Ian Hobson, piano

SubCulture, New York, NY

February 19, 2020

Fantasy Pieces

Fantasiestücke, Op. 111

Fantasiestücke, Op. 12

Fantasia in C, Op. 17

Ian Hobson is a heroic completist. I admire the intellectual curiosity and physical stamina it takes to produce such investigations, for they allow us to perceive the larger context of a composer’s work, what I like to call the genetic resemblance among the works, what amounts to the personal fingerprint or style of that artist, possessed by no other.

Mr. Hobson kicked off his epic series exploring the complete solo piano music and piano-based chamber music of Robert Schumann on February 19th with an evening of ‘fantasy’ titled pieces. (Yes, I wish Schumann’s lieder were included in this series.) The word fantasie in German implies a free flight of the imagination, and this concept fueled so much of Schumann’s output, including pieces that don’t even bear such a title overtly. Interestingly, the pieces called fantasien are some of the most cogently structured in Schumann’s total oeuvre, usually three part A-B-A forms, often with codas of short or medium length.

Some general qualities of Hobson’s performance on this occasion, before I turn to details: He revealed the strength and architecture of every piece, through an unfussy approach. He didn’t automatically slow down the end of every phrase. He didn’t ‘perfume’ the music with a certain Victorian idea of ‘poetry.’ He didn’t treat the music like a museum piece, rather he plunged in with a headlong high energy that put things together.

I think Mr. Hobson performed as Master Raro, the third of Schumann’s personalities and the one who gets the least attention. Master Raro was the mediator between Florestan, the fiery impetuous soul, and Eusebius, the dreamy one. I sensed that Hobson identified with Florestan more, but then he’d do something so breathtaking, some little detail, often in a coda, that was sheer magic.

The recital began with the unjustly neglected late-period Fantasiestücke, Op. 111. Can we once and for all do away with the idea that late-period Schumann is the product of a feeble and disordered mind? The mind was doubtless wracked by mental illness, but it was far from feeble. These three pieces form an arch of sorts, with the most poignant one in the middle. The outer two are both in C minor, and they storm away, with distant references to Schumann’s detailed study of baroque counterpoint. In the middle work, which I regard as Schubert’s ‘seventh’ Moment Musical, the outer ‘A’ sections even resemble Schubert’s second Moment, with the same key, A-flat, and similar melodic rise and fall within a restricted compass. The reverie is interrupted by a contrasting agitated section that seems to reintroduce the first piece. Peace is regained however, and Mr. Hobson was perfect in portraying the calm resolution.

Mr. Hobson was at his finest in the large set of Fantasiestücke, Op. 12. Most of these are well-known, ‘or are they?’ When music becomes iconic, there is a danger of not really listening after the first few notes are played. We think we’re plugged in, but we’re really playing our own soundtrack. Mr. Hobson did not allow such an automatic reaction. Through a combination of strength and delicacy, he showed perhaps what the music sounded like two hundred years ago, when Clara Schumann was constantly begging Robert to compose something ‘a bit less difficult’ for her audiences to grasp.

Mr. Hobson’s rendition allowed me to perceive the frightful toll of undiagnosed bipolar illness, the sudden, violent contrasts between manic energy, unbounded creative confidence, followed by the horrifying plunges into dark chasms of depression from which one thinks one will never emerge. The headlong abandon with which Hobson launched into the Traumeswirren (Dream-Confusions) was truly terrifying and well worth the few dropped notes here or there. Again, I noticed all the codas, which simply melted into reflective contentment. What an achievement!

After a brief intermission came the Fantasie, Op. 17, omnipresent on so many recitals. This work was initially projected as part of the fund-raising effort for a Beethoven monument in Bonn, with Franz Liszt (dedicatee of the work) the prime instigator. The movements once had programmatic titles, and a prominent quotation from Beethoven’s An die ferne Geliebte song cycle (To the Distant Beloved) forms the conclusion to the first movement (once also found at the end of the third movement, which Mr. Hobson I think wisely chose not to play—he stuck to the traditional ending).

