PHILIP SETZER, VIOLIN Violinist Philip Setzer, a founding member of the Emerson String Quartet, was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and began studying violin at the age of five with his parents, both former violinists in the Cleveland Orchestra. He continued his studies with Josef Gingold and Rafael Druian, and later at the Juilliard School with Oscar Shumsky. In 1967, Mr. Setzer won second prize at the Marjorie Merriweather Post Competition in Washington, DC, and in 1976 received a Bronze Medal at the Queen Elisabeth International Competition in Brussels. He has appeared with the National Symphony, Aspen Chamber Symphony (David Robertson, conductor), Memphis Symphony (Michael Stern), New Mexico and Puerto Rico Symphonies (Guillermo Figueroa), Omaha and Anchorage Symphonies (David Loebel) and on several occasions with the Cleveland Orchestra (Louis Lane). He has also participated in the Marlboro Music Festival. Mr. Setzer has been a regular faculty member of the Isaac Stern Chamber Music Workshops at Carnegie Hall and the Jerusalem Music Center. His article about those workshops appeared in The New York Times on the occasion of Isaac Stern’s 80th birthday celebration. He also teaches as Professor of Violin and Chamber Music at SUNY Stony Brook and has given master classes at schools around the world, including The Curtis Institute, London’s Royal Academy of Music, The San Francisco Conservatory, UCLA, The Cleveland Institute of Music and The Mannes School. The Noise of Time, a groundbreaking theater collaboration between the Emerson Quartet and Simon McBurney–about the life of Shostakovich–was based on an original idea of Mr. Setzer’s. In April of 1989, Mr. Setzer premiered Paul Epstein’s Matinee Concerto. This piece, dedicated to and written for Mr. Setzer, has since been performed by him in Hartford, New York, Cleveland, Boston and Aspen. Recently, Mr. Setzer has also been touring and recording the piano trios of Schubert and Mendelssohn with David Finckel and Wu Han.

LUCILLE CHUNG, PIANO Born in Montréal, Canadian pianist Lucille Chung has been acclaimed for her “stylish and refined performances” by Gramophone magazine, “combining vigour and suppleness with natural eloquence and elegance” (Le Soir). She made her debut at the age of ten with the Montréal Symphony Orchestra and Charles Dutoit subsequently invited her to be a featured soloist during the MSO Asian Tour in 1989. Since then, she has performed an extensive concerto repertoire with over 70 leading orchestras such as the Philadelphia Orchestra, Moscow Virtuosi, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Flemish Radio Orchestra, Orquesta Sinfónica de Tenerífe, Orquesta Sinfónica de Bilbao, Staatskapelle Weimar, Philharmonie de Lorraine, Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana, Belgrade Philharmonic, the Seoul Philharmonic, KBS Orchestra, New Jersey Symphony, Dallas Symphony, UNAM Philharmonic (Mexico), Israel Chamber Orchestra as well as all the major Canadian orchestras, including Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver, National Arts Centre (Ottawa), Calgary, Winnipeg and Metropolitain, among others. She has appeared with conductors such as Krzysztof Penderecki, Vladimir Spivakov, Vasily Petrenko, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Peter Oundjian, Gerd Albrecht and Charles Dutoit. As a recitalist, she has performed in over 35 countries in prestigious venues such as the Wigmore Hall in London, New York’s Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center and Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C., the Dame Myra Hess Series in Chicago, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Madrid’s Auditorio Nacional, the Great Hall of the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest, and the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels. Festival appearances include the Verbier Festival in Switzerland, MDR Sommer Festival in Dresden, Lübecker Kammermusikfest, Santander International Festival in Spain, Felicja Blumental Festival in Israel, Music@Menlo, Montreal International Festival, Ottawa Chamber Festival, Bard Music Festival in NY, International Keyboard Institute and Festival in NYC, ChangChun Festival in China, and the Bravissimo Festival in Guatemala. In 1989, she was recognized on the international scene as the First Prize winner at the Stravinsky International Piano Competition. She won Second Prize at