SUNDAY, MAY 15, 2016 AT 3 PM Stephanie Blythe, mezzo-soprano; Craig Terry, piano BUY TICKETS STEPHANIE BLYTHE, MEZZO-SOPRANO “Carnegie Hall is no place for cabaret songs, an art form that thrived in Parisian cafes and Berlin nightclubs. Yet, on Friday the mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe, who can do anything, turned Carnegie’s 2,800-seat Stern Auditorium into her personal cabaret haunt.” – New York Times , May 17, 2015 CRAIG TERRY, PIANIST Lauded for his “sensitive and stylish” (The New York Times ) and “superb” (Opera News ) playing, pianist Craig Terry is Music Director of the Ryan Opera Center at Lyric Opera of Chicago. FEATURING ABOUT THE PERFORMANCE BUY TICKETS Join legendary mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe and pianist Craig Terry as they take the audience on a musical journey through the American Songbook, sharing gems from some of the greatest composers and lyricists of their age, including Irving Berlin, Saul Chaplin and Sammy Cahn, Harry Warren and Mack Gordon, Jerome Kern and B.G. DeSylva, Harold Arlen, George Gershwin and Johnny Mercer. From tender loves songs to passionate torch songs to melodies that remind us to always “to look for the silver lining,” they defined their generation and helped see our country through the Great Depression and two World Wars. This will be a memorable afternoon of music making and a celebratory conclusion to Parlance Chamber Concert’s 9th season! PROGRAM AS LONG AS THERE ARE SONGS Stephanie Blythe will announce the program selections from the stage. Program Notes See Stephanie Blythe and Craig Terry perform “We’ll Meet Again” on PBS

ANTHONY MCGILL, CLARINET The winner of an Avery Fisher Career Grant, Anthony McGill currently serves as principal clarinet of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. Prior to this position he was associate principal clarinet of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, following studies at the Curtis Institute with Donald Montanato and at the Interlochen Arts Academy with Richard Hawkins. An experienced chamber musician, he has participated at the Marlboro Music Festival, Sarasota Festival, Tanglewood, La Musica International Chamber Music Festival, Opera Theatre and Music Festival of Menlo, Italy, and Music@Menlo. Since his solo debut in 1991, McGill has appeared with the Baltimore and New Jersey Symphonies, and with the Tokyo, Guarneri, and Avalon Quartets, and Opus One. He has been heard on Ravinia’s Rising Star Series, toured with Musicians from Marlboro, performed at Carnegie Hall, and appeared at Lincoln Center as a member of its Chamber Music Society Two. McGill has also toured Japan with pianist Mitsuko Uchida and members of the Brentano Quartet, and has appeared in concert with cellist Yo-Yo Ma.

Development Director Inmo Parloff Leadership Council Thomas and Heidi Ahlborn Anne Bosch William and Zitta Chapman Catherine Coo ke Christina Hembree Adrian and Christina Jones Ronald and Mollie Ledwith Youngick and Joyce Lee Carol Martin Dorothy Neff Suzanne Taranto Donald and Gigo Taylor Richard and Michelle Vaccaro

FRANK HUANG, VIOLIN Frank Huang joined the New York Philharmonic as Concertmaster, The Charles E. Culpeper Chair, in September 2015. The First Prize Winner of the 2003 Walter W. Naumburg Foundation’s Violin Competition and the 2000 Hannover International Violin Competition, he has established a major career as a violin virtuoso. Since performing with the Houston Symphony in a nationally broadcast concert at the age of 11, he has appeared with orchestras throughout the world including The Cleveland Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Indianapolis Symphony, NDR Radio Philharmonic Orchestra of Hannover, Amadeus Chamber Orchestra, and the Genoa Orchestra. He has also performed on NPR’s Performance Today, ABC’s Good Morning America, and CNN’s American Morning with Paula Zahn. Recent engagements include his debuts at Wigmore Hall (in London), Salle Cortot (Paris), Kennedy Center (Washington, DC), and the Herbst Theatre (San Francisco), as well as a second recital in Alice Tully Hall (New York), which featured the World Premiere of Donald Martino’s Sonata for Solo Violin. Mr. Huang’s first commercial recording—featuring fantasies by Schubert, Ernst, Schoenberg, and Waxman—was released on Naxos in the fall of 2003. Mr. Huang has had great success in competitions since the age of 15 and received top prize awards in the