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Chamber Music All Stars - Program 2

Featuring musical superstars from all around Europe and the world’s most beloved music

January 2, 2024
Teatro Niccolini

Featuring musical superstars from all around Europe and the world’s most beloved music
 
Artists:
Alessio Bax, piano
Lucille Chung, piano
Daishin Kashimoto, violin
Adrien La Marca, viola
Paul Watkins, cello
Nabil Shehata, double bass 
 
Program: 
Schubert String Trio, D 471
Kashimoto/La Marca/Watkins
 
Beethoven Sonata for piano and violin in A, op.47 “Kreutzer”
Kashimoto/Bax
—–
Rossini Duetto for cello and double bass
Watkins, Shehata
 
Vaughan-Williams Piano Quintet in C minor
Kashimoto/La Marca/Watkins/Shehata/Bax
 
 
To Purchase all events in the Alessio Bax residency  With the NYE Party please click here
To Purchase all events in the Alessio Bax residency  Without the NYE Party please click here
 

Alessio Bax

(Piano)
 

Combining exceptional lyricism and insight with consummate technique, Alessio Bax is without a doubt “among the most remarkable young pianists now before the public” (Gramophone). He catapulted to prominence with First Prize wins at both the 2000 Leeds International Piano Competition and the 1997 Hamamatsu International Piano Competition and is now a familiar face on five continents as a recitalist, chamber musician, and concerto soloist. He has appeared with over 150 orchestras, including the New York, London, Royal, and St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestras, the Boston, Dallas, Baltimore, Cincinnati, Seattle, Sydney, and City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestras, and the Tokyo and NHK Symphony in Japan, collaborating with such eminent conductors as Marin Alsop, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Sir Andrew Davis, Fabio Luisi, Sir Simon Rattle, Yuri Temirkanov, and Jaap van Zweden.

Highlights of the 2023-24 season include his debut with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sir Andrew Davis, return performances with the Dallas Symphony, Pacific Symphony, Helsinki Philharmonic, and Buenos Aires Philharmonic, his fifth performance at the famed Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, a tour of Asia with violinist Daishin Kashimoto, and of Japan with flutist Emmanuel Pahud, numerous New York appearances with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and a wide range of high-profile chamber music projects, recitals, and concerto performances in Europe, Asia, and across the United States.

As a renowned chamber musician, he recently collaborated with Joshua Bell, Lisa Batiashvili, Ian Bostridge, Lucille Chung, James Ehnes, Vilde Frang, Steven Isserlis, Daishin Kashimoto, François Leleux, Sergei Nakariakov, Emmanuel Pahud, Lawrence Power, Jean-Guihen Queyras, Paul Watkins, and Tabea Zimmermann, among many others.

Since 2017, he has been the Artistic Director of the Incontri in Terra di Siena Festival, a Summer Music Festival in the Val d’Orcia region of Tuscany. He appears regularly in festivals such as Seattle, Bravo Vail, Salon-de-Provence, Le Pont in Japan, Great Lakes, Verbier, Ravinia, and Music@Menlo.

In 2009, he was awarded an Avery Fisher Career Grant, and four years later he received both the Andrew Wolf Chamber Music Award and the Lincoln Center Award for Emerging Artists.

Bax’s celebrated Signum Classics discography includes his latest recital “Forgotten Dances,” “Italian Inspirations,” Beethoven’s “Hammerklavier” and “Moonlight” Sonatas (a Gramophone “Editor’s Choice”); Beethoven’s “Emperor” Concerto; “Debussy and Ravel for Two” and Bax & Chung, two duo disc with Lucille Chung; Alessio Bax plays Mozart, recorded with London’s Southbank Sinfonia; Alessio Bax: Scriabin & Mussorgsky (named “Recording of the Month … and quite possibly … of the year” by MusicWeb International); Alessio Bax plays Brahms (a Gramophone “Critics’ Choice”); Bach Transcribed; and Rachmaninov: Preludes & Melodies (an American Record Guide “Critics’ Choice”). Recorded for Warner Classics, his Baroque Reflections album was also a Gramophone “Editor’s Choice.” He performed Beethoven’s “Hammerklavier” Sonata for Daniel Barenboim in the PBS-TV documentary Barenboim on Beethoven: Masterclass, available on DVD from EMI.

At the age of 14, Bax graduated with top honors from the conservatory of Bari, his hometown in Italy, and after further studies in Europe, he moved to the United States in 1994. He has been on the piano faculty of Boston’s New England Conservatory since the fall of 2019 and serves as co-artistic director of the Joaquín Achúcarro Foundation for emerging pianists.

