Feb 27

Feb 27 PREVIEW: March's Classical Music in NYC

92Y

Talea Ensemble (with soloist Lucy Deghrae, who is everywhere these days) performs an evening of two one-act operas called MYTHOS. The US premiere of Futari Shizuka (The Maiden from the Sea) by Toshio Hosokawa, Japan’s “preeminent living composer” is paired with George Benjamin’s retelling of the pied piper myth, Into the Little Hill. Saturday, March 7, at 8PM.
Garrick Ohlsson continues his exploration of Brahms, joined by the Takács Quartet in the Piano Quartet No. 2 in A Major and Piano Quintet in F Minor. Saturday, March 14, at 8PM.
Thursday, March 26, at 7:30PM, Jonathan Biss, emerging as a modern day Artur Schnabel (his Beethoven is that good), plays Beethoven’s last three piano sonatas.
Pianist Anthony de Mare continues his Liaisons project, commissioning and performing “re-imaginations” of the music of Stephen Sondheim by a variety of composers on Friday, March 27 at 9PM. He continues — with guest Conrad Tao, who joins with his own arrangement for two pianos of “Move On” — Sunday, March 29, at 3PM.

The Inflection Series continues with guitarist-composer Sérgio Assad joins pianist and vocalist Clarice Assad and Grammy Award-winning Third Coast Percussion in the New York premiere of Archetypes. Each member of the ensemble has composed part of the 12-movement piece inspired by myth. Saturday, March 28, at 8PM.

Leon Botstein leads an All-Ellington Program, including the Duke’s Black, Brown, and Beige Suite in Carnegie Hall, Thursday, March 12, at 8PM.

Jeanette Sorrell’s renowned Baroque Orchestra from Cleveland, the 2019 Grammy-winning Apollo’s Fire, brings O Jerusalem! Crossroads of Three Faiths to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Saturday, March 7, at 7PM.

The work of female composers will be celebrated by the Broadway Woodwind Musicians in an International Women’s Day Concert featuring music by Joan Tower (Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman) and Libby Larsen. Monday, March 2, at 7PM, in St. Malachy’s - the Actors’ Chapel.

Bang on a Can co-founder and Pulitzer Prize winner David Lang on How Words Become Music with ETHEL String Quartet, Tuesday, March 10, at 7:30PM.

All-star trio — Emmanuel Ax, Leonidas Kavakos, and Yo Yo Ma — observe #Beethoven250 with a series of chamber music concerts in Carnegie Hall, covering not only the birthday boy’s piano trios, but violin and cello sonatas, too. Wednesday, March 4, Friday, March 6, and Sunday, March 8.

Pianist Jeremy Denk joins the Orchestra of St. Luke’s for an all-Beethoven program, Thursday, March 5, at 8PM, that includes the Choral Fantasy and the Mass in C Major, but is most notable for a rare performance of the late cantata Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage, Op. 112, to text of Goethe.

The Philadelphia Orchestra begins their Beethoven cycle with Nos. 5 & 6, Friday, March 13 at 8PM. A week later, come 2 & 3, and Thursday, March 26, they play 8, 4, and 7.
MTT and the San Francisco Symphony visit Carnegie Hall for a pair of concerts, March 17 - 18, with Gautier Capuçon playing the Cello Concerto of Saint-Saëns, the NY Premiere of John Adams’s I Still Dance, Stravinsky’s Firebird (3/17), and Mahler 6 (3/18).
Gerald Finley and Jean-Yves Thibaudet perform a rich program of art song, including Schubert’s Dichterliebe. Sunday, March 22, at 2PM.
Orchestre symphonique de Montréal will be led one last time by Kent Nagano in Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 13, the “Babi Yar.”

Yale School of Music, celebrating their 125th Anniversary, presents English Musical Splendor, Wednesday, March 11, at 7:30PM. The Yale Philharmonia and Yale Schola Cantorum will join The Bach Choir, London, for a program including Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast.

John Harbison’s IF, a CMS co-commission, is receiving its New York premiere by Joelle Harvey, alongside Schumann’s Quintet in E-flat and Mozart’s Quartet in D Major, Sunday, March 8, at 5PM.
Sunday, March 15, at 5PM, Bartók’s Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion, one of his great chamber music masterpieces, is juxtaposed with Tchaikovsky and Dohnányi.
Messiaen’s mesmerizing and moving Quartet for the End of Time is performed, along with Stravinsky’s contrasting Suite italienne on Friday, March 20, at 7:30PM.

The Chelsea Symphony presents Songs of Hope, March 6 - 7, at St. Paul’s Church, in honor of International Women's Day: Missy Mazzoli's River Rouge Transfiguration, which “draws inspiration from the dynamic landscape of Detroit,” Gabriela Lena Frank's Elegía Andina which “explores the composer's multicultural (Lithuanian-Jewish-Chinese-Peruvian-Spanish) identity,” and Joan Tower's Made in America.

Experiments in Opera presents its Off the Ground 2020 festival, Everything for Dawn, at The Flea Theatre, March 4 - 5. Bearthoven will perform.

The JACK Quartet plays the complete John Zorn string quartets over two evenings, March 13 - 14.
Saturday, March 28, at 7PM, The Processing Series, from Lucy Dhegrae, continues with “I Was Breathing,” a program asking the question: “What is the daily at-home experience of a body holding PTSD?”

Steven Blier leads The Art of Pleasure, featuring young artists from Caramoor’s Vocal Rising Stars program in that includes works by Montsalvatge, Rachmaninoff, Jonathan Dove, Tom Lehrer, Leonard Bernstein, and The Kinks. Tuesday, March 17, at 8PM in Merkin Concert Hall.

Louis Langrée leads the Philharmonic in Debussy, Ravel, and Scriabin, March 5 - 10.
March 26 - 28, Bartók’s Miraculous Mandarin Suite completes a program that includes Lalo’s Symphonie espagnole, with violin soloist Frank Huang.

The first version of Beethoven’s only opera, Fidelio, was called Leonore. Opera Lafayette brings a production conducted by Ryan Brown, and directed by Oriol Tomas. Hunter College, March 2 - 4.

Renowned maestro Leonard Slatkin Conducts The Orchestra Now in Rachmaninoff’s Second Symphony, the NYC premiere of Cindy McTee’s Double Play, as well as the NYC premiere of his own Kinah. Sunday, March 22, at 3PM in the The Rose Theater.

The legendary Barbara Nissman, whom Ginastera called “one of the best pianists in the world,” plays one of her specialties, Prokofiev’s Seventh Piano Sonata, as well as Liszt and Rachmaninoff. Christ & St. Stephen's Church, Sunday, March 8, at 7PM. Not to be missed.

The King’s Singers, bring their uplifting message to St. Thomas Church, performing from their recent album, Finding Harmony. Tuesday, March 3, at 7:30PM.
The St. Thomas Choir of Men and Boys and New York Baroque Incorporated perform C. P. E. Bach’s Die letzten Leiden des Erlösers (The Last Sufferings of Christ) — Jeremy Filsell conducts. Thursday, March 26, at 7:30PM.

Tertulia, a delightful dinner party/chamber music salon series, under the direction of Founder Julia Villagra and Artistic Director James Austin Smith, presents the Quodlibet Ensemble for a program Sunday, March 1, at 7PM. The menu includes helpings of Bach and Corelli, in between courses of Bartók and Glass, at Bocca di Bacco in Chelsea.

***