Event

Memoria Nova Ensemble

Memoria Nova Ensemble: Musical Offering

Shanna Gutierrez, flutes

Tara Lynn Ramsey, violin, viola

Andrew Rosenblum, keyboards

Program:

Bohuslav Martinu
Promenades for Flute, Violin, and Harpsichord

Guillaume Dufay
Ballata "Resveilles vous"

Ralph Shapey
Reyem

Henry Cowell
Trio for Flute, Violin, and Harp (arr. piano)

Jean-Philippe Rameau
Pieces de Clavecin en Concert, Cinquième Concert

The word nova means new in Latin. It also refers to a star that has a sudden increase in brightness and then returns to its original state. Music history, like a nova, exhibits periods of bright innovation, but also always returns to borrow from its roots. Musical Offering explores historical time and concepts of newness and tradition. Both the Martinu and Cowell trios are neo-Baroque works from the first half of the twentieth century that pay homage, both in instrumentation and musical form, to the baroque trio sonata, of which the Rameau Concert No. 5 is a prime example. The Rameau, meanwhile, looks both to the future and to the past. In contrast to the harpsichords traditional role as a supporting continuo instrument, here it is featured, with its virtuoso obbligato part, as the soloist in the ensemble. At the same time, Rameau pays tribute to the compositional styles of three French composers of his or the previous generation, Forqueray, Cupis, and Marais, after whom the movements are titled. Working within a framework of traditional concepts of counterpoint, motivic development, and classical form, Ralph Shapey pushes rhythm and harmony to their most modernist limits. Described by his friend Leonard Meyer as a radical traditionalist, he advances rhythmic notation in order to express a polyphony in which each voice moves in its own meter and tempo. In Reyem, written for the occasion of Meyers fiftieth birthday, Shapey juxtaposes two different concepts of time in counterpoint with each other one of highly structured polyrhythmic events, and one of a meterless and gestural nature. In this way, Shapey explores the modernist limits of structured time while liberating time of all structure.

Dufay acts as a bridge between the Medieval and Renaissance styles. One of the last composers to make use of the isorhythmic technique of the Ars Nova, his music is also characteristic of the early Renaissance, with its focus on flowing melody and increased use of triadic harmony. In Resvellies Vous, Dufay uses a variety of numerical techniques, such as gematria and the golden section ratio, to encode messages about the marriage of Carlo Malatesta and Vittoria di Lorenzo Colonna. Although separated by almost 550 years, Resvellies Vous and Reyem share many connections, including their exploration of complex ratio relationships and prioritization of linear counterpoint over the use of harmonic syntax as a way of constructing vertical sonorities.

About Memoria Nova Ensemble:

Memoria Nova means new memory, or new history. By programming less frequently performed works from across the spectrum of musical history, we encourage the listener to form a new memory of musical history, one that does not center on a structured narrative that leads from one masterpiece in the canon to the next, but rather on an exploration of musical styles which continuously cycles between bursts of newness and a return to a more familiar state. Memorial Nova is comprised of some of Chicagos most celebrated chamber musicians: Shanna Gutierrez, flute; Tara Lynn Ramsey, violin/viola; and Andrew Rosenblum, keyboards.

Flutist Shanna Gutierrez is dedicated to promoting and advancing contemporary chamber music performance in cultural life today through innovative performances and educational projects which combine both new and historically reimagined works. She appears throughout the United States and abroad as a soloist, clinician, and in various chamber collaborations, including Collect/Project and Sonic Hedgehog. She is the co-founder of FluteXpansions, an online resource for contemporary flute. She has performed as a guest with the Collegium Novum Zürich, ensemble interface, ensemble TZARA, and Fonema Consort, in addition to concerts and residencies in Germany, Portugal, Switzerland, The Netherlands, South Korea, Mexico, Colombia, and United Kingdom. She has received numerous awards and accolades for her performances including, prizes at the Stockhausen Courses, the Darmstadt Summer Courses for New Music, and a NewMusicUSA project grant. She was a founding member of Chicago-based Ensemble Dal Niente, with whom she received the 2012 Kranichstein Prize for Interpretation. Premieres and performances of pieces written specifically for her have led to appearances at such festivals as the Gaudeamus Muziekweek, Sonic Fusion Festival, Darmstadt New Music Courses, BEAMS Marathon, and Omaha Under the Radar. As the founder of Sonic Sculptures: A Journey in Sound, Shanna presents concerts and workshops on contemporary flute music and techniques throughout the US and abroad. She performs on a Burkart flute and piccolo and Kingma bass and alto flutes. www.shannagutierrez.com Violinist/Violist Tara Lynn Ramsey is passionate about new music, old music, and the direct engagement of musicians with their listeners and the broader communities in which they live and work. Originally from Cedar Falls, Iowa, she holds degrees from Northwestern University (Bachelor of Music summa cum laude) and the Cleveland Institute of Music (Master of Music). She now lives in Chicago, where she is a member of the Civic Orchestra and teaches violin and viola at Triton College.

