Current Concerts
Altadena Main Library
600 E Mariposa St, Altadena, CA
Sunday, February 25, 2024 at 3:00 pm
INTERACTIVE FAMILY CONCERT
A concert geared towards people of all ages but especially accessible for young children. This concert will feature string quartet combing musical imagery and dances from around the world. The program will include an introduction to the string instrument family and some audience participation. Music will include “Pirates of the Caribbean,” “The Blue Danube Waltzes,” Vivaldi’s “Seasons,” Saint Saëns’ “Carnival of the Animals,” Offenbach “Can Can.” Curated by Agnes Gottschewski. Agnes Gottschewski and Ina Veli (violins), Dmitri Bovaird (viola), and Maggie Edmondson (cello).
Sunday, March 17, 2024 at 3:00 pm
18TH CENTURY WIND OCTETS
Wind Octets from the late 18th century were popular as entertainment music and as arrangements of popular operas in the days before recording. In additional to Mozart’s two octets, there are arrangements of Mozart’s operas “Don Giovanni,” “Abduction from the Seraglio” and “the Marriage of Figaro” and one octet of Beethoven. We will select a program from this repertoire.
Curated by Jim Foschia and Phoebe Ray
Musicians: Jonathan Davis and Cathy Del Russo (oboes), Jim Foschia and Helen Goode (clarinets), Duncan Massey and Phoebe Ray (bassoons), John Mason and Suzette Moriarty (horns).
Altadena Community Church
943 E Altadena Dr, Altadena, CA
Sunday, December 10, 2023 at 3:00 pm
TRIOS FOR CLARINET, CELLO, and PIANO
Trios of Beethoven Op 11, Brahms Op 114, with Michele Zukovsky (clarinet), Tina Soule (cello) and Antoinette Perry (piano).
Sunday, January 14, 2024 at 3:00 pm
CLARA WIECK SCHUMANN VIRTUOSO PIANIST AND COMPOSER
Clara Schumann was one of the greatest piano virtuosos of the Romantic era who had a huge impact on the musical life of the 19th century at a time when women were expected to be content as wives and mothers. She learned to compose as a child, and from then to her mid-thirties produced a substantial body of work. In 1853, the year she met Brahms, she engaged in a flurry of composing. Most of Clara Schumann's music was never played by anyone else and largely forgotten until a resurgence of interest in the 1970s. This program will include works by Robert Schumann (premiered by Clara), Clara Schumann’s Romance for Violin and Piano and Piano Trio in g minor, as well as Johannes Brahms Piano Quartet in g minor (premiered by Clara). Musicians: Kevin Fitz-Gerald (piano), Agnes Gottschewski (violin), Dmitri Bovaird (viola), Maggie Edmondson (cello).
Sunday, May 5, 2024 at 3:00 pm
BACH BRANDENBURG CONCERTO #5
Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto #5 is our first offering of Baroque music and our largest ensemble to date. Although the work is uniquely scored for solo flute, solo violin, and solo harpsichord, it is really the first harpsichord concerto ever written. Bach eventually reworked this concerto for the new two manual harpsichord. Harpsichordist Ian Pritchard (member of Tesserae Baroque—whose home base is in Altadena) will join Larry Kaplan (solo flute) and Agnes Gottschewski (solo violin) and a small ensemble of strings and continuo.
Sunday, May 19, 2024 at 3:00 pm
MUSIC WITH "NICKNAMES"
We’re familiar with nicknames assigned — usually by listeners and not the composer — to symphonies such as Beethoven's “Pastoral” and “Eroica” or Dvorak's “from the New World.” Chamber works have also been nicknamed. Violinists Joel Pargman and Carrie Kennedy, violist Agnes Gottschewski, and cellists Tina Soule and Delores Bing will play some of these nicknamed compositions and ask the audience to guess the nicknames. Although we won’t tell you the titles of the compositions now, the composers are Haydn, Mozart and Boccherini.