio recordings with Larry Coryell and Laurindo Almeida; and duo recordings with Carlos Barbosa-Lima. She collaborated with Antonio Carlos Jobim, and has shared the stage with luminaries from Aretha Franklin to Muhammad Ali. Born in Minneapolis, Sharon Isbin began her guitar studies at age nine in Italy, and later studied with Andrès Segovia and Oscar Ghiglia. A former student of Rosalyn Tureck, Ms. Isbin collaborated with the noted keyboardist in preparing landmark first performance editions of the Bach lute suites for guitar (published by G. Schirmer). She received a B.A. cum laude from Yale University and a Master of Music from the Yale School of Music. She is the author of the Classical Guitar Answer Book, and is Director of guitar departments at the Aspen Music Festival and The Juilliard School (which she created in 1989, becoming the first and only guitar instructor in the institution’s 100-year history). In her spare time, Ms. Isbin enjoys trekking in the jungles of Latin America, cross-country skiing, snorkeling, and mountain hiking.

STEPHANIE BLYTHE, MEZZO-SOPRANO A renowned opera singer and recitalist, mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe is considered one of the most highly respected and critically acclaimed artists of her generation. Her repertoire ranges from Handel to Wagner, German lieder to contemporary and classic American song. Ms. Blythe has performed on many of the world’s great stages, such as Carnegie Hall, the Metropolitan Opera, Covent Garden, Paris National Opera and San Francisco, Chicago Lyric and Seattle Operas. Ms. Blythe was named Musical America’s Vocalist of the Year in 2009, received an Opera News Award in 2007 and won the Tucker Award in 1999. Ms. Blythe recently released her first crossover recording on the Innova label with pianist Craig Terry. Mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe is considered to be one of the most highly respected and critically acclaimed artists of her generation. Ms. Blythe has sung in many of the renowned opera houses in the US and Europe including the Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Seattle Opera, Royal Opera House Covent Garden, and the Opera National de Paris. Her many roles include the title roles in Carmen, Samson et Dalila , Orfeo ed Euridice, La Grande Duchesse, Tancredi, Mignon, and Giulio Cesare; Frugola, Principessa, and Zita in Il Trittico, Fricka in both Das Rheingold and Die Walküre, Waltraute in Götterdämmerung,Azucena in Il Trovatore, Ulrica in Un Ballo in Maschera, Baba the Turk in The Rake’s Progress, Ježibaba inRusalka, Jocasta in Oedipus Rex, Mere Marie in Dialogues des Carmélites; Mistress Quickly in Falstaff, andIno/Juno in Semele. She also created the role of Gertrude Stein in Ricky Ian Gordon’s 27 at the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis. Ms. Blythe has also appeared with many of the world’s finest orchestras including the New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, Opera Orchestra of New York, Minnesota Orchestra, Halle Orchestra, Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the Ensemble Orchestre de Paris, and the Concertgerbouworkest. She has also appeared at the Tanglewood, Cincinnati May, and Ravinia festivals, and at the BBC Proms. The many conductors with whom she has worked include Harry Bicket, James Conlon, Charles Dutoit, Mark Elder, Christoph Eschenbach, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, Alan Gilbert, James Levine, Fabio Luisi, Nicola Luisotti, Sir Charles Mackerras, John Nelson, Antonio Pappano, Mstislav Rostropovitch, Robert Spano, Patrick Summers, and Michael Tilson Thomas. A frequent recitalist, Ms. Blythe has been presented in recital in New York by Carnegie Hall in Stern Auditorium and Zankel Hall, Lincoln Center in both its Great Performers Series at Alice Tully Hall and its American Songbook Series at the Allen Room, Town Hall, the 92nd Street Y, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She has also been presenter by the Vocal Arts Society and at the Supreme Court in Washington, DC; the Cleveland Art Song Festival, the University Musical Society in Ann Arbor, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Shriver Hall in Baltimore, and San Francisco Performances. A champion of American song, Ms. Blythe has premiered several song cycles written for her includingTwelve Poems of Emily Dickinson by the late James Legg, Covered Wagon Woman by Alan Smith which was commissioned by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and recorded with the ensemble (CMS Studio Recordings); and Vignettes: Ellis Island, also by Alan Smith and featured in a special television program entitled Vignettes: An Evening with Stephanie Blythe and Warren Jones. Ms Blythe starred in the Metropolitan Opera’s live HD broadcasts of Orfeo ed Euridice, Il Trittico, Rodelinda,and the complete Ring Cycle. She also appeared in PBS’s Live From Lincoln Center broadcasts of the New York Philharmonic’s performance of Carousel and her acclaimed show, We’ll Meet Again: The Songs of Kate Smith. Her recordings include her solo album, as long as there are songs (Innova), and works by Mahler, Brahms, Wagner, Handel and Bach (Virgin Classics). This season, Ms. Blythe’s many engagement include her returns to the Metropolitan Opera for The Rake’s Progress, the Lyric Opera of Chicago for Il Trovatore, the Seattle Opera for Semele, and Carnegie Hall for a recital in Stern Auditorium. This summer she sings the title role in Samson et Dalilah with the Atlanta Symphony, and next season she returns to the San Francisco Opera as Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd and the Houston Grand Opera as Nettie Fowler in Carousel. She also performs her new program, Sing, America! at Carnegie Hall. Ms. Blythe was named Musical America’s Vocalist of the Year for 2009. Her other awards include the 2007 Opera News Award and the 1999 Richard Tucker Award. She is also the Artistic Director of the Fall Island Vocal Arts Seminar at the Crane School of Music.

