Classical •  Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s

July 20, 2014 12:34 am

Classical

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Saturday, July 19, 2014

Olympic Music Festival Chamber-music favorites in a repurposed barn, 2 p.m. each Sat. & Sun. through Sept. 7. This weekend, early-, middle-, and late-Beethoven string quartets. Olympic Music Festival, 7360 Center Rd., Quilcene, WA 98376 $18-$33 Saturday, July 19, 2014, 2pm

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Northwest Mahler Festival A dark forest, a royal castle, a fratricide, an interrupted wedding celebration: Who wouldn’t think of Game of Thrones upon hearing the story told in Das klagende Lied (1880), Gustav Mahler’s first major work? With a taste for genre fiction like many men his age since, it’s no surprise the 17-year-old composer chose this grim Grimm tale, setting it for for chorus, four soloists, and huge orchestra. The vast forces and medieval setting are Wagnerian; a low, primordial-sounding alto narrator looks back to the Ring’s earth goddess Erda-but also ahead to his own “Urlicht” from his Second Symphony. The score’s somber marches and hyperecstatic fanfares, though, are unmistakably Mahler’s own, with echoes in nearly all his later works-not to mention any number of film scores. On the Northwest Mahler Festival’s culminating concert, Das klagende Lied is coupled, appropriately, with Wagner’s prelude to Parsifal; between the two of them, they established a lingua franca for evocations of chivalry and adventure that no composer since has been able to avoid. Mahler’s lyrical, meadow-scented Symphony no. 4 rounds out the program; Nikolas Caoile conducts. GAVIN BORCHERT First Presbyterian Church of Seattle, 1013 Eighth Ave., Seattle, WA 98104 n/a Saturday, July 19, 2014, 7 – 10:30pm

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Sunday, July 20, 2014

Olympic Music Festival Chamber-music favorites in a repurposed barn, 2 p.m. each Sat. & Sun. through Sept. 7. This weekend, early-, middle-, and late-Beethoven string quartets. Olympic Music Festival, 7360 Center Rd., Quilcene, WA 98376 $18-$33 Sunday, July 20, 2014, 2pm

Compline Services A half-hour meditation each week with the eight-voice Renaissance Singers. St. Clement of Rome Episcopal Church, 1501 32nd Ave. S., Seattle Free Sunday, July 20, 2014, 7:30 – 8pm

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Monday, July 21, 2014

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Seun Kuti & Egypt Seun Kuti & Egypt 80 After his father, Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti, died in 1997, Seun Kuti took over as head of his orchestra, Egypt 80 (he was 14 at the time). Since then he’s released three albums with his dad’s group, the latest being A Long Way to the Beginning, which carries on the legacy. Its seven songs are packed with a mix of horn-heavy funk, jazz, and soul, all backed by African rhythms, with touches of hip-hop for a more contemporary sound. Like father, like son; the 31-year-old inherited his father’s skill in bringing issues like corruption, sexism, and the need for change to listeners’ attention. With Cascadia 10, Soul Senate, DJ Darek Mazzone. 21 and over. ACP Neumos, 925 E. Pike St., Seattle, WA 98122 $20 adv. Monday, July 21, 2014, 8pm

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Tuesday, July 22, 2014

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Wednesday, July 23, 2014

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Thursday, July 24, 2014

Auburn Symphony Summer Concerts The Pacific Rims Percussion Quartet performs. Mary Olson Farm, 28728 Green River Rd., Auburn $10-$17 Thursday, July 24, 2014, 7pm

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Friday, July 25, 2014

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Saturday, July 26, 2014

Olympic Music Festival Chamber-music favorites in a repurposed barn, 2 p.m. each Sat. & Sun. through Sept. 7. This weekend, early-, middle-, and late-Beethoven string quartets. Olympic Music Festival, 7360 Center Rd., Quilcene, WA 98376 $18-$33 Saturday, July 26, 2014, 2pm

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Sunday, July 27, 2014

Olympic Music Festival Chamber-music favorites in a repurposed barn, 2 p.m. each Sat. & Sun. through Sept. 7. This weekend, early-, middle-, and late-Beethoven string quartets. Olympic Music Festival, 7360 Center Rd., Quilcene, WA 98376 $18-$33 Sunday, July 27, 2014, 2pm

Compline Services A half-hour meditation each week with the eight-voice Renaissance Singers. St. Clement of Rome Episcopal Church, 1501 32nd Ave. S., Seattle Free Sunday, July 27, 2014, 7:30 – 8pm

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Monday, July 28, 2014

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Tuesday, July 29, 2014

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Wednesday, July 30, 2014

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Thursday, July 31, 2014

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Seattle Chamber Music Society The pleasant surprise for the SCMS’s 33rd summer festival is a strong focus on vocal music: songs and song cycles by Schumann, Brahms, Vaughan-Williams, and others. (The voice recital, once a cornerstone of America’s concert life, has all but vanished outside academia.) The format is the usual: performances on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, July 7-Aug. 2 (except for the closing week), with a informal solo recital at 7 followed by a full-length concert at 8. The recitals are where musicians get to step off the beaten path and share their personal enthusiasms-like the Mystery Sonatas for solo violin by quintessentially Downtowny composer David Lang (July 7, played by Augustin Hadelich, who premiered them in April) and a selection of Bartok’s gnomic violin duos (July 11, with James Ehnes and Amy Schwartz Moretti). Concert highlights include Stravinsky’s mini-opera The Soldier’s Tale for narrator and septet (July 11); Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok (July 18); Haydn’s “Emperor” Quartet, with its heartstopping slow-movement variations (July 21); and this season’s premiere, a piano trio by Derek Bermel intriguingly titled Death with Interruptions (July 14). GAVIN BORCHERT Benaroya Recital Hall, 200 University St., Seattle, WA 98101 Single tickets $48, packages $180-$540 Friday, August 1, 2014