Portsmouth Chamber Music Announces Concert Series

From Canoe Harbor Consulting: Subscriptions are now on sale for Historic Portsmouth Chamber Music. The 2017 series of four concerts kicks off Sunday, June 11, 2017 at 3pm with the Neave Piano Trio. Additional concerts will take place in July, September and October. Historic Portsmouth Chamber Music is produced by the Portsmouth Athenaeum.

All concerts take place at 3:00pm. The 2017 Historic Portsmouth Chamber Music lineup includes:

June 11: Neave Piano Trio at New Castle Congregational Church will present a musical journey through cultures and periods, from the Gallic charm of Debussy's Trio in G Major, to Romantic New Englander Arthur Foote's Trio in B Flat, to the passionate tango of Argentinian Piazzolla's Estaciones Portenas.

July 9: Central4 Piano Quartet at St. John’s Church in Portsmouth will perform a delightfully varied program including Frank Bridge's lush and romantic Phantasy in F# minor, Aaron Copland's Piano Quartet, and British composer William Walton's exuberant Piano Quartet in D minor. The program will end with a Romantic classic, the Andante Cantabile movement of Robert Schumann's Piano Quartet in E-flat.

September 17: Guitarist Jose Lezcano, violinist Jennifer Elowitch, and members of the Portland Chamber Music Festival join together to play a program of music for guitar and strings at South Church in Portsmouth. The program will include Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s sunny and lyrical masterpiece, The Guitar Quintet; Luigi Boccherini’s exciting Fandango from his Quintet in D minor for guitar and strings, and a virtuoso Sonata Concertante for guitar and violin by Paganini. Lezcano will also present one of his own compositions for guitar and strings, Mojito y Habano, in its premiere performance.

October 15: The Omer Quartet returns to Portsmouth’s North Church this year with Bartok's Quartet Number 3, which the group is preparing for the June Borciani Competition in Italy. The program will also include Schumann’s Opus 41, no. 1, a quartet full of lyricism and love, which the composer presented to his wife Clara on her 23rd birthday.

“This year, Historic Portsmouth Chamber Music is pleased to introduce audiences to the stunning Neave Trio and talented guitarist Jose Lezcano as we welcome back beloved favorites Omer Quartet and the Central4 Piano Quartet,” said Bill Wieting, chairman of the Portsmouth Athenaeum Performance Committee. “Subscriptions are a great way to make sure you don’t miss any of these rising star musicians’ performances.”

Audience members planning to attend all four concerts are encouraged to purchase a Series Subscription for $75.00 per person. The Portsmouth Athenaeum also offers Series Patronage for $250 per person, which includes all four concerts plus an invitation to a post-concert reception after each event.

There is a suggested $20 at-the-door donation for each concert for those attendees who do not wish to subscribe to the full series.

Those interested in subscriptions or patronage can mail a check made out to The Portsmouth Athenaeum, P.O. Box 848, Portsmouth, NH 03802 with “HPCM” noted on the memo line.

For more information on Historic Portsmouth Chamber Music or the Portsmouth Athenaeum, please visit here.

Photos courtesy of Canoe Harbor Consulting