C o n t e m p o r a r y
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 9TH AT 3 PM
at La Maison Française
Admission: Free. However, a reservation is required.
The Curtis Institute
Contemporary Music Ensemble
Olivier Messiaen Centennial
Edgar Varèse 125th anniversary
A reception to meet the artists will follow the concert.
Program
(to be confirmed)
Olivier Messiaen:
- Oiseaux Exotiques
- Selections from Poèmes pour mi
Edgar Varèse:
- Densité 21.5
- Intégrales
- Octandre
- Hyperprism
"The Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia is one of best conservatories in the United States, and it periodically sends its orchestra to Carnegie Hall to make that point." -- The New York Times, May 2007
The Curtis Contemporary Music Ensemble studies, rehearses and performs music ranging from important twentieth-century works to contemporary composers’ music not yet borne into the repertoire. Open to all students, the ensemble is flexible in size and scope to include works for solo performers, chamber groups, and larger forces with conductor.
- Audio sample
This concert is organized in conjunction with the 2008 3genFestival. In a span of three months – from September 21st to December 16th – ten concerts, consisting entirely of wonderfully "challenging" contemporary music, will be presented at four of the most respected music venues in the Capital area: the Library of Congress, the National Gallery of Art, the Corcoran Gallery of Art, and La Maison Francaise.
Back to top
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 10TH AT 7:30 PM
at La Maison Française
Admission: $20
Tickets: www.instantseats.com
Musicians of the Paris Opera
Olivier Messiaen & Elliott Carter Centennials
A reception to meet the artists will follow the concert.
- Jérôme Julien-Laferrière: clarinet
- Thibault Vieux: violin
- Alexis Descharmes: cello
- Jean-Marie Cottet: piano
Elliott Carter: Sonata for cello and piano (1948)
- Gra for clarinet (1993)
- Figment for solo cello (1995)
- Statement – Remembering Aaron for solo violin (1999)
- Rhapsodic Musings for solo violin (2000)
- Con Leggerezza Pensosa for clarinet, violin and cello (1990)
- Two Diversions for solo piano (1999)
Olivier Messiaen: Quartet for the End of Time (1940-41)
"A sublime performance by a young string trio at the Embassy of France on Monday will linger long in this reviewer's memory. The program, played without intermission, consisted of 19 of Bach's 30 "Goldberg" Variations, transcribed from the harpsichord original. They were divided into four segments separated by unaccompanied sonatas: one each for violin (Nicolas Dautricourt), viola (Antoine Tamestit) and cello (Alexis Descharmes) by another German composer, Bernd Alois Zimmermann, who died in 1970 [...] Somehow the musicians' ultra-French style cogently underlined the regal Gallic bearing of Bach's towering masterpiece. Each variation issued with rounded sonic sweetness, dead-center rhythmic precision and ornaments as fine as Flemish lace. -- The Washinton Post, December 2004
Born in 1977, Alexis Descharmes studied at the Paris Conservatory from 1995 to 2000 in the classes of Michel Strauss and Philippe Muller (cello), Christian Ivaldi and Pierre-Laurent Aimard (chamber music) and Frédéric Durieux and Alain Louvier (analysis). From 1997 to 1999, he was a member of the European Union Youth Orchestra (Bernard Haitink), and the Academy of the 20th century of the Ensemble InterContemporain (Pierre Boulez). Winner of the Valentino Bucchi Competition in Rome (1997), the Avant-scènes Competition (1999), the Meyer Foundation for cultural and artistic development (2000) and the Banques Populaires Group Foundation (2002), Alexis Descharmes has been a member of the Court-circuit Ensemble since 1998, and of the ensemble 'Alternance' between 2000 and 2003. He has participated in numerous concerts and recordings with the ensemble 'Intercontemporain' and, in addition, is artistic director of 'Quaerendo invenietis', a chamber ensemble of variable forces that he founded while still a student. Alexis Descharmes has made numerous radio appearances on France musiques, as well as recording nearly twenty discs (Deutsche Grammophon, Accord, Naïve, Aeon, Assai, Intrada...), in solo or with the aforementioned ensembles with which he has performed at numerous festivals, in some thirty countries.
This concert is organized in conjunction with the 2008 3genFestival. In a span of three months – from September 21st to December 16th – ten concerts, consisting entirely of wonderfully "challenging" contemporary music, will be presented at four of the most respected music venues in the Capital area: the Library of Congress, the National Gallery of Art, the Corcoran Gallery of Art, and La Maison Francaise.
|
>> Nov. 9: The Curtis Institute |
Alexis Descharmes: cello
Jérôme Julien-Laferrière: clarinet