Bax lives in New York City with pianist Lucille Chung and their daughter, Mila.

Lucille Chung

(Piano)
 

Born in Montréal, Canadian pianist Lucille Chung has been acclaimed for her “stylish and refined performances” by Gramophone magazine, “combining vigor and suppleness with natural eloquence and elegance” (Le Soir).

She made her debut at the age of ten with the Montréal Symphony Orchestra and Charles Dutoit subsequently invited her to be a featured soloist during the MSO Asian Tour in 1989. Since then, she has performed an extensive concerto repertoire spanning from Bach to Adams with over 70 leading orchestras such as the Philadelphia Orchestra, Moscow Virtuosi, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Flemish Radio Orchestra, Orquesta Sinfónica de Tenerífe, Orquesta Sinfónica de Bilbao, Staatskapelle Weimar, Philharmonie de Lorraine, Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana, Belgrade Philharmonic, Seoul Philharmonic, KBS Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony, New Jersey Symphony, Dallas Symphony, UNAM Philharmonic (Mexico), Orquesta Filarmónica de Buenos Aires, MAV Symphony (Budapest), Lithuanian National Symphony, Israel Chamber Orchestra as well as all the major Canadian orchestras, including Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver, National Arts Centre (Ottawa), Calgary, Winnipeg and Métropolitain, among others. She has appeared with conductors such as Krzysztof Penderecki, Vladimir Spivakov, Vasily Petrenko, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Stéphane Denève, Peter Oundjian, Gerd Albrecht and Charles Dutoit.

As a recitalist, she has performed in over 35 countries in prestigious venues such as the Wigmore Hall in London, New York’s Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center and Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C., Spivey Hall, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Madrid’s Auditorio Nacional, the Great Hall of the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest, the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, the Seoul Arts Center, and Sala São Paulo. Festival appearances include the Verbier Festival in Switzerland, Incontri in Terra di Siena in Italy, MDR Sommer Festival and Moritzburg Festival in Dresden, Lübecker Kammermusikfest, Salon-de-Provence Festival, Santander International Festival and Gijón International Piano Festival in Spain, Við Djúpið Festival in Iceland; Felicja Blumental Festival in Israel, Music@Menlo, Montreal International Festival, Ottawa Chamber Festival, Bard Music Festival in NY, International Keyboard Institute and Festival in NYC, Chang Chun Festival in China, and the Bravissimo Festival in Guatemala.

In 1989, she was recognized on the international scene as the First Prize winner at the Stravinsky International Piano Competition. She won Second Prize at the 1992 Montreal International Music Competition, at which she also won a Special Prize for the best interpretation of the unpublished work. In 1993, she received the Outstanding Achievement Award from the Governor General of Canada and in 1994 won the Second Prize at the First International Franz Liszt Competition in Weimar. In 1999, she was awarded the prestigious Virginia Parker Prize by the Canada Council for the Arts.

She graduated from both the Curtis Institute of Music and the Juilliard School before she turned twenty, where she studied with Seymour Lipkin. She decided to further her studies in London with Maria Curcio-Diamand, Schnabel’s protégée, at the “Mozarteum” in Salzburg with Karl-Heinz Kämmerling and received the Konzertexam Diplom from the Hochschule “Franz Liszt” in Weimar, where she worked with the late Lazar Berman. She was the first non-Italian recipient of the honorary title of “Master” upon graduating from the Accademia Pianistica “Incontri col Maestro” in Imola, Italy. She also worked with Joaquín Achúcarro at Southern Methodist University, where she held the Johnson-Prothro Artist-in-Residence endowed position. Ms. Chung is the recipient of the Honors Diploma at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena, Italy and was named Honorary Professor of the Jilin Arts College in China.

Lucille Chung has been hailed as “a considerable artist, admirable for her bold choice of music” by The Sunday Times for her recordings of the complete piano works by György Ligeti on the Dynamic label. The first volume was released in 2001 to great critical acclaim, receiving the maximum R10 from Classica-Répertoire in France, 5 Stars from the BBC Music Magazine, and 5 Stars in Fono Forum in Germany. The final volume, which also contains works for two pianos, was recorded with her husband, Alessio Bax and once again received the prestigious R10 from Classica-Répertoire. Her all-Scriabin CD won the “Best Instrumental Recording” prize at the 2003 Prelude Classical Awards in Holland as well as the coveted R10 from Classica-Répertoire in France.

