South Florida Classical Review

For South Florida classical music lovers, the major change this season will be in their cars. Gone are the days when you could turn on your radio and brighten a drive down Federal Highway with a Mozart symphony.

The demise of South Florida’s classical music stations cast a shadow over the region’s music world, outraging many listeners both in the fact that it happened and the abrupt manner in which it was handled. But South Florida’s live music scene remains vigorous, with excellent local ensembles and visits from the best performers from around the world.

The storied Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra will begin a three-year series of visits to Naples, just across the Everglades. There will be a rare chance to hear German opera this season in West Palm Beach, where Palm Beach Opera will perform Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos. 

A wealth of contemporary music will be performed. New World Symphony is expanding its new music programming and the youthful contemporary chamber orchestra Nu Deco Ensemble launches its first full season with performances mainly in the Wynwood arts district.  And if you like Donizetti’s opera Don Pasquale, you’re in luck because both Florida Grand Opera and Palm Beach Opera will be performing the work.

Here’s a sampling of what to expect this season:

ORCHESTRAS

New World Symphony

The New World Symphony always produces more than its share of season highlights. Yet even with its strong track record, this season’s programs appear particularly distinguished, especially for its expanded emphasis on new music.

The Sounds of the Times, the ensemble’s contemporary series, will grow to four programs this season. The New York contemporary music specialist Jeffrey Milarsky will conduct an American program Dec. 5 that will include John Luther Adams’ Pulitzer Prize-winning Become Ocean, Milton Babbitt’s All Set and Charles Wuorinen’s Bamboula Squared.

The composer and conductor Matthias Pintscher will lead the orchestra Feb. 13 in a concert that will feature the Clarinet Concerto of Unsuk Chin, a South Korean composer best-known for her opera Alice in Wonderland. Serving as soloist will be Jérôme Comte. Also on the program is Boulez’s …explosante-fixe…, as well as Pintscher’s own Five Pieces for Orchestra. 

Stefan Asbury will conduct Thomas Adès’ Violin Concerto on March 26, with soloist Anthony Marwood, in a concert that will also include Tippett’s Symphony No. 4 and the U.S. premiere of A Cold Spring by the young Scottish composer Helen Grime. Patrick Dupré Quigley will bring his Miami choir Seraphic Fire for a joint performance April 16 with New World to perform The Desert Music, Steve Reich’s sprawling setting of poems by William Carlos Williams, as well as works of Ligeti and Monteverdi.

In addition, to the Sounds of the Times performances, the orchestra will welcome guest conductor Susanna Mälkki, another contemporary music specialist. She will lead concerts April 9 and 10 that will include the late French composer Henri Dutilleux’s A Whole Distant World, with cello soloist Anssi Karttunen, as well as Debussy’s Round Dances of Spring and Rachmaninoff’s Symphonic Dances.

While the season contains a beefed-up contemporary music component, there will be several concerts focusing on the classics.

The season opens Oct. 10-11 with Michael Tilson Thomas, New World’s founder and artistic director, leading an all-Russian program, including Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 1, known as “Winter Dreams,” and Stravinsky’s The Fox and The Wedding,  with the Russian folk-singing group the Dmitri Pokrovsky Ensemble.

The conductor James Gaffigan will lead performances Jan. 30-31 of Strauss’s Also sprach Zarathustra and the Mozart Piano Concerto No. 22 with soloist Jeffrey Kahane. Tilson Thomas will continue his survey of Mahler’s symphonic works with performances of Das Lied von der Erde on April 23 and 24, with mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke and tenor Simon O’Neill. Also on the program is Cage’s The Seasons. Berlioz’s quasi-viola concerto Harold in Italy will be performed by Roberto Díaz May 7-8, in a concert that will include not one but two Sibelius symphonies, No. 6 and No. 7.

Led by Tilson Thomas, the orchestra will perform another installment in its Journeys series, in which concerts focus on a single composer. This season it will be Schumann. Taking advantage of the smaller stages mounted around the hall, the evening will mix orchestra, vocal and chamber works. Among the works scheduled for the Oct. 30 performance will be selections from the song cycle Dichterliebe, with baritone Joshua Hopkins, a movement from the Konzertstück for Four Horns and Orchestra, the first movement of Fairy Tale Narrations, the Overture to The Bride of Messina and the Symphony No. 4.

