MARLBORO — Marlboro Music, which is celebrating its 66th season on the hilltop campus of Vermont's Marlboro College, has, in large part, sustained the ideals of its founders and its guiding spirit, the late pianist Rudolf Serkin, through the generosity of former participants who, like Artistic Director Mitsuko Uchida, return to share traditions and their own insights with a new generation, according to a news release.
Two-thirds of its “senior” artists each year are noted musicians whose musical outlook was shaped by their summers as young artists at the Vermont retreat.
The concerts on Marlboro Music's second weekend illustrate this artistic continuity with four of the six pieces to be performed being anchored by an artist who first came to Marlboro in his or her teens or early twenties: former Juilliard Quartet violist Samuel Rhodes (1960) in the Mendelssohn Quintet in A, Op. 18; founding cellist of the Mendelssohn Quartet Marcy Rosen (1975) in the Beethoven Piano Trio in C Minor, Op. 1, No. 3; pianist Jonathan Biss (1997) in the Brahms Zwei Gesänge, Op. 91; former Mendelssohn Quartet first violinist Ida Levin (1981) in the Dvorák Quartet in A flat, Op. 105.
The program on Saturday, July 23, at 8 p.m. at Marlboro College's Persons Auditorium will open with Prokofiev's Quintet, Op. 39, a piece drawn from a chamber ballet that the composer wrote in 1924, to be performed by Emily Beare, oboe; Charles Neidich, clarinet; Kobi Malkin, violin; Hwayoon Lee, viola; and Xavier Foley, double bass.
Also to be heard will be the Ravel String Quartet in F Major with Siwoo Kim and Nick Eanet, violins; Pei-Ling Lin, viola; and Tony Rymer, cello, and the Mendelssohn String Quintet in A Major, Op. 18, with Rhodes being joined by violinists Elizabeth Fayette and Robyn Bollinger; violist Kei Tojo; and cellist Sujin Lee.
The concert on Sunday, July 24, at 2:30 p.m. includes the Beethoven Piano Trio in C Minor, Op. 1, No. 3 with Roman Rabinovich, piano; Bollinger, violin; and Marcy Rosen, cello, and Brahms' Zwei Gesänge, Op. 91 with alto Sara Couden; violist Ayane Kozasa; and pianist Jonathan Biss. The program concludes with Dvorák's String Quartet in A-flat Major, Op. 105, B. 193 with Emilie-Anne Gendron and Ida Levin, violins; Kozasa, viola; and Sarah Rommel, cello.