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  • VIOLINIST & COMPOSER MARIJN SIMONS PERFORMS WORLD PREMIERE OF "SECRET NOTES" WITH LOS ANGELES PHILHARMONIC NEW MUSIC GROUP
  • Apr. 15, 2002
  • MONDAY, APRIL 15 AT 8:00 PM

    ZIPPER HALL AT COLBURN SCHOOL

    Soprano Jessica Rivera & Mezzo-Soprano Luciana Souza
    Sing Golijov Vocal Works

    Violinist and composer Marijn Simons and members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic New Music Group, led by Assistant Conductor Yasuo Shinozaki, present the world premiere of Simons' second violin concerto, Secret Notes, on Monday, April 15 at 8 PM. The concert takes place in Zipper Concert Hall at the Colburn School of Performing Arts as part of the 2001/2002 Green Umbrella series.

    In addition, soprano Jessica Rivera and mezzo-soprano Luciana Souza join the New Music Group for three arias from Osvaldo Golijov's acclaimed La Pasión Según San Marcos and How Slow the Wind for soprano and string quartet. The New Music Group will also perform Golijov's Lullaby and Doina as well as Mark Kopytman's From an Old Tune. There will be a pre-concert discussion at 7 PM featuring Golijov, Simons, and Consulting Composer for New Music Steven Stucky.

    Commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic New Music Group and written last year, Dutch composer Marijn Simons' Violin Concerto No. 2, entitled Secret Notes, has three movements: "Keep Them in the Dark", "Keep Silent" and "Leaked Out." The wunderkind, known for his previous pieces such as Capriccio for Stan and Ollie, will appear as soloist for the concerto, which features an abbreviated orchestra with accordion as well.

    Osvaldo Golijov came to international attention with his La Pasión Según San Marcos, one of four passions that premiered in Stuttgart, Germany in 2000. This triumphant multi-cultural passion that impressed the audience with sounds from many cultures (South American, Jewish and European), was the standout premiere of the year. It was followed by How Slow the Wind, which is dedicated to the composer's friend, Mariel Stubrin, who died in an auto accident in January 2001. The piece is based upon an Emily Dickinson poem that deals with the emotions of those left behind.

    The Lullaby and Doina was commissioned and premiered by the Boston Symphony Chamber Players in April 2001. Dedicated to that ensemble, it starts with a set of variations on a Yiddish lullaby, composed for Sally Potter's film The Man Who Cried -- a love story between a young Jewish woman and a Gypsy man. The theme of the lullaby morphs into a dense and dark doina (a gypsy slow, rubato genre) featuring the lowest string of the viola. The piece ends in a fast gallop on a theme borrowed from the wild gypsy band Taraf de Haidouks. Composer Mark Kopytman's 1977 work for piano quartet, From an Old Tune, is also on the program. Born in 1929 in a portion of Poland that is now in the Ukraine, he taught Golijov during the young composer's stay in Israel.

    Violinist and composer MARIJN SIMONS was born in 1982 and first studied the violin at the age of four, and simultaneously - and without formal teaching - started to compose music of his own. At the age of ten he completed his first string quartet. Marijn currently studies composition with Daan Manneke at the Amsterdam Conservatory, where he is also the student of renowned violin expert, Davina van Wely. He also studies with Saschko Gawriloff. From an early age Marijn has performed in recital and broadcast for radio and television, his first professional concert being at the age of ten. A year later he made his debut with orchestra playing the Mendelssohn Concerto and performed with the Rotterdam Philharmonic and other European orchestras. He has been the subject of several television documentaries aired throughout Europe. Marijn's first CD - including his own Capriccio for Stan & Ollie drew favorable responses and his first CD on the Etcetera label was released last year. It features the re-working of Capriccio for Stan & Ollie for nine players, coupled with his Second String Quartet and First Violin Concerto, Cuddly Animals. Future recordings planned include his most recent concerti, as well as his performances of 20th century concerti, including those by Milhaud, Hindemith and Villa-Lobos. Also due for recording is his largest work to date, Noises in the Night, which received its world premiere in December 1999. Recent commissions include his first Piano Concerto for Jean-Bernard Pommier (which received its premiere with the Netherlands Radio Chamber in 2001), a Flute Quartet for the Rotterdam Dance Academy, and a Percussion Concerto for the Residentie Orkest. Simons has recently been awarded the Philip Morris Arts Prize in the Netherlands.

    Composer OSVALDO GOLIJOV was born in 1960 in an Eastern European Jewish household in La Plata, just outside of Buenos Aires, Argentina. He studied music with Gerardo Gandini, who had studied with Alberto Ginastera, Argentina's most famous composer. Ginastera had established a nationalist classical music idiom with European avant-garde elements, that Gandini furthered by establishing the Grupo de Experimentación Musical. Golijov was exposed to this relatively new classical music tradition and was influenced by other Argentine musical currents, such as the tangos of Astor Piazzolla. In 1983, he moved to Israel and studied with musicologist and composer Mark Kopytman. In 1986, he came to the United States and earned a Ph.D. at the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied with George Crumb. In 1990, he was a fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center. There he began an artistic relationship with the Kronos Quartet. They later recorded his works, K'vakarat (which he wrote for them) and The Dreams and Prayers of Isaac the Blind. He continues to compose and arrange for Kronos. It is through the quartet that he met director Sally Potter who enlisted him to compose music for her film, The Man Who Cried.