The orchestra will leave its Miami Beach hall for the grander surroundings of the Arsht Center in Miami for three programs featuring celebrity soloists. The violinist Pinchas Zukerman will perform the Beethoven Violin Concerto on Oct. 24, in a concert conducted by Tilson Thomas that will include Copland’s Symphony No. 3. Gil Shaham will play the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto Jan. 9. Finally Emanuel Ax performs Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5, known as “the Emperor,” March 5, in a concert conducted by Pablo Heras-Casado  that will include Dvořák’s Symphony No. 7.

New World always performs a series of chamber concerts, often with prominent guest musicians. At the Oct. 18 concert, entitled Viennese Decadence, there will be the chance to hear the cutting-edge music of another age, in a program that will include Webern’s Five Movements and Schoenberg’s Chamber Symphony No. 1, as well as works of Schubert and Korngold.

The clarinetist Alexander Fiterstein will join New World members Nov. 15 for the Brahms Clarinet Quintet, in a performance that will also include the composer’s Horn Trio. The soprano Julia Bullock will perform Feb. 28, singing Falla’s Psyché and Ravel’s Three Poems of Stéphane Mallarmé, in a concert that will also include Falla’s Harpsichord Concerto, the Ravel Piano Trio and other works.

Cleveland Orchestra

Every winter for the past 10 years, the musicians of the celebrated Cleveland Orchestra have left their icy home on Lake Erie to enjoy the sunshine, sand and palm trees of Miami (and play a few concerts).

To celebrate the first decade of the orchestra’s Miami residency, the ensemble will hold a gala event Jan. 23 headlined by celebrated soprano Renée Fleming. The vocal selections are still to be announced. The concert, led by the orchestra’s music director Franz Welser-Möst, will include Mozart’s Haffner Symphony and Ravel’s La Valse.

As the residency has matured, the orchestra’s programming has become more interesting than the hyper-cautious processions of classics performed in the first few years. Among the offerings this season will be rarely heard works by masters, crowd-pleasing spectaculars, a symphony by one of Mexico’s greatest composers and a world premiere.

This will mark the final season in which Giancarlo Guerrero serves as principal guest conductor of the Miami residency. He will lead the opening concerts Nov. 13 and 14, conducting Saint-Saëns’ Symphony No. 3, known as the “Organ Symphony,” Shostakovich’s Cello Concerto No. 1 with soloist Johannes Moser and the Symphony No. 2 of Carlos Chávez, the 20^th century Mexican composer.

Tchaikovsky’s haunting but rarely heard Symphony No. 1, known as “Winter Dreams,” will be on the program for the next pair of concerts Jan. 21 and 22, led by Welser-Möst. Also on the program is the composer’s Romeo and Juliet Overture and the Schumann Piano Concerto with soloist Leif Ove Andsnes.

Concertmaster William Preucil and principal cellist Mark Kosower will team up Jan. 29-30 for another rarely heard work, Brahms’ Double Concerto. Also on the program is Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 3, another work that doesn’t turn up often on concert programs.

For the final concerts March 17-19, the orchestra will perform the world premiere of a work to be announced, by the Israeli composer Avner Dorman, a student of John Corigliano, who now lives in the United States. Also on the program, which will be conducted by Guerrero, will be Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 and Liszt’s Piano Concerto No. 2 with soloist Jean-Yves Thibaudet.

Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra

The legendary Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra launches a three-year residency in Naples this season, establishing a series that’s likely to tempt many South Florida music lovers to make the long drive across Alligator Alley.

The two-program series opens March 1 at the Artis-Naples performing arts center, as conductor Valery Gergiev strikes up Wagner’s Overture to The Flying Dutchman, followed by Debussy’s La Mer and the Mussorgsky/Ravel Pictures at an Exhibition.  The next night, the orchestra will perform Tchaikovsky’s Manfred symphony and the Prelude and Good Friday music from Wagner’s Parsifal.

Two orchestras that will perform in South Florida will also perform at Artis-Naples. The Toronto Symphony, conducted by Peter Oundjian, will appear Jan. 5, performing Estacio’s Wondrous Light, Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade and Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 with soloist Jan Lisiecki. The Cleveland Orchestra conducted by Franz Welser-Möst, will appear Jan. 24, playing Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet Overture-Fantasy, Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 1, “Winter Dreams,” and the Schumann Piano Concerto with soloist Leif Ove Andsnes.

