| WEST MEETS EAST 2001 |
| Saturday, April 14, 2001 ** 8:00pm ** Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center
Following upon the success of their two previous West Meets East collaborations, the Chinese Arts Exchange will present the Newton Symphony Orchestra and Chorus pro Musica—under the baton of Maestro Jeffrey Rink, music director of both groups—in an unusual and varied program of Chinese and Western music on Saturday 14 April at 8:00pm at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall (Broadway at 65th Street). This will be Maestro Rink's New York debut. The concert features Xian Xinhai's heroic Yellow River Cantata, which dates from the period of the Sino-Japanese War and will be sung in Mandarin, as well as the Yellow River piano concerto, which draws on themes from the cantata, with pianist Li Fan. Soprano Yanyan Wang and baritone Ping Yu are soloists for the cantata, which will be narrated by Scott Shi. The program also includes The Butterfly Lovers violin concerto, featuring the award-winning violinist Hu Kun, Rossini's overture to The Barber of Seville, and a cappella selections by Randall Thompson and William Billings. Maestro Jeffrey Rink is currently in his 11th season as Chorus pro Musica's music director and his fifth as music director of the Newton Symphony Orchestra. Proclaimed "among the best of his generation of conductors" (El Ecomonista, Mexico City), Rink received high praise from Richard Dyer of the Boston Globe for his conducting of a "world-class concert Otello" (June 2000 with CpM). Keith Powers of the Boston Herald wrote of the November 1999 world premiere of Leon Biriotti's Sinfonia da Requiem (commissioned and performed by CpM and the NSO): "It was a privilege to sit in the audience for this unforgettable work .... The Newton Symphony played phenomenally well", and the Globe's Richard Buell added: "The orchestral and choral contributions—technically secure and emotionally committed—seemed everything they should be." Maestro Rink is Director of Orchestral Activities at the Longy School of Music, where he conducts both the Longy Chamber Orchestra and the Longy Summer Orchestra, and is on the faculty of UMass Boston. His national and international guest conducting engagements include the Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra (Boston), the Baltic State Philharmonic (Gdansk, Poland), the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra (Japan), the Nashua (NH) Symphony, the Orquesta Sinfon�ca de Monterrey (Mexico), L'Orchestre de Sherbrooke (Quebèc), and L'Orchestre de Jeunes de Fribourg (Switzerland). In November 2000 Maestro Rink returned to Japan to conduct the Ensemble of Tokyo and the Tokyo Chorus Academy in Bach's St John Passion and in February 2001 he led a program of operas by the American composers Dominick Argento, Thomas Pasatieri, and Seymour Barab at The Boston Conservatory. Pianist Li Fan, a Newton resident and member of the Brookline Music School faculty, began his piano studies at the age of six, holds degrees from the Sichuan and Shanghai conservatories, and was on the faculty of the Sichuan Conservatory of Music. In 1990 Li came to Boston to study with Victor Rosenbaum at the Longy School of Music, where he received an Artist Diploma. He has also studied with Gabriel Chodos and Randall Hodgkinson and has performed in Boston, Washington, New Hampshire and Illinois, as well as in his native China. Violinist Hu Kun was Yehudi Menuhin's only private student. Menuhin was so impressed with Hu's talents that he invited him to move to Britain to train with him free of charge. Hu Kun has won numerous international violin competitions, including First Prize in the first Concours International Yehudi Menuhin. He has played with many world-class orchestras and has recorded with EMI. Hu is now professor of violin at the Royal Academy of Music in London. Chorus pro Musica was founded in 1949 by Alfred Nash Paterson and quickly built a reputation for its professional level musical standards and innovative programming. These strengths have led to collaborations with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Philharmonic, the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Ballet, the Opera Company of Boston, and Boston Concert Opera. Chorus pro Musica's dedication to new and rarely performed choral music has resulted in numerous Boston premieres, several American premieres, and at least two world premieres: Poulenc's Gloria and Britten's War Requiem, as well as the 1999 world premiere, jointly commissioned and performed with the Newton Symphony, of Leon Biriotti's Sinfonia da Requiem. The Newton Symphony Orchestra was founded in 1965 by Michel Sasson to present fine music at affordable prices, close to home, for Newton and the surrounding communities, as well as to provide opportunities for the area's wealth of fine volunteer musicians to play in a quality symphonic ensemble. The NSO has championed contemporary music throughout its history and has commissioned works by Richard Boulanger, Charles Fussell, John Heiss, and Gunther Schuller, as well as Biriotti's Sinfonia da Requiem, co-commissioned with CpM. Charles Fussell's Wilde, commissioned for the NSO's 25th season, was one of three finalists for the 1991 Pulitzer Prize in Music. Tickets for The Yellow River are $55, 45, 36 and 28 and are available from the Alice Tully Hall box office, or may be ordered from Center Charge at (212) 721-6500, or ordered online at http://www.lincolncenter.org. Further concert information is available at (212) 875-5050, and email enquiries may be sent to [email protected]. For further information about Chorus pro Musica, call (617) 267-7442, or visit the CpM website at www.choruspromusica.org. For further information about the Newton Symphony Orchestra, call (617) 965-2555, or visit the NSO website at www.newtonsymphony.org. Return to Schedule |
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