Program Notes

The Elements Suite for Violin and Orchestra Jennifer Higdon (b. 1962) Jessie Montgomery (b. 1981) Kevin Puts (b. 1972) I'm so excited to have the opportunity to premiere my new commissions project, The Elements. The idea for this unique endeavor was born during the...

The Elements Suite for Violin and Orchestra Kevin Puts (b. 1972) Jake Heggie (b. 1961) Edgar Meyer (b. 1960) I'm so excited to have the opportunity to premiere my new commissions project, The Elements. The idea for this unique endeavor was born during the early...

String Trio in C Minor, Op. 9, No. 3 Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) When Beethoven embarked on his first chamber works, he initially avoided the string quartet, a form that Haydn and Mozart had effectively monopolized in 1790s Vienna. Instead, he offered the Opus 9...

Cantus Arcticus, Op. 61 (1974) Einojuhani Rautavaara (1928-2016) Einojuhani Rautavaara (1928-2016), often regarded as the most significant Finnish composer since Jean Sibelius, charted a long and shape-shifting compositional career. He was always a free spirit, drawn...

The Rhapsody of Steve Jobs (2021) Mason Bates (b. 1977) In the six years since Santa Fe Opera presented the world premiere of Mason Bates’s debut opera The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs (2017), the piece has steadily gained a foothold in the modern repertory. A debut...

Phantasy Quartet for Oboe and Strings, Op. 2 Francis Poulenc (1899-1963) Years before he cemented his place in history with operas about troubled outsiders (Peter Grimes, Billy Budd) and a War Requiem steeped in pacifist ideals, Benjamin Britten was a prolific...

The Impresario Overture, K. 486 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) Mozart composed the one-act Der Schauspieldirektor (The Impresario) for a competition organized by none other than Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II. Presented before a princely audience at Vienna’s...

Piano Concerto in G Major Maurice Ravel (1875-1937) Maurice Ravel was a master of artful contradictions — in conversation and in music. In a 1931 interview with London’s Daily Telegraph, he declared that the music of a concerto should be “lighthearted and brilliant,...

String Quartet in D Major, K.499 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) Mozart’s K. 499 Quartet is subtitled the “Hoffmeister” Quartet, after his friend (and sometime publisher) Franz Hoffmeister.  A more apt, descriptive title for the work might be the “Figaro” Quartet,...

Flatiron Escapades Jordan Holloway (b. 1999) Flatiron Escapades is a musical tribute to the Colorado Chautauqua, composed in commemoration of its 125th anniversary, and is a reflection of my experiences in the park and the surrounding Flatirons. For three years, I...

Gazebo Dances John Corigliano (b. 1938) Gazebo Dances was originally written as a set of four-hand piano pieces dedicated to certain of my pianist friends. I later arranged the suite for orchestra and for concert band, and it is from the latter version that the title...

Structures for String Quartet (1951) Morton Feldman (1926-1987) Although Morton Feldman's best-known innovation is the devising of graphical scores that permit a range of choices (of, say, pitches to be made by the performer), the present composition is not such a...

Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, Op. 43 Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943) Igor Stravinsky’s quip that Sergei Rachmaninoff “was a six-and-a-half-foot scowl” served to cement his image as a dour, taciturn spirit. But behind the statuesque bearing, severe crewcut, and...

Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, Op. 30 Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943) In writing his Third Piano Concerto to perform on his first American tour in 1909, Sergei Rachmaninoff produced what would become a byword for keyboard pyrotechnics in the 20th century,...

Carmen Suite No. 1 for orchestra Georges Bizet (1838-1875) There are several reasons why Georges Bizet’s 1875 opera Carmen endures as a modern favorite. It is, after all, the fourth most-produced work in the Metropolitan Opera’s history, following only La bohème,...

“Motherboxx Connection” from Tales: A Folklore Symphony for orchestra (2021) Carlos Simon (b. 1986) For generations of Americans, comic books were the first real page-turners: exciting, cheap, and easily available at any newsstand or drugstore. But for many Black...