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Emerson Quartet launches Oberlin series with its own farewell concert (Sept. 22)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Photo: Abe Frato

Nearing the end of their distinguished 47-year run with only one change of personnel, the Emerson String Quartet bid adieu to its local fans in a nostalgic yet festive program that launched Oberlin’s Artist Recital Series on Friday, September 22 in Finney Chapel.

The Emersons (Philip Setzer and Eugene Drucker — who have always shared first violin duties — violist Lawrence Dutton, and cellist Paul Watkins — who replaced David Finckel for the past decade) gave the capacity audience parting gifts of Mendelssohn, Sarah Kirkland Snider, and Beethoven. Plus an exquisite Bach chorale arrangement which should linger long in many listeners’ memories. [Read more…]

Emersons Revisit Oberlin on Farewell Tour: a conversation with violinist Philip Setzer

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 by Daniel Hathaway

After 47 years of touring, the Emerson String Quartet will be retiring as an ensemble this season, but not before revisiting the Oberlin Artist Recital Series during a farewell tour. (L-R: Philip Setzer, Eugene Drucker, Paul Watkins, Lawrence Dutton.)

On Friday, September 22 at 7:30 pm in Finney Chapel, the Emersons will play Felix Mendelssohn’s Quartet No. 2 in a, Sarah Kirkland Snider’s Drink the Wild Ayre, and Ludwig van Beethoven’s Quartet No. 13 in B-flat and Große Fuge. Tickets can be purchased online.

I caught up with violinist and Cleveland native Philip Setzer — both of whose parents were violinists in The Cleveland Orchestra — via Zoom to talk about the group’s four and a half decades on the road and its plans for this season’s grand finale.

Daniel Hathaway: I’m really pleased to have the opportunity to chat with you at the end of your long, distinguished run with the Emerson, having had a small part in launching your career by presenting the quartet on the Gund Concert Series at Groton School way back in 1976. We were looking for an exciting new ensemble of young musicians who would connect well with high school age students, and you were all fresh out of Juilliard and making waves by alternating first and second violins.

Philip Setzer: And here we are 47 years later and those kids are all like 60, right? Crazy, isn’t it? We’ve got quite a farewell season lined up. [Read more…]

Wu Han, Philip Setzer, and David Finckel: spirited Schubert at CCMS (Sep. 13)

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by Stephanie Manning

After more than a decade spent together as an ensemble, Wu Han, Philip Setzer, and David Finckel have become very familiar with certain pieces. And they’re determined to make sure those works only get better with age. On September 13, the pianist, violinist, and cellist opened the 73rd season of the Cleveland Chamber Music Society with a staple in their repertory — Franz Schubert’s two piano trios.

The group recorded both pieces for an album in 2008 and have performed them frequently, including in a concert for the Cleveland Chamber Music Society more than ten years ago. After all this time, they still manage to make things feel fresh.

[Read more…]

Old friends return for 73rd season of Cleveland Chamber Music Society

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by Daniel Hathaway

When you’ve been booking visiting chamber ensembles for seven decades, you develop some special relationships that regularly bring audience favorites back to town.

The first performers on the Cleveland Chamber Music Society’s calendar this season definitely qualify for re-invitable artist status. On Tuesday, September 13 at 7:30 pm, CCMS will present Wu Han, Philip Setzer, and David Finckel in a program of Schubert’s two piano trios in Kulas Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music.

ClevelandClassical.com has conducted multiple interviews over the years with each member of the trio. Here are excerpts from conversations in March of 2010 that give some memorable insights into the lives of three touring musicians.

In March of 2010, we interviewed each of the musicians prior to their performance of Schubert trios on the CCMS series at Fairmount Temple Auditorium. We reached David Finckel in Vienna, Wu Han in New York between rehearsals, and spoke with Philip Setzer soon after he returned from Europe.

