Lenox — For more than three decades, Close Encounters with Music (CEWM) has been presenting themed chamber music concerts in Berkshire County and elsewhere, with commentary, narration, and even dance being integral to its concert programs. Soloists have included pianists Soyeon Kate Lee and Michelle Levin; guitarist Eliot Fisk; violinists Irina Muresanu, Julian Rachlin, and Peter Zazofsky; and innumerable others, as well as such prominent ensembles as the Borromeo, Dover, and Escher quartets. Even beatbox artists have performed in CEWM programs. But CEWM does a lot more than stage performances of works in the standard repertoire. Through its commissioning program, it is also directly involved in the creation of new music. That’s the focus of CEWM’s luncheon musicale benefit concert featuring pianist Ted Rosenthal, to be held at a private residence in Lenox on Sunday, May 7 at 12:30 p.m.
CEWM’s first commission was for Osvaldo Golijov’s “How Slow the Wind” in 2001. Since then, the organization has commissioned works by John Musto (“River Songs”); Lera Auerbach (“Last Letter”); Kenji Bunch (“Sonnet No. 128”); Jorge Martin (“Hollywood Variations”); Kenneth LaFave (“American Avenues”); Paul Schoenfield (“Refractions for Clarinet, Cello and Piano”; “Sha’atnez for Ady”; “Zemer”); Stephen Dankner (“CEWM Fanfare, Klezmer Quintet”); Jonathan Keren (“Homage to Bach”); Zhou Long (“Green for Pipa and Cello”); Robert Beaser (“Spring Songs”); the team of Thea Musgrave, Tamar Muskal, and Judith Zaimont (“Celebration Quilt”); and Tamar Muskal (“Music for Tabla, Cello and Rap Artist”).
If you’re going to hold a concert performance to benefit new works by living composers, why not hire a musician who knows how to compose music on the fly? You want someone capable of composing entire pieces of music spontaneously, in real time. A handful of classically trained musicians (e.g., pianist Robert Levin and cellist Mike Block) know how to do this well. Most major orchestras are lucky to have even a single such musician in their ranks.
How about finding a composer-pianist who plays his own improvised cadenzas in Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue”?
That would be Ted Rosenthal.
Born in Chicago in 1959, Ted Rosenthal is a renowned jazz pianist, composer, and arranger recognized worldwide for his work as a soloist, collaborator, and bandleader. Educated at Indiana University and The Juilliard School, Rosenthal has released several albums, including “Images of Monk” (1994) and “The King and I” (2009), collections of Rosenthal’s distinctive interpretations of Thelonious Monk and Broadway classics. Rosenthal has composed music for film and television, most notably for the documentary “The First Freedom: The Fight for Religious Liberty” (2012). As an esteemed music educator, he has taught at the Manhattan School of Music and The Juilliard School and has received various awards, including the Thelonious Monk International Jazz Piano Competition and the Great American Jazz Piano Competition.
Support CEWM’s next new-music commission at a luncheon musicale benefit concert featuring jazz pianist Ted Rosenthal, to be held at a private residence in Lenox on Sunday, May 7 at 12:30 p.m. To reserve a seat, call (800)-843-0778.
