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Winter Festival: American Voices, 1750 – 2008

This year CMS offers an unprecedented opportunity to experience American chamber music in depth, from the Colonial period to the present. In four programs, CMS delves into two-and-half centuries of our nation’s musical history.

Works by 22 composers display an astounding range of styles:

  • From the United States’ early years, hear rarely played works by Benjamin Franklin (a curiosity from the great polymath), John Antes (a Pennsylvanian who wrote string trios while serving as a missionary in Egypt), Anthony Philip Heinrich (hailed in his day as “The Beethoven of Kentucky”), and Louis Moreau Gottschalk (“the Creole Liszt”);
  • Encounter ambitious late-Romantic works by Amy Cheney Beach and Edward MacDowell;
  • Hear how Americans such as Charles Ives, Charles Tomlinson Griffes, George Antheil, Louis Gruenberg, George Gershwin, Aaron Copland, Samuel Barber, and Leonard Bernstein added their individualistic voices to the evolving language of modernism;
  • Sample the experimental scores of such 20th-century American mavericks as Henry Cowell, Ruth Crawford Seeger, and John Cage. Revel in the sounds of such contemporary masters as Lukas Foss, Joan Tower, and Mario Davidovsky;
  • Discover a new chamber-song cycle by Alan Louis Smith that grapples with the American experience through texts drawn from historical writings by a pioneer woman.

Each program offers a balanced selection from the best of American chamber music, and together they provide a sweeping panorama of our nation’s musical landscape.

Concerts

Subscribe to the entire series now, or visit each program individually:

  • Friday, February 8 at 7:30 PM offers music of Franklin, Cowell, Gruenberg, Antheil, and Beach.
  • Sunday, February 10 at 5 PM includes works of MacDowell, Copland, Cage, Davidovsky, Griffes, and Foss.
  • Tuesday, February 12 at 7:30 PM features selections from Antes, Gershwin, Barber, Seeger, Bernstein, and Tower.
  • Friday, February 22 at 7:30 PM and Sunday, February 24 at 5 PM is highlighted by the World Premiere of an extraordinary work by Alan Louis Smith and performed by renowned mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe, as well as works from Heinrich, Gottschalk, and Ives.

Lectures and Master Class

Additionally, four Inside Chamber Music lectures with Bruce Adolphe provide additional insight into the trail blazers of American music. Subscribe to the series, or come to individual lectures.

A special symposium with Artistic Director Wu Han, mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe, and composer Alan Louis Smith will focus on the words of Margaret Ann Alsip Frink that provided inspiration for Smith’s composition.

Mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe will conduct a rare and illuminating master class in conjunction with her appearance at CMS.


Events for Families

CMS’ spirit of American adventure extends to our family series Meet the Music!, which also focuses on American music! Three concerts in the Spring at 1 PM or 3 PM guarantee you and your family a trip across musical borders—no passport required!