CARNEGIE HALL PRESENTS
Sasha Cooke
Pei-Yao Wang

Weill Recital Hall
Friday, April 4th, 2008 at 7:30 PM

Sasha Cooke, Mezzo-Soprano
Pei-Yao Wang, Piano

DEBUSSY Chansons de Bilitis
·· La flûte de Pan
·· La chevelure
·· Le tombeau des naïades
SCHUMANN Frauenliebe und -leben, Op. 42
·· Seit ich ihn gesehen
·· Er, der Herrlichste von allen
·· Ich kann’s nicht fassen, nicht glauben
·· Du Ring an meinem Finger
·· Helft mir, ihr Schwestern
·· Süsser Freund, du blickest
·· An meinem Herzen, an meiner Brust
·· Nun hast du mir den ersten Schmerz getan
HARBISON North and South
·· Ballad for Billie I
·· Late Air
·· Breakfast Song
·· Ballad for Billie II
·· Song
·· Dear, My Compass
FALLA Siete canciones populares españolas
·· El Paño Moruno
·· Seguidilla Murciana
·· Asturiana
·· Jota
·· Nana
·· Canción
·· Polo

Encores:
RACHMANINOFF "Spring Waters," Op. 14, No. 11
JOHN ADAMS "Am I In Your Light" from Doctor Atomic

More Information:

Please note that Sasha Cooke and Pei-Yao Wang will appear instead of Joseph Kaiser and Craig Rutenberg, who are both ill, on this date. Tickets purchased for Joseph Kaiser will be honored for this concert.

Any ticket holders with questions should call CarnegieCharge at 212-247-7800.

Sasha Cooke, Mezzo-Soprano
Praised by the New York Times for “combining the outward purity of a Renaissance angel and a voice of powerful warmth and excellent musicality,” American mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke is equally at home in operatic, orchestral, and recital settings.

Ms. Cooke has performed this season with the MET Chamber Ensemble and James Levine in Weill Recital Hall and has appeared at the Metropolitan Opera in Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel, Gluck’s Iphigénie en Tauride, and Puccini’s Manon Lescaut. She has recently sung Bach at Miller Theater and with Orpheus Chamber Orchestra at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and has premiered new works by John Musto and William Bolcom with the New York Festival of Song. In the summer of 2008, she travels to Tel Aviv for performances as Olga in Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin with the Israeli Opera. Next season she will appear as Kitty Oppenheimer in the New York premiere of John Adams’s Doctor Atomic at the Metropolitan Opera and will sing the same role with the English National Opera, her European debut.

Ms. Cooke won First Prize in the 2007 Young Concert Artists International Auditions. She made her Washington, DC debut in the Young Concert Artists Series at the Kennedy Center’s Terrace Theater in September 2007 and her New York debut in Zankel Hall in October 2007. Ms. Cooke is a member of the Lindemann Young Artist Development Program of the Metropolitan Opera. At the Young Concert Artists International Auditions, Ms. Cooke was also honored with the Rhoda Walker Teagle Prize, which sponsored her New York debut; the Fergus First Prize; the Swiss Global Artistic Foundation Award, which includes a concert engagement in Europe; and the Embassy Series Prize (Washington, DC). She holds the Lindemann Vocal Chair of Young Concert Artists.

During the summer of 2007, Ms. Cooke was a member of the Wolf Trap Opera Company, appearing with the National Symphony Orchestra as Mercedes in a concert performance of Bizet’s Carmen, as Aloes in Chabrier’s L’Étoile, and in a recital program entitled Manhattan Diaries, hosted by Steven Blier. Her other notable performances include Handel's Messiah and Mozart's Vespers at Carnegie Hall with the Oratorio Society of New York, Chausson’s Poème de l'amour et de la mer at Miller Theater, New York Festival of Song’s Brava Italia! concert in Weill Recital Hall, the Marilyn Horne Foundation’s 2007 Gala in Zankel Hall, Mozart’s Mass in C Minor with the Mozart Academy of San Luis Obispo, and Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky with the Brazos Valley Symphony Orchestra in Texas.

Ms. Cooke won First Prizes in the 2007 Sun Valley Opera Vocal Competition and the 2006 Bach Vocal Competition sponsored by the American Bach Society and The Bach Choir of Bethlehem, as well as Third Prize in the 2006 Licia Albanese-Puccini Competition.

Pei-Yao Wang, Piano
Pianist Pei-Yao Wang has established herself as a prominent soloist and chamber musician. She made her official orchestral debut with the Taipei Symphony Orchestra at the age of eight and since has performed as soloist with the Stamford Symphony, Orlando Symphony, South Fingerlake Orchestra, and Taipei Philharmonic. She also has appeared throughout the United States, Canada, Europe and Asia at venues such as the Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Alice Tully halls at Lincoln Center, the 92nd Street Y, and Merkin Hall in New York City; the Kennedy Center in Washington DC; Salle des Varietes in Monte Carlo; Suntory Hall in Tokyo; and the National Concert Hall in Taipei. As a chamber musician, Pei-Yao has collaborated with members of the Guarneri, Orion, Chicago, Mendelssohn, and Miró string quartets and has performed with other distinguished artists such as Claude Frank, Hilary Hahn, David Shifrin, and Mitsuko Uchida. She is also regularly invited to many festivals, including Marlboro, Caramoor, Norfolk, La Jolla, Ravinia, and Bridgehampton. She is currently a member of Chamber Music Society Two at Lincoln Center, a program to promote emerging young artists, and is also a member of the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artists program.

Born in Taipei, Taiwan, Pei-Yao was, as an eight-year-old, the youngest pianist ever to receive the overall First Prize in the Taiwan National Piano Competition. Four years later, she was invited to study at The Curtis Institute of Music, where she worked with Seymour Lipkin and director Gary Graffman. She then studied with Claude Frank at Yale University, where she received her Master of Music degree, and also pursued a concentration in architecture. She currently resides in New York, where for several years she was under the tutelage of celebrated pianist Richard Goode.