Program Notes: St. Lawrence String Quartet Chamber Music Seminar
PROGRAM INFORMATION
St. Lawrence String Quartet Chamber Music Seminar
Faculty Programs
June 19, 2022–June 25, 2022
ALL REMAINING PERFORMANCES CANCELED
The St. Lawrence String Quartet is one of the world's most active and celebrated classical music ensembles, and has been Stanford's Ensemble-in-Residence since 1998. Beloved on campus and beyond for their highly emotive and visceral music-making, the SLSQ directs the music department's chamber music program and frequently collaborates with other departments including the Schools of Law, Medicine, Business and Education, and performs three times each season at Stanford Live.
The annual Chamber Music Seminar is the crown jewel of the SLSQ's programs at Stanford. Now in its 23rd year, the Seminar is a 10-day intensive program designed for amateurs, professionals and students with a life-long passion for chamber music. The Seminar follows a rigorous schedule of study and performance in a uniquely supportive environment, where advanced students destined for careers in performance rub shoulders with passionate adult musicians whose careers are often in other fields. Gluing the experience together is the SLSQ and a star-studded roster of professional chamber musicians as guest faculty, who perform free public concerts, deliver keynote lectures, interactive demonstrations, and host informal late-night chamber music free-for-alls where all participants mix, play, laugh and connect over some of the greatest music ever written.
To access the digital program for each concert, click on a concert title below:
Sunday, June 19 at 2:30 PM: Spotlight on the Artist!
Monday, June 20 at 12:00 PM: Midday Masters 1
Tuesday, June 21 at 4:00 PM: "The Violin from the Makers Point of View"
Wednesday, June 22 at 12:00 PM: Midday Masters 2
Friday, June 24 at 12:00 PM: Midday Masters 3
Saturday, June 25 at 2:00 PM: Azure Family Concert
Saturday, June 25 at 5:00 PM: 2022 Special Seminar Celebration!
Spotlight on the Artist!
Featuring composer/cellist Paul Wiancko
Sunday, June 19, 2022
2:30 PM
Campbell Recital Hall
Program
PAUL WIANCKO (b. 1983)
Excerpts from
Cello Quartet Op. 1 When the Night
Michael Kannen, cello I
Nina Lee, cello II
Christopher Costanza, cello III
Paul Wiancko, cello IV
A harmonically rich and texturally innovative celebration of all things cello, motivically inspired by the opening line of Ben E. King's "Stand By Me." Premiered by the Boston Cello Quartet at Jordan Hall in Boston, MA on January 22, 2018.
Biographies
Cellist Michael Kannen has distinguished himself as a musician and educator of uncommon accomplishment who is comfortable in widely diverse musical situations and venues. A founding member of the Brentano String Quartet, he performed with that group for seven years on concert stages around the world, on radio, television, and on recordings. During those first seven years, the Brentano Quartet was awarded the first Cleveland Quartet Award, the Naumburg Chamber Music and the Martin E. Segal Award from Lincoln Center, and the Royal Philharmonic Society’s award for best debut recital in England for the 1997-1998 season. With the Brentano Quartet, Kannen appeared regularly in such venues as Alice Tully Hall in New York, the Library of Congress in Washington, Wigmore Hall in London, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, the Chatelet Theater in Paris, and the Sydney Opera House.
An active chamber musician, cellist Nina Lee has collaborated with such artists as Felix Galimir, Jaime Laredo, David Soyer, Nobuko Imai, Isidore Cohen, and Mitsuko Uchida. She has toured with Musicians from Marlboro and participated in the El Paso and the Portland Chamber Music Festivals. She has also performed for the Helicon Foundation and Bargemusic in New York City. As an advocate of music education, Ms. Lee has served as returning guest faculty at the St. Lawrence String Quartet Seminar at Stanford and at the Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music’s Summer Chamber Music Workshop. In 2012, she made a cameo appearance in A Late Quartet, a film which featured the Brentano Quartet on its soundtrack. Before joining the Yale faculty as a member of the Brentano Quartet, Ms. Lee taught at Princeton and Columbia Universities.
