The Old and the New

The program opens with a set featuring soprano Carolyn Kimball Holmquist, flutist Judy Goldwater, and pianist Pascal Salomon. First, the trio will perform two well-known and beloved works, J.S. Bach’s Sheep May Safely Graze (1713) and Franz Schubert’s Ave Maria (1825). Samuel Barber’s Three Songs, Op. 10, for Soprano and Piano follows. Published in 1939, the songs are settings of three poems from James Joyce’s Chamber Music (1907), “Rain Has Fallen,” “Sleep Now,” and “I Hear an Army.” Judy Goldwater and Pascal Salomon next perform two movements from the charming and lyrical Suite de trois morceaux, Op. 116, composed in 1889 by Benjamin Godard. The trio reassembles for the final work in the set, Frank Martin’s Trois Chants de Noël (1947).

Cellist Virginia Kron and pianist Leslie Hogan will close the program with two contemporary works. Composed in 1996, Stephen Paulus’ Air On Seurat was commissioned by the National Society of Arts and Letter and is a reflection on Georges Seurat’s painting, Un Dimanche Après-Midi a l’Ile de la Grande Jatte. Finally, Kron and Hogan will give the world premiere of Leslie Hogan’s Cool Front (2017), a set of continuous variations by turns lyrical, acerbic, and nostalgic.