2023
FOUND IN TRANSLATION
Lydia Chernicoff violin
Jessica Tong violin
Dan Urbanowicz viola
Danielle Cho cello
Kari Kistler oboe
Saturday, January 21 at 3:00pm
Preview Concert. FREE.
Charleston County Public Library
Sunday, January 22 at 5:00pm
Principle Gallery Charleston
What happens when composers and poets inspire each other and the old is made new? We’ll take you on a journey from Ovid, through the Middle Ages, and into the 20th century in this program for string quartet and oboe, looking not for what's lost, but for what’s found in translation.
Hildegard von Bingen
Three Antiphons
Benjamin Britten
Six Metamorphoses After Ovid, Op. 49
Joan Tower
Island Prelude
Samuel Barber
String Quartet in B minor, Op. 11
CARNIVAL OF THE ANIMALS
Ronaldo Rolim piano
Xiaohui Yang piano
Tuesday, March 14 at 6:00pm
Preview Concert. FREE.
Medical University of South Carolina's Ashley River Tower Mezzanine
Wednesday, March 15 at 6:00pm
The Gibbes Museum of Art
Lions, cardboard cats, and elephants, oh my!
Four hands on one piano bring the tales of Sleeping Beauty, Tom Thumb, and a parade of fantastical animals to life, in connection with the Gibbes Museum’s exhibition, Un/Natural Selections: Wildlife in Contemporary Art.
Maurice Ravel
Ma Mère l'Oye (Mother Goose Suite)
Heitor Villa-Lobos
A Prole do Bebê No. 2: Os Bichinhos (The Little Animals)
Camille Saint-Saëns
Le Carnaval des Animaux (The Carnival of the Animals, arr. Lucien Garban)
KOLLABS. Anke Schofield (United States,b. 1972) and Luis Garcia Nerey (United States, b. Puerto Rico, 1973),Watson, 2013. Mixed media on panel. 48 × 48 inches. Gift from E.J. Jewett and Russell Orton, National Museum of Wildlife Art. © KOLLABS. W2013.066
BREAK/OPEN
Caroline Leigh Halleck saxophone
Greg Hankins piano
Wednesday, May 10 at 6:00pm
Preview Concert. FREE.
Medical University of South Carolina's Ashley River Tower Mezzanine
Thursday, May 11 at 6:00pm
Meyer Vogl Gallery - Daniel Island
A bold ensemble of classical saxophone and piano blurs the boundaries between musical styles and genres. You’ll hear strains of folk music, jazz, gospel, pop, and minimalism in an evening of music by American, Turkish, and Italian composers. Join us on Daniel Island for something fresh, eclectic, surprising!
John Fitz Rogers
Breaking
Amy Beach
Romance, Op. 23
Fazil Say
Suite, Op. 55
Daniele di Bonaventura
Maria e il Mare (arr. Caroline Halleck and Greg Hankins)
Meyer Vogl Gallery is a contemporary fine art gallery located in the heart of Charleston’s bustling gallery district and historic French Quarter. Permanently featuring oil paintings by distinguished artists Laurie Meyer and Marissa Vogl, the gallery also exhibits works by a number of local and internationally recognized artists.
A new second location on Daniel Island allows the gallery to bring more cultural events to the Charleston area. Their Culture Cake series connects their audience with local culture and inspiring discussions on art, music, history, fashion, food and wine. More information can be found at https://meyervogl.com/events--workshops.
Have No Fear by Susan Altman.
FELICES DÍAS: HAPPY DAYS
Maharajah Flamenco Trio
Silviu Ciulei guitar + voice
David Cobb bass
Ramin Yazdanpanah percussion + didgeridoo
Sunday, October 8 at 5:00 pm
Redux Contemporary Art Center
Music and well-being are intricately linked across physical, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual dimensions. This concert, featuring works by the Maharajah Flamenco Trio from their 2021 album, Felices Días, explores the complex experience of being — through the lens of Nuevo Flamenco. Traditional styles mesh with Classical and world music influences in an exciting exploration of what it means to be human.
