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  • WDCH
  • EMANUEL AX AND YEFIM BRONFMAN PERFORM AN EVENING OF DUO PIANO WORKS
  • Nov. 11, 2001
  • SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 11 AT 7:30 PM AT THE
    DOROTHY CHANDLER PAVILION

    Program Includes Works By Brahms and Rachmaninoff

    On Sunday, November 11 at 7:30 p.m., the 2001/2002 Celebrity Recitals series continues with a program featuring world-renowned pianists Emanuel Ax and Yefim Bronfman in an evening of duo piano repertoire at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. They perform three works from the Romantic era: Brahms’ Variations on a Theme by Haydn and Sonata in F minor, along with Suite No. 2 by Rachmaninoff. The evening is the second in a series of four recitals, focusing on piano masters, presented this season by the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

    Tickets ($14 - $51) are available at the Philharmonic’s Music Center box office, all Ticketmaster outlets (Robinsons-May, Tower Records, Ritmo Latino, Tu Música, and selected Wherehouse locations), and by credit card phone order at 213/365-3500. Tickets are also available on-line at laphil.com. Groups of 10 or more may be eligible for a 20% discount; call 323/850-2050. A limited number of $10 rush tickets for seniors and full time students may be available 2 hours prior to the performance at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion box office. Valid identification is required; one ticket per person. Groups of 10 or more may be eligible for special discounts. For further information, please call 323/850-2000.

    Emanuel Ax and Yefim Bronfman play a program of music from the latter half of the nineteenth century. The duo will perform a work written for two pianos (Rachmaninoff), and two Brahms works that were re-worked later, one as an orchestral piece (Variations on a Theme by Haydn) and one that became a piano quintet (Sonata in F Minor). Brahms composed the Haydn Variations during a summer retreat in 1873 based upon the “Chorale St. Antoni” given to him by C.F. Pohl, librarian of the Vienna Philharmonic Society. Brahms’ last large-scale piano work, it premiered in February 10, 1874.

    Rachmaninoff and his cousin, Alexander Solti, performed Suite No. 2 for the first time in November of 1901. The work features a march, a waltz and a tarantella, and is one of a number of works that marked Rachmaninoff’s return to composing after the critical failure of his First Symphony in 1897. Brahms adapted his String Quintet in F minor in 1894 for himself and pianist Carl Tausig to play at an upcoming concert of the composer’s work in Vienna in April of that year. The adagio was much praised by Clara Schumann, who said, “How rapturously it sings and rings from beginning to end!”

    The 2001/2002 Celebrity Recitals continue on Friday, March 15 at 8 p.m., as pianist Peter Serkin appears in recital with a Beethoven and Schoenberg concert. The series concludes on Friday, April 5 at 8 p.m. with an evening featuring Alfred Brendel performing works by Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven.

    EMANUEL AX first captured public attention in 1974 when, at age 25, he won the First Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Competition in Tel Aviv. In 1975 he won the Michaels Award of Young Concert Artists and, four years later, the coveted Avery Fisher Prize. He has been an exclusive Sony Classical recording artist since 1987, and his newest releases include period-instrument performances of Chopin’s complete works for piano and orchestra and the Brahms Piano Concerto No. 2 with Bernard Haitink and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. In recent years, Ax has turned his attention toward the music of contemporary composers, giving the world premieres of John Adams’ Century Rolls in September 1997 with the Cleveland Orchestra, Christopher Rouse’s Seeing for Piano and Orchestra in May 1999 with the New York Philharmonic, and Bright Sheng’s Red Silk Dance in January 2000 with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Ax regularly performs chamber music with such artists as Young Uck Kim, Jaime Laredo, Cho-Liang Lin, Yo-Yo Ma, and Peter Serkin.

    The 1991 winner of the prestigious Avery Fisher Prize for outstanding achievement and excellence in music, YEFIM BRONFMAN was born in Tashkent, studied at Tel Aviv University in Israel and, in this country, at Juilliard, Marlboro and The Curtis Institute. His debut at age 17 with Zubin Mehta and the Montreal Symphony launched the pianist’s international career. In previous seasons, Bronfman has appeared with such celebrated ensembles as the Berlin Philharmonic, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Dresden Staatskapelle, the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, the London Philharmonic, the London Symphony, the New York Philharmonic, the NHK Symphony, the Orchestre de Paris, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, and the Vienna Philharmonic. He has given numerous solo recitals in the leading halls of North America, Europe, and the Far East, including acclaimed debuts at Carnegie Hall in 1989 and at Avery Fisher Hall in 1993. In December 1999, Bronfman joined James Levine and London’s Philharmonia Orchestra in New York, London, Paris, Tokyo and Los Angeles to premiere the Disney film, Fantasia 2000, on whose soundtrack he performs the Shostakovich Piano Concerto No. 2. Since his first appearance with the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 1977, Bronfman has collaborated frequently with the Orchestra at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and Hollywood Bowl, as well as on the Philharmonic’s Grammy Award-winning recording of the three Bartók Piano Concertos, Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting.

    EDITORS - PLEASE NOTE:

    Celebrity Recital


    Sunday, November 11, 2001 at 7:30 p.m.

    DOROTHY CHANDLER PAVILION, 135 N. Grand Ave in Los Angeles

    Emanuel Ax, piano

    Yefim Bronfman, piano

    BRAHMS: Variations on a Theme by Haydn, Op. 56b

    RACHMANINOFF: Suite No. 2, Op. 17

    BRAHMS: Sonata in F minor, Op. 34b

    Single tickets ($14 - $51)) are available at the Philharmonic’s Music Center box office, all Ticketmaster outlets (Robinsons-May, Tower Records, Ritmo Latino, Tu Música, and selected Wherehouse locations), and by credit card phone order at 213/365-3500. Tickets are also available on-line at www.laphil.com. A limited number of $10 rush tickets for seniors and full time students may be available 2 hours prior to the performance at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion box office. Valid identification is required; one ticket per person. Groups of 10 or more may be eligible for special discounts. For further information, please call 323/850-2000.

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