For three decades cellist Christopher Costanza has enjoyed a varied and exciting career as a soloist, chamber musician, and teacher. A winner of the Young Concert Artists International Auditions and a recipient of a prestigious Solo Recitalists Grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, Mr. Costanza has performed to wide critical acclaim in nearly every state in the U.S., and in Canada, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Australia, New Zealand, China, Korea, Germany, France, the U.K., Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Romania, and Hungary. His summer festival appearances include the Marlboro, Yellow Barn, Santa Fe, Taos, Chamber Music Northwest, Seattle, Bay Chamber Concerts, Ottawa, and Bravo! Vail Valley festivals. Mr. Costanza is a graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, where he studied cello with Laurence Lesser, David Wells, and Bernard Greenhouse, and chamber music with Eugene Lehner, Louis Krasner, and Leonard Shure.
Mr. Costanza joined the St. Lawrence String Quartet in 2003, and tours extensively with that ensemble, performing over 100 concerts annually throughout the world. As a member of the St. Lawrence, he is an Artist in Residence at Stanford University, where he teaches cello and chamber music and performs a wide variety of formal and informal concerts each season, from the stages of the University’s concert halls to student dormitories and lecture halls. A strong proponent of contemporary music, Mr. Costanza works regularly with the world’s most notable composers, such as John Adams, Jonathan Berger, Osvaldo Golijov, Mark Applebaum, Pierre Boulez, George Tsontakis, Roberto Sierra, R. Murray Schafer, William Bolcom, John Corigliano, and Bright Sheng. As a student, he had the honor of studying Olivier Messiaen’s “Quartet for the End of Time” under the guidance of the composer.
As a chamber musician, cellist Paul Wiancko has performed at the Marlboro, Aspen and Olympic music festivals. Wiancko performs with several New York-based music ensembles, including the East Coast Chamber Orchestra, TAK Ensemble, Lost Dog New Music Ensemble, Meridionalis, Bird’s Eye Trio, and the American Contemporary Music Ensemble. In 2018, Wiancko received the S&R Foundation Award for his work as a composer. Wiancko has composed works for the Grammy Award-winning Parker Quartet, Aizuri Quartet, soprano Susanna Phillips, cellist Judith Serkin, violist Ayane Kozasa, yMusic, Bargemusic, and has been the composer-in-residence at Twickenham Fest, the Newburyport and Methow Valley chamber music festivals, Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts.
Midday Masters 1
Monday, June 20, 2022
12:00 PM
Bing Concert Hall
Program
CLAUDE DEBUSSY (1862–1918)
First Rhapsody, L. 116
Todd Palmer, clarinet
Stephen Prutsman, piano
ANTONÍN DVOŘÁK (1841-1904)
Piano Quartet No. 2 in E-flat major, Op. 87
I. Allegro con fuoco
II. Lento
III. Allegro moderato, grazioso
IV. Allegro ma non troppo
Scott St John, violin
Daniel Phillips, viola
Christopher Costanza, cello
Gilles Vonsattel, piano
Biographies
Clarinetist Todd Palmer has appeared as soloist, recitalist, chamber music collaborator, educator, arranger, and presenter in a variety of musical endeavors around the world. A three time Grammy nominated artist, he has appeared as soloist with the Atlanta, Houston, BBC Scotland orchestras; St. Paul, New York, Cincinnati, Montréal, and Metamorphosen chamber orchestras. He’s collaborated with many of the finest string ensembles such as the St. Lawrence, Brentano, Borromeo, Pacifica, Daedalus and Ying quartets; and also shared the stage with sopranos Kathleen Battle, Renée Fleming, Elizabeth Futral, Heidi Grant Murphy and Dawn Upshaw. He has championed Osvaldo Golijov’s Dreams and Prayers of Isaac the Blind around the world and commissioned the theatre work Orpheus and Euridice by Ricky Ian Gordon which was presented by Great Performers at Lincoln Center in 2005.