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PAUL HUANG, VIOLIN Recipient of the prestigious 2015 Avery Fisher Career Grant and the 2017 Lincoln Center Award for Emerging Artists, violinist Paul Huang is quickly gaining attention for his eloquent music making, distinctive sound, and effortless virtuosity. The Washington Post proclaimed Mr. Huang as “an artist with the goods for a significant career” following his recital debut at the Kennedy Center. His recent and forthcoming engagements include his recital debut at the Lucerne Festival in Switzerland as well as solo appearances with the Mariinsky Orchestra under Valery Gergiev (St. Petersburg’s White Nights Festival), Berliner Symphoniker with Lior Shambadal (Philharmonie Berlin debut), Detroit Symphony with Leonard Slatkin, Houston Symphony with Andres Orozco-Estrada, Orchestra of St. Luke’s with Carlos Miguel Prieto, Seoul Philharmonic with Markus Stenz, and Taipei Symphony with Gilbert Varga (both in Taipei and on a U.S. tour). This season, he will also be making his Chicago orchestral debut at the Grant Park Music Festival, as well as appearances with the Buffalo Philharmonic and with the Baltimore, Alabama, Pacific, Santa Barbara, Charlotte, and Taiwan’s National Symphony Orchestras. During the 2018-19 season, Mr. Huang will make debuts at the Hong Kong Chamber Music Festival, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, and return to the Palm Beach Chamber Music Society with the Emerson String Quartet and pianist Gilles Vonsattel for a performance of the Chausson Concerto for Violin, Piano, and String Quartet. In addition, Mr. Huang continues his association with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and Camerata Pacifica where he will present all three violin sonatas by Johannes Brahms. Mr. Huang’s recent recital engagements included Lincoln Center’s “Great Performers” series and return enagagement at the Kennedy Center where he premiered Conrad Tao’s “Threads of Contact” for Violin and Piano during his recital evening with pianist Orion Weiss. He also stepped in for Midori with Leonard Slatkin and the Detroit Symphony to critical acclaim. Mr. Huang has also made debuts at the Wigmore Hall, Seoul Arts Center, and the Louvre in Paris. His first solo CD, Intimate Inspiration, is a collection of favorite virtuoso and romantic encore pieces released on the CHIMEI label. In association with Camerata Pacifica, he recorded “Four Songs of Solitude” for solo violin on their album of John Harbison works. The album was released on the Harmonia Mundi label in fall 2014. A frequent guest artist at music festivals worldwide, he has performed at the Seattle, Music@Menlo, Caramoor, Bridgehampton, La Jolla, Moritzburg, Kissinger Sommer, Sion, Orford Musique, and the Great Mountains Music Festival in Korea. His collaborators have included Gil Shaham, Cho-Liang Lin, Nobuko Imai, Lawrence Power, Maxim Rysanov, Mischa Maisky, Jian Wang, Frans Helmerson, Lynn Harrell, Yefim Bronfman, and Marc-Andre Hamelin. Winner of the 2011 Young Concert Artists International Auditions, Mr. Huang made critically acclaimed recital debuts in New York and in Washington, D.C. at the Kennedy Center. Other honors include First Prize at the 2009 International Violin Competition Sion-Valais (Tibor Varga) in Switzerland, the 2009 Chi-Mei Cultural Foundation Arts Award for Taiwan’s Most Promising Young Artists, the 2013 Salon de Virtuosi Career Grant, and the 2014 Classical Recording Foundation Young Artist Award. Born in Taiwan, Mr. Huang began violin lessons at the age of seven. He is a proud recipient of the inaugural Kovner Fellowship at The Juilliard School, where he earned his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees under Hyo Kang and I-Hao Lee. He plays on the 1742 ex-Wieniawski Guarneri del Gesù on loan through the generous efforts of the Stradivari Society of Chicago.

