Festival Focus August 8, 2016, correct

FESTIVALFOCUS YOUR WEEKLY CLASSICAL MUSIC GUIDE

SUPPLEMENT TO THE ASPEN TIMES

This week!

AMFS Music Director Robert Spano conducts the wonderful Aspen Philharmonic Orchestra on Wednesday, August 10, at 6 pm at the Benedict Music Tent.

The beloved American String Quartet also performs on Wednesday, August 10, at 8:30 pm in Harris Concert Hall.

Hear original compositions

by AMFS President and CEO Alan Fletcher and AMFS Music Director Robert Spano at the Chamber Music concert on Saturday, August 13, at 4:30 pm in Harris Concert Hall.

All ages are welcome to the AMFS's FREE Ice Cream Social on Sunday, August 14, at 2:30 pm on the David Karetsky Music Lawn. Stick around for the Aspen Festival Orchestra concert at 4 pm in the Benedict Music Tent, featuring pianist Yefim Bronfman and conductor James Gaffigan.

MONDAY, AUGUST 8, 2016

VOL 27, NO. 8

Yefim Bronfman plays Russian masterpiece “Any project he suggests to us, we immediately say yes because his interYefim Bronfman takes to the piano like ests in music are so wide and varied,” an athlete to the field: with determina- Fletcher says. “But a chance to hear him tion and focus, and after a lot of prepa- in this great monument of the repertoire ration. is something to treasure.”

“Practice is the key,” he says. “I try to Popular lore has it that Prokofiev’s always begin from scratch.”

Second Concerto is so difficult that the But this athleticism is more than just composer himself muddled through it a metaphor; he reat a concert in the lies on upper body 1930s. But Bronfman “A chance to hear strength, especially says the real reason for taxing pieces like he continues to play [Bronfman] in this Prokofiev’s Second the piece is not for Concerto, which great monument of the the musical acrobathe will play on Sunics, not because he repertoire is something relishes the chalday, August 14, with the Aspen Festival lenge, but simply beto treasure.”

Orchestra and concause he loves it. ductor James Gaf“Prokofiev’s SecAlan Fletcher figan. ond Concerto is like President and CEO “Few pieces dean epic,” he says. “It’s Aspen Music Festival and School mand so much from very unusual in the a pianist,” Bronfman structure. There are says. “You need to be in good shape four movements when three movements physically. The speed and power of this are typical. That makes it a little bit more music require it.” experimental. I’m always fascinated by Alan Fletcher, Aspen Music Festival new textures and structure.” and School (AMFS) president and CEO, James Gaffigan, who will conduct says audiences may be more familiar the performance, and Bronfman have with Prokofiev’s Third Piano Concerto, worked together once before. Bronfman but he calls the second a “tremendously notes Gaffigan’s youth, saying it leads exciting masterpiece.” him to more surprising approaches.

Fletcher lauds Bronfman as the right That affinity for the unusual draws a man for the performance, calling him “one of the greatest living musicians.”

See Bronfman, Festival Focus page 3 PAIGE COOPERSTEIN

Festival Focus Writer

DARIO ACOSTA

Pianist Yefim Bronfman will perform Prokofiev's "epic" Second Piano Concerto on Sunday, August 14.

Robert McDuffie, R.E.M.'s Mike Mills perform rock concerto JESSICA CABE

Festival Focus Writer

Beloved violinist and Aspen Music Festival and School (AMFS) alumnus Robert McDuffie has become a Festival staple after forty consecutive summers in Aspen, but this season, audiences are going to hear him like never before: backed by a rock band.

On Thursday, August 11, at 7 pm, An Eclectic Evening with Robert McDuffie and R.E.M.’s Mike Mills will invite listeners on a musical journey unlike anything they’ve heard before. The concert features John Adams’s Road Movies and Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings in C major before launching into the U.S. premiere of Mills’s Concerto for Violin, Rock Band, and String Orchestra, an electrifying blurring of

the line between classical and rock music that only Mills and McDuffie could pull off.

For fans of either, the pairing may seem unlikely. One artist, McDuffie, has earned himself the reputation of a great violinist in the classical realm, performing with some of the best orchestras the world over. The other, Mills, played bass and keyboards for one of the most influential alternative rock bands of the 1990s, R.E.M., with hits like “Everybody Hurts” and “Losing my Religion.”

But in truth, the two planted their musical roots in the same place: Macon, Georgia.

“We met when we were twelve. We sang in church choir and played in hand bell choir together,” McDuffie says. “His parents sang in the choir that my mother directed at the church where she played organ. The two families got together ev-

ery Sunday night after church for about three years. So I’ve known them for a very, very long time.”

McDuffie says he and Mills always stayed in touch, and as both of their careers took off, they supported one another. Sometimes, each would be playing a concert in the same city on the same day, so they’d try to catch each other’s performances before or after their own. McDuffie remembers the moment when the weight of Mills’s success really struck him.

