Tonight we feature Clara Schumann’s Three Romances for violin and piano, the Popper Requiem in F Sharp minor, Op. 66 for 3 cellos and the Brahms B Flat Sextet, Op. 18.

Festival Series IV brings the 2018 Season to a close with works by Clara Schumann, David Popper and Johannes Brahms. The Popper Requiem in F Sharp minor, Op. 66, is not a vocal work. However, it capitalizes on the vocal qualities of three cellos in perfect harmony. Balancing the valedictory gravitas of the Popper are the Three Romances of Clara Schumann and the B Flat Sextet, Op. 18 of Johannes Brahms. If the Clarinet Quintet in B minor, Op. 115, represents Autumn, then surely the B Flat Sextet represents Spring. Additional work, TBD. Celebrate the conclusion of the 2018 season in grand melodic style.

The Brahms Sextet in B Flat, Op. 18 is a work that begins in full melodic bloom. From the outset, the cellos predominate, both anchoring the ensemble’s sound and propelling its melodic potential. The inner movements contrast substance in the form of a theme-and-variations movement of stern intensity and a rollicking pastoral scherzo. The Finale is awash in lyricism and ultimately sprints to a joyous conclusion.

The premiere brought together a veritable 19th-century musical triumvirate in the form of violinist Joseph Joachim, pianist Clara Schumann and Brahms himself. We visit A. Morell Wines for the final Tasting Music event of the 2018 season.

Violist, Dr. Marcus Thompson is the Artistic Director of the Boston Chamber Music Society, Institute Professor at MIT and on the faculty of the New England Conservatory. He also has a role in the origin story of WWCMF. You’ll have to attend his Portrait of an Artist recital to find out the details and partake in an incredible evening of music for viola and piano.

We return to the gallery at Foundry Vineyards for this virtuoso recital featuring music of Bach, Mozart, Schubert, Clarke, and Enescu.

Artists: Marcus Thompson, viola and Henry Kramer, piano.

In 1945, World War II had turned decidedly in favor of the Allied Forces. United States GIs moved freely through war-torn Germany, eventually ending up on the front lawn of composer Richard Strauss. It was in this period that Strauss completed his paean to old Europe, Metamorphosen. Alex Ross, writing for The New Yorker, points out that Strauss, born in 1864 and dying in 1949, straddled impossibly disparate worlds, predating the German Empire and outlasting the Third Reich.

Metamorphosen, originally scored for 23 string players, is here condensed into the more intimate ensemble of string septet. Drawing heavily on the influence of Beethoven, Strauss actually quotes the famous Funeral March of Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony and cryptically places the words “In Memoriam!” in the score above the quotation.

This Special Event will explore the deeply moving post-Romantic score, and revel in the lush sorrow of one of this great composer’s final works.

Tonight we feature music by Amy Beach, Joan Tower, Marion Bauer and Gustav Mahler.

Gustav Mahler is known as the composer of ten-ish unwieldy Symphonies, numerous song cycles, and as one of the most polarizing musical figures of the late 19th century. Noticeably absent from his compositional output are any substantive chamber works. There is one exception, however, that of a single movement for piano quartet in A minor. We pair Mahler’s single movement with music by three American composers, Amy Beach, Marion Bauer and Joan Tower.

Originally hailing from Walla Walla (woo-hoo!), Marion Bauer made her mark in New York City as a composer, author and professor, influencing such luminaries as Aaron Copland and Milton Babbitt. She was also the first in a long line of Americans to study with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. Her three-movement Sonata for Viola and Piano, Op. 22, is required listening for any self-respecting music-loving resident or visitor to the Walla Walla Valley.

Rounding out the program are two works for flute and string quartet, the Theme and Variations, Op. 80, by Amy Beach and Rising, by Joan Tower (2009).

Amy Beach, or “Mrs. H. H. A. Beach,” as she was credited in her published music, was arguably the most important homegrown composer in the United States at the end of the 19th century.

A fixture in the musical scene of Boston, Amy Beach experienced triumphs unheard of for a female composer in Europe or America. She had a mass premiered by Boston’s Handel and Haydn Society in 1895, and her Third Symphony by the Boston Symphony in 1896. Both works received near universal praise from audience and critic alike.

