Robert Blocker, Dean
faculty artist series
David Shifrin, clarinet with Robert Blocker, piano, and The Yale Clarinets: alumni, and members of the YSM clarinet studio Sunday, December 15, 2019 | 3 pm | Morse Recital Hall in Sprague Memorial Hall
Felix Mendelssohn 1809–1847
Concert Piece No. 2 in D minor, Op. 114 I. Presto II. Andante III. Allegretto grazioso Romie de Guise-Langlois, clarinet Graeme Steele Johnson, basset horn Hilda Huang, piano
George Enescu 1881–1955 arr. Béla Kovács
Francis Poulenc 1899–1963 arr. David Shifrin
Romanian Rhapsody in A major, Op. 11 , No. 1 Claudia Ng, clarinet César Palacio, clarinet Hilda Huang, piano
Mouvements perpétuels, FP 14 I. Assez modéré II. Très modéré III. Alerte Sonate pour clarinette et piano, FP 184 I. Allegro tristamente II. Romanza III. Allegro con fuoco David Shifrin, clarinet Robert Blocker, piano
Program, cont. intermission
Niccolò Paganini 1782–1840 arr. Ulysse Delécluse
Paganini arr. Arthur Frackenpohl
Caprice in A minor, Op. 1, No. 5 Ziqi Yue, clarinet
Moto perpetuo, Op. 11 Juan Martinez, clarinet Amy Hur, clarinet Claudia Ng, clarinet Richard Adger, bass clarinet
Michele Mangani b. 1966
Dance Variations on a Mozart Theme (2019)
Verdiana (2014) Bixby Kennedy, E-flat clarinet Ziqi Yue, E-flat clarinet Richard Adger, clarinet Romie de Guise-Langlois, clarinet Amy Hur, clarinet Seunghee Lee, clarinet Juan Esteban Martinez, clarinet Thomas Masse, clarinet Claudia Ng, clarinet David Shifrin, clarinet Pavel Vinnitsky, clarinet Graeme Steele Johnson, basset horn Mingzhe Wang, bass clarinet & clarinet Andrew Grenci, bass clarinet César Palacio, contrabass clarinet & bass clarinet Ryan Tani, conductor
As a courtesy to others, please silence all devices. Photography and recording of any kind is strictly prohibited. Please do not leave the hall during musical selections. Thank you.
Artist Profiles David Shifrin, clarinet Winner of the 2000 Avery Fisher Prize, clarinetist David Shifrin has appeared with the Philadelphia and Minnesota orchestras and the Dallas, Seattle, Houston, Milwaukee, Detroit, and Denver symphonies. He has appeared in recital at Alice Tully Hall, Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, the 92nd Street Y in New York City, and at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. In addition, he has appeared in recital and as soloist with orchestras throughout Europe and Asia. A three-time Grammy nominee, he has been the Artistic Director of Chamber Music Northwest since 1980. An artist member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center since 1989, he served as its Artistic Director from 1992 to 2004. A faculty member at the Yale School of Music since 1987, Shifrin is Professor in the Practice of Clarinet and Chamber Music, and serves as Artistic Director of the Oneppo Chamber Music Series and the Yale in New York concert series. Robert Blocker, piano An internationally acclaimed concert pianist, Robert Blocker has been described by the Los Angeles Times as an artist of “great skill and accomplishment” who performs with “a measurable virtuoso bent and considerable musical sensitivity.” Blocker earned his bachelor of arts degree from Furman University and his master of music degree and doctor of musical arts degree from the University of North Texas, under the tutelage of the eminent American pianist
Richard Cass. At Yale University, where he is the Henry and Lucy Moses Dean of Music, Blocker teaches and performs alongside students, alumni, and faculty colleagues. Richard Adger, clarinet & bass clarinet Richard Adger ’19MM is a clarinetist and chamber musician from Kansas City, MO. With his chamber group Trio Affettuoso he won second prize in the Enkor International Chamber Music competition. Richard completed his bachelor’s degree at the University of Kansas under the tutelage of Dr. Stephanie Zelnick, and recently completed his master of music degree at the Yale School of Music under the guidance of David Shifrin. Romie de Guise-Langlois, clarinet Romie de Guise-Langlois ’06MM ’07AD is a first prize winner of the Ima Hogg Competition, the Canadian Music Competition, and at the Yale and McGill Universities Concerto Competitions. She has appeared as soloist with the Houston Symphony, Burlington Chamber Orchestra, and Guanajuato Symphony Orchestra; and at Festival Mozaic and Banff Center for the Arts. Currently Assistant Professor of Clarinet at UMass/Amherst, she is a former member of CMS Two, Astral Artists, Ensemble Connect, and Musicians from Marlboro. Andrew Grenci, bass clarinet Andrew Grenci ’84MM earned a master of music degree at Yale in 1984 under Keith Wilson. He was bass clarinetist with the Coast Guard Band for 24 years, and is
Artist Profiles, cont. often heard with Connecticut orchestras. His CD of music for bass clarinet and piano, Excursions, was praised by The Clarinet for “impeccable musicianship.” In 2017 he recorded his composition Concerto in Rock with the Coast Guard Band. Grenci teaches clarinet at Western Connecticut State University and is an active soloist and chamber player.