the 1992 Montreal International Music Competition, at which she also won a Special Prize for the best interpretation of the unpublished work. In 1993, she received the Outstanding Achievement Award from the Governor General of Canada and in 1994 won the Second Prize at the First International Franz Liszt Competition in Weimar. In 1999, she was awarded the prestigious Virginia Parker Prize by the Canada Council for the Arts. She graduated from both the Curtis Institute of Music and the Juilliard School before she turned twenty. She decided to further her studies in London with Maria Curcio-Diamand, Schnabel’s protégée, at the “Mozarteum” in Salzburg with Karl-Heinz Kämmerling and received the Konzertexam Diplom from the Hochschule “Franz Liszt” in Weimar, where she worked with the late Lazar Berman. She also graduated from the Accademia Pianistica in Imola, Italy with the honorary title of “Master” and from Southern Methodist University under Joaquín Achúcarro where she is now a Johnson-Prothro Artist-in-Residence. Ms. Chung is the recipient of the prestigious Honors Diploma at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena, Italy. Lucille Chung has been hailed as “a considerable artist, admirable for her bold choice of music” by The Sunday Times for her recordings of the complete piano works by György Ligeti on the Dynamic label. The first volume was released in 2001 to great critical acclaim, receiving the maximum R10 from Classica-Répertoire in France, 5 Stars from the BBC Music Magazine, and 5 Stars on Fono Forum in Germany. The final volume, which also contains works for two pianos, was recorded with her husband, Alessio Bax and once again received the prestigious R10 from Classica-Répertoire. Her all-Scriabin CD won the “Best Instrumental Recording” prize at the 2003 Prelude Classical Awards in Holland as well as the coveted R10 from Classica-Répertoire in France. She also recorded the two Mendelssohn Piano Concerti on the Richelieu/Radio-Canada label, which was nominated for the Prix Opus in Canada. In August 2005, Bax and Chung recorded Saint-Saëns’ Carnival of the Animals with the Fort Worth Symphony under Maestro Miguel Harth-Bedoya, which was released in 2006. In 2007 she released a solo album for the Fazioli Concert Hall Series. Lucille then embarked on an exclusive contract with Disques XXI/Universal. So far, she has released two CDs, Piano Transcriptions of Camille Saint-Saëns and Mozart & Me. Both CDs continue earning critical praise and have been broadcast internationally. 2013 marked the release of a piano duo disc with Alessio Bax, presenting Stravinsky’s original four-hand version of the ballet Petrouchka as well as music by Brahms and Piazzolla for Signum Records. In 2015, she released an all Poulenc album which was chosen as the “Recording of the Month” on MusicWeb and most recently in April 2018, a Liszt solo recital album for Signum Records. Lucille is fluent in French, English, Korean, Italian, German, and Russian. She and husband, pianist Alessio Bax make their home in New York City with their daughter, Mila, and are artistic co-directors of the Joaquín Achúcarro Foundation. www.lucillechung.com

April 13, 2025: Quartetto Di Cremona Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827) String Quartet in A minor, Op. 132 April 13, 2025: Quartetto Di Cremona When Prince Nicholas Galitzin ordered “one, two, or three new quartets” from Beethoven in November 1822, he could hardly have realized that he was instigating a series of works by which all later generations would judge profundity. Beethoven had not forgotten the quartet medium in the twelve years since the F minor Quartet, op. 95, but the commission gave him the impetus to turn sketches into finished works. Nevertheless, he could not concentrate on quartet writing until after completing the Missa solemnis , the Diabelli Variations, and the Ninth Symphony, so the project did not begin in earnest until mid-1824. Beethoven completed the E-flat major Quartet, op. 127, in early 1825; the present A minor, op. 132, that July; and the B-flat major, op. 130, in early 1826. The prince loved the Quartets, but was able to make only one payment before going bankrupt and joining the army. The floodgates had been loosed, however, and out of inner necessity Beethoven completed two more quartets in 1826, the C-sharp minor, op.131, and the F major, op. 135, to arrive at the five works known as the “late quartets.” It should