Pianist Stephen Prutsman has been described as one of the most innovative musicians of his time. Moving easily from classical to jazz to world music styles as a pianist, composer and conductor, Prutsman continues to explore and seek common ground and relationships in the music of all cultures and languages. From 2004-2007 Stephen was Artistic Partner with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, where he conducted concertos from the keyboard, conducted works of living composers, developed and arranged collaborations for their Engine 408 series, and wrote several new works for the orchestra. From 2009–2012 he was the AD of the Cartagena International Festival of Music, programming and curating concerts with themes ranging from Mozart celebrations, to eclectic evenings of folk and popular music of the Americas, to hybrid programs fusing art and dance music of multiple musical dimensions.
Violinist Scott St. John is known for his joyful style of music-making and inspiring chamber music coaching. Scott is Concertmaster of the innovative ROCO Chamber Orchestra in Houston, Texas, and returns frequently to the summertime Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont. From 2018 to 2021 he was Director of Chamber Music at The Colburn School in Los Angeles. In addition to a magical year of working at the Disney Store in Times Square, Scott has been Associate Professor at the University of Toronto, and Artist-in-Residence at Stanford University as part of the St. Lawrence String Quartet. Scott has received an Avery Fisher Career Grant and won a Juno Award for recording Mozart with his sister Lara St. John. He has founded two chamber music awards for students: the Felix Galimir Award at University of Toronto and the Ida Levin Award at the Colburn School.
For three decades cellist Christopher Costanza has enjoyed a varied and exciting career as a soloist, chamber musician, and teacher. A winner of the Young Concert Artists International Auditions and a recipient of a prestigious Solo Recitalists Grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, Mr. Costanza has performed to wide critical acclaim in nearly every state in the U.S., and in Canada, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Australia, New Zealand, China, Korea, Germany, France, the U.K., Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Romania, and Hungary. His summer festival appearances include the Marlboro, Yellow Barn, Santa Fe, Taos, Chamber Music Northwest, Seattle, Bay Chamber Concerts, Ottawa, and Bravo! Vail Valley festivals. Mr. Costanza is a graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, where he studied cello with Laurence Lesser, David Wells, and Bernard Greenhouse, and chamber music with Eugene Lehner, Louis Krasner, and Leonard Shure.
Mr. Costanza joined the St. Lawrence String Quartet in 2003, and tours extensively with that ensemble, performing over 100 concerts annually throughout the world. As a member of the St. Lawrence, he is an Artist in Residence at Stanford University, where he teaches cello and chamber music and performs a wide variety of formal and informal concerts each season, from the stages of the University’s concert halls to student dormitories and lecture halls. A strong proponent of contemporary music, Mr. Costanza works regularly with the world’s most notable composers, such as John Adams, Jonathan Berger, Osvaldo Golijov, Mark Applebaum, Pierre Boulez, George Tsontakis, Roberto Sierra, R. Murray Schafer, William Bolcom, John Corigliano, and Bright Sheng. As a student, he had the honor of studying Olivier Messiaen’s “Quartet for the End of Time” under the guidance of the composer.
Swiss-born American pianist Gilles Vonsattel is an artist of extraordinary versatility and originality. Comfortable with and seeking out an enormous range of repertoire, Vonsattel displays a musical curiosity and sense of adventure that has gained him many admirers. Recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant and winner of the Naumburg and Geneva competitions as well as the 2016 Andrew Wolf Chamber Music Award, he has in recent years appeared with the Boston Symphony, Tanglewood, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Munich Philharmonic, Gothenburg Symphony, San Francisco Symphony, and Detroit Symphony Orchestra, while performing recitals and chamber music at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Ravinia, Tokyo’s Musashino Hall, Wigmore Hall, Bravo! Vail, Music@ Menlo, the Gilmore festival, the Lucerne festival, and the Munich Gasteig.
The Violin from the Makers Point of View
with Joe Grubaugh and Sigrun Siefert
Tuesday, June 21, 2022
4:00 PM
Campbell Recital Hall
Program
Local luthier legend Joe Grubaugh joins us to share the secrets of the violin through the lens of a maker
Biography
Joseph Grubaugh was born on May 13th, 1950 and with his family, lived throughout the United States, Japan, Spain and France before settling in the San Francisco bay area at age 13. He majored in Music Theory and Composition and received his degree in music at the University of the Pacific in 1972 before beginning a three and one half year apprenticeship with Albert C. Muller in Sacramento, California. In 1977 he went to work for Hans Weisshaar in Los Angeles where he continued to study restoration techniques. While there, he met his future wife and partner, Sigrun Seifert.
