by Daniel Hathaway
Violinist Andrew Sords will bring a new piece by Cleveland-born, New York-based composer Evan Fein (left) to his recital with Eriko Izumida on Sunday afternoon, April 15 at 3:00 pm at Valley Lutheran Church in Chagrin Falls. In addition to Beethoven’s “Kreutzer” Sonata, Schubert’s Rondo, and Sarasate’s Gypsy Airs, Sords’ program on the Chagrin Concert Series will feature the first performance of Fein’s Untranslatable (Violin Sonata No. 1).
In a telephone conversation from New York, where he teaches at the Juilliard School, Fein noted that he’s known Andrew Sords for years — the composer grew up in Richmond Heights and he and the violinist were in the same class at the Cleveland Institute of Music. Fein wrote a piece for Sords as his senior thesis, and years later, Sords commissioned Untranslatable, which Fein completed last summer.
I asked him where he got the idea for that title.