be noted that, too late for Beethoven himself but in the proper spirit, a son of Galitzin paid with interest what was owed on his father’s three quartets into the Beethoven estate. While pestering Beethoven in 1823 and 1824 about when he would received his quartets, Galitzin was always quick to say he understood that genius couldn’t be rushed. Beethoven’s problem was not a lack of ideas, but his hectic life as a world-famous composer, as mentioned above. With the A minor Quartet, illness was a major impediment. Though he began work late in 1824, from mid-April to mid-May 1825 he suffered from such a serious intestinal inflamation that part of the time he was bedridden. Though considerably weakened, he managed to complete the A minor Quartet by July, his recovery having prompted one of the few genuinely autobiographical manifestations in his music: he included a slow third movement entitled “Heiliger Dankgesang eines Genesenen an die Gottheit, in der lydischen Tonart” (A Convalescent’s Holy Song of Thanksgiving to the Deity, in the Lydian Mode). The opening of the Quartet’s first movement has won special comment ever since the late quartets were considered as a group. Its signature four notes—an ascending half step then a descending half step—bears striking similarity to the main theme of the Grosse Fuge (the original finale of the B-flat Quartet) and the opening fugue subject of the C-sharp minor Quartet. Some have even traced it in all five quartets. Whether Beethoven intended the motive as a unifying feature or recognized instances where he or other composers had used it previously, it seems to have been associated with painful emotions, which fits with these profound, introspective late works and particularly with this Quartet’s underlying script of pain transcended. A remarkable aspect of the first movement is how Beethoven is able to relate this motive—of which he gives several permutations in the brief slow introduction—with the distinctive opening gesture of the fast main part. Another noteworthy feature of the movement is the “double recapitulation,” the first in the “wrong” key and the second capped by an especially key-confirming coda. For his second movement he wrote a new style of waltzlike scherzo with a pastoral musette (bagpipe piece) for a trio. In this slightly contemplative dance, pairs of half steps reappear, but with a third note added, which makes the lilting main theme so distinctive. Pronounced utterances of the half steps gruffly interrupt the end of the ethereal musette. Beethoven employs the Lydian church mode (like F major, but with B-naturals instead of B-flats) to give his convalescent’s hymn an archaic, reverent tone. This exquisitely calm music returns in two equally slow-moving variations, twice contrasted by livelier music with wide leaps and trills that he labeled “Feeling new strength.” At a very late stage Beethoven decided the “German dance” that had originally followed the Thanksgiving movement should be replaced by an almost fierce march. (The original movement wound up transposed as the Alla danza tedesca in his next quartet, the B-flat.) He often seemed to require something earthy after something heavenly, or a witticism after something poetic, which is just what the Alla marcia provides. Shortly, however, the first violin plunges into the dramatic recitative that introduces the finale. This rondo—Beethoven’s last except for the replacement finale of the B-flat Quartet—employs a main theme that he had originally sketched as a “Finale instrumentale” for his Ninth Symphony. He gives the lyrical, pensive melody a sense of unrest with his agitated rocking accompaniment. Toward the end Beethoven increases the speed to a dizzying Presto with the cello playing this theme in extremely high register. Having slipped into a scintillating A major, Beethoven decided at the last phase of composition to extend his coda significantly to provide the proper tonal balance in this key for the entire Quartet. —©Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

