Upcoming and Recent Performances

Chaconne #16 – Chamber Music Conference August 15, 2013

August 13, 2013 / 6 Comments

A private performance late in the evening for colleagues – long time collaborators and good friends – here at the Bennington Chamber Music Conference.

It was a great pleasure to share this performance with friends with whom I have studied and performed many works of great – and not-so-great [smile] – musical significance. As we began, I was not so sure that I would play the entire Partita (what I first had in mind), but decided to just start at the beginning and let it all flow as best as it would after almost two week of daily teaching and rehearsing. The Chaconne is often played by itself, as a stand-alone work – yet I am coming to the firm conclusion that it is an integral part of the entire work (Partita in D Minor BWV 1004): better said, that the 4 opening movements based on old (in Bach’s time), known dance forms completely flow into the Chaconne, that the Chaconne is an organic emotional, musical and spiritual resolution to the questions raised in the previous movements – Allemande, Corrente, Sarabande and Gigue. One of my colleagues pointed out that many musical elements in the Chaconne are foreshadowed in the dances, linking them together, and that those dances are part of the internal balance, so to speak, of the whole work.

I tested out – with apparent success – ideas that I have been working on in the studio – a few of them in brief: the opening (Allemande), a declamatory call for the attention of the Spirit and a reminder of the Soul’s spiritual journey; an encapsulation of the struggles of Life (Corrente), deeply seated questions of Life’s meaning (Sarabande). I also used the organizing principle of rhythmic drive and groove described below in the recent practice session. They all apparently came clear to my listeners. In particular the rhythmic drive in the first part of the Chaconne set up great freedoms in the return of the theme in the concluding section (minor).

Dvorak Beethoven Borodin – Free concert Sunday June 30 6-7 p.m. NYC

June 25, 2013 / 0 Comments

FREE ADMISSION: Music in a Garden 6-7 p.m. on Sunday June 30th, 2013

enter on West 89th or 90th streets between Amsterdam and Columbus Avenues

PROGRAM

Beethoven String Quartet #2 in G Major (1800)

Dvorak American String Quartet (1893)

Borodin Nocturne from String Quartet #2 (1881)

Shem Guibbory and April Johnson, Violins, Jessica Meyer, Viola and Peter Seidenberg, Cello

Shem Chamber Music and Solo May 22, 2013

May 28, 2013 / 0 Comments

Private performance, NY NY

with Judith Kellock, Soprano, Rieko Aizawa, Piano and Peter Seidenberg, Cello

Schubert: Sonata movement, D.28 (1812)

Shostakovich: Romance Suite on poems of Alexander Blok, Op.127 (1967)

Bach: Chaconne (performance #14 in Journey of 100)

Beethoven: Trio in D Major, Op. 70#1 (1808)

Shem solo – Bacewicz Sonata April 24, 2013

May 28, 2013 / 0 Comments

April 24, 2013 5:30-7:30
Manhattan Producer’s Alliance at
Zirazmin

great program [click to see] including performances by Roger Blanc w/ Emiko Hayashi, Svetlana Smolina w/ Alex Sramek, Krister Linder, Rozanna Weinberger w/ Junod Etiene, and Demetrius Spaneas.

90 West Houston Street (btwn. Thompson & LaGuardia, downstairs from Lobster Smack)
New York, NY.
http://www.zirzaminnyc.com/
1 to Houston, walk east (north side of street)

Chaconne #13 – LaGuardia High School for Music and Art

May 28, 2013 / 0 Comments

Journey of 100 performance #13
February 27, 2013

Featured Musician in StringPoet – online publication

January 16, 2013 / 3 Comments

I am proud to announce that I am the Featured Musician in the recent live edition of StringPoet.

This featured article on me in StringPoet has several music tracks from my recent CD Voice of the People, as well as links to 3 short videos I have created to enhance the experience of the music: Sueños de Chambi (written by American composer Gabriella Lena Frank) depicts in music some of the amazing work of Peruvian photographer Martín Chambi (photos displayed); the Shostakovich Violin Sonata depicts (in my view) the Artist’s life journey through the treacherous and deadly times in the former Soviet Union under Stalin.

StringPoet on Facebook