Ithaca College Symphony Orchestra

Li, Weiyan

Pasternack, Jonathan

Pawlak, Benjamin

Yan, Pan

English

Ithaca College

Ithaca CollegeDigital Commons @ ICAll Concert & Recital Programs Concert & Recital Programs3-2-2014Concert: Ithaca College Symphony Orchestra,Featuring Winners of the 2014 ConcertoCompetitionJonathan PasternackPan YanBenjamin PawlakWeiyan LiIthaca College Symphony OrchestraFollow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.ithaca.edu/music_programsPart of the Music CommonsThis Program is brought to you for free and open access by the Concert & Recital Programs at Digital Commons @ IC. It has been accepted forinclusion in All Concert & Recital Programs by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ IC.Recommended CitationPasternack, Jonathan; Yan, Pan; Pawlak, Benjamin; Li, Weiyan; and Ithaca College Symphony Orchestra, "Concert: Ithaca CollegeSymphony Orchestra, Featuring Winners of the 2014 Concerto Competition" (2014). All Concert & Recital Programs. 516.http://digitalcommons.ithaca.edu/music_programs/516Ithaca College Symphony OrchestraJonathan Pasternack, Music DirectorPaul Grobey, Assistant ConductorFeaturing Winners of the 2014 ConcertoCompetitionPan Yan, celloBenjamin Pawlak, pianoWeiyan Li, pianoFord HallSunday March 2nd, 20144:00 pmProgramTromba Lontana (1986) John Adams(b. 1947)Thomas Pang and Aaron Scoccia, trumpetsPaul Grobey, conductorTout un monde lointain... (1970) Henri Dutilleux(1916-2013)I. Énigme (Enigma)Pan Yan, celloPiano Concerto No. 1 in D flat major, Op. 10 Sergei Prokofiev(1891-1953)Allegro brioso - Andante assai - Allegro scherzandoBenjamin Pawlak, pianoIntermissionPiano Concerto No. 1 in G minor, Op. 25 Felix Mendelssohn(1809-1847)Molto allegro con fuoco - Andante - Presto -Molto allegro e vivaceWeiyan Li, pianoTaras Bulba, Rhapsody for Orchestra (1918) Leoš Janáček(1854-1928)I. The Death of AndreiII. The Death of OstapIII. The Prophecy and Death of Taras BulbaBiographiesPan Yan started learning cello at age nine and has been a pupil ofProf. Jiwu Li since age 13. He was a prize winner at numerouscompetitions, including the Golden Bell Award in 2005. In 2006, hewas awarded a full scholarship to participate in the Canada MusicBridge Program. In 2008, Pan joined the Nibbana Trio, and wasawarded the first prize at the Asian Pacific Chamber MusicCompetition held in Melbourne in 2009. In 2010, he was awarded thesecond prize in the China National Cello Competition (no first wasawarded), became a Robert H.W. Ho Family Foundation OrchestralFellow of the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, and participated inmaster classes with cellists Yo-Yo Ma and Jian Wang in Hong Kong andGuangzhou. Pan currently studies with Elizabeth Simkin at IthacaCollege in Ithaca, NY. Benjamin Pawlak, a native of Big Flats, NY, is a freshman pursuing adegree in piano performance. Ben began playing piano at the age ofsix, but quit at the age of eleven to pursue his interest in stringinstruments. Three years later, he decided to continue studying pianoand in high school took lessons with Dr. Nathan Hess.  Ben iscurrently a student of Dr. Jennifer Hayghe.  He also enjoys keeping upwith his viola as a member of the Ithaca College Sinfonietta. Ben has participated in various competitions, taking first prize in the2011 Debussy Piano Competition held at Nazareth College inRochester, first prize in the 2011 NYSMTA Empire Competition held atIthaca College, first prize in the 2012 Cantata Singers Young ArtistCompetition in Elmira, first prize in the 2013 Thursday MorningMusicales Scholarship Competition in Elmira, honorable mention atboth the 2012 and 2013 NYSMTA District Auditions in Ithaca, andsecond place in the 2013 Orchestra of the Southern Finger LakesHerzog Young Artist Competition. For the past five summers, Ben has attended the Credo ChamberMusic Festival at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, where he hashoned his collaborative skills. There he has studied with numerouschamber coaches including James Howsmon and Alvin Chow of theOberlin Conservatory piano faculty, Steuart Pincombe of the baroquechamber group Apollo’s Fire, principal cellist of the PittsburghSymphony Anne Martindale Williams, and the late Dean Emeritus ofThe Juilliard School Stephen Clapp.Weiyan Li comes from Chongqing, China, where she started playingthe piano at age three. After initial piano studies with ChenggangYang at the Sichuan Conservatory of Music in Chengdu (2002-2008),she completed her undergraduate piano studies with Youzhe Lou atthe Shanghai Conservatory of Music (2008-2012). During her timethere, she presented several solo recitals in Chonqing and Shanghai,with a repertory ranging from Scarlatti to Messiaen. In 2010 she wasone of the winners at the KAWAI Asia Piano Competition in HongKong. In the same year she also founded the “Glory Trio,” a piano triowhich performed in Shanghai, Hangzhou and Nanjing. She is currentlya second-year graduate piano performance major and a graduateassistant at the Ithaca College School of Music where she studies withDr. Charis Dimaras and Dr. Wenqing