TONIGHT’S CONCERT IS MOVED
DUE TO THE VERY POOR WEATHER FORECAST AND POSSIBLY UNSAFE CONDITIONS OUTDOORS IN CENTRAL PARK – WE ARE RELOCATING. PLEASE SEE:
Dear Friends,
The show must go on! And with the incredible generosity of our friends at St. Paul’s Chapel/Trinity Wall Street and Naumburg Orchestral Concerts, The Knights are delighted to have an alternate, indoor venue to perform in tonight.
Tonight!
St. Paul’s hosts The Knights, presented by Naumburg Orchestral Concerts
7pm doors / 7:30pm performance
St. Paul’s Chapel
209 Broadway, New York, NY
The Chapel is located on the North-west side of Broadway at Fulton Street. It is across the street from the Fulton Street subway stop on the 4,5 and the Park Place stop for the 2,3.
If you can’t join us in person, please watch and hear us live from the Trinity webcast: www.trinitywallstreet.org
We look forward to sharing our music with you!
JULY 17, 2018 @ 7:30 PM
The Knights
Colin & Eric Jacobsen, Artistic Directors,
Eric Jacobsen, conductor
Anna Clyne, (1980), Within Her Arms, (2008-09)
Komitas, (1869-1935) Armenian Folk Songs arranged as a Suite to include :
Echmiadzin Dance
Stalk Along!
Song of the Little Partridge
Clouds
Haymaker’s Song
Festive Song
Intermission
Leoš Janáček, (1854-1928), Idyll for String Orchestra, (1878)
I. Andante
II. Allegro
III. Moderato
IV. Allegro
V. Adagio
VI. Scherzo
VII. Moderato
Johannes Brahms, (1883-1897), Hungarian Dances (1869), (arr. Paul Brantley)
No. 17, Andantino
No. 11, Poco Andante
No. 19, Allegretto
No. 5, Allegro
**The performance of The Knights has been made possible by a generous grant from the MacDonald-Peterson Foundation.**
WQXR HOST: Annie Bergen
PROGRAM NOTES
WELCOME/INTRODUCTION
“Time past and time future… Point to one end, which is always present.” – T.S.Eliot
It’s hard to believe this is The Knights’ 10th anniversary year playing here at the Naumburg Orchestral Concerts, one of our favorite musical homes! Anniversaries are a chance to reflect, to take stock of the passage of time. We quote these lines from T.S. Eliot’s masterpiece, Four Quartets, partly because we recently were obsessed with the text and immersed in a dance theater piece based on it, and partly because it captures a very specific feeling we all get playing at the Naumburg Bandshell year after year. In the middle of the middle of the world that is Central Park, we can all share the sense that, for a moment, we literally can touch the pulsing heart of New York’s energy source while also tuning out the chaos. Sometimes clouds threaten, sometimes the sky opens up before (or during) a concert, causing us to delay (or play for folks seeking cover under the Bethesda Terrace). But mostly the weather cooperates (through Christopher London’s force of will!).
Ten years ago, The Knights came out on stage as a new orchestra, who most in the audience had not yet encountered. Now, we feel a long-standing bond with the many intrepid music lovers who year after year brave the elements and encourage us to give our all, no matter the heat or wind. The combination of those steadfast fans and the random passerby who gets drawn in, some of whom may not have heard much live orchestral music, creates a magical connection which we love.
The Knights often talk about trying to bottle the energy that we get playing at the Naumburg Bandshell and bringing it with us wherever we go, but ultimately “all is always now” and the sense of the moment is palpable here in a way that isn’t easily recreated. Thank you to the Naumburg Orchestral Concerts and to you the music lover for keeping this all alive. Here’s to time future and the next ten years!
— Colin and Eric Jacobsen, The Knights
ANNA CLYNE: WITHIN HER ARMS
Within Her Arms is music for my mother, with all my love.
Earth will keep you tight within her arms dear one—
So that tomorrow you will be transformed into flowers—
This flower smiling quietly in this morning field—
This morning you will weep no more dear one—
For we have gone through too deep a night.
This morning, yes, this morning, I kneel down on the green grass—
And I notice your presence.
Flowers, that speak to me in silence.
The message of love and understanding has indeed come.
