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Welcome to The Berkeley Hillside Club Concert Series. Our
goal is to provide a superb venue for musicians and listeners
to experience the joy of live music performance. Come join us in
our historic and acoustically excellent hall and see why artists
and audiences are raving about our Concert Series.
Our concerts generally begin at 8:00 pm (please check the
individual concert listing for the exact time), and our doors
open about one half hour before show time. Tickets are available at
the door; we do not offer advance ticket sales.
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"Songs For The Dead And The Living"
Adam Shulman - piano
Katy Stephan - voice
Joseph Hébert - cello
Friday February 19th at 8:00pm
Admission $15 ($10 for HSC members and Seniors)
The Berkeley Hillside Club
2286 Cedar Street
Berkeley 94709
Info: (510) 845-1350
The Berkeley Hillside Club is proud to present these three
stellar artists in a program of original art songs. Don't miss
the opportunity to hear these superb players performing in our
acoustically-excellent hall.
The Program:
If you asked a bebop jazz pianist and a session singer to
name some of their favorite songs, you might not expect works
by Franz Schubert or Maurice Ravel to be at the top of the
list. But when Adam Shulman and Katy Stephan
discovered their mutual affection for 19th century art songs,
the two decided to write some of their own.
Known for his bebop chops, Shulman has long been the pianist
for the Marcus Shelby Jazz Orchestra and has played with jazz
greats such as Paula West, Bobby Hutcherson and with the Glen
Miller Orchestra. Stephan's voice has been featured in several
film scores and television ads, and on Sunday and Tuesday nights
she helms the piano bar Martuni's, where she's known for her
versatility, easily transitioning between pop songs, standards,
show tunes, and opera.
But both grew up playing and listening to classical music.
"I have the sound of that harmony in my ear," Shulman says, "but in
my present career, I never get a chance to play or write in that
style."
Both Shulman and Stephan wanted to try to compose unique,
original songs in a classical style. The two collaborated on the
songs over several months - in some cases working separately and
later combining their efforts, and in others working together to
construct melody and harmony simultaneously.
The result is a song cycle for voice and piano, entitled
Songs For The Dead And The Living. Ranging in mood from
lush and dramatic to sparkling and whimsical, the songs are
patterned after the classical art songs of the 19th century
Romantics and early 20th century Impressionists.
Accompanying Shulman and Stephan for this concert will be
Oakland East Bay Symphony Assistant Principal cellist Joseph
Hébert.
What is an Art Song exactly?
The art song could be considered the prefect marriage of music
and text. An art song, or a collection of art songs, is intended
to stand on its own (which distinguishes it from opera or other
theatrical works), and often utilizes piano accompaniment. But
the piano usually does more than just support the vocal melody,
often functioning as an equal partner with a distinct and
expressive voice.
"An art song is a perfect little gem," explains Stephan. "It
can tell a story, or express the most fleeting mood. It's like
the flash from a camera, capturing something ephemeral in musical
form."
For the listener who enjoys classical music, art song has
the advantage of being presented all on its own, without any
context. You don't have to sit through hours of awkward dialogue
or spear-carrying filler. And for the listener with more of a
pop sensibility, the art song is usually the same duration as a
song you might hear on the radio, but it can offer a much more
dynamic range of expression, color and intensity.
The Artists:
Adam Shulman has been a staple of the San Francisco jazz
scene since he moved to the city in 2002. Before the move, Adam
was a student at UC Santa Cruz where he studied with the great
Smith Dobson and the trumpeter/arranger Ray Brown. He received
his degree in classical performance under the tutelage of the
Russian pianist Maria Ezerova.
Currently, Shulman plays regularly with Marcus Shelby in large
and small group contexts and with Anton Schwartz mostly in a trio
setting. He can also be seen as a sideman with countless bay area
musicians and vocalists such as John Wittala, Vince Lateano,
Kitty Margolis, Andrew Speight, Dayna Stephens, Ian Cary, and
Mike Zilber.
Shulman has played as a sideman with internationally renowned
artists Stefon Harris, Willie Jones III, Miguel Zenon, Luciana
Souza, Paula West, Bobby Hutcherson and with the Glen Miller
Orchestra.
Katy Stephan has created original music for several
live theatre productions, including Under Milk Wood (Porchlight
Theatre), Word For Word's Three Blooms (Magic Theatre),
LysistrataProject (Berkeley Rep), and Bury The Dead (Cooper
Union, New York City). She won a Bay Area Critic's Circle Award
in 2005.
