Fanfare is our curated weekly guide to classical music concerts in the Philadelphia area. Subscribe now to get Fanfare delivered to your inbox every Sunday. And if you have feedback or an upcoming event to share, let us know!
Spotlight: Musicians from Marlboro – Friday, Perelman Theater at the Kimmel Center
Several times each season, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society hosts tours of performances from the Marlboro Festival, a summer mecca of chamber music. The festival regularly pairs distinguished and established chamber musicians with superbly gifted emerging artists, and during the concert season, sends a few groups out on tour.
This program features Marlboro Co-Artistic Director Mitsuko Uchida at the piano, joined by St. Louis Symphony Principal Viola Beth Guterman Chu. Their younger partners are violinist Stephanie Zyzak and cellist Oliver Herbert. I know the latter to be a marvelously gifted player, and though the violinist is new to me, her presence in this exalted company is a recommendation in itself. The program of standards from the chamber music literature has an intriguing accent, as miniatures by the enigmatic Hungarian composer György Kurtág are preludes to Beethoven’s Piano Trio in E-flat Major, Op. 70, No. 2 and Schumann’s Piano Quartet in E-flat Major, Op. 47.
Nov. 8 at 7:30 p.m., Perelman Theater, Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, 300 South Broad Street, $30; tickets and information.
Gesualdo Six – Thursday, St. Mary's Church, Hamilton Village
The Cries of London – Friday, Fleisher Art Memorial
Here’s a chance to enjoy an impromptu festival of English Renaissance vocal music over two successive evenings. On Thursday, Penn Live Arts presents the Philadelphia debut of the well-regarded British vocal ensemble Gesualdo Six, in a West Philadelphia venue very appropriate to their program of Tudor choral masters Tallis, Byrd, Gibbons, and Tomkins. The next evening, head to Queen Village for chamber music of the same era, performed by the chamber trio Filament and mezzo-soprano Meg Bragle (yes, WRTI’s afternoon host!). The venue is perfect: the quirky and wonderful Fleisher Art Memorial, housed in a converted Romanesque-style church.
Gesualdo Six: Nov. 7 at 7:30 p.m., St. Mary’s Church, Hamilton Village, 3916 Locust Walk, $52; purchase tickets.
The Cries of London: Nov. 8 at 7 p.m., Fleisher Art Memorial, 719 Catherine Street, $10-$20; tickets and information.
40th Anniversary Screening of Amadeus – Saturday at Bryn Mawr Film Institute, Bryn Mawr
I couldn’t help noting this event, even though it’s outside Fanfare’s usual concert purview. Is Amadeus history or fiction? The answer, of course, is: Both, and neither. This tension makes some purists deeply uncomfortable, but the biggest truth in this legendary film is the music itself, beautifully performed and deployed to superb dramatic effect under Milos Forman’s direction.
Peter Shaffer’s screenplay (like his earlier play), takes carefully considered liberties with the lives of two composers. One is extravagantly gifted and effortlessly eloquent (musically, at least), yet struggling for success; the other, competent and powerful but hardly inspired. There is a hint, never quite resolved, that the latter murdered the former — a legend long since thoroughly debunked. The fictions, however, don’t obscure the essential human verities here: the corrosion of jealousy, the shame of mediocrity, the tragic futility of attempting to outrun one’s own mortality. All powerfully underscored by Mozart’s music.
Nov. 9 at 1 p.m., Bryn Mawr Film Institute, 824 West Lancaster Avenue, $10.50-$15; purchase tickets.
