Image Credit: Steve Sherman

ANNANDALE-ON-HUDSON, N.Y.— The Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College presents the American Symphony Orchestra (ASO), Friday, February 6 and Saturday, February 7 at 8 p.m. The program includes Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Symphony No. 4; Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Violin Concerto in D Major; and Carl Reinecke, Flute Concerto, and features Concerto Competition winners Gabriel Baeza ’18, violin, and Adrienn Kántor ’14, flute. The concert will be conducted by Leon Botstein, music director. A special preconcert talk by Peter Laki, visiting associate professor of music, begins at 7 p.m. Individual tickets are $25, $30, $35, and $40. Call 845-758-7900 or visit the Fisher Center website at fishercenter.bard.edu to purchase tickets or for further information. Season subscriptions are available. For more information, contact the box office at
845-758-7900. 

The program for the final concert of the season, on April 24 and 25, includes Hermann Goetz’s Symphony No. 2 in F Major, Op. 9; Alberto Ginastera’s Harp Concerto, Xing Gao ’17, harp; and Leoš Janáček’s Sinfonietta.

Originally from Puerto Rico, Gabriel Baeza ’18 is in his second year at The Bard College Conservatory of Music, where he was chosen as a winner of the 2014 Concerto Competition. He began playing the violin at age four, studying in the Suzuki method, and at age 11 moved to the precollege division of the Conservatorio de Musica de Puerto Rico in San Juan, where he studied with Francisco Caban. He completed a year of undergraduate studies there before coming to Bard, where he studies with Daniel Phillips. He plans to choose Italian studies as his second major. In June 2014, he performed with the Conservatory Orchestra in Warsaw, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Budapest, Vienna, Bratislava, Prague, and Berlin during a three-week concert tour.

Adrienn Kántor ’14 has performed in 11 countries in the past five years, beginning an international career as a soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral flutist. She played in Carnegie Hall at the age of 19, and was praised for “her graceful adornment in the slow movement of the Brahms Double Concerto and the rapid fluttering passage work in

the finale of the Beethoven Symphony No. 3.” As an orchestral musician, she has performed on side-by-side concerts with the American Symphony Orchestra and was selected for the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s mentoring scheme. Kántor is a prize winner of the New York Flute Club’s Competition, the Bard Conservatory’s Concerto Competition, and two concerto competitions at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, where she will perform flute concertos by Carl Reinecke and Carl Nielsen with the RCS Orchestra in 2015. She graduated from Bard with a B.A. in German studies and a B.Music in flute performance, studying with Tara Helen O’Connor. She is currently pursuing her M.Music degree at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland under Alison Mitchell.

Leon Botstein, Conductor

Leon Botstein is now in his 23rd year as music director and principal conductor of the American Symphony Orchestra (ASO). He has been hailed for his visionary zeal, often creating concert programs that give audiences a once-in-a lifetime chance to hear live performances of works that are ignored in the standard repertory, and inviting music lovers to listen in their own way to create a personal experience. At the same time he brings his distinctive style to core repertory works. He is also artistic codirector of Bard SummerScape and the Bard Music Festival, which take place at The Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College, where he has been president since 1975. He is also conductor laureate of the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, where he served as music director from 2003–2011.

Botstein leads an active schedule as a guest conductor all over the world, and can be heard on numerous recordings with the London Symphony (including its Grammy-nominated recording of Popov’s First Symphony), the London Philharmonic, NDR-Hamburg, and the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra. Many of his live performances with the ASO are available online, where they have cumulatively sold more than a quarter of a million downloads. Upcoming engagements include the Royal Philharmonic and Russian National Orchestra. Recently he conducted the Taipei Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl, and Sinfónica Juvenil de Caracas in Venezuela and Japan, becoming the first non-Venezuelan conductor invited by El Sistema to conduct on a tour.

Botstein is highly regarded as a music historian. His most recent book is Von Beethoven zu Berg: Das Gedächtnis der Moderne (2013). He is the editor of The Musical Quarterly and author of numerous articles and books. He is currently working on a sequel to Jefferson’s Children, about the American education system. For his contributions to music he has received the award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and Harvard University’s prestigious Centennial Award, as well as the Cross of Honor, First Class, from the government of Austria. Other recent awards include the Caroline P. and Charles W. Ireland Prize, the highest award given by the University of Alabama; the Bruckner Society’s Julio Kilenyi Medal of Honor, for his interpretations of that  composer’s music; the Leonard Bernstein Award for the Elevation of Music in Society; and Carnegie Foundation’s Academic Leadership Award. In 2011 he was inducted into the American Philosophical Society.

About The Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College

Named for the late Richard B. Fisher, the former chair of Bard’s Board of Trustees, the Fisher Center has become an influential force in performing arts programming, earning critical acclaim for innovative productions of opera, orchestral, chamber, dance, and theater programs. The Center was designed by legendary architect Frank Gehry and distinguished acoustician Yasuhisa Toyota, and has received international praise for its breathtaking architecture and superb sound.

Each summer the Fisher Center presents the Bard SummerScape festival, eight weeks of performing arts programs reflecting the life and times of the featured composer of the esteemed Bard Music Festival, now celebrating its 26th year. Fall and spring seasons include original productions, special one-night-only concerts, and touring artists from around the globe.

The Fisher Center is home to the Bard College Theater & Performance and Dance Programs, providing students access to exceptional theater facilities and opportunities to work with professional directors and dramaturges on publicly attended productions throughout the year. Live Arts Bard, a residency and commissioning program, is a laboratory for professional artists in theater, dance, and performance to test ideas and develop new projects, many of which premiere at the Fisher Center. The Bard College Conservatory of Music and the Bard College Music Program stage regular orchestral and chamber concerts.

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January 16, 2015