2026 Festival Program Notes

June 19, 2026 - Fantasy

Wood Works Suite
Traditional, arr. Danish String Quartet

Danish String Quartet members Frederik Øland, Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen, and Asbjørn Nørgaard began performing together as children at a Danish music camp; Norwegian Fredrik Schøyen Sjölin completed the quartet in 2008, and the ensemble has played together ever since.  Their accolades include winning the London International String Quartet Competition in 2009 and the Carl Nielsen Prize in 2011, as well as a Grammy nomination in 2019 for Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance. The quartet has held residencies and artist-development appointments with major arts institutions – including the Lincoln Center and BBC Radio 3 – and is considered one of the leading string quartets of its generation. Their exceptional playing and arrangements of Nordic folk music have made them a distinctive presence among today’s chamber ensembles.

This Traditional Nordic Suite brings together four movements from the Danish String Quartet’s Wood Works (2014), plus one companion piece from Last Leaf (2017). Both collections feature folk tunes arranged by the artists, and most of the movements performed this evening were developed during one intensive week of arranging and recording in the Danish countryside. O Fredrik, O Fredrik is a contemporary folk piece written by Johannes Rusten, named for his childhood friend, DSQ cellist Fredrik Schøyen Sjölin. While it never sounds out of place amidst the other movements of Wood Works, the piece has a decided rock-like groove that creates a fun, fresh vitality. Jässpodspolska is a polska (Nordic dance) from Sweden, which are typically in a triple meter with a characteristic uneven lilt.  Jässpodspolska is no different; notated in 3/4, its uneven gait comes from a triplet figure stretched over the first two beats of most measures, blurring the sense of the second beat. The Dromer (a traditional tune with links to the Scottish reel) is a frenzied whirlwind of notes, briefly catching its breath before it surges forward toward a vigorous, impassioned close.  Sønderho Bridal Trilogy – Part II comes from a musical bridal trilogy which is still used today for weddings on Fanø, a Danish island.  It is a Fanø wedding tradition for the couple to drink three shots of alcohol – sweet, sour, and bitter – to represent the sweet, sour, and bitter in married life. Part II of the trilogy represents the sour aspects of marriage. Old Reinlender from Sønndala (Gammel Reinlender fra Sønndala) is a Norwegian folk tune named for the reinlender, a couple dance that originated in the Rhineland region of Germany. This particular reinlender is in cut time, as is traditional, but also includes some not-so-traditional pitch bends, percussive bow “chops,” and biting, accented rhythms to give this old tune a folk-rock edge.

Phantasy Trio
Joan Trimble

Joan Trimble (1915 – 2000) wrote no more than two dozen pieces; yet her small catalog was highly regarded, and she became known as one of Ireland’s distinctive twentieth-century musical voices. Beyond her work as a composer and performer, she also trained as a nurse and served as editor for her family’s newspaper, The Impartial Reporter. Trimble’s compositions convey her nationality through their use of Irish folk melodies, modes, and titles, while also showing the influence of her studies in London with Ralph Vaughan Williams and Herbert Howells, both associated with the British pastoral chamber tradition. Her music also shows touches of French Impressionism, often attributed to her piano teacher, Annie Lord, who was a strong champion of French piano repertoire.

Trimble’s Phantasy Trio (1940) follows the British “phantasy” tradition: a single-movement chamber work that feels rhapsodic and free, while remaining carefully structured and balanced. Its melodic language feels improvisatory with a clear Irish inflection, and the character shifts quickly between intimate tenderness and buoyant animation, dramatic turbulence and composed introspection. The strings interact with each other often, creating a dialogue, but also move in parallel gestures, or pass motifs back and forth. The piano plays several roles: at times conversing with the strings, or simply building atmosphere around the other instruments, then occasionally taking center stage with brilliant solo passages. The trio packs an impressive range of emotion and drama into its modest duration, and earned Trimble the coveted Cobbett Prize for Chamber Music as well as the Royal College of Music’s Sullivan Prize for Composition.

