Guest Artists and Special Events at Filene Recital Hall
Spring 2009
The Filene, Sterne and Carnegie Hall Premieres series

Don't miss a single performance during this final complete year of spectacular musical events  in Filene Hall!

Watch Zankel Hall grow as we present our final year of musical events in our cherished, well-used Filene Hall, the very first building to be completed in 1966 on Skidmore's "new" campus.

CARNEGIE HALL PREMIERES
featuring ENSEMBLE ACJW

FEBRUARY 6, 8 PM

7 PM: Pre-concert conversation with Marc-André Dalbavie and musicians from Ensemble ACJW, moderated by Prof. Charles M. Joseph.
Free Admission

• HANS WERNER HENZE Fragmente aus einer Show
• MARC-ANDRÉ DALBAVIE Piano Trio No. 1
• BRAHMS Piano Quartet No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25

Ensemble ACJW presents "programs which are original, challenging, and always surprising."  --ConcertoNet.com

"...the [Dalbavie] score was hard to resist..."  --Allan Kozinn, New York Times, of the Carnegie Hall premiere of the Piano Trio No. 1, played by Yefim Bronfman, Gil Shaham and Lynn Harrell.

Ensemble ACJW returns to Filene, sending eight superb musicians for another incredible performance. The upstate premiere of Dalbavie's trio, a Carnegie Hall commission, headlines the program.  Dalbavie is composer-in-residence for the Orchestre de Paris. A brass quintet by Hans Werner Henze, extracted from a controversial theater piece that scandalized Berlin, and Brahms's great Romantic quartet, round out the program.

SKIDMORE COLLEGE ORCHESTRA
Anthony Holland, Music Director

FEBRUARY 21, 8 PM                    

7 PM:  Pre-concert lecture by Prof. Thomas Denny, "The Puzzle of Schubert's "Unfinished" Symphony"

MOSTLY SCHUBERT!

• Schubert: Rosamunde: Overture, D. 644 
• Schubert: Symphony No. 8, D 759, B minor (Unfinished)
• Saint-Saëns: Violin Concerto No. 3, Op. 61, B

Featuring Student Concerto Competition Winner HANNA TONEGAWA, Violin

THE CHRISTIAN MCBRIDE BAND

Filene Concert Series

MARCH 2, 8 PM

• Christian Mcbride, Bass
• Ron Blake, sax
• Geoffrey Keezer, keyboard
• Terreon Gully, drums

"You could feel the seats vibrate..."  "churningly funky, jam-band jazz."   — All About Jazz 

Grammy Award winner Christian McBride has been "...the name in acoustic bass playing for nigh on a decade." (MOJO)  McBride is co-director of The Jazz Museum in Harlem, and artistic director at both the Jazz Aspen Snowmass summer festival and the Dave Brubeck Institute at the University of the Pacific. McBride performs a diverse canon of original compositions and imaginatively arranged covers.

HAWTHORNE STRING QUARTET
as part of the SKIDMORE STRING FESTIVAL

Sterne Virtuoso Series                      

February 28, 8 PM

• Elliott Carter: Fragment No. 2
• Charles Ives: String Quartet No. 1
• Hans Kråsa: String Quartet (1921)
• Schubert: String Quartet in A-minor, D 804 (Rosamunde)

The Hawthorne String Quartet will be joined by visual artist Jim Schantz, who will create an improvisational painting inspired by the performance of Hans Krása's String Quartet.

GEORGE POPE, flute
ERIC CHARNOFSKY, piano

Filene Concert Series

MARCH 20, 8 PM

Music by André Caplet, Beethoven, Dan Welcher and Luigi Cortese, among others.

"Pope's playing is clean, arrestingly vigorous and beautiful."  -- FANFARE Magazine

"(Pope's) Ohio premiere of the Christopher Rouse Concerto for Flute and Orchestra was hailed for its 'eloquent narrative voice' and 'magnificent force.'"

Professor of Flute at University of Akron and Instructor of Flute at the Baldwin Wallace Conservatory, George Pope has performed as soloist and with chamber ensembles throughout the U.S., Europe and South America. He was Principal and Solo Flute of the Akron Symphony Orchestra for nearly 25 years, and has performed with the Cleveland Orchestra, Red, the Ohio Ballet Orchestra and many others.

CELEBRATING ISAAC ALBENIZ

Sterne Virtuoso Series

MARCH 28, 3 PM               
Free Admission

One hundred years after the death of Spanish composer Isaac Albéniz, Skidmore's own Albéniz expert, pianist Pola Baytelman, will host an afternoon of music and commentary commemorating his life and work. Performances will include Albéniz' seldom heard choral and solo voice music, instrumental transcriptions, and works for piano.

Noted musicologist and author Walter A. Clark will present "Spanish Music with a Universal Accent: Isaac Albéniz and His World." Clark is a professor of musicology and chair of the music department at University of California, Riverside, where he is also founder/director of the Center for Iberian and Latin American Music.

Joining in the musical celebration will be Skidmore faculty members Ann Alton, Joel Brown, Michael Emery, Janet McGhee and Anne Turner; the Skidmore Guitar Ensemble, Vocal Chamber Ensemble, and Skidmore student pianists.

VADYA SUNADHA SANGAM

APRIL 2, 8 PM

Filene Concert Series

TERENCE BLANCHARD QUINTET
McCormack Artist-in-Residence
Presented by the Office of the Dean of Special Programs

APRIL 3, 7:30 PM and 9:30 PM
Free Admission

Grammy Award winning jazz trumpeter and composer Terence Blanchard brings his top-tier quintet to Filene as the culminating event of his 2008-2009 McCormack Residency.  Blanchard has composed music for many of Spike Lee's screen and television films, including the four-hour HBO documentary on Hurricane Katrina, When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts. Blanchard continues to record and tour with legends of the jazz world, and is the artistic director of the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Performance in New Orleans.  His 2008 recording, A Tale of God's Will: A Requiem for Katrina (Blue Note) received a Grammy Award.

SKIDMORE COLLEGE ORCHESTRA
Anthony Holland, Music Director
featuring the HAWTHORNE STRING QUARTET

Sterne Virtuoso Series

APRIL 25, 8:15 PM

• Beethoven: Namensfeier Oveture, Op. 115 
• David Post: Fantasia On A Virtual Choral 
• Elgar: Introduction and Allegro for solo quartet and string orchestra 
• Brahms: Variations on a theme of Joseph Haydn, Op.
• 56a (Haydn variations) 
• Suk: Meditation on an Ancient Czech Chorale