Following the completion of her master's degree in 2013, Ms. Ramsey spent two years based in Cleveland, performing with a number of contemporary music ensembles and teaching a large studio of young violinists. As violinist with Ars Futura Ensemble, she performed music of northeast Ohio-based composers Keith Fitch, Jeffrey Mumford, Jeremy Allen, and dozens of student composers as well as composers such as Jennifer Higdon, Joan Tower, Mario Davidovsky, David Lang, John Harbison, and Lou Harrison. With composer Margaret Brouwer's Blue Streak Ensemble, she performed throughout northeast Ohio and in New York City and was coached by composers Victoria Bond, Robert Paterson, and David T. Little, in addition to performing many works by Brouwer. She premiered a work by Peter Kramer at the inaugural concert of Cleveland-based Syndicate for the New Arts and performed music ranging from Steve Reich's Clapping Music to Christian Wolff's Digger Song with UNION ensemble. During this period, she was also a Fellow at the Tanglewood Music Festival and, in two residencies at Avaloch Farm Music Institute, recorded the horn trios of Brahms, Ligeti, and Harbison with the Purple Line Trio, with whom she was a finalist at the 2014 Arriaga Competition. She was featured in live broadcasts on 104.9 WCLV, Cleveland's classical music station, and 90.1 WCPN, Cleveland's public radio station. A committed pedagogue, she was a member of the Suzuki faculty at the Cleveland Music Settlement, where she taught violin and music theory, in addition to maintaining a studio at Skyline Music in Westlake, OH, and teaching privately. She has performed in master classes given by eighth blackbird, the Guarneri String Quartet, and violinist Joseph Silverstein, and studied with Blair Milton, David Updegraff, and Gerardo Ribeiro, in addition to coaching with members of the Cleveland, Boston Symphony, and Chicago Lyric Opera orchestras and the Cleveland, Vermeer, and Juilliard string quartets.

Andrew Rosenblum, Chicago-based pianist and harpsichordist, is highly sought-after as both a soloist and collaborative artist.

Andrew performed as the harpsichord soloist in Bach Brandenburg Concerto No. 5, with Yo-Yo Ma and the Civic Orchestra of Chicago in December, 2015. In October and November of 2015, he was the pianist for the Lyric Opera of Chicagos Opera in the Neighborhoods production of Second Nature by Matthew Aucoin, which was performed for 18,000 children in the Chicagoland area.

Andrew joined the collaborative piano faculty of the Heifetz International Music Institute in June 2015, and is excited to return in 2016. He currently works as a pianist for vocal and instrumental studios at DePaul University, and prior to moving to Chicago worked as a staff pianist at the Cleveland Institute of Music, staff pianist for the International Clarinet Association's ClarinetFest®, substitute rehearsal pianist for the Cleveland Orchestra Chorus, and choral pianist for Cleveland State University Choirs. As a rehearsal pianist, he has helped soloists prepare for concerto performances with many leading orchestras, including the Minnesota Orchestra, the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. Andrew has performed in many prominent venues in the U.S., including the Kennedy Center and Alice Tully Hall, and has concertized internationally in Guadalajara, Mexico, Gros Islet, St. Lucia, and Banff, Canada. His performances include collaborations with Yo-Yo Ma, Elmar Oliveira, Robert Vernon and Joan Kwoun. Andrew's passion for new music has led him to premiere works by many eminent composers, including Lori Laitman, Juan Pablo Contreras, and Daniel Wohl.

Andrew received his master's degree in collaborative piano and harpsichord from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where he studied with Anita Pontremoli and Peter Bennett.

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PianoForte Studios (View)
1335 S Michigan Ave
Chicago, IL 60605
United States

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Owner: PianoForte Chicago

On BPT Since: Nov 29, 2016

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