For Immediate Release - The NoHo/East Village based Sheen Center for Thought and Culture is proud to announce its 2017 spring classical series made up of three unique concerts curated by Marc Kaplan of SubCulture, exploring the gamut of chamber music from the classical to the contemporary eras.

The series begins on April 24 with violinist Anthony Marwood and the acclaimed chamber orchestra Les Violons du Roy performing works by Strauss, Mozart, and Enescu. The second concert, May 6, features cellist, composer, and curator Joshua Roman and several guest musicians in a far-ranging recital program. A final June 5 concert rounds out the season with the world premiere performance of Gregg Kallor’s piano quintet, performed by Kallor and The Attacca Quartet.

For more information about the Spring season please visit:
http://sheencenter.org/music/classical/

 

SPRING CONCERT LISTINGS

ANTHONY MARWOOD & LES VIOLONS DU ROY

April 24, 2017 at 7:30PM
Anthony Marwood, violin
Les Violins du Roy, chamber orchestra
Tickets: $35
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Program:
R. STAUSS : Capriccio Sextet
MOZART : String quintet in G minor K. 516
ENESCU : String Octet

"The radiant intensity of Marwood’s playing had extraordinary emotional power."
- The Guardian

“The elegant performance by the superb Les Violons du Roy ensemble...was especially wondrous”
- The New York Times

Les Violons du Roy takes its name from the renowned string orchestra of the court of the French kings and has become the jewel of Québec City’s musical scene. With over thirty-one recordings to its name and multiple decades of experience, the chamber orchestra brings its regular collaborator, acclaimed British violinist Anthony Marwood, to the Sheen Center for a night of chamber music. Marwood’s name has become “magic” in the classical scene (The Independent), his playing “the realization of perfection and honesty” (The Sunday Tribune), and has been denoted the “consummate artist...blessed with boundless energy, intellectual curiosity and creative wizardry” (BBC Music Magazine). Together, they present a varied program of works by Mozart, Strauss and Enescu.

 

JOSHUA ROMAN

May 6, 2017 at 7:30PM
Joshua Roman, cello
Andrius Zlabys, piano
Guest Artists
Tickets: $35
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Program:
DEBUSSY : Sonata
BEETHOVEN : Sonata No 3
ROMAN/ZLABYS : Only Once (an improvisation)
MESSIAEN : Louange a l’eternite de Jesus
JANACEK : Pahadka
PART : Fratres
PIAZZOLLA : Le Grand Tango

“If all musicians were as affable as cellist Joshua Roman, there’d be no chatter about classical music
and how it is in jeopardy or doomed to die a slow death in cavernous concert halls”
- San Francisco Classical Voice

Cellist Joshua Roman has earned an international reputation for his wide-ranging repertoire, commitment to communicating the essence of music in visionary ways, artistic leadership and versatility. As well as being a celebrated performer, he is recognized as an accomplished composer and curator, and was named a TED Senior Fellow in 2015. In this wide-ranging program, Roman will lead a handful of guest musicians in a traversal of chamber music repertoire through the centuries.

 

GREGG KALLOR & THE ATTACCA QUARTET - WORLD PREMIERE

June 5, 2017 at 7:30PM
Gregg Kallor, piano
The Attacca Quartet
Tickets: $35
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“We are living in a golden age of string quartets...it’s hard to disagree when you
hear the vibrant young players in New York’s Attacca Quartet.”
- NPR

"At home in both jazz and classical forms, [Kallor] writes music of unaffected emotional directness."

- The New York Times

Composer/pianist Gregg Kallor teams up with the Attacca Quartet for the world premiere of Kallor's new piano quintet, commissioned by The Classical Recording Foundation and funded by a gift from Linda and Stuart Nelson. This new composition is inspired by the writings of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Kallor describes Dr. King's words as “a powerful salve for the frustrations wrought by injustices that persist. Dr. King’s message of compassion, inclusiveness and equality for all - which he preached with singular faith in our capacity to love and to do better - remains vital, and essential. His words are the music of the collective soul of humanity.”

This new work is one of a number of recent commissions for Kallor, including his acclaimed monodrama based on Edgar Allan Poe’s The Tell-Tale Heart as well as a new work for string orchestra commissioned by Town Hall Seattle. The Attacca Quartet are one of the fastest-rising quartets playing currently, with a style, energy and charisma entirely their own. Said The Washington Post: "they may be a relatively young ensemble, but already they come very close to epitomizing the string quartet ideal... Mastery like this is scarce enough in quartets that have played together for decades."

 

ABOUT THE SHEEN CENTER FOR THOUGHT & CULTURE

Named after the late Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, best known for his popular radio and TV ministry in the 1950s and 60s, The Sheen Center is a project of the Archdiocese of New York and showcases works that affirm the highest values of the human spirit through the performing and visual arts, lectures and exhibits. The state-of-the-art complex has a 270-seat proscenium theater equipped with five-camera high-definition Livestream capability and a multi-track recording studio with thirty-two onstage inputs; an 80-seat black box theater; four rehearsal studios; and an art gallery.

 

ABOUT MARC KAPLAN

Marc Kaplan is a music entrepreneur, educator, conductor and composer. A lifelong lover of the arts, in 2013 he co-founded SubCulture, a music and performing arts venue in downtown Manhattan that has garnered praise from The New York Times, The New Yorker, New York Magazine and more. Marc has always believed that the arts have the ability to change lives, and he's continuously used that passion — as both an entrepreneur and an educator — to support the emergence and growth of arts institutions.

After graduating from the George Washington University, Kaplan became a music educator, garnering numerous awards and accolades for ensembles under his direction. Additionally, he has been an artistic director and guest conductor at music festivals and with such established organizations as the West Hartford Summer Arts Festival, The Hartford Symphony Orchestra, the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA), and the National Association for Music Education (NAfME). Kaplan lives in Brooklyn, NY, with his wife, Betsy, and their daughter, Zoe.