Bouche-Pillon.Paul Grobey is a native of Preston, Washington and a graduatestudent in orchestral conducting at Ithaca College. In fall 2013 heserved as assistant conductor to the Ithaca College Sinfonietta, andhe currently serves as assistant conductor to the Ithaca CollegeChamber and Symphony Orchestras. Paul holds a Bachelor of Musicdegree in violin performance from the University of North Texas, andis an active violinist and composer.Jonathan Pasternack conducts orchestras, opera and balletinternationally, with such ensembles as the London SymphonyOrchestra, Residentie Orkest of The Hague, Scottish ChamberOrchestra, and the National Symphony Orchestra at the KennedyCenter, among many others. His recent debut recording on the Naxoslabel, leading the London Symphony in Béla Bartók's MiraculousMandarin Suite and the Symphony No. 1 by Johannes Brahms, washailed by critics as “superbly done” (FANFARE), with “risk-taking,profound” Brahms (National Public Radio), and Bartók sounding“especially delectable in Pasternack’s hands” (The Seattle Times).Born and raised in New York City, Jonathan Pasternack studied vio­lin,cello, trombone, piano, and percussion.  He won a scholar­ship at theage of sixteen to the Manhattan School of Music and later transferredto the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he studiedastronomy and political philosophy. He earned his MM and DMAdegrees from the University of Washington, and also studied at theMannes College of Music and Accademia Musicale Chigiana. A topprizewinner at the Sixth Cadaqués International ConductingCompetition in Barcelona, Spain, where he was the only Americaninvited to compete, Dr. Pasternack also earned distinctions at theAspen, Brevard, and David Oistrakh Festivals.  From 2010-2013,Jonathan Pasternack served as Director of Orchestral Activities at theUniversity of Washington School of Music.  He has held appointmentswith the Oregon Symphony, Seattle Youth Symphony, Bellevue Opera,Skagit Opera, Affinity Contemporary Ensemble, Icicle Creek MusicCenter, and Pacific Lutheran University.  Pasternack’s conductingteachers included Peter Erös, Neeme Järvi, Jorma Panula, Hans Vonk,and James DePreist.    Program NotesTromba Lontana (“distant trumpet”) was written to commemorate the150th anniversary of Texas’ declaration of independence from Mexico. Adamswrites that the piece “was written at the request of the Houston Symphony,part of a fanfare commissioning project initiated by the composer TobiasPicker, who wrote his own well-known Old and Lost Rivers for the sameseries. Taking a subversive point of view on the idea of the generic loud,extrovert archetype of the fanfare, I composed a four-minute work that barelyrises above mezzo piano and that features two stereophonically placed solotrumpets (to the back of the stage or on separate balconies), who intonegently insistent calls, each marked by a sustained note followed by a softstaccato tattoo. The orchestra provides a pulsing continuum of serene tickingin the pianos, harps and percussion. In the furthest background is a long,almost disembodied melody for strings that passes by almost unnoticed likenocturnal clouds.”Tout un monde lointain…, completed in 1970 and dedicated to the lateMstislav Rostropovich, is a five-movement work usually thought of as a celloconcerto, though not technically bearing that designation in the score. Basedexplicitly on the poetry of Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867), and borrowing itstitle from his Les fleurs du mal, Tout un monde lointain… (“a whole distantworld”) is united by cyclic musical thematic threads, though the inspirationfor each movement is based on a separate poem. The first movement, Énigme (“Enigma”) bears this inscription: "... And in this strange and symbolicnature." After beginning with an improvisatory exchange between the solocello and percussion, the strings quietly enter, the solo cello continuing topunctuate solos with extended pizzicato (plucked) material. The first full tutti,decorated by glissandi (slides) in the solo cello, announces a theme that willrun through the entire piece. Imitative material based on the first severalnotes and played with extended techniques in the orchestra (the wood of thebow being used to beat the strings, timpani glissandi, etc.) comprise the restof this movement, whilst supporting the extremely virtuosic nature of the solocello part. Sergei Prokofiev's Piano Concerto No. 1 was completed in 1912, receivingits premiere in the same year with the soloist as composer. Famously, in1914, he won the Anton Rubinstein Prize at the St. Petersburg Conservatoryfor his performance of the work, correctly forecasting that he would be morelikely to win playing his own music, since mistakes were less likely to benoticed by the panel of judges. Similar in conception to his first violinconcerto, which was originally intended to be a one-movement ternary-formwork, the first piano concerto is indeed in one movement, and ends largely asit begins. The opening heroic theme is played in its entirety by the piano andorchestra together, before a scherzo like