All music composed by Silviu Ciulei (except Asturias by Isaac Albéniz, arr. Silviu Ciulei).
Nueva Vida (Alegrias)
Vamos Destino (Rumba)
Mas y Mas (Bulerias)
Ma Gandesc (Reggae/Rumba)
Farruqueria (Farruca/Bulerias)
Asturias (Leyenda)
Dariya (Rumba)
Felices Días: Happy Days is presented in conjunction with "Under the Radar 2023", an exhibition presented in collaboration between Charleston magazine, Redux Contemporary Art Center, and Charleston Arts Festival.
2022
2022 SEASON
NOW LET ME FLY
songs of freedom & transformation
Alva Anderson voice
LaToya Reneá voice + percussion
March 30 at 3:30pm
Preview Concert. FREE.
Charleston County Public Library
Music has been a universal expression of protest and powerful agent of change. Here, it gives voice to the heroic figures portrayed by William H. Johnson in the exhibit, Fighters for Freedom: William H. Johnson Picturing Justice. Listen for hidden messages in songs of the Underground Railroad, hear new songs of freedom and transformation, and lift your own voice in call and response.
Bob Marley Redemption Song
Traditional Now Let Me Fly
Alva Anderson/LaToya Reneá
When I Rise/Freedom Calling
John Coltrane
Underground Railroad (lyrics by Alva Anderson and LaToya Reneá)
Traditional
Wade in the Water/Follow the Drinking Gourd
Alva Anderson
Take My Hand
Marian Anderson, ca. 1945, by William H. Johnson (American, 1901-1972). Oil on paperboard, 35 5/8 x 28 7/8 inches. Image courtesy of Smithsonian American Art Museum.
This performance accompanies the exhibition Fighters for Freedom: William H. Johnson Picturing Justice organized by the Smithsonian American with generous support from Art Bridges, Faye and Robert Davidson, and the Jacob and Gwendolyn Lawrence Foundation.
SEA TO SHINING SEA
two composers envision America
Lydia Chernicoff violin
Jessica Tong violin
Dan Urbanowicz viola
Danielle Cho cello
July 6 at 3:30pm
Preview Concert. FREE.
Charleston County Public Library
July 7 at 6:00pm
The Gibbes Museum of Art
Hazy, Southern nights, foot-tapping fiddle tunes, and traditional folk songs bring William Eggleston’s ground-breaking photographs of rural America to life. We’ll investigate how the everyday becomes art, and how a contemporary Southerner and a romantic Czech composer translate the sights and sounds of America, in connection with the exhibition, Charleston Collects: William Eggleston Photography.
Jennifer Higdon
Southern Harmony
Antonín Dvořák
American Quartet
Photo: Untitled (Boy in chair, Sumner, Mississippi), 1972. Dye transfer print, 1986, 20 1/2 x 13 3/4 inches. © Eggleston Artistic Trust, courtesy of David Zwiner New York.
CURRENT
Lydia Chernicoff violin
Lenora Cox Leggatt violin
Kirsten Swanson viola
Ismar Gomes cello
August 21 at 6:00pm
Principle Gallery Charleston
The sounds of our modern world and those of centuries past flow together in this program of electroacoustic music. Steve Reich uses recorded speech to generate melody and rhythm in a string quartet that explores the wildly different journeys taken by train before, during, and after WWII. Mason Bates finds a funky groove that seamlessly blends the warmth of a live string quartet with prerecorded sounds and electronics.
Steve Reich
Different Trains
Mason Bates
Bagatelles
Photo courtesy of JMBoatwright Photography.
FROM CHAOS TO HARMONY
music and the Greek ideal
Trio Appassionata
Lydia Chernicoff violin
Andrea Casarrubios cello
Ronaldo Rolim piano
October 26 at 6:00pm
The Gibbes Museum of Art
An early Beethoven piano trio embodies the Classical Greek ideals of beauty, clarity and balance (with plenty of light-hearted charm). Only Brahms could make a neo-classicist of himself by revisiting and reworking one of his earliest chamber pieces some thirty-five years later. While much of the trio and its main themes remain the same, Brahms brings a maturity and craftsmanship to the work that lifts every note to new heights. See the goddesses, musicians, and animals from the Gibbes exhibition, From Chaos to Order, leap to life in response.
