The phenomenal pair will perform the composer's famous song cycle Winterreise, a work that expresses a physical and spiritual journey of winter.
Shriver Hall Concert Series (SHCS) — Baltimore's premier presenter of chamber music ensembles and solo recitalists — welcomes the acclaimed tenor Mark Padmore and pianist Mitsuko Uchida to Shriver Hall on Sunday, March 10, 2024 at 5:30pm in their inaugural performance in the city of Baltimore. The phenomenal pair – hailed as “Two Schubert masters” by The New York Times – will perform the composer's famous song cycle Winterreise, a work that expresses a physical and spiritual journey of winter.
Mark Padmore writes, “Words make you think thoughts / Music makes you feeling a feeling / But a song makes you feel a thought. This wonderful description by Yip Harburg - lyricist of the Wizard of Oz - perfectly captures what makes Schubert such a great songwriter. Words and music, singer and pianist combine to take us on a literal and metaphorical journey. We are really excited to bring this masterpiece to the Shriver Hall Concert Series.”
Composed in 1827, Winterreise shows similarities to Schubert's symphonies and operas. Contemporary reviewers of Winterreise recognize the song cycle as an authentic Romantic work and some speculate that it is an autobiographical work as well. Winterreise is known to take listeners through an exploration of the human heart and leave an impression of the correlation to the world around us.
Early in 2023, Padmore and Uchida released an album on Decca Classics featuring Schubert's Schwanengesang (first published mere weeks after the composer's death in 1828) and Beethoven's only major song cycle, An die ferne Geliebte. Padmore has held residency at Wigmore Hall, was a Musical America 2016 Vocalist of the Year, and was appointed CBE in the 2019 Queens' Birthday Honours List. Uchida was named Musical America's 2022 Artist of the Year, is currently a Carnegie Hall Perspectives artist through the 2022-25 seasons, and in 2009 was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire.
Performing next with Shriver Hall Concert Series on Sunday, Febuary 4, 2024 at 5:30pm is pianist Garrick Ohlsson in works by Beethoven, Chopin, Mamlok, and Schubert.
Following is the French ensemble Ébène Quartet in its Baltimore debut on Sunday, April 7, 2024 at 5:30pm. The program will include works by Schnittke, Grieg, and Mozart.
Concert Information
Mark Padmore, tenor and Mitsuko Uchida, piano
Sunday, March 10, 2024 at 5:30pm
Shriver Hall | 3400 N. Charles Street | Baltimore, MD 21218
Tickets: $46 Single Tickets, $10 Students
Link: https://www.shriverconcerts.org/padmoreuchida
Franz Schubert – Winterreise, D. 911
A Pre-Concert Talk precedes the concert with The Peabody Institute's Anna Celenza at 4:30pm in Shriver Hall.
The Sidney & Charlton Friedberg Concert
About Shriver Hall Concert Series
For more than 50 years, Shriver Hall Concert Series (SHCS) has been “Baltimore's finest importer of classical music talent” (The Baltimore Sun) and the area's premier presenter of chamber music ensembles and solo recitalists with a mission to craft performances and educational programs at the highest level of excellence. A 5-time recipient of Baltimore Magazine's distinction “Best Classical Music” in its annual “Best of Baltimore” issue, the coveted subscription series features many of the world's most renowned soloists and ensembles, presented in The Johns Hopkins University's Shriver Hall.
Founded in 1966 by Dr. Ernest Bueding, a pharmacologist at Johns Hopkins University, and a group of similarly dedicated music enthusiasts, SHCS set out to make an important contribution to the vitality of an already vibrant city. When flutist Jean-Pierre Rampal walked onto the stage of Shriver Hall for the first concert, more than 1,100 people witnessed the launch of what is now recognized as a remarkable success story: Shriver Hall Concert Series. In the succeeding years, SHCS has presented hundreds of acclaimed and emerging International Artists in classical chamber music and recitals and a legacy of important debuts and premieres. In addition, SHCS collaborates with local schools and subsidizes hundreds of student tickets each season.
The list of artists presented by SHCS is remarkable—Radu Lupu, Murray Perahia, Ewa Podlés, Maurizio Pollini, Jacqueline du Pré, Mstislav Rostropovich, Jordi Savall, András Schiff, Rudolf Serkin, Janos Starker, Daniil Trifonov, Lynn Harrell, Emmanuel Ax, Alban Berg Quartet, Guarneri Quartet, Kronos Quartet, Cleveland Quartet, and Quartetto Italiano, among many others. SHCS also has a history of championing important musicians early in their careers, including Richard Goode, Hilary Hahn, Hélène Grimaud, Dawn Upshaw, Lang Lang, and the Emerson String Quartet. Commissioned composers include Timo Andres, Sebastian Currier, Jonathan Leshnoff, James Lee III, Han Lash, Caroline Shaw, and Nina C. Young.
Designed specifically for the community, SHCS offers the Discovery Series, a series of free concerts presented in venues throughout the region focused on artists emerging on the national and international scene. Artists featured include Narek Hakhnazaryan, Colin Currie, Xavier Foley, Eric Lu, and the Dover Quartet. SHCS also offers the annual Spring Lecture Series, a series of free talks focused on annual topics related to the intersection of music and society, and a variety of student programs.
