Thursday, November 10, 2011 –Series A

Among the strongest and most ardent voices in chamber music coming from Germany today is the Morgenstern Trio. This young ensemble has the polish of the older masters and, more importantly, the fire of youth. Still in their 20s, this group has been together for four years and they are loaded for bear. They won the Kalichstein Laredo Robertson Trio award in 2010, which granted them their 20-concert American debut tour and their gifts were unanimously celebrated across the country. Everyone noted the incendiary urgency of their playing. Their program includes the suave Debussy trio, the zany trio Leonard Bernstein wrote as a student at Harvard, and the profound Op. 8 of Brahms.

Tuesday, December 6, 2011 – Series B

The Shanghai Quartet made their striking Napa debut three years ago when they jumped in at the last second to replace the Berlin Philharmonic Quartet. Their revelatory performance of the Barber Adagio assured their return invitation. The quartet was formed at the Shanghai Conservatory just after the dark days of the Cultural Revolution. The cellist who joined the quartet in 2000 is from Spanish Harlem. Two of them, as little kids in short pants, appeared in Isaac Stern’s documentary From Mao to Mozart. The quartet has enjoyed a long relationship with the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival Artistic Director, composer Marc Neikrug, whose String Quartet No. 3 receives its world premier on this tour. A group of several winemaking audience members are co-commissioners of the new work. The program also includes Mozart’s Hunt quartet and the Smetana Quartet No. 1, From My Life.

Monday, January 23, 2012 – Series A

The Jupiter Quartet is rising to the top of the substantial heap of exciting young American string quartets. They came to international attention when they won both the Banff and Fischoff String Quartet competitions. Their first appearance here in 2008 and their return in 2010 showed why they are so in demand. The Washington Post shares our appreciation of the Jupiter’s exciting style, “The Jupiter performs with freewheeling excitement and precise ensemble. As you would expect from a group that named itself after the king of the gods, they don’t lack for confidence.” This summer they mark another career milestone, playing the complete Beethoven cycle for the Aspen Music Festival. In their Napa debut they floored the audience with their Mendelssohn Op. 80. This year we get to hear how they see Mendelssohn’s Op. 44, No. 1 along with the Beethoven Op. 74, and the searing Bartok String Quartet No. 6.

Tuesday, February 14, 2012 – Series B

Formed in Warsaw in 1995, the Szymanowski Quartet is now based in Hanover, Germany. Two of the members were born and musically nurtured in Poland and two in Ukraine. The amazing first violin, one of the Ukrainians, is ten years younger than the others and joined the ensemble in 2005. They came to our attention as the ensemble of their generation most admired by Alfred Brendel, whose 80th birthday celebration concert they performed in Leipzig last year. Bernard Holland of the New York Times, who has heard it all and is hard to impress, praised their recent concert at the Frick Collection, “All professionals play with intensity, but playing from the heart is another matter.” They will perform Beethoven Op. 18, No. 1; Prokofiev String Quartet No. 2; Szymanowski String Quartet No. 2; and Beethoven Op. 59, No. 2.

Thursday, February 23, 2012 – Series A

The Fauré Quartett is Europe’s leading piano quartet. The ensemble was founded at the Musikhochschule in Karlsruhe, Germany 17 years ago, where they trained with the Alban Berg Quartet. Chosen by Deutsche Gramophone to record the Mozart piano quartets during the Mozart year in 2006, they have continued to create definitive recordings for DG of the Romantic repertory. They are as at home in a Berlin night club as they are on the stage of the great halls in Vienna, Amsterdam, London, New York, and Tokyo. Usually the wonderful piano quartet repertory is played by a trio plus a colleague or as string quartet less a violin plus a pianist, and while those concerts can be great, they rarely have the polish or insight of an ensemble that concentrates on this literature exclusively. The overwhelming audience enthusiasm to their extraordinary Napa debut two years ago encouraged their speedy return. Their program features the deeply Romantic and rarely heard Josef Suk Piano Quartet in A minor, the Mendelssohn Op. 2, and the Dvorak Op. 87.

Friday, March 2, 2012 – Series B

The great Hungarian-born pianist, András Schiff, is one of the all-time giants of the keyboard. At this point in his career, recitals and special cycles form an important part of his activities such as the major keyboard works of Bach, Bartok, Beethoven, Mozart, Haydn, Schubert, Schumann, and Chopin. While he has performed and recorded the concerto repertory with many of the great conductors, he now performs primarily as both conductor and soloist with the major orchestras and has created his own orchestra in Florence, the Cappella Andrea Barca (that would be his name in Italian). He is a prolific recording artist. Mr. Schiff’s achievement is so enormous that it is impossible to shine enough light on this multifaceted artist with a single quote from a music critic. Maybe Manny Ax’s statement says it: “András plays everything and perfectly.” He has chosen a program from three of his favorite composers: Bach’s Three Part Inventions, the Bartok sonata, and Beethoven’s madcap final piano masterpiece, the Diabelli Variations.

Monday, March 19, 2012 – Series A

These artists are no strangers to Chamber Music in Napa Valley: the Takacs have played here seven times beginning in 1985, and “Garrick” is on a first name basis with his beloved Napa audience after coming twelve years in a row. Takács and Garrick have famously collaborated on several tours in the past, and this concert is part of an American tour which we instigated. Both the Takács Quartet and Garrick have won Grammys for their Beethoven and both have performed Beethoven extensively in Napa, but Beethoven didn’t write a piano quintet, so we are thrilled to hear them bring their substantial powers to Shostakovich’s masterpiece. To have this much genius on the stage at once seems an unimaginable luxury. The Takács will also play the Schubert Quartettsatz and Ravel’s quartet.

Tuesday, May 1, 2012 – Series B

Paul Lewis is internationally recognized as one of the leading pianist of his generation. From an improbable beginning, this 39-year old son of a Liverpool dockworker commands the respect equal to those masters a generation ahead of him. Perhaps he made up for a late start by becoming Alfred Brendel’s student after finishing at Guild Hall in London. However, studying with Brendel cannot explain how he could have already won so many awards (including three Grammys), recorded so much music so definitively, played the complete Beethoven cycle in so many cities, or how he can play the late Schubert music (his latest project) with such terrifying intensity. Those of you who so enthusiastically enjoyed the Vertavo concert last season will be happy to know that Mr. Lewis is married to the Vertavo cellist, Bjorg Lewis, and together they organize the Midsummer Music Festival in Buckinghamshire, England. Mr. Lewis’ all-Schubert program will include German Dances, D783; Sonata in A minor, D784; Allegretto in C minor, D915; and Sonata in A minor, D845.