orchestral musician, Bixby currently holds titles as the Associate Principal Clarinetist of the New Haven Symphony Orchestra, Associate Principal in the Albany Symphony, and the Principal Clarinetist of Symphony in C. He is a former member of Ensemble Connect and studied with David Shifrin at Yale. Seunghee Lee, clarinet
Graeme Steele Johnson, basset horn Winner of the Hellam Young Artists’ Competition and the Yamaha Young Artists Competition, Graeme Steele Johnson ’17MM ’18MMA has appeared recently as a TEDx speaker and as a concerto soloist with the Vienna International Orchestra, Springfield Symphony Orchestra and the Caroga Lake and Vermont Mozart Festival Orchestras. In chamber settings, Johnson has performed at the Ravinia Festival, Phoenix Chamber Music Society, Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, Chicago’s Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concerts Series, and Chamber Music Northwest, where he will return in 2020 to perform his octet arrangement of Debussy’s Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun. He has recorded commercially for Hyperion Records and Delos Productions, with a forthcoming recording on Cantaloupe Music.
Seunghee Lee ’92MM ’94AD is the founder of Music Solis Productions, an independent record label, sheet music publisher, and artist consulting company. She is a frequent lecturer on the topic of music entrepreneurship and spoke at the Harvard Business School’s 2019 Asia Business Conference titled “The Game Changers.” Ms. Lee’s solo albums were chosen as “CD of the Week” by numerous radio stations worldwide, and KDFC San Francisco included her in their “Top 30 Under 30”. She collaborated with the Italian film composer Andrea Morricone, performing his world-premiere arrangement of the Love Theme from Cinema Paradiso for clarinet and orchestra. Also a highly skilled golfer, she spoke at TEDx Hong Kong about the surprising similarities between golf and music and the mental challenges of viewing both skills through the lens of a perfectionist.
Bixby Kennedy, E-flat clarinet
Thomas Masse, clarinet
Admired for his “suppleness and beauty of tone,” Bixby Kennedy ’16MM has performed in Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall, The Kennedy Center, and Marlboro Music Festival. He is the clarinetist for the “explosive” chamber ensemble Frisson and as an
Clarinetist Thomas Gilmore Masse ’91MM ’92AD has enjoyed a varied career as an artist, teacher, and academic administrator. He served Yale University in a variety of positions, including as Deputy Dean of the School of Music and as Associate
Provost for the Arts. In 2013, he was named Dean of the School of Music and Professor of Music at Stetson University, where he teaches clarinet and chamber music. Masse holds graduate degrees in music from Yale University and the University of Michigan, as well as an MBA in Finance from the University of Connecticut. He has been a panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts and serves on national accreditation committees for NASM, NASD (Dance), and NAST (Theatre). Pavel Vinnitsky, clarinet Pavel Vinnitsky ’05MM currently performs with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. Previously he has been an associate clarinetist with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and appeared as a guest clarinetist with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Chicago Symphony, among others. Mr. Vinnitsky is a clarinet and chamber music faculty member at NYU Steinhardt. He has been featured on Grammy-winning albums as well as numerous major motion picture soundtracks. Mingzhe Wang, bass clarinet & clarinet Clarinetist Mingzhe Wang ’03MM ’04AD ’06MMA ’12DMA is committed to promoting both the music of our time and the classics. He has worked closely with some of the world’s leading composers. He performed the Copland Clarinet Concerto in its original version with the Gateway Chamber Orchestra to great acclaim. In addition, he has performed on period clarinets with prominent groups such as The American Classical Orchestra and the Clarion Music Society Orchestra. In
chamber settings, Wang consistently collaborates with some of the most prominent young artists today, appearing in concerts and music festivals worldwide and on radio stations across North America. A native of Wuhan, China, Wang received the doctor of musical arts degree from Yale University. He is a co-founder of Trio Séléné and currently serves as an Associate Professor of Clarinet at Michigan State University College of Music.