They moved to the San Francisco bay area in 1979 and they have worked, lived and raised a family in Petaluma, California,North of the Golden Gate Bridge since 1980. In 1982 they collaborated on their first instrument together and since then, have continued in the tradition of making and labeling their creations jointly.
He was recognized at the First American Federation of Violin and Bow Makers (AFVBM) International Competition held at Lincoln Center, New York City in 1984 where he won 3rd prize overall. Since then he and Sigrun Seifert have won 5 Gold medals and 4 Silver medals at the Violin Society of America for their work together and were both declared Hors Concours by the Violin Society of America in 1998.
In 1993 and 1994 they organized and attended a workshop at the Smithsonian’s Conservation and Analytical Laboratory outside Washington DC under the sponsorship of the AFVBM. They have shared that experience and continue the search for better techniques in work to instruments that come into their shop. Joseph has also been a frequent presence on the teaching staff of the VSA sponsored Oberlin Violin Making Workshop since it’s beginning in 1998.
In 1994 he and his wife discovered the “Duke of Alcantara” violin of Antonio Stradivari circa 1732, that had been missing since 1972 and were very instrumental in it’s return to the University of California at Los Angeles.
They currently spend about three quarters of their time making new instruments and one quarter in restoration.
Midday Masters 2
Wednesday, June 22, 2022
12:00 PM
Bing Concert Hall
Program
PAUL WIANCKO (b. 1983)
Cello Quartet Op. 1 When the Night
Michael Kannen, cello I
Nina Lee, cello II
Christopher Costanza, cello III
Paul Wiancko, cello IV
GEORG PHILIPP TELEMANN (1681–1767)
Fantasia for solo flute in A Minor
I. Grave
II. Vivace
III. Adagio
IV. Allegro
Tara Helen O'Connor, flute
LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN (1770–1827)
Piano Trio in E-flat major, Op. 70 No. 2
I. Poco sostenuto - Allegro ma non troppo
II. Allegretto
III. Allegretto ma non troppo
IV. Finale. Allegro
Scott St John, violin
Nina Lee, cello
Pedja Muzijevic, piano
Biographies
Cellist Michael Kannen has distinguished himself as a musician and educator of uncommon accomplishment who is comfortable in widely diverse musical situations and venues. A founding member of the Brentano String Quartet, he performed with that group for seven years on concert stages around the world, on radio, television, and on recordings. During those first seven years, the Brentano Quartet was awarded the first Cleveland Quartet Award, the Naumburg Chamber Music and the Martin E. Segal Award from Lincoln Center, and the Royal Philharmonic Society’s award for best debut recital in England for the 1997-1998 season. With the Brentano Quartet, Kannen appeared regularly in such venues as Alice Tully Hall in New York, the Library of Congress in Washington, Wigmore Hall in London, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, the Chatelet Theater in Paris, and the Sydney Opera House.
An active chamber musician, cellist Nina Lee has collaborated with such artists as Felix Galimir, Jaime Laredo, David Soyer, Nobuko Imai, Isidore Cohen, and Mitsuko Uchida. She has toured with Musicians from Marlboro and participated in the El Paso and the Portland Chamber Music Festivals. She has also performed for the Helicon Foundation and Bargemusic in New York City. As an advocate of music education, Ms. Lee has served as returning guest faculty at the St. Lawrence String Quartet Seminar at Stanford and at the Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music’s Summer Chamber Music Workshop. In 2012, she made a cameo appearance in A Late Quartet, a film which featured the Brentano Quartet on its soundtrack. Before joining the Yale faculty as a member of the Brentano Quartet, Ms. Lee taught at Princeton and Columbia Universities.