Since Schumann and Clara were forbidden by her father to see each other, he communicated with her through music that was mailed, often containing the famous Clara cipher, usually six descending notes. The Fantasie is preceded by an epigram from Schlegel: “Through all the tones resounding/In the many-colored dream of life/A softer tone sounds/For the one who knows secretly how to listen.” Again, the coded conversation is stunning.

Mr. Hobson’s approach was brisk and orchestral. The fearsome coda to the second movement’s march almost got away from him, but the sense of risk was palpably worth it. Many virtuosi won’t end an entire program with the work, because of the quiet ending. Thank goodness Mr. Hobson can’t be bothered with such silliness. He returned us to the dream-state we need, and now we can’t wait to hear the sequel(s) of his devotion to the rest of Schumann.

Mr. Hobson favored his appreciative audience with an encore by Chopin that was nicknamed by Schumann “The Aeolian Harp” (Etude Op. 25, No. 1), referring to a mythical Greek instrument played by the wind, whose modulations depended on the strength of the breeze. Recall what Schumann’s dreamy side, Eusebius, said about Chopin in 1831: “Hat’s off, gentlemen! A genius!” regarding the latter’s variations on Mozart’s “La ci darem la mano” for piano and orchestra.

Regina Shenderovich, piano

The National Opera Center-OPERA America, Marc A. Scorca Hall, New York, NY

January 28, 2020

There’s a first time for everything—I’ll explain shortly. Pianist Regina Shenderovich had the inspired idea of presenting Baroque and neo-Baroque music on the same program. Three toccatas: Frescobaldi (Toccata Nona in F Major from Il secondo libro di toccata) and Froberger (Toccata II in D Minor, FbWV102, from Libro Secondo ), two predecessors of Bach, then genuine Bach (Toccata in E minor, BWV 914), followed by the complete first half of Shostakovich’s monumental Preludes and Fugues, Op. 87. Here’s the first time: In all my years as a performer, listener, and critic, I have never heard either Frescobaldi or Froberger on a piano recital! Organ recitals, yes, harpsichord yes, but piano, never. This alone signals an unusual level of curiosity in Ms. Shenderovich.

The recital took place in the rather acoustically live hall of the National Opera Center. I don’t know what was done in terms of promoting the event, but it’s a shame that more people were not in attendance to hear it—it was free. The bare-bones program listed no biographical information, so I had to Google to find out that Ms. Shenderovich was trained in Saint Petersburg (Russia), and that she has bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in piano from Boston Conservatory, Peabody Conservatory, and University of Illinois, respectively; and that she has studied with some of the finest teachers and performers. Ms. Shenderovich dedicated her program to the memory of her grandmother.

Her innovative program was played with great commitment and more than enough technical fluidity. The massive Shostakovich group was played from score—no objection here, though I do expect greater accuracy when using the music. The recital was marred by a certain tendency to rush, or not hold long notes or rests for their full value, all of which gave the music a perfunctory quality, though I could see her emotional involvement. Ms. Shenderovich’s left hand was not fully grounded, often failing to sound, or, when it did, failing to provide needed resonant support for the treble. As I need to say so often in these pages, there was insufficient attention paid to dynamics of piano and pianissimo; though every so often Ms. Shenderovich would create a magical soft sound, contrasting with her customary boisterous approach.

The group of Baroque toccatas suffered from the left-hand issue, particularly the Bach, and there was just not enough sonic variety: after all, if we’re using the modern piano, let’s go for it. Her trills and ornaments were quite admirable, however.

It is an honor just to be in the ‘same room’ as the Shostakovich, which was inspired by his serving on the jury of the first-ever Leipzig international Bach competition, held on the 250th anniversary of Bach’s death, and was won by Tatiana Nikolaevich, to whom the works were dedicated, and who premiered them and carried them across the globe for decades.

