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Sunday, January 7, 2024
— a “hybrid” event —
Michael Kannen, cello
Wan-Chi Su, piano
Gardens of Joy and Terror
Program
Johannes Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Sonata No. 2 in D major, BWV 1028
I. Adagio
II. Allegro
III. Andante
IV. Allegro
Dimitri Shostakovich (1906-1975)
Sonata in D minor for Cello and Piano, Op. 40
I. Allegro non troppo
II. Allegro
III. Largo
IV. Allegro
Erich Wolfgang Korngold(1897-1957)
Much Ado About Nothing Suite, Op. 11
IV. Intermezzo (Garden Scene)
Biography
Cellist Michael Kannen has distinguished himself as a musician and educator of uncommon accomplishment who is comfortable in widely diverse musical situations and venues. He has devoted himself to the art of chamber music as a player, teacher, and lecturer and in all these areas has been totally committed to music as a means to connect to and communicate with people.
He was a founding member of the Brentano String Quartet and for seven years performed with that group on concert stages around the world, on radio and television, and on recordings. During those first seven years, the Brentano Quartet was awarded the first Cleveland Quartet Award, the Naumburg Chamber Music Award, the Martin E. Segal Award from Lincoln Center, and the Royal Philharmonic Society’s award for best debut recital in England for the 1997-1998 season. With the Brentano Quartet, Mr. Kannen appeared regularly in such venues as Alice Tully Hall in New York, the Library of Congress in Washington, Wigmore Hall in London, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, the Chatelet Theater in Paris, and the Sydney Opera House.
In addition to his work with the Brentano Quartet, Mr. Kannen has been a member of the Meliora String Quartet, the Apollo Trio, and the Cooperstown Quartet. He is currently a member of the Cooperstown Quartet. Mr. Kannen has been heard with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Berkshire Bach Society, and has appeared at major summer music festivals, including the Spoleto Festivals in Charleston, Italy and Australia, Chamber Music Northwest, the International Musicians Seminar in Prussia Cove, England, the Rockport Chamber Music Festival, the Cascade Head Music Festival in Oregon, the Vancouver Chamber Music Festival, the Caramoor Music Festival, the Skaneateles Music Festival and has served on the faculties of the Yellow Barn Music Festival and Tanglewood. He has collaborated with such artists as Jessye Norman, Phyllis Bryn-Julson, Itzhak Perlman, Sergiu Luca, Hilary Hahn, Daniel Phillips, Donald Weilerstein, Pamela Frank, Leon Fleisher, Mitsuko Uchida, Peter Frankl, Peter Serkin, Paula Robison, Kenneth Cooper, David Krakauer, Charles Neidich, Jörg Widmann, Steven Isserlis, and with jazz artists Michael Formanek and Uri Caine. Mr. Kannen frequently performs on period instruments, and has recorded the music of Robert Schumann on old instruments with the chamber group Context, in Houston. He has also recorded new music on the CRI and Azica labels.
Mr. Kannen is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, and pursued graduate studies at the New England Conservatory and Indiana University.
Mr. Kannen is currently the Director of Chamber Music at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, where he holds the Sidney Friedberg Chair in Chamber Music. In 2019 he received the Johns Hopkins Excellence in Teaching Award.
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Pianist Wan-Chi Su has performed both as a soloist and a collaborative artist at major venues, including Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall, Salle Cortot in Paris, and the Taiwan National Concert Hall in Asia, Europe, and the United States. In a review of her performance with the PostClassical Ensemble at the Washington National Cathedral, the American Scholar noted that she ‘played with sensitivity and imagination.’
Decorated with numerous awards, Dr. Su won first prize in both the Taiwan Cultural Cup Invitational Piano Competition and the Taiwan National Student Music Competition in Piano. She has received invitations to numerous prestigious music festivals, such as the Taos School of Music, the Beethoven Institute, both the Icicle Creek Piano Festival and the Icicle Creek Chamber Music Festival, the NTSO International Piano Program in Taiwan, and the Paris Piano Program in France. In addition to collaborating with many established artists and musicians, Dr. Su is the founder of Duo Sorolla and an artist member of the Piatigorsky Foundation. Furthermore, she serves as an organist at Memorial Episcopal Church in Bolton Hill, Baltimore.
Born in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, Dr. Su began piano lessons at the age of four. She earned a bachelor’s degree in piano while minoring in French horn at the National Kaohsiung Normal University in Taiwan. She furthered her pursuit of musical excellence, obtaining a Master of Music, a Graduate Performance Diploma, and a Doctor of Musical Arts from the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University, where she primarily studied under Seth Knopp and Benjamin Pasternack. Dr. Su currently serves on the faculty at Georgetown University and Loyola University Maryland.
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