Principal Conductor of the Bonn Opera in Germany, Jacques Lacombe led the company in La Bohème and Tristan & Isolde throughout September, October, and November of 2016. This season has also seen Lacombe leading productions of Die Fledermaus at Opera de Marseille, La Juive at the Opera National du Rhin, and four performances of Faust at Deutsche Oper Berlin in February and March.
Lacombe looks forward to leading Peter Grimes and Tosca at Theater Bonn, May through July, as well as a range of concerts with the Orchestra Symphonique de Trois-Rivières.
April 27-May 12, Maestro Bernhard Gueller leads his orchestra Symphony Nova Scotia in its annual Festival, focusing on European Masterworks, including the Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 5, Brahms Symphony No. 1 and Piano Concerto No. 1 (with Marc-André Hamelin!), and Beethoven Symphony No. 9. Gueller explains the programming in this video.
This Summer (or rather, this Winter), Gueller returns to the Cape Town Philharmonic, where he is Principal Guest Conductor, leading the CPO in its Winter Symphony Season, exploring works by Brahms, Franck, Gershwin, Prokofiev, and others.
In the Fall, Gueller returns for his final season as Music Director of the Symphony Nova Scotia, leading a season opener of Dvorák, Brahms and Canadian composer Alexina Louie. Other notable concerts include the Cherubini Requiem with the RAM Koor, the Estonian National Male Choir.
Now Booking Tales of Two Cities: February 26 – March 10, 2019
Tales of Two Cities: The Leipzig-Damascus Coffee House is the latest multi-media creation from Alison Mackay, who conceived and programmed their most recent J.S. Bach: The Circle of Creation as well as House of Dreams and The Galileo Project. Mackay’s latest musical time-travel project takes the audience to the year 1740, when coffee houses were important cultural and social hubs in both the famous trading centers of Leipzig, and in one of the oldest cities in the world, Damascus. Tales of Two Cities: The Leipzig-Damascus Coffee House is performed in a theatrical setting recreating two wooden-paneled interiors which transform from a coffeehouse in Syria to one in Leipzig.
Program to include works by Telemann, Monteverdi, Handel, Lully, and Bach interwoven with classical arabic music performed by guest ensemble Trio Arabica and 2 actor narrators.
“There was plenty of music, echoing and augmenting the spirit of the text. Particularly lovely: a propulsive bassoon line under playful oboes in the overture to Orchestral Suite No. 1 in C Major and the finale, Sinfonia (“Praise the Lord in his riches”) which was suffused with radiant joy.” – Matthew J. Palm, ORLANDO SENTINEL, March 7, 2017
“Tafelmusik was a superb ensemble with a generous sound not found in many baroque orchestras. Musical selections ran the gamut from orchestral pieces to solos for cello, violin, or harpsichord. Often baroque music concerts suffer from textural monotony, but Tafelmusik’s timbral variety was pleasant and well-conceived.” – Christian Hertzog, THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE, March 12, 2017 Welcoming Elisa Citterio to the Tafel family
Elisa Citterio, Music Director Designate. Photographer: Monica Cordiviola
Tafelmusik is excited to announce the appointment of Elisa Citterio to be Tafelmusik’s new Music Director. Elisa immediately becomes Music Director, assuming her role in July 2017. She will open the 2017/18 season with a celebratory program at Koerner Hall.
Renowned for stunning virtuoso performances on baroque violin and for her innovative approach to period performance, Elisa has recorded and toured, often as concertmaster, with many renowned ensembles. These include Europa Galante, Accademia Bizantina, and Il Giardino Armonico, and she has collaborated with some of the foremost period instrumentalists of our time. Since 2000 she has been concertmaster of the Accademia della Scala, and since 2004 has been a member of the orchestra of La Scala, Milan, working with conductors such as Daniele Gatti and Riccardo Muti.
Michael Stern, conductor. Photo by Todd Rosenberg. download
Conductor and Music Director of the Kansas City Symphony, Michael Stern just led a subscription week with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and fellow Colbert Artist, Marc-André Hamelin in nights of Shostakovich, Tchaikovsky, and Medtner’s Piano Concerto No. 2.
“Under Stern’s impassioned baton, the orchestra produced teeth-rattling forte passages in the fifth movement, which turned abruptly into complete silence. The juxtaposition, which was exaggerated by Stern, emphasized Tchaikovsky’s wittiness.” – Jon Ross, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, March 10, 2017
Last month, Stern led a round of several different programs with the National Symphony in Washington D.C. and Joshua Bell in Édouard Lalo’s Symphonie Espagnole, and the premiere of Anne Dudley’s The Man With The Violin.
Stern returned from two weeks in Guangzhou in January as Music Director for the Youth Music Culture Guangdong, alongside Artistic Director Yo-Yo Ma, to finish his tenth week with the Kansas City Symphony in a program of Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony and Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde.
Next up, Stern will premiere Rautavaara’s Violin Concerto with Anne Akiko Meyers and the Kansas City Symphony on March 24, 25, & 26.
Program I Beethoven: String Quartet in D Major, Op. 18, No. 3 Lembit Beecher: Newly Commissioned Piece [c. 20 Minutes] Intermission Dvorak: String Quartet in F Major, Op. 96 (“American”)
Program II Haydn: String Quartet No. 2 in F Major, Op. 77 Bartok: String Quartet No. 3 Intermission Beethoven: String Quartet in E minor, Op. 59, No. 2 (“2nd Razumovsky”)
Coming up, the Juilliard String Quartet will be holding week-long seminars at the Juilliard School in May, and with former violist Samuel Rhodes and former violinist Joel Smirnoff at Tanglewood Music Center in June, leading intensive workshops for professional quartets, culminating in all-day quartet marathons at the conclusion of the seminars.
