The new festival season offers 18 superb concerts featuring internationally renowned artists such as the Tokyo String Quartet, violinist James Ehnes, pianist Jean-Philippe Collard and jazz star Carol Welsman. The programme includes the complete Beethoven String Quartet cycle, a marathon of Russian music, music from France, tangos, Cuban jazz and much more.
The offerings also include some free concerts and lectures.
The offerings also include some free concerts and lectures.
The 16th Festival De Musique De Chambre De Montréal continues to May 28.
---
THE MONTREAL CHAMBER MUSIC FESTIVAL
16TH EDITION
MAY 5TH TO 28TH 2011
The Montreal Chamber Music Festival marks 16 years of excellence with a move to an exquisite new location – St. George’s Church, an architectural jewel located in the heart of Montreal directly across from Windsor Station.
With yearly events ranging from classical “greats” and world premieres to jazz and jeans and something in between, the Montreal Chamber Music Festival celebrates everything that makes music of all kinds the language of our emotions. For more than three weeks during the month of May, revel in 18 concerts dedicated to bringing you musical experiences of unparalleled beauty.
Through the broadcast voice of American Public Media and its 450 member supported Classical Music stations, Festival concerts are heard across North America by over six million listeners. But only 600 people per concert can share the experience of a Montreal Chamber Music Festival live performance in all its captivating immediacy.
Great artists, great music, unique programming, this is a Festival you must attend!
NEW FESTIVAL VENUE: ST. GEORGE’S CHURCH
(Across from Windsor Station – corner Peel and de la Gauchetière)
Metro Bonaventure
In the exquisite architectural jewel that is St. George’s Church, located in the heart of Montreal across from Windsor Station, at the corner of Peel and de la Gauchetière Denis Brott, Founder and Artistic Director of the Montreal Chamber Music Festival, unveiled details of the 16th season which will be held from Thursday, May 5th to Saturday, May 28th, 2011 and, for the first time, at St. George’s Church. The new home of the Festival is recognized as one of the most outstanding English Gothic Revival structures of its kind in Canada. This 600 seat space is ideally suited for chamber music. It is at once intimate, awe-inspiring and acoustically exceptional...AND THE SEATS ARE CUSHIONED! The interior of this church is of unparalleled beauty and the intimate atmosphere amidst this splendour will further enhance the experience of hearing some of the world’s greatest artists and discovering some who are about to be. Unique mixes of repertoire and artists are the hallmark of the award-winning Montreal Chamber Music Festival.
PROGRAM DETAILS
JAMES EHNES – CANADA’S MASTER VIOLINIST
TWO CONCERTS FEATURING THE ART OF JAMES EHNES AND THE MONTREAL
PREMIERE OF THE NEWLY FORMED JAMES EHNES PIANO TRIO
Thursday, May 5th: Canada’s Master Violinist
Now considered one of the world’s finest violinists, James Ehnes opens the Festival season joined by Canada’s 16 year-old piano sensation and newly signed Deutsche Grammophon recording artist Jan Lisiecki, in a performance of Saint-Saens excitingly virtuosic Violin Sonata and the majestic Hungarian inspired Brahms G Minor Piano Quartet with former St. Lawrence Quartet member Barry Shiffman on viola and Festival Founder Denis Brott as cellist.
Saturday, May 7th: Tchaikovsky, I Love You
Discover a truly theatrical multi-media event! Tchaikovsky, I Love You! Features veterans of the stage Albert Millaire and Danielle Proulx, two newcomers Francesca Bárcenas and Stéphan Allard and the Montreal premiere of the James Ehnes Trio animated by a newly written script by Quebec’s venerable Albert Millaire. This new theatrical text will interweave musical performance of works by Massenet (“Méditation” from the opera Thaïs), Debussy (Trio in G Major) and Tchaikovsky (Trio in A Minor) with text from letters of exchange between the composers and their Russian patroness Nadejda Filaretovna von Meck.
CELEBRATION BEETHOVEN!
THE COMPLETE STRING QUARTETS OF THE WORLD’S GREATEST COMPOSER
LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN IN A SIX CONCERT SERIES
Tuesday, May 10th, Wednesday, May 11th: Afiara String Quartet
Tuesday, May 17th, Wednesday, May 18th: Tokyo String Quartet
Tuesday, May 24th, Wednesday, May 25th: Chiara String Quartet
For the first time in over a decade Montrealers will have the experience of hearing the complete cycle of string quartets by Ludwig van Beethoven in a six concert series featuring one of the world’s greatest quartets, the Tokyo String Quartet, Canada’s own prize winning Afiara String Quartet and Harvard University’s exciting new quartet-in-residence the Chiara String Quartet. Every Tuesday and Wednesday during the Festival each of these great quartets will present two concerts featuring this amazing repertoire considered by all to be the pinnacle of string quartet repertoire.
