PROGRAM

Nkeiru Okoye Movements for String Quartet
Chen Yi Shuo for String Quintet
Francis Poulenc Trio for Oboe, Bassoon and Piano
Adolphus Hailstork "Detroit" Piano Quintet

FEATURING

Ashley Horne, Violin
Claire Chan, Violin
William Frampton, Viola
Wayne Smith, Cello
Anthony Morris, Double Bass
Hassan Anderson, Oboe
Alexander Davis, Bassoon
Lydia Brown, Piano
David Berry, Piano

*Editors note: this concert program will also take place on Friday September 24, 2021. See link below for info and tickets to either event.

PROGRAM

Franz LISZT, arr. Müller-Berghaus Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2

Michael TORKE SKY (Concerto for Violin)*
I. Lively;
II. Wistful;
III. Spirited
Tessa Lark, violin

William DAWSON Negro Folk Symphony
I.The Bond of Africa;
II. Hope in the Night;
III. O, Le’ Me Shine, Shine Like a Morning Star!

CONDUCTOR
Mei-Ann Chen

GUEST ARTIST
Tessa Lark, violin

*Chicago Premiere

On SKY: “The balance between the worlds of classical and vernacular music is masterly: one can bet that this work will soon be imposed as a classic of literature for violin and orchestra.” — Filippo Focosi, Kathodik

Chicago Sinfonietta’s 34th season begins with a dynamic concert drawing on the deep connections of community through works grounded in folk music. The rhythmic spontaneity and seductive expression of Franz Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 opens the concert, followed by violinist Tessa Lark’s compelling energy in Michael Torke’s SKY, a fusion inspired by Irish reel and American bluegrass. The evening closes with American composer William Dawson’s Negro Folk Symphony, a Chicago Sinfonietta signature piece informed by traditional spirituals.

September 18, 2021 at 8:00 pm | Wentz Concert Hall
September 20, 2021 at 7:30 pm | Symphony Center

Approximately 70 mins, no intermission

PROGRAM

Franz LISZT, arr. Müller-Berghaus Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2

Michael TORKE SKY (Concerto for Violin)*
I. Lively;
II. Wistful;
III. Spirited
Tessa Lark, violin

William DAWSON Negro Folk Symphony
I.The Bond of Africa;
II. Hope in the Night;
III. O, Le’ Me Shine, Shine Like a Morning Star!

CONDUCTOR
Mei-Ann Chen

GUEST ARTIST
Tessa Lark, violin

*Chicago Premiere

On SKY: “The balance between the worlds of classical and vernacular music is masterly: one can bet that this work will soon be imposed as a classic of literature for violin and orchestra.” — Filippo Focosi, Kathodik

Chicago Sinfonietta’s 34th season begins with a dynamic concert drawing on the deep connections of community through works grounded in folk music. The rhythmic spontaneity and seductive expression of Franz Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 opens the concert, followed by violinist Tessa Lark’s compelling energy in Michael Torke’s SKY, a fusion inspired by Irish reel and American bluegrass. The evening closes with American composer William Dawson’s Negro Folk Symphony, a Chicago Sinfonietta signature piece informed by traditional spirituals.

September 18, 2021 at 8:00 pm | Wentz Concert Hall
September 20, 2021 at 7:30 pm | Symphony Center

Approximately 70 mins, no intermission

Aakash Mittal’s Nocturne suite offers listeners a reimagining of the night. The music places the density and sonic collisions of urban India alongside the meditations of a world at rest, night terrors conjured by the imagination, and the slow cadence of blue light melting into darkness. The second half of the program will feature Mittal’s new works for voice that explore dreams as a non linear space where memory, experience and premonition meet.

ARTISTS
Aakash Mittal | Alto Saxophone
Rajna Swaminathan | Mridangam
Miles Okazaki | Guitar
Jasmine Wilson | Voice
Shurmila Dhar | Voice
Eddy Kwon | Violin
Trevor New | Viola
Stephan Crump | Bass

Emerald Futures: NYPhilharmonic Very Young Composers and toy piano and composer duo, Chromic Duo, team up to create an immersive soundwalk!

About this event

Come celebrate with us! 

Immerse yourself in an evolving sound-world that changes according to your geographic location, as you listen to world premieres of pieces by the Very Young Composers at the New York Philharmonic. With GPS hotspots plotted along the route, site-specific pieces will play as you move from one contrasting natural soundscape into a future imagined by the next generation of composers and thinkers on a future that we believe in. 

Emerald Futures is an Augmented Reality Sound Walk that guides you through a year of transformation and growth, from Central Park (W. 72nd St + Central Park West) to Amanda Phingbodhipakkiya’s mural, “We Belong Here”, in response to the rise of anti-AAPI hate. 

As you reach the end of the walk at Lincoln Center, unlock a *special element* with Chromic Duo that is especially rendered for this closing event! 

