Nov 1

Joyce Yang

Release of solo debut CD, Collage (Avie)

Scarlatti, Debussy, Schumann+

Nov 1: Los Angeles

Dan Visconti

Blue Whale, Little Tokyo - Eclipse Quartet

Dan Visconti: Love Bleeds Radiant

Nov 2, 3, 5: Toronto, Canada

Stefan Jackiw

Toronto Symphony Orchestra

Mendelssohn: Violin Cto.

Nov 4: London

Kelley O'Connor

London Symphony Orchestra

Honegger: Jeanne d'Arc au bûcher (St. Catherine)

Nov 4, 5: Springfield, MA

Joyce Yang

Springfield Symphony Orch.

Rachmaninov: Piano Cto. 3

Nov 4, 11: Helsinki, Finland

Jessica Rivera

Finnish National Opera

Adams: Doctor Atomic (Kitty Oppenheimer)

Nov 9: Milwaukee, WI

Joyce Yang

Milwaukee Symphony Orch.

Tchaikovsky: Piano Cto. 1

Nov 9,10: Ottawa, ON

Julian Kuerti

National Arts Centre Orchestra

Estacio, Mozart, Brahms

Nov 10: NYC

Dan Visconti

The Stone - Eclipse Quartet

Dan Visconti: Love Bleeds Radiant

Nov 11: Tampa, FL

Stefan Jackiw

The Florida Orchestra

Beethoven: Violin Cto.

Nov 11, 12: Omaha, NE

Joshua Roman

Omaha Symphony Orchestra

Lalo: Cello Cto. in D minor

Nov 12: Interlochen, MI

Dan Visconti

Interlochen Arts Academy Orchestra

Dan Visconti: Drift of Rainbows

Nov 12: St. Petersburg, FL

Stefan Jackiw

The Florida Orchestra

Beethoven: Violin Cto.

Nov 12: Fort Worth, TX

Alessio Bax

Chamber Music Society of Fort Worth, TX

Modern Art Museum

Nov 13: Mamaroneck, NY

Joyce Yang

Singer Hall

Chamber music w/ Alexander String Quartet

Nov 13: Clearwater, FL

Stefan Jackiw

The Florida Orchestra

Beethoven: Violin Cto.

Nov 14: New York, NY 

Joyce Yang

Miller Theatre, Columbia U

Double Stop Foundation's Gala Concert

Nov 15: St. John's, NL, Canada

Julian Kuerti

National Arts Centre Orchestra

Estacio, Mozart, Brahms

Nov 16: Akron, OH

Joshua Roman 

Tuesday Musical Association

Dan Visconti: Americana

w/ Andrius Zlabys

Nov 17: Beijing, China

Brooklyn Rider

National Center for the Performing Arts

Nov 17: Eugene, OR

Joyce Yang

Eugene Symphony Orchestra

Rachmaninov: Paganini Rhapsody

Nov 17: Charlottetown, PEI, Canada

Julian Kuerti

National Arts Centre Orchestra

Mozart, Brahms+

Nov 17, 18: Baltimore, MD

Kelley O'Connor

Baltimore Symphony

Honegger: Jeanne d'Arc au bûcher (St. Catherine)

Nov 18: Middletown, CT

Joshua Roman  

Wesleyan University

Dan Visconti: Americana

w/ Andrius Zlabys

Nov 19: New York, NY

Kelley O'Connor

Carnegie Hall - Baltimore Symphony

Honegger: Jeanne d'Arc au bûcher (St. Catherine)