Premio Paganini International Violin Competition and the Indianapolis International Violin Competition. Other honors include Gold Medal Awards in the Kingsville International Competition, Irving M. Klein International Competition, and D’Angelo International Competition. In addition to his solo career, Mr. Huang is deeply committed to chamber music. He has attended the Marlboro Music Festival, Ravinia’s Steans Institute, Seattle Chamber Music Festival, and Caramoor, and frequently participates in Musicians from Marlboro’s tours. He was also selected by The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center to be a member of the prestigious CMS Two program. Before joining the Houston Symphony, Mr. Huang held the position of first violinist of the Grammy Award-winning Ying Quartet and was a faculty member at the Eastman School of Music. Frank Huang was born in Beijing, China. At the age of seven he moved to Houston, Texas, where he began violin lessons with his mother. He commenced study with Fredell Lack at the University of Houston and at 16 he enrolled in the pre-college program at the Cleveland Institute of Music (CIM) where he studied with Donald Weilerstein. He continued studies with Weilerstein in college and earned his bachelor of music degree from CIM in 2002. He subsequently attended The Juilliard School in New York City, studying violin with Robert Mann, and is an alumnus of the Music Academy of the West, now a partner in the New York Philharmonic Global Academy. Mr. Huang, who began his tenure as concertmaster of the Houston Symphony in 2010, also serves on the faculties of the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University and the University of Houston.

JEEWON PARK, PIANO Hailed for her “deeply reflective” playing (Indianapolis Star), pianist Jeewon Park is rapidly garnering the attention of audiences for her dazzling technique and poetic lyricism. Since making her debut at the age of 12 performing Chopin’s First Concerto with the Korean Symphony Orchestra, Ms. Park has performed at major venues such as Weill Recital Hall, Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall and Kaplan Penthouse, Merkin Hall, 92nd Street Y, Steinway Hall, Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Kravis Center (FL). As a recitalist, she has been heard at the Steinway Hall in New York, Seoul Arts Center in Korea, Caramoor International Festival, Norfolk Music Festival, Music Alp in Courchevel (France) and Kusatsu Summer Music Festival (Japan), among others. An avid chamber musician, Ms. Park has performed in numerous festivals such as the Spoleto USA Festival, Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival, Beethoven Festival, Lake Champlain Chamber Music Festival (VT), Appalachian Summer Festival (NC), Emilia-Romagna Festival (Italy) and Barge Music. She has performed as a guest artist with the Fine Arts Quartet and New York Philharmonic Chamber Ensemble, and has collaborated with numerous artists. As an orchestral soloist, she has performed with the Charleston Symphony (SC), Mexico City Philharmonic, Monterrey Symphony, Mexico State Symphony, in addition to many major orchestras from her native Korea. Following her performance of the Mozart Concerto K. 453 with the Charleston Symphony, the Post and Courier acclaimed that “Park demonstrated rare skill and sensitivity, playing with a feline grace and glittering dexterity…. lyrical phrasing and pearly tone quality.” In the 2008-2009 season, Ms. Park appears in many North American cities including New York, Boston, Washington D.C., St. Paul, Indianapolis, Buffalo, Burlington and Omaha. Highlights of this season include several performances of Mozart Piano Concertos K. 414 and K. 415, a solo recital and an all-Mendelssohn chamber music program at Caramoor, and a U.S. tour with the “Charles Wadsworth and Friends” series. Jeewon Park most recently recorded an album of chamber works by the Pulitzer Prize winning composer Paul Moravec, which was released by Naxos in the fall of 2008. She has been heard in numerous live broadcasts on National Public Radio and New York’s Classical Radio Station, WQXR. Additionally, her performances have been nationally broadcast throughout Korea on KBS and EBS television. Ms. Park holds degrees from The Juilliard School and Yale University, where she was awarded the prestigious Dean Horatio Parker Prize. Her teachers include Herbert Stessin, Claude Frank and Gilbert Kalish.