MICHAEL PARLOFF, lecturer

April 2, 2023: ETTORE CAUSA, VIOLA; PAUL WATKINS, CELLO; BORIS BERMAN, PIANO JOHANNES BRAHMS (1833-1897) Trio in A minor for viola, cello, and piano, Op. 114 April 2, 2023: ETTORE CAUSA, VIOLA; PAUL WATKINS, CELLO; BORIS BERMAN, PIANO As mentioned above (see the Sonata, op. 120, no. 2), Brahms was convinced that the G major String Quintet of 1890 would be his last composition, yet the following year he became so inspired by the clarinet playing of Richard Mühlfeld in Meiningen that he wrote four more works, all featuring the clarinet. For all of these works he broadened their appeal by also writing versions featuring the viola in place of the clarinet. Brahms wrote a rather humorous letter to Countess Heldburg, wife of Count Meiningen, on July 25, 1891: I wish to invite myself to Meiningen! For once this is not out of pure egotism! I must tell you in secret how much I have thought of you and worked for your welfare. Entre nous it has not escaped my notice that you have a “penchant” for the Right Honorable Richard Mühlfeld. I have seen you try to pick him out in the orchestra; last winter I was able to bring him into the limelight with the Weber Concerto, but now I can produce him properly and in secret. He can sit on one of your chairs; you can turn over [turn pages] for him and make your vows during the pauses allotted to him! To this end I must tell you that I have written a Trio and a Quintet in which he has to play. Brahms wanted to try the works out in Meiningen comfort before presenting them in Vienna. His longtime but sometimes estranged friend Joseph Joachim, the celebrated violinist, begged to be present at the trial and played in the Quintet. Brahms performed the Trio on November 21 with Mühlfeld and the superb Berlin cellist Robert Hausmann, and on November 24 the Quintet was tried. Both performances took place at parties given by Countess Heldburg. Joachim liked both works so much that he arranged their first public performance on one of his Berlin Quartet concerts, December 12, with Brahms again playing the piano part in the Trio. Both works were extraordinarily well received. The Trio and Quintet contain some of Brahms’s most formally skilled and impressive music, yet both, especially the Trio, are tinged with melancholy. The Trio’s opening and closing movements are both in sonata form, both are in A minor, and both contain second themes that are presented by the cello, then by the clarinet with the cello echoing the theme canonically upside-down. Brahms strove to make the lower-ranged cello an equal partner with the clarinet, and indeed the cello presents not only the second theme but begins the introduction—alone and in high register. The first movement shows Brahms’s penchant for fashioning a first theme group out of several contrasting ideas. This not only provides great resources for development but also enables him to disguise the recapitulation by beginning with an idea from the first theme group, but not necessarily the initial one. The movement closes with fluid whispered scales and arpeggios. The serene slow movement in D major epitomizes Brahms’s late period conciseness, unfolding in only fifty-four measures. It gives the impression of a ternary form, but also contains elements of sonata form. A leisurely scherzo-alternative, the Andante grazioso presents a clearer ternary structure, with the meter and ambiance of a waltz or Ländler. The unhurried simplicity of the opening gives little hint of the movement’s scope, in which Brahms gently indulges in his love of metric play. The Finale offers intriguing rhythmic organization, with the opening notated both in 2/4 and 6/8 meter. The second theme, with the canonic continuation mentioned above, switches to 9/8. Brahms plays with the form by bringing back the first theme directly after the exposition, almost as if the exposition were to be repeated or as a rondo refrain. The development ensues, however, rich in modulation through Brahms’s favored descending chains of thirds. The recapitulation then begins where the “false return” left off. The work closes resoundingly and seriously in A minor. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

SIMONE DINNERSTEIN, PIANO American pianist Simone Dinnerstein has been called “a throwback to such high priestesses of music as Wanda Landowska and Myra Hess,” by Slate magazine, and praised by TIME for her “arresting freshness and subtlety.” The New York-based pianist gained an international following because of the remarkable success of her recording of Bach’s Goldberg Variations, which she raised the funds to record. Released in 2007 on Telarc, it ranked No. 1 on the US Billboard Classical Chart in its first week of sales and was named to many “Best of 2007” lists including those of The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, and The New Yorker. Her follow-up album, The Berlin Concert, also gained the No. 1 spot on the Chart. Ms. Dinnerstein has recently signed an exclusive agreement with Sony Classical, and her first album for that label — an all-Bach disc — will be released in January 2011. Ms. Dinnerstein’s performance schedule has taken her around the world since her triumphant New