Beethoven
Trio in E flat Major, Op. 1 No. 1
Brahms
Trio in B Major, Op. 8
Greek (Olympia?), Dancing Bull, Eighth century B.C., Bronze, The Sol Rabin Collection
2021
BLAME IT ON THE BOSSA NOVA!
Alva Anderson voice + viola
Duda Lucena voice + guitar
Three performances:
Friday, April 23 at 1:00 pm. FREE.
Charleston County Public Library
Thursday, April 29 at 7:30 pm. FREE.
Commonhouse Aleworks
Friday, May 7 Time TBD. FREE.
Online performance
“With its hushed intimacy, poetic lyrics, alluring melodies and mesmerizing rhythms, bossa nova music continues to cast a spell 60 years after it first came into the world. It possesses an ineffable quality that just seems to epitomize coolness, transcend time and transport the listener to another place.” — Charles Waring
Escape to Rio! You’ll hear the choro, samba rhythms, and jazz — and the sensual, flowing Bossa Nova tunes that bring it all together.
Dorival Caymmi
Samba da Minha Terra
Ary Barroso
Aquarela do Brasil
Duda Lucena
Choro (lament)
Antônio Carlos Jobím
A Felicidade
Girl from Ipanema
One Note Samba
Agua de Beber
No More Blue
Kenny Dorham
Blue Bossa
Marcos Valle
Summer Samba
WATER MUSIC
Mary Reed bass
Dan Morris vibraphone
Two performances:
Wednesday, June 16 at 7:30 pm. FREE.
Commonhouse Aleworks
Friday, June 18 at 1:00 pm. FREE.
Charleston County Public Library
Splash! In a program that explores the mysterious, changeable nature of water, you’ll hear new and familiar pieces arranged for a bass and vibraphone duo, just for this concert. Let the current take you downriver, listen to the rain, spy on the creatures that live beneath the sea. Float lazily through Charleston harbor, and we’ll sail you home with a tune you’re sure to recognize!
G. F. Handel
Water Music Suite No. 1: Air, Minuet, and Bourree
François Couperin
“L’anguille” (The Eel)
Frederic Chopin
Prelude Op. 28, No. 15 "Raindrop"
Franz Liszt
Nuages Gris S. 199 (Grey Clouds)
Tōru Takemitsu
Toward the Sea: II. Moby Dick
Claude Debussy
Petite Suite, L. 65: I. En Bateau
Bjork
Anchor Song
Jack Lawrence/CharlesTrenet
Beyond the Sea (La Mer)
NEXUS
Music at the Crossroads of East and West
Lydia Chernicoff violin
Ronaldo Rolim piano
Two performances:
Saturday, July 10 at 5:00 pm
Sunday, July 11 at 3:00 pm
The Gibbes Museum of Art
In a nexus of music, art, and poetry, these four composers exchange ideas and influences across cultures, mediums, eras, and geography. Rudolf Dittrich invokes Utagawa Hiroshige’s woodblock prints in his setting of Japanese folksongs for solo piano; Tōru Takemitsu takes his inspiration from poetry, creating a world of sound informed by the great impressionist composers; Somei Satoh finds a free, flowing lyricism that suspends time; Claude Debussy draws on traditional, modal scales to craft an evocative, sensual sonata that lives somewhere between East and West.
Rudolf Dittrich
Nippon Gakufu: Six Japanese Popular Songs Collected and Arranged for Pianoforte
Tōru Takemitsu
Distance de Fée
Somei Satoh
Bifü
Claude Debussy
Sonata in G minor for Violin and Piano
BLUEPRINT
Lydia Chernicoff violin
Lenora Leggatt violin
Kirsten Swanson viola
Ismar Gomes cello
Three performances:
Thursday, November 4 at 6:00 pm. FREE.
