It can be demanding for any musician to play a concerto, which is a piece of music that features a soloist accompanied by orchestra usually written for the purpose of showing off the soloist’s technical and artistic skill.
In most symphony performances, a single concerto is played as the highlight of the performance. However, during “Asheville Symphony’s Artist Residency: A Celebration of the Violin,” husband and wife duo Noah Bendix-Balgley and Shanshan Yao will take the stage for a program made up of three violin concertos.
“Programming an all-concerto performance is almost unheard of because of the technical demands that it puts on a single artist,” said Asheville Symphony Executive Director Daniel Crupi. “However, Noah and Shanshan are both at the pinnacle of their fields—Noah leads the Berlin Philharmonic as Concertmaster and Shanshan previously was a member of the New York Philharmonic. Together, they will tackle a program that would be impossible for many violinists.”
Asheville Symphony Music Director Darko Butorac says that the program for “Masterworks 5: Violin Virtuosi” will “feature three distinct violin experiences.”
“Masterworks 5: Violin Virtuosi” will start off with a baroque masterpiece, Bach’s Double Violin Concerto, before going into Butterfly Lovers, an ionic Chinese work for violin and orchestra that features virtuosic and intertwining melodies. The grand finale will feature Bendix-Balgley alone as he takes on Brahm’s technically demanding violin concerto, which Butorac calls “one of the most beautiful works ever written for violin and orchestra.”
“Masterworks 5: Violin Virtuosi” will serve one of the major highlights of Asheville Symphony’s first-ever Artist Residency, which for its inaugural year celebrates the impact and the legacy of the violin. The March 11-18 residency will feature Bendix-Balgley and Yao and include a series of 11…
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