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Featuring the inaugural performance of a new work for two pianos, the next concert in the award-winning Southern Exposure New Music Series will combine the performance and composing talents of several the School of Music's own faculty members and regional musicians.
The program will feature the world premiere of Ad Lucem, composed by series artistic director and associate professor John Fitz Rogers. Marina Lomazov and Joseph Rackers, piano professors in the School of Music, will perform the work written for two pianos.
"The title, Ad Lucem, means 'towards the light,' and both the music and the choice of a title in Latin reflect a kind of distance or, perhaps, an attempt at clarity without ever fully achieving it," Rogers said. "The work is scored for two pianos, and each pianist plays fairly simple, complementary melodic lines. However, these lines often move at different speeds from one another, like two people engaged in a musical conversation about one topic, though they often talk past each other."
The remainder of program will continue to explore contemporary music from around the world with works mostly by Russian composers.
"We'll present works by three of Russia's most important composers, Rodion Shchedrin, Sophia Gubaidulina, and Alfred Schnittke, including a performance of Schnittke's profound and deeply moving masterpiece, Piano Quintet," Rogers said. "Also on the program are works by Polish composer Witold Lutoslawski."
The concert will feature School of Music faculty members Charles Fugo, Constance Gee, and Peter Kolkay, as well as guest artists drawn from the Charleston Symphony.
Lomazov will open the concert with selected solo piano works by Shchedrin. Born in Moscow in 1932, Shchedrin synthesizes traditional and new forms of music, using every contemporary technique of composition.
After the premiere of Ad Lucem, Gee, on the viola, Kolkay, on bassoon, and Fugo, on piano, will perform Quasi Hoquetus (1985), by Gubaidulina. Born in 1931 in the Tartar Republic of the Soviet Union, Gubaidulina often composes for nonstandard instruments and distinctive combinations of instruments, and her scores frequently explore unconventional techniques of sound production.
After an intermission, Lomazov and Rackers will perform Variations on a Theme by Paganini (1941), by Lutoslawski. Lutoslawski composed the work during the German occupation of Poland in World War II in 1941. As a basis, he took Niccolo Paganini's 24th Carpice for solo violin and translated the violin line for keyboard.
The concert will end with "Piano Quintet" (1972-76), by Alfred Schnittke, with Rackers, on piano, and Yuriy Bekker, concertmaster of the Charleston Symphony, on violin, and other principal performers from the Charleston Symphony string section: Molina, violin, Jill King, viola, and Norbert Lewandowski, cello. Born in the Soviet Union in 1934, Schnittke is know not only for his classical compositions but also for his scores for more than 60 films.
11/07
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Marina Lomazov and Joseph Rackers, piano professors, University of South Carolina School of Music