March 11, 2018: Benjamin Beilman, Violin; Orion Weiss, piano LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN (1770–1827) Sonata No. 10 in G, Op. 96 (1812) March 11, 2018: Benjamin Beilman, Violin; Orion Weiss, piano Beethoven wrote his ten sonatas for piano and violin (his generation still thought of the piano first and the violin second) during his early and middle periods. Of his celebrated late, introspective, otherworldly style we catch only a foretaste—in his very last Sonata, the present G major, op. 96. Drawing on materials he had begun earlier, Beethoven composed this Sonata in December 1812 for French violinist Pierre Rode, who was visiting Vienna. Rode’s inclinations surely account for some of Beethoven’s leaning in the introverted direction, especially in the finale. As the composer wrote to his patron and pupil Archduke Rudolph: I have not hurried unduly to compose the last movement merely for the sake of being punctual, the more so as in view of Rode’s playing I have had to give more thought to the composition of this movement. In our finales we like to have fairly noisy passages but R does not care for them—and so I have been rather hampered. Rode played the premiere of “his” G major Sonata with the Archduke joining him on the piano December 29, 1812, at a soiree of another of Beethoven’s patrons, Prince Lobkowitz. The Sonata was one of a group of works that Beethoven sold to publisher Anton Sigmund Steiner in 1815 in repayment of a debt. The debt must have been substantial because the batch also included the Archduke Trio, the Seventh and Eighth Symphonies, the Serioso Quartet, and several smaller works. As with many of his other works, Beethoven dedicated Opus 96 to the Archduke. Beethoven gives the delicate opening of the first movement with its signature trill figure to the violin alone. Opening with an unaccompanied stringed instrument was a device he had used before in his Kreutzer Sonata, Cello Sonata, op. 69, and Trio, op. 70, no. 2, and would again in his Cello Sonata, op. 102, no. 1. With such highlighting he assures that the motive will be recognizable even in its most disguised permutations. Here such manipulations occur throughout the movement, as in the mysterious low-range interplay between violin and piano at the beginning of the coda. This spot apparently came to Beethoven as an afterthought when he was preparing the Sonata for publication in 1815. With the sublime serenity of the Adagio espressivo we enter the intimate, personal world of Beethoven’s late style. The glorious hymn tune of the piano’s opening moves fluidly into a tender continuation by the violin. After a decorative flourish we listen awestruck as Beethoven lingers with infinite patience over the unfolding of his harmonies in the middle section. Another flourish brings us back, not to the real world, but to the serene main theme. As this final section continues he savors each fragment of the intimate conversation between the two instruments. After seeming to come to rest Beethoven adds one unsettled chord to lead directly into the brief Scherzo. Here the minor-mode outer sections impishly play with our metric expectations by accenting normally unaccented beats. The interior trio settles into a lyrical dance tune—straightforward until with seeming innocence he plays again with our sensations of the basic pulse. Beethoven’s solution for a finale to please Rode is one that also offers great variety—a theme-and-variations movement. He takes a simple little theme, with one nice harmonic twist, and treats it ingeniously in six variations. These are not simple embellishments of the tune, but foreshadow his great Diabelli Variations in their remarkable transformations of the theme. The general momentum halts for the meditative fifth variation, which distances itself utterly from the folkish simplicity of the tune. The resumption of the movement’s high spirits points to the composer’s well-developed sense of humor. But Beethoven is far from finished—further surprises include an introspective fugal passage and one additional application of the brakes before the final race to the close. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

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.