FREE LECTURE @ 7 p.m. PRECEDING EACH BEETHOVEN CONCERTIn addition, and free with admission to any Beethoven concert, we offer a pre-concert lecture by Montreal’s esteemed musicologist and conteur, Richard Turp. Mr. Turp will enlighten you, sharing his insights for the program you are about to experience. Beethoven’s unique role, as the composer who brought western music from the classics into the romantics championing the Napoleonic ideals of Liberty, Fraternity and Equality, will be the subject of this musical excursion.
PIANO MADNESS: PIANO CHAMBER WORKS FROM BACH TO BARTOK
Saturday, May 14th: Competition Winners extraordinaire
The Festival often integrates remarkable young talents with seasoned professionals to create unique chamber ensembles. Hear tomorrow’s stars today in this concert devoted to amazing talent. At age 16 both Timothy Chooi, violin (Grand Prize winner of the 2010 OSM Standard Life Competition) and Conrad Tao, piano (winner of the prestigious Juilliard School of Music Gina Bachauer Piano Competition in 2006) are destined for great things. Hear them play Mozart’s Violin Sonata K. 304, Mozart’s Sonata for Piano Four-Hands in D Major, K.381 with Montreal’s own rising star protégé of André Laplante, Mehdi Ghazi (Canadian Music Competition 1st Prize Chamber Music winner) as well as the Canadian premiere of piano phenomenon Conrad Tao’s Three Songs. The concert closes with a performance of Mendelssohn’s youthful Trio in D Minor with Festival Director Denis Brott as cellist.
Thursday, May 19th: Piano madness: les maîtres françaisWorld renowned French master pianist Jean-Philippe Collard presents a piano soirée with music by Fauré, Debussy and Ravel concluding with the ever-popular Franck Violin Sonata partnering with Quebec’s brilliant violin virtuoso and former youngest-ever concertmaster of the OSM, Jonathan Crow. M. Collard will stay on in Montreal after his appearance at the Festival to be on the jury of the Montreal International Musical Competition. www.concoursmontreal.ca
Saturday, May 21st: Le Sacre du printemps & the Canadian Premiere of Pianist Ran Dank
Two international prize-winning pianists, Korean-American Soyeon Lee (First prize 2010 Naumburg International Piano Competition) and Israeli-American Ran Dank (Sander Buchman Memorial First Prize in the 2008-09 Young Concert Artists International Auditions and the 2006 Juilliard School of Music prestigious Gina Bachauer Scholarship) join forces to play works for four hands and for two pianos that changed the 20th century repertoire: Stravinsky’s Sacre du printemps (in the original four-hand version) and Bartok’s Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion (with OSM’s principal percussionist Serge Desgagnés and André Dufour). Both these first-prize winning pianists have already appeared with some of the world’s greatest performers and as soloist with some of the world’s most venerable orchestras and conductors despite being under age 30.
Thursday, May 26th: Variations and ConcertMontreal’s world renowned pianist David Jalbert scales the heights of one of Bach’s greatest keyboard
works, The Goldberg Variations, and after intermission American pianist Kevin Loucks joins forces
with violin super-star Rachel Barton Pine, and Canada’s 2010 Banff International String Quartet first-prize winner The Cecilia Quartet in a performance of the brilliant Concert for Violin, Piano and String Quartet by Ernest Chausson.
UNIQUE EXPERIENCES
Thursday, May 12th: The Swingle Singers
It has been over 20 years since this ground-breaking vocal octet visited Montreal. Recognized throughout the world as a phenomenon of a capella, the Swingle Singers will present a varied and entertaining program unlike any you have ever heard. Their repertoire runs the gamut from Bach and Vivaldi through Chopin and Tchaikovsky all the way to the Beatles. This will be an entertaining evening for the whole family!
