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FRANZ SCHUBERT (1797-1828) Duo Sonata in A, Op. 162, D. 574, for violin and piano October 18, 2009 – David Chan, violin; Jeewon Park, piano Although Schubert was never a great instrumental virtuoso in the mold of Paganini or Liszt, he grew up in a family that loved music, and he performed from his earliest years as a singer, violinist, organist, and pianist. His schoolteacher father, an amateur cellist, organized family string quartet sessions in which the young Franz played the violin and viola, and he often performed the piano parts for his own songs and chamber works. In 1816, at the age of 19, Schubert composed three sonatas for violin and piano (later published as “Sonatinas”), which demonstrated his hands-on knowledge of both instruments and the influence of Beethoven’s works for that combination. The following summer, his lyrical sensibilities now in full flower, the 20-year-old Schubert wrote the exquisite “Duo” in A major for violin and piano. The entire work is an unbroken stream of graceful, beautifully crafted melody, reflecting his quintessential genius for song. Although the designation “Duo” was not appended to the A-Major sonata until its publication some 23 years after his death, the aptness of the title is justified by the continuous dialogue between the two instruments, particularly in the third and fourth movements. The Allegro moderato begins with a strolling, dotted-rhythm piano figure over which the violin floats a sweet and constantly evolving melodic line. The piano contributes to the thematic dialogue, but the violin dominates the musical texture of this uncommonly lovely movement. Taking a cue from Beethoven, Schubert follows the first movement with an exuberantly heroic Scherzo, featuring leaping intervals, brusque cross rhythms, and unexpected juxtapositions of forte and piano. A soft, sinuous chromatic violin scale announces the contrasting trio, which is characterized by a subtle dynamic range and trimly gliding intervals. The piano fully establishes its musical partnership in the lyrical, 3/8 Andantino. Composed in the ABA form of one of his Lieder, Schubert provides a mellow “duet without words” in which the violin and piano contribute equally to the musical discourse. The final Allegro vivace continues the melodic interweaving of the violin and piano parts. Cast as a whirling Viennese waltz, the movement brings Schubert’s Duo Sonata to a buoyant conclusion. By Michael Parloff Return to Parlance Program Notes

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JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH (1685-1750) Suite in B minor, BWV 1067 for flute, strings, and continuo April 3, 2016: Sir James Galway, flute; Benjamin Beilman and Danbi Um, violins; Mark Holloway, viola; Nicholas Canellakis, cello; Timothy Cobb, bass; Paolo Bourdignon, harpsichord When music scholars began sifting through Bach’s long-forgotten works in the nineteenth century, they came across four orchestral masterpieces that they catalogued as “orchestral suites” because of their similarity to suites for keyboard or individual string instruments—and simply to avoid confusion. Bach, however, had called them “ouvertures” in the tradition of his German contemporaries, who used the term for orchestral works headed by a “French overture,” followed by a string of French-style dance movements, such as bourrées, gavottes, and minuets, in binary form—two halves each repeated. Since the seventeenth century, French composers had been introducing their ballets and operas with multisectioned ouvertures, which Jean-Baptiste Lully expanded and standardized into what became known as the “French overture.” These introductory pieces consisted of two contrasting sections: the first marchlike and majestic with characteristic dotted (long-short) rhythms, and the second faster, in contrasting meter (triple or compound) with imitative, contrapuntal texture. They often closed with a brief return to the opening stately music. English and German composers adopted this style to satisfy the prevailing taste for things French. Bach’s four existing orchestral suites (there may have been others that did not survive) cannot be precisely dated, but the First in C major and Fourth in D major probably stem from about 1725 (the Fourth also exists in a later version). The Second in B minor may date from around 1738–39, and the Third Suite—also in D major—from about 1731. Since 1723 Bach had been working in Leipzig, where he was responsible for the music of the town’s four principal churches and civic music events, and trained the musicians at the Thomasschule. In addition to those myriad duties, he began directing the Collegium Musicum in 1729, continuing until the early 1740s (with a short interruption from 1737 to 1739). The Collegium Musicum presented weekly public community concerts, for which he produced all manner of music: overtures, duo and trio sonatas, sinfonias, concertos, and suites. The earliest existing copies of the orchestral suites indeed date from Bach’s Leipzig days, but it is conceivable that he could have composed some of them previously in Cöthen when he was employed by music-loving Prince Leopold. The beloved seven-movement Second Suite, with the sparest scoring of the four, includes only flute along with the strings and continuo. Its opening “French overture” features characteristic dotted rhythms and elegant ornamental figures in its majestic first section and a fugal fast section. Here for the most part, and in the Rondeau, Sarabande, and Minuet, the flute mainly doubles the first violin part, but in the movements that include an interior second dance before the opening dance returns—the Bourrée and Polonaise—the middle dance contains a more elaborate solo flute part. In the lively perpetual-motion final movement—Badinerie—the flute takes the spotlight throughout in the manner of a flute concerto. © Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