We began by asking cellist David Finckel about the recording of the Schubert piano trios the ensemble had just completed. What did he do to prepare for the sessions? [Read more…]

DIARY: Tuesday, July 13, 2021

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by Stephanie Manning

TONIGHT IN-PERSON AND ONLINE:

The Oberlin-Como Piano Festival begins tonight at 7:00, presented online as part of Oberlin’s Stage Left Series. The Day 1 program, Piano Concerti of Beethoven and Brahms, will include an interview with Yefim Bronfman followed by performances and master classes with Anastasia Vorotnaya, Xiaoyu Liu, Leonardo Pierdomenico, and Yangrui Cai. Tune in here, and learn more about the festival in this preview article.

And at 8:00 in Cleveland Heights, Apollo’s Fire will feature harpsichordist Jeannette Sorrell and violinists Olivier Brault, Alan Choo, and Emi Tanabe in an energetic program of Bach, Vivaldi, and Telemann. Tickets are available here.

IN THE NEWS:

The Cleveland Institute of Music is welcoming three new members to the conservatory faculty (pictured). They are violinist Philip Setzer of the Emerson String Quartet and two Cleveland Orchestra musicians: assistant concertmaster Jessica Lee and principal horn Nathaniel Silberschlag. All are recruiting students for 2022-23, and Silberschlag will co-teach with CIM’s head of the horn department and Cleveland Orchestra principal horn emeritus, Richard King.

TODAY’S ALMANAC:

Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg was obsessed with the number thirteen — notable, then, that he died on this day in 1951, a Friday the 13th, at the age of 76 (7+6 = 13). For a concise introduction to his life and works, check out this ten-minute YouTube video by Samuel Andreyev.

Schoenberg is best known for his use of a compositional technique called twelve-tone serialism, which can create a dissonant or “scary” sound. Learn more about this system and its evolution in this article in The New York Times. Even before he finalized the technique, Schoenberg embraced atonality in his earlier works, such as Pierrot Lunaire. Listen (and watch) a fantastic performance by the Israeli Chamber Project on YouTube here.

Despite Schoenberg’s lasting association with serialism, many of his works also incorporated classical forms and techniques. A great example is his Piano Concerto, which soloist Kirill Gerstein performed with The Cleveland Orchestra in 2017. In our preview for that performance, we interviewed Gerstein, who explained that “there’s a lot of dance in the concerto. There’re some waltzes, some gavottes, and some marches — really traditional musical references.”

The Cleveland Orchestra will perform Schoenberg’s Piano Concerto again on February 24-26, 2022 — this time with pianist Mitsuko Uchida. Franz Welser-Möst will conduct the program, which also includes Brucker’s Symphony No. 9.

Just like Schoenberg’s music itself, the story behind the Piano Concerto is complicated. He was commissioned to write it by one of his students at UCLA, Oscar Levant, who thought it would be a short composition — but Schoenberg fleshed it out into four movements, charging Levant an exorbitant sum which he then refused to pay. Though Levant eventually relented, it was another student of Schoenburg, Eduard Steuermann, who premiered the work in 1944.

Photo of glass armonica

And on this date in 1762, Benjamin Franklin announced the creation of a new instrument (pictured). Inspired by the sounds produced by swirling a wet finger around the rim of a wine glass, Franklin worked with a glassmaker to create a series of spinning glass bowls he named the armonica. The instrument became so popular that it was featured in compositions by Beethoven, Mozart, and Donizetti, but it was largely forgotten by the 1820s.

Franklin ultimately made no money from the construction of more than 5,000 armonicas, because he refused to patent or copyright any of his inventions. He explained the reason why in his autobiography:

“As we enjoy great Advantages from the Inventions of others we should be glad of an Opportunity to serve others by any Invention of ours, and this we should do freely and generously.”