For three decades cellist Christopher Costanza has enjoyed a varied and exciting career as a soloist, chamber musician, and teacher. A winner of the Young Concert Artists International Auditions and a recipient of a prestigious Solo Recitalists Grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, Mr. Costanza has performed to wide critical acclaim in nearly every state in the U.S., and in Canada, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Australia, New Zealand, China, Korea, Germany, France, the U.K., Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Romania, and Hungary. His summer festival appearances include the Marlboro, Yellow Barn, Santa Fe, Taos, Chamber Music Northwest, Seattle, Bay Chamber Concerts, Ottawa, and Bravo! Vail Valley festivals. Mr. Costanza is a graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, where he studied cello with Laurence Lesser, David Wells, and Bernard Greenhouse, and chamber music with Eugene Lehner, Louis Krasner, and Leonard Shure.
Mr. Costanza joined the St. Lawrence String Quartet in 2003, and tours extensively with that ensemble, performing over 100 concerts annually throughout the world. As a member of the St. Lawrence, he is an Artist in Residence at Stanford University, where he teaches cello and chamber music and performs a wide variety of formal and informal concerts each season, from the stages of the University’s concert halls to student dormitories and lecture halls. A strong proponent of contemporary music, Mr. Costanza works regularly with the world’s most notable composers, such as John Adams, Jonathan Berger, Osvaldo Golijov, Mark Applebaum, Pierre Boulez, George Tsontakis, Roberto Sierra, R. Murray Schafer, William Bolcom, John Corigliano, and Bright Sheng. As a student, he had the honor of studying Olivier Messiaen’s “Quartet for the End of Time” under the guidance of the composer.
As a chamber musician, cellist Paul Wiancko has performed at the Marlboro, Aspen and Olympic music festivals. Wiancko performs with several New York-based music ensembles, including the East Coast Chamber Orchestra, TAK Ensemble, Lost Dog New Music Ensemble, Meridionalis, Bird’s Eye Trio, and the American Contemporary Music Ensemble. In 2018, Wiancko received the S&R Foundation Award for his work as a composer. Wiancko has composed works for the Grammy Award-winning Parker Quartet, Aizuri Quartet, soprano Susanna Phillips, cellist Judith Serkin, violist Ayane Kozasa, yMusic, Bargemusic, and has been the composer-in-residence at Twickenham Fest, the Newburyport and Methow Valley chamber music festivals, Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts.
Flutist Tara Helen O’Connor is a charismatic performer noted for her artistic depth, brilliant technique and colorful tone. Recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant, a two-time Grammy nominee and the first wind player chosen to participate in The Bowers Program, she is now a Season Artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. A Wm. S. Haynes flute artist, Tara regularly participates in the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Music@ Menlo, Chamber Music Festival of the Bluegrass, Spoleto Festival USA, Chamber Music Northwest, Mainly Mozart Festival, Music from Angel Fire, the Banff Centre, Rockport Music, Bay Chamber Concerts, Manchester, Great Mountains, Chesapeake music festivals, and the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival. Along with her husband Daniel Phillips, she is the newly appointed Co-Artstic Director of the Music From Angel Fire Festival in New Mexico.
Violinist Scott St. John is known for his joyful style of music-making and inspiring chamber music coaching. Scott is Concertmaster of the innovative ROCO Chamber Orchestra in Houston, Texas, and returns frequently to the summertime Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont. From 2018 to 2021 he was Director of Chamber Music at The Colburn School in Los Angeles. In addition to a magical year of working at the Disney Store in Times Square, Scott has been Associate Professor at the University of Toronto, and Artist-in-Residence at Stanford University as part of the St. Lawrence String Quartet. Scott has received an Avery Fisher Career Grant and won a Juno Award for recording Mozart with his sister Lara St. John. He has founded two chamber music awards for students: the Felix Galimir Award at University of Toronto and the Ida Levin Award at the Colburn School.
Pianist Pedja Muzijevic has toured as soloist with orchestras and as a recitalist throughout eastern and western Europe, Great Britain, Canada, the United States, South America, Australia, and Asia. A native of Sarajevo, his artistic curiosity has led him to explore the music of the 18th and 19th centuries on period instruments and the music of contemporary composers such as Knussen, Carter, Cage, Henze, Nancarrow, Crumb, Adès. His festival engagements include performances at Tanglewood, Spoleto USA, Mostly Mozart, Newport, OK Mozart, Bridgehampton, Bay Chamber Concerts, San Miguel de Allende, Aldeburgh, Lucerne, Holland, Melbourne, Aix-en-Provence, Dubrovnik, Merano, and Bratislava. Mr. Muzijevic’s recording Sonatas and Other Interludesis available on Albany Records—it juxtaposes music for prepared piano by John Cage with composers ranging from W. F. Bach to Liszt.
