Composer and Pianist Timo Andres Launches First “CSO Proof” Performance at Music Hall

Calling all musical adventurists! The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra's new CSO Proof series offers a novel way to experience performances at Music Hall. Imagine artists and audience members sharing the stage in casual, intermission-less concerts with elements of music, theater, lighting and dance. During the 2019/2020 season, three CSO Proof performances will help celebrate the Orchestra's 125th anniversary by presenting artists collaborating with different curators who craft themes connecting orchestral music to listeners in adventurous ways.

First up is American Perspective, which takes place Friday, November 22, 2019 at 7:30 pm at Cincinnati's Music Hall. Here, composer and pianist Timo Andres explores American musical identity with musicians, dancers and audience.

Describing the performance, Andres says, "We'll hear how Charles Ives toyed with the rhythms of ragtime, Tania León fractured Cuban-American modernism, and early New Englanders fused the sacred and secular into a vibrant tradition of Sacred Harp singing. American music has always been a stacking of influences, a mirror of ourselves."

Andres will be joined by conductor André de Ridder, choreographer John Heginbotham, cellist Inbal Segev, and the Cincinnati Sacred Harp Singers.

Artists:

Timo Andres, composer, pianist

Timo Andres (b. 1985, Palo Alto, CA) is a composer and pianist who grew up in rural Connecticut and now lives in Brooklyn, NY. A Nonesuch Records artist, his album of orchestral works, Home Stretch, has been hailed for its "playful intelligence and individuality," (The Guardian), and of his 2010 debut album for two pianos Shy and Mighty (performed by himself and duo partner David Kaplan), Alex Ross wrote in The New Yorker that "it achieves an unhurried grandeur that has rarely been felt in American music since John Adams came on the scene... more mighty than shy, [Andres] sounds like himself."

Notable works include Everything Happens So Much for the Boston Symphony with Andris Nelsons; Strong Language, a string quartet for the Takács Quartet, commissioned by Carnegie Hall and the Shriver Hall Concert Series; Steady Hand, a two-piano concerto commissioned by the Britten Sinfonia and premiered at the Barbican with Andres and pianist David Kaplan; and The Blind Banister, a piano concerto for Jonathan Biss, which was a 2016 Pulitzer Prize Finalist.

As a pianist, Timo Andres has appeared with the LA Philharmonic, North Carolina Symphony, the Britten Sinfonia, the Albany Symphony, New World Symphony, and in many collaborations with Andrew Cyr and Metropolis Ensemble. He has performed solo recitals for Lincoln Center, Wigmore Hall, San Francisco Performances, the Phillips Collection, and (le) Poisson Rouge. Among others, Andres has collaborated with Ted Hearne, Becca Stevens, Jeffrey Kahane, Gabriel Kahane, Brad Mehldau, Nadia Sirota, the Kronos Quartet, the LA Dance Project, John Adams, and Philip Glass, with whom he has performed the complete Glass Etudes around the world, and who selected Andres as the recipient of the City of Toronto Glenn Gould Protégé Prize in 2016.

Timo Andres earned both his bachelor's and master's degrees from the Yale School of Music. He is a Yamaha/Bösendorfer Artist and in 2018 joined the composition faculty at Mannes School of Music at The New School. For more info, visit https://andres.com/

André de Ridder, conductor

André de Ridder has produced innovative records that speak to his stylistic versatility from baroque to contemporary music. His projects and collaborations include the BBC Proms, the Holland, Sydney and Manchester International Festivals, New York Philharmonic, Amsterdam's Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, and commissioned projects with his musicians' collective Stargaze.

In the 2019/2020 season, de Ridder will return to such orchestras as Chicago and Melbourne Symphony Orchestras and Orchestra de Paris, and notable debuts will include Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestra Symphonique de Quebec, Orchestra Symphonic de Barcelona and Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, as well as collaborations with Damon Al barn and with Max Richter. In collaboration with the Southbank Centre, he launches a series of genre-defying concerts, "Unclassified Live" based on the Radio 3 program and co-curated and presented by the program's presenter Elizabeth Alker.

De Ridder was educated in Berlin and studied at the music academies of Vienna and London under Leopald Hager and Colin Davis.

Dance Heginbotham

Dance Heginbotham (DH) is a New York-based contemporary dance company committed to supporting, producing and sustaining the work of choreographer John Heginbotham. With an emphasis on collaboration, DH enriches national and international communities with its unique blend of inventive, thoughtful, and rigorous dance theater works.

Founded in 2011, DH has quickly established itself as one of the most adventurous and exciting new companies on the contemporary dance scene and is celebrated for its vibrant athleticism, humor, and theatricality, as well as its commitment to collaboration. DH has shared the stage with music icons including Alarm Will Sound, Brooklyn Rider, Gabriel Kahane and Shara Nova, and members of The Knights orchestra.

