Past Concerts 2011 to the present (click the year, below right, to navigate back from the most recent)

PIOTR ANDERSZEWSKI, piano

Bach

from The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book II:

Prelude and Fugue in A-flat, BWV 886

Prelude and Fugue in D-sharp minor, BWV 877

Prelude and Fugue in F, BWV 880

Prelude and Fugue in B-flat minor, BWV 891

Prelude and Fugue in E-flat, BWV 876

Prelude and Fugue in G minor, BWV 885

Prelude and Fugue in E, BWV 878

Prelude and Fugue in G-sharp minor, BWV 887

Webern

Variations, Op. 27

Beethoven

Sonata no. 31 in A-flat, Op. 110

Piotr Anderszewski is regarded as one of the most outstanding pianists performing today. He appears regularly in recital at such concert halls as the Wiener Konzerthaus, Berlin Philharmonie, Wigmore Hall, Carnegie Hall, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées and the Concertgebouw Amsterdam. His collaborations with orchestra have included appearances with the Berlin Philharmonic and Berlin Staatskapelle orchestras, the London Symphony and Philharmonia orchestras and the NHK Symphony Orchestra. He has also placed special emphasis on playing and directing, working with orchestras such as the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Chamber Orchestra of Europe and Camerata Salzburg.

His recent recital programme have featured a specially curated selection from J. S. Bach's Well-Tempered Klavier Book 2, which is also the subject of his latest recording released in January 2021. This recording went on to win a Gramophone Award in September 2021. His orchestral engagements included appearances with the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia with Sir John Eliot Gardiner, the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra under Jakub Hrůša, and the Wiener Symphoniker conducted by David Zinman.

Piotr Anderszewski has been an exclusive artist with Warner Classics-Erato (previously Virgin Classics) since 2000. His first recording for the label was Beethoven's Diabelli Variations, which went on to receive a number of prizes. He has also recorded Grammy-nominated discs of Bach's Partitas nos. 1, 3 and 6 and Szymanowski's solo piano works, the latter also receiving a Gramophone Award in 2006. His recording devoted to works by Robert Schumann received the BBC Music Magazine's Recording of the Year award in 2012. Anderszewski's disc of Bach's English Suites nos. 1, 3 and 5, released in November 2014, went on to win both a Gramophone Award and an ECHO Klassik award in 2015. Recognised for the intensity and originality of his interpretations, Piotr Anderszewski has been a recipient of the Gilmore Award, the Szymanowski Prize, and a Royal Philharmonic Society Award.

The EMERSON STRING QUARTET

Eugene Drucker, violin, and Philip Setzer, violin

Lawrence Dutton, viola

Paul Watkins, cello

Shostakovich

Quartet no. 10 in A-flat, Op. 118

Shostakovich

Quartet no. 8 in C minor, Op. 110

Beethoven

Quartet no. 12 in E-flat, Op. 127

For more than four decades, the Emerson String Quartet has maintained its status as one of the world’s premier chamber music ensembles. ‘With musicians like this,’ wrote a reviewer for The Times, ‘there must be some hope for humanity.’ The Quartet has made more than thirty acclaimed recordings, and has been honoured with nine Grammy Awards (including two for Best Classical Album), three Gramophone Awards, the Avery Fisher Prize, and Musical America’s Ensemble of the Year award. The Quartet collaborates with some of today’s most esteemed composers to premiere new works, keeping the string quartet form alive and relevant. The group has partnered in performance with such stellar soloists as Renée Fleming, Barbara Hannigan, Evgeny Kissin, Emanuel Ax, and Yefim Bronfman, to name a few.

The Quartet’s extensive discography includes the complete string quartets of Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Bartok, Webern, and Shostakovich, as well as multi-CD sets of the major works of Haydn, Mozart, Schubert, and Dvorak. In 2018, Deutsche Grammophon issued a box of the Emerson Complete Recordings on the label. In October 2020, the group released a recording of Schumann’s three string quartets for the Pentatone label. In the preceding year, the Quartet joined forces with Grammy-winning pianist, Evgeny Kissin, to release a collaborative album for Deutsche Grammophon, recorded live at a sold-out Carnegie Hall concert in 2018.