Slow Dance
Kenji Bunch

Kenji Bunch (b. 1973) is a composer and performer whose work seeks commonalities across musical traditions, understanding across cultural and generational boundaries, and empathetic connections. Drawing on vernacular music, history, the natural world, and classical training, his music appeals to performers, audiences, and critics alike, and has been performed by more than sixty American orchestras, by chamber musicians on six continents, and recorded numerous times. A widely recognized violist, Bunch maintains an active performing career and is especially known for performing his own groundbreaking works for viola.  He was the fiddle player and vocalist for Citigrass for over 15 years and frequently collaborates with jazz, pop, folk, country, rock, and experimental musicians, as well as choreographers and filmmakers. A Juilliard alum, he serves as Artistic Director of new music group Fear No Music, teaches at Portland State University, Reed College, and for the Portland Youth Philharmonic.

Slow Dance (1996) is an early piano trio commissioned by the Soho Arts Festival and premiered by the Ahn Trio at American Opera Projects in 1996. Bunch called the single-movement work lyrical and abstract, noting its difference from the driving pulse found in some of his more rhythmically energized compositions. The first notes are fragmented, ephemeral sounds, and the 5/4 meter contributes to the feeling of time being suspended. The instruments flicker in and out, eventually becoming more corporeal. As a languid dance finally begins, the drawn-out lines and harmonic shifts still hold a sense of restraint. Even as the piece expands and its sense of motion increases, the dance continues to feel patient, never hurried. After building to its fullest intensity, the music begins its descent, gradually returning to the ether from which it came.

String Quartet in G minor, Op. 10
Claude Debussy

Claude Debussy (1862 – 1918) was one of the defining composers of French music in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Often associated with Impressionism (a label Debussy himself disliked), his works are filled with color, nuance, and harmonic freedom, and were shaped by poetry, visual art, nature, and non-Western musical traditions. He valued ambiance and suggestion over conventional rhetoric, and his music – including works such as Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune, La mer, and Clair de lune – helped shape the sound of the jazz, film scores, and piano repertoire that followed.

String Quartet in G minor, Op. 10 (1893) was premiered by Eugène Ysaÿe and his string quartet at the Société Nationale in Paris; it is Debussy’s only string quartet.  Composed early in his career, the work follows a traditional four-movement quartet structure, but the music itself is unmistakably Debussy, with its modality, unconventional harmonies, and rhythmic flexibility. Debussy opens the piece with a boldly stated theme that appears throughout the entire work (albeit in altered forms), creating a sense of cohesion between all movements. The first movement is decisive and urgent, and the material is developed with color changes, texture, and an expanded harmonic palette. The restless, energetic second movement is a lively scherzo with its percussive quality, use of pizzicato, and cross-rhythms. The third movement is lyrical and gentle, softening and stretching elements of the recurring theme into something wistful and heartfelt. The final movement begins in a state of restraint; it is poised, lingering before pressing forward and taking flight. The quartet ends in a triumphant G major as the first violin recalls the beginning of the opening theme three times before the brilliant final cadence.

Notes by Lauren Servias

June 23, 2026 - Capriccio

Lullaby and Grotesque
Rebecca Clarke

Rebecca Clarke was born in England in 1886. She first studied violin, but switched to viola on the advice of Charles Villiers Stanford. She studied viola with Lionel Tertis, and was able to support herself playing the viola when her father turned her out of the house and cut off her funds for attending the Royal College of Music. She was one of the first female professional orchestra musicians in London, a role model for many to follow. She had begun composing seriously after going to the U.S. during World War I, winning a prize in the Coolidge competition in 1919.

After returning to England in 1928 she formed a piano quartet and toured Europe with it. At the outbreak of World War II she was in the United States visiting her two brothers. She could not get a visa to return to England so she stayed in New York. There she met James Friskin, a well-known writer and pianist and the two married in 1944, both in their late 50s. In spite of her husband’s encouragement, Clarke quit performing and composing. In a memoir from 1967 she described her early life, including beatings by her father and strains in the family’s life. After being called an ‘important woman composer’ Clarke told a journalist “I would sooner be regarded as a 16th-rate composer than be judged as if there were one kind of musical art for men and another for women.” A comment that could be right at home in our 21st century!

