DA CAPO CHAMBER PLAYERS PERFORM WORKS BY DVORÁK AND FIVE CONTEMPORARY COMPOSERS ON SUNDAY, MAY 7 Composers include Antonin Dvorák, Martin Bresnick, Marc Mellits, Belinda Reynolds, Richard Teitelbaum, and Larry Wallach
ANNANDALE-ON-HUDSON, N.Y.—The Naumburg Award-winning chamber ensemble, the Da Capo Chamber Players—cellist André Emelianoff, violinist Eva Gruesser, pianist Lisa Moore, flutist Patricia Spencer, and guest clarinetist Meighan Stoops—will perform works by Dvorák and five contemporary composers on Sunday, May 7, at 4:00 p.m. in Olin Hall, Bard College. The performance, presented by The Bard Center, is free and open to the public.
The works chosen for this program represent the Da Capo Chamber Players' openness to a wide spectrum of new music and their special dedication to working with composers of all ages and styles. The Trio in E Minor, "Dumky," Op. 90 by Antonín Dvorák is an early sign of the composer's approaching change of musical direction toward less classical and more romantic musical forms. Richard Teitelbaum, associate professor of music at Bard College, composed "Music for Flute" while studying composition with the late Mel Powell at Yale University in the early 1960s. Larry Wallach, chairman of the music program at Simon's Rock College of Bard, composed "Canzona" for Da Capo this spring. Martin Bresnick's "Bird as Prophet" for violin and piano is the last in a series of twelve pieces entitled Opere della Musica Povera (Works of a Poor Music). Dance, theater, and, instrumental composer Belinda Reynolds wrote "Cover" in 1996 as part of a commission from Continuum Contemporary Music. Marc Mellits, composer of Spam, is founding member of the acclaimed Common Sense Composers' Collective and the unique new ensemble, the Mellits Consort.
Da Capo
, winner of the Naumburg Chamber Music Award in 1973, is widely acclaimed for its virtuosity, stimulating programs, and openness to a wide spectrum of styles in new music. Its dedication to working with composers is matched by its commitment to rehearsing a piece as a living, moving, breathing entity rather than a fixed blueprint to be executed precisely and perfectly. For the 2000–2001 season, their thirtieth anniversary, Da Capo will be honored with commissioned works by Martin Bresnick (as part of Chamber Music America's Musical Celebration of the Millennium), Chinary Ung (commissioned with a grant from the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust), and Penka Kouneva. The Da Capo Chamber Players are Patricia Spencer, flute; Jo-Anne Sternberg, clarinet; Eva Gruesser, violin; Lisa Moore, piano; and André Emelianoff, cello.Guest artist Meighan Stoops holds degrees from Northwestern University and Yale University. This year she received an Artists Diploma from Yale, where she studied with David Shifrin. While at Yale, she was a recipient of the Lucy G. Moses Fellowship and the 1998 Dean's Award. She has also performed on the Yale Chamber Music Society series and has been a finalist twice at the Woolsey Hall Concerto Competition. A participant in many contemporary festivals, Stoops has been a guest artist with the Da Capo Chamber Players on numerous occasions.
For further information about the concert, call The Bard Center at 914-758-7425. Funding for the concert is provided by the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts, Chamber Music America, the Aaron Copland Fund for Music, the Amphion Foundation, generous individuals, and through the generosity of the Homeland Foundation and the Leon Levy Foundation at Bard College.
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