Sunday may 23rd, 4pm

Program

Graham Fitkin “Frame”
for six-mallet marimba and flute

Alexandre Lunsqui “Diogenes Lantern.”
for solo marimba

Eric Wubbels “Shiverer”
Members of the Wet Ink Ensemble, Alex Mincek and Eric Wubbels,
join Due East flutist, Erin Lesser.

Bernhard Lang “Difference/Repetition #1″
for flute, piano and tenor saxophone

Lou Harrison “First Concerto”
for Flute and Percussion

The Solarium, The Roger Smith Hotel
tickets $15 at the door, cash only
includes wine & cheese

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The Talea Ensemble, along with the iO Quartet, presents “When Music Becomes Unruly”.  The concert focuses on award-winning composer Jason Eckardt’s 16 for flute and string trio.  Jason writes, “The work’s title refers to the sixteen words that should have been excised from George Bush’s January 2003 State of the Union address: “The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” This false claim illustrates the policy of deceit typical of the morally impoverished current administration. As an artist angered and ashamed by my country’s actions, my deepest response is expressed in my work and my faith in art’s ability to contribute to, if not transform , society.

Additionally Jason has curated the concert.  Complementing his work will be Brahms’ fierce and tragic c minor String Quartet.  Jason will speak about the ideas of struggle and adversity within a musical work.

The Solarium, The Roger Smith Hotel

tickets $15 on the door, cash only

includes wine and cheese

www.fourthsundays.tumblr.com

For reservations please contact 212.339.2092

or rogersmitharts@rogersmith.com

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As part of the Talea Ensemble’s Out of Italy Festival to celebrate Italian Contemporary Music, the Talea Ensemble has invited Composer Stefano Gervasoni to curate and attend the March 28th concert, which will  feature his viola solo, Tornasole, Franz Schubert’s Quartettsätz and Hugo Wolf’s Italian Serenade performed by the iO Quartet.   Mr. Gervasoni will discuss his work as well as trends in Italian Contemporary Music.

Hugo Wolf Italian Serenade
(performed by the iO Quartet)

Stefano Gervasoni Tornasole for solo viola
(performed by Elizabeth Weisser, Talea Ensemble)

Franz Schubert Quartettsätz
(performed by the iO Quartet)

The Solarium, The Roger Smith Hotel
tickets $15 on the door, cash only
includes wine and cheese

www.fourthsundays.tumblr.com

For reservations please contact 212.339.2092
or rogersmitharts@rogersmith.com

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Daniel Acsadi is the Director of the Boston Classical Guitar Society and is finishing his Doctor of Musical Arts degree at New England Conservatory with Eliot Fisk. Through his acclaimed performances, arrangements, and teaching, Dan is a passionate advocate for both the guitar and the music of his native Hungary. Dan’s arrangements encompass art and folk music of the 18th through 21st centuries, innovatively expanding the guitar’s repertoire. He is firmly committed to the guitar as a versatile chamber music instrument, performing regularly with voice, viola, violin, flute string quartet, and guitar ensemble. Beginning his musical studies at age six, Dan earned his M.M. from New England Conservatory (NEC) and B.A. from Cornell University, where he double majored in music and economics. Dan has previously studied with Pablo Cohen and John Hall, and has performed in the masterclasses of Manuel Barrueco, Leo Brouwer, Eduardo Fernandez, and Adam Holzman. Dan maintains a large and diverse teaching studio in the Boston area.

co-presented by the NYCCGS and RogerSmithArts

The Solarium, 16th Floor
The Roger Smith Hotel
Tickets $15, includes wine and cheese
Pay at the door, cash only

For reservations, email rogersmitharts@rogersmith.com or call 212.339.2092

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These new pieces take advantage of loadbang’s facility in improvisation, while pushing the ensemble in new directions. Andy Kozar’s work for this concert is a kind of translation; Chinese characters are stripped of their semantic meaning and broken down into shapes to be realized as musical contours. Jeff Gavett’s work is concerned primarily with formal aspects of time. Large temporal divisions are delineated with great specificity, but the ensemble is left to fill these durations on the fly, improvising and imitating one another. Finally, one half of the group’s compositional personalities will be heard for the first time as Alejandro Acierto and Will Lang will present their premier compositions for loadbang.

All of the works to be presented are literally experimental: each performer-composer has branched out into unknown territory musically and notationally. Guided improvisation. Game pieces. Graphic scores. Loadbang’s originals straddle these categories.