SUNDAY, MAY 6, 2018 AT 3 PM NEUBAUER-McDERMOTT FAMILY CONCERT BUY TICKETS GILAD COHEN, COMPOSER KERRY McDERMOTT, violin New York Philharmonic PAUL NEUBAUER, VIOLA “A master musician.” — The New York Times ANNE-MARIE McDERMOTT, PIANO Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society CLARA NEUBAUER, VIOLIN “It was a committed, refreshing performance displaying absolute technical security.” — The Epoch Times OLIVER NEUBAUER, VIOLIN (2021) “His was a captivating performance, fully bringing-out the shifting moods, wit, and lyricism of Mozart’s music.” — The Epoch Times FEATURING ABOUT THE PERFORMANCE BUY TICKETS On May 6 , the stellar Neubauer-McDermott Family will bring our eleventh season to an exhilarating conclusion. Violist Paul Neubauer (of the Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society), violinist Kerry McDermott (of the New York Philharmonic), and their children, violinists Oliver and Clara Neubauer , will be joined by Kerry’s sister, CMS pianist Anne-Marie McDermott , in music of Bach, Dvořák, Ravel, and Schumann . The concert will include the World Premiere of Gilad Cohen’s* “Moonrhymes” for three violins, viola, and piano , commissioned by PCC especially for this event. Inspired by the familial theme, Cohen’s work will focus on children’s songs from Israel, America, and Spain. *Gilad Cohen is a Ridgewood resident and a music professor at Ramapo College. A Princeton Ph.D., he is the winner of the 2016 Barlow Prize and the 2010 Israeli Prime Minister Award for Composers. PROGRAM Johann Sebastian Bach Preludio from Partita No. 3 arranged for 3 violins & viola Program Notes Antonín Dvořák Terzetto in C, Op. 74 for 2 violins and viola Program Notes Maurice Ravel Tzigane for violin and piano Program Notes Gilad Cohen “Moonrhymes” (Premiere) for 3 violins, viola and piano Program Notes Robert Schumann Sonata No. 1 in A minor, Op. 105 for violin and piano Program Notes Mark O’Connor F.C.’s Jig for violin and viola Program Notes Charles Dancla Variations on Ah! Vous dirai-je, Maman for three violins and viola Program Notes Watch Clara Neubauer perform Arensky’s Trio in D minor: Watch Paul Neubauer perform Benjamin Dale’s Romance for Viola and Piano: Watch Anne-Marie McDermott perform Haydn’s Piano Sonata in C:

April 19, 2009 – Jon Manasse, clarinet; John Novacek, piano JOHN NOVACEK Four Rags for Two Jo(h)ns for clarinet and piano April 19, 2009 – Jon Manasse, clarinet; John Novacek, piano John Novacek writes: American music may well force upon us the futility of certain distinctions: “popular” and “serious”, “folk” and “culivated”. Case in point, ragtime, that complex hybrid of black dance tunes filtered through the procedures of the polka, march, and white minstrel song. Classic ragtime flourished from 1895 to 1915 when a number of talented pianists gathered at Tom Turpin’s Rosebud Cafe in St. Louis. The greatest was Scott Joplin (1868-1917), whose infectiously syncopated marches conceal a solid compositional technique. Inspired by the Joplin revival of the 1970s (itself spurred by the soundtrack to the film The Sting), I found playing and composing rags habit-forming, and the habit persists. My own rags show various influences: classic ragtime, the classical showpiece, and stride (the highly embellished, virtuosic offshoot of ragtime practised by Harlem pianists James P. Johnson and Fats Waller). The Four Rags for Two Jo(h)ns were written at the insistence of clarinetist Jon Manasse and pianist Jon Nakamatsu. I’m mightily grateful to them for the pressure they exerted, for they play the set with virtuosity, panache, and an uncanny feel for the idiom, and I am delighted that they’ll be recording the rags for Harmonia Mundi later this year. This afternoon, I’ll do my best in filling Mr. Nakamatsu’s spot on the piano bench. By Michael Parloff Return to Parlance Program Notes

March 9, 2025: Ravel’s 150th Birthday Concert, Soohong Park, piano Maurice Ravel (1875-1937) Le Tombeau de Couperin for piano March 9, 2025: Ravel’s 150th Birthday Concert, Soohong Park, piano The term tombeau originated in the seventeenth century as the title for memorial dirges composed to honor friends or famous people, specifically as used by lutenist-composer Denis Gaulthier (1603–1672). Couperin, influenced by Gaulthier’s style and his fanciful titles, went even further by composing entire suites to honor Lully and Corelli, entitled Apothéoses . Ravel took up the French tradition, paying homage “less, in reality, to Couperin himself,” he said, “than to eighteenth-century French music”—particularly harpsichord music. Conceived in 1914 but interrupted by Ravel’s participation in World War I, the original piano suite was completed in 1917. Ravel dedicated the six movements to the memory of six friends who had died in the War, making it a kind of double tombeau . Marguerite Long, a great champion of