Presidential Chamber Music Series II- String Quartets

Mon, 11/15/2010 - 7:30pm
Free
Macey Center - Directions


Sponsored by

Violist Willy Sucre will be joined by violinists LP How, and Roberta Arruda with cellist Sally Guenther, performing works by Haydn, Boccherini, and Mendelssohn.

The program should include:

 String Quartet in B Flat Major Op. 76 No. 4

"Sunrise"

by Franz Joseph Haydn

 I. Allegro con spirito

II. Adagio

III. Menuetto: Allegro

IV. Finale: Allegro, ma non troppo

 

Franz Joseph Haydn was born on March 31, 1732 in Robrau, Austria. After his second immensely successful visit to London, in 1795 he returned to Vienna with several new elements integrated into his writing. When Count Joseph Erdödy asked Haydn for a set of quartets, the sixty-four-year-old composer brought to the task his newly developed musical outlook, along with forty years of continuous growth and maturation in writing for the medium.  Composed in 1796 and 1797, the six quartets of Op. 76 were dedicated to Count Erdödy and published in 1799. 

In the view of many, op. 76, No. 4 is the finest among Haydn’s eighty-three quartets. Rarely, if ever, did he equal its luminous spirituality and depth of feeling. Perhaps Haydn intended this quartet, with its prominent viola part, for his own use, since he was also an avid quartet violist. The nickname, “Sunrise,” widely accepted in America and England but seldom used elsewhere, comes from the very opening of the quartet where the first violin traces a loving curve of ascent above a soft, sustained chord, much as the sun gloriously rises to bathe the earth in its radiance. Haydn died tens years later on May 31, 1809 in Vienna.

Notes adapted from Melvin Berger's Guide to Chamber Music.

 

 

String Quartet in A Major Op. 6, No.6

by Luigi Boccherini

 I.  Allegro brillante

II. Amoroso

III. Allegro Maestoso

 

Luigi Boccherini was born on February 19, 1743, the son of a professional musician who was the first double bassist to perform solo concerts. The elder Boccherini started to give his son cello lessons when the boy was five years old. When the boy made his first public appearance it was conceded that he had already surpassed his teacher's skills and he was sent to Rome. After one year in Rome, Luigi and his father were summoned to Vienna, where they were hired by the Imperial Theater Orchestra.

Boccherini's compositions were first published when he was 17 years old. In 1765 Boccherini and his father went to Milan. It was there that he wrote his first string quartet. In the same year, the ill health that would plague Boccherini all his life began to take its toll. The composer endured a further blow in 1766 when his father died. Boccherini and violinist Filippo Manfredi toured Italy in 1767 and made their way to Paris, where they became a sensation. In Paris, Boccherini published a number of notable works, including a set of six string quartets. Following his successes there, Boccherini began writing and publishing prolifically.

In 1769 Boccherini and Manfredi journeyed to Spain, where the composer enjoyed great acclaim. He became best known for his works, written for string quartet with an additional cello. Now enjoying the benefits of a steady job, Boccherini married in 1771. In 1785 both his wife and his Spanish patron died, leaving Boccherini without a position.

In 1787 Boccherini remarried. In 1796 he entered into an arrangement with publisher, composer, and piano manufacturer Ignaz Pleyel, who both praised and published Boccherini's works while cheating him of income. In 1802 two of his daughters died from an epidemic within a few days of each other. In 1804 both his wife and his only living daughter died. It seems clear that Boccherini, although he continued to compose up to the end, had little interest in living, and died on May 28, 1805 of what was described as pulmonary suffocation.

Notes adapted from the All Music Guide on Answers.com.

 

I N T E R M I S S I O N

 

 String Quartet in E Flat Major, Op. 12

                                                         by Felix Mendelssohn    

 I. Adagio non troppo; Allegro non tardante

II. Canzonetta: Allegretto

III. Canzonetta: Allegretto

IV. Andante espressivo

IV. Molto allegro e vivace

 

Felix Mendelssohn was born on February 3, 1809 in Hamburg and died on November 4, 1847 in Leipzig. Few composers were born with as much musical aptitude, if not genius, as Mendelssohn, and few achieved as much success and recognition during their lifetimes.

Mendelssohn started life as part of a wealthy and cultured family; his father, Abraham, was a prominent banker and his grandfather, Moses, a noted philosopher. When Felix was three years old the family fled French-occupied Hamburg and settled in Berlin, where their lavish home became a gathering place for the world’s most outstanding artists, intellectuals, and social leaders. As a very young child, Mendelssohn displayed amazing musical ability—perfect pitch, the ability to recognize any note or combination of notes that he heard, and a phenomenal musical memory. His mother gave him his first piano lessons, and at age nine he made his concert debut. In the same year, his choral setting of the Nineteenth Psalm was performed in public. From that time on, he began composing in earnest.

He started his three-year past-university tour of Europe by sailing to England in April 1829. In a letter written to his sister Fanny on September 10, he said, “My quartet [Op. 12] is now in the middle of the last movement, and I think it will be completed in a few days.” The work carries the lowest opus number of his quartets because it was published before Op. 13, which was actually written two years earlier.

Notes adapted from Melvin Berger's Guide to Chamber Music.

 

Time, date, and program subject to change.

