Russian Cellist Joins WMS for Masterworks Concert Season Opener
Award-winning cellist Alexander Buzlov will join the West Michigan Symphony on Friday and Saturday, Oct. 28 and 29, at 7:30 p.m. for the first Masterworks concert of the 2011-2012 season.
MUSKEGON, MI, October 12, 2011 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Award-winning cellist Alexander Buzlov will join the West Michigan Symphony on Friday and Saturday, Oct. 28 and 29, at 7:30 p.m. for the first Masterworks concert of the 2011-2012 season.
The evening will feature:
• Michael Daugherty, "Oh, Lois!"
• Edward Elgar, Cello Concerto in E minor, Op. 85, featuring Buzlov
• Johannes Brahams, Symphony no. 3 in F major, Op. 90
This will be Buzlov's third visit to the West Michigan Symphony and his sixth time working with Music Director Scott Speck. His beautiful and evocative cello will be showcased in Edward Elgar's haunting Cello Concerto. More information, as well as expanded program notes with audio samples for all masterworks concerts, is available online at the Symphony's website.
While in the area, Buzlov will also conduct a master class with students from North Muskegon High School on Wednesday, Oct. 26, at 1:30 p.m. Three students will perform, and Buzlov will provide each with individual feedback and suggestions for improvement as well as address the rest of the class.
"Alexander Buzlov is able to create some of the most beautiful cello sounds I have ever heard," Speck said. "His music is both powerful and sensitive. He and I first collaborated about eight years ago, which was Alex's very first performance with a symphony orchestra in the United States. It is very gratifying to see his meteoric international success since that time.
"He has been a favorite of our audiences since first performing Dvorak for us. Alex is constantly working with some of the world's greatest living musicians, and we are delighted to welcome him back to the Frauenthal to perform with the West Michigan Symphony."
Speck and the Symphony will begin the evening with the "faster-than-a-speeding-bullet" tempo of Michael Daugherty's "Oh, Lois!" The five-minute concert opener evokes intrepid newspaper reporter Lois Lane flying alongside Superman. The composition creates the dramatic feel of danger and excitement through the use of an expanded percussion section, and Speck says audiences should prepare for a wild ride.
Daugherty, who served as the composer-in-residence for WMS from 2005-06, blends an avid interest in comic books with his careers as a professional musician and professor of composition at the University of Michigan. He has used Superman as a "compositional metaphor in order to create an independent musical world" that is able to express the "energies, ambiguities, paradoxes and wit of American popular culture."
The night will also feature Elgar's Cello Concerto, which premiered following the end of World War I and is said to be his last great work. Speck said the piece is "one of the most emotional and heartfelt pieces in the repertoire."
Elgar was a product of late nineteenth-century Romanticism, and was influenced by the works of Schumann, Brahms, Wagner and Dvorak. The Cello Concerto is Elgar at his best, though the piece is dark and filled with sadness and disillusionment. Elgar wanted the cello to dominate the work. While the orchestral forces are large, the writing is always scaled down, never overpowering the soloist who plays nearly continuously.
Speck said that Cello Concerto will be a fitting showcase for Buzlov's incredible talents. A native of Moscow, Buzlov began studying cello at the age of 6. He is a graduate of The Moscow Conservatory and is currently enrolled in the Conservatory's postgraduate program. He has performed in the United States with symphonies in Washington, Illinois and Alabama, in addition to playing with the Moscow Chamber Orchestra at Carnegie Hall after winning the Guzile Foundation Career Grant in 2004.
Buzlov has been the recipient of several awards for his skill and performance, including winning the Vishnevskaya and Rostropovich Foundation Prize at the 2007 International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow and first prize and the audience prize at the 35th Jeunesse Musicale International Cello Competition in Belgrade in 2005.
"Johannes Brahms wrote four symphonies, and for many people, the third is their favorite," said Speck, "It is played less often than all the others, though, simply for the fact that the last minute of the piece is quiet. But the piece is full of energy and vitality, especially in the first and last movements. And the slow movement is one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard."
Season and individual tickets can be purchased by calling the West Michigan Symphony ticket office at 231.726.3231. Several subscriber plans are available including the full series, Masterworks series only, pop series only or flexible ticketing that allows concertgoers to create their own experience. For more information or to receive a 2011-2012 season brochure, contact 231.726.3231 or info@westmichigansymphony.org.
Single tickets may be purchased online at www.westmichigansymphony.org; in person at the West Michigan Symphony Ticket Office, Suite 409 (4th floor) in the Frauenthal Center for the Performing Arts, 425 W. Western Ave., Muskegon; or by calling 231.726.3231.
About West Michigan Symphony
As one of the few professional regional orchestras in Michigan, West Michigan Symphony has played a leading role in the region's cultural community for more than 70 years. Founded as the West Shore Symphony Orchestra, WMS now serves a regional audience with eight pairs of concerts annually, along with dozens of educational and outreach activities for children and adults. WMS oversees operations for the West Michigan Youth Symphony. For more information, visit www.westmichigansymphony.org.
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