Here we encounter Amy Beach in the more personal and private sphere of chamber music. Using her 1896 composition “An Indian Lullaby” as the principle theme, Beach shows her flair for romantic invention in this moving set of variations for flute and string quartet.

WWCMF is pleased to visit Doubleback Winery for the first time in their brand new facility.

Flutist Sarah Brady has been a Festival regular since her first visit in 2011. She is known for her commitment to pioneering modern music as a member of the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, and she is a devoted teacher at the Boston Conservatory. You might also find her onstage with the Boston Symphony or at a music festival in Italy. It just depends on the week.

Sarah gave a Portrait of an Artist performance back in 2013, but we feel greedy for having staged that event at a venue with only about 75 seats. This time we’ll give Sarah room to stretch out a bit and welcome a capacity crowd to beautiful Pepper Bridge Winery. Her program includes music by Jacques Ibert, Claude Debussy, Judith Shatin, and Ned McGowan.

Artists: Sarah Brady, flute and Henry Kramer, piano.

A Festival tradition since 2010, Collage returns to the bucolic super-venue, Abeja Winery. Out go the stainless steel tanks, and in come the steely-eyed virtuosos of WWCMF. This season, Collage finds inspiration in the world of dance. From ballet to modern to hip-hop, music composed for dance has consistently been at the forefront of innovation. We’ll have you tapping your toes and practicing your pliés with music by Tchaikovsky, Britten, Gershwin and PROJECT Trio.

A Festival tradition since 2010, Collage returns to the bucolic super-venue, Abeja Winery. Out go the stainless steel tanks, and in come the steely-eyed virtuosos of WWCMF. This season, Collage finds inspiration in the world of dance. From ballet to modern to hip-hop, music composed for dance has consistently been at the forefront of innovation. We’ll have you tapping your toes and practicing your pliés with music by Tchaikovsky, Britten, Gershwin and PROJECT Trio.

After a six-year hiatus, WWCMF is delighted to welcome back PROJECT Trio. PROJECT Trio first participated in the inaugural Winter Festival back in January 2012. The intervening years have seen the prolific genre-bending group tour the world over.

Playing to packed houses wherever they go, their unique blend of compositional style and improvisational savvy reveals myriad influences from jazz standards to classical warhorses to who-knows-what. This event will sell out quickly, so make it a personal PROJECT to get tickets ASAP!

Tonight we feature music of Robert Schumann, György Kurtág, Josh Burel and Andrew Norman.

Our second Festival Series performance invites the clarinet to the fore with works old and new. Robert Schumann, ever given to flights of fantasy, composed his Märchenerzählungen, Op.132 near the end of his compositional life. Loosely translated as “Fairy Tales,” this work for piano, viola, and clarinet does not tell any specific fairy tale but rather evokes certain tropes such as sparkling elven mischief, regal pomp and the lyricism of loneliness. György Kurtag provides modernist counterpoint to Schumann’s foray into the magical with his Hommage à Robert Schumann for the same instrumentation.

Also on the program are works by 21st-century composers Josh Burel and Andrew Norman. Burel, in his Andooni for clarinet quintet, mourns the Armenian genocide of 1915-1923 and Norman, in his Gran Turismo for eight violins imagines an Italian baroque ensemble revving its engines at the speed of an F1 race car. Though each piece inhabits its own unique sphere, each work shares an essential component of storytelling that looks both to the past and the future.

Composed in 2004 for the violin studio of famed pedagogue Robert Lipsett at the University of Southern California, Gran Turismo is a virtuosic masterpiece for the rarely heard combination of eight violins. In fact, when eight violinists get together, a competition usually breaks out. The music world is a network wherein one or two degrees of separation are common among professional performers. Rather than insular, such closeness is a testament to the common paths and experiences shared by so many who “make it.” Here, the musicians of WWCMF pay homage to the original context of the work featuring an ensemble of teachers and their students past and present, all navigating the music world at different stages of career and education. As Founder and Artistic Director, I am always keenly aware of my lineage and make it a point to pay respect to the teachers who made me into the musician I am today.