CHEE-YUN, VIOLIN Chee-Yun has performed with many of the world's foremost orchestras and conductors. Orchestral highlights include her tours of the United States with the San Francisco Symphony under Michael Tilson Thomas and Japan with the NHK Symphony, a concert with the Seoul Philharmonic conducted by Myung-Whun Chung that was broadcast on national television, and a benefit for UNESCO with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s at Avery Fisher Hall. Chee-Yun has performed with such distinguished conductors as Michael Tilson Thomas, Jaap van Zweden, Manfred Honeck, Hans Graf, James DePriest, Jesus Lopez-Cobos, Krzysztof Penderecki, Neeme Järvi, Pinchas Zukerman, Giancarlo Guerrero, José Luis Gomez, Miguel Harth-Bedoya, and Carlos Kalmar. She has appeared with the Toronto, Pittsburgh, Dallas, Atlanta, and National symphony orchestras, as well as with the Saint Paul and Los Angeles Chamber Orchestras. Other orchestral engagements include performances with the Orquesta Sinfonia Nacional and the Mobile and Pasadena Symphonies, in addition to appearances with the National Philharmonic, Colorado and Pacific Symphonies, and the Tucson, Detroit, and Pensacola symphony orchestras. A champion of contemporary music, Chee-Yun has performed Christopher Theofanidis’ Violin Concerto conducted by David Alan Miller as part of the Albany Symphony's American Festival, in addition to performing Kevin Puts’ Violin Concerto with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra. As a recitalist, Chee-Yun has performed in many major U.S. cities, including New York, Chicago, Washington, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Atlanta. Career highlights include appearances at the Kennedy Center's "Salute to Slava" gala honoring Mstislav Rostropovich and with the Mostly Mozart Festival on tour in Japan, as well as a performance with Michael Tilson Thomas in the inaugural season of Carnegie Hall's Zankel Hall and the U.S. premiere of Penderecki’s Sonata No. 2 with pianist Barry Douglas. In 2016, Chee-Yun performed as a guest artist for the Secretary General at the United Nations in celebration of Korea's National Foundation Day and the 25th anniversary of South Korea joining the UN. Other career highlights include recitals in St. Paul, Buffalo, Omaha, Scottsdale, and Washington, D.C., duo recitals with cellist Alisa Weilerstein, a recital tour with pianist Alessio Bax, and a performance at American Ballet Theatre's fall gala. Firmly committed to chamber music, Chee-Yun has toured with Music from Marlboro and appears frequently with Spoleto USA, a project she has been associated with since its inception. Additional chamber music appearances include performances at the Ravinia, Aspen, Bravo! Vail Valley, La Jolla, Caramoor, Green Music, Santa Fe, Orcas Island, Hawaii Performing Arts, and Bridgehampton festivals in the U.S.; the Great Mountains Music Festival in South Korea; the Clandeboye Festival with Camerata Ireland in Northern Ireland; the Opera Theatre and Music Festival in Lucca, Italy; the Colmar Festival in France; the Beethoven and Penderecki festivals in Poland; and the Kirishima Festival in Japan. Chee-Yun has received exceptional acclaim as a recording artist since the release of her debut album of virtuoso encore pieces in 1993. Her recent recording of the Penderecki Violin Concerto No. 2 on Naxos was acclaimed as "an engrossing, masterly performance" (The Strad) and "a performance of staggering virtuosity and musicality" (American Record Guide). Her releases on the Denon label include Mendelssohn's E-minor Violin Concerto, Vieuxtemps' Violin Concerto No. 5, Lalo's Symphonie Espagnole and Saint-Saëns' Violin Concerto No. 3 with the London Philharmonic under the direction of Maestro Lopez-Cobos, and violin sonatas from Debussy, Fauré, Franck, Saint-Saëns, Szymanowski, Brahms and Strauss. Two compilation discs, Vocalise d'amour and The Very Best of Chee-Yun, feature highlights of Chee-Yun's earlier recordings. In 2007, Chee-Yun recorded the Beethoven Triple Concerto with Camerata Ireland, pianist Barry Douglas, and cellist Andrés Diaz for Satirino Records. In 2008, Decca/Korea released Serenata Notturno, an album of light classics that went platinum within six months of its release. Chee-Yun has performed frequently on National Public Radio's Performance Today and on WQXR and WNYC radio in New York City. She has been featured on KTV,a children's program on the cable network CNBC, A Prairie Home Companion, Public Radio International, and numerous syndicated and local radio programs across the world. She has appeared on PBS as a special guest on Victor Borge's Then and Now 3, in a live broadcast at Atlanta’s Spivey Hall concurrent with the Olympic Games, and on ESPN performing the theme for the X Games. In 2009, she also appeared in an episode of HBO's hit series Curb Your Enthusiasm. A short documentary film about