Angela Allen

Killin’ it with Gilles Vonsattel and the Sinta Sax Quartet

The sax quartet and virtuoso pianist joined forces for a surprising CMNW concert.

Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch August 2022

The Sinta Saxophone Quartet, alarmingly good and ravishingly charming, took the audience by surprise with its highly diverse program, American Voices, July 24 and 25 (I heard the July 25th concert at the Kaul Auditorium). Theirs was the tightest and brightest concert at the spectacularly varied Chamber Music Northwest’s five-week festival. Read More

All these ways of being: The musical worlds of Reena Esmail

An exchange with the Indian-American composer, featured recently at Chamber Music Northwest and set to return next month as this year’s Willamette Valley Chamber Music Festival composer-in-residence.

Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch July 2022

Reena Esmail’s cross-cultural music is making star turns in Oregon concerts this summer.

At two Chamber Music Northwest concerts July 17 and 18, violinist Vijay Gupta–who happens to be Esmail’s husband–played her Darshan: Bihag and When the Violin. After the concert, Portland composer David Schiff called Gupta “a rock star” and was blown away by Esmail’s music, which was preceded by poetry and delivered with an intensity that the couple holds in common. Read More

Comfortable with uncertainty: A back-and-forth with Alistair Coleman

The young composer, whose music was featured on a string of recent concerts at Chamber Music Northwest, discusses his formative musical moments.

Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch August 2022

Alistair Coleman and Zlatomir Fung play a game on Spotify. One picks a tune and the other tries to figure out the composer, time period or piece. “Even if we couldn’t identify the exact piece, we could still discern the composer or time period,” said Coleman, who fondly call himself and Fung “nerds.” Read More

A beginner every day: Considering Zlatomir Fung

The 23-year-old cellist’s recent visit to Oregon for Chamber Music Northwest included concerts, a master class, an afternoon with four cellists even younger than him, and “one of the best string recitals” Soovin Kim has ever heard.

Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch July 2022

In 2019, Zlatomir Fung–who has been playing his cello around Portland this summer–won the International Tchaikovsky Competition, among the most prestigious honors awarded to young classical musicians. Read More

Worth a crowd’s attention: A review of David Schiff’s ‘Prefontaine’

Schiff’s latest, a tribute to the esteemed runner, was premiered by the Eugene Symphony.

Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch June 2022

Portland composer David Schiff’s much anticipated Prefontaine premiered with the Eugene Symphony June 4 at the Hult Center for the Performing Arts in Eugene, Oregon. The concert was not sold out at the cavernous 2,448-seat Silva Concert Hall, a big place to fill. But the stunning music was worth a crowd’s attention. Read More

From exhilaration to exhaustion to final victory: David Schiff’s summer premieres

The retired Reed College composition professor’s “Prefontaine” and “Vineyard Rhythms” come to Eugene and Portland.

Originally Published in Classical Voice North America and Oregon Arts Watch May 2022

David Schiff is one of Oregon’s– well, America’s – most prolific composers of chamber and symphonic music. Add to those genres his knack for writing jazz, opera, Irish folk, rock ’n’ roll, klezmer, Jewish liturgical, pop and art song. Yet, to accomplish this huge body of work, he has not lived the isolated life of a self-absorbed artist. 

Just the opposite. Read More

Imani Winds premieres northwest composers at Alberta Rose Theatre

The restless wind quintet’s blissful concert featured new music co-commissioned by CMNW, OBF, and Anima Mundi.

Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch May 2022

Neither a note of Bach nor Beethoven, Mozart nor Mendelssohn was played–but three world premieres by Pacific Northwest composers of color amply compensated for Old World nostalgia at Imani Winds’ sold-out concert April 28 at the Alberta Rose Theatre in Northeast Portland.  Read More

Opening our ears: Fear No Music’s concert of Asian music

FNM performs music by Asian and Asian-American composers at The Old Church.

Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch May 2022

Fear No Music’s“Asian Resilience and Joy” concert May 9 at The Old Church in downtown Portland was partly about the surprising happiness that occurs when we open our ears to more than Western sounds and rhythms. Read More