Nov 19: Glen Ellyn, IL

Dan Visconti

McAninch Arts Center - eighth blackbird

Dan Visconti: Fractured Jams

Nov 20: New York, NY

Alessio Bax and Joyce Yang 

The Greene Space - WQXR

Beethoven piano sonata marathon 

Nov 20: Moncton, NB, Canada

Julian Kuerti

Capitol Theatre - National Arts Centre Orchestra

Hétu, Mozart, Beethoven

Nov 21: Hong Kong, China

Brooklyn Rider

Jockey Club Amphitheatre

Premiere Performances Hong Kong

Nov 22: Bordeaux, France

Alessio Bax

L'Esprit du Piano Festival

Recital

Nov 22: Fredericton, NB, Canada

Julian Kuerti

The Playhouse - National Arts Centre Orchestra

Mozart, Brahms+

Nov 23, 24: Saint John, NB, Canada

Julian Kuerti

National Arts Centre Orchestra

Mozart, Brahms+

Nov 25: Bourges, France

Alessio Bax

Théâtre Saint-Bonnet

Recital   

Nov 25: Busan, Korea

Stefan Jackiw

Korea Tour w/ Anna Polonsky

Stravinsky, Copland, Strauss+

Nov 26: La Charité-sur-Loire, France

Alessio Bax 

Domaine des Forges de la Vache

Recital    

Nov 26: Seoul, Korea

Stefan Jackiw

Seoul Arts Center - Korea Tour w/ Anna Polonsky

Stravinsky, Copland, Strauss+

Nov 27: Daejeon, Korea

Stefan Jackiw

Korea Tour w/ Anna Polonsky

Stravinsky, Copland, Strauss+

Nov 27: Seattle, WA

Joshua Roman

TownMusic series

Bach: Cello Suites

Dec 1: New York, NY

Alessio Bax

Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center

w/ Elmar Oliveira &  

Julie Albers

Dec 1: Eugene, OR

Joshua Roman

Eugene Symphony Orchestra

Beethoven: Triple Cto.  

w/ Inon Barnatan, Chee-Yun

Dec 1, 2: Odense, Denmark

Joyce Yang

Odense Symphony Orchestra

Tchaikovsky: Piano Cto. 1

Dec 3, 4: Las Cruces, NM

Stefan Jackiw

Atkinson Recital Hall - Las Cruces Symphony

Beethoven: Violin Cto.

Dec 4: Malibu, CA

Joshua Roman

Pepperdine U

Bach, Gabriela Lena Frank

Dec 5: Malibu, CA

Joshua Roman

Pepperdine U

Master class

Dec 6: New York, NY 

Kelley O'Connor

Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center

Alice Tully Hall

Bach cantatas

Dec 13: Santa Barbara, CA

Alessio Bax

Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra

Beethoven: Piano Cto. 5

"I'm awfully glad to have met Alessio, and I can't wait to hear what he'll bring to the music he plays in the future," wrote Performance Today host Fred Child in "The Poetry and Power of Pianist Alessio Bax," his most recent "Favorite Sessions" blog post for NPR Music (Nov 10). Click here to read further, and to hear Bax at the piano and in conversation with Child in the PT studio.  

Child isn't Bax's only admirer. In its review of the pianist's new album, Rachmaninov: Preludes & Melodies, the Gramophone magazine praised "the wondrously gifted Alessio Bax," saying, "You would have to have a heart of stone not to be beguiled by Bax's romantic warmth." American Record Guide proclaimed, "This is an outstanding Rachmaninov program... . Bax conquers all with plenty of technique to spare."

In September, the pianist returned to the Dallas Symphony to play Mendelssohn's Piano Concerto No. 1 with music director Jaap van Zweden. Styling him "the eloquent pianist Alessio Bax," the Dallas Morning News hailed his performance as "world-class Mendelssohn." Theater Jones confirmed, "Italian pianist Alessio Bax has both the nimble fingers and the easy charm required to give the concerto a marvelous outing."

On November 20, Bax will contribute two Beethoven piano sonatas - No. 8 in C minor, Op. 13, "Pathétique" and No. 31 in A-flat, Op. 110 - to WQXR's complete Beethoven piano sonata marathon at The Greene Space in New York City. This unique event will be streamed live at WQXR.org; to hear Bax's performances, click here.

For more information, visit AlessioBax.com, the artist's YouTube channel, or the Barrett Vantage Artists web site.      

Kelley O'Connor: Boston, the Barbican, Baltimore, and Bach

Mezzo-soprano Kelley O'Connor's busy fall season has taken her from Opera Boston, where she sang Ursule in Berlioz's rarely-heard opera Béatrice et Bénédict, to London's Barbican Centre, where she performed Honegger's Jeanne d'Arc au bûcher (Joan of Arc at the Stake) with the London Symphony Orchestra and conductor Marin Alsop earlier this month. Now the California native reunites with Alsop for performances with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, both at the orchestra's home in Baltimore (Nov 17 & 18) and at New York's Carnegie Hall (Nov 19). When O'Connor last performed at Carnegie Hall, the New York Times praised her "fine, well-modulated voice that travels easily in big spaces," and her "ability to hold her audience captive." (Click here to read the review in full.) The mezzo returns to New York on December 6 to perform Bach cantatas with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

For more information, visit KelleyO'Connor.com or the IMG Artists web site.  