York recital debut at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall in 2005, performing Bach’s Goldberg Variations. Recent and upcoming performances include her recital debuts at The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Vienna Konzerthaus, and London’s Wigmore Hall, the Lincoln Center Mostly Mozart Festival, the Aspen and Ravinia festivals, in Cologne, Paris, London, Copenhagen, Vilnius, Bremen, Rome, and Lisbon, and at the Stuttgart Bach Festival; as well as debut performances with the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, Dresden Philharmonic, Czech Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Minnesota Orchestra, Atlanta Symphony, Baltimore Symphony, Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Kristjan Järvi’s Absolute Ensemble, and the Tokyo Symphony. In New York she has performed on Lincoln Center’s Great Performers series, and in three sold-out recitals at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. She is also a frequent performer at New York’s (Le) Poisson Rouge, a club presenting all genres of music. Ms. Dinnerstein has played concerts throughout the United States for the Piatigorsky Foundation, an organization dedicated to bringing classical music to non-traditional venues. Amongst the places she has played are nursing homes, schools and community centers. Most notably, she gave the first classical music performance in the Louisiana state prison system when she played at the Avoyelles Correctional Center. She also performed at the Maryland Correctional Institution for Women, in a concert organized by the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra to coincide with her BSO debut. In addition, Ms. Dinnerstein has founded P.S. 321 Neighborhood Concerts, an evening concert series at the Brooklyn public elementary school that her son attends and where her husband teaches fifth grade. The concerts, which feature musicians Ms. Dinnerstein has admired and collaborated with during her career, is open to the public and raises funds for the school’s Parent Teacher Association. The musicians performing donate their time and talent to the program. Over the past few years, Ms. Dinnerstein has been featured in Gramophone, BBC Music Magazine, Classic FM Magazine, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, “O” The Oprah Magazine, TIME, Slate, The Sunday (London) Times Magazine, The Daily Telegraph, The Independent, The Guardian, and the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, among others, and has appeared on radio programs including BBC Radio 3’s In Tune, BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, NPR’s Morning Edition, Public Radio International’s Studio 360 with Kurt Andersen, American Public Media’s Performance Today, Minnesota Public Radio, XM Radio’s Classical Confidential, as part of the news on SIRIUS Satellite Radio’s The Howard Stern Show, and on national television in Germany. Ms. Dinnerstein is a graduate of The Juilliard School where she was a student of Peter Serkin. She was a winner of the Astral Artist National Auditions, and has twice received the Classical Recording Foundation Award. She also studied with Solomon Mikowsky at the Manhattan School of Music and in London with Maria Curcio. Simone Dinnerstein (pronounced See-MOHN-uh DIN-ner-steen) lives in Brooklyn, New York with her husband and son. She is managed by Tanja Dorn at IMG Artists and is a Sony Classical artist.

November 12, 2023: Angel Blue, soprano; Bryan Wagorn, piano American Songbook Arlen: I Wonder What Became of Me; Gershwin: Our Love is Here to Stay; Weill: Youkali November 12, 2023: Angel Blue, soprano; Bryan Wagorn, piano I Wonder What Became of Me Harold Arlen Born in Buffalo, New York, February 15, 1905; died in New York, April 23, 1986 After composing Broadway musicals in New York in the 1930s, Harold Arlen began writing for Hollywood films—he is best-known for his songs for The Wizard of Oz, in particular, “Over the Rainbow” with lyricist Yip Harburg. He spent the next two decades composing primarily in collaboration with lyricist Johnny Mercer, helping to shape the spectacular effusion of American popular song at the time. In the mid-1940s Arlen again turned his attention to the theater, and it was for the 1946 Broadway show St. Louis Woman that he and Mercer wrote “I Wonder What Became of Me.” The lead, Della, was supposed to sing it as a lament that luxury has not brought fulfillment. Though the song was dropped in pre-Broadway tryouts, it took on a life of its own with such illustrious interpreters as Lena Horne. Arlen liked to break the mold of a thirty-two-bar popular song form on occasion, just as he sometimes felt some songs just need to “get into another key” than where they began.” “I Wonder What Became of Me” does both—it employ sections uneven in length and ends up in a new key in reflection of its wistful lyrics. Our Love Is Here to Stay George Gershwin Born in Brooklyn, New York, September 26, 1898; died in Hollywood, California, July 11, 1937 Pursuing his prodigious musical talent after dropping out of high school, George Gershwin went to work at age fifteen for a music publisher of popular songs, singing and playing them at