Saturday, October 23, 2021, 8pm
All Saints Parish
1773 Beacon Street, Brookline, MA 02445

Please note that masks and proof of vaccination are required for all attendees over 12 years old; masks required for those under 12.

Tickets are $15 general admission, $10 for students and seniors, and free for children 12 & under.
Pre-ordering tickets online is strongly encouraged.

Missy Mazzoli, Violent, Violent Sea

Grammy-nominated composer Missy Mazzoli was recently deemed “one of the more consistently inventive, surprising composers now working in New York” (The New York Times) and “Brooklyn’s post-millennial Mozart” (Time Out New York). Mazzoli is the Mead Composer-in-Residence at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and her music has been performed all over the world by the Kronos Quartet, eighth blackbird, pianist Emanuel Ax, Opera Philadelphia, Scottish Opera, LA Opera, Cincinnati Opera, New York City Opera, Chicago Fringe Opera, the Detroit Symphony, the LA Philharmonic, the Minnesota Orchestra, the American Composers Orchestra, the Boston Symphony, JACK Quartet, cellist Maya Beiser, violinist Jennifer Koh, pianist Kathleen Supové, Dublin’s Crash Ensemble, the Sydney Symphony and many others. In 2018 she made history when she became one of the two first women (along with composer Jeanine Tesori) to be commissioned by the Metropolitan Opera. That year she was also nominated for a Grammy in the category of “Best Classical Composition” for her work Vespers for Violin, recorded by violinist Olivia De Prato.

Violent, Violent Sea was commissioned by the Barlow Endowment and the League of Composers Chamber Orchestra, and was premiered at Miller Theater in New York City in June 2011.

This work began with more of an emotional impression than a precise musical idea. My early notes for the piece look something like this:

LOUD BUT SLOW. LIGHT BUT DARK. VIBRAPHONE. HOW TO DO THIS?

To my relief I eventually did figure out “how to do this.” The work evolved significantly from these early sketches but my idea of creating a loud, dense work with conflicting light and dark sides remained intact. The result is a ten-minute piece with a deceptively sparkling exterior and dark, slow-moving chords at its core. These chords grind against each other, dissolve into glissandos and crescendo into surprising dissonances under the glistening patina of vibraphone and marimba. This work is dedicated to Sheila Mazzoli, who loves the sea more than anyone. - Missy Mazzoli

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Piano Concerto No. 17

with Concerto Competition winner Chengcheng Ma

Pianist Chengcheng Ma won top prizes in the TOYAMA Asia International Piano Competition, Asian Chopin International Piano Competition, the First KAWAI Asia International Piano Competition, the 14th Hong Kong - Asia Piano Open Competition, the 6th Manhattan International Music Competition, the 3rd WPTA (World Piano Teacher Association) FINLAND International Piano Competition, the 9th edition of New York Artist International Competition, the Lancaster International Piano Competition, Boston University Richmond Solo Piano Competition, BU Soloist (concerto) Competition, BU@Carnegie Competition, and Brookline Symphony Orchestra Concerto Competition.

Chengcheng has performed recitals in different cities in China, the U.S., and Europe, including the Forbidden City Concert Hall in Beijing, Shijiazhuang People’s Hall, the Académie de Musique de Braine l'Alleud Concert Hall (Belgium), the Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, Keene Faculty Center (University of Florida), Steinman Concert Hall (The Pennsylvania Academy of Music), Jed Leshowitz Recital Hall (Montclair State University), and Tina Weedon Smith Memorial Hall. Chengcheng’s latest performances include a solo recital in BU Tsai Performance Center, performances in The Fondation Bell’Arte Music Academy (Belgium), Puerto Rico Int. Piano Festival, University of Illinois Summer Piano Institute, Thomas “Fats” Waller and other Great Jazz Masters Live Concert, and a concerto performance with BU Symphony Orchestra under Maestro James Burton.

Chengcheng is currently working on and organizing the HARLEM STRIDE PIANO project, a lecture recital tour in the U.S. and Asia. This is an ongoing project with no end date, with a focus on the piano music of Fats Waller, James P. Johnson, Mary Lou Williams, Willie “The Lion” Smith, Luckey Roberts, and other jazz piano giants.

Chengcheng is a pupil of Prof. Min Li, Timothy Ehlen, William Heiles, and Boaz Sharon. He has received BA and MA degrees in piano performance from China Conservatory of Music in Beijing, and Artist Diplomas from University of Illinois and Boston University. Chengcheng is currently pursuing his DMA from Boston University under Prof. Boaz Sharon. Chengcheng is a member of the Alpha Kappa Chapter of Pi Kappa Lambda National Music Honor Society.

Born in Salzburg, Mozart showed prodigious ability from his earliest childhood. Already competent on keyboard and violin, he composed from the age of five and performed before European royalty, embarking on a grand tour. At 17, Mozart was engaged as a musician at the Salzburg court but grew restless and travelled in search of a better position. During his final years in Vienna, he composed many of his best-known symphonies, concertos, and operas, and portions of the Requiem, which was largely unfinished at the time of his early death at the age of 35. Despite his early death, his rapid pace of composition resulted in more than 600 works of virtually every genre of his time. He is considered among the greatest classical composers of all time, and his influence on Western music is profound.

 
Antonín Dvořák, Symphony No. 9 in E Minor

Antonín Leopold Dvořák was a Czech composer that frequently employed rhythms and other aspects of the folk music of his native Bohemia. Dvořák's own style has been described as "the fullest recreation of a national idiom with that of the symphonic tradition, absorbing folk influences and finding effective ways of using them."

Dvorak’s Symphony No. 9 in E minor, "From the New World", popularly known as the New World Symphony, was composed in 1893 while he was the director of the National Conservatory of Music of America. The symphony was commissioned by the New York Philharmonic.

Dvořák was influenced not only by music he had heard, but by what he had seen, in America. He wrote that he would not have composed his American pieces as he had, if he had not seen America. It has been said that Dvořák was inspired by the American "wide open spaces" such as prairies he may have seen on his trip to Iowa in the summer of 1893.

At the premiere in Carnegie Hall, the end of every movement was met with thunderous clapping and Dvořák felt obliged to stand up and bow. This was one of the greatest public triumphs of Dvořák's career, and popularity spread throughout the world. The universal popularity of the symphony has persisted, possibly most notably illustrated by the fact that astronaut Neil Armstrong took a tape recording of the New World Symphony along during the Apollo 11 mission Moon landing in 1969.