For me, the standouts of Ms. Shenderovich’s Shostakovich were several of the Preludes: the A minor, E minor, B minor (dotted rhythms of the French overture), E major, and C-sharp minor, in which her technique and passion were best united. The C major prelude lacked the tenderness of the sarabande; its fugue should peak at a mezzo-forte. Many of the fugues were taken too fast, and lacked the laser-focused contrapuntal clarity that makes them transparent. The best fugue was the final one in G-sharp minor, whose many subject entries were audible, though still lacking enough pianissimo. The G major fugue was a close second, with its jaunty subject highlighting Ms. Shenderovich’s strengths. A majority of the fugues, as specified in the score, begin quite softly and do not increase in dynamics, often for many measures. With Ms. Shenderovich’s inflated dynamics, many of them sounded like character pieces that contained ‘some’ counterpoint, instead of the encyclopedia of twentieth-century polyphonic ingenuity that they are. (An arguable approach?)

Notwithstanding my complaints above, Ms. Shenderovich’s performance allowed me to perceive the many intricate thematic relations among the preludes and fugues, with ‘tonic-dominant-sixth scale degree’ recurring in striking fashion, not surprising in a work composed fairly quickly, out of the same laboratory of the mind that belonged to Dmitri Shostakovich. I hope that Ms. Shenderovich will continue her work with the cycle (also the second half!), refining her deep listening and ability to bring out the contrapuntal beauties while placing some competing voices on a different sonorous level, and adding that indefinable contemplative quality which reveals the inner tragedy never far from the surface in Shostakovich. She is well on the way to acquiring something our world urgently needs to hear.

Shiqi Zhong, Percussion

Misha Piatigorsky, Piano

Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, New York, NY

 December 27, 2019

Well, here’s something I never thought would happen during that strange week between Christmas Day and New Year’s Day: I attend a percussion recital and am moved to tears by its sheer beauty and excellence.

The prodigious young Chinese multi-percussionist Shiqi Zhong displayed not only sovereign technical mastery on a dizzying array of instruments, but he created a total performance environment through the use of visual light projections on the rear wall of the recital hall, pre-recorded sounds (many specified by their respective composers), and moody low lighting. All these conspired to immerse the listener in a world as concentrated as the performer was. I often felt as though I was witnessing a high priest summoning a realm inaccessible to mere mortals. The whole event was given in a very stylish way.

As if to defy expectation, the very first piece on the program, a world premiere commissioned by Mr. Zhong from Lu Wang called Up Kind as Water involved no playing of any percussion instrument. Mr. Zhong simply moved his hands in choreographed shapes and rhythms, and haunting patterns of light and sound were generated by the movements. This set the tone for the inventive evening.

Mr. Zhong’s technical resources appear limitless, ranging from furious energy, when required, to ethereal delicacy. His independence of hands is unbelievable; and he has a certain meditative humility, often facing upstage when not playing, seeming to contemplate something within.

He then gave a blistering account of a percussion “classic,” if one may use that word: John Psathas’ One Study One Summary. The etude portion, with its motoric textures was mesmerizing, dissolving into the more lyrical “summary.” By the way, if you’ve never attended a percussion recital, you don’t know that it is in fact possible to phrase and sing on these instruments in the way countless generations of piano teachers have strived to instill in their students while de-emphasizing the percussive nature of the piano. It’s quite ironic.

The second world premiere, another commission by Mr.  Zhong, was Heng Liu’s When the Sun Goes Down, a beautiful meditation on sunset, on light passing into darkness. The “mere” catalog of instruments played was: bass drum, djembe, congas, bongos, doumbek, shaker, windchimes, bells, and splash cymbals.

Next came a more “user-friendly” set, involving Zhong’s assisting artist, pianist Misha Piatigorsky, who is the grand-nephew of that Piatigorsky, famed cellist Gregor. Blues, tango, and a unique fusion of the sonorities of the various percussion instruments with the sound of a concert grand piano made for an exciting romp, especially with the ferocious energy summoned by Mr. Piatigorsky in the attraction/repulsion of the Milonga, with its references to Piazzolla. The two players were in perfect synchronization, to say the least, and their blend was unreal.