Upcoming Events dec 16 Bassoonarama YSM Ensembles A performance by students from faculty bassoonist Frank Morelli’s studio. 7:30 p.m. | Sudler Recital Hall free Catherine Russell Ellington Jazz Series “One of jazz’s most celebrated vocalists, an incandescent performer who can make a century-old blues song as fresh and bracing as tomorrow’s bad news.” — San Francisco Chronicle 7:30 pm | Morse Recital Hall Tickets start at $22, students $10 jan 17
Melvin Chen Horowitz Piano Series A performance of Janaček’s In the Mists, faculty composer Hannah Lash’s Six Etudes and a Dream, and Shostakovich’s infrequently performed Piano Sonata No. 2 in B minor. 7:30 pm | Morse Recital Hall Tickets start at $15, students $7 jan 22
Peter Oundjian, principal conductor Yale Philharmonia The 250th anniversary of Beethoven’s birth is celebrated with a performance of the composer’s Choral Fantasy, with the Yale Glee Club and faculty pianist Boris Berman; the Triple Concerto, with violinist and YSM alumna Sunmi Chang, faculty cellist Paul Watkins, and faculty pianist Melvin Chen; and the revolutionary Third Symphony, “Eroica.” 7:30 pm | Woolsey Hall Tickets start at $12, Yale faculty/ staff $8, students free $3 surcharge at the door jan 24
Brentano String Quartet Oneppo Chamber Music Series A performance of Bruce Adolphe’s Coiled and the work on which it’s based, Beethoven’s “Serioso” Quartet, along with music by Bach, Mendelssohn, and Shostakovich. 7:30 pm | Morse Recital Hall Tickets start at $28, students $13 jan 28
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Program Notes by Graeme Steele Johnson Concert Piece No. 2 in D minor Mendelssohn Felix Mendelssohn shared with father and son clarinetists Heinrich and Carl Baermann a friendship based not only on common musical interests, but on culinary delights as well; in addition to their instrumental prowess, the Baermanns were evidently formidable dumpling chefs. Around Christmas 1832, Mendelssohn hosted the Baermanns at his home in Berlin, and they traded an evening of dumplings for a new piece to play together: a Concert Piece in F minor for clarinet, basset horn and piano. The evening was so enjoyable for all that they repeated the exchange, resulting in the Concert Piece No. 2 in D minor, Op. 114. The opening Presto sets a tone of operatic virtuosity and vocalism that will prevail for all three movements. The piano sits out for much of the honeyed Andante aria, and the Spanish-sounding finale evokes castanets amid swirling solo lines. Romanian Rhapsody No. 1 in A major Enescu/Kovács As beloved as they are today, the two Romanian Rhapsodies, Op. 11 became something of a thorn in the side of their composer, George Enescu, then only 19 years old, whose later, mature works were dwarfed by what he considered the outsized popularity of this earlier success. The composer’s frustration notwithstanding, the Rhapsodies’ favorable reception makes sense in the context of the West’s 19th-century fascination with Eastern folk music; Enescu’s 1901 Romanian sampling seems a logical extrapolation of Dvořák’s Slavonic Rhapsodies, Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsodies, and Brahms’ Hungarian Dances. Enescu’s Rhapsodies in A and D major study gypsy dance and song, respectively: the first is joyous and rollicking, the second soulful and expressive. The Hungarian clarinetist-composer Béla Kovács co-opted the better known first Rhapsody for the present version for two clarinets and piano. Kovács choice of clarinets here is not without origin in the original; in the orchestral version, a lone clarinet pronounces the opening melody-fragment, a quote of a folk tune whose title roughly translates as “I have a coin, and I want a drink.” In clarinet circles, Kovács is widely known a sort of musical chameleon for his remarkable ability to imitate other composers to a tee, a skill put on display in his series of Hommages to master composers from Bach to Strauss to Khachaturian. In this regard, Kovács shares a similar place in the pantheon of clarinet repertoire as Michele Mangani, who is also celebrated for his clarinet-centric works that cleverly borrow from other composers, two of which are highlighted at the end of this program. Mouvements perpétuels Poulenc Poulenc’s Mouvements perpétuels finds an unlikely companion in Enescu’s Romanian Rhapsodies; like Enescu, Poulenc was only 19 when he wrote the short piano piece, and like Enescu, Poulenc also misjudged posterity’s opinion of what he thought to be a trivial work. In his maturity, Poulenc predicted, “if people are still listening to my music in 50 years’ time it will be for my Stabat Mater rather than the Mouvements perpétuels.” As it turns out, Poulenc is celebrated today for both sides of his musical persona — “half monk and half naughty boy,” as one critic described him — and the present work, lighthearted as it may be, remains one of the composer’s most popular. The piece has an overall circular quality dressed in the urban charm of the early-century salons of Erik Satie (Poulenc’s teacher) and the Paris intelligentsia — all clever irony and understated beauty. Full of innocence, the first movement’s untroubled theme drifts downward over a chugging accompaniment. Even as the theme is refracted through heavy chromaticism, Poulenc cautions the performer, incolore (“colorless”), permitting only a passing observation of the theme’s contortions. The second movement’s pairing of a pseudo-folk