Joshua Roman with Stanford Medicine Orchestra
PROGRAM
Immunity
J.S Bach Suite No. 1 in G Major, BWV 1007: I. Prélude
Allison Loggins-Hull Stolen
Caroline Shaw in manus tuas
Krzysztof Penderecki Capriccio per Siegfried Palm
Joshua Roman Duet
Immunity
-Intermission-
Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel Overture in C Major
Camille Saint Saëns Cello Concerto No. 1 in A minor
PROGRAM NOTES
JOSHUA ROMAN Immunity
In January of 2021, I caught COVID and unfortunately, never fully recovered. Long COVID—an autoimmune condition that affects an estimated 65 million people worldwide—brought a multitude of debilitating physical and cognitive challenges, forcing a profound shift in my life and music.
Adjusting was neither simple nor graceful—after brute-forcing my way through two major performances, I crashed and abandoned my daily practice routine for the first time in over thirty years.
When I was finally able to pick up the cello again, the sheer physicality of making sound, of feeling the vibrations, moved me to tears. It made me realize how much I had lost sight of my own need for nourishment and connection through music amidst the demands of my career.
This program begins with Bach’s famous Prélude, a piece I’ve played more than any other. Those opening notes were the ones that brought me back after the longest break from the cello of my life. The Saint-Saëns was the first piece I performed after the initial infection—before I fully understood how difficult returning to my old life would be. Preparing for, traveling to, and giving that first performance required a herculean effort, and only later did I learn the kind of damage such exertion could cause in my newly affected body. To return to this familiar piece now—but this time with an orchestra of musicians who have dedicated their lives to healing – is a unique experience, one I am still processing and deeply grateful for. Every piece on this program has its own reason for being here, and together they represent not only the music that has carried me through the challenges of adapting to Long COVID but also a statement about what the cello has meant to me since childhood.
Rather than hide my struggle, I’ve chosen to embrace vulnerability and let go of my attachment to perfection. This journey has taught me that music is not just about giving—it’s also about receiving. Through this performance, I share not just the cello’s technical and emotional range, but also the deeply personal meaning music holds for me. It is through learning to let go that we begin to find true meaning and purpose.
For the past year, I’ve taken Immunity to concert stages, conferences, intimate gatherings, and most central to the project, Long COVID clinics across the country, reaching hundreds of patients. I’m so excited to bring this program to Stanford this week—not only to perform tonight but also to connect with faculty and students across the arts and health disciplines to further explore the intersections of art, vulnerability, and our collective well-being.
CAMILLE SAINT-SAËNS Cello Concerto No. 1, in A minor, Op. 33 (1872)
Born in Paris, France, October 9, 1835; died in Algiers, Algeria, December 16, 1921
French composer Camille Saint-Saëns once remarked that he produced music as naturally as a tree produces apples. That tree first blossomed when he was three, and by eleven, it was bearing remarkable fruit—Saint-Saëns, the piano prodigy, was publicly offering to immediately perform any of Beethoven’s 32 piano sonatas from memory. His full harvest totaled more than 300 works, including five symphonies, thirteen operas, and ten concertos, of which the Cello Concerto in A Minor remains the most enduringly popular. Beyond music, Saint-Saëns was a polymath, writing a book of philosophy, essays on botany and zoology, several plays, and volumes of poetry. His monograph on the archaeology of classical theater is still regarded as a credible work of scholarship.
Saint-Saëns’s music shares many of the hallmarks associated with his student, Gabriel Fauré, and the French tradition more broadly. It is finely crafted, elegantly proportioned, polished, and balanced, with a keen sense of where it belongs in the order of things. His effortless fluency—as evidenced by his prolific output across virtually every 19th century musical genre—tended to produce music free of dramatic struggle or cathartic triumph over adversity. Saint-Saëns said: “I am an eclectic spirit. It may be a great defect, but I cannot change it.” His contemporary Charles Gounod admired him as ‘the French Beethoven,’ a comparison that likely pleased the proud and ambitious composer who became increasingly intolerant of modern music as he got older. Debussy, on the other hand, recognized that Saint-Saëns essentially re-created and amalgamated existing styles and summed up the older composer as ‘the musician of tradition.’