After intermission came the largest work, again another “classic”: Per Nørgård’s I-Ching, which refers to the thousands of years old “Book of Changes,” a repertoire of sixty-four archetypal combinations of three solid or dashed lines that represent “everything” real, metaphorical, spiritual, and universal. The book was highly valued by Carl Jung in his therapeutic system. There are four sections in the work, which begins with the elemental fury of universal energies and takes us on a journey to calmer material before returning to cataclysm. The stage was absolutely full, with every type of percussion instrument, some that I had never seen before. Mr. Zhong changed into a gorgeous Chinese long garment for this performance.  He finished the work, and the evening, with a final blow on the large gong, which was saved for this one moment only. It was a truly hypnotic evening.

Charles Neidich, Artistic Director, clarinet, basset horn; Ayako Oshima, clarinet, bass clarinet; Lucy Fitz Gibbon, soprano; Katie Hyun, violin; Fred Sherry, cello

Tenri Cultural Institute, New York, NY

December 8, 2019

Charles Neidich’s latest themed concert paired two masters of musical construction separated by two hundred years of music history: Anton Webern and J.S. Bach. No less fastidious a master than Maurice Ravel said (I paraphrase): “My goal is technical perfection. Since that is unattainable, I know that I may strive to come a little closer to it each day.”

Webern is one-third of the Schoenberg, Berg, Webern “Twelve-tone trinity,” which Schoenberg adamantly claimed was not a “method” (though it was, and it wasn’t even Schoenberg’s invention). Webern’s strength lies in his manipulation of timbre, allied with brevity that is sometimes carried to the extreme.

Webern’s Sechs Lieder nach Gedichten von Georg Trakl, Op. 14 (1917/21), set to six darkly expressionistic poems by fellow Austrian Georg Trakl, who died of a cocaine overdose three years before, feature Webern’s signature widely disjunct vocal lines that make text comprehension difficult. On that subject, soprano Lucy Fitz Gibbon gave a compelling performance, her voice even from top to bottom despite the wild demands placed on it, and I could even understand a large percentage of the words. The ensemble partnered her with sensitivity. I take issue with her textual analysis however: Trakl, a pharmacist whose mother was a drug addict, and who had incestuous relations with his own sister, distilled burning eroticism and menace into his work, not Catholic symbols.

Mr. Neidich then brought five of his own arrangements of Contrapuncti  (I,IV, II, VII, IX) from Bach’s “last will and testament”: Die Kunst der Fuge, BWV 1080, a compendium of fugues all built from the same subject, displaying every possible combination of counterpoint, an anthology of the type that obsessed Bach late in his life, with the desire to summarize, teach, and leave a legacy. In the first group, Mr. Neidich refreshingly used the rarely heard autograph versions, which often lack the codas that were added later, by J.S. Bach, not his son, as claimed. The first eleven were actually put in order and prepared for publication in Bach’s lifetime, thought the first edition would have to wait until 1802.

Mr. Neidich’s engaging oral program notes failed to take into account one issue: Christoph Wolff and many other Bach scholars agree that in the case of the great “unfinished” quadruple fugue (heard at the end of the program), the final combinatorial section was figured out first, to make sure it was possible. Bach then went back and began writing it out from the beginning, and the music peters out right after the introduction of the musical spelling B-A-C-H (B-flat, A, C, B natural) as the third subject, where Bach’s son indicates that “he died.” This gave rise to centuries of romantic speculation about Bach’s “musical hubris” as a cause of his demise.

The contrapuncti were played with clarity, though the endings of two of them (VII and IX) were botched. I wished for slightly more articulation than the (mostly) legato that was applied.

After intermission, Ms. Fitz Gibbon returned with Webern’s own counterpoints, Fünf Canons, Op. 16 (1923/24), to Roman Catholic liturgical lines. They are canons in the sense of musical imitation, and also the religious sense. Mr. Neidich ought to have made the point that Bach’s Art of the Fugue also contains four canons, and that Webern himself arranged Bach’s fugues using his characteristic Klangfarbenmelodie (sound-color-melody), assigning a different instrument to each note of the theme(s).