Clarke’s two pieces for viola and cello clearly shows her knowledge of the two instruments. The Lullaby, as expected, is calm and soothing, capitalizing on the lower strings’ sonorities. The Grotesque is fast and playful with many double stops.

Sextet from Capriccio
Richard Strauss

Richard Strauss completed his sixteenth opera, Capriccio, in 1941. When it premiered in 1942 in Munich, Strauss did not expect it to be a great success. He didn’t even call it an opera, but rather a “conversation in music.” The plot concerns a widowed young Countess, Madeleine, who is being courted by two men, one a poet and one a composer. The two men are carrying on a rivalry not only about the Countess but also the issue of which is more important in composing an opera- the words or the music? The poet writes a sonnet for the Countess and the composer immediately sets it to music. The Countess sings the sonnet but cannot decide the issue.

The sextet on this program appears at the very beginning of the opera. The piece is being rehearsed for a celebration of the Countess’s birthday. She and her two suitors are listening at the open door of the salon where the rehearsal is taking place.  It is a sextet for two each of violins, violas and cellos. The very first short motif played by the first violin reappears repeatedly.  The first section of the piece is quiet and contemplative, the second part becomes more agitated, with some frantic-sounding tremolos at one point. The music returns to the opening contemplative mood, but with more minor key harmonies. The peaceful opening returns to round off the piece.

Five Bagatelles
Gerald Finzi

Gerald Finzi was born in London in 1901 and died there in 1956. He began his study of music during World War I, but his teacher was killed on the Western Front.  He also lost three brothers in the slaughter.  His outlook on life understandably became rather bleak, and he took solace in poetry, writing many songs and choral works.  He married and moved with his wife to a rural area, devoting himself to growing apples. He is credited with saving several rare English varieties from going extinct.  World War II delayed the performances of some major works but some were widely performed. He was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s disease in 1951, then developed shingles, followed by encephalitis and died at age 55 in 1956.

In 1941 he wrote three pieces for clarinet and piano using what he called “20-year-old bits and pieces.” He later added a fourth piece for a performance in 1943, adding a final movement in 1945. He pronounced the pieces to be “only trifles, not worth much, but got better notices than my decent stuff.” The arrangement for clarinet and string quartet was done to mark the centenary of Finzi’s birth on July 14, 2001. The set of pieces of Five Bagatelles consists of a spirited Prelude, a peaceful Romance, a tender Carol and a Forlana, a lively dance from Northern Italy, all capped off with a fast Finale-Fughetta.

Five Novelettes
Alexander Glazunov

Alexander Glazunov was an influential composer, conductor and teacher in Russia in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He reorganized the St. Petersburg Conservatory, where many young composers studied and later taught.  Glazunov was influenced by many of his peers, like Rimsky-Korsakov and Tchaikovsky, but his own style blended nationalism with cosmopolitanism. His fame grew quickly after his conducting debut in 1888. One setback occurred in 1897 when Glazunov conducted the premier of Sergei Rachmaninoff’s first symphony. The performance was disastrously bad, and the failure of the symphony sent Rachmaninoff into a three-year depression. Rumors quickly spread that Glazunov had been drunk at the time of the concert, a quite believable story since conservatory students, including Dmitri Shostakovich, had reported that Glazunov kept a bottle of vodka by his desk and sipped it from a tube during lessons. It was also likely that Glazunov had not prepared the score adequately. Glazunov had a tumultuous relationship with the Bolsheviks after the October Revolution in 1917. Using the centenary of Schubert’s death as a reason for leaving Russia in 1928, Glazunov did not go back to St. Petersburg, but settled in Paris, where he got married at age 64. (His new wife’s daughter had previously performed Glazunov’s second piano concerto.)  He died of natural causes in Paris in 1936.