The Solarium, The Roger Smith Hotel
Tickets $15 at the door, cash only

www.fourthsundays.tumblr.com

For reservations please contact 212.339.2092
or rogersmitharts@rogersmith.com

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As the chosen guitarist for Televisión Española’s centennial celebration of Francisco Tárrega,Mattias Jacobsson has emerged as one of the up-and-coming guitarists on the international stage today. The program “Es Música” will be broadcast bi-weekly throughout 2009.

Engagements include concerto appearances in The United States and Sweden, live performances at WQXR Radio and performances with guitarist Sharon Isbin at the Aspen Music Festival where they performed music by Howard Shore from Martin Scorsese’s movie The Departed, which was later broadcast on NPR’s Performance Today to an audience of 1.1 million. In June, 2008, Mr. Jacobsson was featured in the BBC documentary series “Imagine” about Oliver Sacks; in August, 2008, he replaced Angel Romero in both Concierto de Aranjuez andFantasia para un Gentilhombre by Rodrigo; and in March, 2009, he made his debut with the Helsingborg Symphony Orchestra.

At the age of 17, Mr. Jacobsson made his recital debut at the Stockholm International Guitar Festival on very short notice, immediately followed by a tour of Estonia, along with his first recording album containing music by Bach, Poulenc, Mertz, Lauro, Albéniz, Sor and Tárrega. Since then, he has performed with principal members of Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra, and The Royal Danish Opera, and has been broadcast on BBC, TVE, WQXR, NPR and SRP2, the Swedish classical radio. He has also made recital and chamber music appearances in major Swedish venues as well as Alice Tully Hall, New York.

Born in Sweden in November, 1984, Mattias Jacobsson began studying the guitar with Erik Möllerström and Bo Hansson. He continued his studies at the Malmö Academy of Music with Göran Söllscher and Gunnar Spjuth and at The Juilliard School with Sharon Isbin.

Mr. Jacobsson plays exclusively on guitars by Thomas Fredholm.

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Concerts begin at 4:00 PM and take place in the penthouse recital space of the Roger Smith Hotel, located at 501 Lexington Ave. at East 47th St. (see map).

Tickets $15, includes wine and cheese.
For reservations, email rogersmitharts@rogersmith.com or call (212) 333-2092.

September 13 – Valerie Hartzell
October 11 – Max Zuckerman
November 8 – Alberto Rodríguez Ortiz
December 13 – Anthony Bez
January 10 – Gabriel Bianco
February 14 – Thomas Viloteau
March 14 – Daniel Acsadi
April 11 – Pia Gazarek-Offermann
May 9 – Brad Richter
June 13 – Dieter Hennings
July 11 – Atanas Ourkouzounov

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“…there could be no better introduction to the Latin American classical guitar.”

Micaela Kramer, Classical Guitar Magazine

I met Alberto J. Rodríguez-Ortiz earlier this month at a new music festival in Mexico.  He’s a fabuous human being as well as guitarist and composer.  So I’m thrilled to announce he will play for Second Sundays Classical Guitar Series at the Roger Smith Hotel at 4pm on November 8; 501 Lexington Ave (tickets $15 at the door, to reserve call 212-339-2092).  Alberto is among the most active contemporary interpreters and composers of the new generation of Puerto Rican musicians.

Among various international festivals Rodríguez-Ortiz has participated are the Festival Pa´Lo escrito (Mexico City, 2009, 2008), Festival Casals (Puerto Rico, 2008), Fiesta Iberoamericana de las Artes (Puerto Rico, 2007), Festival de Música Contemporánea and Foro de Compositores del Caribe (La Habana, Cuba, 2006 and 2004); International Guitar Festival of Puerto Rico (2000), El Salvador’s International Festival of Contemporary Music (2000); María Escalón de Núñez’s Guitar Festival (El Salvador 2000), Second Twentieth Century Music Festival (San Juan, Puerto Rico 1999). That same year he opened the concert series “Caras Nuevas”, sponsored by FAMA.  In 1997, he was invited as composer in residence at The Rome Festival.  Rodríguez-Ortiz has also performed in cities such as London, Porto, Paris, Vienna, Morelia, Orlando, Miami and New York.  In this last city, he made his debut in 1997 as part of the series “Música de Cámara, Inc.” He has performed extensively with the guitar trio “Matices”, ensemble that received the first prize at Puerto Rico’s Chamber Music Festival in 1994 with his composition “Invocando a Yúcahu”.  He has been soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra of El Salvador and the Symphony Orchestra of Bayamón.

