Ascending Dragon Music Festival & Cultural Exchange 2010
Southwest Chamber Music was sponsored by the U.S. State Department for the largest cultural exchange in history between the United States and Vietnam. Ascending Dragon Music Festival and Cultural Exchange was a six week cultural exchange that brought 19 Americans to Vietnam in March 2010, and 19 Vietnamese to the U.S. in April-May 2010, each for three weeks.
Guadalajara FIL Arts Festival 2009
Grammy® Award-winning Southwest Chamber Music performed at the prestigious Guadalajara FIL Arts Festival, Mexico in December 2009, representing the festival's guest of honor Los Angeles, with sponsorship from the NEA and the Cultural Affairs Department of the City of Los Angeles.
We collaborated with internationally renowned and Grammy Award-nominated Tambuco Percussion Ensemble of Mexico City and soprano Suzanna Guzmán, in a program featuring Mexican and American composers, Carlos Chávez, Aaron Copland, John Adams, and William Kraft.
This program highlights the strong cultural ties between the United States and Mexico, demonstrated by the lifelong friendship between Chávez and Copland and in the working relationship between Tambuco Percussion Ensemble and composer William Kraft that go back many decades. Southwest Chamber Music collaborated with Tambuco in the Grammy-nominated recording of works by Chávez at the suggestion of Kraft.
Concert Program for Guadalajara FIL Arts Festival at Teatro Diana
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
William Kraft - Encounters X:
Duologue for Violin & Marimba
John Adams - Shaker Loops
William Kraft - Encounters V:
In the Morning of the Winter Sea
Carlos Chávez - Cuatro Melodías
Tradicionales Indias del Ecuador
Aaron Copland - Appalachian Spring
UNAM, Mexico City 2007
Southwest Chamber Music performed in May 2007 at the UNAM Center in Mexico City with a cycle of five concerts of the complete chamber works of Carlos Chávez.
Two-time GRAMMY-winner Southwest Chamber Music closed its 20th Anniversary Season with a historic five-concert tour to Mexico City from May 23rd to May 28th, 2007. These performances- hosted by the most prestigious arts presenter in Mexico, the Universidad Nacional Autonomia de Mexico (UNAM)- constituted the first complete cycle of chamber music by Carlos Chávez in the history of Mexico. This project reunited Southwest Chamber Music with the Grammy-nominated Tambuco Percussion Ensemble of Mexico City. The five concerts surveyed music from 1919 to 1974 and covered chamber music works for strings, winds, brass, percussion, piano, and voice.
Five-Concert Program at UNAM in Mexico City
May 23rd – May 28th, 2007
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Soli I for Wind Quartet
Sonata for Four Horns
Antigona, apuntes para la sinfonia
Suite for Double Quartet from “La hija de Cólquide”
Thursday, May 24, 2007
Sonatinas for Violin, Cello & Piano
Three Pieces for Guitar & Feuille d’Album for Guitar
Sextet for 2 Violins, Viola, 2 Cellos & Piano
Friday, May 25, 2007
Soli II for Wind Quintet
Variations for Violin & Piano
Three Spirals for Violin & Piano
Invention II for Violin, Viola & Cello
Soli IV for Brass Trio
Trio for Flute, Viola & Harp
Saturday, May 26, 2007
String Quartet No. 1 for 2 Violins, Viola & Cello
Fuga H-A-G-C for Violin, Viola, Cello & Double Bass
String Quartet No. 2 for Violin, Viola, Cello & Double Bass
String Quartet No. 3 for 2 Violins, Viola & Cello
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Xochipilli, an Imaginary Aztec Music
Toccata for Percussion
Tres Exágonos & Otros Tres Exágonos
Lamentaciónes
Cuatro Melodías Tradiconales Indias del Ecuador
Tambuco for Percussion
Cantos de México para orquesta méxicana
Vietnam-Cambodia Cultural Exchange Residencies 2006
In December 2006, Southwest Chamber Music was the first American ensemble-in-residence to begin a long term residency and cultural exchange program with the Royal University of Fine Arts in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, and the Hanoi National Conservatory of Music in Vietnam.
In December 2006, Southwest Chamber Music was the first American ensemble-in-residence to perform and teach at the Hanoi National Conservatory in Vietnam as part of the Conservatory’s 50th anniversary celebration. Southwest Chamber Music’s musicians taught and interacted with over 100 students and faculty members at the Conservatory. “The two concerts in Hanoi were one of the most spirited and inspirational in Southwest Chamber Music’s career”, say Founding Directors Jeff von der Schmidt and Jan Karlin. Artistic Director Jeff von der Schmidt prepared a varied world program that symbolizes the cultural bridges possible through music, with the Asian tinged aesthetics of John Cage and Lou Harrison supported by a glance toward the Indochine of France’s Maurice Ravel, and included the Grawemeyer Award-winning composer Chinary Ung’s powerful Oracle.
The ensemble also performed a work that uses very popular Vietnamese folkloric song by composer Phuc Linh, which received its American premiere at Southwest’s 2007 Summer Festival at The Huntington. The solemn Adagio for Strings by Samuel Barber made many audience members shed tears with its wartime association. The melodic Mozart Clarinet Quintet ended the program with celebration.
The second program in Vietnam took place at the prestigious Hanoi Opera House, which featured Chinary Ung’s 45-minute masterpiece Aura, as well as side-by-side performances between Hanoi National Conservatory musicians and Southwest Chamber Music players in Takemitsu’s The Seasons and the Mendelssohn Octet. Composer Ung said after the performance of Aura that “it was the most moving and satisfying performance to date.”