For more information, visit www.shriverconcerts.org.
About Mark Padmore
Mark Padmore was born in London and studied at King's College, Cambridge. He has established an international career in opera, concert, and recital. His appearances in Bach's Passions have gained particular notice, especially his renowned performances as the Evangelist in the St. Matthew and St. John passions with the Berlin Philharmonic and Simon Rattle, staged by Peter Sellars.
The current season focuses on recitals, including performances in Madrid with Julius Drake, Alicante with the Elias String Quartet, the Muziekgebouw Amsterdam with Till Fellner, the Théâtre de l'Athénée Paris with Julius Drake, and Schubert's Winterreise with Mitsuko Uchida at New York's Carnegie Hall, Philadelphia's Kimmel Center, the University of California at Berkeley, and other venues.
Following a residency at Wigmore Hall in the 2021-22 season where he celebrated his relationship with pianists Till Fellner, Imogen Cooper, Mitsuko Uchida, and Paul Lewis, he returned to Wigmore Hall last season singing Ralph Vaughan Williams and Gabriel Fauré with the Elias Quartet and James Baillieu. The 2022-23 season also saw him appear on stage in the title role of a new production of Claudio Monteverdi's Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria conducted by Fabio Biondi, sing the world premiere of Mark-Anthony Turnage's song cycle A constant obsession with the Nash Ensemble, and give concerts with Sinfonieorchester Basel and Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen.
Padmore's most recent appearance at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden was in a new production of Benjamin Britten's Death in Venice, where his performance was described as a “tour de force” and “exquisite of voice, [presenting] Aschenbach's physical and spiritual breakdown with extraordinary detail and insight.” Other opera roles have included Captain Vere in Benjamin Britten's Billy Budd, the Evangelist in a staging of the St. Matthew Passion for the Glyndebourne Festival and leading roles in Harrison Birtwistle's The Corridor and The Cure at the Aldeburgh Festival.
In concert Padmore performs with the world's leading orchestras. He was Artist in Residence for the 2017-18 season with the Berlin Philharmonic and held a similar position with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in 2016-17. His work with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment has involved projects exploring Bach's St. John and St. Matthew passions without conductor, attracting worldwide acclaim.
His extensive and award-winning discography includes Robert Schumann's Dichterliebe with Kristian Bezuidenhout and Schubert song cycles with Paul Lewis, both for Harmonia Mundi. Described by The New York Times as “Schubert Masters,” Mark Padmore and Mitsuko Uchida recently embarked on a series of highly acclaimed worldwide recitals, and this partnership has culminated in a recording on Decca Classics of Franz Schubert's Schwanengesang and Ludwig van Beethoven's An die ferne Geliebte.
Padmore was Artistic Director of the St. Endellion Summer Music Festival in Cornwall from 2012 to 2022, voted 2016 Vocalist of the Year by Musical America, and appointed CBE in the 2019 Queen's Birthday Honours List. His website is markpadmore.com.
About Mitsuko Uchida
One of the most revered artists of our time, Mitsuko Uchida is known as a peerless interpreter of the works of W.A. Mozart, Franz Schubert, Robert Schumann, and Ludwig van Beethoven, as well for being a devotee of the piano music of Alban Berg, Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern, and György Kurtág. She was Musical America's 2022 Artist of the Year, is Music Director of the 2024 Ojai Music Festival, and is a Carnegie Hall Perspectives artist across the 2022-23, 2023-24, and 2024-25 seasons. Her latest solo recording, of Beethoven's Diabelli Variations, was released to critical acclaim in 2022, was nominated for a Grammy Award, and won the 2022 Gramophone Piano Award.
Mitsuko Uchida has enjoyed close relationships over many years with the world's most renowned orchestras, including the Berlin Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Bavarian Radio Symphony, London Symphony Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, and—in the US—the Chicago Symphony and the Cleveland Orchestra, with whom she recently celebrated her 100th performance at Severance Hall. Conductors with whom she has worked closely have included Bernard Haitink, Sir Simon Rattle, Riccardo Muti, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Vladimir Jurowski, Andris Nelsons, Gustavo Dudamel, and Mariss Jansons.
Since 2016, Mitsuko Uchida has been an Artistic Partner of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, with whom she is currently engaged on a multi-season touring project in Europe, Japan, and North America. She also appears regularly in recital in Vienna, Berlin, Paris, Amsterdam, London, New York, and Tokyo, and is a frequent guest at the Salzburg Mozartwoche and Salzburg Festival.
Mitsuko Uchida records exclusively for Decca, and her multi-award-winning discography includes the complete Mozart and Schubert piano sonatas. She is the recipient of two Grammy Awards—for Mozart Concertos with The Cleveland Orchestra, and for an album of lieder with Dorothea Röschmann—and her recording of the Schoenberg Piano Concerto with Pierre Boulez and the Cleveland Orchestra won the Gramophone Award for Best Concerto.
A founding member of the Borletti-Buitoni Trust, and Director of Marlboro Music Festival, Mitsuko Uchida is a recipient of the Golden Mozart Medal from the Salzburg Mozarteum and the Praemium Imperiale from the Japan Art Association. She has also been awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Philharmonic Society and the Wigmore Hall Medal, and holds Honorary Degrees from the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. In 2009 she was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire. Her website is mitsukouchida.com.
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