Chee-Yun, “Chee-Yun: Seasons on the Road,” premiered in 2017 and is available on YouTube . Chee-Yun's first public performance at age eight took place in her native Seoul after she won the Grand Prize of the Korean Times Competition. At 13, she came to the United States and was invited to perform Vieuxtemps’ Concerto No. 5 in a Young People's Concert with the New York Philharmonic. Two years later, she appeared as soloist with the New York String Orchestra under Alexander Schneider at Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center. In 1989, she won the Young Concert Artists International Auditions, and a year later she became the recipient of the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant. In Korea, Chee-Yun studied with Nam Yun Kim. In the United States, she has worked with Dorothy DeLay, Hyo Kang, Daniel Phillips, and Felix Galimir (chamber music) at The Juilliard School. In addition to her active performance and recording schedule, Chee-Yun is a dedicated and enthusiastic educator. She gives master classes around the world and has held several teaching posts at notable music schools and universities. Her past faculty positions have included serving as the resident Starling Soloist and Adjunct Professor of Violin at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and as Visiting Professor of Music (Violin) at the Indiana University School of Music. From 2007 to 2017, she served as Artist-in-Residence and Professor of Violin at Southern Methodist University in Dallas.

HESPÈRION XXI, EARLY MUSIC ENSEMBLE Ancient music’s most important value stems from its ability as a universal artistic language to transmit feelings, emotions and ancestral ideas that even today can enthrall the contemporary listener. With a repertoire that encompasses the period between the 10th and 18th centuries, Hespèrion XXI searches continuously for new points of union between the East and West, with a clear desire for integration and for the recovery of international musical heritage, especially that of the Mediterranean basin and with links to the New World. In 1974 Jordi Savall and Montserrat Figueras, together with Lorenzo Alpert and Hopkinson Smith, founded the ancient music ensemble Hespèrion XX in Basel as a way of recovering and disseminating the rich and fascinating musical repertoire prior to the 19th century on the basis of historical criteria and the use of original instruments. The name Hespèrion means “an inhabitant of Hesperia”, which in ancient Greek referred to the two most westerly peninsulas in Europe: the Iberian and the Italian. It was also the name given to the planet Venus as it appeared in the west. At the turn of the 21st century Hespèrion XX became known as Hespèrion XXI. Today Hespèrion XXI is central to the understanding of the music of the period between the Middle Ages and the Baroque. Their labours to recover works, scores, instruments and unpublished documents have a double and incalculable value. On one hand, their rigorous research provides new information and understanding about the historical knowledge of the period, and on the other hand, the exquisite performances enable people to freely enjoy the aesthetic and spiritual delicacy of the works of this period. Right from the beginning Hespèrion XXI set out on a clearly innovative and artistic course that would lead to the establishment of a school in the field of ancient music because they conceived, and continue to conceive, ancient music as an experimental musical tool and with it they seek the maximum beauty and expressiveness in their performances. Any musician in the field of ancient music will have a commitment to the original spirit of each work and has to learn to connect with it by studying the composer, the instruments of the period, the work itself and the circumstances surrounding it. But as a craftsman in the art of music, he is also obliged to make decisions about the piece being played: a musician’s capacity to connect the past with the present and to connect culture with its dissemination depend on his skill, creativity and capacity to transmit emotions. Hespèrion XXI’s repertoire includes, amongst others, the music of the Sephardi Jews, Castilian romances, pieces from the Spanish Golden Age, and Europa de les Nacions. Some of their most celebrated concert programmes are Les Cantigues de Santa Maria d’Alfons X El Savi, La Diàspora Sefardí, the music of Jerusalem, Istanbul, Armenia and the Folías Criollas. Thanks to the outstanding work of numerous musicians and collaborators who have worked with the ensemble over all these years Hespèrion XXI still plays a key role in the recovery and reappraisal of the musical heritage, and one that has great resonance throughout the world. The group has published more than 60 CDs and performs concerts for the whole world, appearing regularly at the great international festivals of ancient music.

