By Signe Hammer
We are thrilled to welcome back to St. Paul’s Will Ransom, piano, and three members of the Vega Quartet – Jessica Wu, violin; Yinzi Kong, viola; and Guang Wang, cello – on Friday and Sunday, March 11 and 13, at 5pm. Seating will be socially distanced at a maximum of 50% capacity, and standard Covid hygiene protocols will be in place.
Will is Professor of Piano at Emory University in Atlanta, where the Vega is Quartet-in-Residence; he and Yinzi Kong are husband and wife. Will is also Artistic Director of the acclaimed Highlands-Cashiers Chamber Music Festival in North Carolina, He regularly appears in recitals, as soloist with orchestras, and as a chamber musician in countries around the globe. He has performed in many of the country’s top venues, including Carnegie Hall, Washington DC’s National Gallery; and in Philadelphia, Boston, Miami, and Dallas.
The Vega Quartet tours throughout Asia, Europe and North America and has appeared at Carnegie Hal, Bargemusic, and London’s Royal Academy of Music. The Quartet is a frequent guest at music festivals, including Amelia Island, Aspen, Highlands-Cashiers, Juneau Jazz & Classics in Alaska, Mostly Mozart, Rockport, and its members regularly collaborate with leading musicians.
On Friday, March 11 at 5pm, we begin with Mozart’s Piano Quartet in G Minor. Among the first composers to explore this genre, Mozart loved to play viola in a chamber music setting. We continue with Beethoven’s «Gassenhauer» Piano Trio in Bb Major, named for the finale’s variations on a street (gasse) tune, «Pria ch’io l’impegno» (“before going to work, I need a snack”).
The second half is devoted to Brahms’s Piano Quartet in G Minor, for the premier of which Clara Schumann played the piano part. Arnold Schoenberg later orchestrated it for Otto Klemperer’s Los Angeles Philharmonic and George Balanchine choreographed his ballet, Brahms–Schoenberg Quartet, from that version.
Schumann’s Piano Quartet in E-flat Major starts the program on Sunday, March 13, at 5pm. At its premiere, Clara Schumann was too ill to play, so Mendelssohn stepped in and sight-read the piano part. Joaquín Turina’s Piano Quartet in A Minor follows; although he had studied in Paris for 10 years, Turina, along with the better known Manuel de Falla and Isaac Albéniz, decided to compose in the Spanish style, part of an early-20th-century nationalistic trend.
Finally, Beethoven considered his «Archduke» Piano Trio one of his finest works, and it is a masterpiece of the genre. One of 14 compositions dedicated to his patron, friend and student, Archduke Rudolph of Austria, it was the last piece Beethoven, grown deaf, played in public.
Tickets for the concerts at St. Paul’s are $200, $400 and $600 pesos donation each, and are on sale through our website, and at the concert 45 minutes before performance time. Details of all Pro Musica’s concerts and Patron Membership are on our website, www.promusicasma.org, or contact us at promusicasma@aol.com.
Pro Musica Concert Series
Piano Quartet with William Ransom, Piano
Vega Quartet Members
Fri & Sun, Mar 11 & 13, 5pm
St. Paul’s Church, calle Cardo
Tickets 200, 400, 600 pesos