His program is fascinating!

- Frank Wallace, Artistic Director of Second Sunday’s Classical Guitar Series

Sólo entre Bach y yo

Sonata no. 2*           Alberto Rodríguez Ortiz
Intro (Íntimo-Allegro)
Canción nocturna
Allegro violento

Partita II para violín BWV 1004           Johann Sebastian Bach  (1685-1750)
Allemanda                                                  arr. Alberto Rodríguez Ortiz
Corrente
Sarabanda
Giga
Ciaccona

Intermedio

Preludio, Fuga y Allegro  BWV 998          Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)

Sonata no. 3 “Homenaje a la Sonora Ponceña y a Bach”*                  Alberto Rodríguez Ortiz
Adagio rítmico “Preludio en candela”
Scherzo (Presto) “Canción en gavota”
Aire y fuga…al fogón

* NYC premier

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His playing was the night before the opening of the Roger Smith Shorts Film Festival

Craig Greenberg plays Cat Stevens in Lily’s

Craig plays the piano in Lily’s #2

Craig plays the piano in Lily’s #3

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Co-sponsored by the New York City Classical Guitar Society and RogerSmithArts.
Tickets $15, includes wine and cheese.
For reservations, email rogersmitharts@rogersmith.com or call (212) 339-2092.

Valerie Hartzell began her classical guitar studies on a half-size Ramirez at the age of three. At the age of six, she studied with maestro Alexandre Lagoya at the Académie Internationale d’Eté in Nice, France. She has participated in master classes with several internationally acclaimed artists, including Ako Ito, Castellani-Andriaccio Duo, David Russell, and Elena Papandreou. In 1991, Ms. Hartzell made her debut performing Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s “Concerto for guitar and orchestra” with the New Philharmonic Orchestra of Irving, Texas. She made her international debut in San Mamete, Italy at the Festival del Piccolo Mondo in August 1994. She has performed in Europe, Canada, the U.S. and has appeared on television in Nice, FR. From September 29-October 5, 2002 she toured the Carolinas which promoted her first cd, Fuoco!

She has performed in many festivals, including the ‘Close Encounters’ Voice and Guitar Festival at University of Houston (where she performed and co-directed the festival along the side of Katherine Ciesinski), the Eastfield College Guitar Festival and Competition in Mesquite, the first Classical Guitar Weekend Workshop at The Music Conservatory of Texas in Frisco, the Tennessee Festival at Middle Tennessee State University, the ECU Competition and Festival in Greenville, NC and the MANC Guitar Competition and Festival in Greensboro, NC. She has won 1st prizes at the 10th International Guitar Competition “Simone Salmaso” in Viareggio, Italy and at the Concours de Guitare Classique Heitor Villa-Lobos in Nice, France among other prizes. At the Peabody Conservatory of Johns Hopkins University, Ms. Hartzell was awarded the highest undergraduate scholarship for the classical guitar and studied with Manuel Barrueco earning her Bachelor’s Degree in 1997. She was awarded a Graduate Teaching Fellowship at Radford University with Robert Trent and was placed as Adjunct Faculty while studying for her Master’s Degree in Music. She received her performance degree in May of 1999 and currently, she is a Professional Teacher at Moores School of Music, University of Houston and is Adjunct Faculty at the Houston Community College. She also accompanies many vocal students at both Moores School of Music, University of Houston and at the Shepherd School of Music, Rice University.

She keeps an active solo career and works in a professional duo with soprano Sandra Johnson, as Duo Athena and frequently is a judge at international competitions throughout the United States (St. Joseph International Competition, Texas Guitar Competition, East Carolina University International Competition, the Eastfield Guitar Competition, the ‘Classical Minds’ Guitar Competition, and the MANC Guitar Competition). Many of her private students have placed and won national and international competitions. Also, her private students have been accepted on scholarship to Schwob School of Music (University of Columbus), San Francisco Conservatory, University of North Texas in Denton, University of Texas at San Antonio, and Texas State University at San Marcos.

Valerie Hartzell is the creator and Director of the “Classical Minds” Guitar Festival and Competition at Moores School of Music, University of Houston and is the director of the Greater Houston Guitar Guild.

For more information, visit our website at nyccgs.org . I look forward to seeing you at these events!

John Olson, President

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