Three of Webern’s canons concern the crucifixion, and the two instrumental strands and one vocal strand crisscross each other in symbolic fashion, with every possible permutation and breathtaking efficiency: different pitch levels, inversion, and retrograde. The lullaby for the infant Jesus was tender, though in Webern’s severe way. This was the finest performance of this rarity that one is likely ever to hear live.

The ensemble finished with four more Bach Contrapuncti (III, V, XI, XVIII). They negotiated a near-mishap in Contrapuntus XI, a devilishly complicated triple fugue, managing to find each other again with subtle skill.

This concert featured the “head” portion of what I call the “head/heart ratio,” though, as Bach scholar Wilfred Mellers states, what makes Bach’s music so expressive is his “keen understanding of human suffering reflected through his use of dissonance.” Webern’s music is highly expressive too, though one needs to be on his wavelength to perceive just how much passion he channeled into his art.

The final song from the Trakl series was offered as a true encore—the savvy audience that attends the WA series is not afraid of a little serialism- they applauded long and loud. The customary curated feast of food and drink was delicious as always. A word to the wise, this series has been and will continue to be one of New York’s most valuable gems—please support it.

Adrienne Haan, chanteuse; Bart Shatto, vocalist

Richard Danley, Music Director/Piano; Melanie LaPatin, Choreographer; Laurence Pierron, Original Idea

Triad Theater, New York, NY

December 5, 2019

I have reviewed Adrienne Haan several times in these pages- always with great pleasure. She is known as a performer with a flair for decadent Weimar-era cabaret and the like (Brecht/Weill), as well as many other eclectic international programs. On this occasion, she featured an entertaining and educational primer through a tiny fraction of the songs of a fellow adopted American: Irving Berlin. It takes a truly secure performer to share her stage with a partner, in this case the excellent Broadway and television star Bart Shatto.

Thirty-three songs and a built-in encore made for a generous evening, one that I feared would prove too long, however, the patter was engaging and concise, and some of the songs were given a mere “taste” and joined attacca to the following song(s), which allowed the pace to move forward.

The ultimate immigrant success story, Berlin wrote over 1500 songs, 20 musicals, and 15 movie scores. He was also his own lyricist. He never learned to read music, and had a transposing piano to move his songs from the black keys to which he confined himself. A startling coincidence was made in juxtaposing Ms. Haan, a native of Luxembourg, with Berlin’s long-time home on Manhattan’s luxurious Beekman Place, which once belonged to Navy  and Defense secretary James V. Forrestal, and today serves as the consulate of . . . Luxembourg.

The evening was divided into groups corresponding to Berlin’s iconic work: immigration themes, military songs (both world wars), musicals, Hollywood, love songs, and holiday songs. Only one transition I found rather jarring: after Ms. Haan and Mr. Shatto explained that the Berlins’ only son, Irving Jr., died at age three weeks on Christmas Day 1928, they segued right into Happy Holidays performed with absolutely no irony whatsoever. All this says, I suppose, is what the entire show tells us, that Berlin’s music is truly optimistic at all times. There is no cynicism in it. He was genuinely patriotic, even to the point of writing “propaganda” songs for the Federal government about income tax and the armed forces.

Ms. Haan and Mr. Shatto showed charming chemistry with each other, and distributed quite evenly through the duos were solos for each of them. Ms. Haan’s skills are well-known to New Yorkers by now, and she shimmied her way through standards and lesser-known material with consummate ease. To a great extent, Mr. Shatto showed a certain American “corn-fed” quality even better than she did.

Standouts from this crowded song list were: Ofyn Pripetchik (the only number not by Berlin), tenderly sung by Ms. Haan; Oh How I Hate To Get Up In The Morning, I Paid My Income Tax Today, The Hostess With The Mostes’ On The Ball, You’re Just In Love, Mr. Shatto’s brilliant voice in How Deep Is The Ocean, and Haan’s comedic Falling Out Of Love Can Be Fun.

An all-Berlin evening could have easily become one-dimensional, but these talented folks ensured that that didn’t happen. We could use another Berlin today, indeed  “God Bless America.”

