The critically-acclaimed American Chamber Ensemble, celebrating its 52nd anniversary, will present A Toast to Schubert on Sunday, Nov. 12 at 3 p.m. at Hofstra University’s Monroe Lecture Center Theater at California Ave. in Hempstead. This is presented by the University’s Music Department.
Selections for this special collaboration are a multimedia presentation of Schubert’s Trout Quintet, a new work composed for ACE by renowned jazz bassist and composer Martin Wind and a selections of songs performed by ACE’s soprano Donna Balson.
Performers will include bassist and composer Martin Wind, along with ACE members, pianist Marilyn Lehman, violinist Eriko Sato, violist Lois Martin and guest cellist Laurinel Owen. Special guests will be Hofstra ACE AWARD recipients Chris McKee and Alex Herron.
Wind was born in Flensburg, Germany in 1968 and moved to New York in 1996 to study at New York University with a scholarship by the German Academic Exchange Service. He has become a regular at all major jazz clubs and is also in demand as a session player. He’s on the faculty at New York University and Hofstra University and has taught at the National Youth Jazz Orchestra Germany and the Centrum, Stanford and Litchfield Jazz Camps among others.
Directed Lehman, ACE was founded in 1965 by pianist Blanche Abram and clarinetist Naomi Drucker. The ensemble explores the great chamber music literature for clarinet and piano in combination with strings, woodwinds and voice and presents performances featuring world-class artists. ACE consists of the finest freelance musicians in the New York area and has been cited by critics for their superb presentations of chamber masterworks. Their latest CDs on Elysium are American Clarinet Treasures, featuring core members of ACE performing works by George Kleinsinger, Virgil Thomson, Daniel Gregory Mason, Elliott Carter, Douglas Moore and Gary Schocker, with guest artist Stanley Drucker and The American Chamber Ensemble Plays Peter Schickele, which features five of this modern master’s most important chamber works.
Tickets to the concert are available at the Hofstra University Box Office ($20 general admission; $15 senior citizen (over 65) or matriculated non-Hofstra student with ID). Children are free with a paying adult. For ticket information, call 516-463-6644 or visit https://tkt.xosn.com/tickets/.
ACE’s concert season is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature, and by private contributions.
For more information about the American Chamber Ensemble, go to www.americanchamberensemble.com.