April 2, 2023: PAUL WATKINS, CELLO; BORIS BERMAN, PIANO JOHANNES BRAHMS (1833-1897) Sonata in E minor for cello and piano, Op. 38 April 2, 2023: PAUL WATKINS, CELLO; BORIS BERMAN, PIANO In 1862 Brahms composed three movements of a cello sonata—his first duo sonata. He put it aside, however, until June 1865 when he added a fugal finale to complete the E minor Sonata for amateur cellist Josef Gänsbacher, who had helped secure his appointment as director of the Vienna Singakademie for the 1863–64 season. At the time Gänbacher was practicing law and giving piano and singing lessons, but eventually devoted himself exclusively to teaching singing. By 1866, when Brahms published the piece, he had deleted the Adagio movement, leaving a three-movement work of curious proportions—an expansive first movement, a minuet-like movement with the air of a valse triste (sad waltz), and a powerful fugal closing movement. A manuscript of the deleted slow movement apparently existed until the 1930s, unlike the typical scenario in which Brahms destroyed his discarded movements. Beloved as a three-movement work, the E minor Sonata takes up the cello-piano tradition of Beethoven, paying homage to the earlier master’s last cello sonata (D major, op. 102, no. 2) by including a fugue as its finale. But Brahms also looks back even further to Bach, whom he also revered greatly. Gänsbacher tells of visiting Brahms after the death of his mother in 1865 and finding him sobbing and playing Bach at the piano—neither of which activity he interrupted despite Gänsbacher’s presence. As pointed out by many commentators, Brahms’s fugue subject bears a striking similarity to Contrapunctus 13 from Bach’s celebrated Art of Fugue. Some have also suggested an additional but more tenuous link between Brahms’s first movement and Bach’s Contrapuntus 3. Naturally Brahms creates his own rich musical language despite his indebtedness to his predecessors. The remarkable, continually evolving main theme of his first movement rises out of the depths, showing off the cello’s lowest register before highlighting the upper register with impassioned lyricism. The second theme is remarkable for its close imitation between cello and piano, as is the exposition’s closing theme for its consolatory effect aided by a shift to the major mode and rocking accompaniment. In the Allegretto quasi Menuetto, the two outer sections project a sad kind of whimsy, something Mahler evoked when he came to write the second movement of his Second Symphony. In the center Brahms provides a flowing trio full of Romantic arpeggios, poignant lyricism, and gentle hesitations. Brahms shatters the gentle mood with the jagged leaping figure and ensuing bustle that constitutes his fugue subject. He then proceeds by ingeniously combining elements of fugue and sonata form, introducing a lovely flowing second theme that gives respite at critical junctures from the contrapuntal intricacies of his fugal material. The grand last appearance of the fugue subject launches a coda that hurtles to its exhilarating conclusion at breakneck speed. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

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LYSANDER PIANO TRIO Itamar Zorman, Violin
 Michael Katz, Cello
 Liza Stepanova, Piano The Lysander Piano Trio has been praised by The Strad for its “incredible ensemble, passionate playing, articulate and imaginative ideas and wide palette of colors” and by The Washington Post for “an uncommon degree of heart-on-the-sleeve emotional frankness” and “vivid engagement carried by soaring, ripely Romantic playing.” The group has developed a reputation for exciting programming, finding creative ways to connect well-known masterworks with pieces by lesser-known and underrepresented composers, discovering common threads across cultures and times. The Trio’s debut recording After A Dream (CAG Records) was acclaimed by The New York Times for its “polished and spirited interpretations.” Its most recent album, Mirrors, featuring world-premiere recordings of six works the ensemble has commissioned or premiered, was released in early 2021 by First Hand Records . In the 2023-24 season, the Trio performs at series around the US, Canada, and Israel including their debuts at Parlance Chamber Concerts, Feldman Chamber Music Society, Chamber Music Society of Williamsburg, Northeast Kingdom Classical Series, Blue Hill Concert Association, University of Idaho's Auditorium Chamber Music Series, Nelson Overture Concerts Society, Kelowna Chamber Concert Association, and Israel's Keshet Eilon. In the spring of 2023, the Lysander "brought the house