the piano to attract buyers. Soon he began composing his own songs and piano pieces, and when he got a better job as a pianist for Broadway shows, it was a small step for him to compose his own shows, for which his brother Ira wrote the lyrics. They scored their first big hit in 1920 with the song “Swanee,” recorded by Al Jolson. George gained further celebrity with his highly original works combining jazz and classical styles for the concert hall such as Rhapsody in Blue and An American in Paris. By age thirty he was America’s most famous composer. He and Ira continued to write successful Broadway shows through the 1930s, but George’s untimely death of a brain tumor at age thirty-eight robbed the world of one of its most innovative and successful composers. “Our Love Is Here to Stay” was the last song Gershwin wrote before his death on July 11, 1937. His brother Ira fit it with words after George’s death as a tribute to him for the film The Goldwyn Follies (1938), in which it was sung by Kenny Baker. The song’s extraordinary popularity, however, stems from its use in the hit film An American in Paris, where Gene Kelly sings it to Leslie Caron. Youkali Kurt Weill Born in Dessau, March 2, 1900; died in New York, April 3, 1950 Kurt Weill had already earned recognition as Germany’s leading avant-garde theater composer when the rise of Nazism forced him and his wife, singer and actress Lotte Lenya, to move to Paris in 1934, then to New York in 1935. His greatest European successes—Mahagonny (1927) and Die Dreigroschenoper (1928), with its hit song “Mack the Knife”—had resulted from his collaboration with satiric dramatist Bertolt Brecht. Weill quickly adapted to the very different world of Broadway, having already begun to use American jazz and popular song elements in his European theater works. Writing for stage, film, and radio in America, Weill became especially known for works such as Knickerbocker Holiday (1938), which contains the ultra-popular “September Song”; Lady in the Dark (1940); Street Scene (1946); and Lost in the Stars (1949). Weill originally composed an instrumental version of the tango that became “Youkali” while in Paris as an interlude for the 1934 play Marie galante by Jacques Duval. The following year Roger Fernay (pseudonym of French actor Roger Bertrand) wrote lyrics for it, and the song was published jointly by the two under the title “Youkali.” It lay in obscurity, however, until the aging Lenya turned over a stack of Weill’s materials to Canadian-born soprano Teresa Startas, whose career at the Metropolitan opera spanned thirty-six years. Though written and first published in France, this “Tango Habanera,” as it is subtitled, holds a place in the “American songbook” because it emerged from oblivion when Stratas recorded it in 1981 in New York on her album The Unknown Kurt Weill. “Youkali” refers to an idyllic land where one can escape life’s troubles, but which turns out to be only a dream. —©Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

STEPHEN WILLIAMSON, CLARINET Stephen Williamson is the newly appointed principal clarinetist of the New York Philharmonic. Prior to joining the Philharmonic, he served for two seasons as Ricardo Muti’s principal clarinetist in the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and, before that, eight seasons as James Levine’s principal clarinet in the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. Steve also was recently appointed principal clarinet with the Saito Kinen Festival Orchestra in Japan under Seiji Ozawa. As a core member of the MET Chamber Ensemble, Williamson performed extensivelyperformed with James Levine as soloist and as chamber artist. In August 2011, he performed Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto with the Pacific Music Festival Orchestra in Japan under Fabio Luisi. In January 2012, Williamson joined Luisi and the MET Orchestra as soloist in a performance of Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto at Carnegie Hall. Williamson serves on the clarinet faculty at Columbia University and the Mannes College of Music in New York City, as well as at the Pacific Music Festival. He has recorded for the Sony Classics, Telarc, CRI, BMG, Naxos and Decca labels and can be heard on numerous film soundtracks. Williamson received his bachelor’s degree and performer’s certificate from the Eastman School of Music, and his master’s degree from the Juilliard School. As a Fulbright Scholar, he furthered his studies at the Hochschule der Künste in Berlin, where he collaborated with various members of the Berlin Philharmonic. His past teachers include Peter Rieckhoff, Charles Neidich, Kenneth Grant and Michael Webster. Williamson was the grand prize winner of the 1994 Boosey & Hawkes/Buffet Crampon First Annual North American Clarinet Competition. Other past awards include the Concert ArtistsGuild Competition as well as the Coleman International Chamber Music Competition. A long-time Selmer-Paris and Vandoren Artist, Mr. Williamson currently plays Selmer Signature clarinets and uses Vandoren traditional reeds with a James Pyne JX/BC mouthpiece. He resides in Nyack, NY with his wife Jill, sons Ryan, Connor, Matthew and their dog Lila.