Miami Symphony

The Miami Symphony will tap into the energy of the Wynwood arts district, moving into a new home at NatComStudios at Mana Wynwood, a huge contemporary performance space.

Eduardo Marturet, the orchestra’s music director, said the orchestra hopes to use the Wynwood venue to reach a different audience, mainly people who wouldn’t normally have attended the orchestra’s concerts at the Arsht Center. At Wynwood, he said, the orchestra will perform more contemporary and pops-oriented concerts. The orchestra will still appear at the Arsht Center, too, he said, which will remain the venue for classic symphonies and concertos.

The season opens Oct. 4 at the Arsht Center with a world premiere and two classics. The orchestra will play Echoes by Tulio Cremisini, the ensemble’s composer in residence, who has written award-winning music for television, film and advertising. Also on the program is Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony and the Brahms Symphony No. 4.

The NatComStudios debut takes place Oct. 29, with selections from Bizet’s Carmen with the Cuban-American mezzo-soprano Mabel Ledo and Marturet’s own composition, Pictures for an Exhibition, inspired by contemporary art works owned by South Florida collectors. 

Also at the Wynwood venue, the orchestra will perform a family-oriented concert (Jan. 23), a Valentine’s Day concert (actually the day before) focusing on Frank Sinatra (Feb. 13), and a collaboration with several Latin music performers, including the Afro-Caribbean music group Tiempo Libre (March 19-20).

The Wynwood site will still be a venue for music by the great composers of the past. Mendelssohn’s rarely heard Double Concerto for Violin and Piano will be on the program for an April 10 concert (also performed April 9 at FIU’s Wertheim Performing Arts Center). Concertmaster Daniel Andai will conduct and handle the violin part, with Ciro Fodere at the piano. Also on the program are two world premieres, Canto Llano 2 by Marturet and Towards the Light: Into the Numinous by Orlando Jacinto Garcia, professor of composition at FIU. Performing the Garcia work with the orchestra will be the Latin Grammy-winning string quartet Cuarteto Latinoamericano.

Closing the season May 15 will be the pianist Lola Astanova performing Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, on a program that will include Ginastera’s Variaciones Concertantes and the Sibelius Symphony No. 5.

Nu Deco Ensemble

 After a promising, high-energy debut last April before an enthusiastic and youthful audience, the Nu Deco Ensemble will put on its first full season of concerts this year.

Nu Deco is a chamber orchestra that specializes in contemporary classical music, as well as collaborations with pop musicians and an occasional nod to Bach and other composers of the past.

Three concert programs will be at The Light Box at Goldman Warehouse in Miami’s Wynwood arts district.

The season opens at The Light Box Sept. 25 with the music of Clint Needham, Marc Mellits, Marcos Balter, Greg Simon and Sam Hyken. Hyken, a trumpet player and faculty member of the University of Miami’s Frost School of Music, is one of the ensemble’s founders.

They will perform at Miami’s historic Deering Estate on Nov. 22, playing the music of Bach, Andy Akiho, Bizet, Greg Simon, LCD Soundsystem, Hyken, and Daft Punk.

Other concerts will be at the North Beach Band Shell in Miami Beach (Jan. 28), The Light Box (March 3-4), New World Center (March 5) and The Light Box (April 29-30).

The Symphonia

Top-quality soloists and a few concert rarities will be on the schedule this year for the Symphonia Boca Raton.

The well-known pianist Misha Dichter will play Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 on March 20, with the orchestra led by guest conductor Gerard Schwarz, former music director of the Seattle Symphony.

David Kim, concertmaster of the Philadelphia Orchestra, will spend a busy afternoon conducting and serving as violin soloist Jan. 10 in Piazzolla’s The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires, Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos Nos. 2 and 3 and Bach’s Concerto for Violin and Oboe. 

The pianist Alexandre Moutouzkine will play Poulenc’s Aubade, Concerto choréographique and Fauré’s Ballade for Piano and Orchestra on Feb. 7, in a concert conducted by Alexander Platt.

Symphony of the Americas

Symphony of the Americas crams a surprising variety of music into its nine-concert season at the Broward Center, with Italian arias, Broadway, classic violin and piano concertos and rarely heard symphonies by masters.