 

BIOGRAPHIES

 

WILLY SUCRE, Viola, was born in La Paz, Bolivia, Willy Sucre studied at the Conservatorio Nacional de Música in La Paz, Colby College Chamber Music Institute in Waterville, Maine, Mannes School of Music in New York, and Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, Maryland. Sucre has been conductor and music director of the Albuquerque Philharmonic Orchestra, assistant conductor and principal violist of the Canada Symphony Orchestra in Montreal, assistant conductor and assistant principal violist of the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra, principal violist and guest conductor of the National Symphony of Bolivia, principal violist and guest conductor of the Albuquerque Chamber Orchestra, and principal violist and guest conductor of the Chamber Orchestra of La Paz. This past year Sucre performed with  the Albuquerque Chamber Orchestra as viola soloist.  In the summer of 2004 he performed as viola soloist in three concerts in Cochabamba and La Paz, Bolivia.

Currently, Sucre is a member of the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra and is the driving force behind the "Willy Sucre & Friends" concerts.

 During the summer, Sucre travels throughout South America to pursue his major interests, which are to find new works of chamber music by modern composers and to encourage composers both here and in South America to write new pieces, especially piano quartets. He enjoys playing with other musicians and ensembles of diverse instrumentation. As a chamber musician, Sucre was the founder of the Cuarteto Boliviano and guest violist with various chamber music ensembles, and for ten years the violist of the Helios String Quartet. His experience includes extensive chamber music concerts, lectures and school demonstrations, CD recordings, and television performances throughout South, Central, and North America.

 

Liang-Ping How, began studying violin at the age of four and continued his studies at the Interlochen Arts Academy and with Jaime Laredo at the Curtis Institute of Music. How made his solo debut with the National Youth Orchestra of Taiwan at the age of seven and his Carnegie Hall debut in 1974 with the New York String Orchestra under Alexander Schneider. He has been a member of the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra since 1980, appearing both as member and soloist and often leading the group as concertmaster. He has toured extensively throughout North and South America, Europe, and Asia with Orpheus, among other ensembles, and has recorded on numerous occasions with Orpheus for the Deutsche Grammophon label.

How is an active soloist and chamber musician.  He performed as soloist with Orpheus playing the Bruch violin concerto and the Morzart G major with the New Mexico Symphony. How's chamber music activities have included performances at the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Grand Teton Music Festival, Spoleto, Caramoor Music Festival, the Lockenhaus Festival, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He also appeared with the New York Philomusica at the International Music Festival of Sofia and with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

How currently resides in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he is a member of the Santa Fe Opera Orchestra and the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival. He plays an 1863 J.B. Vuillaume. How will be performing with Willy Sucre & Friends on November 14, 2010.

 

 ROBERTA ARRUDA, Violin, was born in Joao Pessoa, Brazil and began playing the violin during a sojourn in the US when she was ten. She holds a Bachelor´s degree in music from Unicamp, Brazil, and recently completed a Master´s in Performance at the University of New Mexico (UNM). She spent two years at the Budapest Music Academy on a full-scholarship from Vitae Foundation from Sao Paulo, and later studied with Rudolf Koeckert from the Munich Hochschule für Musik und Kunst.

Arruda took part in the most relevant festivals in Brazil, and has played in masterclasses for musicians such as Leon Spierer, Guy Braunstein and Menahem Pressler. In the US she attended the Colorado College Music Festival, a full-scholarship program. She holds prizes from national competitions in Brazil and has appeared as a soloist not only in her home country with several orchestras, such as the Sergipe Symphony Orchestra and Experimental Repertoire Orchestra, but also abroad, in Romania and the US.

Arruda recorded the “Concertino for Violin and Orchestra” by Ernst Mahle with the Campinas Youth Orchestra in 2006.

In New Mexico, she has been a regular at Church of Beethoven performing chamber music and solos, and can be heard in many ensembles in the state, such as Santa Fe Pro Musica and Santa Fe Symphony. In 2008 she won an audition and held a one year position with the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra. She has soloed with the UNM Symphony Orchestra as a Concerto Competition winner and with the Albuquerque Philharmonic.

She is currently studying baroque violin interpretation, completing Suzuki and String Pedagogy training at UNM and teaching at the Lab School. Arruda will be performing with Willy Sucre & Friends on September 17, 2010 and November 14, 2010.

 

Sally Guenther, Cellist graduated from Indiana University and The Juilliard School with her B.M. and M.M. degrees, studying with Janos Starker and Harvey Shapiro. After playing in several American orchestras including Syracuse, Cincinnati, and the Metropolitan Opera orchestras, she moved to Norway, where she served as alternating solo cellist in the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra for over twenty years. During that time she was an active soloist and chamber musician, and served as cello professor on the faculty of the Grieg Academy of Music in Bergen. She was also one of the founding members of the contemporary ensemble BIT 20 which tours and records extensively throughout Europe and Asia.

In 2004 she settled in New Mexico with her artist husband, Janis Mintiks and their three Samoyeds. She has performed regularly with the Santa Fe Opera, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Taos Chamber Music Group, Serenata of Santa Fe, and in numerous chamber music festivals throughout the New Mexico/Colorado area.  She maintains a cello studio in Santa Fe.

Guenther will be performing with Willy Sucre & Friends on November 14, 2010.