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Friendly Inspiration
February 18, 2017, 7pm Broadmoor Community Church February 19, 2017, 2:30pm First Christian Church |
Antonio Vivaldi Concerto in G Minor for Two Cellos & Orchestra, RV531
Gerald Miller & Pamela Chaddon, cellos Johann Sebastian Bach Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 in D Major, BWV1050 Allison Gioscia, flute Eric Wicks, harpsichord Elisa Wicks, violin Francesco Geminiani Concerto Grosso in D Minor, op. 5, no. 12 “La folia” Jacob Klock & Elisa Wicks, violins Michael Hart, viola Gerald Miller, cello Alberto Ginastera Variaciones Concertantes, op. 23 Pre-concert lecture 45 prior to each concert with Colin McAllister, D.M.A., UCCS Is there anything more delightful than a concerto with more than one soloist? Two, three, or four times the artistry and a musical conversation unparalleled in the concert experience! Join the Chamber Orchestra for a little friendly inspiration and an afternoon of virtuosity as the entire orchestra shine.
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PROGRAM NOTES by Mark Arnest
Concert overview: Since the late 18th Century, solo concertos have been so much the norm that it’s easy to forget that early concertos generally featured groups of soloists. Vivaldi was not the first composer of solo concertos, but he was the first in whose output the solo concerto dominated – although he still composed a couple hundred concertos for multiple instruments.
Three of the works on this program probably date from a brief span of time – seven or eight years during the late teens and early twenties of the 18th Century – and display very different takes on the Baroque concerto. Vivaldi’s concerto is the most typical, Bach’s the most extravagant, and Geminiani’s an arrangement of one of his teacher Corelli’s most unusual concertos. Ginastera’s work comes from a different musical universe, but in its soloistic treatment of the instruments it falls very much in a direct line of descent from these Baroque ensemble concertos.
Overview: Antonio Vivaldi
Born March 4, 1678, Venice, Italy; died July 28, 1741, Vienna, Austria
Work Composed: 1720s?
Why It Matters: You can tell your grandchildren that you heard a live performance of the only concerto for two cellos in existence
Vivaldi composed over 500 concertos for various instruments, but this is his only concerto for two cellos, and indeed, it may be the only concerto for two cellos ever composed. This isn’t actually surprising: The cello’s low register already makes it a challenge to show off in an ensemble, where it’s easily overshadowed by higher-pitched instruments; and doubling the number greatly increases the challenge.
Vivaldi’s solution is to treat all instruments – soloists and orchestra – with a light touch. There is no bass and only a single cello in the accompanying instruments (ripieno in musicologese). There are no double-stops to thicken things, and while the two cellos often play together, they also frequently alternate passages, further thinning the textures.
Even with these steps taken, this is a dark-textured concerto. The first movement’s typically Vivaldian rhythmic energy seems angrier than usual. As is typical in concertos of this period, the ripieno and the soloists have different thematic material, though in one spot they alternate, and they join during some particularly furious chromatic episodes.
The mournful second movement is a duet for the cellos plus a small accompanying continuo of cello and harpsichord. It’s in binary form, with two halves that are each embellished when they’re repeated. In the 18th Century, the ability to improvise variations was routinely expected of instrumentalists, but this skill was lost – mainly in the 18th and 19th Centuries – as composers took greater control of their work. Vivaldi expected liberties to be taken with his music, and allowed room for them; two centuries later, Stravinsky objected to conductors changing his tempos by a click or two of the metronome.
The finale is characterized by energetic syncopations – accented notes that fall off the main beats, giving the movement an even more propulsive motion than the first – and a cello episode that veers dangerously close to Four Seasons territory. The opening ripieno is barely developed at its repetitions; Vivaldi relies on changes of key to provide sufficient variety. Additional variation occurs in the intervening cello episodes, some of which are clearly related to the syncopated ripieno material.
Overview: Johann Sebastian Bach
Born March 21, 1685, Eisenach, Germany; died July 28, 1750, Leipzig, Germany
Work Composed: Late 1710s
Why It Matters: Historically important as the first concerto with a substantial solo keyboard part; but also one of the greatest of Baroque concertos
Bach wrote what his employers wanted to hear, meaning that his musical genres are strongly correlated with his job positions. Most of his organ music is early: He began his career as an organist. His final position at Leipzig emphasized religious choral music, and for several years Bach churned out sacred cantatas at a fearsome rate. (He was the hiring committee’s third choice, and a major reason for their misgivings was the thinness of Bach’s sacred music portfolio.)