The three-movement A minor Cello Concerto takes its cue from the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto as the solo cello launches immediately into the main theme, bypassing any orchestral preamble. From the outset, Saint-Saëns's unerring sense of balance allows the solo instrument to be heard over the orchestra, whether the cello is intent on virtuoso display or lyrical eloquence. Saint-Saëns could now build on the experience of three piano concertos, together with two violin concertos and the sparkling Introduction and Rondo capriccioso. In a nod to Franz Liszt’s piano concertos, Saint-Saëns eliminates breaks between movements, telescoping the three movements into one continuous, cohesive structure. The two outer movements share and develop thematic material, framing a graceful, somewhat antique minuet.
— Program note copyright © 2025 Keith Horner. Comments welcomed: khnotes@sympatico.ca
Joshua Roman, cello
Terrance Yan, conductor
Stanford Medicine Orchestra
Joshua Roman is a cello soloist and composer, hailed for his “effortlessly expressive tone… and playful zest for exploration” (The New York Times), as well as his “extraordinary technical and musical gifts" and “blend of precision and almost improvisatory freedom… that goes straight to the heart" (The San Francisco Chronicle). His genre-bending programs and wide-ranging collaborations have grown out of an “enthusiasm for musical evolution that is as contagious as his love for the classics" (The Seattle Times).
Committed to bringing classical music to new audiences, Roman opened the acclaimed 2017 TED Conference — and his performance of the complete Bach Cello Suites after the 2016 U.S. presidential election was the most-viewed event in the history of TED’s social channels, with nearly a million live viewers. Roman has collaborated with world-class artists across genres and disciplines, including Yo-Yo Ma, Edgar Meyer, DJ Spooky, Tony-winner/MacArthur Genius Bill T. Jones, GRAMMY®-winning East African vocalist Somi, and Tony-nominated actor Anna Deavere Smith.
As a soloist, Roman’s “exceptionally high quality of performances” (The Los Angeles Times) combine “the expressive control of Casals with the creative individuality and virtuoso flair of Hendrix himself” (Gramophone). He has performed with leading orchestras around the United States and the world, including the Los Angeles Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, New World Symphony, Toronto Symphony, BBC Scottish, and Mariinsky Symphony Orchestra, and he was principal cellist of the Seattle Symphony from age 22 to 24.
Roman’s singular 2024-25 season opens with the launch of his ambitious and deeply personal project Immunity, an intimate musical exploration of his life-altering experience of ongoing Long COVID, with music ranging from J.S. Bach to George Crumb to Caroline Shaw, as well as Roman’s own compositions. A recording of the full program will be released October 4 on Bright Shiny Things, coinciding with a tour where Roman will perform music from Immunity in Long COVID clinics across the United States, including New York City, Philadelphia, Seattle, Portland, Kansas City, St. Louis, and more. By sharing music and community with other Long COVID patients, Roman aims to raise awareness of the condition and communicate the project's core message of finding strength in vulnerability.
Additional 2024-25 highlights include a national Trio tour with violinist Tessa Lark and double bassist Edgar Meyer, the world premiere of a new Cello Concerto composed by James Lee III with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, two Well-Being concerts with Carnegie Hall, a residency at Stanford University that will center around Immunity, concerto performances with the Pacific Symphony, Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, and Asheville Symphony, and solo recitals around the country.
Roman has long been a leader and innovator in his use of digital and social media, with projects like his Popper Etude videos amassing nearly two million views. His solo performance with the YouTube Symphony at Carnegie Hall was viewed by 33 million people across almost 200 countries, with Yo-Yo Ma introducing him as “one of the great exemplars of the ideal 21st century musician.”