Formed in 1976 and based in New York City, the Emerson String Quartet was one of the first quartets to have its violinists alternate in the first chair position. The Quartet, which takes its name from the American poet and philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson, balances busy performing careers with a commitment to teaching, and serves as Quartet-in-Residence at Stony Brook University. In 2013, cellist Paul Watkins—a distinguished soloist, award-winning conductor, and devoted chamber musician—joined the original members of the Quartet to form today’s group.

MITSUKO UCHIDA, piano • MARK PADMORE, tenor

Beethoven

An die Hoffnung [To Hope], Op. 94

Beethoven

Resignation, WoO 149

Beethoven

Abendlied unterm gestirnten Himmel [Evening-song under a star-lit sky], WoO 150

Beethoven

An die ferne Geliebte [To the Distant Beloved], Op. 98

Schubert

Schwanengesang, D. 957

World-renowned tenor Mark Padmore has established an international career in opera, concert and recital. His appearances in Bach Passions have gained particular notice, especially his renowned performances as Evangelist in the St Matthew and St John Passions with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and Simon Rattle, staged by Peter Sellars. He is currently an artist in residence at London’s Wigmore Hall where he celebrates his relationship with pianists Till Fellner, Imogen Cooper, Mitsuko Uchida and Paul Lewis. He has previously been artist in residence with the Berliner Philharmoniker and Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, and recently appeared in a new Royal Opera House, Covent Garden production of Britten’s Death in Venice, where his performance was described as a “tour de force” and “exquisite of voice, [presenting] Aschenbach’s physical and spiritual breakdown with extraordinary detail and insight”.

Mark was voted 2016 Vocalist of the Year by Musical America and was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by Kent University in 2014. He was appointed CBE in the 2019 Queens’ Birthday Honours List.

Legendary pianist Dame Mitsuko Uchida brings a deep insight into the music she plays through her own quest for truth and beauty. Renowned for her interpretations of Mozart, Schubert, Schumann and Beethoven, she has also illuminated the music of Berg, Schoenberg, Webern and Boulez for a new generation of listeners. She is a former Visiting Fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge, and her May concert is her sixth for Camerata Musica.

She has enjoyed close relationships over many years with the world’s most renowned orchestras, including the Berlin Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Bavarian Radio Symphony, London Symphony Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, and – in the US – the Chicago Symphony and The Cleveland Orchestra, with whom she recently celebrated her 100th performance at Severance Hall. Conductors with whom she has worked closely have included Bernard Haitink, Sir Simon Rattle, Riccardo Muti, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Vladimir Jurowski, Andris Nelsons, Gustavo Dudamel, and Mariss Jansons.

Since 2016, Mitsuko Uchida has been an Artistic Partner of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, with whom she is currently engaged on a five-year touring project in Europe and North America. She also appears regularly in recital in Vienna, Berlin, Paris, Amsterdam, London, New York and Tokyo, and is a frequent guest at the Salzburg Mozartwoche and Salzburg Festival.

Mitsuko Uchida records exclusively for Decca, and her multi-award-winning discography includes the complete Mozart and Schubert piano sonatas. She is the recipient of two Grammy Awards – for Mozart Concertos with The Cleveland Orchestra, and for an album of lieder with Dorothea Röschmann – and her recording of the Schoenberg Piano Concerto with Pierre Boulez and the Cleveland Orchestra won the Gramophone Award for Best Concerto.

