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The Paul Dresher Ensemble
Saturday, September 13, 2008, 7:30 p.m.
The Paul Dresher Ensemble interprets the ideas and sounds of today's most innovative and irreverent composers. With energy, virtuosity and incredible attention to the theatrical dimensions of performance, it produces and tours its own works of opera and experimental music theater (developed in collaboration with Obie Award-winning performer Rinde Eckert), and as the Electro-Acoustic Band performs the work of an amazing range of contemporary composers with instrumentation that combines traditional acoustic and contemporary electronic instruments. Virtuoso solo performers like Terry Riley, Joan Jeanrenaud and David Abel frequently join the Electro-Acoustic Band for concerts that redefine contemporary chamber music.
The program includes FUSEBOX, a "progressive rock n' roll meets contemporary art music" composition by the Conservatory's James Mobberley, Curator's Professor of Music Composition and former Interim Dean, Dresher's Chorale Times Two (the 2nd movement of Concerto for Violin and Electro-Acoustic Band) Din of Iniquity, and Ingram Marshall's In Deserto Black Rock,, and the world premiere of a work commissioned from Gyan Riley.
This concert is partially underwritten by Steven M. Karbank.
Borealis Wind Quintet
Saturday, September 27, 2008, 7:30 p.m.
The Borealis Wind Quintet has been acclaimed as one of America's preeminent chamber ensembles. The highest musical integrity, irresistible energy and five-fold charisma distinguish Borealis in the chamber music field. Audiences love their exquisite programming that includes the finest of the classics, engaging commissions, opera arias, and works for piano and winds.
The Washington Post praised their "sensitive collaborations that have a sophisticated and cosmopolitan air." Peter G. Davies of The New York Times described one concert as "a polished, elegantly turned performance...each work received lively, expert and musicianly treatment by this skilled and exceptionally talented chamber group." Joseph Horowitz of The New York Times describes "lively communicative readings... the performance was a scintillating one." The Philadelphia Inquirer writes, "they demonstrated the sort of rapport that characterizes the very best chamber playing." The program includes Gavotte with Six Doubles, Jean-Philippe Rameau and Potpourri Fantastico (Sul Barbieri de Siviglia del Rossini) by Guilio Briccialdi.
Battleworks Dance Company
Saturday, October 25, 2008, 7:30 p.m.
Robert Battle formed this company of eight dancers in 2001 as a platform for his choreography and as a home for dancers to work and grow. The company premiered August 2002, at the World Dance Alliance's Global Assembly in Düsseldorf, Germany. Selected as the American representatives to the festival, the company was chosen for its unique outlook on the future of modern dance. Since then, Battleworks has continued to perform nationally and internationally at Dance Theater Workshop, the Joyce Theater, Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival and the International Baltic Ballet Festival, among others. According to Joy Goodwin of The New York Sun, "Mr. Battle makes an audience sit up and take notice, marvel, even laugh. His work reaches over the edge of the stage and communicates with people." Battle will have a residency with Conservatory dance students.
Formosa Quartet
Saturday, January 31, 2009, 7:30 p.m.
Formosa is the name the Portuguese gave to the island of Taiwan and means beautiful. The original formation of the quartet with cellist Ru Pei Yeh was completely Taiwanese. The group came together in late December 2002 for a tour of Taiwan with no idea that it would stay together afterwards. The process of how the members evolved into the quartet might be likened to being in a drizzling rain. Members note, "You get wetter and wetter by imperceptible degrees and at some point-though it's hard to say when-you are drenched. After the tour we simply took every opportunity of playing together that we could find and three and a half years later found ourselves with the responsibilities and challenges of a 'real' quartet." Winners of the prestigious 2006 Tenth London International String Quartet Competition, the young group has drawn high praise. Andrew Lindemann Malone wrote in The Washington Post, "The Formosa's sound is fastidious but energetic...Intonation was wonderfully precise; in the Mozart Quartet No. 23, K. 590, the Strads rang out with perfectly centered harmonies." Their program includes Bedrich Smetana's String Quartet No. 1 in E Minor, (From My Life), composed in 1876 and Shih-Hui Chen's String Quartet No. 5, Mei-Hua which was written for the Formosa Quartet in 2007.
This concert is underwritten by the James and Vera Olson Fund for the Arts.
Hung-Kuan Chen
Saturday, March 21, 2009, 7:30 p.m.
Hung-Kuan Chen is one of the great personalities of the music world: enigmatic, brilliant and versatile. He is a pianist of uncompromising individuality and a remarkably inspiring pedagogue. Born in Taipei and raised in Germany, Mr. Chen's early studies fostered strong roots in Germanic Classicism, which he tempered with the sensibility of Chinese philosophy. The result is a dynamic and imaginative artistry. Furthermore, he is regarded as an extraordinary interpreter of Beethoven's music. One of the most decorated pianists of his generation, Mr. Chen won top prizes in the Arthur Rubinstein, the Busoni and the Geza Anda International Piano Competitions, along with prizes in the Queen Elisabeth, Montreal, Van Cliburn, and Chopin International Competition; he is also the recipient of the Avery Fisher Career grant. He has appeared in the music capitals of Asia, Europe and the Americas and collaborated with many major orchestras including Houston, Baltimore, Israel, Montréal, Pittsburgh, the Tonhalle, San Francisco and Shanghai. Mr. Chen has performed with highly esteemed conductors Hans Graf, Christoph Eschenbach, George Cleve, Josef Silverstein, Andrew Parrett and Sui Lan; and colleagues including Yo-Yo Ma, Cho-Liang Lin, Roman Totenberg, Denes Zsigmondy, Bion Tsang, Anthony Gigliotti, David Shifrin, and Laurence Lesser and pianists Tema Blackstone and Pi-hsien Chen.
April 25, 2009, Finale Concert, Mahler's Second Symphony
Saturday, April 25, 2009, 7:30 p.m.
Community of Christ Auditorium, 1001 W. Walnut, Independence, MO
Signature Series culminates with the 100-piece Conservatory Orchestra led by the esteemed Mahler specialist Robert Olson. Gustav Mahler's music is recognized as the height of the Austro-German symphonic tradition and the great précis of the late Romantic epoch. Mahler himself conducted the Second Symphony, or Resurrection Symphony as it is also known, thirteen times and chose it for his farewell concert in Vienna, marking the end of his ten-year stint as the Vienna Opera's director. Mahler constantly explored the themes of death and life, in that order, in his music, and it is no accident that the incredibly uplifting Second Symphony-especially for its finale sung by the Conservatory Choir-has emerged as his most beloved symphony of the canon.
The Signature Series is partially underwritten by the Richard J. Stern Foundation for the Arts-Commerce Bank, Trustee.
Artists and repertoire are subject to change.
