All posts by Laura Williams

Upcoming British Music Performances at Duke

Upcoming British music performances at Duke
Upcoming British music performances at Duke

A weekend of British music begins this Friday, Nov. 3, with a performance by The Villiers Quartet at 8:00 p.m. in Baldwin Auditorium.

The Villiers Quartet is quickly establishing a reputation as champions of 20th-21st century British (and American) music. This concert in Duke’s Baldwin Auditorium, part of their 2017 North American tour, features a wonderful balance of the lushly romantic Delius (in its original 1916 version), the lyrical poise of American composer/violinist Andrew Waggoner’s recent score Every Sentient Being, and unusual British pieces from the 1920s (Bush’s Dialectic) and 1950s (Fricker’s Quartet No. 2).

The Villiers are currently Quartet-in-Residence at Oxford University. The Strad hailed them as among the most charismatic and “adventurous” players on the scene.  The Villiers Quartet has released several highly-acclaimed CDs on Naxos which are available from the Duke Music Library, most recently a recording of the Delius String Quartet (original and revised versions) and the Elgar String Quartet.

The public is invited to attend a pre-concert talk given by Daniel Grimley (Merton College, Oxford) at 7:00 p.m. in the Library Seminar Room, Biddle Music Building (adjacent to Baldwin Auditorium).

On Saturday, Nov. 4, at 5:00 p.m. in the Nelson Music Room on Duke’s East Campus, British composer Frank Bridge’s Piano Trio No. 2 (1929), widely considered to be one of his greatest chamber works, will be featured in a concert by violinist Hsiao-mei Ku, Professor in the Duke Department of Music and member of the Ciompi Quartet; pianist R. Larry Todd, Arts and Sciences Professor of Music at Duke; and cellist David Meyer of the North Carolina Symphony.  Listen to a performance of this piece through the Duke Music Library subscription to the Naxos online streaming service.

These two concerts are part of the symposium, British Music & Europe in the Age of Brexit, presented by the Duke University Department of Music and Franklin Humanities Institute: Humanities Futures.

 

Spanish keyboard festival at Duke

Spanish keyboard festival at Duke University

The Duke University Music Department hosts the International Festival of Spanish Keyboard Music this week.  Special highlights of the festival are a  harpsichord concert in the Nelson Music Room at 8 pm on June 2nd by acclaimed Spanish keyboardist and scholar Luisa Morales and a performance of Spanish organ music from the 16th and 17th centuries by distinguished Duke University Organist and Professor Robert Parkins on June 4th at 8 pm in the Duke Chapel.  Admission to both concerts is free.