VIKTORIA MULLOVA, violin • ALASDAIR BEATSON, fortepiano

Beethoven

Sonata for Violin and Piano in C minor, Op. 30 no. 2

Beethoven

Sonata for Violin and Piano in F, Op. 24

Schubert

Fantasie for Violin and Piano in C, D. 934

PLEASE NOTE: the Student Tickets are free for this concert and are available for booking online. To be advised of returns in the event that Free Student Tickets are fully booked, please join Camerata Musica's email list by registering at the link at the bottom of the home page.

Long regarded as one of the world’s greatest violin virtuosos, Viktoria Mullova’s musical horizons continue to expand. Already a master of the classical repertory, she has jalso ourneyed into the world of jazz and world music, she works regularly with the period ensembles such as Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Il Giardino Armonico, Accademia Bizantina and Venice Baroque, as well as appearing each season with top international orchestras and conductors.

This season, Viktoria Mullova performs Classical and Romantic repertoire with several major orchestras and conductors. Highlights include Copenhagen Philharmonic Orchestra, Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia, Filarmonica Arturo Toscanini and Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra. With Alasdair Beatson she plays Beethoven recitals on gut strings and fortepiano, repertoire which also forms her most recent recording. As well as her own projects, she has also commissioned works from composers such as Pascal Dusapin, Fraser Trainer, Thomas Larcher and Dai Fujikura.

Viktoria Mullova plays either her ‘Jules Falk’ 1723 Stradivarius or a Guadagnini violin.

Alasdair Beatson is renowned as an outstanding musician and intrepid programmer. His concerto repertoire includes works of Bach, Bartok, Fauré, Hans Abrahamsen, Hindemith, Mozart, Sally Beamish, Stravinsky, and Messiaen. In recent years he has appeared with Britten Sinfonia, Moscow Virtuosi, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Scottish Ensemble, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Sønderjyllands Symphony Orchestra and Tapiola Sinfonietta. Two new recordings were released in Spring 2021: three Beethoven Sonatas for violin and fortepiano with Viktoria Mullova on Onyx, and a solo piano recital Aus Wien on Pentatone. These join an acclaimed discography of numerous solo and chamber recordings, on modern and period pianos, on BIS, Claves, Champs Hill, Evil Penguin, Pentatone and SOMM labels.

LUCAS & ARTHUR JUSSEN, pianos

Shostakovich

Concertino for Two Pianos, Op. 94

Schubert

Fantasie in F minor, D. 940

Ravel

La Valse, poème chorégraphique, M. 72

Stravinsky

Le Sacre du printemps [The Rite of Spring], version for two pianos (1913)

PLEASE NOTE: the 250 Free Student Tickets for this concert are now fully booked. To be advised of any returns, please join Camerata Musica's email list by registering at the link at the bottom of the home page.

The brothers Lucas and Arthur Jussen are the world’s foremost piano duo, recording exclusively for Deutsche Grammophon since 2010. They are currently Artists in Residence at the Konzerthaus Berlin for the 2021-22 season. They have performed with orchestras such as the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, Concertgebouworkest (Amsterdam) and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields, as well as Montréal, Sydney, Singapore and Shanghai Symphony Orchestras. They have collaborated with conductors such as Christoph Eschenbach, Valery Gergiev, Manfred Honeck, Sir Neville Marriner, Andris Nelsons, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Jukka-Pekka Saraste and Jaap van Zweden.

Their debut CD with works by Beethoven received platinum status and was awarded the Edison Klassiek audience award. A Schubert recording and Jeux, a CD dedicated to French piano music, were subsequently released. Their recording of Mozart’s Piano Concertos KV 365 and KV 242 together with the Academy of St Martin in the Fields and Sir Neville Marriner reached gold status. The Jussen brothers also recorded Poulenc’s Double Piano Concerto and Saint-Saëns’ The Carnival of the Animals with the Concertgebouworkest and Stéphane Denève, as well as concertos and chorales by Bach with the Amsterdam Sinfonietta. The latest addition to their discography is The Russian Album (released March 2021) which features works for two pianos by Rachmaninov, Stravinsky and Arensky.