Saturday, May 28th: Russian Passion: A Four-Hour Marathon
In keeping with a five-year tradition the Festival’s closing concert is, once again, a Marathon event. Hear four hours of some of the most exquisite and romantic Russian music ever written. A bevy of performers will allow you to bask in this amazing repertoire. Beginning at 6 p.m. the concert opens with the rarely heard Shostakovitch Octet featuring Canada’s own first-prize winning 2010 Banff Competition winners The Cecilia Quartet joined by the American Chiara Quartet. Hear Arensky’s haunting Trio in D minor Op. 32 with Rachel Barton Pine, Denis Brott and Kevin Loucks, revel in Rachmaninoff’s romantic Cello Sonata (recently recorded for CD release in the fall) with Canada’s brilliant cellist Denise Djokic and pianist David Jalbert. This Russian Marathon of Musical Passion ends the 2011 Festival season with Tchaikovsky’s ever-popular Souvenir de Florence.
TD JAZZ AND JEANS SERIES
TD Canada Trust presents,
TD JAZZ AND JEANS – A FOUR CONCERT FRIDAY NIGHT EXPERIENCE
Friday, May 6th: HOT SAX
The riveting ANDRÉ LEROUX SAX QUARTET features André Leroux, David Bellemare, Janis Stepran, Jean Fréchette and will be joined by Cuban percussionist Eugenio "Kiko" Osorio, and bassist Rémi-Jean Leblanc. The evening will include music by Thelonius Monk and Paquito D’Rivera, and a world-premiere work by Jean Fréchette. As well, as part of the Festival’s annual commitment to celebrating the compositions of Alexander Brott, the Quartet will perform his rarely heard, jazz-inspired piece entitled “Three Acts for Four Sinners”.
Friday, May 13th: CAROL WELSMAN TRIO
Fresh from sold-out appearances throughout North America including the Montreal Jazz Festival, the Carol Welsman Trio – Carol Welsman, vocalist, Marc Rogers, bass and Christian Pamerleau, drums. Carol will share her inimitable vocal style with our Festival audience.
Friday, May 20th: THE LORRAINE DESMARAIS TRIO
Quebec’s own jazz star Lorraine Desmarais, a Montreal favorite for over two decades, presents several original works as well as jazz standards. Lorraine Desmarais, piano, Frédéric Alarie, upright bass, and Camil Bélisle, drums. Don’t miss Quebec’s Great Lady of Piano Jazz.
Friday, May 27th: TANGO DU TERROIR
The sultry Tango rhythms of Argentina will raise the temperature of our audience as Quebec’s premiere tango artist Denis Plante and his Tango Boréal (Denis Plante, bandoneon, David Jacques, guitar and charango, Ian Simpson, doublebass) joined by Luis Lopez, a Cirque du Soleil artist, dancer/percussionist and Malambo (an acrobatic dance) virtuoso and a string quartet will perform works by Tango legend Astor Piazzolla as well as many Piazzolla inspired Tangos by Quebec composers in a hot evening.
FREE CONCERTS – NEW IN 2011
Les Brasseurs du Nord presents,
CONCERTS DANS LA RUE: FREE CONCERTS
After a hiatus of several years the Festival is delighted to announce it will once again be presenting free concerts as part of an initiative to expose more Montrealers to chamber music. With the newly created public performance stages in the Place des Arts just outside the entrance to the main halls, thousands of people will be able to experience Festival performances during peak periods prior to PDA concerts or just after work hours. Thanks to the generous support of Les Brasseurs du Nord, the Festival will create a Festival Brass Quintet especially for this occasion. Members will be drawn from the finest brass students studying at the Conservatoire de musique de Montréal with renowned trumpeter Manon Lafrance. Concerts will feature a wide variety of repertoire from the classics to popular tunes. Dates of these performances will be announced at a later time.
2011 GALA CONCERT GASTRONOMIQUE: APRIL 13TH AT 6:30 P.M. HOTEL OMNI
Under the distinguished patronage of John Paul Macdonald, Senior Vice President, Human Resources and Public Affairs, Bombardier Inc. the Festival will hold its annual Gala Concert and Silent Auction at the Hotel Omni Mont-Royal on Wednesday, April 13th at 6:30 p.m. Canada’s super-star soprano Karina Gauvin is joined by vocal pianist extraordinaire Michael McMahon for what is sure to be an unforgettable evening. Tables of ten at $4,000 as well as individual tickets at $400 are available through the Festival office only.
Montreal Chamber Music Festival: 514 489 7444 festivalmontreal@videotron.ca
www.festivalmontreal.org
No comments:
Post a Comment