The concert activities of Southwest Chamber Music in Cambodia featured the first professional performances in Phnom Penh and Siem Reap of the music of Southeast Asia’s most accomplished musician, Grawemeyer Award-winning composer Chinary Ung. The ensemble was also the only American organization represented by a performance at the 2006 World Culture Expo in Siem Reap, Cambodia, following a performance and Master Classes in Phnom Penh for the Royal University of Fine Arts. These performances constituted the most significant musical activity in Cambodia since the end of the Khmer Rouge Era. Works by Cambodian and Vietnamese composers will be presented in subsequent seasons at concerts and educational events throughout Southern California.
Vietnam-Cambodia Concert Programs
December 1-11, 2006
Friday, December 1, Chenla Theater, Phnom Penh, Cambodia
W.A. Mozart - Quartet in D major for Flute & Strings
W.A. Mozart - Quintet in A major for Clarinet & Strings
Chinary Ung - Aura
Sunday, December 3, World Culture Expo, Siem Reap, Cambodia
W.A. Mozart - Quartet in D major for Flute & Strings
W.A. Mozart - Quintet in A major for Clarinet & Strings
Chinary Ung - Aura
Friday, December 8, Concert Hall of Hanoi National Conservatory of Music, Vietnam
John Cage - In A Landscape
Lou Harrison - Songs in the Forest
Maurice Ravel - Three Mallarmé Songs
Chinary Ung - Oracle
Phúc Linh - Suite
Samuel Barber - Adagio for Strings
W.A. Mozart - Quintet in A major for Clarinet and Strings, KV. 581
Monday, December 11 - Hanoi Opera House, Vietnam
Toru Takemitsu - The Seasons
Felix Mendelssohn - Octet in Eb major
Chinary Ung - Aura
Library of Congress, Washington D.C. 2003
Southwest Chamber Music performed An American Decameron, a collaboration between composer Richard Felciano and noted author Studs Terkel at the Library of Congress.
Southwest Chamber Music traveled to Washington D.C. to perform at the Library of Congress with a concert of Richard Felicano’s An American Decameron. Commissioned by the Serge and Natalie Koussevitsky Fund at the Library of Congress, An American Decameron is a collaboration between Felciano and noted author Studs Terkel, whose observations of the American scene offer a very upbeat look at the world we experience.
Concert Program at Library of Congress, Washington D.C.
March 27, 2003
Tuesday, March 27
Richard Feliciano - An American Decameron
Cooper Arts, New York City 2003
Southwest Chamber Music made its New York debut in two concerts at Cooper Union in programs surveying the complete Los Angeles chamber music by Arnold Schoenberg.
“I can’t imagine any time in the future when I will hear Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire without the memory of how Phyllis performed it on the Southwest Chamber Music program. The ensemble bathed her remarkable presence in an ethereal wash of color.” — LA Weekly
Southwest Chamber Music made its New York debut in two concerts at Cooper Union in programs surveying the complete Los Angeles chamber music by Arnold Schoenberg.
After a successful set of concerts in New York City, Southwest Chamber Music became the first American ensemble to perform at the Arnold Schoenberg Center in Vienna. This week long residency at the Schoenberg Center in Vienna included all of the chamber music Schoenberg composed in Los Angeles, Pierrot Lunaire (the only work he recorded as a conductor of his music, which was also done in Los Angeles) and his arrangement of The Emperor Waltz, which he made for a tour with Pierrot Lunaire in the 1920s.
At Schoenberg’s home in Mödling, where Schoenberg developed the twelve tone technique, members of Southwest Chamber Music performed works by Schoenberg’s most important American students, John Cage and Lou Harrison, as well as Elliott Carter, Stephen L. Mosko, and Milton Babbitt.
New York Concert Programs
March 20-21, 2003
Thursday, March 20
Arnold Schoenberg - String Quartet No. 4, Op. 37
Arnold Schoenberg - Phantasy for Violin & Piano, Op. 47
Arnold Schoenberg - Canon for the Birthday of Thomas Mann
Arnold Schoenberg - Ode to Napoleon, Op. 41
Friday, March 21
Johann Strauss - The Emperor Waltz, Op. 437 (arr. by Schoenberg)
Arnold Schoenberg - String Trio, Op. 45
Arnold Schoenberg - Pierrot Lunaire, Op. 21
Arnold Schoenberg Center, Vienna, Austria 2003
During a week long residency at the Arnold Schoenberg Center in Vienna, Southwest Chamber Music became the first American ensemble to perform there. Our musicians studied or coached with the first generation of Schoenberg disciples.
Vienna Concert Programs
March 25-27, 2003
Tuesday, March 25
Arnold Schoenberg - String Quartet No. 4, Op. 37
Arnold Schoenberg - Phantasy for Violin & Piano, Op. 47
Arnold Schoenberg - Canon for the Birthday of Thomas Mann
Arnold Schoenberg - Ode to Napoleon, Op. 41
Wednesday, March 26
Elliott Carter - Four Lauds
Stephen L. Mosko - Bovine Song
Arnold Schoenberg - Six Little Pieces, Op. 19
Milton Babbit - A Little Bit Goes A Long Way
John Cage - Winter Music
Lou Harrison - Grand Duo for Violin & Piano
Thursday, March 27
Johann Strauss - The Emperor Waltz, Op. 437 (arr. by Schoenberg)
Arnold Schoenberg - String Trio, Op. 45
Arnold Schoenberg - Pierrot Lunaire, Op. 21
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