She also recorded the two Mendelssohn Piano Concerti on the Richelieu/Radio-Canada label, which was nominated for the Prix Opus in Canada. In August 2005, Bax and Chung recorded Saint-Saëns’ Carnival of the Animals with the Fort Worth Symphony under Maestro Miguel Harth-Bedoya, which was released in 2006. In 2007 she released a solo album for the Fazioli Concert Hall Series. Lucille then embarked on an exclusive contract with Disques XXI/Universal: Piano Transcriptions of Camille Saint-Saëns and Mozart & Me. 2013 marked the release of a piano duo disc with Alessio Bax, presenting Stravinsky’s original four-hand version of the ballet Petrouchka as well as music by Brahms and Piazzolla for Signum Records. In 2015, she released an all-Poulenc album for Signum Records, which was chosen as the “Recording of the Month” on MusicWeb and in 2018, her 13th album titled Liszt Piano Works was released to great acclaim. Her latest album for Signum Records featuring works by Debussy and Ravel was released in 2024.

Lucille is fluent in French, English, Korean, Italian, German, and Russian. She and husband, pianist Alessio Bax make their home in New York City with their daughter, Mila, and are artistic co-directors of the Joaquín Achúcarro Foundation, which seeks to further the careers of young pianists.

Daishin Kashimoto

(Violin)

Both as the soloist of international orchestras and as a sought-after chamber musician, Daishin Kashimoto is a regular guest of major concert halls around the globe. The tremendous wealth of experience gained in over 15 years as first concert master of the Berliner Philharmoniker benefits him in his equally adept role as a soloist, where he plays a wide repertoire ranging from classical to new music.

Recently, Daishin Kashimoto performed Bruch’s Violin Concerto with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra conducted by Fabio Luisi and appeared with the City of Birmingham Orchestra under the baton of Kazuki Yamada, the Gürzenich Orchestra under the direction of François-Xavier Roth as well as the NDR Radio Philharmonic conducted by Thomas Søndergård. A highlight of 2023 is the world premiere of Toshio Hosokawa’s new violin concerto Prayer with the Berliner Philharmoniker under Paavo Järvi at the Philharmonie Berlin, followed by the Swiss premiere at the KKL Luzern with the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra and the Asian premiere at the Suntory Hall with the Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra. The new season also sees the start of his residency as soloist with the Kurpfälzisches Kammerorchester Mannheim.< /p>

Daishin Kashimoto has appeared with the NHK Symphony Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre National de France, the Bavarian, Hessian, and West German Radio Symphony Orchestras, the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, and the St Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra under conductors such as Mariss Jansons, Seiji Ozawa, Lorin Maazel, Yehudi Menuhin, Paavo Järvi, Myung-Whun Chung, Daniel Harding, and Philippe Jordan. He can also be heard as a soloist in concerts with the Berliner Philharmoniker. Past engagements include Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante at the Grafenegg Festival and Lucerne Festival, Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 1 under the baton of Sir Simon Rattle, and Tchaikovsky’s Sérénade Mélancolique and Valse Scherzo at Berlin’s Waldbühne under direction of Andris Nelsons.

As a chamber musician Daishin Kashimoto has appeared alongside Martha Argerich, Yuja Wang, Leif Ove Andsnes, Alessio Bax, Emmanuel Pahud, Itamar Golan, Tabea Zimmermann, Yefim Bronfman, Claudio Bohórquez and Konstantin Lifschitz, among others. With Konstantin Lifschitz, he also recorded a highly acclaimed CD of Beethoven’s Violin Sonatas in 2014. His other recordings include a CD of Brahms’ Violin Concerto with the Staatskapelle Dresden under Myung Whun Chung for Sony Music.

His parents introduced him to various instruments early on, with the three-year-old opting for the violin and receiving his first lessons in Tokyo. After moving to the United States, Daishin Kashimoto was accepted, at the tender age of seven, as the youngest student to ever attend Julliard School’s pre-college program; at age eleven, he transferred to the Lübeck University of Music under Zakhar Bron, before becoming a student of Rainer Kussmaul at the Freiburg University of Music from 1999 to 2004. He also had great success in major competitions as a teenager, taking first prize at the Menuhin Junior International Competition in 1993, the Cologne Violin Competition in 1994, and in 1996 at the Vienna Fritz Kreisler and the Long-Thibaud Competitions. Daishin Kashimoto has been the artistic director of the Le Pont Music Festival in Ako and Himeji (Japan) since 2007. He plays on a del Gesu 1744 “de Beriot” kindly loaned by Crystco, Inc. and its chairman Mr. Hikaru Shimura.