—Thich Nhat Hanh
— Anna Clyne
KOMITAS: ARMENIAN FOLK SONGS ARRANGED AS A SUITE
Komitas Vardapet (born Soghomon Soghomonyan) is a deeply cherished figure by the Armenian people worldwide. The Armenian priest, composer, musicologist, baritone, and educator is widely credited with preserving the folk melodies of the southern Caucasus region as well as creating a new national musical voice. Born in 1869 in Anatolia, his musical gifts were quickly recognized in his seminary studies as a youth. When he was ordained a priest, his musical activities included organizing choirs, researching the history of Armenian sacred music, and working with popular folk melodies and instruments. Becoming increasingly curious about European music, he decided to continue his musical studies in Berlin at the conservatory of Professor Richard Schmidt. He returned to Armenia in 1899 and spent much of the next decade collecting thousands of melodies of Armenian, Kurdish, Persian, and Turkish origin, often creating choral arrangements and compositions based on these melodies. He also made numerous trips to Europe, introducing audiences to Armenian music. Komitas never recovered from the deeply tragic events of 1915-1917, in which hundreds of thousands of Armenians were displaced and lost their lives. He spent the remaining twenty years of his life in a Paris sanatorium. Tonight’s selection of Armenian Folk Songs were collected by Komitas and later arranged by Sergey Aslamazian, the founding cellist of the Komitas Quartet (which happens to be the world’s oldest string quartet in continual existence, 1924-present).
— Nicholas Cords
LEOŠ JANÁČEK: IDYLL FOR STRING ORCHESTRA
Czech composer Leoš Janáček (1854-1928) completed the Idyll for String Orchestra in August 1878. The work received its premiere on December 15, 1878 in Brno under the direction of Janáček, with friend and contemporary influence Antonin Dvorák in the audience. A great admirer and champion of Dvorák, Janáček borrowed heavily from Moravian and Slavic folk music in this early orchestral work written in the Romantic style. From a young age, Janáček had great interest in the East-European traditional music of his homeland and developed an individual style which incorporated elements of Czech speech, songs, and dances as well as the expanded use of modality.
Idyll for String Orchestra consists of seven elegant movements of distinct character. The opening Andante has a melancholic feel to the melody while the second movement Allegro lilts in triple-time. The third movement’s Moderato solemnly states sorrow. An energetically explosive Allegro claims the middle movement. The fifth movement’s Adagio is marked by a sweetly tragic tone as melodic lines weave apart and together. The sixth movement is a lively and imitative Scherzo and the closing Moderato expresses finality in the gravity of its contrapuntal writing.
— Lily Chaw
JOHANNES BRAHMS ARR. PAUL BRANTLEY: FOUR HUNGARIAN DANCES FOR 11 INSTRUMENTS Just a few weeks after giving the premiere of my cello concertino, The Royal Revolver, Eric Jacobsen called asking if I might arrange some Brahms Hungarian Dances for The Knights. I blinked and said yes. Eric had three of the dances in mind and 11 instruments available – including bass clarinet! I suggested adding another dance as the third of four – which might create a set of satisfying and Brahmsian key relationships of falling thirds. I grew up hearing, playing, and loving all the traditional orchestrations (by Brahms, Dvorak, and others) but went back to the original piano four-hands versions and worked from there. And although I was given free reign to “cover” these pieces to whatever extent I liked, I was immediately reminded of how integral and perfectly composed they are. And so the first three are virtually note-for-note faithful to the originals while opening up the color spectrum a bit. Whereas with the famous last one, I had a bit more fun and opened up just about everything.
— Paul Brantley
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
The Knights
The Grammy-nominated Knights are an orchestral collective, flexible in size and repertory, dedicated to transforming the concert experience. Engaging listeners and defying boundaries with programs that showcase the players’ roots in the classical tradition and passion for artistic discovery, The Knights have “become one of Brooklyn’s sterling cultural products… known far beyond the borough for their relaxed virtuosity and expansive repertory” (New Yorker).
The Knights have had an exciting 2017-18 season, a highlight of which was a U.S. tour with genre-defying Israeli mandolinist Avi Avital and Syrian clarinetist and composer Kinan Azmeh. Tour repertoire came from around the world, with arrangements and transcriptions by the artists themselves, and features the world premiere of Azmeh’s Triple Concerto for Clarinet, Mandolin, Violin and Orchestra. Thanks in part to the generous support of the Mellon Foundation, The Knights’ will complete their second Home Season in Brooklyn, in partnership with the downtown venue BRIC, presenting family concerts, evening performances, and a characteristically wide-ranging roster of guest artists. Programs include a collaboration with Puerto-Rican composer Angelica Negrón on her drag opera, a night of German lieder with Katja Herbers, as well as an exploration of the pervasive influence of Eastern European folk music. The Knights’ 2017 summer season encompassed a world premiere by composer Judd Greenstein and an East Coast premiere by Vijay Iyer; their tenth consecutive appearance in Central Park’s Naumburg Orchestral Concerts series; their fourth year at Tanglewood, a performance at the Ravinia Festival with mezzo-soprano Susan Graham; and a collaboration with choreographer John Heginbotham at the Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival.