Stephan has recently been a soloist with the Oakland East Bay
Symphony, for their concert of Stephen Sondheim's Follies, and
previously for Leonard Bernstein's Mass. She was a soloist and
chorus member on the Grammy-nominated recording of Mass with Kent
Nagano, the Pacific Mozart Ensemble and the Deutsche Symphonie.
Stephan's first attempt at original songs, recorded at home in November
2005 and posted on her website, was named one of the San Francisco
Chronicle's "Ten Best Local Releases" of the year; and from March
through December of 2006 she wrote, recorded, and posted a new
song once every week (every7days.com). She revived the weekly
songwriting project in January 2010.
Joseph Hébert is Assistant Principal Cello of
the Oakland East Bay Symphony in California, and is Music
Director of a 10,000 member church, where he directs multiple
choirs. Mr. Hébert is also a voting member of the Grammy Awards
Recording Academy.
He has shared the concert stage and recording studio
with renowned artists from the classical and popular music
worlds including: Carlos Santana, Stevie Wonder, Natalie Cole,
Linda Ronstadt, Ray Charles, Harry Connick Jr., Jesse Norman,
Marilyn Horne and a host of others. As a member of the Skywalker
Symphony Orchestra at George Lucas' Skywalker Ranch, Mr. Hébert
has recorded on numerous soundtracks for movies and individual
artist/CD projects.
Hébert served for over 15 years on the faculty of the
University of California at Berkeley where he taught cello,
conducted the String Ensemble, and directed multiple choruses in the
Young Musicians Program; a program that provides music training
scholarships to highly gifted disadvantaged Junior High and High
School students. Joseph studied music at Stanford University,
California State University East Bay (Hayward), and the University of
California at Berkeley.

The Sun Quartet with special guests
In Concert
Saturday February 27th at 8:00pm
Admission $15 ($10 for HSC members and Seniors)
The Berkeley Hillside Club
2286 Cedar Street
Berkeley 94709
Info: (510) 845-1350
The Berkeley Hillside Club is delighted to present one of our
favorite ensembles, joining us this time with special guests, in
an All-Brahms program. Don't miss the opportunity to hear these
superb players performing in our acoustically-excellent hall.
The Ensemble:
The Sun Quartet's members are among the most highly
regarded instrumentalists on the West Coast, and include major
international prize-winners, noted soloists, and esteemed chamber
musicians.. This superb ensemble consists of Sacramento State
faculty members Ian Swensen and Anna Presler on
violin, Anna Kruger on viola, and Andrew Luchansky
on cello. The quartet has performing together since 1994, and
is nationally regarded for their mastery of instrumental color
and driving performance style.
Joining the Sun Quartet for this performance will be special
guest artists Deborah Pittman on clarinet, Emily
Onderdonk on viola and Hans Hoffer on cello.
The Program:
The Sun Quartet and guests will perform two of Brahms'
chamber music masterpieces. The G major Sextet opus 36, an
early deeply personal work and the Clarinet Quintet opus 115,
his final chamber music offering.
In his biography of Brahms, Jan Swafford says of the exuberant
and romantic G major Sextet, "this is a piece about love and
loss-Brahm's particular love and loss and anyones. The meaning
of those notes to him resounds breathtakingly in the music...he
shaped their effect for the listener by craft, every dimension
contributing its part. Melody, harmony, texture,timbre and form
coalesce to make the climax what it is." The last movement is
one of Brahms most glorious and uplifting Finales.
Swafford says of the Clarinet Quintet "nothing competes with
the glory of the instrument "...it raises the a veil of autumn
...wistful sweetness pervades the atmosphere" "In the Quintet
even more than in other works , Brahms also demonstrates as well
as any composer that some of the greatest art exists near the
edges of sentiment.." This work is full of passion and warmth.