Adrien La Marca

(Viola)

Hailed by The Financial Times as  a truly pure talent  and described by Le Monde as  a new viola heroAdrien La Marca’s playing is characterised by a depth of expression, technical mastery and a sound with rich, deep, burnished quality. Gifted with a charismatic stage presence and ability to create an immediate emotional connection with his audience, Adrien La Marca is considered as one of today’s most compelling musicians.  

As a soloist, La Marca has performed with renowned Orchestras such as Orchestre National de France, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio-France, Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra (MDR), Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Hong-Kong Sinfonietta, Orchestre Philharmonique Royal de Liège (artist in residence for 2018-19 season), Insula Orchestra, Les Siècles, L’Orchestre de la Loge, Orchestre du Capitole de Toulouse, Orchestre de Metz and more. 

His first album, « English Delight », released in 2016 for the Label La Dolce Volta, has been highly praised by the press (The Strad, Gramophone, Strings Magazine, Le Monde, Le Figaro, Diapason, Classica, etc. ) and awarded Diapason d’OR, FFFF Telerama, Coup de Coeur FNAC, France Musique, Radio Classique and Gramophone’s choice. His second recording “HEROES” includes Walton Viola Concerto with Orchestre Philharmonique Royal de Liège, a World Premiere of Gwenaël Mario Grisi’s Viola Concerto written for him and Prokofiev Romeo and Juliet. It is the first time this has been recorded for solo viola and orchestra. His latest recording, “Chanson Bohème” contains a wild range of styles, from unknown gem Hans Sitt cycle, through valses, film music and even french chansons.

Born in Aix-en-Provence, France in 1989 to a family of musicians, Adrien La Marca began playing piano and viola at the age of 4. He entered Paris Conservatoire at 16 and studied with Jean Sulem. He completed his studies in Leipzig with Tatjana Masurenko and further in Berlin with Tabea Zimmermann. During his studies, Adrien was regularly invited to take part in different Musical Academies and had the opportunity to work with inspiring musicians including Seiji Ozawa, Valery Gergiev, Gidon Kremer, Andras Schiff and Menahem Pressler. In 2016, La Marca was the first classical musician to receive the prestigious “Fondation Lagardère” Grant. He is a winner of the “Fondation Banque Populaire” and supported by “L’Or du Rhin” and the “Safran” Foundation. La Marca has additionally won numerous prizes in international competitions including William Primrose Competition, Lionel Tertis Competition and Johannes Brahms Competition.

La Marca plays an outstanding viola by Nicola Bergonzi made in Cremona in 1780, on generous loan from the Boubo-Music Foundation.

Paul Watkins

(Cello)

Acclaimed for his inspirational performances and eloquent musicianship, Paul Watkins enjoys a distinguished career as concerto soloist, chamber musician and conductor. He is the Artistic Director of the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival in Detroit (since 2014), the cellist of the Emerson String Quartet (2013-2023) and Visiting Professor of Cello at Yale School of Music (since 2018). He took first prize in the 2002 Leeds Conducting Competition, and has held the positions of Music Director of the English Chamber Orchestra and Principal Guest Conductor of the Ulster Orchestra.

Watkins has given regular concerto performances with the major British orchestras, including at the BBC Proms, where he most recently performed with the BBC Symphony and Thomas Ades in Lutoslawski’s cello concerto, and with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales in the world premiere of the cello concerto composed for him by his brother, Huw Watkins. He has performed with prestigious orchestras across the globe including the Netherlands Philharmonic, Melbourne Symphony and Queensland Orchestras, the Konzerthausorchester Berlin, Hong Kong Philharmonic, Colorado Symphony, Norwegian Radio Orchestra, Antwerp Symphony, and the Orchestra Nazionale Sinfonica della RAI Torino, under the baton of renowned conductors including Paavo Berglund, Leonard Slatkin, Sakari Oramo, Gianandrea Noseda, Sir Mark Elder, Richard Hickox, Sir Andrew Davis, and Sir Charles Mackerras. He premiered (and was the dedicatee of) Mark-Anthony Turnage’s new concerto with the Antwerp Symphony and Edo de Waart, the Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra and Hannu Lintu, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Vasily Petrenko, and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig and Andris Nelsons. Highlights of the 23/24 season include Tippett’s Triple Concerto with the Halle orchestra and Shostakovich’s first concerto with the Aalborg Symphony.