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GABRIEL FAURÉ (1845-1924) Mélodies November 12, 2023: Angel Blue, soprano; Bryan Wagorn, piano Fauré’s first work, “Le papillon et la fleur,” was a mélodie (song) composed in 1861 when he was a sixteen-year-old student at the École Niedermeyer. He continued to compose mélodies throughout his long life, penning his last set, L’horizon chimérique, in 1922. He progressed from writing primarily romances to working in a mature style—influenced by poet Paul Verlaine—beginning with the celebrated “Clair de lune,” and eventually focusing his attention on the song cycle and its many interconnections. Often considered the master of French song composers, Fauré left his mark on all who followed, including Debussy, Ravel, and Roussel. Fauré loved texts that permitted him to create a mood or set a scene rather than those that restricted him to illustrative details and he altered texts of lesser poets when it suited his purpose. Verlaine’s poetry drew a new style from him, a more continuous flow and more use of modality, though he still concentrated on atmosphere rather than on each textual nuance, as Debussy did at roughly the same time. Fauré’s first Verlaine setting, “Clair de lune” (1887), is subtitled “minuet,” the composer’s response to the eighteenth-century images in the text of elegant statues, parks, and masqueraders. Verlaine’s Mandoline, which describes eighteenth-century commedia dell’arte serenaders, was set by Fauré in 1891, having already attracted Debussy in 1882. Fauré permitted himself to repeat the opening verse to achieve a ternary form. His accompaniment figures suggest the plucked mandolin. In 1884, submerged beneath Fauré’s musically serene exterior, there lurked a certain violence, which erupted in “Fleur jetée.” One of Fauré’s most successful Silvestre settings, it recalls Schubert’s “Erlkönig” in its savage repeated octaves and blustering scales. The voice part is no less dramatic as the rejected lover implores the wind to dry up her broken heart. —©Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

Jean Barrière (1707-1747) Allegro prestissimo from Sonata in G for two cellos September 29, 2024: Carter Grey and Edward Arron, cellos French cello virtuoso and composer Jean Barrière most likely lived in Bordeaux for some time before moving to Paris, judging by documents that appeared after his death. In 1730 he earned the designation “Musicien ordinaire de notre Académie Royale de Musique” in Paris, and three years later he was granted a privilege to publish “many sonatas and other instrumental musical works.” Two books of his sonatas appeared before Barrière left for Rome in 1736 intending to study with Italian cellist Francesco Alborea, known as Francischello. Barrière seems not to have studied with him, however, and made concert tours in Italy before returning to Paris in 1738. Few descriptions of Barrière’s playing survive, but he was known as one of the greatest cello virtuosos of the first half of the eighteenth century, when the modern cello, already popularized in Italy, began taking over from the viol in France. In 1739 Barrière’s publishing privilege was extended for twelve more years, and he continued to issue cello sonatas (which included a trio sonata for treble instrument and cello and the two-cello sonata), as well as a collection for pardessus de viole (highest member of the viol family) and one for harpsichord. Unfortunately he died at age forty—only four years into his second publishing privilege—but he is considered the first to write specifically idiomatic music for the cello. The Two-Cello Sonata in G major appears as the fourth work in Book 3 (later publications follow different numbering), and in Barrière’s day, when typically there would have been continuo accompaniment (keyboard and reinforcing bass instrument), the work gives no figures with a bass line accompaniment, meaning the two cellos alone carry the whole. After two slow movements, the virtuosic third movement takes off in a rapid-fire conversation between the two protagonists. —©Jane Vial Jaffe Return to Parlance Program Notes