The Artists:
Ian Swensen is one of the very few musicians to
have been awarded top prize in both the International Violin
Competition and the International Chamber Music Competition
(as first violinist of the Meliora String Quartet) of the Walter
W. Naumburg Foundation; he received the awards consecutively in
1984 and 1985. Since then he has performed as soloist and chamber
artist in many prestigious concert halls, including Alice Tully
Hall at Lincoln Center, Symphony Hall in Boston, and at the
Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. He has also performed
with the Spoleto, Santa Fe, Aspen, Marlboro, and Chamber Music
West festivals, among others. Swensen studied at the Juilliard
School with Dorothy DeLay and at the Eastman School with Donald
Weilerstein, and has taught at the Longy School at Cambridge,
Florida State University, and Oberlin Conservatory. His recordings
can be found on the Telarc, Mercury, and Musical Heritage labels.
A native of North Carolina, violinist Anna Presler now lives
in Berkeley, California. She is a member of the New Century
Chamber Orchestra and performs with several groups specializing
in 20th century music including the Left Coast Ensemble and the
Onyx Quartet. As a member of the Sun Quartet she serves on the
faculty of California State University in Sacramento. She has
taught at the Center for Chamber Music at Apple Hill in New
Hampshire and participated in festivals at Tanglewood and at
the International Musicians' Program in Cornwall, England. She
holds degrees in music from the North Carolina School of the
Arts and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and a degree
in history from Yale University. Anna currently teaches violin
and music history at CSUS.
As founding violist of the renowned Lark Quartet, Anna
Kruger toured extensively for 13 years throughout the United
States and Europe, to Asia, Australia and New Zealand, Mexico,
Canada, and Russia. Among many competition prizes awarded the Lark
were the Gold Medal in the 1991 Shostakovitch International String
Quartet Competition and the 1990 Naumburg Chamber Music Award.
Highlights of Ms. Kruger's seasons with the Lark include
performances at the Lockenhaus Festival in Austria at the
invitation of Gidon Kremer, the Beethoven Festival at the Pushkin
Museum in Moscow, (under the direction of Sviatoslav Richter),
Lyon's Musicades Festival in France, the Schleswig-Holstein Musik
Festival in Northern Germany, and Mexico's Festival de Musica de
Camera. Major centers where she has performed include NY's Lincoln
Center, the National Gallery and Kennedy Center in Washington,
DC, St. Paul's Ordway Theater, San Francisco's Herbst Theater,
and in the cities of Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Houston,
Honolulu, Chicago, Atlanta, and Indianapolis. She has concertized
abroad in the major cities of London, Paris, Basel, Stockholm,
Munich, Hamburg, Vienna, St. Petersburg and Moscow.
Ms. Kruger has recorded a series of CD's with the Lark Quartet
for Arabesque Recordings, including works by Borodin, Elgar,
Handel, Schickele, Schnittke, Schoenberg, Schumann, Spohr,
and Zemlinsky. She has also recorded works for Decca , New
World, CRI, and Point record labels. Ms. Kruger received her
Bachelor's Degree with High Distinction from Indiana University
and her Master's Degree from the Manhattan School of Music. Her
major teachers have included Abraham Skernick, Karen Tuttle,
James Buswell, Burton Kaplan, and George Neikrug.
Andrew Luchansky earned a Bachelor of Music in cello
performance from the New England Conservatory of Music, and
a Master of Music from State University of New York at Stony
Brook. In addition, he studied chamber music with members of the
Juilliard and Guarneri Quartets, as well as the Beaux Arts Trio.
Prior to joining the Sacramento State faculty in 1993,
Mr. Luchansky served as Professor of Cello at the Florida
State University School of Music, and also as Principal Cellist
with the Tallahassee Symphony. Before joining the FSU faculty,
Mr. Luchansky spent ten years in New York City, where he was a
frequent performer on the stages of Carnegie Hall and Lincoln
Center's Avery Fischer Hall. He has performed in nearly every
other major U.S. city, as well as in Europe. In addition to
teaching at Sacramento State, Mr. Luchansky also coaches chamber
music at the San Francisco Conservatory and has recorded for
the Sony Classical label and was as soloist on the Wesley Snipes
Warner Brothers Film "Sugar Hill".
Mr. Luchansky has presented Master Classes at The University
Of Florida, Colgate University, The San Francisco Conservatory
of Music, Princeton University, and The University of Southern
Florida. An active chamber musician, Mr. Luchansky served on the
faculty of California Summer Music at Pebble Beach for five years
and is a regular Guest Artist at the Apple Hill Center for Chamber
Music in Keene New Hampshire. This past summer Mr. Luchansky was
a guest artist at the Adriatic Chamber Music Festival in Italy and
a soloist at the Festival International de Musica in Deia Spain.
