Pianist Amy Dorfman and cellist Michael Samis will perform a recital at the Blair School of Music’s Turner Hall, Thursday, February 12, at 8 pm. Aptly scheduled on Abraham Lincoln’s birthday, the performance explores music by composers who had a voice in human rights, standing for equality in their daily lives and through their music.
A brief overview before each work highlights the individual composer’s efforts toward the proliferation of equal opportunity and freedom. The program opens with the energetic Romanian Folk Dances of Béla Bartók. This celebration of the under-respected Hungarian peasant music became a voice for all people; a stark contrast to the imposing Germanic fascism of the early 20th century.
The performance includes the moving sonata by British Romantic composer, Dame Ethel Smyth. Smyth became involved in Britain’s women’s suffrage movement, and eventually spent time in prison because of her activities. Paired with Smyth’s rarely-heard sonata is the well-known and loved A-Major sonata by Ludwig van Beethoven, who advocated for equality and democracy. This sonata was the first to match the piano and cello equally, with the two instruments answering each other back-and-forth in perfect symmetry.
This program is free and open to the public.
Bartók Romanian Folk Dances
Smyth Cello Sonata, Op.5
Beethoven Cello Sonata A major, Op 69
ABOUT MICHAEL SAMIS: Fanfare Magazine (Nov./Dec. 2014) stated that Samis’s playing places him “in the very highest echelon of the world’s living cellists.” He is recognized for his “golden tone and commanding technique” (Nashville Scene), “haunting” tone (The Cincinnati Post), and “shining and expressive” playing (The Tennessean). In 2013, he gave what was likely the U.S. premiere of Carl Reinecke’s Cello Concerto with the Gateway Chamber Orchestra, and released a debut solo album on the Delos label in 2014. Samis is Co-Principal Cellist of the Grammy®-nominated Gateway Chamber Orchestra, Principal Cellist with the Nashville Opera Orchestra, and was a 15-year member of the Nashville Symphony.
ABOUT AMY DORFMAN: Pianist Amy Dorfman has performed as a soloist and chamber musician throughout the United States and in Europe. Ms. Dorfman combines in her playing a gentle touch and musical sensitivity with what critics describe as a “formidable technique…exciting and energetic.” For over twenty years, Dorfman has accompanied the great American bass virtuoso Edgar Meyer performing in such series as the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in Alice Tully Hall and Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, as well as on NPR’s St. Paul Sunday Morning and The Lonesome Pine Special. She has performed with the Blair String Quartet in chamber music series in Memphis, Sedona, Arizona and Music Mountain in Connecticut.