Invitation to the Dance
This event has passedSat, Apr 25, 2026, 7:30 pm
Alice Tully Hall
2 hours, including intermission
“Last week I gave a ball in my own rooms . . . we began at 6 in the evening and stopped at 7—what? only an hour?—no, no—at seven in the morning.” — W. A. Mozart
Beginning with Mozart, who was an avid and reportedly expert dancer, this program offers a unique opportunity to enjoy the special synergy between music and dance: from composers who created dance music for social gatherings like the “Waltz King” Johann Strauss, Jr., to artistic representations of folk dances by Johannes Brahms and David Serkin Ludwig. Double bassist Nina Bernat performs Chopin’s dazzling polonaise, and a quartet of CMS musicians presents Shostakovich’s comical, almost sarcastic take on the polka.
Program
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
(1756–1791)5 Contradances for Flute, Strings, and Drum, K. 609
(1791)Franz Schubert
(1797–1828)Polonaise in E major for Piano, Four Hands, D. 824, Op. 61, No. 6
(1826)David Serkin Ludwig
(b. 1974)Three Yiddish Dances for Piano, Violin, and Cello
(2010)Dmitri Shostakovich
(1906–1975)Two Pieces for String Quartet
(1931)Igor Stravinsky
(1882–1971)Duo Concertant for Violin and Piano
(1932)Alexandre Tansman
(1897-1986)Fantaisie sur les valses de Johann Strauss for Two Pianos
Johannes Brahms
(1833–1897)Selected Hungarian Dances for Violin and Piano
(arr. Joseph Joachim) (1868, 1880)Frédéric Chopin
(1810–1849)Introduction and Polonaise brillante in C major for Double Bass and Piano, Op. 3
(1829-30)Johann Strauss, Jr.
(1825-1899)Schatz-Walzer for Two Violins, Viola, Cello, Piano, and Harmonium, Op. 418
(1885)
Sahun Sam Hong
Hyeyeon Park
Aaron Boyd
Bella Hristova
Daniel Phillips
Estelle Choi
Nina Bernat
Sooyun Kim
Renowned for his “imaginative, intoxicating . . . high-voltage” playing (Sindelfinger Zeitung) and “wide range of rich colors” (San Diego Story), Korean-American pianist Sahun Sam Hong commands the world’s most prestigious stages with his distinctly magnetic tone and effortless vitality. He is a prize winner of numerous international competitions, including the Naumburg Competition, Vendome Prize, Beethoven Competition Vienna, and the American Pianists Awards. In addition to performing, Hong is a prolific arranger and orchestrator recognized for his innovative transcriptions that are featured in the touring programs of Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Mount Vernon Virtuosi, and ensemble132, which he co-directs. His primary mentors have included John Owings, Leon Fleisher, and Yong Hi Moon. A member of CMS’s Bowers Program and a Steinway Artist, Hong is currently based in New York City and serves on the faculty of CUNY Queens College.
Pianist Hyeyeon Park has appeared on major concert stages around the world, performing with orchestras including the Seoul Philharmonic, Incheon Philharmonic, Gangnam Symphony, and Seoul Festival Orchestra. Named Artist of the Year by the Seoul Arts Center in 2012, she is also a laureate of numerous international competitions, including Oberlin, Ettlingen, Hugo Kauder, Prix Amadèo, Corpus Christi, Vittorio Gui, and Plowman. Her solo and chamber recordings including Klavier 1853, Wavelength, and The Complete Cello-Piano Sonatas by Lowell Liebermann. She is a graduate of the Peabody Institute, Yale School of Music, and the Korea National University of Arts; her teachers include Yong Hi Moon, Peter Frankl, Claude Frank, Daejin Kim, and Kyungsook Lee. Piano Professor at the University of Nevada, Reno, together with cellist Dmitri Atapine, Park shares the Artistic Directorship of Apex Concerts and the Friends of Chamber Music Kansas City, co-leads the Music@Menlo Smith Family Young Performers Program, and is the Artistic Co-Director of Music@Menlo.
Violinist Aaron Boyd enjoys a versatile career as soloist, chamber musician, orchestral leader, recording artist, lecturer, and teacher. Since making his New York recital debut in 1998, he has concertized throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. Formerly a member of the Escher String Quartet, he was a recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant and the Martin E. Segal prize from Lincoln Center, and was also awarded a Proclamation by the City of Pittsburgh for his musical accomplishments. A passionate advocate for new music, he has been involved in numerous commissions and premieres, and has worked directly with such legendary composers as Milton Babbitt, Elliott Carter, and Charles Wuorinen. He is also founder of the Zukofsky Quartet (quartet-in-residence at Bargemusic); the only ensemble to have played all of Milton Babbitt's notoriously difficult string quartets. As a recording artist, he can be heard on the BIS, Music@Menlo Live, Naxos, Tzadik, North/South and Innova labels. He has been broadcast in concert by NPR, WQXR, and WQED, and was profiled by Arizona Public Television. Born in Pittsburgh, Mr. Boyd began his studies with Samuel LaRocca and Eugene Phillips and graduated from The Juilliard School where he studied with Sally Thomas and coached extensively with Paul Zukofsky and cellist Harvey Shapiro. He now serves as Director of Chamber Music and Professor of Practice in Violin at the Meadows School of the Arts at Southern Methodist University and lives in Dallas with his wife Yuko, daughter Ayu, and son Yuki.
