Close Encounters With Music will partner with the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center and Classical WMHT-FM to present the series of three concerts October through December filmed live from the Mahaiwe stage and available for everyone to access—with the illuminating and personal insights from artistic director Yehuda Hanani that audiences have enjoyed for over twenty-eight years, plus an “Afterglow” chat with guest musicians.  

A FREE event,  a link to stream will be available to stream. Find the link at mahaiwe.org or on the @closeencounterswithmusic Facebook page.

From the opera hall to the music room—tracking how the melodrama and extravaganza of the operatic stage finds its way into the intimate world of chamber music. Familiar and beloved arias from Italian, French and German operas stud the program, both in their original as well as transformed to become vehicles for instrumental virtuosity and new delight. No lesser figures than Paganini, Liszt, Vladimir Horowitz—and even Beethoven—borrowed from Wagner, Bizet, Mozart and Rossini to create equally captivating progeny. Metropolitan opera soprano Danielle Talamantes, baritone Kerry Wilkerson, violinist Peter Zazofsky, pianist Max Levinson and cellist Yehuda Hanani share the adventure.