Kent Blossom Music Festival: Emerson String Quartet (July 18)

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by Nicholas Stevens

After the Emerson String Quartet’s performance with cellist Jerry Grossman at Kent State University last week, audience members exited Ludwig Recital Hall to find an extraordinary reception laid out. Food and drink of diverse tastes, textures, and temperatures lined half a dozen tables. It felt like a metaphor for the concert: so rich and extensive that to describe it is to make it sound excessive. Despite its duration and emotional range, however, the concert itself never felt overstuffed. It went down smoothly, like an expertly arranged and executed feast. [Read more…]

Kent/Blossom Music Festival: a conversation with the Emerson Quartet’s Philip Setzer

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by Delaney Meyers

On Wednesday, July 18 at 7:30 pm, The Emerson String Quartet will perform with cellist Jerry Grossman in Ludwig Recital Hall as part of Kent/Blossom Music Festival’s 50th anniversary concert season. I spoke with Philip Setzer, violinist of the Emerson, by telephone and asked about the program and his personal connections with KBMF as an alumnus. The Quartet is this year’s Kulas Guest Artist.

Setzer said that “the theme, if there is one, is of loss and mourning, but also a celebration of life.” The all-20th century first half will open with the adagio from Barber’s string quartet, a work that is very meaningful to the ensemble. Setzer said that the string orchestra version, known as Adagio for Strings, “has become iconic as a piece of national and international mourning.” [Read more…]

Kent/Blossom Music Festival to celebrate its 50th Anniversary

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by Daniel Hathaway

SepulvedaWith less than two weeks to go before students in the 50th Kent/Blossom Music Festival descend on the Kent State University campus for five weeks of rehearsals, master classes, and coachings, festival director Ricardo Sepulveda is close to solving the annual puzzle of scheduling daily activities for 43 students and 30 faculty members — mostly from The Cleveland Orchestra. “It keeps me up at night,” he said in a recent telephone conversation.

This summer’s students (16 of whom are international, hailing from Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, Japan, and Colombia) will arrive on July 1 and begin their experience with a dinner for participants, faculty, donors, and host families who will house eight of the students. “Rehearsals, coachings, and lessons start right up the next day,” Sepulveda said.

Recruitment began in mid-winter. “I changed the process a bit, shortening it to end before the first of March. Instead of print, we did online promotion using the Violin Channel and Facebook, which allows us to reach people faster,” he said, noting that the Festival is now old enough that it’s fun to see students of former students applying. Once they settle in at Kent, there are busy days ahead. [Read more…]

Cleveland Chamber Music Society: Wu Han, Setzer & Finckel at Fairmount (Mar. 23)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Finckel-WuHan-Setzer2Pianist Wu Han, violinist Philip Setzer, and cellist David Finckel — the No-Name trio who like to keep it that way — have been offering performances of Beethoven’s complete piano trios for several years now. That repertoire takes up two complete concert programs, and presenters have been given their choice of several formats.

[Read more…]

Cleveland Chamber Music Society: Two Nights, Six Trios — a conversation with Wu Han and David Finckel

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by Mike Telin

WuHan-Setzer-Finckel“Beethoven’s six piano trios are important touch points in his development as a composer,” pianist Wu Han said during a telephone conversation. “Hearing all of them is the equivalent of hearing all of the string quartets — not only is it a rich and unusual experience, but you become a different listener.”

Thanks to the Cleveland Chamber Music Society, audiences will have the opportunity to hear all six trios when Wu Han, violinist Philip Setzer, and cellist David Finckel perform them on two adjacent nights at Fairmount Temple.

On Monday, March 26 at 7:30 pm, the program includes Op. 1, Nos. 1 and 3, and Op. 70, No. 1 (“Ghost”). The following evening — same time — you can hear Op. 1, No. 2, Op. 70, No. 2, and Op. 97 (“Archduke”). Tickets are available online.

The pianist said that hearing the three trios that make up Opus 1 will help listeners understand Beethoven in a deeper way. “He made his debut in Vienna with them. They were played in one evening and Haydn was there. Each of the three are completely different, but it was the most innovative piano trio writing of that time. He pushed the art form forward. You gain a sense of the evolution of the art form in Opus 70, and of course Opus 97 set the stage for the trios of Brahms, Mendelssohn, and Dvořák.”

[Read more…]

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