The season opens Oct. 13 with a concert of film scores, music from Cuba and the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 1 with soloist Jorge Luis Prats. The West Point Glee Club performs with the orchestra Nov. 10, for a mix of classical and patriotic music.

The young Romanian violinist Florin Galati will make his U.S. debut Jan. 12 in Wieniawski’s Violin Concerto No. 2, in a concert that will also include Dvořák’s rarely heard Symphony No. 6.  For lovers of the human voice, the orchestra will bring singers to the stage for arias and songs ranging from Mozart and Puccini to Marvin Hamlisch and Andrew Lloyd Webber.

The pianist Joaquín Achúcarro will perform April 12 in de Falla’s Nights in the Gardens of Spain, in a concert that will include another infrequently heard symphony, Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 2, known as the “Little Russian.”

OPERA

Florida Grand Opera

Three Italian classics and a contemporary drama of the Holocaust will take the stage this year, as Florida Grand Opera continues to reinvent itself financially and artistically.

The season opens Nov. 14 at the Arsht Center with Rossini’s Barber of Seville, which will run through Nov. 21 in Miami and Dec. 3-5 at the Broward Center in Fort Lauderdale. 

Next comes Bellini’s Norma, a bel canto classic that contains one of the three or four most famous arias in all of opera, the soprano aria “Casta Diva.” The performances, which are the company’s first of the opera in more than 25 years, will be Jan. 23-30 in Miami and Feb. 11-13 in Fort Lauderdale.

The most daring programming of the season is a production of The Passenger by Mieczysław Weinberg, a Polish Jew who escaped to the Soviet Union during the German invasion of 1939. The opera, which will run April 2-9, takes place aboard an ocean liner bound for Brazil, where a German diplomat’s wife, who had been a guard at Auschwitz, encounters a woman she thinks had been one of her prisoners. There are flashbacks to the concentration camp, in an opera that John von Rhein of the Chicago Tribune called “harrowing” and “deeply moving.”

 The season will close May 7-14 with Donizetti’s Don Pasquale. 

Palm Beach Opera

Palm Beach Opera will depart from the Italian and French works that dominate its programming to offer the first production in its history of Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos, to be performed March 18-20. 

An opera-within-an-opera, the work is set in the home of a Viennese gentleman whose wealth is matched only by his bad taste. Singing the title role in two of the three performances will be the young California-born soprano Wendy Bryn Harmer, who has earned stellar reviews for roles in the Metropolitan Opera’s productions of Wagner’s Ring.

Before offering that local rarity, the company will go for the tried-and-true. The season will open with Bizet’s Carmen (the company’s sixth production), running Jan. 22-24. The only Italian opera of the season will be Donizetti’s comedy Don Pasquale, to be performed Feb. 19-21.

Miami Lyric Opera

Miami Lyric Opera, the low-budget troupe that often delivers high-quality performances, plans a season of Italian favorites as well as a Spanish-language opera inspired by zarzuela. The company’s performances will be at the South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center in Cutler Bay and the Colony Theater in Miami Beach.

The company stages operas off and on throughout the year, so it doesn’t have as defined a season as other arts organizations. The next performance will be Nov. 7, with a production of Verdi’s La Traviata. Next comes Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore, running April 9-10.

The one rarity on the schedule, although it has been performed before by the company, is Marina, a Spanish-language opera by the zarzuela composer Emilio Arrieta. It will be performed June 4-5. The company will perform Puccini’s Tosca August 27-28.

CHORAL MUSIC

Seraphic Fire

Seraphic Fire, one of the few South Florida arts organizations with national status, will devote more of its attention to concerts in other cities this season. The choir will open a concert series in Naples, and perform three concerts each in New York, Washington D.C. and Philadelphia. The organization’s founder and artistic director, Patrick Dupré Quigley, maintains dual residences in Miami Beach and Washington.

Quigley has insisted, however, that Seraphic Fire will remain a Miami-based ensemble, and the choir has scheduled a full schedule of performances this season in Broward and Miami-Dade counties. The season includes the usual eclectic mix, from contemporary pieces to works that might have been sung in old European churches.

The season opens with just such a combination, Schubert’s Mass in G performed alongside the world premiere of a work by the young American composer Jake Runestead (Oct. 14-18).

Next, Seraphic Fire will be joined by the period-instrument orchestra The Sebastians for Handel’s grandiose Coronation Anthems, composed for the coronation of George II and Queen Caroline of England (Nov. 6-8). Also on the program will be Marc-Antoine Charpentier’s Te Deum.