Brooklyn Rider: from Carnegie Hall to China

Those who passed up trick-or-treating to experience Brooklyn Rider's Carnegie Hall debut on October 31 were treated to something of a Halloween party, when the quartet's members donned costumes to perform Michael Jackson's "Thriller" - arranged for the occasion by Brooklyn Rider's own Colin Jacobsen - as an encore. Before the hijinks began, the quartet delivered a varied program featuring its first group composition, Seven Steps, alongside music by Philip Glass, Christopher Tignor, and John Zorn, as well as an account of Beethoven's Quartet in C-sharp minor (Op. 131) that the New York Times deemed "soulful and fresh," declaring: "This mostly new-music group doesn't play a lot of Beethoven, but it should do more." (Click here to read the review in full.) 

With this success at Carnegie Hall under its belt, the quartet is set to embark on its first tour of China. "We are bringing a wide-ranging program that includes works from our Carnegie debut," explains violinist Jacobsen. "We are also playing a gypsy-inflected romp I wrote, called Brooklesca (literally, 'in the Brooklyn style'), hoping Chinese audiences will enjoy hearing something from our hometown." After performances in Beijing and Hong Kong, the quartet travels to Japan for a residency at Tokyo's American School in Japan with composer and shakuhachi virtuoso, Kojiro Umezaki, followed by an appearance at a Buddhist temple in the Sendai region that was badly damaged in the recent tsunami.   

For more information, visit BrooklynRider.com, the group's YouTube channel, or the Opus 3 Artists web site.    

This season, the music of Dan Visconti plays a vital part for some of new music's biggest names. Sextet eighth blackbird has programmed Visconti's Fractured Jams several times, playing it at New York's SONiC festival, the Sydney Opera House, and Chicago's Museum of Contemporary Art.

At London's Wigmore Hall on January 27, the Kronos Quartet will revisit Visconti's Love Bleeds Radiant, a work commissioned in 2005 as part of the quartet's Under 30 Project. Click here to hear the Kronos Quartet play Love Bleeds Radiant in a recent concert from (Le) Poisson Rouge on WQXR's Q2 Music.

Cellist Joshua Roman and pianist Andrius Zlabys will present Visconti's Americana, as heard recently on WFMT's Impromptu, at upcoming recitals in Akron, Chicago, and San Francisco. It was Roman who premiered this sweeping work in 2010, and he continues to program and play it. "Americana is a great example of why Dan's music speaks so well for my generation of musicians," the cellist explains. "He manages to fuse the classical tradition with other genres of music that we all grew up listening to and loving. Dan's music has a clear and wonderful voice."

For more information, visit www.DanVisconti.com.  

Cellist Joshua Roman seems to pop up everywhere - be it playing with a hip-hop dancer at New York's Fall for Dance Festival or dazzling an Atlanta recital audience with Bach's cello suites (click here for the full Arts CriticATL review.) With each performance, the cellist surprises audiences with his limitless repertoire, gifted musicianship, and quest to present programs with a fresh perspective. This distinctive approach will be on display at the opening of Seattle's TownMusic - a chamber music series curated by Roman that kicks off with his performance of the complete Bach cello suites on November 27 and continues throughout the season with concerts by Brooklyn Rider (Jan 29), Alarm Will Sound (April 26), and Joshua Roman and an all-cello ensemble, featuring the world premiere of a new work by Mason Bates (June 22). Roman has become a hometown hero in Seattle, where he spent several seasons as principal cellist with the Seattle Symphony and recently returned as guest soloist for the orchestra's 2011-12 season opening-night concert.

Click below to watch Roman in the latest addition to his YouTube "Popper Project" - an online video series presenting David Popper's Etudes for cello.

For more information, visit JoshuaRoman.com, the artist's YouTube channel, or the Opus 3 Artists web site.