Bulgarian-American violinist Bella Hristova has won international acclaim for her “expressive nuance and rich tone” (New York Times) and “impressive power and control” (Washington Post). A recipient of the Avery Fisher Career Grant, she is known for a diverse repertoire, bold programming, and a warmly beguiling stage presence. Hristova has performed as a soloist with orchestras across the United States, Asia, Europe, Latin America, and New Zealand, and has given recitals at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, and Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. A devoted champion of living composers, she has premiered new concertos by Anthony Ritchie and her husband, David Serkin Ludwig. Her commissioning project, Lineage, features six new solo violin works and will be released as an album on Azica Records in 2027. She plays a 1655 Nicolò Amati violin once owned by Louis Krasner.
Violinist/violist Daniel Phillips enjoys a versatile career as a chamber musician, soloist, and teacher. A graduate of Juilliard, he counts among his teachers his father, Eugene Phillips, Ivan Galamian, Sally Thomas, Nathan Milstein, Sándor Végh, and George Neikrug. He co-founded the Orion String Quartet, which played worldwide for 37 years. Since winning the 1976 Young Concert Artists Competition, he has performed as soloist with many major orchestras. Along with his wife, Tara Helen O’Connor, he is the Co-Artistic Director of Music from Angel Fire. He was a member of the renowned Bach Aria Group and has toured and recorded in a string quartet for Sony with Gidon Kremer, Kim Kashkashian, and Yo-Yo Ma. Phillips is a professor at the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College and on the faculties of Bard College Conservatory and Juilliard. He plays a violin made by Samuel Zygmuntowicz in 2017 and a 1702 Stradivarius, and a viola made by his grandfather, Benjamin F. Phillips.
Cellist Estelle Choi has been praised by the Los Angeles Times for “giving the impression that music and the room are a single living being.” She is a founding member of the Calidore String Quartet, which made international headlines when they won the Grand Prize of the 2016 M-Prize International Chamber Music Competition. The Calidore is an Avery Fisher Career Grant winner, BBC 3 New Generation Artist, recipient of the Lincoln Center Emerging Artist award and a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship, and alums of CMS’s Bowers Program. She serves on the faculty of the University of Delaware School of Music as Associate Professor of Violin and co-directs the UD Graduate Fellowship Quartet Program and Calidore String Quartet Seminar. She studied with John Kadz and went on to work with Aldo Parisot at the Yale School of Music and Ronald Leonard at the Colburn Conservatory.
Double bassist Nina Bernat has established herself as one of the leading solo voices for her instrument. The Star Tribune praised her concerto debut with the Minnesota Orchestra as “exhilarating, lovely and lyrical.” In 2023, she became the first female bassist to receive the Avery Fisher Career Grant and won first prize in the Concert Artists Guild Elmaleh Competition. She has appeared as soloist with the Minnesota Orchestra, Brooklyn Symphony Orchestra, and Long Island Symphony, and her performances have been featured on NPR's Performance Today. Her debut album, Crossroads, will be released in fall 2026. She is a member of the CMS’s Bowers Program and has appeared at major music festivals such as Marlboro, Music@Menlo, Chamber Music Northwest, and Bridgehampton. She is Professor of Double Bass at Stony Brook University and performs regularly with ROCO and Sejong Soloists, and has appeared as guest principal with the Israel and Oslo Philharmonics.
Since her concerto debut with the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, flutist Sooyun Kim has enjoyed a flourishing career performing with orchestras, including the Bavarian Radio Symphony, Munich Philharmonic, Munich Chamber Orchestra, and Boston Pops. She has appeared in recital in Budapest’s Liszt Hall, Millennium Stage at the Kennedy Center, and the Louvre Museum in Paris. She is a winner of the Georg Solti Foundation Career Grant and ARD International Flute Competition. An alum of CMS’s Bowers Program, she studied at the New England Conservatory under the tutelage of Paula Robison. She is recently appointed Assistant Professor of Flute at University Cincinnati College-Conservatory and teaches summer courses at Orford Musique. Kim plays on a rare 18-karat gold flute made especially for her by Verne Q. Powell Flutes and has recorded for labels including ArtistLed, Naxos, Toccata Classics, and BR-Klassik. Her album Confluence was released to great acclaim in 2025 on the Musica Solis label.