Ensemble Connect shares classical music with Skidmore, Saratoga Springs
New Class of Ensemble Connect Fellows Debuts First Virtual Performance
Ensemble Connect February 2024 Program
Friday, February 16, 2024
7:30 PM Performance
Helen Filene Ladd Concert Hall
Arthur Zankel Music Center
CONCERT PROGRAM
INTI FIGGIS-VIZUETA | seven sisters paint the earth (World Premiere, commissioned
by Carnegie Hall)
GABRIELA LENA FRANK | Leyendas: an Andean Walkabout for String Orchestra*
*with Skidmore student musicians
TANIA LEÓN | De Memorias
BEETHOVEN | Quintet in E-flat Major, Op. 16
Ensemble Connect explores the past, present, and future of classical music with a spirit of adventure
and endless possibility. In this wide-ranging program, the musicians perform the world
premiere of a Carnegie Hall–commissioned work by inti figgis-vizueta, a composer whose
music “feels sprouted between structures, liberated from certainty and wrought from
a language we’d do well to learn” (The Washington Post). They also perform Beethoven’s Quintet for Piano and Winds in E-flat Major; the
string orchestra version of Gabriela Lena Frank’s adventuresome Leyendas: An Andean Walkabout, in collaboration with Skidmore music department students; and De Memorias, a woodwind quintet by Cuban-American composer, Tania León.
This event is free and open to the public; no tickets required.
Presented by the Department of Music and the Office of Special Programs
The biannual residency is made possible by the generous support of David and Beverly Sanders Payne '59 (October residency) and the Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Foundation (February residency).
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NY-based composer inti figgis-vizueta (b.1993) braids a childhood of overlapping immigrant communities and Black-founded Freedom schools—in Chocolate City (DC) —with direct Andean & Irish heritage and a deep connection to the land. “Her music feels sprouted between structures, liberated from certainty and wrought from a language we’d do well to learn” writes The Washington Post. inti's work explores the transformative power of group improvisation and play, working to reconcile historical aesthetics and experimental practices with trans & Indigenous futures. Recent highlights include the Carnegie Hall premiere of her string quartet concerto, Seven Sides of Fire, written for the Attacca Quartet and American Composers Orchestra, conducted by Mei-Ann Chen; performances of Coradh (bending) by the Spoleto Festival, PODIUM Festival, and Oregon Symphony; and the REDCAT premiere of her evening-length show Music for Transitions, created in collaboration with two-time Grammy Award-winning cellist Andrew Yee, praised as “thrilling” and “revolutionary” by I Care If You Listen. Upcoming projects include clay songs for Kronos Quartet’s 50th Anniversary, a new Carnegie Hall-commissioned work for Ensemble Connect, continued development of Earths to Come for vocal ensemble Roomful of Teeth, and a new piano concerto for Conrad Tao and the Cincinnati Symphony, conducted by Matthias Pintscher. |
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