Before going to Leipzig, Bach was employed by Leopold, Prince of Anhalt-Köthen, a Calvinist who had little need for sacred music. Much of Bach’s best-known instrumental music dates from this period, including the orchestral suites, the works for solo violin and cello, the first book of the Well-Tempered Clavier, and the six Brandenburg Concertos.
That’s good as a general principle; but there are numerous exceptions, very likely including this concerto.
Like the B-minor Mass decades later, the Brandenburg concertos were probably compiled as a subtle job application. Bach was happy in Köthen until 1721 when Prince Leopold married his cousin, who reportedly disliked music. Seeking another position, Bach revised six of his best concertos and presented them to Christian Ludwig, margrave of Brandenburg-Schwedt.
The margrave never acknowledged the gift, and anyway, he lacked the musicians to perform these concertos. The manuscript was sold at the margrave’s death in 1734, and didn’t resurface again until 1859. The six Brandenburg concertos – among the supreme examples of Baroque instrumental music – were not published until 1860, 110 years after Bach’s death.
There are two versions of Brandenburg Concerto No. 5. The first version was probably composed around 1717, possibly for Bach’s visit to Dresden, and revised two or three years later. Comparing changes to the instrumentation and dynamic scheme between the two versions, Dutch harpsichordist and musicologist Pieter Dirksen concluded that the concerto was originally composed for a standard single-manual harpsichord, and revised for the more robust, two-manual harpsichord available to Bach beginning in 1719.
Bach’s biggest change is to what was already the work’s most striking feature: the first movement’s harpsichord cadenza, the earliest known concerto keyboard solo. Bach’s model is Vivaldi’s Violin Concerto in D, Grosso Mogul, where, as here, the instruments of the orchestra gradually drop out, creating a solo by default. (Bach thought highly enough of this concerto to have transcribed it for organ sometime around 1715.)
But in his revision, Bach goes much farther than Vivaldi. Bach’s original cadenza is a mere 18 bars long; the revised cadenza is 65 bars long, nearly 30 percent of the movement. For comparison, Rachmaninoff’s famously enormous cadenza for his Piano Concerto No. 3, which unlike this cadenza includes most of the structural recapitulation, is about 25 percent of the movement – and Rachmaninoff decided it was too long. He composed a second, shorter cadenza, and never played the longer one.
Nor is there anything conventional about the remainder of the movement. While it hews to the typical Baroque concerto structure, alternating ritornellos (in which everyone plays) with episodes dominated by the soloists, Bach uncharacteristically bases the episodes on themes from the ritornellos, creating a tighter and more homogeneous structure than the typical Italian concerto. And in an era where the violin was king, here the keyboard dominates – unusual, but not surprising considering Bach’s prodigious keyboard skills.
The second movement – a sweet, sad song – is also uncharacteristic for a Baroque concerto in being performed entirely by the three soloists. The theme is closely related to one by French organist Louis Marchand, whom Bach was hoping to meet in Dresden.
The third movement is reminiscent of the central section of a French Overture: partly fugal, and partly a rollicking gigue. As in the first movement, the harpsichord part stands out for its virtuosity.
Overview: Francesco Geminiani
Born December 5, 1687, Lucca, Italy; died September 17, 1762, Dublin, Ireland
Work Composed: 1720s, based on an original published in 1700
Why It Matters: A brilliant exploration of Baroque variation techniques
Francesco Geminiani is one of a slew of superbly trained Italian Baroque violinist-
composers, most of whom have been forgotten outside of connoisseurs of Italian Baroque music.
He studied with Alessandro Scarlatti (father of the great Domenico Scarlatti) and later with Arcangelo Corelli, whose current obscurity belies the tremendous influence his music had on composers of the 18th Century. Geminiani spent most of his career in the British isles. Although it’s not fair to compare him with J.S. Bach, like Bach he spurned the light Gallant style of his time, and instead cultivated the older contrapuntal style. Within this style, Geminiani’s voice is distinct and harmonically adventuresome.