Midday Masters 3
Friday, June 24, 2022
12:00 PM
Bing Concert Hall
Program
Buster Keaton's 1925 movie Seven Chances
Original Film Score by Stephen Prutsman (1960-)
Commissioned by Cynthia Weglarz for the 2022 Ocean Reef Chamber Music Festival, Key Largo, Florida
Tara Helen O’Connor, flute
Daniel Phillips, violin
Lesley Robertson, viola
Paul Wiancko, cello
Ken Miller, bass
Biographies
Flutist Tara Helen O’Connor is a charismatic performer noted for her artistic depth, brilliant technique and colorful tone. Recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant, a two-time Grammy nominee and the first wind player chosen to participate in The Bowers Program, she is now a Season Artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. A Wm. S. Haynes flute artist, Tara regularly participates in the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Music@ Menlo, Chamber Music Festival of the Bluegrass, Spoleto Festival USA, Chamber Music Northwest, Mainly Mozart Festival, Music from Angel Fire,
the Banff Centre, Rockport Music, Bay Chamber Concerts, Manchester, Great Mountains, Chesapeake music festivals, and the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival. Along with her husband Daniel Phillips, she is the newly appointed Co-Artstic Director of the Music From Angel Fire Festival in New Mexico.
Violinist Daniel Phillips enjoys a versatile career as an established chamber musician, solo artist, and teacher. In 2020, he was named co-artistic director of Music from Angel Fire with his wife, flutist Tara Helen O’Connor.
A graduate of The Juilliard School, Mr. Phillips’s major teachers were his father, Eugene Phillips; Ivan Galamian; Sally Thomas; Nathan Milstein; Sandor Vegh; and George Neikrug. He’s a founding mem- ber of the Orion String Quartet, which was established in 1987. The quartet was in residence at the Mannes School of Music for 27 years, and it performs regularly with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. The quartet’s discography includes the complete quartets of Beethoven and Kirchner.
A graduate of both the Curtis Institute and the Juilliard School, Lesley Robertson, viola, hails from Edmonton, Alberta and currently lives in California where, along with the St. Lawrence String Quartet she is Artist-in-Residence at Stanford University.
A founding member of the SLSQ, Lesley has been privileged to perform in some of the world’s most renowned concert halls including Amsterdam’s Konzertgebau, New York’s Lincoln Center, and Paris’ Theatre de la Ville, as well as more unusual venues such as Hanoi’s “The French Opera House," Luxembourg’s Bourglinster Castle and at the White House for President and Mrs. Clinton.
As a chamber musician, cellist Paul Wiancko has performed at the Marlboro, Aspen and Olympic music festivals. Wiancko performs with several New York-based music ensembles, including the East Coast Chamber Orchestra, TAK Ensemble, Lost Dog New Music Ensemble, Meridionalis, Bird’s Eye Trio, and the American Contemporary Music Ensemble. In 2018, Wiancko received the S&R Foundation Award for his work as a composer. Wiancko has composed works for the Grammy Award-winning Parker Quartet, Aizuri Quartet, soprano Susanna Phillips, cellist Judith Serkin, violist Ayane Kozasa, yMusic, Bargemusic, and has been the composer-in-residence at Twickenham Fest, the Newburyport and Methow Valley chamber music festivals, Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts.
Azure Family Concert
Saturday, June 25, 2022
2:00 PM
Campbell Recital Hall
Presented by the SLSQ, Azure Family Concerts are free, friendly and engaging performances for families with children and young adults on the Autism spectrum. Azure concerts are approximately one hour in length. Family members and caregivers of all ages are welcome to attend.