melody in counterpoint with a slinking chromatic accompaniment seems reminiscent of the dual influences of Poulenc’s parents: his father’s Catholic piety (suggested by the modal, chant-like melody) with his mother’s cosmopolitan, artistic background in the chromatic bass. After the second movement’s finishing wink, the third movement crashes onto the scene with a stomping first theme before the more expansive, floating subjects that follow. Like the preceding movements, this one feels open-ended, as Poulenc again dodges firm closure to avoid a hard stop to the feeling of constant motion. Sonate pour clarinette et piano Poulenc Like Mozart, Schubert, Brahms, Saint-Saëns, Debussy, and Nielsen before him, Poulenc’s music for clarinet was some of his last. Written just months before his death, Poulenc’s Clarinet Sonata shares with Copland’s Clarinet Concerto, Bartók’s Contrasts, and other landmark works a debt to Benny Goodman, who was responsible for many of the most important clarinet commissions of the 20th century. The King of Swing was slated to give the premiere of the Sonata
at Carnegie Hall in April 1963 with the composer at the piano, but after a heart attack claimed Poulenc’s life in January that year, Leonard Bernstein joined Goodman for the memorializing performance instead. The piece itself represents a memorial of its own; Poulenc christened it with the dedication “to the memory of Arthur Honegger,” one of Poulenc’s colleagues in the Montparnasse composer group Les Six, the artistic disciples of enfants terribles Erik Satie and Jean Cocteau. Seeking to move on from the grand Wagnerian and Debussian responses on either side of the fin-de-siècle artistic crisis, Les Six aimed to inflect modern music away from “high art” and toward the quotidian styles of folk and popular song, jazz, music-hall, children’s songs and operetta airs. The odor of popular music does indeed permeate Poulenc’s Clarinet Sonata, with its percussive opening, its cool, wistful monotones, and its rambunctious wit. Finally, Poulenc declared, “the music hall was invading Art with a capital A.” Caprice No. 5 in A minor Paganini It is difficult to overstate the shock value and mysticism that enswathed Niccolò Paganini during his lifetime. Alternately rumored to be a murderer, seducer, escaped convict, and devil dealer, Paganini and the lore surrounding his performances and origins reinvented the notion of virtuosity and wrested newfound celebrity for the performer-composer class. The myth of Paganini fed on itself, with one contemporary report claiming that three hundred of his listeners were “in the hospital suffering from over-enchantment.” But the PR-savvy Paganini also fanned the flames of his own mystique, as well; he reportedly won his Stradivarius on a bet that he could sight-read a piece that no other violinist could play with practice, and he kept his music secret by refraining from publishing, performing from memory, and only giving cues — not playing — in rehearsals, so that in concert his collaborators were as floored as his audiences. The only solo violin music that he did issue during his lifetime were his unthinkably virtuosic 24 Caprices, which he only allowed in print to prove that no one else could play them. The two dozen numbers test (and redefined) the limits of violin technique, and in the Fifth Caprice in A minor, unrelenting staccato at breakneck velocity is bookended by dizzying cadenzas that arc across the instrument’s massive range. Moto perpetuo Paganini Compared with Poulenc’s easygoing three-movement set, Paganini’s Moto perpetuo, Op. 11 is the more archetypal of the two. Just as a perpetual motion machine is a physical impossibility that has teased scientists over the centuries, Paganini’s unending stream of machine-gun sixteenth notes invites the tantalizing sensation of witnessing the impossible. Dance Variations on a Mozart Theme Mangani Mangani’s delightfully imaginative Dance Variations on a Mozart Theme — namely, that of the finale of Mozart’s Clarinet Quintet, K. 581, also a theme and variations movement — effectively suggests a tongue-in-cheek alternative ending to that great Quintet, one that has been updated to reflect some dance styles familiar to more modern audiences. Mangani begins by presenting Mozart’s theme intact, albeit reorchestrated for the organ-like clarinet choir, before filtering it through seven dance variations: a dainty Viennese waltz, a panicked tarantella (an Italian dance derived from the hysteria following a spider bite), rag-time, sultry tango, lazy swing, cool bossa nova, and a racing Czárdás of the Hungarian folk style. Verdiana Mangani Mangani’s Verdiana plays on a robust 19th-century tradition of opera paraphrases in clarinet music; clarinetistcomposers engaged by Verdi and Mascagni would milk the instrument’s pyrotechnic capabilities to create dazzling fantasies on beloved opera themes for advertising purposes. The genre’s firework displays of virtuosity were well-suited for the contemporary appetite for Paganini-style showmen, and Verdi gladly released his music to the likes of Luigi Bassi and Donatello Lovreglio for recomposition, himself profiting from the publicity of their opera fantasy performances. But whereas 19th-century opera fantasies concentrated on popular numbers from one opera at a time, Mangani’s Verdiana subsumes several of Verdi’s most famous scores, and reads like a “greatest hits” catalogue of his most beloved arias.