CARNEGIE HALL PRESENTS
Performance
Wednesday, April 18, 2012 | 7:30 PM
Ensemble ACJW
Featuring musicians of The Academy—a program of Carnegie Hall, The Juilliard School, and the Weill Music Institute in partnership with the New York City Department of Education
Weill Recital Hall
Seating
Chart
Experience “the brightest, most promising postgraduate musicians the city has to offer” (The New York Times) up close and personal in an intimate Weill Recital Hall performance of 19th-, 20th-, and 21st-century chamber music, from the autumnal beauty of late Brahms to Perle’s prismatic yet approachable flavor of modernism. Be sure to stay after the concert to meet the artists and enjoy a free drink.
Performers
Program
- PERLE Critical Moments 2
- FRANÇAIX Wind Quintet
- BRAHMS Clarinet Quintet in B Minor, Op. 115
Bios
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Ensemble ACJW
Ensemble ACJW is an inspirational collective of outstanding young professional musicians
from The Academy that has earned accolades from critics and audiences alike for the quality
of its performances, as well as its fresh and open-minded approach to performance and
programming. In a variety of venues, the ensemble has played a wide range of music-from
works written centuries ago to those completed days before-with verve and total commitment
to their art.
The group performs its own series at Carnegie Hall and regularly appears at The Juilliard
School's Paul Hall. As part of a partnership with Skidmore College that began in 2007,
Ensemble ACJW gives master classes to university students and performs for the Saratoga
Springs community both in concert halls and in informal settings around town.
All Ensemble ACJW members are alumni or current fellows of The Academy, a two-year
fellowship program created in 2007 by Carnegie Hall's Executive and Artistic Director Clive
Gillinson and The Juilliard School's President Joseph W. Polisi to support young
professional musicians develop their careers as top-quality performers, innovative
programmers, and dedicated teachers who are fully engaged with the communities in which
they live and work.
Fellows of the two-year Academy program-chosen for their musicianship, and also for their
leadership qualities and commitment to music education-come from some of the best music
schools in the country, including the Curtis Institute of Music, Eastman School of Music,
The Juilliard School, Mannes College The New School for Music, New England Conservatory,
and Yale School of Music.
In addition to performance opportunities at the highest level, a robust program of
professional development is an essential part of The Academy. Fellows partner with New York
City public schools to share their artistry with-and become central resources for-music
classrooms in the five boroughs. In their second year, the fellows take part in community
work through the Weill Music Institute's Musical Connections program, in which they
perform at multiple nontraditional music venues across New York City. In past years, they
participated in community-based group projects, including a collaboration with residents of
a Bronx family apartment complex, a pen-pal program that paired young students with
professional musicians, and a performance of George Crumb's Voice of the
Whale in the American Museum of Natural History's Millstein Hall of Ocean
Life.
Exemplary performers, dedicated teachers, and advocates for music throughout the
community, the fellows of The Academy that make up Ensemble ACJW are redefining what it
means to be a musician in the 21st century. Visit acjw.org to learn more.
More Info
Audio
Brahms Clarinet Quintet in B Minor (Adagio)
Juilliard String Quartet
Sony
At a Glance
Hailing from different countries, George Perle, Jean Françaix,
and Johannes Brahms each have their own specific and distinctive
compositional style. Critical Moments 2 and
the Op. 115 Clarinet Quintet, both written at the end of Perle's
and Brahms's lives, respectively, embody the well-defined style of
each composer. The Wind Quintet No. 1 was written in the middle of
Françaix's career, though it still exhibits the composer's
characteristic humorous style.
Perle created the 12-tone tonality method by taking certain
elements of 12-tone serialism and applying them to tonal music.
Critical Moments 2 develops small musical ideas, while
flowing between consonance and dissonance. Françaix is known for
writing humorous pieces of music that play with the expectations of
the audience; tonight's quintet is one of his many chamber
compositions for wind instruments. Alternately, Brahms's Clarinet
Quintet is one of the first chamber works by the composer that used
woodwind instruments. Although the music sounds like the Romantic
Brahms of the famous four symphonies, it reflects the composer's
mindset during a time when he was burdened by death.
Program Notes