Constance Emmerich, Founder/piano; Mark Peskanov, violin; Nicholas Mann, viola;Thomas Demenga, cello; Robert Ingliss, oboe

Merkin Concert Hall, Kaufman Music Center, New York, NY

November 10, 2019

It seems almost impossible that forty-three (!) years ago, pianist Constance Emmerich founded a chamber ensemble called An die Musik (German: To Music, after the title of one of Schubert’s best-loved songs). The instrumentation of oboe, string trio, and piano permits a wide variety of program choices and sonorous variety. And here they are still (with a few changes of personnel along the way), playing to a sold-out house of admirers. This group of musicians has what I will dare to call “musical charisma,” in contrast to the “superstar” assemblages of big-name virtuosi who barely know each other and lack sufficient time to rehearse, playing on the same stage at the same time but without true collegiality. An die Musik is diametrically opposed to that, although its components are no slouches in the virtuoso department.

You know you’re at a conservatively programmed event when the outlier is Britten from 1951. Nevertheless, An die Musik’s enthusiastic, if somewhat elderly, following lapped it up, uttering great, deserved cheers. The players currently on the roster all have impressive pedigrees in contemporary music, and the ensemble has a wonderful list of commissions and adventurous programming—it might have been nice to hear some of that. I also would have liked to hear the oboe playing with the strings, and more piano-inclusive ensemble works.

The concert opened with an excerpt from one of Haydn’s great piano trios, the one in F-Sharp minor, Hob. XV/26, the same tonality as his “Farewell” symphony. But why play just the Adagio, beautiful as it is? Taken out of context, we lose the sense of an oasis between two extremely active, almost frantic movements. The Adagio is an unusual instance of self-borrowing in Haydn’s output, the melody having already appeared in his Symphony No. 102 in B-flat major  from 1794. The mellow sonorities of the three players were a marvel, and their harmonic sensitivity was keen.

This was followed by the Bach/Marcello Adagio from BWV 974, played by cello and piano, from a keyboard transcription by Bach of an oboe concerto by Marcello. Although I am no youngster, I felt strangely hip in recognizing that the movement figured large in the 2015 soft-core film Fifty Shades of Grey. Thus, as rhapsodically played as it was by the superb Thomas Demenga on cello, with beautiful cushioned chords provided by Ms. Emmerich, it had for me an erotic subtext.

The concert continued with an excellent performance of a rarity, Benjamin Britten’s Six Metamorphoses After Ovid, for solo oboe, Op. 29 (1951). These brief programmatic works purport to illustrate six of the transformations in Ovid’s retelling of classic Greek myths: Pan, Phaeton, Niobe, Bacchus, Narcissus, and Arethusa. Somehow I think that if one didn’t know the titles, it wouldn’t matter, perhaps a good indicator for any “program” music. Robert Ingliss, the oboist, had great control, and Britten allows the listener to follow the thread by masterfully “metamorphosing” the opening melodic gambit of each movement with subtly developing variations upon each repetition. Even the perky moments are predominantly lyrical, sometimes ending with quizzical stops.

The first half concluded with a guaranteed barn-burner: the Handel/Halvorsen Passacaglia for violin and cello, another transcription, this time from a harpsichord suite by Handel. Mark Peskanov, violin, and Mr. Derenga reveled in its every complicated virtuoso turn with great characterization and collegial wit.

After intermission came the major work of the evening, Beethoven’s String Trio in G major, Op. 9 No. 1. A relatively early work (1797/98), it exhausts the possibilities of motivic development based on the interval of the third, even extending to the key relationship between the slow movement and the other three movements. Mr. Peskanov and Mr. Derenga were joined by the wonderful violist Nicholas Mann. Their phrasing and articulation were incandescent.

It is well known that Beethoven used to take long walks in the forests and countryside for inspiration, often with a sketchbook or at least some paper. He’d return to some of his motivic ideas obsessively, over a period of many years, even decades. I was able to hear that the opening theme of the Allegro in the first movement relates exactly (transposed) to the closing theme of the finale of his Piano Trio, Op. 1 No. 1. Also, the third movement, Scherzo, of this String Trio has a motto that will become the “Muss es sein?” (Must it be?) of his final string quartet, Op. 135! The excitement of the Presto conclusion was palpable.