“I was just walking through LaGuardia Airport and saw on the newsstand the cover of Rolling Stone had declared R.E.M. America’s greatest band,” he says with a laugh. “And I went, ‘Oh my god, See Rock, Festival Focus page 3

ROGER IDENDEN

Classical violinist Robert McDuffie and Mike Mills, of the mega-rock band R.E.M., will perform Mills's Concerto for Violin, Rock Band, and String Orchestra, on Thursday, August 11. It will be the piece's U.S. premiere.

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MONDAY, AUGUST 8, 2016

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Rising star pianist Daniil Trifonov performs recital, concerto JESSICA CABE

Festival Focus Writer

In 2011, at only twenty years old, Russian pianist Daniil Trifonov exploded on the classical music scene when he won two of the most prestigious piano competitions in the world.

First was the 13th Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Master Competition in Tel-Aviv. Then came the XIV International Tchaikovsky Competition in Russia.

Three years later, he made his debut with the Aspen Music Festival and School (AMFS) playing something a little different from the Russian Romantic works audiences had grown to expect from him: Mozart.

“It was natural, winning the Tchaikovsky, that the presenters at first wanted him to always be playing Tchaikovsky or Rachmaninoff concertos,” says AMFS President and CEO Alan Fletcher. “But we were delighted to offer him an Aspen debut in Mozart, which was his wish.”

Trifonov returns to Aspen this week with three events: first, a recital on Tuesday, August 9; then, an Artist Dinner on Wednesday, August 10, at a private residence; last, he will join the Aspen Chamber Symphony for Schumann’s Piano Concerto in A minor on Friday, August 12.

“Here we have a concerto that I would say is the most poetic of all piano concertos,” Fletcher says of the Schumann.

“It is a work with a lot of tremendous Romantic emotion, but it’s also full of intimacy and delicacy. This is a side of Trifonov that is what makes him one of the greatest artists of his generation.”

The twenty-five-year-old pianist was born to two profes-

sional musicians, and when his parents recognized his innate abilities, they did everything they could to nurture those talents. He began playing piano at five years old, and he also started composing and performing at a very young age. In fact, his first performance at eight years old was marked by the loss of one of his baby teeth in the middle of the concert.

Trifonov says the moment he understood the importance of music in his life was when he broke his arm at thirteen. He couldn’t play piano for almost a month, and it was during this time forced away from his instrument that he realized how much it meant to him.

So, he studied, and he practiced, and after a decade and a half of near-obsessive dedication, he made a name for himself in 2011 by winning those two fateful competitions. Since then, he’s traveled the world as a recitalist and concerto soloist, joining such prestigious orchestras as the Vienna Philharmonic, the London Symphony Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and many more.

And though his mastery of the Russian Romantics may still be his staple, audiences would be remiss to pass up the opportunity to hear his recital, featuring Bach/Brahms’s Chaconne in D minor, Liszt’s Grandes études de Paganini, Schubert’s Sonata No. 18 in G major, and Brahms’s Variations on a Theme of Paganini.

“Our audiences have been seeing him across the United States in complete cycles of Prokofiev and Rachmaninoff concertos, but in Aspen, we will see him in the central German repertoire, and I think it’s very exciting for more reasons

DARIO ACOSTA

Daniil Trifonov, winner of the 2011 International Tchaikovsky Competition in Russia, will play a recital featuring works by Brahms and Liszt on Tuesday, August 9, and will join the Aspen Chamber Symphony for Schumann's Piano Concerto in A minor on Friday, August 12.

than one,” says Asadour Santourian, AMFS vice president for artistic administration and artistic advisor. “I think Daniil is not one who likes to muse about his artistry, but rather is someone who gives us a finished product of his thinking process.

I think it’s a very colorful window into his imagination that we are invited into. And, of course, his pianism is superior. What I observe the most is that his virtuosity is always at the service of the music.”

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MONDAY, AUGUST 8, 2016 3

BRONFMAN: Part of 'White Nights' mini-festival Continued from Festival Focus page 1

nice parallel with the piece itself, which is part of the AMFS's White Nights mini-theme celebrating music from above the Arctic Circle.

Prokofiev hailed from Russia and gained recognition in the early 20th century for virtuosic works. Likewise, Bronfman was born in the Soviet world, in Uzbekistan, before moving to Israel and later the United States. He says his parents were the first to suggest he play piano, and he stuck with it through each move.

“It was very interesting to be exposed to different cultures at an early age,” Bronfman says. “For me, it was a very positive experience. One notable thing: we left a totalitarian regime for freedom. Whether you want it or not, your life is always reflected in what you do. I bring culture from Russia, America, and Europe. Everything is connected. That’s what makes it interesting.”

Bronfman’s varied musical interpretations

come from his life experiences, and in this case, the music itself is diverse as well.

“The piece runs the gamut from fast, florid passages to robust and big-boned sound that almost matches the entire orchestra, sound for sound,” says Asadour Santourian, vice president for artistic administration and artistic advisor of the AMFS. He adds that Bronfman “really gets the sonic relationships from the most intimate to the most heroic moments of the work.”

In addition to an international upbringing, Bronfman’s life has also included more than thirty summers spent at the AMFS. He says the caliber of the musicians, instruments, and venues keeps him coming back.

