Palm Beach, FL
Sun, Jan 12, 2025, 3:00 pm
Walter S. Gubelmann Auditorium, The Society of the Four Arts
2 hours, including intermission
Program
Felix Mendelssohn
(1809–1847)Sonata in F major for Violin and Piano
(rev. Menuhin) (1838, rev. 1953)Felix Mendelssohn
(1809–1847)Sonata in D major for Cello and Piano, Op. 58
(1843)Felix Mendelssohn
(1809–1847)Trio No. 2 in C minor for Piano, Violin, and Cello, Op. 66
(1845)
Wu Han
Julian Rhee
David Finckel
Pianist Wu Han, recipient of Musical America’s Musician of the Year Award, enjoys a multi-faceted musical life that encompasses artistic direction, performing, and recording at the highest levels. Co-Artistic Director of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center since 2004 as well as Founder and Co-Artistic Director of Silicon Valley’s innovative chamber music festival Music@Menlo since 2002, she also serves as Artistic Advisor for Wolf Trap’s Chamber Music at the Barns series and Palm Beach’s Society of the Four Arts, and as Artistic Director for La Musica in Sarasota, Florida. Her recent concert activities have taken her from New York’s Lincoln Center stages to the most important concert halls in the United States, Europe, and Asia. In addition to countless performances of virtually the entire chamber repertoire, her concerto performances include appearances with the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Atlanta Symphony, and the Aspen Festival Orchestra. She is the Founder and Artistic Director of ArtistLed, classical music’s first artist-directed, internet-based recording label, which has released her performances of the staples of the cello-piano duo repertoire with cellist David Finckel. Her more than 80 releases on ArtistLed, CMS Live, and Music@Menlo LIVE include masterworks of the chamber repertoire with numerous distinguished musicians. Wu Han’s educational activities include overseeing CMS’s Bowers Program and the Chamber Music Institute at Music@Menlo. A recipient of the prestigious Andrew Wolf Award, she was mentored by some of the greatest pianists of our time, including Lilian Kallir, Rudolf Serkin, and Menahem Pressler. Married to cellist David Finckel since 1985, Wu Han divides her time between concert touring and residences in New York City and Westchester County.
Winner of the prestigious 2024 Avery Fisher Career Grant, Korean-American violinist Julian Rhee has enthralled listeners internationally, praised for his refinement and beauty of sound, and “the kind of poise and showmanship that thrills audiences” (The Strad). Rhee came to international prominence following his prize-winning performances at the 2024Queen Elisabeth International Violin Competition and the 11th Quadrennial International Violin Competition of Indianapolis. He has appeared with orchestras including the Milwaukee Symphony, Belgian National Orchestra, Antwerp Symphony, Indianapolis Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony, Richmond Symphony, and San Diego Symphony alongside conductors such as Francesco Lecce-Chong, Valentina Peleggi, Antony Hermus, Leonard Slatkin, and Rune Bergmann. Equally passionate about chamber music, Rhee is a member of CMS’s Bowers Program. He has performed at festivals including the Ravinia Steans Institute, Marlboro Music, and North Shore Chamber Music Festival, performing alongside esteemed musicians such as Vadim Gluzman, Jonathan Biss, and Mitsuko Uchida. Rhee received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the New England Conservatory, and currently studies with Christian Tetzlaff at the Kronberg Academy. He is the recipient of the outstanding 1699 “Lady Tennant” Antonio Stradivari violin and a Jean Pierre Marie Persoit bow on extended loan through the generosity of the Mary B. Galvin Foundation and the Stradivari Society.
Co-Artistic Director of CMS since 2004, cellist David Finckel’s dynamic musical career has included performances on the world’s stages in the roles of recitalist, chamber artist, and orchestral soloist. The first American student of Mstislav Rostropovich, he joined the Emerson String Quartet in 1979, and during 34 seasons garnered nine Grammy Awards and the Avery Fisher Prize. His quartet performances and recordings include quartet cycles of Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Dvorák, Brahms, Bartók, and Shostakovich, as well as collaborative masterpieces and commissioned works. In 1997, he and pianist Wu Han founded ArtistLed, the first internet-based, artist-controlled classical recording label. ArtistLed’s catalog of more than 20 releases includes the standard literature for cello and piano, plus works composed for the duo by George Tsontakis, Gabriela Lena Frank, Bruce Adolphe, Lera Auerbach, Edwin Finckel, Augusta Read Thomas, and Pierre Jalbert. In 2022, Music@Menlo, an innovative summer chamber music festival in Silicon Valley founded and directed by David and Wu Han, celebrated its 20th season. As a young student, David was winner of the Philadelphia Orchestra’s junior and senior divisions, resulting in two performances with the orchestra. Having taught extensively with the late Isaac Stern in America, Israel, and Japan, he is currently a professor at both the Juilliard School and Stony Brook University, and oversees both CMS’s Bowers Program and Music@Menlo’s Chamber Music Institute. David’s 100 online Cello Talks, lessons on cello technique, are viewed by an international audience of musicians. Along with Wu Han, he was the recipient of Musical America’s 2012 Musicians of the Year Award.