February1 & 2, 2025

Performing Arts Center
Greenwich High School
10 Hillside Road, Greenwich, CT
Saturdays at 7:30 pm.
Sundays at 3:00 pm

Stuart Malina, Conductor
Valentin Kovalev, Saxophone

Gioachino Rossini, Overture to
The Barber of Seville
Eunike Tanzil, Veni, Vidi, Vici
Takashi Yoshimatsu, Alto Saxophone
Concerto Cyberbird
Felix Mendelssohn, Symphony No. 3
(“Scottish”)

Valentin Kovalev is a dedicated performer who is a leader in elevating the voice of the saxophone in classical music. A native of Siberia, Mr. Kovalev studied saxophone in Moscow and Paris before coming to the United States. He is the first Russian saxophonist to earn a master’s degree at the University of Michigan, home to the premier saxophone program in this country.

His international concert career includes performances as soloist across the U.S., Europe, and Asia. In 2021, he joined the roster of Astral Artists (Philadelphia) as a National Competition Winner. He has also received significant awards from foundations in France (Fondation pour la vocation), in Russia (Rostropovich Foundation), and the U.S. (Musical Fund Society of Philadelphia). 

A winner of the esteemed Naumburg Foundation 2022 Saxophone Competition, Mr. Kovalev gave a sold-out debut recital at Carnegie Hall in March, 2024, premiering a newly commissioned piece by GRAMMY-winning composer Steven Mackey. He also received the Audience Award from the Concert Artists Guild, a distinguished classical music management organization based in New York City.

An active educator, Mr. Kovalev teaches master classes in North America, Europe, and Asia. He has been a saxophone professor at Rowan University in New Jersey, and he is a visiting professor at the Cleveland Institute of Music. He recently recorded his master class and podcast for an online educational platform, Ad Libitum Class. 

Our soloist has built an engaged community of music lovers through his social media platforms on Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok, collectively surpassing 100,000 followers. This robust online presence allows him to share his passion for the saxophone, inspire others, and foster a thriving global community of music enthusiasts.

PROGRAM NOTES

In addition to the program notes below, watch Maestro Malina speak about and demonstrate selected aspects of this program in this PRE-CONCERT LECTURE on YouTube.

Overture to The Barber of Seville
Gioachino Rossini (1792–1868)

Written in 1816 and one of Rossini’s most popular operas, despite a disastrous premiere, The Barber of Seville is one of the greatest masterpieces of comedy in music. It is set to the first of three social satires on class distinction by eighteenth-century playwright Pierre Beaumarchais. Thirty years earlier, Mozart had set the second play to his opera, The Marriage of Figaro. With a mostly shared cast of characters, these operas follow the wily butler Figaro as he outsmarts and manipulates his master, Count Almaviva.

The overture bears no thematic relationship to the opera itself, having been recycled by Rossini from two previous operas, Aureliano in Palmira and Elizabeth, Queen of England. This was not an uncommon practice by Rossini. Comprising bright, happy, and lyrical themes, the Overture to the Barber of Seville has remained a concert favorite over the years. In popular culture, millions of moviegoers, music lovers, and animation fans have been entertained by the wit and musical sophistication of the 1950 Warner Brothers Bugs Bunny cartoon Rabbit of Seville, featuring a series of madcap episodes set to the overture. Of Rossini’s more than forty operas, this is the best known.

Veni, Vidi, Vici
Eunike Tanzil (b. 1998)

Born in Indonesia and currently living in Los Angeles, Eunike Tanzil holds degrees from the Berklee College of Music as well as the Juilliard School, having received a full scholarship from each. Her musical aptitude spans various genres, including classical, jazz, and world music. Ms. Tanzil’s compositions are characterized by lyrical melodic lines and emotive harmonies. She has composed a diverse musical portfolio for film, television, commercials, dance, theater and the concert hall. Ms. Tanzil has worked with Ray Chen, TwoSet Violin, Arturo Sandoval and Laufey, among others. In April 2024, she signed an exclusive agreement with Deutsche Grammophon. The composition to be played on this program is a reworking for saxophone of the first movement (Toccata) of her Clarinet Concerto, a virtuoso whirlwind. The title, Veni, Vidi, Vici (“I came, I Saw, I Conquered”) refers to a declaration by Julius Caesar upon a decisive military victory. 