The 2016-17 season saw the release of the celestial-themed album Azul on Warner Classics with longtime collaborator Yo-Yo Ma; an EP release with Gabriel Kahane of his song cycle Crane Palimpsest; a debut at Washington DC’s Kennedy Center as part of the inaugural “SHIFT: A Festival of American Orchestras;” and the New York premiere of Sarah Kirkland Snider’s song cycle Unremembered, which The Knights also performed at Tennessee’s Big Ears Music Festival. They rounded out the season with a European tour, which took them to the Easter Festival at Aix-en-Provence for six performances with celebrated guest artists pianists Jean-Yves Thibaudet and Bertrand Chamayou, and violinist Renaud Capuçon; along with three concerts across Germany, including one at the new Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg where the ensemble’s performance was lauded as one of the best in the new hall (Hamburg Abendetter).
Counted among the highlights from recent seasons are: a performance with Yo-Yo Ma at Caramoor; the recording of Prokofiev’s Second Violin Concerto on master violinist Gil Shaham’s Grammy-nominated 2016 release, 1930’s Violin Concertos, Vol. 2, as well as a North American tour with Shaham; residencies at Dartmouth, Penn State and Washington DC’s Dumbarton Oaks; and a performance in the NY PHIL BIENNIAL along with the San Francisco Girls Chorus (led by composer Lisa Bielawa) and the Brooklyn Youth Chorus, which featured world premieres by Rome Prize-winner Bielawa, Pulitzer Prize-winner Aaron Jay Kernis, and Knights violinist and co-founder Colin Jacobsen. The ensemble made its Carnegie Hall debut in the New York premiere of the Steven Stucky/Jeremy Denk opera The Classical Style, and has toured the U.S. with banjo virtuoso Béla Fleck, and Europe with soprano Dawn Upshaw. In recent years The Knights have also collaborated with Itzhak Perlman, the Mark Morris Dance Group, Joshua Redman, Silk Road virtuoso Siamak Aghaei, and pipa virtuoso Wu Man. Recordings include 2015’s “instinctive and appealing” (The Times, UK) the ground beneath our feet on Warner Classics, featuring the ensemble’s first original group composition; an all-Beethoven disc on Sony Classical (their third project with the label); and 2012’s “smartly programmed” (NPR) A Second of Silence for Ancalagon.
The Knights evolved from late-night chamber music reading parties with friends at the home of violinist Colin Jacobsen and cellist Eric Jacobsen. The Jacobsen brothers, who are also founding members of the string quartet Brooklyn Rider, serve as artistic directors of The Knights, with Eric Jacobsen as conductor. In December 2012, the Jacobsens were selected from among the nation’s top visual, performing, media, and literary artists to receive a prestigious United States Artists Fellowship.
The Knights’ roster boasts remarkably diverse talents, including composers, arrangers, singer-songwriters, and improvisers, who bring a range of cultural influences to the group, from jazz and klezmer to pop and indie rock music. The unique camaraderie within the group retains the intimacy and spontaneity of chamber music in performance.
Colin Jacobsen, Artistic Director
As the Washington Post observes, violinist and composer Colin Jacobsen is “one of the most interesting figures on the classical music scene.” A founding member of two game-changing, audience-expanding ensembles – the string quartet Brooklyn Rider and orchestra The Knights – he is also a touring member of Yo-Yo Ma’s venerated Silk Road Project and an Avery Fisher Career Grant-winning violinist. Jacobsen’s work as a composer developed as a natural outgrowth of his chamber and orchestral collaborations. Jointly inspired by encounters with leading exponents of non-western traditions and by his own classical heritage, his most recent compositions for Brooklyn Rider include Three Miniatures – “vivacious, deftly drawn sketches” (New York Times) – which were written for the reopening of the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Islamic art galleries. Jacobsen collaborated with Iran’s Siamak Aghaei to write a Persian folk-inflected composition, Ascending Bird, which he performed as soloist with the YouTube Symphony Orchestra at the Sydney Opera House, in a concert that was streamed live and seen by millions of viewers worldwide. His work for dance and theater includes Chalk and Soot, a collaboration with Dance Heginbotham, and music for Compagnia de’ Colombari’s theatrical production of Walt Whitman’s Song of Myself.
Eric Jacobsen, Artistic Director
Hailed by the New York Times as “an interpretive dynamo,” conductor and cellist Eric Jacobsen has built a reputation for engaging audiences with innovative and collaborative projects. Jacobsen is the founder and Artistic Director of The Knights and a former member of the genre-defying string quartet Brooklyn Rider. As conductor of The Knights, Jacobsen has led the “consistently inventive, infectiously engaged indie ensemble” (New York Times) at New York venues ranging from Carnegie Hall to Central Park, and at renowned international halls such as the Vienna Musikverein, Cologne Philharmonie and the Elbphilharmonie. In 2017-18, Jacobsen is set to embark on his third season as Music Director of the Orlando Philharmonic. Also in demand as a guest conductor, Jacobsen has recently led the Camerata Bern, the Detroit Symphony, the Alabama Symphony, ProMusica Chamber Orchestra, Deutsche Philharmonie Merck, and Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble.