THE HUDSON VALLEY CHAMBER MUSIC CIRCLE AT BARD ANNOUNCES THE 2006 CONCERT SEASON Three June concerts feature flutist Eugenia Zukerman, soprano Arianna Zukerman, and pianist Rachelle Jonck, as well as the Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio

ANNANDALE-ON-HUDSON, N.Y.—The 2006 Hudson Valley Chamber Music Circle series at Bard College presents three concerts in June by world-renowned musicians. The Saturday evening concerts, presented by The Bard Center, begin at 8:00 p.m. in Olin Hall. A subscription to the three-concert series is $60 ($50 for senior citizens). Individual tickets are $25; for senior citizens, $18; for students, $5. On Saturday, June 3, Hudson Valley Chamber Music Circle presents flutist Eugenia Zukerman, soprano Arianna Zukerman, and pianist Rachelle Jonck, performing Vivaldi’s All’ombra di Sospetto, for flute, soprano, and continuo; Bartók’s Suite Paysanne Hongroise, for flute and piano; Bach’s Ich folge dir gleichfalls mit freudigen Schritten (St. John Passion); Seufzer, Tränen, Kummer, Not (Cantata #21, BWV. 21); and Schafe können sicher weiden (Cantata #208, BWV. 208), for soprano, flute and piano; and Fauré’s Fantasty, Op. 79 for flute and piano. Soprano Zukerman and pianist Jonck perform Reynaldo Hahn’s À Chloris, Fêtes Galantes, L’heure exquise, Quand je fus pris au pavillon, and Si mes vers avaient des ailes; as well as Richard Hundley’s Screw Spring, Richard Pearson Thomas’s The Road to Avrillé, David Del Tredici’s Tired Sex, Ben Moore’s Let Me Explain, John Musto’s Maybe, Thomas J. Wolf’s Spring Can Really Hang You Up the Most, and cabaret song arrangements by Paul Stephan. On Saturday, June 10, the Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio will perform all three Brahms Trios. The 2006 series concludes on Saturday, June 17, with a performance by the acclaimed Emerson String Quartet. The program includes Mendelssohn’s String Quartet in D Major, Op. 44, No. 1; Mozart’s Quartet in C Major (“Dissonant”); and Shostakovich’s Quartet No. 8, Op. 110. The Hudson Valley Chamber Music Circle, an association of chamber music lovers that is celebrating its 56th season, was founded by Helen Huntington Hull and two friends from Staatsburg, New York. They enlisted the help of violinist Emil Hauser, then a member of the Bard College faculty and original first violinist of the Budapest Quartet, to invite musicians to perform at the Mills and Vanderbilt Mansions. In 1979, the concert series began its association with Bard College. The HVCMC remains a venue that attracts many of the world’s preeminent chamber music artists. In 2000, Robinson and Laredo assumed artistic directorship of the chamber music series. These performances are made possible, in part, through the generosity of the Homeland Foundation and the Leon Levy Endowment at Bard College. For further information, call 518-537-6665. # About the Artists Concert 1: South African pianist Rachelle Jonck moved to the United States in 1998, serving as assistant conductor of Bel Canto (with Will Crutchfield)—a position she still holds. Balancing her love for opera and song literature, she maintains a busy schedule of vocal coaching and enjoys recital collaborations with her singers. In addition to regular concerts at the Caramoor Festival, her appearances include the Bard Music Festival, Weill Recital Hall, Monadnock Music Festival, Music Mountain, Van Cliburn Concerts, National Gallery Recitals, and the Dame Myra Hess broadcast concert series. As a conductor, she has performed with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s and at the Caramoor Festival. In January 2000, Jonck returned to South Africa to conduct Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia at the Spier Festival in Stellenbosch. Possessing a luminous voice with “the breadth of dramatic inflection to make for a powerfully effective performance” (Opera), soprano Arianna Zukerman is equally in demand for opera and concert performances. The Boston Globe lauds her “vocal poise, elegant control of style and dynamics, and real spunk” as elements that continually bring her acclaim on national and international stages. Zukerman’s engagements in the 2005–06 season included her New York City Opera debut as Tisiphone, Charito, and Aphrodite in Mark Adamo’s Lysistrata; Mozart’s Exultate, jubilate with the Pittsburgh and Jackson Symphony Orchestras; Haydn’s Creation with the Huntsville Symphony Orchestra; and Euridice in Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice with the Chattanooga Symphony and Opera. She also appears as soloist in the holiday concerts presented at the Kennedy Center by the Choral Arts Society of the District of Columbia. Zukerman appears frequently in solo recitals in the United States and Europe and in duo recitals with her mother, flutist Eugenia Zukerman. An accomplished chamber musician, she also performs regularly at the Vail Valley Music Festival and Caramoor Music Festival. A 2002 Sullivan Foundation Award Winner, Zukerman was a member of the Bavarian State Opera Junges Ensemble. She studied theater at Brown University and received a bachelor of music degree from The Juilliard School. According to the Boston Globe, “Eugenia Zukerman is an international triple threat. She is a published novelist, a television commentator, and, most impressively, one of the finest flutists of our time.” A consummate musician, her elegant sound has been referred to as “finely articulated cascades of classical grace”; her lyrical phrasing, extraordinary agility, and compelling stage presence have contributed to her popularity as an international performer with orchestras, in solo and duo recitals, and in chamber music ensembles in North America, Europe, and Asia for more than 25 years. A versatile artist, Zukerman is respected for her innovative programming as well as for her performances. She has been artistic director of the international Vail Valley Music Festival in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains since 1998. The festival has grown artistically under her guidance, and includes residencies with the New York Philharmonic, the Rochester Philharmonic, and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. The festival has presented such ensembles as eighth blackbird, the Shanghai Quartet, and the Rossetti String Quartet, as well as solo artists such as Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, Garrick Ohlsson, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, and Alisa Weilerstein. Concert 2: Since making their debut as the Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio at the White House for President Carter’s inauguration in January 1977, pianist Joseph Kalichstein, violinist Jaime Laredo, and cellist Sharon Robinson have set the standard for performance of the piano trio literature for 28 consecutive seasons. Highlights of the recent seasons include collaborations with the Miami and Guarneri String Quartets, featuring the works of Brahms and Dvořák. Domestic touring includes appearances in New York, Washington, Boston, Cincinnati, and Miami. September 2004 marked the release of their most recent recording on Arabesque Records, a tour-de-force CD of the mammoth trios of Tchaikovsky and Arensky. The Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio was named Musical America’s 2002 Ensemble of the Year. Concert 3: Acclaimed for its insightful performances, brilliant artistry, and technical mastery, the Emerson String Quartet—violinists Eugene Drucker and Philip Setzer, violist Lawrence Dutton, and cellist David Finckel—is one of the world’s foremost chamber ensembles. It has amassed an impressive list of achievements: a brilliant series of recordings exclusively documented by Deutsche Grammophon since 1987; six Grammy Awards, including two unprecedented honors for “Best Classical Album”; three Gramophone magazine awards; and performances of the complete cycles of Beethoven, Bartók, and Shostakovich quartets in major concert halls throughout the world. The ensemble is lauded globally as a string quartet that approaches both classical and contemporary repertoire with equal mastery and enthusiasm. # # # (4/18/06)

This event was last updated on 06-19-2006

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