Saxophone Concerto: Cyberbird
Takashi Yoshimatsu (b.1953)

Born and raised in Tokyo, Mr. Yoshimatsu first came to music through exposure to pop and rock bands such as The Ventures and The Walker Brothers. At age fourteen he became fascinated with the symphonies of Beethoven and Tchaikovsky. Shortly after entering college, he abandoned the study of medicine in order to take up music. While studying at Keio University, he became a pupil of Teizo Matsumura. He later studied with Manabu Kawai at Tokyo University of the Arts, and with Isao Harada. Mr. Yoshimatsu’s musical inclinations proved to be eclectic, ranging from traditional classical to atonal; and from traditional Japanese to Western progressive rock, as influenced by Pink Floyd, Yes, and Emerson, Lake, and Palmer. He has been somewhat prolific with six symphonies, ten concertos for various instruments, and miscellaneous works including some for traditional Japanese instruments.

Mr. Yoshimatsu composed his Saxophone Concerto, subtitled Cyberbird, in 1994 for saxophonist Nobuya Sugawa. In the composer’s words, it is an “imaginary bird in the realm of electronic cyberspace.” He cites the tragic loss of his sister to cancer as inspiration. Apparently, some of her last words were that she would like to be a bird in her next life. In three movements, the concerto follows a bird (the saxophone) on its journey through colors, grief, and the wind. Influenced by jazz, Mr. Yoshimatsu places piano and percussion with the soloist in front of the accompanying orchestra.

Movement I – Bird in Colors, presents a cascade of fast melodies intertwined with unique textures, timbres, and irregular rhythms, counter-balanced by slow bluesy interludes. A short cadenza leads to a dramatic conclusion. Movement II – Bird in Grief, is a tribute to his sister. Movement III – Bird in the Wind, is the shortest and the most flamboyant of the three movements. As the solo part swirls up and down various scales, one can imagine a bird in flight. At times, the brass adds a big band feel. The soloist and the orchestra combine their forces to complete the work with an ecstatic flourish.

                                                                                            

Symphony No. 3 in A minor, Op. 56 (“Scottish”)
Felix Mendelssohn (1809–1847)

Though numbered third due to order of publication, the Scottish Symphony was the last of Mendelssohn’s five symphonies to be completed. The composer began the work during his first visit to the British Isles in 1829, the period in which he wrote the overture The Hebrides, but he did not finish the symphony until 1842. After giving the premiere that year with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, he created the currently known version by making some small changes and a few cuts. Mendelssohn was captivated by heroic figures in Scotland’s history as well as its bracing weather and rugged scenery. He was an avid reader of Sir Walter Scott and made a point of meeting the distinguished writer.

Mendelssohn was considered musically conservative during a period known for radical, highly innovative composers such as Liszt, Berlioz, and Wagner. Though not as bold as they, he was highly regarded as a natural talent, gifted with originality and invention that some believed rivaled that of Mozart. The Scottish Symphony was likely the first in which each of the four movements would be played without pause. The symphony begins in quiet darkness; its mood expressing a visit to a ruined castle beneath overcast skies. The main allegro section suggests stormy weather. The second movement imparts the feeling of a Highland fling. The solemn nature of the third movement is believed to be a tribute to Mary Queen of Scots, whose troubled history as a Scottish monarch and possible contention for the English throne was the cause of her difficulties and execution ordered by Queen Elizabeth I. The finale is regarded by some as a war dance, by others as a battle scene. In any case, the movement ends with an unusual shift from minor to major key for a hymn-like anthem. Mendelssohn suggested that this coda should resemble the singing of a male choir, and one can visualize a group of men standing as they raise a toast, glasses brimming with the aged blend of Scotch whiskey.                                                                   

—Richard Schneider