developmental section leads to asecond darker, yet comical theme. The slow portion, andante, is soulful, dark,and poignant, beginning quietly and reaching a dramatic climax. Fragmentedscherzando material leads into a recapitulation of music from the first portionbefore the concerto ends in triumph. Felix Mendelssohn wrote his Piano Concerto No. 1 in G minor in greathaste, a common circumstance in his generally recognized “Grand Tour”period (1829-1832), during which he visited Switzerland, France, and Italy,and Britain twice. This particular piece was written and premiered in Munichin the space of one month, October of 1832. The piece embodies those ofMendelssohn’s techniques most familiar to us: a one-movement constructionand an immediate entrance of the soloist, much like his later violin concerto;striding, bold, dotted rhythms; and a juxtaposition of tender themes with bothstorm-like and scherzando writing. Though the work is united into one singlemovement by careful modulation to and away from the key of the middlesection, three “movements” are easily identifiable: a stormy first movement,a tender and evocative second, and a jovial third. The piano writing isvirtuosic throughout, yet allowing the orchestra melodic material of definitelyromantic proportions.  Leoš Janáček’s Taras Bulba (composed 1915-18), dedicated to the Czecharmed forces, is based on scenes from Nikolai Gogol’s historical novel of thesame name. It is one of Janáček’s earliest fully mature works, predating thepopular Sinfonietta by about ten years. Janáček found the tale of Ukrainianpatriotism especially relevant during World War I, hoping for a Russianliberation of his native land from Austrian rule. Gogol's novel chronicles themilitary exploits of a Cossack, Taras Bulba, and his two sons. The firstmovement, The Death of Andrei, portrays the romantic inclinations of Bulba’sson Andrei towards a girl of Polish nobility, leading to his eventual defectionand subsequent execution at the hands of his own father. A solo violinportrays the fated romance throughout. The Death of Ostap focuses on thedeath of the other son, who is captured by Polish forces and tortured. Amid-movement Polish Mazurka, a dance, is one of celebration as Ostap iscaptured; the extended E-flat clarinet solo which closes the movement istypically seen as his distraught calling to his father before he is executed. Thefinal movement, which seems more concerned with noble or epic musicalqualities than the first two, seems to presuppose the capture of the story’shero; the agitated opening motifs soon give way to a sweeping andprofoundly inspiring melody played by the violins, followed by capriciousdance music, a melody of triumph, and a moment of intense conflict before abroad, striding, victorious coda, which looks forward to victory and freedom. “There is no fire nor suffering in the whole world which can break the strengthof the Russian people” are the words that inspired Janáček’s composition, andhe directs the focus of the composition towards this patriotic inspiration forthe last word. Ithaca College Symphony OrchestraViolin I Cello BassoonMartiros Rachele Prawdzik, Ross Triner, principal   Shakhzadyan,      principal   Andrew Meyes   concertmaster   David Fenwick James Smith,Brian Schmidt Shauna Swartz    contrabassoon    Aiden Chan Zachary BrownMarcus Hogan Julia Rupp French HornTimna Mayer Emily Doveala Emma Staudacher,Kangzhuo Li Felicya Schwarzman    principal   Aiko Richter Bryce Tempest Paul ShimMichael Petit Grace Miller Jacob FactorKevin Pham Alex Lampel Joshua JenkinsJoe D'Esposito Andrew DesselEmily Kenyon Alexandria Kemp  TrumpetCorey Dusel Thomas Pang,Paul Grobey Double Bass    principalAndrew Whitford, Aaron ScocciaViolin II    principal   Rosemary WardJenna Jordan, principal Desmond BrattonEmily Wilcox Lindsey Orcutt TromboneJason Kim Alexander Toth Matthew Confer,Hallie Smith Kevin Thompson    principal   Emilie Benigno Gillian Dana Stephen MeyerhofferXinying Li Cara Turnbull Jeffrey Chilton, bassCynthia Mathiesen John DiCarlo    trombone   Keryn Gallagher Nora Murphy Rachel Doud TubaAmy Chryst Flute Justin Chervony,Darya Barna Sophie Ennocenti,    principalScott Altman    principal   Leila Welton Jessica Peltz TimpaniSandi O'Hare, piccolo Jessie Linden, principalViola Allison Krauss, piccoloEmma Brown,        Percussion   principal   Andrew Hedge,Jonathan Fleischman Oboe    principalKelly Ralston Chloe Washington, Will MarinelliIsadora Herold    principal   Dennis O'KeefeLindsey Clark Phoebe RitrovatoAustin Savage Catie McGovern, HarpCarly Rockenhauser    English Horn   Julie Spring, principalKelly SadwinAlyssa Rodriguez Clarinet KeyboardsNatalie Morrison Christopher Peña, Mengfei Xu, pianoSam Rubin    principal Amy Brinkman-Davis,Ryan Pereira    celesta    Allison Smetana, E-flat   clarinet   

Concert: Ithaca College Symphony Orchestra, Featuring Winners of the 2014 Concerto Competition

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Concert: Ithaca College Symphony Orchestra, Featuring Winners of the 2014 Concerto Competition

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