The choir will celebrate Christmas with two of its most popular programs. James K. Bass will lead performances of Christmas music, including Gregorian chant, traditional carols and contemporary works (Dec. 9-13). Quigley will return to lead performances of Handel’s Messiah (Dec. 18-20).

A prominent guest conductor, Julian Wachner, music director of Trinity Wall Street in New York, will lead of program of contemporary works from the Americas, as well as his own compositions. On the program will be the American composer Morten Lauridsen’s Chansons de Roses, as well as works of Villa-Lobos and Ginastera (March 9-13).

The traditional mass for the dead has inspired some of the world’s most important choral works, and this season, Seraphic Fire will perform two of the greatest. Joined by The Sebastians, they will encore Mozart’s Requiem, a work left unfinished at the composer’s death, with a completion commissioned by the choir from the composer Gregory Spears (Feb. 12-14). The choir will also perform Brahms’ German Requiem in the composer’s own arrangement for piano accompaniment (April 8-10). (Seraphic Fire’s recording of this arrangement was nominated for a Grammy award.)

Master Chorale of South Florida

The Master Chorale of South Florida will offer a promising mix of the classic and the populist, with performances in Broward, Miami-Dade and Palm Beach counties.

The season opens on a solemn note Oct. 23 with Mozart’s Requiem, at Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale. The following days, they will perform the work in Coral Gables and Boca Raton.

Another classic choral work, Handel’s Messiah, will be performed Dec. 11 in Pompano Beach, with the audience invited to sit in with the choir and sing along. You can bring your own score or borrow one from the Master Chorale.

The chorale will set aside the European classics and turn to some American ones for a concert called Broadway Legends, performed Feb. 19-21. The season will end with Haydn’s turbulent Lord Nelson Mass, performed April 29-May 1.

PERFORMING ARTS CENTERS

Arsht Center

The Arsht Center will reduce the number of classical concerts from five to four this season, although the center will offer two classical crossover events featuring the cellist Yo-Yo Ma and violinist Itzhak Perlman. And the center will again host the Cleveland Orchestra’s Miami residency and performances by the New World Symphony, offered separately from its main classical series.

The center’s season focuses on orchestras, with the lone recital coming from the always interesting pianist Jeremy Denk.

The season opens Jan. 7 with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra under music director Peter Oundjian. He will lead a program that will includeJohn Estacio’s Wondrous Light, Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade, and Beethoven’s Piano Concerto, No. 4 with soloist Jan Lisiecki.

The Philadelphia Orchestra, not heard in Miami in years, performs Feb. 25 under the baton of principal guest conductor Stéphane Denève . The orchestra will perform works composed to accompany Shakespeare, including the Overture to Berlioz’s opera Beatrice and Benedict (based on Much Ado About Nothing), excerpts from Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet.

The Cleveland Orchestra will perform a concert supplemental to its own Miami residency, performing March 17 under Giancarlo Guerrero. On the program will be Mahler’s Symphony No. 1, Liszt’s Piano Concerto No. 2 with soloist Jean-Yves Thibaudet, and a world premiere by the Israeli-born composer Avner Dorman to mark the tenth anniversary of the orchestra’s partnership with the Arsht Center.

The recital March 31 by Jeremy Denk will include Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata, Schubert’s Wanderer Fantasy and works by Bach, Haydn, Hindemith, Stravinsky and Ives.

Yo-Yo Ma will perform Nov. 15 with colleagues in an ethnic stew reminiscent of his Silk Road Project. Entitled “Musical Perspectives on the Cultures of BRIC,” the concert will focus on the music of Brazil, Russia, India and China. More ethnic music will come from Itzhak Perlman, who will perform Klezmer music with colleagues March 9.

Broward Center

After another season of disappointing ticket sales, the Broward Center for the Performing Arts will cut its classical offerings down to just three concerts, along with a pair of semi-classical events.

The season opens Feb. 1 with the violinist Pinchas Zukerman at the helm of the Zukerman Trio, consisting of himself, cellist Amanda Forsythe (Zukerman’s wife) and the pianist Angela Cheng. They will perform Beethoven’s “Archduke” Trio and Dvořák’s “Dumky” Trio. 