However, this concerto grosso is not typical Geminiani. It’s one of a dozen concerti grossi that are arranged from violin sonatas by his teacher Corelli. Geminiani thickens the textures, but for the most part the first violin part and the accompanying bass duplicate Corelli. Today, this concerto would probably be classified as an arrangement rather than a composition.
The piece consists of a theme and 23 variations in one large movement. The theme – La folia – is one of the oldest known European musical themes, with early versions dating from at least the late 15th Century. It was codified into the now-familiar melody and harmonic progression by Jean-Baptiste Lully in the 17th Century, and appears in the music of over 150 composers, including Handel, J.S. and C.P.E. Bach, Liszt, and Rachmaninoff. Its almost hypnotic chord progression is frequently used – as it is here – as the jumping-off for variations.
Perhaps no version has been more influential than Corelli’s. If Corelli’s harmony – barely altered by Geminiani – is not surprising, the expert string writing along with enormous contrast of textures, moods, and tempos makes for a wonderful piece.
Overview: Alberto Ginastera
Born April 11, 1916, Buenos Aires, Argentina; died June 25, 1983, Geneva, Switzerland.
Work Composed: 1953
Why It Matters: One of the most appealing pieces by Argentina’s greatest composer
These variations have a subjective Argentine character. Instead of using folkloristic material, I try to achieve an Argentine atmosphere through the employment of my own thematic and rhythmic elements. The work begins with an original theme followed by eleven variations, each one reflecting the distinctive character of the instrument featured. All the instruments of the orchestra are treated soloistically. Some variations belong to the decorative, ornamental or elaborative type, others are written in the contemporary manner of metamorphosis, which consists of taking elements of the main theme and evolving from it new material.
--Alberto Ginastera
Today Astor Piazzolla may be the most popular Argentinian composer, but Piazzolla’s teacher Alberto Ginastera remains the most widely respected and influential of that country’s composers.
Ginastera began his compositional studies as a follower of Debussy and Ravel, but later gravitated to Stravinsky and Bartók. He first heard Stravinsky’s seminal Rite of Spring when he was 14, and it took him several years to digest: It “sounded incomprehensible and even cacophonous,” he later wrote. “But it made me think.”
By the time he composed his first orchestral piece four years later, he had come around to Stravinsky. He wrote that “with all the ingeniousness and innocence of youth I employed in it the same percussive effects, the same changing rhythms, using an immense orchestra with the percussion occupying pride of place – in other words, the same ingredients as Stravinsky had made use of for the first time in that musical prodigy known as The Rite of Spring. On comparing notes with my Latin-American colleagues I discovered that I was not the only one to succumb to the marvelous spell of the Stravinskian magic.”
In contrast, his encounter at age 15 with Bartók's Allegro barbaro was instantly revelatory: “The Allegro barbaro filled in all the gaps I felt in my conception of forging a national music,” he wrote. “The rhythmic strength of that admirable piece – the ‘feverish excitement produced by the repeated primitive themes,’ in Bartók's own words; the construction of the melody from cells and repetition of parts of those cells … all these aspects captivated me.”
The final major influence was Argentinian folk music, especially the songs of the gauchos, the cowboys of the Pampas. The Variciones Concertantes contains references to numerous Argentinian dances, including the zamba, the chacerera, the gato, and the closing malambo.
The Variciones Concertantes is one of Ginastera’s most popular works: a colorful mix of Stravinskian sonorities and architecture, Bartókian thematic procedures, and Argentinian dance rhythms. Each variation features different soloists, making the piece a concerto for orchestra; but it could equally be described as a set of mostly lyrical character pieces. Ginastera described his music of this period as “subjective nationalism,” meaning that, like much of Bartók's mature music, it was rooted in folkloric influences without using actual folk songs.
The eleven variations lead first away from the expressive opening theme – a duet for cello and harp – and then back to it. Much of the harmony is rooted in the chord E-A-D-G-B-E, familiar to most of us as the open strings of a guitar. Ginastera’s variation technique is very different from that of Beethoven or Brahms. Some are very free, without the traditional repeating harmonic module, and several bear very little relation to the theme. Ginastera scholar David Edward Wallace has identified two distinct techniques: “the type which embellishes the original melodic line; and the type which is derived from the original material but developed into new material – the generative type.” Brian Hughes, in his monograph on the piece, adds that “subsequent variations are also based in part on elements within the accompaniment of the opening theme.”
