ensembleNewSRQ’s “Visions & Miracles”

December 30, 2024 | Sarasota

ensembleNEWSRQ (enSRQ), the innovative chamber music ensemble, continues its ninth season with “Visions & Miracles,” a concert featuring five works for strings, flute, and clarinet by Han Lash, Dai Wei, Gabriela Lena Frank, as well as two composers—Anna Clyne and Christopher Theofanidis—who have received residencies from The Hermitage Artist Retreat. In their own way, each of these composers speak to the transient beauty of the things we cannot see. The concert is Monday, January 13, 7:30 p.m., at First Congregational Church, 1031 S. Euclid Ave., Sarasota. A post-concert reception will follow, offering attendees the chance to meet the guest artists. Single tickets are $30. For more information on ticket packages and single tickets, including student ticket pricing, visit www.EnSRQ.org. 

Violinist Samantha Bennett and percussionist George Nickson are the group’s founders and co-artistic directors. 

“We’re starting off 2025 with a (mostly) string quartet program, grounding us as we go forward with the remaining four programs of the season,” says Nickson. “The composers featured in this concert build upon the classical tradition, transforming it to speak to modern experiences and concepts. In particular, Gabriela Lena Frank’s ‘Milagros’ is an incredible work, inspired by her time in her mother’s home country of Peru. Usually a religious and marvelous occurrence, a milagro here refers to the remarkable sights and sounds of daily life, both past and present, that she experiences on her frequent travels home.”

“‘Visions & Miracles’ opens with a contemplative solo violin piece by Anna Clyne, one of my favorite new works for the repertoire,” says Bennett. “Improvisatory but ultimately inspired by Bach’s solo violin partitas, Clyne wrote the work after her mother passed away and she stumbled upon a violin in an antique shop. The piece opens with a recitation of one of her mother’s poems—her voice in effect, speaking to us from the beyond.”  

EnSRQ musicians performing in this concert include: Samantha Bennett, violin; Betsy Traba, flute; Calvin Falwell, clarinet; Stephanie Block, viola; Claire Allen Solomon, cello and Leah Latorraca, violin.

Anna Clyne (b. 1980) Described as a “composer of uncommon gifts and unusual methods” in a New York Times profile, GRAMMY-nominated Anna Clyne is one of the most in-demand composers today, working with orchestras, choreographers, filmmakers, and visual artists around the world. Clyne has been commissioned and presented by the world’s most dynamic and revered arts institutions. She often collaborates on creative projects across the music industry, and collaborators include such notable musicians as Jess Gillam, Jeremy Denk, Martin Fröst, Pekka Kuusisto, and Yo-Yo Ma. Clyne’s works are frequently choreographed for dance, while her fascination with visual art has inspired several projects including ATLAS, inspired by a portfolio of work by Gerhard Richter; Color Field, inspired by the artwork of Mark Rothko; and Abstractions, inspired by five contemporary paintings. 

Chris Theofanidis (b.1967) is an American composer whose works have been performed by leading orchestras from around the world, including the London Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Moscow Soloists, the National, Atlanta, Baltimore, St. Louis, Detroit, and many others. He participated in the Young American Composer-in-Residence Program with Barry Jekowsky and the California Symphony from 1994 to 1996 and, more recently, served as Composer of the Year for the Pittsburgh Symphony during their 2006–2007 Season, for which he wrote a violin concerto for Sarah Chang. He currently teaches at the Yale School of Music. 

Han Lash (b. 1981) They began their studies in music during early childhood and continued to pursue music throughout their education. Lash obtained a bachelor’s degree in composition from the Eastman School of Music in 2004, a performance degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music in 2008, a PhD from Harvard University in 2010,and an Artist Diploma from the Yale School of Music in 2012. Lash was appointed to the composition faculty of the Yale School of Music in 2013. Their primary teachers include Martin Bresnick, Bernard Rands, Julian Anderson, Steven Stucky, Augusta Read Thomas, and Robert Morris. Lash is an accomplished harpist and often performs their own music on the harp. Their “Concerto” for piano and harp was premiered in November 2019 by the Naples Philharmonic. In 2022, Lash was appointed associate professor of music in Composition at the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University. Lash’s music is published by Schott. 

Dai Wei (b. 1989) is originally from China. Her musical journey navigates in the spaces between East and West, classical and pop, electronic and acoustic, innovation and tradition. Her music often challenges the practice of labeling and delves into the untold narratives of social issues and obscured historical events from various communities, creating works with contemporary resonance. Being an experimental vocalist, she performs in the manner of Khoomei throat singing in her recent compositions, filtered through different experiences and backgrounds as a calling that transcends genres, races, and labels. Dai Wei is currently serving as Composer-in-Residence for Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra’s 2024-2025 Sound Investment Composer.  Dai Wei is currently pursuing her doctorate in Music Composition at Princeton University, where she holds a 2024-25 Procter Honorific Fellowship. She holds an Artist Diploma from the Curtis Institute of Music. After she finished her B.A. in Music Composition at the Xinghai Conservatory of Music in China, she came to the United States and earned an M.M. in Music Composition at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

Gabriela Lena Frank (b. 1972) was born in Berkeley, California. Her father is of Lithuanian Jewish heritage and her mother is Peruvian, of Chinese descent. She grew up in Berkeley, California. Her parents met when her father was a Peace Corps volunteer in Peru in the 1960s. Frank received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Rice University and a Doctorate in Music Composition from the University of Michigan in 2001. She has studied composition with Paul Cooper, William Albright, Leslie Bassett, William Bolcom, Michael Daugherty, and Samuel Jones. Frank’s work often draws on her multicultural background, especially her mother’s Peruvian heritage. In many of her compositions, she elicits the sounds of Latin American instruments such as Peruvian pan flute or charango guitar, although the works are typically scored for Western classical instruments and ensembles such as the symphony orchestra or string quartet. She has said, “I think the music can be seen as a by-product of my always trying to figure out how Latina I am and how gringa I am.”