Three of the greatest names in Russian music will be on the program Feb. 25, when the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra performs under the baton of the Russian conductor Dmitry Yablonsky. They will perform Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet Overture, Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 2 and Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with the Azerbaijani pianist Farhad Badalbeyli.

The most interesting concert on the series may the final one, a recital by the pianist Emanuel Ax, a musician whose South Florida performances generally take place in front of an orchestra. He will play an all-Beethoven recital  March 22, including the popular Pathetique and Appassionata sonatas, as well as lesser-known works.

Kravis Center

In contrast to the shorn classical schedules of its counterparts to the south, the Kravis Center for the Performing Arts in West Palm Beach will present a wealth of orchestras, soloists and chamber ensembles.

Particularly impressive is the range of orchestras that will take the stage. These include the Munich Symphony Orchestra (Nov. 21), Toronto Symphony (Jan. 3-4), New World Symphony (Jan. 11), Orpheus Chamber Orchestra (Jan. 25), Cleveland Orchestra (Jan. 26), Buffalo Philharmonic (Feb. 7), Philadelphia Orchestra (Feb. 23-24), Jerusalem Symphony (Feb. 28) and Russian National Orchestra (March 7).

Some of these ensembles will play more than one concert. The Toronto Symphony, in its first concert, will play John Estacio’s Wondrous Light, Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade and Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 with soloist Jan Lisiecki. The next day, they will play Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6  and  Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 1 in E minor, with Lisiecki at the piano.

The Philadelphia Orchestra, conducted by Stéphane Denève, will  also perform two concerts, including a Wednesday matinee. The first concert will include Dvořák’s Symphony No. 8 and the Sibelius Violin Concerto with soloist James Ehnes. The next day they will perform Berlioz’s Overture to Béatrice et Bénédict, Mendelssohn’s Incidental Music for A Midsummer Night’s Dream and excerpts from Prokofiev’s ballet Romeo and Juliet.

The Jerusalem Symphony, conducted by Dmitry Yablonsky, will play Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 2 , The Khojaly Requiem by the contemporary Russian composer Alexander Tchaikovsky (no relation) and Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 1, with soloist Farhad Badalbeyli. The Russian National Orchestra, led by Kirill Karabits, will play Borodin’s In the Steppes of Central Asia, Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite and Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2 in G minor, with soloist Stefan Jackiw.

Soloists will include the 13-year-old pianist Daniela Liebman (Dec. 7), violinist Itzhak Perlman (Dec. 16), cellist Christine Lamprea (Jan. 4) and pianist Haochen Zhang (April 4). Zhang, the youngest gold medal winner of the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, will perform Schubert’s Impromptu in F minor, D. 935 Op.142, No. 4, Schubert’s Sonata No. 21 in B-flat Major, D. 960, Chopin’s Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor and Prokofiev’s Sonata No. 7. Perlman, in addition to his recital, will appear a second time March 10 with several colleagues for an evening of Klezmer music.

Chamber ensembles include the Horszowski Trio (Feb. 8), Axiom Brass (March 14) and Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center (March 28). The Lincoln Center ensemble will perform Mozart’s Piano Quartet No. 2 in E-flat, K. 493, Schubert’s Rondo in A Major for violin and string quartet, D. 438, and Mendelssohn’s Double Concerto in D minor for violin, piano, and strings.

CHAMBER MUSIC

Friends of Chamber Music of Miami

The 60^th anniversary season of Friends of Chamber Music of Miami will bring the return of old friends, performances of the complete Beethoven piano trios and a vocal recital by a young and celebrated tenor of the Metropolitan Opera.

The group’s concerts will be split between Coral Gables Congregational Church and the University of Miami’s Gusman Hall, with one taking place at Florida International University’s Wertheim Concert Hall.

The season opens Oct. 13 with one of the world’s most distinguished chamber ensembles, the Borodin Quartet, making its first appearance on the series in years. They will play music of Borodin, Tchaikovsky and Shostakovich. The Ehnes Quartet, a frequent visitor to the series, will perform an all-Beethoven program Nov. 16.

The violist Roberto Díaz, another perennial performer on the series, will appear Dec. 15 with the Brentano Quartet for a program that will include Mendelssohn’s String Quintet.