2022 Special Seminar Celebration!
Saturday, June 25, 2022
5:00 PM
Bing Concert Hall
Program
JOSEPH HAYDN (1732–1809)
Op. 76
St. Lawrence String Quartet
Geoff Nuttall, violin
Owen Dalby, violin
Lesley Robertson, viola
Christopher Costanza, cello
GUILLAUME CONNESSON (b. 1970)
Techno-Parade
Tara Helen O’Connor, flute
Todd Palmer, clarinet
Gilles Vonsattel, piano
CARL PHILIPP EMANUEL BACH (1714–1788)
Concerto in D Minor
I. Allegro
II. Un poco andante
III. Allegro di molto
Tara Helen O’Connor, flute
Violins
Geoff Nuttall
Daniel Phillips
Owen Dalby
Scott St John
Violas
Lesley Robertson
Maria Lambros
Cellos
Christopher Costanza
Nina Lee
Michael Kannen
Ken Miller, bass
Pedja Muzijevic, harpsichord
Biographies
The St. Lawrence String Quartet (SLSQ) has established itself among the world-class chamber ensembles of its generation. Its mission: bring every piece of music to the audience in vivid color, with pronounced communication and teamwork, and great respect to the composer. Since winning both the Banff International String Quartet Competition and Young Concert Artists International Auditions in 1992, the quartet has delighted audiences with its spontaneous, passionate, and dynamic performances. Alex Ross of The New Yorker magazine writes, “The St. Lawrence are remarkable not simply for the quality of their music making, exalted as it is, but for the joy they take in the act of connection.”
Flutist Tara Helen O’Connor is a charismatic performer noted for her artistic depth, brilliant technique and colorful tone. Recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant, a two-time Grammy nominee and the first wind player chosen to participate in The Bowers Program, she is now a Season Artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. A Wm. S. Haynes flute artist, Tara regularly participates in the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Music@ Menlo, Chamber Music Festival of the Bluegrass, Spoleto Festival USA, Chamber Music Northwest, Mainly Mozart Festival, Music from Angel Fire, the Banff Centre, Rockport Music, Bay Chamber Concerts, Manchester, Great Mountains, Chesapeake music festivals, and the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival. Along with her husband Daniel Phillips, she is the newly appointed Co-Artstic Director of the Music From Angel Fire Festival in New Mexico.
Clarinetist Todd Palmer has appeared as soloist, recitalist, chamber music collaborator, educator, arranger, and presenter in a variety of musical endeavors around the world. A three time Grammy nominated artist, he has appeared as soloist with the Atlanta, Houston, BBC Scotland orchestras; St. Paul, New York, Cincinnati, Montréal, and Metamorphosen chamber orchestras. He’s collaborated with many of the finest string ensembles such as the St. Lawrence, Brentano, Borromeo, Pacifica, Daedalus and Ying quartets; and also shared the stage with sopranos Kathleen Battle, Renée Fleming, Elizabeth Futral, Heidi Grant Murphy and Dawn Upshaw. He has championed Osvaldo Golijov’s Dreams and Prayers of Isaac the Blind around the world and commissioned the theatre work Orpheus and Euridice by Ricky Ian Gordon which was presented by Great Performers at Lincoln Center in 2005.
Swiss-born American pianist Gilles Vonsattel is an artist of extraordinary versatility and originality. Comfortable with and seeking out an enormous range of repertoire, Vonsattel displays a musical curiosity and sense of adventure that has gained him many admirers. Recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant and winner of the Naumburg and Geneva competitions as well as the 2016 Andrew Wolf Chamber Music Award, he has in recent years appeared with the Boston Symphony, Tanglewood, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Munich Philharmonic, Gothenburg Symphony, San Francisco Symphony, and Detroit Symphony Orchestra, while performing recitals and chamber music at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Ravinia, Tokyo’s Musashino Hall, Wigmore Hall, Bravo! Vail, Music@ Menlo, the Gilmore festival, the Lucerne festival, and the Munich Gasteig.
Violinist Daniel Phillips enjoys a versatile career as an established chamber musician, solo artist, and teacher. In 2020, he was named co-artistic director of Music from Angel Fire with his wife, flutist Tara Helen O’Connor.
A graduate of The Juilliard School, Mr. Phillips’s major teachers were his father, Eugene Phillips; Ivan Galamian; Sally Thomas; Nathan Milstein; Sandor Vegh; and George Neikrug. He’s a founding member of the Orion String Quartet, which was established in 1987. The quartet was in residence at the Mannes School of Music for 27 years, and it performs regularly with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. The quartet’s discography includes the complete quartets of Beethoven and Kirchner.