Five Novelettes for string quartet from the mid-1880’s use Spanish, Hungarian and oriental dance rhythms to create an attractive and engaging set of pieces for string quartet.

Notes by Angela Carlson

June 26, 2026 - Spark

Adagio and Fugue in C minor, K. 546
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Legendary Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791) was one of the central figures of the Viennese Classical tradition, along with Haydn and early Beethoven and Schubert. Though his life was short, he became one of the most prolific and influential composers in Western music, writing masterfully in various genres: opera, symphony, concerto, chamber music, and sacred music. His works embody the Classical era’s ideals of clarity, balance, and elegance while also revealing remarkable emotional range.  Mozart’s chamber music shows a particular gift for conversation between instruments, graceful melodies, and clean, refined writing.

The Adagio and Fugue in C minor, K. 546 (1788) is from Mozart’s late period, during his renewed interest in Baroque counterpoint. The Adagio was newly composed in 1788, but the Fugue was originally written in 1783 for two pianos.  Mozart rearranged the fugue for string quartet, essentially assigning the two right-hand parts to the violins, and assigning the two left-hand parts to the viola and cello.  The Adagio resembles a Baroque French overture with its dotted rhythms, stark quality, and abrupt harmonic shifts, which dramatically contrasts with the following Fugue, rigorous and relentless before coming to a formidable conclusion.

Piano Trio
Germaine Tailleferre

Germaine Tailleferre (1892–1983) was the only female member of the French composer collective known as Les Six, whose music was a reaction against the opulence and density of late-Romantic and Impressionistic music. Les Six consisted of Tailleferre, Francis Poulenc, Darius Milhaud, Arthur Honegger, Georges Auric, and Louis Durey; their alliance was defined by their shared attitude eschewing what they saw as the heaviness and excess of the earlier musical eras. Tailleferre’s acceptance as a member of Les Six was significant, as women were rarely encouraged to pursue composing careers, a stance that her own father took. However, she persevered, studying at the Paris Conservatory and later composing orchestral, chamber, solo, and film/stage works. She eventually changed her surname from Taillefesse – her father’s name – to Tailleferre, as a show of commitment to her life as a musician.

Tailleferre began writing her Piano Trio (1978) in 1916–1917, then returned to it over sixty years later. Her revisions include reworked earlier material, the replacement of one movement, and the addition of a finale. Completed in 1978, decades after its conception, the final version’s four movements are like four siblings: each with its own distinct character but unmistakably from the same family.  The trio launches with a watercolor-like Allegro animato: sheer, fluid, and delicately colorful. The Allegro vivace has a different sort of energy, effervescent and playful, but also slightly biting with subtle dissonances. The quietly expressive third movement, Moderato, balances pastoral poise with more contemporary harmonies and gestures, resulting in something that feels simultaneously traditional but also quietly modern. The Très animé finaleis a sharp contrast, full of agitated figures, perpetual motion, and an unsettled restlessness.

String Quartet No. 1, WV 72
Erwin Schulhoff

Erwin Schulhoff (1894–1942) was a Czech composer and pianist of German-Jewish descent. Encouraged by Antonín Dvořák, Schulhoff’s oeuvre was inspired by Expressionism, Dadaism, jazz, dance rhythms, and Czech folk music. Some of his pieces were strikingly modern, including Fünf Pittoresken, a piano suite with a completely silent movement (In Futurum), which preceded John Cage’s 4’33” by more than thirty years. Despite the positive reception of pieces such as Suite for Chamber Orchestra and Five Pieces for String Quartet, the Nazi regime denounced Schulhoff and his music as “degenerate,” due to his Jewish heritage and communist views. He was eventually arrested and sent to the Nazi prison camp Wülzburg in 1942, where he died of tuberculosis.

