PUTNEY — Building on last year's exploration of acclaimed works of the Romantic canon through early recordings and modern day interpretation, pianist Marisa Gupta, violinist Maria Wloszczowska, violist Rosalind Ventris, and cellist Jonathan Dormand returned to Yellow Barn in February for a residency that widens the scope of their study to works by Brahms, Dvorak, and Chausson.
The quartet's full concert program and discussion on Monday, March 6, at 8 p.m., at Next Stage, 15 Kimball Hill, is the culmination of their residency, according to a news release.
In the release Gupta writes, “I am thrilled to return to Yellow Barn for the second part of Faithful to the Spirit. The sense of discovery, risk taking, and creativity associated with Yellow Barn, and the curiosity and open-mindedness of its audience, have made the residency a fertile setting in which to experiment with more daring ways of playing - ever supported by [Artistic Director] Seth Knopp's encouragement to expand these boundaries further.”
Despite interest in historical performance practice, mainstream performers have largely ignored the hardest evidence of all: early recordings. These performances, often made by a composer's contemporaries, sometimes even in consultation with composers, “may tell us something about the spirit of music-making that a composer's words and notation cannot,” according to the release.
Gupta, who initiated this project with support from the British Library Edison Fellowship, has received top prizes at the International Concours Maria Canals in Barcelona, the Viotti Competition in Vercelli, a Fulbright Scholarship for studies in the UK, and a Solti Foundation Award.
As a soloist and a chamber musician, she has performed in such venues as the Wigmore Hall in London, the Royal Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Warsaw Philharmonic Hall, and Palau de la Música Catalana in Barcelona.
Dormand is an alumnus of Yellow Barn's summer festival, and also has taught at the Young Artists Program. A laureate of the ISANGYUN International Cello Competition 2012 and recipient of a major incentive grant from the Pierre Fournier Award in 2015, Dormand has performed at the Wigmore Hall and the Southbank Centre in London, and Carnegie Hall's Weill Hall.
He has won numerous awards from organizations in the UK, including the Hattori Foundation, Musicians Benevolent Fund, Philharmonia Orchestra/Martin Musical Scholarship Fund, and the Countess of Munster Musical Trust.
Wloszczowska is the First Prize winner of the 2013 Michail Elsky International Violin Competition in Minsk, and a finalist in the XV International Henryk Wieniawski Violin Competition in 2016.
Her debut recording of Mozart's complete Church Sonatas for two violins and organ with her teacher, Maxim Vengerov, released in 2013, was recently featured on BBC Radio 3's “In Tune.”
As a soloist and chamber musician, Ventris has performed throughout the UK and abroad. In past seasons she has performed as a soloist at the Emilia Romagna Festival in Italy, and in the Royal Festival Hall, the Purcell Room, and the Bridgewater Hall in London.
Ventris performed at the Wigmore Hall's 2014 viola celebration, and received five prizes at the 2013 Lionel Tertis International Viola Competition. She is a winner of the Making Music Philip & Dorothy Green Awards for Young Concert Artists 2016.
The first retreat program in the U.S. created specifically for professional, performing musicians, Yellow Barn's Artist Residencies further the art of the performance of classical music by providing an environment conducive to undistracted study, an exchange of ideas, and opportunities for performance.