Left Coast Chamber Ensemble presents Sonnets to Orpheus

Left Coast Chamber Ensemble continues its 25th anniversary season with a program exploring the enduring fascination of the ancient Greek myth of Orpheus, the legendary musician, poet, and prophet endowed with the ability to charm all living things with his music. It has intrigued composers from every century because music is the story’s true hero, defying death and despair. In this concert Left Coast musicians perform excerpts from Claudio Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo, a late Renaissance/early Baroque opera from 1609, Christoph Willibald Gluck’s Dance of the Blessed Spirits, first performed in Vienna in 1762, and the late 20th century work, Sonnets to Orpheus for Soprano, Oboe, String Quartet, and Piano by Eric Moe, along with a new arrangement of music composed for the 1958 film Black Orpheus.

To complement these works, LCCE has commissioned Iranian-born composer Aida Shirazi to provide the newest addition to the Orpheus repertoire. Shirazi refers to her new piece for flute, violin, viola, and cello as "a myth, reimagined as a surreal miniature."

"Musicians gravitate toward the story of Orpheus and Eurydice, happy to see that music is powerful enough to changes fate's path and turn away death,” explained Anna Presler, LCCE Artistic Director. “The subject fascinated the earliest opera composers, and has maintained its hold on our imagination right up to the present day."

A special addition to this concert is the performance of the LCCE’s 2017 Composition Contest winning piece by Chiayu Hsu, Rhapsody Toccata with guest pianist Dr. Katy Luo.