Gran Turismo represents the intersection between composer Andrew Norman’s study of Italian Futurist Giacomo Balla and his brush with the popular car racing video game, Gran Turismo. Start your engines!

Violinist, Alessandra Jennings Flanagan (Ali) makes her WWCMF debut. Ali has been a member of the Fort Worth and Colorado Symphonies, holding leadership positions in both organizations. A graduate of the prestigious Shepard School of Music at Rice University and frequent participant summer programs such as Tanglewood and Yellowbarn, Ali now comes west to bring us a program that includes music by Mozart, Copland, Smetana and Clara Schumann. Expect a cameo from Festival regular and dad, Andrew Jennings, too. This special recital affords a unique view into the life of a great violinist from an extremely musical family.

Artists: Alessandra Jennings Flanagan, violin and Oxana Ejokina, piano.

Tonight we feature a World Premiere by composer Texu Kim, plus music of Beethoven and Clara Schumann with the Volta Piano Trio.

To kick off the 2018 Festival Series, WWCMF welcomes longtime friends, the Volta Piano Trio to perform the masterpiece by composer and pianist Clara Schumann, the Piano Trio in G minor, Op. 17. It is often said that Clara Schumann took a backseat to her more famous husband, Robert. However, this is incorrect on two counts. First, Clara was known as a virtuoso pianist of the highest order throughout Europe, her fame exceeding that of her hubby during her 60-plus-year performing career. Second, you can’t take a backseat when you are the one driving the bus!

Also on the program is the world premiere of a duo for violin and cello by the composer Texu Kim and the Quartet in D Major, Op. 18, No. 3 by Beethoven. It is a concert of firsts…

Beethoven’s creative life is divided into three neat sections, Early, Middle and Late. The Early Period is defined by his tendency to shake up convention and thwart expectations with persistent and needling harmonic escapades and emphatic rhythmic accentuations where they don’t belong. You may recognize this text from Portrait of an Artist I, Stephen Miahky 2.0, violin. Here at the Festival, we support recycling!

For our first Tasting Music presentation of the 2018 Season, we return to Walla Walla Vintners for an outdoor performance, weather permitting (bring a sweater or cardigan… it can be chilly, indoors or out!). We will explore Beethoven’s very first string quartet, his Quartet in D, Op. 18, No. 3 (don’t worry, we’ll explain all the numbers, and how something called “No. 3” can actually be No. 1).

With Haydn more or less out of the picture, Beethoven turned his attention from smaller forms like the string trio to the medium invented and perfected by Haydn before him, that of the string quartet. Publishing the work in 1801, Beethoven shows himself to be a quick study, seemingly mastering the sophisticated and conversational style of his former teacher with aplomb. Perhaps this will be your first string quartet… If so, like Beethoven before you, you have struck gold!

Beethoven’s creative life is divided into three neat sections, Early, Middle and Late. The Early Period is defined by his tendency to shake up convention and thwart expectations with persistent and needling harmonic escapades and emphatic rhythmic accentuations where they don’t belong. In the Middle Period, Beethoven confronts form itself, testing the limits of Classical proportion. In the Late Period, Beethoven moves into a completely uncharted territory, looking ever inward. His shadow would loom large across the 19th century and beyond.

Here in the 21st century, we have the opportunity to visit with a remarkable violinist and WWCMF Lifer, Stephen Miahky. Steve played the first-ever June Portrait of an Artist recital back in 2013. He was in his Early Period back then. Life has thrown a lot his way in the last half-decade, and he has thrown a lot back. Welcome to his Middle Period!

Kick off the 2018 June Festival at Rasa Vineyards with Portrait of an Artist, Stephen Miahky 2.0. Back in 2013, we didn’t have the capacity to program works with piano at satellite locations like Rasa, but thanks to the inspired work of the Walla Walla Piano Group, we now benefit from a magnificent Steinway Grand in all of our locations. The program will include music of Mozart, Bach, Debussy/Heifetz, Mark O’Connor, and Ysaÿe.

Artists: Stephen Miahky, violin; with Kristin Vining, piano; and Christina McGann, violin