The UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music will present more than two dozen performances this winter quarter by world-class student ensembles as well as programs and master classes by faculty artists, composers, scholars and guest artists. Among the events are several interdisciplinary programs. These include “Swinging to a World of Strings” on Feb. 5, a partnership between the departments of ethnomusicology and music; the West Coast premiere of “Synaesthesia Playground” on March 2, a collaboration of piano music, art and mobile technologies, and “Inside the (G)earbox: John Adams @ 70” on March 4, a day-long symposium featuring scholarly presentations and a pair of concerts exploring the work and process of American composer Adams.
Guest artists and scholars on the winter season include pianists Sarah Cahill and Soyeon Kate Lee, conductor and pianist Grant Gershon, mezzo-soprano Suzanna Guzmán, resident artists the piano duo HOCKET, Diotoma Quartet, as well as composer and critic Kyle Gann, musicologist Alice Miller Cotter and ethnomusicologist Ruth Hellier-Tinoco.
Many of the programs are free and all are open to the public. For more details and a complete list of events, see the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music calendar.
Classical performance and composition
Feb. 5: “Swinging to a World of Strings” showcases music from the United States, Mexico, England, Turkey and China. Embroidered with touches of European classical music’s form and structure, the program includes a 50-plus-piece orchestra accompanying compositions that also feature America’s indigenous music called jazz. With special guest mezzo-soprano Suzanna Guzmán and others.
Feb. 10: UCLA strings faculty Movses Pogossian, Guillaume Sutre, CarlaMaria Rodrigues, Antonio Lysy, Ambroise Aubrun and Ji Yong An return with the first-year strings students for this annual celebration featuring Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons” along with other baroque works, performed in Powell Library and enhanced by the building’s wonderful acoustics. Free admission.
Feb. 17, 19, 24, 26: Opera UCLA presents “Cendrillon (Cinderella)” by Jules Massenet, an opera based on the 1968 version of the Cinderella fairy tale by Charles Perrault; French libretto by Henri Caïn. Performed in French with English supertitles.
Feb. 24: Lauded as “brilliant” by Mark Swed in the Los Angeles Times, the innovative modern piano duo HOCKET caps a residency at UCLA with performances of cutting-edge work by UCLA faculty and students, local composers and beyond.
* Feb. 27: This season’s annual woodwind faculty concert is a tribute for retiring faculty flutist Sheridan Stokes. Stokes has recorded numerous movie and TV scores and will perform at this concert. Free admission.
March 2: chambermusic@ucla presents Synaesthesia Playground, a classical concert experience for a 21st century audience in its West Coast premiere. Jocelyn Ho, Young Steinway Artist and assistant professor of performance studies, brings together a world-class team of musicians, computer scientists, visual artists and fashion designers to create an immersive and interactive experience.
March 4: Inside the (G)earbox: John Adams @ 70 explores the American composer’s work and process, with scholarly presentations and a pair of concerts featuring two of the most physically challenging pieces of classical music — “Shaker Loops” and “Phrygian Gates.” Longtime associates of Adams, pianists Sarah Cahill and Gloria Cheng, conductor and pianist Grant Gershon, as well as UCLA FLUX are among the performers. Also featured are composer and critic Kyle Gann, musicologists Alice Miller Cotter and Robert Fink, and former Nonesuch Records president Robert Hurwitz. Free admission for UCLA students with valid ID.
March 8: The UCLA Symphonic Band and UCLA Wind Ensemble present an evening of music by classical and contemporary composers from across Europe. Highlights include Antonin Dvořák's Serenade in D minor, Op. 44, and Florent Schmitt's “Dionysiaques.”
March 9: chambermusic@ucla presents a recital with pianist Inna Faliks. Called “adventurous and passionate” in the New Yorker, Faliks is professor and area head, piano, at the music school.
March 12: UCLA Percussion Ensemble Concert program includes “Twisted Proverb,” by Lynn Glassock; “Chamber Piece for Percussion Quintet,” by Michael Colgrass; “Arabesque” and “Golliwog’s Cakewalk,” by Claude Debussy.
March 15: Under the baton of exceptional student conductors, the UCLA Symphony presents a program of works by Rimsky-Korsakov, Max Bruch, George Gershwin, and Stravinsky. With Morgan O'Shaughnessey, viola.
March 17: UCLA Strings presents Camarades Concert with VEM Quartet, the graduate string quartet-in-residence at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music and the cornerstone of the newly created Armenian music program at UCLA. Free Admission.
March 18: Celebrating British composer Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958), this All-Vaughan Williams Concert in Royce Hall features guest soloists, the UCLA Chorale, UCLA Chamber Singers and UCLA Philharmonia, all conducted by Neal Stulberg. The concert begins with one of the most famous and well-loved string orchestra works in the repertoire, “Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis.”
March 19: FLUX UCLA, the school’s contemporary chamber music group, performs its quarterly recital of 20th and 21st century music. Free admission.
* Editor’s note: The woodwind faculty concert on Feb. 27 has been rescheduled from a previous date.
Jazz and world music
March 6: The Jazz Combo Concert features student combo ensembles directed by Kenny Burrell, George Bohanon, Clayton Cameron, Charley Harrison, Charles Owens and Michele Weir.
March 7: UCLA’s award-winning jazz studies students present Big Band Jazz Concert, with performances by the Latin Jazz Big Band, directed by Bobby Rodriguez; Ellingtonia Orchestra, directed by Kenny Burrell, and the UCLA Jazz Orchestra, directed by Charley Harrison.
Lectures and master classes
Feb. 17: UCLA Strings: Violin Master Class with Grigory Kalinovsky, professor of music, Jacobs School of Music, Indiana University. Free admission.
Feb. 23: David Abell Piano Masters Series features a short recital with pianists Inna Faliks and Soyeon Kate Lee followed by a master class with selected students. Free admission.
Feb 24: UCLA Wind Ensemble Invitational brings together seven outstanding high school bands from southern and central California to perform at Royce Hall and receive feedback from some of the foremost wind band musicians in the world. Free admission.
Feb 24: Chamber Music Master Class with Diotima Quartet. Founded in 1996 by laureates of the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris, the Diotima Quartet has gone on to become one of the world’s most in-demand ensembles. Free admission.
March 3: Lecture by Ruth Hellier-Tinoco, scholar, creator and performer, whose work engages in an interdisciplinary context with the fields of performance studies, ethnomusicology, dance studies, community arts, theater studies, and Mexican and Latin American studies. Her research projects explore issues of identity, ethnicity and migration, power relations, tourism, gender, embodiment, vocality, and the ethics in/of performance and research. Free admission.
March 10: UCLA Strings: Violin Master Class with Axel Strauss, professor at the Shulich School of Music at McGill University, Canada. Free admission.
A full schedule of the Winter 2017 season is available here. Tickets can be purchased online, at the door or through the UCLA Central Ticket Office.
Classical music concerts made possible by the David and Irmgard Dobrow Fund. Classical music was a passion of Drs David and Dr. Irmgard Dobrow, who established a generous endowment at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music to make programs like this possible. The school is proud to celebrate this program as part of the 2016-17 Dobrow Series.