Violinist Scott St. John is known for his joyful style of music-making and inspiring chamber music coaching. Scott is Concertmaster of the innovative ROCO Chamber Orchestra in Houston, Texas, and returns frequently to the summertime Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont. From 2018 to 2021 he was Director of Chamber Music at The Colburn School in Los Angeles. In addition to a magical year of working at the Disney Store in Times Square, Scott has been Associate Professor at the University of Toronto, and Artist-in-Residence at Stanford University as part of the St. Lawrence String Quartet. Scott has received an Avery Fisher Career Grant and won a Juno Award for recording Mozart with his sister Lara St. John. He has founded two chamber music awards for students: the Felix Galimir Award at University of Toronto and the Ida Levin Award at the Colburn School.
Violist Maria Lambros has performed throughout the world as a member of three of the country’s finest string quartets, in venues such as the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, London’s Wigmore Hall, the Wien Konzerthaus, New York’s Lincoln Center and Weill Recital Hall. She was a member of the renowned Ridge String Quartet, which was nominated for the 1993 Grammy Award for their recording of the Dvořák Piano Quintets with pianist Rudolf Firkusny. She was also a founding member of the Naumburg Award-winning Meliora String Quartet, which was Quartet-in-Residence at the Spoleto Festivals of the U.S., Italy, and Australia, and which recorded Mendelssohn’s Octet with the Cleveland Quartet on the Telarc label. She was most recently a member of the Mendelssohn String Quartet and is currently the violist with the New York based chamber ensemble, La Fenice.
An active chamber musician, cellist Nina Lee has collaborated with such artists as Felix Galimir, Jaime Laredo, David Soyer, Nobuko Imai, Isidore Cohen, and Mitsuko Uchida. She has toured with Musicians from Marlboro and participated in the El Paso and the Portland Chamber Music Festivals. She has also performed for the Helicon Foundation and Bargemusic in New York City. As an advocate of music education, Ms. Lee has served as returning guest faculty at the St. Lawrence String Quartet Seminar at Stanford and at the Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music’s Summer Chamber Music Workshop. In 2012, she made a cameo appearance in A Late Quartet, a film which featured the Brentano Quartet on its soundtrack. Before joining the Yale faculty as a member of the Brentano Quartet, Ms. Lee taught at Princeton and Columbia Universities.
Cellist Michael Kannen has distinguished himself as a musician and educator of uncommon accomplishment who is comfortable in widely diverse musical situations and venues. A founding member of the Brentano String Quartet, he performed with that group for seven years on concert stages around the world, on radio, television, and on recordings. During those first seven years, the Brentano Quartet was awarded the first Cleveland Quartet Award, the Naumburg Chamber Music and the Martin E. Segal Award from Lincoln Center, and the Royal Philharmonic Society’s award for best debut recital in England for the 1997-1998 season. With the Brentano Quartet, Kannen appeared regularly in such venues as Alice Tully Hall in New York, the Library of Congress in Washington, Wigmore Hall in London, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, the Chatelet Theater in Paris, and the Sydney Opera House.
Pianist Pedja Muzijevic has toured as soloist with orchestras and as a recitalist throughout eastern and western Europe, Great Britain, Canada, the United States, South America, Australia, and Asia. A native of Sarajevo, his artistic curiosity has led him to explore the music of the 18th and 19th centuries on period instruments and the music of contemporary composers such as Knussen, Carter, Cage, Henze, Nancarrow, Crumb, Adès. His festival engagements include performances at Tanglewood, Spoleto USA, Mostly Mozart, Newport, OK Mozart, Bridgehampton, Bay Chamber Concerts, San Miguel de Allende, Aldeburgh, Lucerne, Holland, Melbourne, Aix-en-Provence, Dubrovnik, Merano, and Bratislava. Mr. Muzijevic’s recording Sonatas and Other Interludesis available on Albany Records—it juxtaposes music for prepared piano by John Cage with composers ranging from W. F. Bach to Liszt.