September 13, 2017

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Discovering the Classical String Trio, vol. 2 is in the Can!

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During the first week of September, Liz, Allison, and Stephanie recorded 7 new string trios for Vol. 2 of Discovering the Classical String Trio.  As in vol. 1, the set of trios comprises works rarely performed, and most of them never before recorded.  One trio in particular by Ignaz Klausek, is a special discovery.  This work, in the unusual key of Bb minor, is part of the Moravian Music Foundation's Philharmonic Society of Bethlehem Collection and has likely not been played for more than 200 years.  Other works on the CD are by J.C. Bach, Carlo Antonio Campioni, Joseph Haydn, F. J. Gossec, and J.B. Breval.  In addition we have included a trio sonata by our namesake Antonio Vivaldi as a link to the classical string trio's heredity.  We cannot wait to hear the sound that Richard Price of Candlewood Digital was able to capture from our recording session.

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Special thanks to Lafayette College for the use of their wonderful concert hall, the Bethlehem Comfort Suites for housing us.

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March 7, 2017

The Vivaldi Project announces its new Development Manager, Nadege Noel.  

 

Nadege Noel, a native of Haiti, developed a strong interest in the arts, especially in dance, where she began her study of ballet as a young child and has been dancing Argentine Tango for the last 17 years. Nadege currently works for The Washington Ballet as the School and Studio Manager. She has also held positions in New York as General Manager at the Jamaica Performing Arts Center (JPAC) and as Educational Outreach Director at the Harlem School of the Arts (HSA). At JPAC she had the privilege and honor to program the venue’s first performance season in 2011 and through her work at HSA she worked to strengthen and increase art in education program in the school system in New York City. She has also worked in the health insurance industry where her responsibilities included marketing and operations management.

Nadege earned a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and Business Management from The City College of the City University of New York, and holds a Master’s Degree in Performing Arts Management from New York University. She currently resides in Alexandria VA and enjoys dancing, reading, and traveling in her spare time.

 

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Sep 6, 2016

More Reviews and Feature in Early Music America

September E-Notes

Category: General

Posted by: sdv

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Vivaldi Project Explores Neglected Treasures

Source: Early Music America. Published: September 6, 2016.

 

MORE REVIEWS

GREGO APPLEGATE EDWARDS

The string trio tends to be overlooked today. Yet from the classical period on there have been some wonderful examples. The Vivaldi Project, a trio with plenty of spunk and precision, give us seven great examples on their Discovering the Classical String Trio (MSR Classics 1621). Trios by JC Bach, Campioni, Boccherini, Franz Joseph Haydn, Cannabich, Giardini, Cambini all give us wonderfully clean lines and lots of chance for the trio to show off their brio energy.

Each composer was well respected in his lifetime and knew the ins and outs of the strings and bows of the day, the state-of-the-art in trio technique. There is a nicely busy, energetically configured set of lines for the players to delve into and the Vivaldi Project show us they are up for it. The clean simplicity and lyricism speak as directly to us now as they no doubt did then.

Why by the end of the classical era the string quartet had all but left the string trio in the dust is a complex story, and one might blame Haydn for the excellence of his quartets and how they served as models of chamber music to come, but in the end you listen to these trios and forget all about that. The trios in the hands of the Vivaldi Project have a charm and sonorousness all their own.

This is a real change of pace listen. After hours of heavy fare, one turns to this program with no little delight. Definitely recommended. http://classicalmodernmusic.blogspot.com/2016/08/the-vivaldi-project-discovering.html

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( + + + + ) STRINGS ARE STRUNG 

MARK J. ESTREN

A period-instrument string trio with the intriguing name of The Vivaldi Project offers seven almost wholly unknown works – none by Vivaldi – on a new MSR Classics CD devoted to trios composed at a time when trios were thought not to be composed. Indeed, with the exception of Mozart’s superb Divertimento, K.563 and a few works by Beethoven and Schubert, the Classical-era string trio is generally absent from the repertoire. But, it turns out, that is not because it does not exist – it is only because no one has looked very hard for it. All the world première recordings on this splendid disc are worthy of a place in chamber recitals, even if it is a bit of a stretch to look at all of them as “trios” in a more-modern sense. Two are really duets with bass: J.C. Bach’s Sonata in D (ca. 1755) and the Sonata in G minor (1756) by Campioni (1720-1788), which specifies either harpsichord or cello in addition to two violins. The other works all have the Trio label and all have more of a three-player flavor about them, even though the cello still tends to have a lesser role than the higher instruments: Boccherini’s Op. 2, No. 4 (1760); Haydn’s Divertimento in B minor (sometime after 1750); Op. 3, No. 1 (1773) by Cannabich (1731-1798); Op. 20, No. 2 (1778) by Giardini (1716-1796); and Op. 33, No. 1 (1780s) by Cambini (1746-1825). There are many surprises on this fascinating CD, including the fact that several of the composers, not just Haydn, had unusually long lives for their time. It would be a stretch to call any of this music profound: these are true chamber pieces, intended for what was in effect salon performance, often by amateur musicians of royal households; to some extent, these trios were the “background music” of their era. But this detracts not a whit from their charms. Melodies flow easily, harmonies are pleasant, and balance is always carefully thought through (with, as noted, a general bias toward the two violins or, in the case of the Giardini and Cambini works, the violin and viola). The members of The Vivaldi Project, who apparently had a great time digging out these works from the dust heaps of musical history, also appear to have a grand time performing them: none of the pieces has the fully “conversational” feeling of a Haydn quartet, but all are on display here as genial and highly attractive – if admittedly minor – examples of small-chamber-group thinking in the Classical era. And one thing this disc does, although this is surely not its purpose, is to show that Mozart’s deeply emotional, beautifully balanced and very extended K.563 was an even more spectacular accomplishment than it is generally known to be. http://transcentury.blogspot.com/2016/08/strings-are-strung.html