Poulenc Trio to Visit SFSU This Sunday

Back when I was writing for Examiner.com, I found that San Francisco State University (SFSU) was a desirable venue for free performances of music. Thanks to the Morrison Chamber Music Center, I found it particularly easy to encounter chamber music performances, many of which involved visiting artists presented by the Morrison Artist Series. In 2020 the Center received a generous gift from the estate of Clement Galante, and that series was renamed “The Jane H. Galante Series of the May Treat Morrison Foundation.” Ever since then, encountering word about chamber music performances has become a sometime thing.

Poulenc Trio members Bryan Young, Irina Kaplan Lande, and Alexander Vvedenskiy (from the event page for the recital being discussed)

I offer that paragraph as an apology for what is practically a last-minute announcement of a recital taking place this coming Sunday. The performers will be the members of the Poulenc Trio, whose members are pianist Irina Kaplan Lande, bassoonist Bryan Young, and oboist Alexander Vvedenskiy. Their name is based on the fact that Francis Poulenc composed a trio for that particular combination of instruments in 1926, and that trio will be the opening selection on the program that the ensemble has prepared. This is the twentieth anniversary of the trio, and they are celebrating the occasion with an extensive touring schedule. The program will also include the D minor “Trio pathétique,” which Mikhail Glinka originally composed for clarinet, bassoon, and piano, as well as an F major trio sonata by George Frideric Handel whose specific HWV number has not been provided. The one recent work on the program will be “Explain Yourself,” which Viet Cuong composed in 2019.

Two of the works on the program will be products of arrangement. The opening Poulenc trio will be followed by a selection of that composer’s songs, realized as strictly instrumental music by Heinrich Zöllner. At the other end the program will conclude with music inspired by Gioacchino Rossini’s opera Semiramide. The nineteenth-century French oboist Charles Triébert and his bassoonist compatriot Eugène Louis-Marie Jancourt were known for composing “fantasies-concertantes” for the oboe and bassoon. One of their sources was Semiramide, and Jancourt subsequently published the duo as his Opus 48.

The performance of this program will begin at 3 p.m. on Sunday, April 16. The venue will be Knuth Hall, which is in the Creative Arts Building at SFSU at 1600 Holloway Avenue, a short walk from the SFSU Muni stop at the corner of 19th Avenue and Holloway. Tickets are free but advance registration is highly desirable. Reservations may be made through the event page for this concert. As usual, there will be a pre-concert event, which will begin at 2 p.m., also in Knuth Hall. In addition, the trio will conduct residency activities at the SFSU School of Music on Monday, April 17.