Join violist Erika Gray and pianist Christopher Schmitt in a celebration of the macabre just in time for Hallow’s Eve! Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet Suite memorializes innocence and youth, conflict and injustice, and ultimately the bittersweet embrace of death. Chopin’s four movement “Funeral March” Sonata highlights the poignancy of longing and despair in one of the most widely recognized tropes in all of classical music.

Beethoven’s “Ghost” Trio for piano and strings, Op. 70 No. 2, realizes so many hallmarks of what makes this composer so cherished, even in modern times. The utter contrasts apparent from the first seconds of the work; juxtapositions of rambunctious joy and sublime soaring melody abound in the outer movements. However, the “Ghost” and true essence of the piece lies in its center movement, betraying and fully expressing the full gamut of inner conflict lying in the center of the man who composed it, and quite possibly contained deep within all who appreciate it.

Hailed by critics for her “hauntingly beautiful performances,” New York based flutist Emi Ferguson will perform a riveting program anchored by the flute sonatas of Francis Poulenc and Sergei Prokofiev. The French charm and fascination with wind idioms which grace the Poulenc provide a stark contrast to the clear and somber quality of the Soviet influenced work of Prokofiev. Emi’s own transcription of Henry T. Burleigh's song cycle Five Songs on Poems by Laurence Hope sets the poetry of British writer Adela Florence Cory in a soulfully invigorating context.

The music of Dmitry Shostakovich represents an outpouring of emotional intensity amidst the suppression and terror of living in a Stalinist dictatorship. Although Shostakovich was never arrested for his compositional output, he was formally denounced by his authoritarian government multiple times for his art, and lived in a state of fear that he would be exiled, just as his grandfather had been decades before. This sense of deep sensitivity, expressed in such a restrained context, lends his music a certain desperation, all the more poignant because it is often found below the surface of an icy exterior. Edvard Grieg expressed his Norwegian heritage through a love of folk music, set in the harmonies and structures of Western musical tradition. More direct in its passionate Romanticism, Grieg’s music nonetheless possesses a certain textural clarity and cool precision, betraying its Scandinavian origin and accentuating its beauty. Like the northern lights themselves, some of the most sublime moments in music can only appear when enveloped by a frigid darkness.

These quintessential Romantics; Johannes Brahms, Robert Schumann, and Clara Schumann, were not only profoundly expressive throughout their compositional output, but were also deeply affectionate in their own personal lives, savoring tender feelings of passion and love. Robert’s wife, Clara, was perhaps the most influential pianist of her generation, and a masterful composer in her own right. She maintained a close friendship with Brahms throughout her life, and especially after the passing of her husband in a psychiatric asylum at the age of 46. The richness of their musical language of these three composers, their shared life experiences, and the profound effects they had on the arts as a whole, are especially pronounced in a piano trio setting. Join violinist Zino Bogachek, cellist Loewi Lin, and pianist Christopher Schmitt in a performance of works by these three composers, celebrating what it is to be a Romantic.

Born of a French father and Polish mother, the music of Frédéric Chopin represents a beautiful symbiosis of both cultures, synthesizing French texture, form and harmony with Polish dance and rhythmic flair. Chopin’s amorous, decade-long relationship with novelist Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin, who wrote under the pen name George Sand, was a primary influence in his life and art. Chopin’s solo piano music formed a bond between the two lovers that, once severed, seemed to precipitate the composer’s demise: after all, Chopin’s cello sonata, the last work of his published during his lifetime, was composed near the end of the tumultuous relationship. Cellist Joseph Gotoff and pianist Christopher Schmitt will perform this work, alongside an anthology of Chopin’s solo piano pieces, befitting the salon style concerts the composer was so fond of.

Cellist Loewi Lin of the National Symphony Orchestra will be joined by pianist Christopher Schmitt in presenting a program of lush, orchestrally-inspired works by Soviet composers Rachmaninov and Tchaikovsky. Resembling a piano concerto more than a cello sonata, composer-pianist Sergei Rachmaninov took it upon himself to imbue the genre with a hitherto unrealized level of virtuosity and drama on the part of the pianist, while Tchaikovky’s Valse Sentimantale offers a refreshing, if poignant, sense of emotional directness and simplicity.

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