String Quartet No. 1, WV 72 (1924) was first performed by the Zika Quartet at the International Society for Contemporary Music festival in Venice. Its movements are exceptionally divergent, displaying a wide range of temperaments. Presto con fuoco erupts with fiery energy, the rapid-fire sixteenth and thirty-second notes driving furiously to the movement’s end. The Allegretto con moto e con malinconia grotesca lives up to its marking (“…with grotesque melancholy”), its pleasant surface paired with wry, mocking undercurrents. Allegro giocoso alla Slovacca channels the spirit of traditional Slovak dances with rhythmic intensity, raw vitality, and techniques that mimic folk instruments. After the vim and vigor of the third movement, Andante molto sostenuto acts as an exhalation: slower, calmer, and contemplative.

Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor
Anton Arensky

Russian musician Anton Arensky (1861–1906) was a composer, pianist, and conductor. His career connected two generations of Russian musical lineage, as he studied with Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov at the St. Petersburg Conservatory, then later taught Sergei Rachmaninoff and Alexander Scriabin at the Moscow Conservatory.  Arensky contributed to a number of genres, including orchestra, opera, ballet, solo piano, and works for solo voice and choir, but he is best known for his chamber music, particularly his piano trios, piano quintet, and string quartets. Arensky’s style is known for its tender expressiveness, rich harmonies, and piano parts that showcase the best of both the instrument and the pianist.

Arensky composed Piano Trio No. 1 in D minor, Op. 32 (1894) in honor of the departed Russian cellist Karl Davydov, who had been the director of the St. Petersburg Conservatory during Arensky’s studies. The Allegro moderato is soulful and impassioned while still having a controlled quality; Arensky offsets ideas of dramatic urgency with long, lyrical melodic lines. The second movement is a Scherzo, brimming with lightness and carefree spirit; the strings give this movement lift and a delicate grace, while the especially agile piano part provides sparkle.  A calmer waltz section offers a moment of tranquility before the return of the nimble opening material. Elegia is a dignified, intimate third movement, and the composer’s tribute to the late Davydov can be heard in the noble, heartfelt cello solo. A sunnier middle section provides a brief respite from the somber tone before the elegy returns.  The finale is a rousing Allegro non troppo, reintroducing the initial key of D minor, then later recalling a gesture from the first movement’s opening theme, bringing the piece full circle.

Notes by Lauren Servias

June 28, 2026 - Jubilee

Starburst
Jessie Montgomery

American composer Jessie Montgomery (b. 1981) is a Grammy Award-winning composer, violinist, and educator whose catalog has become a distinctive voice in contemporary American classical music. Inspired by social justice themes, the Black diasporic experience, and a deep sense of community, her work creates musical depictions of the human experience by weaving together classical tradition, vernacular styles, and improvisation. Her Coincident Dances, Banner, and Strum all exemplify the rhythmic vibrance, intricacy, and spontaneity that she is known for.

Montgomery’s Starburst (2012) was written for the Sphinx Virtuosi ensemble, and is fleeting but brilliant, with its vivid bursts of color and light. Montgomery’s provided definition of a starburst is “The rapid formation of large numbers of new stars in a galaxy at a rate high enough to alter the structure of the galaxy significantly.” This image is also a beautiful metaphor for the Sphinx Organization’s mission: to increase visibility, excellence, and momentum for Black and Latinx classical musicians.  Starburst is pulsing, shimmering energy in the form of music, refracting light while constantly changing shape.  The work’s short length adds to the title’s imagery as something flashing into being, and then releasing one final, glowing chord before growing dark and silent again.

Oboe Concerto in C Major, K. 314
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756 – 1791) was one of the defining voices of the Classical era. First celebrated as a child prodigy, then as a composer of remarkable refinement and charm, Mozart brought exquisite elegance and depth – not to mention wit – to every major genre of his time. He wrote over forty concertos, works that feel personal and organic, truly bringing out the best of both soloist and instrument as they converse with the orchestra.