Concert overview: Since the late 18th Century, solo concertos have been so much the norm that it’s easy to forget that early concertos generally featured groups of soloists. Vivaldi was not the first composer of solo concertos, but he was the first in whose output the solo concerto dominated – although he still composed a couple hundred concertos for multiple instruments.
Three of the works on this program probably date from a brief span of time – seven or eight years during the late teens and early twenties of the 18th Century – and display very different takes on the Baroque concerto. Vivaldi’s concerto is the most typical, Bach’s the most extravagant, and Geminiani’s an arrangement of one of his teacher Corelli’s most unusual concertos. Ginastera’s work comes from a different musical universe, but in its soloistic treatment of the instruments it falls very much in a direct line of descent from these Baroque ensemble concertos.
Overview: Antonio Vivaldi
Born March 4, 1678, Venice, Italy; died July 28, 1741, Vienna, Austria
Work Composed: 1720s?
Why It Matters: You can tell your grandchildren that you heard a live performance of the only concerto for two cellos in existence
Vivaldi composed over 500 concertos for various instruments, but this is his only concerto for two cellos, and indeed, it may be the only concerto for two cellos ever composed. This isn’t actually surprising: The cello’s low register already makes it a challenge to show off in an ensemble, where it’s easily overshadowed by higher-pitched instruments; and doubling the number greatly increases the challenge.
Vivaldi’s solution is to treat all instruments – soloists and orchestra – with a light touch. There is no bass and only a single cello in the accompanying instruments (ripieno in musicologese). There are no double-stops to thicken things, and while the two cellos often play together, they also frequently alternate passages, further thinning the textures.
Even with these steps taken, this is a dark-textured concerto. The first movement’s typically Vivaldian rhythmic energy seems angrier than usual. As is typical in concertos of this period, the ripieno and the soloists have different thematic material, though in one spot they alternate, and they join during some particularly furious chromatic episodes.
The mournful second movement is a duet for the cellos plus a small accompanying continuo of cello and harpsichord. It’s in binary form, with two halves that are each embellished when they’re repeated. In the 18th Century, the ability to improvise variations was routinely expected of instrumentalists, but this skill was lost – mainly in the 18th and 19th Centuries – as composers took greater control of their work. Vivaldi expected liberties to be taken with his music, and allowed room for them; two centuries later, Stravinsky objected to conductors changing his tempos by a click or two of the metronome.
The finale is characterized by energetic syncopations – accented notes that fall off the main beats, giving the movement an even more propulsive motion than the first – and a cello episode that veers dangerously close to Four Seasons territory. The opening ripieno is barely developed at its repetitions; Vivaldi relies on changes of key to provide sufficient variety. Additional variation occurs in the intervening cello episodes, some of which are clearly related to the syncopated ripieno material.
Overview: Johann Sebastian Bach
Born March 21, 1685, Eisenach, Germany; died July 28, 1750, Leipzig, Germany
Work Composed: Late 1710s
Why It Matters: Historically important as the first concerto with a substantial solo keyboard part; but also one of the greatest of Baroque concertos
Bach wrote what his employers wanted to hear, meaning that his musical genres are strongly correlated with his job positions. Most of his organ music is early: He began his career as an organist. His final position at Leipzig emphasized religious choral music, and for several years Bach churned out sacred cantatas at a fearsome rate. (He was the hiring committee’s third choice, and a major reason for their misgivings was the thinness of Bach’s sacred music portfolio.)
Before going to Leipzig, Bach was employed by Leopold, Prince of Anhalt-Köthen, a Calvinist who had little need for sacred music. Much of Bach’s best-known instrumental music dates from this period, including the orchestral suites, the works for solo violin and cello, the first book of the Well-Tempered Clavier, and the six Brandenburg Concertos.
That’s good as a general principle; but there are numerous exceptions, very likely including this concerto.
Like the B-minor Mass decades later, the Brandenburg concertos were probably compiled as a subtle job application. Bach was happy in Köthen until 1721 when Prince Leopold married his cousin, who reportedly disliked music. Seeking another position, Bach revised six of his best concertos and presented them to Christian Ludwig, margrave of Brandenburg-Schwedt.
