From Bach Brandenburg to Appalachian Spring, Sun. April 23, 4 pm

CLOSE ENCOUNTERS WITH MUSIC PRESENTS

From Bach Brandenburg to Appalachian Spring

with Manhattan Chamber Players 

Performed Live at the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center in Great Barrington, MA

SUNDAY, APRIL 23, 4 PM

Bringing a “mellifluous blend of vigorous intensity and dramatic import, performed with enthusiasm, technical facility and impressive balance,” the 13-strong Manhattan Chamber Players make their Close Encounters With Music debut this season. In a program both orchestral (Brandenburg No. 3 and Copland’s iconic Appalachian Spring and reduced to octet for Mendelssohn’s early work (“Its youthful verve, brilliance and perfection make it one of the miracles of nineteenth-century music”), they demonstrate their versatility and virtuosity. First written as a ballet for Martha Graham and telling the story of 19th century pioneers celebrating spring after building a new Pennsylvania farmhouse, Copland’s reworking of the Appalachian Spring Suite has become one of the staples of the concert hall.

In addition to numerous engagements across the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, MCP regularly tours throughout the U.S., Canada, Mexico and in Asia and the Middle East. Its players are current and former members of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall’s Ensemble Connect, and the Amphion, Attacca, Dover, Escher, and Ying Quartets, as well as top prizewinners in the Banff, Concert Artists Guild, Fischoff, Naumburg, Osaka, Primrose, Queen Elisabeth, Rubinstein, Tchaikovsky, Tertis, and Young Concert Artists Competitions.

Manhattan Chamber Players, chamber orchestra

Tickets, $52 (Orchestra and Mezzanine), $28 (Balcony) and $15 for students, are available through Close Encounters With Music. Virtual tickets are also available.

Complete Information on the season’s seven concerts can be found here

Close Encounters With Music:

“Innovative and captivating…a smart blend of classical, contemporary, and cutting-edge.”

“CEWM patrons have learned that sooner or later they’ll be blindsided by a performance so sublime it will defy explanation.”  —  The Berkshire Edge

ABOUT THE ARTISTS-

The Manhattan Chamber Players are a chamber music collective of New York-based musicians who share the common aim of performing the greatest works in the chamber repertoire at the highest level. Formed in 2015 by Artistic Director and violist Luke Fleming, MCP is comprised of an impressive roster of musicians who all come from the tradition of great music making at the Marlboro Music Festival, Steans Institute at Ravinia, Music@Menlo, Yellow Barn Chamber Music Festival and Perlman Music Program, and are former students of the Curtis Institute, Juilliard, Colburn, and the New England Conservatory. MCP has been praised in Strings Magazine for “A fascinating program concept…It felt refreshingly like an auditory version of a vertical wine tasting.” At the core of MCP’s inspiration is its members’ joy in playing this richly varied repertoire with longtime friends and colleagues, with whom they have been performing since they were students. Its roster allows for the programming of the entire core string, wind, and piano chamber music repertoire—from piano duos to clarinet quintets to string octets. While all its members have independent careers as soloists and chamber musicians, they strive for every opportunity to come together and again share in this special collaboration, creating “a mellifluous blend of vigorous intensity and dramatic import, performed with enthusiasm, technical facility and impressive balance. Members of MCP are current and former members of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Ensemble Connect, and the Aizuri, Attacca, Dover, Escher and Vega quartets; the Aletheia, Appassionata, and Lysander Piano Trios; and Imani Winds. They are top prizewinners in the Banff, Concert Artists Guild, Fischoff, Melbourne, Naumburg, Osaka, Primrose, Queen Elisabeth, Rubinstein, Tchaikovsky, Tertis, and Young Concert Artists Competitions, and are some of the most sought-after solo and chamber performers of their generation. The Manhattan Chamber Players is the Ensemble-in-Residence at both the Festival de Febrero in Mexico and the Crescent City Chamber Music Festival in New Orleans. In addition to its numerous concerts across the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, MCP regularly tours in Asia and the Middle East, and has led chamber music residency programs at institutions throughout the U.S. and abroad.

ABOUT CLOSE ENCOUNTERS WITH MUSIC

Close Encounters With Music stands at the intersection of music, art and the vast richness of Western culture. Entertaining, erudite and lively commentary from founder and Artistic Director Yehuda Hanani puts the composers and their times in perspective to enrich the concert experience. Since the inception of its Commissioning Project in 2001, CEWM has worked with the most distinguished composers of our time—Paul Schoenfield, Osvaldo Golijov, Thea Musgrave, Lera Auerbach, Jorge Martin, John Musto, among others—to create over 20 important new works that have already taken their place in the chamber music canon and on CD. A core of brilliant performers includes pianists Max Levinson, Roman Rabinovich, and William Wolfram; violinists Shmuel Ashkenasi, Cho-Liang Lin, Vadim Gluzman and clarinetists Alexander Fiterstein, Charles Neidich; vocalists Dawn Upshaw, Emily Marvosh and William Sharp; the Escher, Amernet, Muir, Manhattan, Dover, Avalon quartets, and Cuarteto Latinoamericano; and guitarist Eliot Fisk. Choreographer David Parsons and actors Richard Chamberlain, Jane Alexander and Sigourney Weaver have also appeared as guests, weaving narration and dance into the fabric of the programs.

HOW TO REACH US

Close Encounters With Music

Post Office Box 34

Great Barrington, MA 01230

800.843.0778

Web: cewm.org

e-mail: [email protected]  

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