Pianist Charlie Albright and guest conductor Holly Hyun Choe came into the KPBX studio to chat with E.J. Iannelli ahead of the Spokane Symphony’s Masterworks 5 concert this weekend.
Choe is conducting the Spokane Symphony for these performances, and Albright is the featured soloist on Sergei Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor, Op. 18.
Opening this concert program is Britta Byström's "A Drama in the Air," an approximately 7-minute work based on a Jules Verne short story. Choe described her first encounter with this work at the 2021 Malko Competition, the very suspenseful narrative that it follows, and some of the qualities it shares with Byström's larger body of work.
Choe also talked about some of the other female composers whose work she tries to incorporate into programs and why. Some of these composers include Jessie Montgomery, Molly Joyce and Inti Figgis-Vizueta.
Albright offered some insight into the rich emotional palette of the Rachmaninoff concerto, aka 'Rach 2,' as well as his own background as a regular improviser who came to the piano at a young age. He opened the interview with an improv piece live in the SPR performance space.
Lastly, Choe gave some historical context to the final piece on the concert program, Johannes Brahms' Symphony No. 3 in F major, Op. 90. As she noted, the composer's personal life informed the symphony's F–A♭–F (and later F–A–F) motif, which represents the phrase Frei aber froh, or "free but happy."
There are two performances of the Masterworks 5 program: One on Saturday, January 20, and the other on Sunday, January 21. Both are at the Martin Woldson Theater at the Fox in downtown Spokane.
Tickets and more information are at the Fox Theater website.