The margrave never acknowledged the gift, and anyway, he lacked the musicians to perform these concertos. The manuscript was sold at the margrave’s death in 1734, and didn’t resurface again until 1859. The six Brandenburg concertos – among the supreme examples of Baroque instrumental music – were not published until 1860, 110 years after Bach’s death.
There are two versions of Brandenburg Concerto No. 5. The first version was probably composed around 1717, possibly for Bach’s visit to Dresden, and revised two or three years later. Comparing changes to the instrumentation and dynamic scheme between the two versions, Dutch harpsichordist and musicologist Pieter Dirksen concluded that the concerto was originally composed for a standard single-manual harpsichord, and revised for the more robust, two-manual harpsichord available to Bach beginning in 1719.
Bach’s biggest change is to what was already the work’s most striking feature: the first movement’s harpsichord cadenza, the earliest known concerto keyboard solo. Bach’s model is Vivaldi’s Violin Concerto in D, Grosso Mogul, where, as here, the instruments of the orchestra gradually drop out, creating a solo by default. (Bach thought highly enough of this concerto to have transcribed it for organ sometime around 1715.)
But in his revision, Bach goes much farther than Vivaldi. Bach’s original cadenza is a mere 18 bars long; the revised cadenza is 65 bars long, nearly 30 percent of the movement. For comparison, Rachmaninoff’s famously enormous cadenza for his Piano Concerto No. 3, which unlike this cadenza includes most of the structural recapitulation, is about 25 percent of the movement – and Rachmaninoff decided it was too long. He composed a second, shorter cadenza, and never played the longer one.
Nor is there anything conventional about the remainder of the movement. While it hews to the typical Baroque concerto structure, alternating ritornellos (in which everyone plays) with episodes dominated by the soloists, Bach uncharacteristically bases the episodes on themes from the ritornellos, creating a tighter and more homogeneous structure than the typical Italian concerto. And in an era where the violin was king, here the keyboard dominates – unusual, but not surprising considering Bach’s prodigious keyboard skills.
The second movement – a sweet, sad song – is also uncharacteristic for a Baroque concerto in being performed entirely by the three soloists. The theme is closely related to one by French organist Louis Marchand, whom Bach was hoping to meet in Dresden.
The third movement is reminiscent of the central section of a French Overture: partly fugal, and partly a rollicking gigue. As in the first movement, the harpsichord part stands out for its virtuosity.
Overview: Francesco Geminiani
Born December 5, 1687, Lucca, Italy; died September 17, 1762, Dublin, Ireland
Work Composed: 1720s, based on an original published in 1700
Why It Matters: A brilliant exploration of Baroque variation techniques
Francesco Geminiani is one of a slew of superbly trained Italian Baroque violinist-
composers, most of whom have been forgotten outside of connoisseurs of Italian Baroque music.
He studied with Alessandro Scarlatti (father of the great Domenico Scarlatti) and later with Arcangelo Corelli, whose current obscurity belies the tremendous influence his music had on composers of the 18th Century. Geminiani spent most of his career in the British isles. Although it’s not fair to compare him with J.S. Bach, like Bach he spurned the light Gallant style of his time, and instead cultivated the older contrapuntal style. Within this style, Geminiani’s voice is distinct and harmonically adventuresome.
However, this concerto grosso is not typical Geminiani. It’s one of a dozen concerti grossi that are arranged from violin sonatas by his teacher Corelli. Geminiani thickens the textures, but for the most part the first violin part and the accompanying bass duplicate Corelli. Today, this concerto would probably be classified as an arrangement rather than a composition.
The piece consists of a theme and 23 variations in one large movement. The theme – La folia – is one of the oldest known European musical themes, with early versions dating from at least the late 15th Century. It was codified into the now-familiar melody and harmonic progression by Jean-Baptiste Lully in the 17th Century, and appears in the music of over 150 composers, including Handel, J.S. and C.P.E. Bach, Liszt, and Rachmaninoff. Its almost hypnotic chord progression is frequently used – as it is here – as the jumping-off for variations.
Perhaps no version has been more influential than Corelli’s. If Corelli’s harmony – barely altered by Geminiani – is not surprising, the expert string writing along with enormous contrast of textures, moods, and tempos makes for a wonderful piece.
Overview: Alberto Ginastera
Born April 11, 1916, Buenos Aires, Argentina; died June 25, 1983, Geneva, Switzerland.