SUSANNA PHILLIPS, SOPRANO Alabama-born soprano Susanna Phillips, recipient of the Metropolitan Opera’s 2010 Beverly Sills Artist Award, continues to establish herself as one of today’s most soughtafter singing actors and recitalists. 2012-13 sees Phillips take the stage of the Met for her fifth consecutive season, this time to perform Donna Anna in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, conducted by Edward Gardner. Her opera season in New York City continues with her return to the Perlman stage at Carnegie Hall for a special concert performance, portraying Stella in Previn’s A Streetcar Named Desire opposite Renée Fleming—a role which she will then perform at Lyric Opera of Chicago. Phillips also makes her solo recital debut at Carnegie Hall this season, presenting a program with accompanist Myra Huang in Weill Recital Hall. Other 2012–13 operatic highlights include Phillips’s return to Santa Fe Opera as the Countess in Le nozze di Figaro, and a concert production of Idomeneo at the Ravinia Festival under the direction of James Conlon. Symphonic appearances include Mozart’s Requiem with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the Lord Nelson Mass with Music of the Baroque in Chicago, Knoxville: Summer of 1915 with Alabama Symphony, works by Berg and Beethoven with the St. Louis Symphony conducted by David Robertson, performances with Musica Sacra led by Kent Tritle at Alice Tully Hall, and Paul Moravec’s Blizzard Voices with the Oratorio Society of New York at Carnegie Hall. Phillips’s recital performances include appearances with tenor Joseph Kaiser and Myra Huang in Boston with Celebrity Series and in New York City at the Morgan Library, as well as solo recitals at the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Cal Performances, Sarasota, and Huntsville Chamber Music Guild. Last season, Phillips reprised her celebrated portrayal of Musetta in the Met’s timeless production of La bohème—the same role with which she made her Met debut in 2008. Phillips also released her first solo album on Bridge Records, Paysages, lauded by the San Francisco Chronicle as “sumptuous and elegantly sung.” Her 2011–12 season also boasted appearances in the title role of Lucia di Lammermoor with Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Minnesota Opera; her European debut as Pamina in Die Zauberflöte at the Gran Teatro del Liceu Barcelona; and the Countess in Le nozze di Figaro with the Grand Théâtre de Bordeaux. In concert, Phillips appeared with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, and the Santa Fe Concert Association. Highlights of Phillips’s previous seasons include numerous additional Metropolitan Opera appearances: as Pamina in Julie Taymor’s celebrated production of The Magic Flute, Musetta in La bohème (both in New York and on tour in Japan), and she was a featured artist in the Met’s Summer Recital Series in Central Park and Brooklyn Bridge Park. She made her Santa Fe Opera debut as Pamina, and subsequently performed a trio of other Mozart roles there: Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte, Countess Almaviva in Figaro, and Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni. Phillips made two appearances with Boston Lyric Opera (A Midsummer Night’s Dream’s Helena and Don Giovanni’s Donna Anna), and three with Opera Birmingham (the Countess, Violetta, and the title character in Lucia di Lammermoor). She portrayed Adina in Lyric Opera of Chicago’s L’elisir d’amore, and as a participant in Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Ryan Opera Center, she sang Juliette in Roméo et Juliette and Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus. Phillips made her Minnesota Opera debut in the notoriously challenging role of Elmira in Tim Albery’s production of Reinhard Keiser’s The Fortunes of King Croesus, and later sang Euridice there opposite David Daniels in Orfeo ed Euridice. Phillips has played Mozart’s Countess with the Dallas Opera and Donna Anna with the Fort Worth Opera Festival. In August 2011, Phillips was featured at the opening night of the Mostly Mozart Festival, which aired live on PBS’s Live From Lincoln Center. She has also been a resident artist at the 2010 and 2011 Marlboro Music Festivals, was part of Marilyn Horne Foundation Gala at Carnegie Hall, made her New York solo recital debut at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall (in 2009 as a Juilliard School alumna and Alice Tully Vocal Arts Debut Recital Award recipient), and has appeared at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC (under the auspices of the Vocal Arts Society). Her ever-expanding concert repertoire has been showcased with many prestigious organizations: she performed with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic under Alan Gilbert; sung in Mozart’s Mass in C minor with the Chicago Symphony; and also took part in Beethoven’s Mass in C major and Choral Fantasy at Carnegie Hall with Kent Tritle and the Oratorio Society of New York. Phillips has sung Dvorák’s Stabat Mater with the Santa Fe Symphony, Brahms’s Ein deutsches Requiem with the Santa Barbara Symphony, and Wolf’s Spanisches Liederbuch at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall. Other recent concert and oratorio engagements include Carmina Burana, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Mahler’s Fourth Symphony, Mozart’s Coronation Mass, the Fauré and Mozart requiems, and Handel’s Messiah. She also made her Carnegie Hall debut with Skitch Henderson, Rob Fisher, and the New York Pops. Following her Baltimore Symphony Orchestra debut under Marin Alsop, the Baltimore Sun proclaimed: “She’s the real deal.” Phillips had a magnificent 2005, winning four of the world’s leading vocal competitions: Operalia (both First Place and the Audience Prize), the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, the MacAllister Awards, and the George London Foundation Awards Competition. She has also claimed the top honor at the Marilyn Horne Foundation Competition, and she won first prizes from the American Opera Society Competition and the Musicians Club of Women in Chicago. Philips has received grants from the Santa Fe Opera and the Sullivan Foundation, and is a graduate of Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Ryan Opera Center. Born in Birmingham, Alabama and raised in Huntsville, Susanna Phillips is grateful forthe ongoing support of her community in her career. She sang Strauss’s Four Last Songs and gave her first concert performances in the title role of Lucia di Lammermoor with the Huntsville Symphony, and returns frequently to her native state for recitals and orchestral appearances. Over 400 people traveled from Huntsville to New York City in December 2008 for Phillips’s Metropolitan Opera debut in La bohème.

WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART (1756-1791) Adagio in C for Armonica, K. 617 January 31, 2010 – Cecilia Brauer, glass harmonica While visiting England in 1757, Benjamin Franklin attended a concert by a “wine glass organist.” Charmed by the ethereal tones that the performer drew from the rims of the crystal goblets, the ever creative Franklin imagined a mechanical instrument that would allow for greater technical fluency and a full range of chord voicing. His resulting invention, the “armonica, ” was later described by an Italian acquaintance, Alessandro Vietri: “I have been to see the Newton of electricity, the famous Franklin. He is a man of over fifty years of age. You know that by pressing and sliding a moistened finger over the edge of a glass a sound is produced. He has made the instrument on this principle. He has strung on a spindle, or common axis, as many glass bells as correspond to the pegs of a harpsichord, proportionately graduated. The spindle turns by means of the left foot, with a wheel, as the knife grinder does. At the same time one touches with the fingers, as one does a harpsichord, the bells which spin like wheels, after having first wet them slightly with a sponge. A melody comes out which goes to the heart.” Franklin’s musical invention became voguish during the 18th and 19th Centuries. European monarchs were captivated by the instrument, and major composers such as C.P.E. Bach, Gaetano Donizetti, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Camille Saint-Saëns contributed works to showcase its unique sonority. Mozart first encountered the instrument in the Vienna home of the famous German physician-astrologist Franz Mesmer, who incorporated its hallucinogenic strains into his displays of “Mesmerism.” In 1791 the 35-year-old Mozart attended a performance by the reigning armonica virtuosa of the day, Marianne Kirchgaessner. Blinded at the age of four by smallpox, she had learned the armonica as a child and had become a sensational performer on the instrument. A critic of the day wrote, “she plays with an unbelievable talent, full of gentle grace and feeling.” Mozart evidently concurred. So inspired was he by the performance that he composed for her the Adagio in C for solo armonica; the Adagio & Rondo in C for armonica, flute, oboe, viola, and cello; and he began to write a third work, a Fantasia in C for the same combination, but completed only the first 13 measures. Mozart’s two completed works for armonica ranked among the most popular works in Kirchgaessner’s repertoire. The four-minute Adagio, composed at the same time as The Magic Flute, perfectly captures the angelic essence of the armonica. Spiritually akin to the dignified chorales and marches that Mozart wrote for the Priests of Isis and Osiris, the Adagio blends innocence and simplicity with an aura of mystery and timeless wisdom. By Michael Parloff Return to Parlance Program Notes

KEVIN ZHU, VIOLIN American violinist Kevin Zhu has amassed an outstanding record of concert performances and competition wins since he began playing violin at age three. Praised for his “awesome technical command and maturity” (The Strad) and “absolute virtuosity, almost blinding in its incredible purity” (L’ape musicale), Kevin has performed on the world’s largest stages, ranging from Carnegie Hall in New York to London’s Royal Festival Hall to the Forbidden City Concert Hall in Beijing. Initially coming to international attention after winning the 2018 Paganini Competition and 2012 Yehudi Menuhin Competition, he has established himself as a leading figure among the next generation of musicians, astonishing audiences with his peerless technical mastery and inimitable artistic voice. In the 2022-23 season, Kevin will make concerto debuts with the Des Moines Symphony and at the Auditorio Nacional in Madrid, and embark on a project to record the 24 Paganini Caprices on Paganini’s famed violin ‘Il Cannone’, something never done before in history. He performs the complete Caprices in Italy, Singapore, and Germany, and makes his Merkin Hall recital debut with a program inspired by ballet and operatic masterpieces. Recent performing highlights include concerto appearances with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Moscow Virtuosi, and China Philharmonic Orchestra. A highly sought-after recitalist, he has toured across the United States and Europe with repertoire ranging from Beethoven to contemporary commissions. Kevin is also a passionate chamber musician, collaborating with artists such as Itzhak Perlman, Lawrence Power, and Jan Vogler. In addition to his efforts on stage, Kevin serves as a Culture Ambassador of the Lin Yao Ji Music Foundation of China. He has been featured on ABC Eyewitness News, BBC Radio 3, and RAI Radio 3, and is the recipient of a 2021 Avery Fisher Career Grant and Salon de Virtuosi Career Grant. Kevin holds a Bachelor’s degree from The Juilliard School, where he studied with Itzhak Perlman and Li Lin. Kevin performs on the c1722 “Lord Wandsworth” Antonio Stradivari violin, which is on loan from the Ryuji Ueno Foundation and Rare Violins In Consortium, Artists and Benefactors Collaborative.

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