    More About On Location:

    On Location, the Los Angeles Philharmonic's residency program, with Osvaldo Golijov, a Music Alive Composer-in-Residence, occurs over three weeks with the music departments of the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts and California State University, Los Angeles. High school students will, under the guidance of Mr. Golijov, compose original works to be performed by the university students at the Los Angeles Philharmonic's Neighborhood Concert on April 12, 2001. Mr. Golijov will work with the students in person and via internet technology, guiding them through the process of writing for small instrumental ensembles and voice. In addition, Mr. Golijov attended rehearsals and met with the members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic who performed his work at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and in a chamber music concert.

    This residency by Osvaldo Golijov is made possible through Music Alive, a residency program of the American Symphony Orchestra League and Meet The Composer. This national program is designed to provide orchestras with resources and tools to support their presentation of new music to the public and build support for new music within their institutions. Funding for Music Alive is provided by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, and The Aaron Copland Fund for Music.

    Assistant Conductor YASUO SHINOZAKI was appointed during the summer of 2001 and took up his duties at the start of the 2001/2002 season. In February 2002, he made his debut with the orchestra at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. This season, he conducts several community concerts as well as a Green Umbrella concert and two Toyota Symphonies for Youth. Shinozaki was born in Kyoto, Japan in February 1968. He studied in Vienna with Leopold Hager. He has worked extensively with orchestras throughout Japan in a wide range of repertoire. This season, he returns there to conduct the Kansai Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestra Musica Celeste and the Osaka Symphony Orchestra and will make his debut with the Fukuoka City Philharmonic Orchestra. He made his opera conducting debut with Mozart's Marriage of Figaro in Tokyo in 1993 and since then has conducted at many opera houses in Japan, including the Tokyo Nikikai Opera and the Japan National Opera Theatre. Shinozaki has worked with Bernard Haitink, Myung-Whun Chung, the Santa Cecilia Orchestra (Rome), and with Seiji Ozawa at Tanglewood.

    Soprano JESSICA RIVERA is a Resident Artist with Los Angeles Opera and has performed with Opera Santa Barbara and Santa Fe Opera. Her rich array of soprano roles includes Pamina in The Magic Flute, Valencienne and Sylviane in The Merry Widow, Frasquita in Carmen, Melisande in Impressions de Pelléas, Héro in Béatrice et Bénédict, and Masha in The Queen of Spades, conducted by Valery Gergiev. This spring, she sings the role of Nella in Gianni Schicchi with Los Angeles Opera. She has also been invited to return during the 2002-2003 season for a second year as Resident Artist to perform Anna in Nabucco and Octavia's amorous servant girl Damigella in The Coronation of Poppea. Rivera made her Los Angeles Philharmonic debut last season under the baton of Miguel Harth-Bedoya in Joaquin Rodrigo's Ausencias de Dulcinea. As a guest artist, she has been featured in various works, including Mahler's Symphony No. 2 with the New West Symphony, Mozart's The Magic Flute as Pamina with the San Bernardino Symphony, and Canteloube's Chants d'Auvergne with the Downey Symphony. In addition to her operatic and concert work, Rivera has given numerous recitals throughout the U.S. Other upcoming engagements include her debut with the Ft. Worth Symphony in Mahler's Symphony No. 2, and a recital entitled Music to Lighten the Heart, in conjunction with the Skirball Center and the USC Thornton School of Music. Rivera received her Master of Music in Vocal Arts Performance from USC and her Bachelor of Arts in Music from Pepperdine University.

    Mezzo-soprano LUCIANA SOUZA hails from São Paulo, Brazil, where she grew up in a family of Bossa Nova innovators who performed and wrote numerous hit tunes for stars like Jõao Gilberto and Elis Regina. She spent four years on faculty at Unicamp State University in Brazil, followed by an assistant professorship at Berklee College of Music, where she received a Bachelor's in Jazz Composition. Ms. Souza also received a Master's degree from New England Conservatory of Music. She holds workshops in Europe, North and South America, and is a respected composer and performer, having appeared and recorded with renowned jazz musicians and new music composers, including Danilo Perez, John Patitucci, Hermeto Pascoal, Kenny Werner, David Kikoski, Donald Brown, Osvaldo Golijov, Kenny Wheeler, Bob Moses, and George Garzone. Her 1999 CD, An Answer to Your Silence, was released on NYC Records. Ms. Souza's latest project, The Poems of Elizabeth Bishop and Other Songs, is on Sunnyside Records, and was included in The New York Times 2000 The Year in Pop and Jazz: the Critics' Choice list, at number five.

    EDITORS- PLEASE NOTE:

    Monday, April 15, 8:00 PM


    - GREEN UMBRELLA -

    ZIPPER HALL AT THE COLBURN SCHOOL, 200 S. Grand Ave in Los Angeles

    LOS ANGELES NEW MUSIC GROUP

    YASUO SHINOZAKI, conductor

    MARIJN SIMONS, violin

    JESSICA RIVERA, soprano

    LUCIANA SOUZA, mezzo-soprano

    Members of the Los Angeles Master Chorale

    Marijn Simons: Secret Notes (World Premiere; Los Angeles Philharmonic New Music Group commission)

    Osvaldo Golijov: Lullaby and Doina (from the soundtrack of The Man Who Cried)


    Mark Kopytman: About an Old Tune

    Osvaldo Golijov: How Slow the Wind (for soprano and string quartet)

    Osvaldo Golijov: Three arias from La Pasión Según San Marcos: Agonia, Quisiera yo renegar, Lua descolorida (Peter's Tears)

    Tickets ($26) are on sale now at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion box office, all Ticketmaster outlets (Robinsons-May, Tower Records, Ritmo Latino, and selected Wherehouse locations), and by credit card phone order at 213.365.3500. Tickets are also available on-line at www.laphil.com. For further information, please call 323.850.2000.

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  • Contact:

    Elizabeth Hinckley, 323/850-2047; David Barber, 323/850-2023