Please download Gesso (available for iOS + Google Play) and have headphones ready beforehand. https://www.gesso.app/download

Duration: ~30 minutes

Benjamin Baker, violin
Brian Hong, violin and co-artistic director
Jordan Bak, viola
Alexander Hersh, cello and co-artistic director
Stefán Ragnar Höskuldsson, flute
Kristina Bachrach, soprano

Augusta Read Thomas, composer and emcee

Program

Upon Wings of Words

Amy Beach: Theme and Variations for flute and string quartet
Augusta Read Thomas: Upon Wings of Words (Emily Dickinson Settings) for soprano and string quartet
—World Premiere
Alma Mahler: Five Lieder (1910) for soprano and string quartet (arr. Cliff Colnot)

Lara Downes, piano
Rachel Barton Pine, violin
Ifetayo Ali-Landing, cello
Members of the Chicago Sinfonietta

Program

Rising Sun: Migration and Renaissance

Tracing the journey, physical and metaphorical, of the Great Migration and the creative flowering of the Chicago Black Renaissance, this program features music—by artists whose work and lives were transformed by the journey north—that tells stories of migration and metamorphosis, trial and triumph, courage, creativity, and collaboration.

Margaret Bonds: The Bells and Troubled Water from Spiritual Suite
Margaret Bonds: “Dream Variations” from Three Dream Portraits
William Grant Still: Summerland from Three Visions
Nora Holt: Nora’s Dance
Florence Price: Sketches in Sepia
Florence Price: Andante con espressione
William Grant Still: Gamin from Suite for Violin and Piano
Florence Price: Piano Quintet in A minor
Lil Hardin Armstrong: “Just For a Thrill” (arr. Jeremy Siskind)
Sam Cooke: “A Change Is Gonna Come” (arr. Jeremy Siskind)

Thursday, July 8th, ISSUE is pleased to stream the debut collaboration between Diné composer, performer, and installation artist Raven Chacon and New Zealand Māori composer, performer, improvisor, and anthropologist Rob Thorne. The duo’s debut work will stream on ISSUE’s site.

Both Chacon and Thorne have extensive histories using various high-pitched Indingenous wind instruments from their respective territories. Recently, Chacon has composed chamber works including Sweet Land, co-composed with Du Yun (commissioned and produced by The Industry) as well as Owl Song, for sinfonietta and voice (commissioned by Borealis Festival for Bit20 Ensemble). In 2020, Chacon released An Anthology of Chants Operations on the Ouidah label, a body of recordings drawn from across the last decade of his output capturing live performance, installation, and composition. Rob Thorne has maintained a broad solo and collaborative practice that includes cross-disciplinary works with Berlin based electronic composer Fis, Athenian pianist Tania Giannouli, The NZ String Quartet, and Orchestra Wellington, and in 2017, reimagined a pre-colonial dawn chorus in the field-based acousmatic work Te Koki. Recent work includes contributions to short-film Super Special, chamber opera He Pūtōrino Mākutu with Celeste Oram, and the Unsettling Scores series with Liquid Architecture. Currently a Research Fellow at the NZ School of Music, he has an upcoming album release with improvisor David Rothenberg (US) and vocalist Anna Fält (Sweden/Finland), as well as a creative commission with NZ Crown Research Institute Manaaki Whenua that seeks to express people’s nationally surveyed perceptions of how they relate to trees.

Japanese-born, Chicago-based sound artist KIKÙ HIBINO produces cross-genre electronic music.

From chamber music for media productions to non-linear analog noise for art installations, he has collaborated internationally with a wide variety of artists and scholars, including Kawaguchi Takao (Dumb Type), Curtis Roads, Norma Field, Theaster Gates, Mike Weis (Zelienople), Mitsu Salmon, and Yuge Zhou.

The publication, The Wire once described his music as "trying to cram in as many memories as possible before it all disappears" and that the music "concerns itself with themes of capturing and preserving fleeting moments" (2007, issue 279). 

His recent work attempts to deconstruct Chicago House Music through the noise music production approach. The project was funded by DCASE and presented at various locations in Chicago. 

He studied electronic music composition at Keio University Shonan Fujisawa Campus with Toru Iwatake, Atau Tanaka, and Christopher Penrose, and at the University of California at Santa Barbara with Curtis Roads and Karen Tanaka, and holds M.A. in media art and technology.

Orchestra 2001 – Mark Loria, conducting

Heitor Villa-Lobos (1887-1959) – Sexteto místico

Clarice Vasconcelos Assad (b. 1978) – The Book of Spells

Orlando Haddad (b. 1953) – Lendas Amazônicas (Amazon Legends) premiere

Orlando Haddad's commission generously funded by the Steven R. Gerber Trust.

Orchestra 2001 returns to Teatro Esperanza as part of Esperanza Arts Center’s VOCES series, featuring live-streamed performances that spotlight the arts and traditions of Brazil. Enjoy authentic Brazilian food while watching VOCES at home and support our local Latino-owned restaurants.

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 23, 2021 at 7pm
Virtual Livestreamed Event from Teatro Esperanza; recorded at World Cafe Live
Tickets $5 / FREE for Students & Seniors
Orchestra 2001 SOUNDING BOARD members can select a free ticket.

This is an online event with no live audience. We hope you will join us.

PROGRAM
Jessie Montgomery Starburst
Alice Coltrane Prema for Harp and Strings
arranged by Tom Cunningham of Urban Playground Orchestra
Adolphus Hailstork TULSA 1921 (Pity Theses Ashes, Pity This Dust) for Mezzo-Soprano and Chamber Orchestra
*World Premiere - libretto by Herbert Woodward Martin
Trevor Weston The People Could Fly for Violin Solo, Narrator and Strings
(Based upon an African-American folktale by Virginia Hamilton; featuring dancers from Harlem School of the Arts)

FEATURING
Amadi Azikiwe, Music Director and Conductor
Terrance McKnight, Host and Performer
J’Nai Bridges, Mezzo-Soprano
Jessica (Lady Jess) McJunkins, Violin
Ashley Jackson, Harp
With an orchestra comprising members of The Harlem Chamber Players. Also featuring dancers from Harlem School of the Arts.

Join us for an evening of classical and jazz fusion featuring the music Duke Ellington and South Florida Composer, Dwight Banks.

A new series featuring Black artists of history, Music of the Unsung America continues its live and virtual series with a concert featuring a classical and jazz fusion program of repertoire with the feature piece being, Tre. The first part of the performance will have music by Duke Ellington: Sacred Concert, Come Sunday, as well as a string arrangement of Billy Holiday's Strange Fruit.

Pianist John Urban and Violist Dwayne Beach will be presenting a hybrid recital full of Viola and Piano works by Nicolò Paganini, William Walton, a living female composer Amanda Harberg and an original transcription of a gem for violin once forgotten by Cesar Espejo in their Consorto Accademico.

Noel Pointer Foundation @ Restoration Plaza
247 Herkimer Street 
Noel Pointer Foundation 
Brooklyn, NY

PROGRAM

Piazzolla (arr. Steven Verhelst) Suite from Maria de Buenos Aires for Brass and Percussion
Valerie Coleman Suite: Portraits of Josephine
Victor Wooten La Lección Tres*
*World Premiere, Chicago Sinfonietta Commission

CONDUCTOR
Mei-Ann Chen

GUEST ARTIST
Victor Wooten, Bass

Chicago Sinfonietta closes its 2020-2021 season with a finale that honors the voice of the people in its many forms, tracing the line of stories told across time and place. Merging the present with the past, the orchestra presents a mesmerizing closing season concert. The orchestra welcomes back Grammy award-winning bassist and prized collaborator Victor Wooten for the commissioned world premiere of La Lección Tres, a merging of music and philosophy moved forward in exuberant bass lines. The orchestra marks the centenary of Astor Piazzolla's birth with an arrangement of the catchy Suite from his Tango Opera, Maria de Buenos Aires, followed by Valerie Coleman's musical portrayal of entertainer and activist Josephine Baker's life.

World premiere of new work by Chicago-based composer Carlos Jaquez Gonzalez

A plea for understanding. A multi-media Immigrant Mass performance/film reflecting the lives and struggles of those who have sought better lives in America. The goal of the mass is to humanize immigrants and their experiences through real interviews, striking visuals, and music. Through this multi-media lense, this message can be better communicated and understood.

The six movement Immigrant Mass is a fusion of the mass ordinary and immigrant experiences (collected by photo-journalist Greg Constantine). The purpose of this exploration is to examine how religion and government affect the lives of those seeking a better life (from war, poverty, and more). The Roosevelt University Conservatory Choir led by Dr. Cheryl Frazes Hill, will be singing the standard Greek/Latin text of the mass ordinary and fulfilling the role of religion and government. Soloists; Corinne Costell, Tori Darnell, David Chavez, and Austin Sanders will be singing and embodying first-hand accounts of immigrants who have been held at border detention camps.

The ultimate goal of this mass is to highlight the realities and resilience of humanity, particularly struggling families, and what our role and duty is to help them. Through this melting pot of sounds and visuals by the Chicago Composers Orchestra, Conservatory Choir, soloists, and Greg Constantine, it is my hope that this work - which has brought so many hard working people from different walks of life together - will inspire to aid the immigrant community through various organizations, donations, and change in perspective.

Join us for an intimate conversation with CSO Mead Composer-in-Residence Missy Mazzoli and Jessie Montgomery as they discuss what it means to be a composer working with symphony orchestras in 2021. 

Free and open to the public, this webinar will be followed by Q&A.