In a departure from the chamber music format, the series will present a concert Jan. 15 by the pianist Stephen Hough with the FIU Symphony Orchestra conducted by James Judd, in concertos of Beethoven and Liszt. Perennial visitor British pianist Benjamin Grosvenor will perform a recital Jan. 17, playing works of Mendelssohn, Chopin and Ravel.

No ensemble appears more frequently or offers more consistently excellent performances than the Kalichstein Laredo Robinson Trio. The celebrated ensemble will offer a three-concert cycle of the complete Beethoven piano trios, Feb. 11-14.

The young tenor Paul Appleby, who has been receiving stellar notices for appearances at the Metropolitan Opera and elsewhere, will appear in recital March 13 with the pianist Ken Noda. Ending the season will be a performance March 21 by the pianist Nikolai Lugansky,  playing Beethoven, Albeniz and Rachmaninoff.

Society of the Four Arts

In case you needed a reminder that this elegant arts complex stands in the town of Palm Beach, the season’s concert announcement contains this request: “Gentlemen are asked to wear a jacket and tie to evening concerts.”

For the appropriately dressed (or those attending concerts in the afternoon, when most are scheduled), the Society of the Four Arts  offers a rich diversity of performances this year, from keyboard, to vocal to choral.

The season opens Dec. 7 with a combination of cello recital and symphonic concert by the cellist Amid Peled and the Palm Beach Symphony in a performance entitled “Homage to Pablo Casals.” On the program will be a sonata of Handel, various short pieces for cello and Haydn’s Cello Concerto No. 1.

The pianist and classical music popularizer Jeffrey Siegel will return with his Keyboard Conversations events, with performances devoted to Chopin (Jan. 6), Schumann (Feb. 7) and the musical and visual imagery of Debussy and Mussorgsky (March 20).

From San Francisco comes the renowned all-male choral ensemble Chanticleer, which will perform Jan. 27, singing Monteverdi, Mahler, Elgar and Finzi, as well as arrangements of popular works. Those disappointed by the soprano Deborah Voigt’s cancellation of her Miami performance this summer will get another chance to hear her in Palm Beach. She will put on her one-woman show, “Voigt Lessons” Feb. 3, talking and singing in an account of her life and career. The classical guitar ensemble The Romeros will perform Feb. 28.

There will several concerts by more traditional chamber ensembles, including the Escher String Quartet (Jan. 10), playing works of Mendelssohn, Bartók and Beethoven; the American Chamber Players (Jan. 17); Trio con Brio Copenhagen (Jan. 24); Minguet Quartett (Jan. 31), playing works of Mozart, Glenn Gould and Brahms; the Modigliani Quartet (Feb. 14); and Amernet String Quartet with pianist Joseph Kalichstein (Feb. 21).

Broward College Bailey Hall

A pair of leading classical ensembles are included on Broward College’s schedule of music, drama and dance at Bailey Hall in Davie.

The Jerusalem Quartet performs Oct. 15, playing works of Haydn, Bartók and Dvořák. The renowned all-male chorus Chanticleer performs Jan. 28, singing works of Mahler, Barber, Poulenc and several popular composers.

Festival Miami

Classical music has faded from its central position in Festival Miami, the University of Miami Frost School of Music’s fall music festival, yielding to jazz, country and Latin music.

The series opens Oct. 16 with Thomas Sleeper conducting the Frost Symphony Orchestra in a program of American music. The pianist Simone Dinnerstein, renowned for her Bach recordings, will be the soloist in Phillip Lasser’s Piano Concerto. Also on the program is Alan Hovhaness’ And God Created Great Whales and Howard Hanson’s Symphony No. 5.

The Frost faculty’s new violin professor, Charles Castleman, will perform works for unaccompanied violin Oct. 18, including the Bach Chaconne, Ysaÿe’s Sonata No. 3 and Tango Etudes by Astor Piazzolla. Another faculty member, French horn professor Richard Todd, on Oct. 28 will join violinist Joel Smirnoff and pianist Christopher O’Riley for the Brahms’ Horn Trio. 

The Frost Wind Ensemble will see the debut of its new conductor, Robert Carnochan, following the retirement of Gary Green.  The Nov. 2 concert will include works by Leonard Bernstein, Frank Ticheli, Donald Grantham and John Adams, with solos by the soprano Esther Jane Hardenbergh and tuba player Aaron Tindall.

Posted in Articles

---

Leave a Comment

Name (required):

Email (will not be published) (required):

Website:

Message:

Δ