down" (Dumbarton Concerts) with its new tango-infused collaboration with Argentine bandoneon player and composer JP Jofre and looks forward to continuing the collaboration in upcoming seasons. Highlights of the past few seasons include a return engagement at Atlanta’s premier chamber music series at Spivey Hall, a multi-concert residency with Chamber Music Tulsa, a weeklong series of performances and educational activities at New Orleans’s Crescent City Chamber Music Festival, and appearances with Massachusetts’ Valley Classical Concerts, Chamber Music Raleigh, Lee University's Presidential Concert Series, Concerts International Memphis, Sanibel Music Festival, Florida Keys Concert Association, and Shelter Island Friends of Music, among others. In addition, the ensemble performed in concerts and residencies across the United States as a featured touring group of Allied Concert Services. The Lysander Trio also performed abroad in recent seasons, notably at Calgary Pro Musica in Canada, Pro Musica San Miguel de Allende in Mexico, and a tour of Israel. The Lysander Piano Trio has spent over a decade performing around the US with appearances at notable venues such as the Kennedy Center’s Terrace Theater, Los Angeles’ Da Camera Society, San Francisco’s Music at Kohl Mansion, West Palm Beach's Kravis Center and Norton Museum of Art, Juneau Jazz and Classics, and notable college venues including Middlebury College, Clemson University, Purdue University’s Convocations Series, and University of Illinois’ Krannert Center. Summer and festival appearances include the Bard Music Festival, Cooperstown Summer Music Festival, Copenhagen Summer Festival, The Chautauqua Institution, Princeton University Summer Chamber Concerts, and a critically acclaimed recital at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Among special projects, the Trio recently collaborated with clarinetist Charles Neidich in a unique program presented by the Chamber Music Society of Philadelphia and Lincoln Friends of Chamber Music. Orchestral engagements include Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with the DuPage Symphony Orchestra, University of Wyoming Symphony Orchestra and Greenwich Village Orchestra in New York City. The Lysander Piano Trio frequently performs in New York City, where the ensemble first launched in the 2010-11 season. The New York Times lauded the ensemble’s Weill Recital Hall debut at Carnegie Hall as “…rich sound and nuanced musicianship… resulting in a finely hued collaboration among the three musicians.” Other notable New York dates are Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall and David Rubinstein Atrium, Schneider Concerts Chamber Music Series at the New School, National Sawdust, Merkin Concert Hall, and the Mostly Mozart Festival’s 50th Anniversary season at David Geffen Hall. The Trio has a long-standing commitment to working with living composers and building a new repertoire for the piano trio. The ensemble’s commissions include Gilad Cohen’s Around the Cauldron (2017), co-commissioned by Concert Artists Guild and premiered at Weill Recital Hall; Ghostwritten Variations , by Venezuelan-American composer Reinaldo Moya; Jakub Ciupinski’s The Black Mirror ; and Four Movements Inspired by “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” penned by four pre-teen composers of ComposerCraft from NYC’s Kaufman Music Center and premiered at Merkin Concert Hall in 2014. Lysander members also premiered Jennifer Higdon’s Love Sweet for soprano and piano trio, which received its world-premiere recording together with acclaimed soprano Sarah Shafer on the group’s 2021 release, Mirrors . Beyond its praise from Musical America for being “strikingly inventive…meticulous” and from The Strad for its “evocative moments,” Gramophone celebrated Mirrors by noting that “all six of this release’s compositions benefit from the Lysander Trio’s finely honed ensemble values and well-characterised solo contributions.” The Lysander Piano Trio, whose name is inspired by the character in Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream , was formed at The Juilliard School. The Trio studied with Ronald Copes of the Juilliard String Quartet, the late Joseph Kalichstein and Seymour Lipkin, and had a memorable masterclass with Alfred Brendel. Early in their career, Lysander became a standout at competitions, with top honors at the 2010 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition, the 2011 Coleman Chamber Ensemble Competition (Grand Prize), the 2011 J. C. Arriaga Chamber Music Competition (First Prize), and the 2012 Concert Artists Guild Victor Elmaleh Competition.