Work Composed: 1953
Why It Matters: One of the most appealing pieces by Argentina’s greatest composer
These variations have a subjective Argentine character. Instead of using folkloristic material, I try to achieve an Argentine atmosphere through the employment of my own thematic and rhythmic elements. The work begins with an original theme followed by eleven variations, each one reflecting the distinctive character of the instrument featured. All the instruments of the orchestra are treated soloistically. Some variations belong to the decorative, ornamental or elaborative type, others are written in the contemporary manner of metamorphosis, which consists of taking elements of the main theme and evolving from it new material.
--Alberto Ginastera
Today Astor Piazzolla may be the most popular Argentinian composer, but Piazzolla’s teacher Alberto Ginastera remains the most widely respected and influential of that country’s composers.
Ginastera began his compositional studies as a follower of Debussy and Ravel, but later gravitated to Stravinsky and Bartók. He first heard Stravinsky’s seminal Rite of Spring when he was 14, and it took him several years to digest: It “sounded incomprehensible and even cacophonous,” he later wrote. “But it made me think.”
By the time he composed his first orchestral piece four years later, he had come around to Stravinsky. He wrote that “with all the ingeniousness and innocence of youth I employed in it the same percussive effects, the same changing rhythms, using an immense orchestra with the percussion occupying pride of place – in other words, the same ingredients as Stravinsky had made use of for the first time in that musical prodigy known as The Rite of Spring. On comparing notes with my Latin-American colleagues I discovered that I was not the only one to succumb to the marvelous spell of the Stravinskian magic.”
In contrast, his encounter at age 15 with Bartók's Allegro barbaro was instantly revelatory: “The Allegro barbaro filled in all the gaps I felt in my conception of forging a national music,” he wrote. “The rhythmic strength of that admirable piece – the ‘feverish excitement produced by the repeated primitive themes,’ in Bartók's own words; the construction of the melody from cells and repetition of parts of those cells … all these aspects captivated me.”
The final major influence was Argentinian folk music, especially the songs of the gauchos, the cowboys of the Pampas. The Variciones Concertantes contains references to numerous Argentinian dances, including the zamba, the chacerera, the gato, and the closing malambo.
The Variciones Concertantes is one of Ginastera’s most popular works: a colorful mix of Stravinskian sonorities and architecture, Bartókian thematic procedures, and Argentinian dance rhythms. Each variation features different soloists, making the piece a concerto for orchestra; but it could equally be described as a set of mostly lyrical character pieces. Ginastera described his music of this period as “subjective nationalism,” meaning that, like much of Bartók's mature music, it was rooted in folkloric influences without using actual folk songs.
The eleven variations lead first away from the expressive opening theme – a duet for cello and harp – and then back to it. Much of the harmony is rooted in the chord E-A-D-G-B-E, familiar to most of us as the open strings of a guitar. Ginastera’s variation technique is very different from that of Beethoven or Brahms. Some are very free, without the traditional repeating harmonic module, and several bear very little relation to the theme. Ginastera scholar David Edward Wallace has identified two distinct techniques: “the type which embellishes the original melodic line; and the type which is derived from the original material but developed into new material – the generative type.” Brian Hughes, in his monograph on the piece, adds that “subsequent variations are also based in part on elements within the accompaniment of the opening theme.”
Eric Wicks serves as organist at the First Lutheran Church in downtown Colorado Springs. He received his Master’s Degree in organ performance from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where he studied with Todd Wilson. He also studied harpsichord with Janina Ceaser, piano with Olga Radosavljevich, eurhythmics with David Brown, and early music performance practice with Ross Duffin. While in Cleveland, Eric joined Elisa in performing baroque programs at the Cleveland Museum of Art, and in house concerts at the home of Phillip Cucchiara, a harpsichord builder. As an organist, Eric previously served at St. Paul’s Episcopal in Kennewick, Washington; St Peter’s Episcopal in Lakewood, Ohio; Old Stone Church (First Presbyterian) in Cleveland, Ohio; Anshe Chesed Fairmount Temple in Beachwood, Ohio; and, from 2004 to 2012, First United Methodist in Butler, Pennsylvania.
