When we’re lucky, it just clicks. We’re so used to the idea of “no pain, no gain” that we’re amazed by those few occasions when we can achieve something wonderful with a minimum of effort—it does happen just once in a while! That’s the way it was working with our recent piano soloist, Martina Filjak, playing beautiful performances of Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G. She just makes it happen, and it was so easy to perform with her.
One of the many fascinating parts of my job is getting to work with quite a few world-class soloists. Sometimes I’ve met and worked with these artists before, but just as often we’re meeting for the first time during a concert set—it’s about 50/50. In this case, I had never met Martina before last week—but it was certainly about time, we’ve been trying to book her with the Symphony for quite a while, and the schedules finally meshed.
Last Monday afternoon, Martina played through her concerto for me in Atherton Auditorium—just the two of us were in the hall. Listening to her, it was obvious right away by her sense of timing what a treasure these performances would be. We made just a couple of suggestions to each other, but she made this difficult work so easy—working in rehearsals and concerts with Martina was a breeze.
All great artists have a great feeling for rubato—when to stretch the tempo, when to push ahead, and so on. But even within that keen sense, there’s what I call musical radar. Some great artists play in such a way that when a stretch is about to happen, she/he telegraphs the ideas in advance. We’ve been so fortunate at the Stockton Symphony to be able to work with so many soloists who possess specifically that gift of creating poetry through musical time. When you’re working with a great artist like Martina, the radar is wonderful. You don’t even have to look at her, you can sense what’s coming. I sometimes think the nonverbal communication you get when collaborating with soloists and with an orchestra is the closest we can get to telepathy.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Tuesday, September 20, 2011
Vibrant Colors and Rhythms Open Symphony Season
’Hard to imagine, but in the early 1930s most of the U.S. had never seen nor heard some percussion instruments we now take for granted—bongos, maracas, claves (wood blocks), and the guiro (notched gourd played with stick). The fascinatin’ dance rhythms of Latin America were just beginning to take hold, and two iconic American composers contributed to that enthusiasm, each traveling south of the border and bringing back a musical souvenir. These inspirations bookend our season opener with the Stockton Symphony: George Gershwin’s catchy Cuban Overture, inspired by the rumba; and Aaron Copland’s vivacious El Salón México, incorporating folk melodies while evoking a dance hall in Mexico City.
This colorful program also explores the intriguing Gershwin-Ravel connection. French composer Maurice Ravel had traveled to New York in the late ’20s, becoming infected with a healthy dose of Gershwin’s current take on jazz. Likewise, Gershwin had traveled to Paris, getting acquainted with Ravel’s music on his home turf, and he began to orchestrate his American jazz elements with a bit of the French master’s sophistication.
Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G continues to show the composers’ mutual admiration, incorporating wonderful elements of jazz harmony and rhythm. Our fabulous soloist, visiting Stockton for the first time, is the international pianist sensation Martina Filjak, winner of the 2009 Cleveland Piano Competition. We’re all eagerly anticipating her performances of Ravel’s virtuoso vehicle, and you may want to check out her accomplishments in detail at http://www.martinafiljak.com/.
The second half of our program explores two very different facets of Aaron Copland. The Orchestral Variations, in the compact space of 12 or 13 minutes, shows a dramatic, powerful, brooding side of the composer that we don’t often get to hear. Rounding out the evening in rousing contrast is El Salón México described above, exhibiting the same exuberance of those familiar Copland “cowboy” ballets, like Rodeo.
What a great way to open the concert season—we look forward to having you join us!
Thursday, September 22, at 8:00 p.m., repeated on Saturday, September 24 at 6:00 p.m. at Atherton Auditorium on the campus of San Joaquin Delta College.
Purchase tickets at 209-951-0196 or visit our website by clicking on the link below.
stocktonsymphony.org
This colorful program also explores the intriguing Gershwin-Ravel connection. French composer Maurice Ravel had traveled to New York in the late ’20s, becoming infected with a healthy dose of Gershwin’s current take on jazz. Likewise, Gershwin had traveled to Paris, getting acquainted with Ravel’s music on his home turf, and he began to orchestrate his American jazz elements with a bit of the French master’s sophistication.
Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G continues to show the composers’ mutual admiration, incorporating wonderful elements of jazz harmony and rhythm. Our fabulous soloist, visiting Stockton for the first time, is the international pianist sensation Martina Filjak, winner of the 2009 Cleveland Piano Competition. We’re all eagerly anticipating her performances of Ravel’s virtuoso vehicle, and you may want to check out her accomplishments in detail at http://www.martinafiljak.com/.
The second half of our program explores two very different facets of Aaron Copland. The Orchestral Variations, in the compact space of 12 or 13 minutes, shows a dramatic, powerful, brooding side of the composer that we don’t often get to hear. Rounding out the evening in rousing contrast is El Salón México described above, exhibiting the same exuberance of those familiar Copland “cowboy” ballets, like Rodeo.
What a great way to open the concert season—we look forward to having you join us!
Thursday, September 22, at 8:00 p.m., repeated on Saturday, September 24 at 6:00 p.m. at Atherton Auditorium on the campus of San Joaquin Delta College.
Purchase tickets at 209-951-0196 or visit our website by clicking on the link below.
stocktonsymphony.org
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