Deborah Pittman holds B.S. and M.A. degrees in music
performance from Brooklyn College Conservatory and has done
doctoral studies at the Manhattan School of Music. Ms. Pittman
was second and bass clarinetist with the Sacramento Symphony
from 1981-1990. She has also held orchestral positions with
the Brooklyn Philharmonic, the State Symphony of Mexico, the
Orchestra of New York, the Dance Theartre of Harlem, and she has
played in th epit for several Broadway shows. Ms. Pittman is a
member of the California Arts Project (TCAP), teaches at the CSU
Chico Chamber Music Workshop and the Northern California Chamber
Musicians, and in the summer of 2002 she became a Festival Artist
at the Apple Hill Summer Festival. She was an Artist In Residence
for the Sacramento Light Opera Association's Theatre education
Project from 1996 to 1999.
Emily Onderdonk, a native of San Francisco, received her
Bachelor's and Master's degrees at the Manhattan School of Music,
and continued with post-graduate studies at Boston University
and the New England Conservatory of Music. Her teachers include
Raphael Bronstein, James Buswell, Daniel Kobialka, and Karen
Tuttle.
While working on her master's degree, Ms. Onderdonk won the
principal viola position and went on tour with the New York
City Opera National Company. Since then, she has performed as
principal violist with numerous orchestras around the country
including the Santa Fe Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra in New Mexico,
the Berkeley Symphony in California, and the Reno Philharmonic
in Nevada. In 1995, Ms. Onderdonk began a two-year stint as
principal violist with the Lyon National Opera in France, touring
with the company to Paris, London and Vienna and recording CDs
of Offenbach, Donizetti, Werther, Massenet and Puccini. In
addition, she has performed with the New York Philharmonic,
the New Jersey Symphony, the San Francisco Symphony and the San
Francisco Opera. As a proponent of contemporary music for over
25 years, Ms. Onderdonk has played with such ensembles as Earplay
in the San Francisco Bay Area and the Group for Contemporary
Music in New York City. Also an avid supporter of children's
music education, Ms. Onderdonk continues to perform yearly in
schools, community centers and gyms - developing and performing
interactive concerts for thousands of children across the western
states. As a seasoned chamber musician she has appeared with
chamber ensembles in New York, California, Texas, New Mexico,
Colorado, Wyoming, Mexico, Brazil, and Argentina.
Most recently, Ms. Onderdonk is performing and touring with
her eclectic (musically) and spirited (personally) group Quartet
San Francisco, which is currently in residence at Mills College.
As a result of winning the Grand Prize at the 2004 International
Tango Competition in NYC, the quartet recently completed a trip to
Buenos Aires, where they gave two standing-room-only performances
of tango and jazz works. Ms. Onderdonk often records pop and
movie soundtracks, and plays for the San Francisco dates of many
touring Broadway musicals. Ms. Onderdonk loves the outdoors,
cherishes all animals and is especially enamored of fine
chocolates.
Cellist Hans Hoffer is a frequent performer as both an
orchestral and chamber musician. A former member of the Anchorage
Symphony, Hoffer is a scholar of the Academy at All Hallows,
where he serves as Principal Cello. He is also a longtime
member of the Northstate Symphony, where he has performed as
Assistant-Principal since 2006. He is a regular substitute with
many Northern California orchestras, including recent appearances
with the Sacramento Philharmonic, the Sacramento Choral Society
and Orchestra, the Modesto Symphony, the Mendocino Music Festival,
and the Townsend Opera Players.
A dedicated performer and instructor of chamber music,
Hoffer has been, since 2004, cellist of the Tyree Trio. He has
concertized widely on the west coast, including appointments
as an Emerging Artist at the Mendocino Music Festival and
as principal cellist of the Chico Bach Festival. He is on
staff at the California Captital Chamber Music Workshop and a
fellow of the Palo Alto Chamber Orchestra. He is also a member
of Sacramento's Camerata Capistrano, a historically-informed
performance ensemble. His primary teachers have been Linda Ottum,
Andrew Luchansky, and Carla-Maria Rodrigues, and he has performed
in master classes for such artists as the Tokyo String Quartet,
Gilbert Kalish, Wieland Kuijiken, the Apple Hill Chamber Players,
Eleanor Schoenfeld, and Chris Finckel. He lives in Sacramento.
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