Well-known for his 14-year tenure as a dancer with Mark Morris Dance Group, Artistic Director John Heginbotham creates work known for its "tight formal structure and inventive movement, bolstered by a disarming wit and strangeness" (The New Yorker). In recognition of his unique artistic vision, John received the 2014 Jacob's Pillow Dance Award.

Dance Heginbotham will premiere a new work commissioned by the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra in an evening of dance and music curated by composer Timo Andres and conducted by André de Ridder. For more info visit: http://www.danceheginbotham.org/

John Heginbotham, choreographer

Originally from Anchorage, Alaska, John Heginbotham is a Brooklyn-based choreographer, performer and teacher. John graduated from The Juilliard School in 1993 with a BFA in Dance, and was awarded the Martha Hill Prize for Sustained Achievement in Dance. John was a member of the Mark Morris Dance Group (MMDG) from 1998 - 2012, performing lead roles in L'Allegro, il Penseroso, ed il Moderato; The Hard Nut; Four Saints in Three Acts; and Romeo and Juliet: On Motifs of Shakespeare. During his time with MMDG, he toured across the United States and abroad alongside artists including Mikhail Baryshnikov, Yo-Yo Ma, Emanuel Ax, The Bad Plus, and Zakir Hussain, and performed with opera companies including The Metropolitan Opera, New York City Opera, and the English National Opera.

John received a 2018 Guggenheim Fellowship and in June 2014, he was awarded the prestigious Jacob's Pillow Dance Award in recognition of his unique choreographic vision and promise. John is currently a Research Fellow at the National Center for Choreography at The University of Akron (NCCAkron), was awarded a 2017/18 New York City Center Choreography Fellowship, was a 2016 Fellow at NYU's Center for Ballet and the Arts, and is a two-time recipient of the Jerome Robbins Foundation New Essential Works (NEW) Fellowship (2010, 2012).

As a teacher, John offers dance master classes in the United States and abroad. He has taught at institutions including Princeton University, Barnard College, George Mason University, Laban Centre in London, School of Visual Arts, University of California, Berkeley, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and the University of Washington. He was invited to give the keynote address to the Utah Dance Educator's Conference in November 2016. John is the Director of the Dartmouth Dance Ensemble, and is a founding teacher of Dance for PD, an ongoing collaboration between the Mark Morris Dance Group and the Brooklyn Parkinson Group. For more info, visit: http://www.danceheginbotham.org/about

Inbal Segev, cello

Cellist Inbal Segev's playing has been described as "characterized by a strong and warm tone...delivered with impressive fluency and style" and with "luscious phrasing." She has performed as soloist with the Berlin Philharmonic, Israel Philharmonic and Pittsburgh Symphony, and has collaborated with Zubin Mehta, Lorin Maazel and Marin Alsop.

Highlights for 2019/2020 include solo debuts with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and Chautauqua Symphony Orchestras; a recital debut with the Piatigorsky Festival; and performances with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Amerigo Trio, which Segev co-founded with former New York Philharmonic concertmaster Glenn Dicterow and violist Karen Dreyfus.

Segev has commissioned works by Anna Clyne, Avner Dorman, Timo Andres, Gity Razaz, and Dan Visconti, and has co-curated the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra New Music Festival with Marin Alsop since its inception. In 2018, she collaborated with David Alan Miller and Albany Symphony to perform Christopher Rouse's violoncello concerto for the first time since Yo-Yo Ma premiered it in the 1990s.

Segev's recent discography includes acclaimed recordings of romantic cello works with pianist Juho Pohjonen (Avie) and Bach's Cello Suites (Vox). Her YouTube channel has more than a 1,000,000 views, and features her popular masterclass series Musings with Inbal Segev. Honors include prizes at the Pablo Casals and Paulo International competitions. Segev began playing the cello in Israel and at age 16 was invited by Isaac Stern to continue her studies in the U.S. She holds degrees from The Juilliard School and Yale University. Her cello was made by Francesco Ruggieri in 1673. For more info, visit http://www.inbalsegev.com/

Cincinnati Sacred Harp Singers

The Cincinnati Sacred Harp Singers formed on June 26, 1988, by six singers (names unknown). In 1990, they hosted a singing school taught by Richard DeLong at Xavier University. The Cincinnati Sacred Harp Singers meet monthly in an informal setting to sing. They perform annually on January 1 at the Cincinnati New Year's Singing Event at the Harriet Beecher Stowe House.

Sacred Harp, a popular music style from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries is experiencing a revival in the northern American states. Sacred Harp's most distinctive characteristic is the use of shape notes to indicate the degree of the musical scale. Sacred Harp singers sing the names of the notes "fa", "sol", "la", and "mi" before singing the text. Singers sit in a hollow square with the bass, tenor, treble, and alto facing the leader in the center. For more info, visit http://cincysacredharp.ej345.com/

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