A dedicated chamber musician, Watkins was a member of the Nash Ensemble from 1997 until 2013, and the Emerson String Quartet from 2013 until 2023. With the Quartet he travelled extensively, performing at major international festivals including Tanglewood, Aspen, Ravinia, Edinburgh, Berlin and Evian and collaborated with distinguished artists such as Emanuel Ax, Yefim Bronfman, Renee Fleming and Evgeny Kissin. After 44 successful seasons, the Quartet decided to retire, and undertook an extensive series farewell tours, culminating in their final performances in New York Lincoln Center in October 2023, with the concerts is filmed for a documentary by acclaimed filmmaker Tristan Cook, and the release of their final recording of Berg, Chausson, Schoenberg and Hindemith with prestigious guests soprano Barbara Hannigan and pianist Bertrand Chamayou.

Watkins has conducted all the major British orchestras, and a wide range of international orchestras including the Kristiansand Symphony, Swedish Chamber Orchestra, Vienna Chamber Orchestra, Prague Symphony, Ensemble Orchestral de Paris, Tampere Philharmonic, Netherlands Radio Chamber Philharmonic and the Melbourne Symphony, Queensland and Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestras. In 2006 he made his opera debut conducting a critically praised new production of Poulenc’s La Voix Humaine for Opera North.

Recent highlights include his conducting debuts with the Minnesota Orchestra and Detroit Symphony, as well as concerto appearances with the BBC Symphony under Semyon Bychkov and Sir Andrew Davis, the City of Birmingham Symphony under Alexander Vedernikov, and the European Union Youth Orchestra under the baton of Bernard Haitink, in a tour featuring performances at the Grafenegg Festival and Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw. Last season also saw appearances at the Sante Fe Chamber Music Festival and Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

His extensive discography as a cellist includes a wide range of repertoire for Chandos Records, including Britten’s Cello Symphony, the concertos of Delius, Elgar, Finzi, Lutoslawski, Walton, Tobias Picker and Cyril Scott, and recitals of Mendelssohn, Martinu, and 20th century British and American music for cello and piano with Huw Watkins. He has recorded the Britten solo cello suites and twentieth century British repertoire for Nimbus, Takemitsu’s Orion and Pleiades for BIS Records, and as a conductor, music by Mozart, Gliere, Röntgen, and a Grammy® nominated pairing of the Berg and Britten violin concertos with Daniel Hope.

Watkins plays on a cello made by Domenico Montagnana and Matteo Goffriller in Venice, c.1730.

Nabil Shehata

(Double Bass)

“Giving space to music” runs like a thread through Nabil Shehata’s life, both literally and figuratively. As a nine-year-old, the double bass opens the door to, in his words, “the most beautiful repertoire there is” – namely that of classical music. As a young person, he feels the growing desire to be involved in this music as a conductor. Shehata follows this impulse, gives up his position as principal bass player of the Berliner Philharmoniker, and has since successfully embarked on a career as a conductor. A critic recently wrote that he conducts with “authority full of ease” an observation that corresponds precisely with what Shehata is aiming for. “It is about resonating with each other. This is what creates music. This is what I want to achieve with orchestras”. Shehata has developed a conducting style that is closely related to chamber music making, because he is convinced that “this is how music is created that can achieve what audiences, orchestras, and conductors alike desire:unforgettable concert experiences!”.

The BBC Music Magazine honoured Nabil Shehata’s realisation of this intention by presenting him with the BBC Music Award for the best orchestral recording 12|2021.

Nabil Shehata’s career began as principal bass player with the Staatskapelle Berlin and the Berlin Philharmonic. As a conductor, he has been mentored and taught by Christian Thielemann, Rolf Reuter, and Lawrence Forster, among others. He was chief conductor of Philharmonie Südwestfalen from 2019 to 2024 and has recently< conducted as a guest, among other ensembles, the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, the Stuttgart Philharmonic, the Munich Radio Orchestra, the Robert Schumann Philharmonic, and the Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra. Not long ago, he made his conducting debut with great success at the sold-out Elbphilharmonie. Prior to his current position, he was the chief conductor at the Munich Chamber Opera, and broadened his experience at the Berlin State Opera as an assistant to Daniel Barenboim. As a professor of double bass in Munich and Berlin as well as a member of the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, he has passed on his experience to younger musicians for many years. In his hometown of Verden, Shehata founded the “Maiklänge” chamber music festival, which is a heartfelt project for him to organize high-quality concerts where he grew up.

January 2, 2025 - 20:30