Civitas Ensemble to Perform Music by Chinese Composers on Feb. 26

Chicago, Ill. – Civitas Ensemble is pleased to announce its program for its Winter Concert 2 on Monday, Feb. 26 at 7:30 p.m. at Galvin Recital Hall at Northwestern University, 70 Arts Circle Drive, Evanston, and its performance on Saturday, March 4 at 2 p.m. at the Art Institute of Chicago. Tickets for the Feb. 26 concert at $8 general admission and $5 for students. Tickets for the March 4 concert are $33.

Both concerts will feature three works by living Chinese-born composers as well as a traditional Chinese folk piece for piano and pipa, a traditional Chinese instrument. The program will include:

• “Emanations of Tara” by Yao Chen This piece for violin, cello, piano, clarinet, and pipa was commissioned by the Fromm Music Foundation at Harvard University and dedicated to Civitas Ensemble, which premiered it in 2015. Written by Yao Chen, a Chinese composer who studied at the University of Chicago and now lives in Beijing, the piece is a musical tribute to the Tibetan goddess Tara, who is able to manifest in a rainbow of colors and comes alive in green, gold, blue, red and white.

• “Five Elements” by Zhou Long Written for violin, cello, clarinet, flute/piccolo, percussion and pipa, this piece was also composed for and premiered by Civitas Ensemble in 2015 with a commission from the Chinese Fine Arts Society and represents Chinese philosophies ruled by earth, fire, water, metal and wood.

• “Tibetan Dance” by Bright Sheng Written in 2000 by Bright Sheng, a Chinese-born composer who is now on faculty at the University of Michigan, this piece for violin, clarinet and piano is based on the rhythm and melodic motive of a Tibetan folk dance from Qinghai, a Chinese province near the border of Tibet where the composer lived when he was a teenager.

• “Chun Jiang Hua Yue Ye" (A Moonlit Night on the Spring River) This ancient Chinese folk melody has been popular in China since the Ming Dynasty. Its earliest score was first seen on handwritten copies around 1820, and in 1895 it was collected in 13 Sets of Pipa Music Scores by Li Fangyuan. This version is for pipa and piano and was arranged by composer Wu ZuQiang.

Three guest artists will be joining the ensemble at both the Feb. 26 and March 4 concerts: Chen Yihan (pipa), Cynthia Yeh (percussion) and Emma Gerstein (flute/piccolo).

The performance at the Art Institute of Chicago is part of the museum’s Chamber Music series, and concert tickets include admission to the museum. Stay after the concert to learn more about Chinese history as told through its Bronze Age culture.

Civitas is made up of three members of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra — Yuan‐Qing Yu, violin and Assistant Concertmaster; Kenneth Olsen, Assistant Principal cello; and J. Lawrie Bloom, clarinet and bass clarinet — as well as Winston Choi, head of the Piano Department at Roosevelt University’s College of the Performing Arts.

PERFORMANCE DETAILS

DATE: February 26, 7:30 p.m.
VENUE: Galvin Recital Hall at Northwestern University, 70 Arts Circle Drive, Evanston, 60208
TICKETS: $8 general admission, $5 students. Purchase tickets at http://events.music.northwestern.edu/content/j-lawrie-bloom-clarinet-civitas-ensemble

DATE: March 4, 2 p.m.
VENUE: Fullerton Hall at the Art Institute of Chicago, 11 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago, 66003
TICKETS: $33. Purchase tickets at https://cso.org/ticketsandevents/subscriptions/cso-chamber-at-aic/

CIVITAS ENSEMBLE MISSION

Civ­i­tas is a cham­ber music ensem­ble with a three­fold mis­sion: to present engag­ing live per­for­mances of new and tra­di­tional works; to inspire a young gen­er­a­tion of clas­si­cal musi­cians; and to bring the heal­ing power of music to those with lim­ited access to live performances.

ABOUT CIVITAS ENSEMBLE

Civitas Ensemble was founded by members of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 2011. The ensemble presents repertoire spanning four centuries of music history and also nurtures relationships with living composers to introduce audiences to exciting new works.

Civitas has performed at various venues, including the Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park and with Yo-Yo Ma at the 2012 Chicago Humanities Festival. The group’s performance on WFMT was selected by the station as the one of the “Best of Live Broadcasts in 2012,” and the ensemble has received rave reviews from the Chicago Tribune, Chicago Classical Review, and Chicago on the Aisle.

Civitas Ensemble is the recipient of grants from the Driehaus Foundation MacArthur Arts Fund, the Albert Pick Jr. Fund, the Leslie Fund, the Dolores Kohl Educational Fund, The Sage Foundation, the Aaron Copland Fund for Music, the Illinois Arts Council, and is supported by Judith and Scott McCue and the Elizabeth F. Cheney Foundation.