Two chamber series announce lineups
Greater Cincinnati has a lively chamber music scene. Two of the finest series have announced impressive lineups for their 2011-12 seasons.
The Linton Music Series, overseen by artistic directors Sharon Robinson and Jaime Laredo, will present major stars of classical music and notable premieres for its 33rd season of "music making among friends."
Opening Linton's season Oct. 23 and 24, legendary pianist Menahem Pressler will be joined by violinist Alexander Kerr (former concertmaster of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra), violist Paul Neubauer and former CSO principal cellist Eric Kim in best-loved piano quartets by Mozart, Turina and Dvorak. Pressler, founding member and pianist of the former Beaux Arts Trio, is among the world's most distinguished musicians, with a career that spans more than six decades.
In December, more than a dozen Cincinnati musicians come together in Stravinsky's "L'Histoire," and the Beethoven Octet for Winds.
January's program will celebrate the 35th anniversary of the Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio with the regional premiere of Ellen Taaffe Zwilich's Quintet for violin, viola, cello, bass and piano, commissioned by a consortium of chamber music organizations and Carnegie Hall. The Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Trio will be joined by Michael Tree, viola, and Sharon Robinson's brother, Harold Robinson, principal bassist of the Philadelphia Orchestra.
In April, violinist Pamela Frank returns for a concert with pianist Michael Chertock, violinist Andy Simionescu, violin; violist Nokuthula Ngwenyama (the Taft Museum's 2010 Duncanson artist-in-residence) and cellist Matt Haimovitz.
And celebrating 35 years as husband and wife, Robinson, cellist, and Laredo, violinist, will perform "Inventions on a Marriage" by Richard Danielpour, commissioned in their honor, in May.
Sunday Linton concerts are held at the First Unitarian Church in Avondale. A Monday evening Linton Music series is held in Congregation Beth Adam in Loveland.
Chamber Music Cincinnati will present three string quartets and three ensembles with piano and strings next year. The season will open Sept. 20 with the distinguished Juilliard String Quartet in music by Stravinsky, Janacek and Mozart. Founded in 1946 at the Juilliard School in New York, the quartet will be introducing a new first violinist, Joseph Lin.
In October, the St. Lawrence String Quartet, ensemble-in-residence at Stanford University in California, visits with music spanning from Mozart to John Adams. The renowned American composer wrote his String Quartet for the St. Lawrence Quartet in 2008.
Other programs will also include a mix of standard chamber music repertoire with newer fare. The Morgenstern Piano Trio (the 2009 winner of the Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson International Trio Award) will be performing Leonard Bernstein's Piano Trio of 1937. And the Kaplan-Weiss-Newman Piano Trio will match up Brahms and Beethoven with music by Jennifer Higdon and Clancy Newman.
Chamber Music Cincinnati's concerts are held in Robert J. Werner Recital Hall, College-Conservatory of Music, University of Cincinnati. The March 20 concert will be at First Unitarian Church in Avondale.