In this Juilliard Inside Look video, the Quartet celebrates its 70th anniversary season and the introduction of new cellist, Astrid Schween. Watch, and enjoy!
Amarcord is pleased to announce their 2017 run of A Cappella, a music festival and competition celebrating a cappella music from April 21 to 30 in Leipzig, Germany! To learn more, please visit the festival’s website.
“Psychologically, I am bound to this piece,” Bailey says. “Most things we play, we’re reinterpreting the past. This is new music. This was written for me. This is the present and the future, and that excites people.” – As told to byTed S. McGregor Jr, February 13, 2017
Congratulations to the golden man of the hour! We are excited to share that cellist Zuill Bailey won the “Best Classical Instrumental Solo” GRAMMY for his live recording of Michael Daugherty’s Tales of Hemingway with the Nashville Symphony Orchestra and music director, Giancarlo Guerrero. The recording also won in the category “Best Contemporary Classical Composition”.
Zuill enjoyed the GRAMMY Awards ceremony with his son, Mateo, in LA last weekend, and dedicated the award to his mother.
Inspired by the adventures, literature, and life of American author and journalist Ernest Hemingway, Michael Daugherty composed Tales of Hemingway, an homage to the 20th century writer. In four parts, Daugherty takes the piece from the American grassroots tradition of where Hemingway grew up, to a more exotic flavor as the narrative travels from Michigan to Spain and Cuba.
In addition to the two GRAMMYs, the album has also won a GRAMMY in the category “Best Classical Compendium”. Widely performed across North America already, Tales of Hemingway has been heard with Zuill Bailey and the symphony orchestras in Detroit, Erie, Virginia, Asheville, Evansville, Roanoke, and with the Busan Istanbul Philharmonic in Turkey.
Listen to Tales of Hemingway performed with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, here. Learn more about the piece and orchestration, here.
Cellist Mark Kosower enjoyed a rich fall season with performances of Elgar’s and Dvörak’s cello concerti; Bloch’s Schelomo; and Tchaikovsky’s Variations on a Rococo Theme; with symphony orchestras in Buffalo, Naples, Toledo, Las Cruces, and Phoenix
“Kosower’s cello sang with a fervent voice against a sea of brooding emotion: moving, prayerful, artistically driving toward a higher plane.” – Wayne F. Anthony, Toledo Blade, October 29, 2016
“An elegant player with fine-grained tone, sensitive phrasing, and fluent technique, Mark Kosower is the perfect advocate for these two concertos. Never aggressive in his playing, his lyrical gifts shine through even in the climaxes.” – Timothy Robson, Cleveland Classical, July 22, 2016
Having recorded the two discs comprising the complete Ginastera works for Cello on Naxos (one of his two cello concerti, the other of solo pieces), Kosower also celebrated the Ginastera legacy in recital at the Cleveland Institute of Music.
“Kosower’s virtuosity was on almost relentless display. Time and again, one’s jaw dropped as the cellist, suavely bolstered by his partner, exploited his instrument in ways almost beyond belief, to stunning and haunting effect.” – Zachary Lewis, The Plain Dealer, September 26, 2016
Next up, Mark plays a subscription week with the Cleveland Orchestra as the soloist in Strauss’s Don Quixote from April 20-22.
In 2016, Harpist Yolanda Kondonassis released her album Ginastera: One Hundred, a centennial celebration of the composer, Alberto Ginastera, featuring his harp concerto written in 1956. Yolanda spoke with Mike Goldberg from NPR about the album, Ginastera’s contributions to harp repertoire, and how she approaches new projects. Listen to the interview here.
“He created the work that pushed the harp out of its box and gave us the kind of indelible, substantive composition that makes or breaks a solo career like mine.” – Yolanda Kondonassis (from the liner notes of Ginastera: One Hundred)
“Kondonassis has done a service to Ginastera’s legacy with One Hundred and we are the beneficiaries of her advocacy. I would say if you own one record of Ginastera it should be this one.” – JEREMY SHATAN, November 1, 2016
Yolanda’s next project is a harp concerto commission with Grammy and Pulitzer Prize-winning composer, Jennifer Higdon. Yolanda premieres the concerto in the spring of 2018 and performances with commissioning partners are slated for the 18/19 season.
Yolanda began 2017 with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, performing Mozart’s Concerto for Flute and Harp, as part of the orchestra’s Mozart Festival. Watch the performance on the Detroit Symphony Orchestra’s website here.
Next month, Yolanda and her recording partner, guitarist Jason Vieaux, visit the Schubert Club of Saint Paul for an educational program about preserving the environment on March 3, and a program from their album, Together, on March 5, for the Music in the Park series.
JACK Quartet - photo by Shervin Lainez. L to R: Jay Campbell, cello; John Pickford Richards, violin; Christopher Otto, violin; Austin Wulliman, viola. download
JACK Quartet launched into the new year with a bi-coastal tour: University of Washington, Santa Cruz with the Lightbulb Ensemble, and Wallis Center in LA on the west coast, and on the East Coast: Boston University, Treetops Chamber Music Society in Connecticut, and Carnegie Hall’s Neighborhood Concert series in Brooklyn.
“…the JACKs captured the fleeting gossamer essence of music seemingly impossible to capture.”
After stops for performances at University of Maryland and Eastman School of Music, the Quartet returns to Wigmore Hall, where they will perform a day-long marathon of the complete quartets (plus one quintet) of Iannis Xenakis. Next is Italy for concerts in Florence and Genoa, featuring music by Ruth Crawford Seeger, Julia Wolfe, Derek Bermel, Morton Feldman, and Cenk Ergün.
![Bernhard Gueller photo by Scott Blackburn [cropped]](https://colbertartists.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Gueller_Scott-Blackburn_001_crop2.jpg)
