The quarterly Shpachenko and Friends Chamber Music Festival will feature world premiere performances of musical works for piano, toy piano and electronics.
Cal Poly Pomona music Associate Professor Nadia Shpachenko-Gottesman and Pomona College music Professor Genevieve Feiwen Lee will perform “Music for a New B’ak’tun and Otherworldly Resonances” at 8 p.m., Wednesday, May 22, in the Music Recital Hall.
“The pieces on my program are mesmerizing, powerful and imaginative, and represent one of the most significant and exciting musical endeavors I have ever undertaken,” Shpachenko-Gottesman says.
The concert is a series of solo and duet performances of contemporary music written by composers Tom Flaherty, James Matheson, Adam Schoenberg and George Crumb. The concert will feature two new solo piano pieces composed by Matheson and Flaherty exclusively for Shpachenko.
Matheson has written works for the New York and Los Angeles philharmonics, the Chicago and Albany symphony orchestras, Carnegie Hall and the Borromeo String Quartet. Previously, he was executive director of the MATA Festival of New Music in New York. He is currently the artistic director at Neighborhood Classics at P.S. 142, a concert series that raises money for one of New York’s most underserved schools.
Flaherty is the John P. and Magdalena R. Dexter Professor of Music at Pomona College. He is also a cellist and member of Quartet Euphoria. Music ensembles have performed his work throughout Europe and North America.
Schoenberg has composed works for the Aspen Music Festival & School, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Kansas City Symphony, Lexington Philharmonic and Los Angeles Philharmonic. He teaches composition, orchestration and theory at UCLA and also composes music for films. His most recent score, “Graceland,” co-written with his father Steven Schoenberg, premiered at the 2012 Tribeca Film Festival.
Crumb is a Pennsylvania-based Grammy and Pulitzer Prize-winning composer who has written for voice, piano, orchestra and electric string quartet. He earned his doctorate in music arts from the University of Michigan and taught for more than 30 years at the University of Pennsylvania.
Flaherty, Matheson and Schoenberg will be in attendance Wednesday, sharing their insights and inspirations with the audience.
The festival also marks the final concert Shpachenko will perform before she begins recording for her World Premieres CD this summer.
Tickets are $15 general/$10 student, available at csupomona.tix.com or through the Publicity Office in Building 24-188.
Program:
- Part Suite-a for Solo Piano (2013) World Premiere – Tom Flaherty
- Cretic Variations for Solo Piano (2013) World Premiere – James Matheson
- Picture Etudes for Solo Piano (2013) – Adam Schoenberg
- Airdancing for Toy Piano, Piano, and Electronics (2013) – Tom Flaherty
- Otherworldly Resonances for Two Amplified Pianos (2005) – George Crumb
(Photo: Professor Nadia Shpachenko-Gottesman)