Ravel’s music, premiered the piano version on April 11, 1919. Before the year’s end Ravel heard that Rolf de Maré, director of the Ballet Suédois, wanted to produce a ballet of Le tombeau , but in an orchestral version. He happily chose four of the six original movements to orchestrate—Prélude, Forlane, Minuet, and Rigaudon. This version was first heard not as a ballet but at a concert of the Pasdeloup Orchestra of Paris in 1920 with the ballet version presented later that year. Reflecting Baroque style, the Prélude spins out in fast running triplets in a kind of perpetual motion, but with Impressionist harmonies. The Forlane, with its haunting melody, stems from the ancient dance of the same name, which actually originated in Italy and is distantly related to the French gigue. The lovely Minuet is a restrained movement, growing slightly more agitated in the middle section, but retaining the elegance of the courtly dance. Ravel based the festive Rigaudon on the ancient lively Provençal dance, which was immensely popular in its ballroom version during the reigns of Louis XIII, XIV, and XV. —©Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

< Back Felix Mendelssohn Octet in E-flat, Op. 20 for strings Program Notes Previous Next

2019-2020 ARTIST ROSTER BENJAMIN BEILMAN, VIOLIN 2019 INN-HYUCK CHO, CLARINET YING FANG, SOPRANO PAUL JACOBS, ORGAN BENJAMIN LUXON, ACTOR-NARRATOR JUHO POHJONEN, PIANO DANBI UM, VIOLIN DEMIAN AUSTIN, TROMBONE CHRIS COLETTI, TRUMPET DAVID J. GROSSMAN, DOUBLE BASS PAUL LEWIS, PIANO FRANK MORELLI, BASSOON QUARTETTO DI CREMONA ZUKERMAN TRIO IAN ROSENBAUM, PERCUSSION ANNI CROFUT, DANCER PAUL HUANG, VIOLIN MATTHEW LIPMAN, VIOLA KEN NODA, PIANO ANDREW TYSON, PIANO

May 15, 2016: James Morris, bass-baritone; Ken Noda, piano GEORG FRIEDRICH HÄNDEL (1685-1759) Hear me, ye winds and waves from Scipione and Giulio Cesare, Del minacciar del vento from Ottone May 15, 2016: James Morris, bass-baritone; Ken Noda, piano Always able to compose quickly when circumstances demanded, Handel wrote Scipione in just three weeks, completing the opera only ten days before the first performance on March 12, 1726, at the King’s Theatre in London. He had planned to present Alessandro, but had to come up with a new opera when one of his singers had to arrive too late. Not only did he have to borrow music from some of his recorder sonatas for the overture, but at the last minute had to remove a role and alter Paolo Antonio Rolli’s already hastily prepared libretto when one of the already assembled cast dropped out. It is no wonder that he made extensive revisions for a 1730 revival, which became almost a pastiche with the inclusion of fourteen numbers from his earlier operas. The creation of the recitative and aria “Hear me, ye winds and waves” mirrors the kind of assembly that produced Scipione. In Act II, Scene 2, the imprisoned Princess Berenice (soprano) sings the gently martial but lamenting aria, “Tutta raccolta ancor” (Still wholly contained) while awaiting her captor Scipio, who loves her, though she loves Lucejo. In the late nineteenth century British composer, semiprofessional baritone, and poet Theo Marzials and composer/arranger Amelia Lehmann (known by the inititals A. L.) took the music from this aria and, setting it for low voice, fit it with the English words “Hear me, ye winds and waves”—Marzials’s translation of “Aure, deh, per pietà spirate,” an aria in Handel’s Giulio Cesare. (Handel’s original Caesar was sung by an alto castrato, but is now often performed by a baritone.) Marzials preceded the aria (music from Scipione, words from Giulio Cesare translated into English) with the recitative “Dall’ondo periglio,” which he translated as “From the rage of the tempest” and which had introduced “Aure, deh, per pietà spirate” in Giulio Cesare. Caesar sings his Act III recitative and aria after surviving a drowning attempt and being washed ashore—he tells of his escape, laments the loss of his legions and his glory, and prays for an end to his misery. Thus the English recitative and aria known as “Hear me, ye winds and waves,” actually contains more words and measures of music from Giulio Ceasre, though the memorable music of the aria portion has become so beloved that the selection is always billed as from Scipione. Though originally a lament for Berenice, the music serves Caesar’s purpose equally well, a transference Handel himself could easily have appreciated. The Marzials/Lehmann