Mozart’s Oboe Concerto in C Major, K. 314 (1777) was most likely written for Giuseppe Ferlendis, a Salzburg court oboist. Audience members may be familiar with the work in its later guise, as Mozart later adapted it for flute in D major, which has become a standard concerto in the flute repertoire. The piece launches with the elegant and spirited Allegro aperto, in which the oboe possesses a vocal quality with its timbre, warmth, and flexibility, and remains athletic and quick-witted in its dialogue with the ensemble. The second movement is a graceful Adagio, and there is an intimacy in how the long, poised lines from the oboe unfold over a gentle orchestral accompaniment. The whimsical final Rondo is buoyant and carefree, possessing the lightness of one of Mozart’s comic operas. The oboist requires agility, precision, and control, but in the hands of a true artist, seems deceptively effortless and conversational.

Concerto Grosso No. 1
Ernest Bloch

Ernest Bloch (1880 – 1959) was a Swiss-born American composer whose life and music were shaped by dichotomy. He was both European and American, culturally but not religiously Jewish, and his music is as brooding and sweepingly dramatic as any Romantic composer’s while also full of contemporary dissonances and irregular rhythms. Born in Geneva, Bloch eventually became a United States citizen in 1924 and spent his final years living in Oregon. His final home can still be seen in Agate Beach, where his ashes were scattered after his death. Concerto Grosso No. 1 is among his best-known works, along with Schelomo, Baal Shem, Suite hébraïque, and Sacred Service.

Bloch composed Concerto Grosso No. 1 during his time as the founding director of the Cleveland Institute of Music. An homage to the Baroque concerto grosso, this work is still unmistakably modern with its twentieth-century harmonic language and piano obbligato. (In the Baroque era, the keyboard served as a continuo fleshing out harmonies, as opposed to Bloch’s obbligato full of percussive writing, as well as significant weight and color.) Its turbulent Prelude is forceful and vehement, establishing a stormy atmosphere. The following Dirge is calmer but remains restless due to its jagged angles and heavy tread. In contrast, the brighter third movement, Pastorale and Rustic Dances, brings a welcome change in mood as well as an earthy vitality to the composition.  The work culminates in its Fugue, which demonstrates the work’s ties to earlier musical forms, using Baroque-style counterpoint to form newer harmonies and dissonances for a powerful conclusion.

The Children of Corvallis
Dave Metzger

The Children of Corvallis was commissioned by the Chintimini Chamber Music Festival and this is the world premiere performance.

Corvallis native Dave Metzger brings passion, experience, and craftsmanship to every project he touches. As composer of Mufasa: The Lion King, Disney’s Wish, Once Upon a Studio, Brother Bear 2, and Tarzan 2, he has developed an expansive, melodic style and complete command of the modern cinematic orchestra. A highly regarded arranger and orchestrator, Dave has crafted songs and scores for Frozen, Frozen 2, Moana, Tarzan, Spirited, and many others, contributing to Academy, Grammy, and Tony Award-winning songs, soundtracks, and cast albums, including Let It Go, How Far I’ll Go, and The Lion King.

He received a Tony nomination for Best Orchestrations for Broadway’s The Lion King and also orchestrated Broadway’s Frozen. Dave began composing in Corvallis school ensembles, later arranged for The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, and has worked

on eleven of the sixty-two animated films that Disney has ever produced. For more information, visit davemetzgermusic.com.

From the composer: “Let me just say it: Corvallis is a gem. My upbringing there served as the perfect inspiration for this piece. Starting with a simple viola solo, which is joined interactively by an oboe, supplanted by a trio of celli, followed by more and more instruments joining in and continuing to grow and mature in the depth of the music – I hope that the listener can imagine this being a musical presentation of a child playing alone, joined by another curious child, then other children, until the playground is full of children playing together. As the piece progresses, one can envision the children maturing into cooperative adults, working harmoniously together to create a thriving community.

I’d like to thank my Corvallis mentors, including but not limited to Joyce Eilers, Harvey Brooks, and Marlan Carlson, who gave me the tools that helped me tremendously in my career.”

   -Dave Metzger

Notes by Lauren Servias