Principle Gallery Charleston
Friday, November 5 at 1:00 pm. FREE.
Charleston County Public Library
Baxter-Patrick James Island Branch
Saturday, November 6 at 3:00 pm. FREE.
Munkle Brewing Co
Every listener hears something different in a piece of music, and the way we hear a piece changes over time. Blueprint shows us how composer Caroline Shaw hears Beethoven. Written hundreds of years after the quartet that inspired it, Shaw’s Blueprint explores both the modernity and the timeless essence of Beethoven’s music.
Come join us for both string quartets, and hear for yourself how one influences the way you hear the other. If you don’t know her work already, Caroline Shaw is a great discovery — and Ludwig van Beethoven may never sound the same.
Caroline Shaw
Blueprint
Ludwig van Beethoven
String Quartet Op. 18 No. 6
FOREVER, MY GRACE
Online concert
arx duo:
Garrett Arney percussion
Mari Yoshinaga percussion
Ian Gottlieb composer
Be the first to hear it! Q Concerts is pleased to present the premiere performance of Forever, My Grace, a new work by LA-based composer Ian Gottlieb, performed by arx duo. The premiere was originally broadcast online on November 22. It's available now for streaming here. A concert just for you!
Based on an imaginary folk tale in which a king asks five philosophers to define the infinite, each movement offers a different conception of forever. Performed by percussion ensemble arx duo, Forever, My Grace introduces the listener to new worlds of sound, by turns calming and invigorating.
BACCHANALIA
Outdoor concert
Lydia Chernicoff violin
Kari Kistler oboe
Live music outside at Munkle Brewing Co., including music by Bach, Telemann, Handel, and Mozart, and even an old drinking song or two!
SONGS OF HEAVEN AND EARTH
Online concert
in collaboration with the Charleston County Public Library
Lydia Chernicoff violin
Pamela Hentges violin
Sadie Nichols viola
Natalia Khoma cello
In a program that celebrates two groundbreaking women composers, you’ll hear Italy’s Maddalena Casulana’s mysterious Five Madrigals — songs she wrote in the 16th century, arranged for string quartet, and, from four centuries later, African American composer Florence Price’s Five Folksongs in Counterpoint, based on American songs and spirituals including Oh My Darlin’ Clementine, Shortnin’ Bread, and Swing Low Sweet Chariot.
Maddalena Casulana: Five Madrigals
Florence Price: Five Folksongs in Counterpoint
MOSQUITO DANCE
Online concert
in collaboration with the Charleston County Public Library
Lydia Chernicoff violin
Pamela Hentges violin
Music tells a tale! Selected from Béla Bartók’s 44 Duets for Two Violins, this set of twenty-five pieces, each based on a peasant folk melody, is a series of miniatures: a mosquito dance, a wedding song, a march, a lullaby.
We’ve arranged the pieces to tell an overarching tale, a love story that begins on May Day and ends in surprise. These charming duets, as short as twenty-seven seconds, as long as two minutes, delight the ear and the imagination. We dare you not to tap your foot!
SPEAKEASY!
A Celebration of the 1920's
Principle Gallery
Lydia Chernicoff violin
Pamela Hentges violin
Hilary Glen cello
Daniel Urbanowicz viola
A celebration of the roaring 20’s: swinging ragtime, sultry folk songs, waltzes and tangos for guys and dames, and all that jazz! From a decade bursting with artistic creativity in Charleston and around the world, you’ll hear string quartets by Amy Beach, William Bolcom, and Erwin Schulhoff, as well as tunes by Irving Berlin, Duke Ellington, and George Gershwin. Come as you are, or get out your top hats, feathers and pearls. We’re puttin’ on the Ritz!
Amy Beach - Quartet for Strings (in one movement), Op. 89
William Bolcom - Three Rags for String Quartet
Erwin Schulhoff - Five Pieces for String Quartet