“It’s like coming home in a way,” he says.

“I’ve been going since I was in my teens. It’s a wonderful festival in a beautiful location. I’ve met many wonderful colleagues here that I enjoy interacting with. Every artist would be lucky to perform here.”

ASPEN MUSIC FESTIVAL AND SCHOOL BOX OFFICE HOURS

ALEX IRVIN

Pianist Yefim Bronfman has performed more than thirty summers at the Aspen Music Festival and School, and he will join the Aspen Festival Orchestra on Sunday, August 14.

Harris Concert Hall: 9 am through the intermission of the evening concert, daily.

Wheeler Opera House: 9 am–5 pm daily.

ROCK: Concerto

Faculty Profile: Jonathan Haas

for Rock Band

LINDA BUCHWALD

Festival Focus Writer

When Jonathan Haas was eight years old, he had a habit of banging on pots and pans. His sister, driven mad by the clamor, begged their parents to get him something else to drum.

So, they did. And he always loved making noise with his percussion instruments, but it wasn't until he studied at the Aspen Music Festival and School (AMFS) that he realized he wanted to make music his living.

When Haas was a student, Charles Owen, the head of the AMFS percussion program at the time, assigned him to play snare drum on a piece that Aaron Copland was conducting for a television show. Haas didn't feel confident, but Owens said, "This is what you're going to be doing."

"I never looked back,” Haas says. “And that singular experience was the defining moment when I decided that that's what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.”

He went from thinking he'd be a lawyer or businessman to studying at Juilliard for graduate school, and he’s now the longest-standing AMFS percussion artist-faculty member, going on more than thirty years.

One of the reasons Haas keeps coming back each summer is the setting in Aspen, which he says is second to none. "It's the combination of the beauty of the area with the beauty of the music that everybody's studying," he says. Haas teaches and lives in New York City, and though he loves it there, he says, "there's nothing quite like a beautiful Tuesday morning giving a lesson on Debussy's La Mer in the stillness, the beauty, the smells, and the visually inspiring area that we're in [in Aspen]."

Though he’s always loved the AMFS, he says this year's redevelopment of the Bucksbaum Campus makes him feel a little safer here now than three decades ago. When he first started teaching, the percussion building was in an avalanche zone. "When you would be giving lessons on a fairly regular basis, large boulders would be coming down the side of the mountain, banging into the sides of the practice rooms," he says.

COURTESY PHOTO

AMFS percussion artist-faculty member Jonathan Haas has been teaching in Aspen for more than thirty years, and it was actually when he was a student of the AMFS that he realized he wanted to make a career out of music.

Today, Haas teaches in a safe, beautiful percussion studio, and there have been other improvements with the new Bucksbaum Campus, too. "When I first came to the Festival, it didn't have the world reach that it now has. It was a well-kept secret when I first got here,” he says. “And now, not only is it not a secret, but it's the leader in music education.”

Haas is excited about the changes to the Campus because he says evolving is a requirement for success, as music always needs to be forward-looking. "I think we can be much more on the cutting edge of music education and performance with our new facilities," he says.

All these years after that life-changing moment as a student at the AMFS, Haas continues to love what he does, saying there is nothing he doesn't like about being a percussionist and banging on drums. "I like that they're big and heavy and that there's a lot of them,” he says. “And I like the fact that when we play them, they have a significant part in whatever piece of the music that they occupy."

Continued from Festival Focus page 1 there he is! I’m so proud of him.’”

R.E.M. broke up five years ago, but Mills has stayed active in music. Knowing this, McDuffie thought it was about time the two of them collaborated.

“It’s a privilege to play the 'Top 40' of classical music, and I’ve been doing that for most of my career, but I wanted to expand a little bit,” he says. “That’s why I went to Philip Glass and asked him to write a piece for me, and then I thought, why not go to another great American composer, Mike Mills, and throw the idea of a violin concerto out to him? So I did, and he said, ‘Let’s go for it.’”

And so, Mills’s Concerto for Violin, Rock Band, and String Orchestra was born. The piece consists of six movements spanning a wide array of musical styles, including waltz and good old-fashioned rock and roll. It incorporates traditional rock instruments like electric guitars and a drum set, but it also features a string orchestra, tying it back to classical instrumentation.

“I think people will respond very well to it, if not ecstatically to it,” says Asadour Santourian, AMFS vice president for artistic administration and artistic advisor. “The more music of Mike Mills you know, the more you will probably think, ‘Wow, how refreshing to hear it again, yet in a virtuoso violin part.’ Bobby is always exploring new pathways for his instrument and for himself, his musicianship, and his artistry.

This is a great opportunity to experience this.”

The piece made its world premiere with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra earlier this year, and McDuffie and Mills will take it on a sixteen-city tour this fall after recording the piece for Philip Glass’s record company, Orange Mountain Music. But before all of that, the concerto will make its United States debut right here in Aspen.

“Aspen is really where I grew up musically,” McDuffie says. “So it’s incredibly meaningful to me that we’re doing it in Aspen. It’s funny; it’s my fortieth appearance in Aspen and Mike’s first, so we’re having fun with that.”