Gerald Miller has been the principal cellist with the Fresno Philharmonic for nearly two decades and is a full-time member of the Colorado Springs Philharmonic. He is principal cellist with the Chamber Orchestra of the Springs. Gerald’s solo career has taken him around the world to places in Europe and Asia. Starting his cello studies in California he continued at the University of Michigan School of Music studying with Jeffrey Solow and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where he studied with Irene Sharp and Bonnie Hampton. In addition to his performing career, he has an active cello studio and has been a cello instructor at the Community School of Music and Arts in Mountain View, California and at the Colorado State University School of Music in Pueblo, Colorado. He teaches cello students from the Colorado College and the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs.
Praised for playing with “poetic grace” and "capturing the bold imagery and beauty" of the works she performs (Gazette), cellist Pam Chaddon currently serves both as Associate Principal Cellist and Orchestra Administrator for the Chamber Orchestra of the Springs. She is immensely excited about the orchestra’s 2017-2018 season and would be happy to take your new or renewing subscription Saturday or Sunday! If you call or email the orchestra, you will probably be talking to her! She is a passionate advocate for the Chamber Orchestra and hopes this weekend will further inspire our wonderful audience to support our music! In addition to the Chamber Orchestra, she performs baroque cello with Colorado Springs early music ensemble, Parish House Baroque. In her free time, she loves researching under-performed composers and works, poetry, art museums, hiking and Zumba fitness.
Colorado native Jacob Klock was six years old when he received a VHS copy of Walt Disney’s “Fantasia” for Christmas. Inspired by the music featured in the film, he told his parents he wanted to learn the violin and began taking lessons in March 1992. Jacob first worked with the Chamber Orchestra of the Springs in 2004-07 as Assistant Concertmaster and currently serves as Concertmaster, a position he has held since 2010. He has regularly been featured as soloist with the group during that time. Jacob is also a member of the Colorado Springs Philharmonic, and joined local string quartet Hausmusik in 2014. Venturing into the non-classical realm, he has played fiddle with Colorado Springs alt-country outfit, Joe Johnson & The Colorado Wildfire since 2012. Jacob enjoys all genres of music past and present, from traditional to experimental, and is an avid collector of records and scores. His favorite composers include J.S. Bach, Brahms, Mahler, and Bartók. Jacob currently lives on the west side of Colorado Springs with his wife Heather, and his three children, Ivy, Ella, and Arlo.
Elisa Wicks brings a deep passion for early music to the stage. She has worked and studied with many of the great baroque violinists of our day, including Rachel Podger, Cynthia Roberts, Carla Moore and Julie Andrijeski with coachings from Jeannette Sorrell, Marilyn McDonald, Ross Duffin and Mimi Mitchell. She has performed with Chatham Baroque, the Bach and the BaroqueOrchestra, the Baroque Chamber Orchestra of Colorado, Seicento, the Case Western Reserve University Baroque Orchestra (as Concertmaster) and the Pittsburgh Baroque Ensemble (as co-Concertmaster). On modern violin, she earned both her bachelor's and master's degrees in violin performance from the Cleveland Institute of Music where her principal instructors were Linda Cerone and Stephen Rose, along with Michelle George and Teri Einfeldt from whom she received her full Suzuki teacher certification. Elisa formerly served as Concertmaster and soloist for the Butler County Symphony and as Principal Second Violin for the Academy Chamber Orchestra, both in the Pittsburgh area. In addition, she performed with the Wheeling Symphony, Erie Philharmonic, and the Westmoreland Symphony. Currently she serves as Principal Second Violin in the Chamber Orchestra of the Springs and is frequently asked to play with the Colorado Springs Philharmonic and other groups throughout the Pikes Peak region both as ensemble member and soloist.
Allison Gioscia currently holds the positions of Principal Flute with the Chamber Orchestra of Colorado Springs and Second Flute with the Greeley Philharmonic Orchestra, and has also performed in recent seasons with the Colorado Springs Philharmonic, the Fort Collins Symphony Orchestra, and at the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center. Before moving to Colorado Springs, she was Principal Flute with the Orquesta de UniNorte in Asunción, Paraguay and served as Professor of Flute at the Universidad Evangélica del Paraguay. Allison has previously held positions with Opera in the Ozarks (Eureka Springs, AR), the Eclectic Laboratory Chamber Orchestra (Pittsburgh, PA), and the Nebraska Theatre Caravan (Omaha, NE). She is a graduate of the University of Northern Colorado.