Our first virtual performance of the season!
FCM is pleased to present clarinetist Anthony McGill, winner of the 2020 Avery Fisher Prize, who had been slated to open our series on September 9 with the Pacifica Quartet. In this exclusive online concert, he was joined by pianist Anna Polonsky to perform Brahms’s Clarinet Sonata No. 2 and James Lee III’s 2015 work, Ad Anah?. The performance concluded with a conversation on music and social justice issues with Roger Holland, DU faculty member and Director of the Spirituals Project. The concert was recorded in the beautiful Leshowitz Recital Hall at Montclair State University.
If you weren’t able to join us for the Sunday premiere, we hope you’ll take time to enjoy the concert recording now (available until October 20):
Click here to listen to Anthony McGill’s conversation with Ryan Warner (Colorado Matters, CPR) on Friday, September 18.
Anthony McGill serves as principal clarinet of the New York Philharmonic (the orchestra’s first African-American principal player) and maintains an international solo and chamber music career. A graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, he serves on the faculty of the Juilliard School, the Curtis Institute, and Bard College’s Conservatory of Music. McGill has been using his platform as a renowned musician to speak out powerfully about the struggle for racial justice and decency.
Anna Polonsky was scheduled to close FCM’s last season with violinist Arnaud Sussmann. She has previously performed on our series with violinist Stefan Jackiw and pianist Orion Weiss. Polonsky, who earned degrees from the Curtis Institute and Juilliard, serves on the piano faculty of Vassar College, and in the summer at the Marlboro and Kneisel Hall chamber music festivals.
This free performance is made possible thanks to the generosity of our FCM friends who donated the value of their tickets for canceled concerts last spring.