Orpheus Chamber Orchestra

Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847), A Midsummer Night’s DreamOp. 21/61, (1842,1861), (arr. Andreas Tarkmann)

  1. Ouvertüre
  2. Scherzo
  3. Elfenmarsch
  4. Elfenlied
  5. Intermezzo
  6. Notturno
  7. Hochzeitsmarsch
  8. Trauermarsch
  9. Tanz der Rüpel (Clowns)
  10. Finale

Intermission

Othmar Schoeck (1886-1957) Summer NightPastoral Intermezzo for Strings, Op. 58, (1945)

Ludwig Van Beethoven (1770-1827)/Mahler (1860-1911), String Quartet in F Minor, Op. 95 “Serioso” (1810), (arr. Gustav Mahler)

1. Allegro con brio
2. Allegretto ma non troppo
3. Allegro assai vivace ma serioso
4. Larghetto espressivo

**The New York premiere of Schoeck’s Sommernacht, (Summer Night), an astonishingly beautiful piece. See below.**

 

WQXR HOST:  Jeff Spurgeon

Orpheus Chamber Orchestra

A standard-bearer of innovation and artistic excellence, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra is one of the world’s foremost chamber orchestras. Julian Fifer and a group of like-minded young musicians determined to combine the intimacy and warmth of a chamber ensemble to the richness of an orchestra founded Orpheus in 1972.  With 71 albums, including the Grammy Award-winning Shadow Dances: Stravinsky Miniatures, and 42 commissioned and premiered original works, Orpheus rotates musical leadership roles for each work and strives to perform diverse repertoire through collaboration and open dialogue.

Performing without a conductor, Orpheus presents an annual series at Carnegie Hall and tours extensively to major national and international venues. For the 2017-18 Season at Carnegie Hall Orpheus welcomes back Grammy-winning pianist André Watts for Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 9. The Norwegian cellist Truls Mørk makes his long-awaited Orpheus debut with Shostakovich’s First Cello Concerto, a fascinating product of Soviet Russia that embeds a core of yearning and struggle within a facade of whimsy and humor. In February, Orpheus welcomes Norway’s young trumpet sensation Tine Thing Helseth, featuring concertos by Vivaldi and Albinoni, as well as Mozart’s popular Symphony No. 40. The season closes with Georgian violinist Lisa Batiashvili performing Prokofiev’s Second Violin Concerto, a powerful yet vulnerable work created while the composer teetered between his life of exile in Europe and a return to his transformed homeland.

Orpheus has trademarked its signature mode of operation, the Orpheus Process™, an original method that places democracy at the center of artistic execution. It has been the focus of studies at Harvard and of leadership seminars at Morgan Stanley and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Hospital, among others. Two unique education and engagement programs, Access Orpheus and Orpheus Institute, aim to bring this approach to students of all ages.

Access Orpheus, Orpheus’ educational initiative, shares the orchestra’s collaborative music-making process with public school students from all five boroughs in New York City. Because of declining resources for arts education, many public schools do not have access to fulltime arts teachers to provide music instruction and exposure to art and culture. Access Orpheus helps to bridge this gap with in-class visits, attendance at working rehearsals, and free tickets for performances at Carnegie Hall.

Orpheus Institute brings the Orpheus Process™ and the orchestra’s musicians to select colleges, universities, conservatories, and businesses to work directly with leaders of tomorrow. Corporate employees and students in all fields of study learn from Orpheus’ creative process and in areas of collaboration, communication, creative problem solving, and shared leadership. In the coming seasons, Orpheus will continue to share its leadership methods and performance practices as the ensemble provides audiences with the highest level of musicianship and programming.

“In sternheller Sommernacht ernten junge Landleute von dankbaren Empfindungen bewegt, das reife Kornfeld einer Waise oder Witwe, welche für diese Arbeitkeine Hilfe weiss.  Sichelrauschen, Jauchzen und Harmonikaklang verraten das fröhliche Treiben des alten, schönen Brauches, bis Morgenhähne, erwachende Vogelstimmen und Frühglocken die wackern, heimlichen Helfer zur eigenen, schweren Arbeit rufen.”

In a bright summer night, young peasants reap, moved by grateful sensations, the ripe grain of an orphan or widow, who knows no help for this work. Crescent noises, cheers and harmonica sound betray the cheerful activity of the old, beautiful custom, until morning cocks, awakening bird calls and early bells call the brave, secret helpers to their own, heavy work.