There’s only one An die Musik concert in New York next year. A word to the wise: get your ticket(s).

Featured Artists: Maria Asteriadou, piano; Kutztown Chamber Players, Peter Isaacson, conductor; Johanna Cox Pennington, English Horn; Kurt Nikkanen, violin; Esther Waite, flute; Gabriela Werries, harp; Sandra Moon, soprano; Christopher Lowry, viola; Caio Diniz, cello; Perla Fernandez, violin; Mireille Lopez, violin; Luis Casal, violin; Isaac Casal, Cello

Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, New York, NY

September 30, 2019

Distinguished Concerts International New York (DCINY) presented the music of Greek composer Dinos Constantinides for the twelfth time (in ten years) on September 30th, in a very generous program, which was practically a retrospective of his oeuvre. I have reviewed his concerts previously in these pages, always with pleasure. This occasion was no different. All the performers were great, a few of them even world-class, and they infused the composer’s music with heartfelt expressive energy, without which it wouldn’t succeed (no composer’s would).

One over-arching “theme” of this concert was Mr. Constantinides’ ability not only to invent, but to reinvent his extant works. All the great composers have done so, from Bach to Ravel and beyond. It’s wonderful to have this ability and opportunity to reconsider, taken from such a large body of work. All but one of the works exhibited his great love for his Greek heritage, and many sonorities and rhythms of Grecian folk music.

The first half consisted of three concerto-like creations, one for piano (Grecian Variations, from an early solo work), one for English horn (Threnos of Creon, from an operatic setting of Antigone), and the third for violin (Mountains of Epirus, originally for violin and piano).

Maria Asteriadou was the authoritative pianist in the Grecian Variations, playing with great personality and energy, accompanied (as were the other two concerto-like works) by the beaming young faces of the Kutztown Chamber Players, ably led by Peter Isaacson. Johanna Cox Pennington drew forth gorgeous tones from her English Horn in the Threnos, which was uniformly mournful in tone, appropriate to its subject: the disaster that King Creon’s life had become. Kurt Nikkanen’s virtuosity on the violin, along with wonderful flair and commitment, elevated the materials in the Mountains of Epirus to something epic.

After intermission, a generous helping of chamber-music-scaled works included a former concerto for flute and harp, re-arranged for the two instruments and piano (dedicated to DCINY for their 10th anniversary), played with subtle delicacy by Esther Waite, Gabriela Werries, and Ms. Asteriadou.

The only work that didn’t refer to Hellenistic culture directly was a setting of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s famous sonnet “How Do I Love Thee” for soprano and viola. There was a great deal of text repetition, with long melismatic settings of certain words, perhaps a bit much for an already lengthy poem. For my taste, despite the excellent involvement of both Sandra Moon and Christopher Lowry, and Ms. Moon’s really good diction, the setting didn’t add much to my understanding of the poem. However, I suppose the heightened expressivity of Mr. Constantinides’ music did, in fact, coordinate with the white-hot tone of High-Romanticism à la Browning.

The Kaleidoscope Fantasy for solo cello (also a reworking of an original for soprano, violin, cello, piano, and two slide projectors), based on a musical response to children’s art works, provided a rare instance of Mr. Constantinides exploring much more dissonant, exploratory sounds, superbly brought to life by Caio Diniz, who did not let a slipped tuning peg faze him at all. A Hellenic Dance for two violins and viola was the briefest work of the evening; Perla Fernandez, Mireille Lopez, and Mr. Lowry made the audience feel the folk sources vividly. The evening concluded with a former concerto for violin, cello, and orchestra, also re-arranged for piano, resulting in a piano trio. The Casal brothers (Luis and Isaac) were joined by Ms. Asteriadou for an exciting close.

Mr. Constantinides, a committed teacher, surely leaves wonderful influences on his lucky students, and the devotion of his performers attests to a lifetime of collegiality and creation.