piano vocal arrangement, published in 1895, has become a popular recital selection. * * * * * Handel composed Ottone in the summer of 1722 for premiere at the King’s Theatre, but he had to make numerous revisions before the opening on January 12, 1723, because of complaints from the illustrious cast about their roles. Nicola Francsco Haym had adapted the libretto—somewhat clumsily according to critics—from that of Stefano Benedetti Pallavicino for Antonio Lotti’s 1719 Teofano, and further segmenting during Handel’s setting caused disjointedness of the drama. But the opera turned out to be one of the most popular of Handel’s career, in large part because of the music’s merits. The plot revolves around a true event, the marriage of Otto II of Germany to Princess Theofano of the Eastern Empire in Rome in 972. Pallavicino, and hence Haym, added story elements concerning Berengar’s suppressed attempt to overthrow Otto I in 950 and the 976 succession of Basil II to the Eastern Empire throne. The blustery bass aria “Del minacciar del vento” (The threats of the wind) is sung in Act I, Scene 4, by the pirate Emireno (Emirenus) who has delayed Ottone (Otto) on his way to Rome to be married, but whom Ottone has captured. Emireno hints that he is someone important (actually Teofane’s brother, which he doesn’t reveal) and boasts that he will always retain his pride just before he is dragged off to prison. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

< Back Camille Saint-Saëns Romance, Op. 36 for cello and piano Program Notes Previous Next

October 30, 2016: Wu Han, piano; Philip Setzer, violin; David Finckel, cello LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN (1770–1827) Piano Trio in E-flat major, op. 1, no. 1 October 30, 2016: Wu Han, piano; Philip Setzer, violin; David Finckel, cello Beethoven carefully considered his presentation to the musical world of Vienna. Though he had composed quite a few works by 1795, he chose the three Trios that form Opus 1 as his first publication. He had been sponsored by Elector Maximilian Franz to move from his hometown of Bonn to Vienna at the end of 1792, to study with the great Joseph Haydn and to make his name in a musically more active world. Haydn was writing piano trios at that time, and though Beethoven probably had started work on his trios before he left Bonn, it was natural for him to work on them under the influence of his new teacher. When Haydn left for a sojourn in London in January 1794, Beethoven immediately began studies with Johann Albrechtsberger, which continued for fourteen months until Haydn’s return. A sketch for one of the movements of the G major Trio, op. 1, no. 2, was found among lessons Beethoven had done for Albrechtsberger. The Trios were performed privately in 1794 at the house of Prince Lichnowsky, the dedicatee of the Opus 1 Trios. Ferdinand Ries, later Beethoven’s pupil, reported many years after the fact that Haydn was among the distinguished guests in the audience and that the older composer had many nice things to say about the works, but advised against publishing the Third in C minor, saying the public would have difficulty understanding it. Ries also reported that Beethoven took this to be a sign of jealousy on Haydn’s part. It has been shown more recently that Ries’s account mixed up the chronology and that possible qualms Haydn may have had about the C minor Trio were raised upon his second return from London in 1795, after the Trios had already been published. In response to this and other accounts that Haydn was envious of the younger composer, esteemed musicologist James Webster wrote, “[I]t is inconceivable that the powerful and original genius of Haydn at the height of his powers should have had any difficulty with this work . . . or indeed any of Beethoven’s music of the 1790s, unless for reasons that reflect on Beethoven’s limitations rather than his own.” Furthermore, Webster demonstrated that no irreparable falling out between the two composers occurred in the 1790s, though they did experience a period of distrust between 1800 and 1804. Beethoven may have worked more on the Trios after the 1794 performance and perhaps other performances of them at Prince Lichnowsky’s. But his most likely reason for delaying their publication until 1795 was to build up a following—meaning a sufficient number of subscribers. Like the other Opus 1 Trios and the Opus 2 Piano Sonatas, Beethoven conceived of the E-flat