As a composer, Roman has been commissioned by Music Academy of the West, Illinois Philharmonic, ProMusica Chamber Orchestra, San Francisco Girls Chorus, Grace Cathedral, and more, and he has written for the JACK Quartet, violinist Vadim Gluzman, and conductor David Danzmayr. Equally accomplished as an interpreter of the music of other contemporary composers, Roman has premiered works by Mason Bates, Reena Esmail, Timo Andres, Gabriela Lena Frank, Aaron Jay Kernis, Lisa Bielawa, and others. Roman also curated a forward-looking chamber music series at Town Hall in Seattle for 15 years, presenting artists like Jennifer Koh, JACK Quartet, Sō Percussion, and more.
A native of Oklahoma City, Roman began playing the cello at the age of three on a quarter-size instrument and gave his first public recital at age 10. He went on to pursue his musical studies at the Cleveland Institute of Music, studying with Richard Aaron and Desmond Hoebig, former principal cellist of the Cleveland Orchestra. Roman plays an 1830 Giovanni Francesco Pressenda on a generous loan through The Stradivari Society of Chicago.
For Roman’s complete itinerary of 2024/25 concerts — please visit joshuaroman.com/schedule.
Terrance Yan is the music director and conductor of the Stanford Medicine Orchestra and the Infinite Philharmonic, an orchestra he found with his colleagues at Apple. With two decades of experience in the Bay Area, he is dedicated to fostering a welcoming, inclusive, and diverse environment for music-making within the community.
Terrance earned his MMus and BMus from San Francisco State University. He has served as a conducting fellow at multiple music festivals and has received valuable coaching from renowned conductors, including Kenneth Kiesler, Donald Portnoy and Markand Thakar. Terrance also holds an MBA from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and an MS in Information Systems from Boston University.
There has long been a vibrant relationship between medicine and music. Music has been called "medicine for the brain,” and provides a direct human connection among performers and listeners. Many caregivers and patients use and play music for its soothing and restorative power.
The Stanford Medicine Orchestra and Chorus, founded in Spring 2022 and supported by Stanford's Medicine & the Muse program, now perform concerts throughout the year, showcasing a diverse repertoire of classical and contemporary works. The orchestra and chorus consists of volunteer musicians, including Stanford School of Medicine (SOM) and Stanford Healthcare faculty, staff, residents, postdocs, and students. Led by Maestros Terrance Yan and Minseung Choi, the ensembles welcome all Stanford community members affiliated with the Stanford SOM and Stanford Medicine.
If you’re interested in learning more about the orchestra or other programming, contact Jacqueline Genovese at jmgeno@stanford.edu
This concert made possible, in part, by the generosity of the Alice L. Walton Foundation, and by Dr. Audrey Shafer and Mr. Robert Townsend, who created the Townsend Shafer Family First Chair in Violin in honor of Dr. Lynn Ngai Gerber.
Special thanks to our patrons for your ticket purchases and donations. Your support makes these concerts possible.
STANFORD MEDICINE ORCHESTRA
Terrance Yan, Music Director & Conductor
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Violin Rigele Abilock Michelle Baldonado, PhD Hélène Benveniste, PhD Wendy Chou Katie Grace Fang Peter Galatin, MD, PhD Christi Kambs, RN Jenny Kim Ivy Lee Koh Sharon Kwong, LCSW Brandon Le Alvin Lee Joshua Lyu Ralph Page, PhD Abby Katherine Scurfield, MD Brooke Senne, RN Derrick Wu, MD |
Viola Avneet Dosanjh Alice Fan, MD Leelane Hines, LLB Derek Lee Jane Moorman Derek Lee Rebecca Shi, PhD Sharif Vakili, MD Allison Wang Cello Clementine Chou Ann M. Jona Ashley Kwong Anne Merrill Jenny Clark Schiff, PhD, MA Lee Shahinian, MD Matthijs Werdler Bass Timothy Wu |
Flute/Piccolo Ruthann Richter Hammer Anita Honkanen, MD, MS Jennifer W. Lee, MD Oboe Vicky Xiong Clarinet Meredith Kan, MD Joan Oloff, DPM David L.M. Preston Bassoon Jennifer Wolfeld Horn Jennifer Bohac Jason Corn Alexander Lin Trumpet Timpani |
Acknowledgments