major Trio in four movements, despite the custom of the day to compose chamber works with piano in three movements. Beethoven’s first public utterance, the first theme of the first movement, takes simple repeated chords and upward-rushing arpeggios and makes distinct motives out of them—short “building-block” kinds of motives that remained central to his mature style. Three quiet repeated chords begin the second theme, which stays within a narrow range in contrast to the more ebullient first theme. His sonata-form movement concludes with an extended coda, showing even in his early work the tendency toward substantial codas that begin almost as second development sections. The Adagio cantabile gently follows a rondo scheme as three presentations of the graceful main theme alternate with two contrasting episodes. Beethoven adds ornamental variants with each recurrence of the main theme and subtracts from its total length in the second appearance to make a more concise form. Beethoven wrote a scherzo instead of a minuet for the third movement of his Trio. Haydn had written minuets in fast enough tempos to be considered scherzos and even used the term Scherzo in his Opus 33 Quartets of 1781, but he was not writing scherzos in his piano trios or for that matter giving them a fourth movement. Beethoven’s sense of humor surfaces in the present Scherzo as it merrily begins in a key twice removed from the home key (the dominant of the dominant). The recurring little three-note motive with a grace note contributes to the section’s cheerful character. The Trio certainly changes character and texture, with long sustained notes in the strings supporting quiet legato figures in the piano. A striking leap of a tenth, heard three times, initiates the exuberant Presto Finale, which contains elements of both sonata and rondo form. The second theme, with its arpeggiated then stepwise descent, enters in each instrument in turn—violin, cello, piano, and again in the violin. Beethoven shows a little harmonic ingenuity late in the movement when this theme appears in E major before returning dramatically to the home key of E-flat. Just before the affirmative closing measures he has a bit of fun with his leaping motive. All in all the Trio makes a very assured as well as promising first opus. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 15, 2023 AT 4 PM LYSANDER PIANO TRIO SCANDINAVIAN INSPIRATIONS ABOUT THE PERFORMANCE BUY TICKETS The Lysander Piano Trio has developed a reputation for passionate playing and exciting programming. They find creative ways to connect well-known masterworks with music by lesser-known and underrepresented composers, discovering common threads across cultures and times. 2023-2024 SEASON October 15, 202 3 Lysander Piano Trio November 12, 2023 Angel Blue, soprano Bryan Wagorn, piano December 3, 2023 Brentano String Quartet Antioch Chamber Choir January 14, 2024 Goldmund String Quartet February 18, 2024 Candlelit Music of The Spirit March 10, 2024 Richard Goode, Piano Late Beethoven April 7, 2024 Jordi Savall, Conductor Hespèrion XXI May 12, 2024 Mothers Day Concert June 2, 2024 Mozart’s Double Concertos Artist Roster Parlance Program Notes LOCATION At West Side Presbyterian Church 6 South Monroe Street Ridgewood, NJ 07450 For map and directions, click here . CONCERT AMENITIES Whee lchair Accessible Fr e e Parking for all concerts FEATURING BUY TICKETS Lysander Piano Trio Itamar Zorman, violin Michael Katz, cello Liza Stepanova, piano “…technical assurance and thoughtful musicality…performed with rich sound and nuanced musicianship in the varied works… finely hued collaboration among the three musicians.” —The New York Times “…a passionate single-mindedness that wound up serving all of the score’s varied moods, right through to a finale of exhilarating panache.” — The Washington Post On October 15 they will perform a Scandinavian-themed program including music by the great Norwegian composer, Edvard Grieg and 19th-century Swedish violinist-composer, Amanda Maier . The Lysander Trio’s concert will culminate with Schubert’s towering Piano Trio in E-flat, Op. 100 , which features the poignant Swedish folk song “Se solen sjunker” (The Sun Is Setting). PROGRAM Edvard Grieg Program Notes Andante con moto for piano trio Amanda Maier Program Notes Piano Trio in E-flat Franz Schubert Piano Trio in E-flat, Op. 100 Program Notes Watch the Lysander Trio perform the Finale of Ravel’s Piano Trio: