Oct. 23: APECT Chamber Music Series Opens Season with Schubert Quintet, Featuring the Formosa Quartet and Cellist Peter Wiley

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Katy Salomon | Morahan Arts and Media
katy@morahanartsandmedia.com | 863.660.2214

ASPECT Chamber Music Series Opens 2019-2020 Season with
Schubert Quintet, October 23 at the Italian Academy of Columbia University

Featuring the Formosa Quartet and Cellist Peter Wiley 
with an Illustrated Talk by Composer, Writer, and Producer Misha Donat
 

New York, NY (September 12, 2019) — ASPECT Chamber Music Series opens its fourth New York City season of illuminating performances with Schubert Quintet on Wednesday, October 23, 2019 at 7:30pm at the Italian Academy of Columbia University. The concert features the Formosa Quartet and cellist Peter Wiley in Schubert’s String Quintet in C Major, D956.

Composer, writer, and producer Misha Donat presents an illustrated talk about  the miraculous outpouring of music Schubert composed in the year in which he died, at the tragically early age of thirty-one. Like so much of Schubert’s output, his Quintet lay forgotten and unpublished for more than twenty years after his death, but today is rightly cherished as one of the peaks of the chamber repertoire. Donat was a senior music producer at BBC Radio 3 for more than 25 years. He now works as a freelance writer, lecturer and producer. He provides program notes on a regular basis for the Wigmore Hall, Edinburgh Festival, Aldeburgh Festival, Royal Festival Hall and other venues. He is currently working on a new critical edition of the Beethoven piano sonatas being published by Bärenreiter.

ASPECT Chamber Music Series’ fall season continues with Haunted Minds on Wednesday, November 13, 2019 at 7:30pm at the Italian Academy of Columbia University featuring the Ariel Quartet and an illustrated talk by Nicholas Chong and Russian Elegy on Thursday, December 4, 2019 at 7:30pm atBohemian National Hall featuring violinist Misha Keylin, cellist Zlatomir Fung, and pianist Pavel Nersessian with an illustrated talk by Stephen Johnson.

Program Information
Schubert Quintet
Wednesday, October 23, 2019 at 7:30pm
Italian Academy of Columbia University | 1161 Amsterdam Ave | New York, NY 10027
Tickets: $45 includes wine and refreshments
Link: https://www.aspectmusic.net/payment-test/schubert-quintet

Performers:
Formosa Quartet
Peter Wiley, cello
Illustrated talk by Misha Donat

Program:
Schubert — String Quintet in C Major, D956                                        

About the Formosa Quartet
Winners of both the First Prize and Amadeus Prize at the Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition, the Formosa Quartet has been hailed as “spellbinding” (The Strad) and “remarkably fine” (Gramophone). The Formosa Quartet has given critically acclaimed performances at the Library of Congress, the Da Camera Society of Los Angeles, the Chicago Cultural Center, the Walter Reade Theater at Lincoln Center, the National Concert Hall in Taipei, Wigmore Hall in London, die Glocke Bremen, and the Kammermusiksaal at the Berliner Philharmonie. The ensemble is deeply committed to championing Taiwanese music and promoting the arts in Taiwan, as well as exploring diverse and adventurous mediums for string quartet.

In 2013, the Quartet founded the annual Formosa Chamber Music Festival, which represents one of its primary missions: to bring high-level chamber music training to talented young musicians in Taiwan, while simultaneously offering first-rate music to Taiwanese audiences of all ages. Formosa is also the faculty quartet-in-residence at NYO Canada, holds week-long performance and teaching residencies at Eastern Michigan University and the University of California, Los Angeles, and has enjoyed residencies with Art of Élan, Rice University, and University of California, San Diego.

The Formosa Quartet has played a leading role in actively commissioning new works, contributing significantly to the modern string quartet repertory. Formosa’s 2019 milestone album From Hungary to Taiwan includes premiere recordings of three Formosa commissions: Lei Liang’s Song Recollections, Dana Wilson’s Hungarian Folk Songs, and Wei-Chieh Lin’s Five Taiwanese Folk Songs. Other works composed for the Quartet include pieces by Dana Wilson, Wei-Chieh Lin, Shih-Hui Chen, and Clancy Newman.

The members of Formosa Quartet – Jasmine Lin, Wayne Lee, Che-Yen Chen, and Deborah Pae – hold degrees from the Juilliard School, Curtis Institute of Music, and New England Conservatory and have been top prizewinners at the prestigious Paganini, Primrose, Fischoff, Naumburg, and Tertis competitions. The members of the Formosa Quartet are currently on faculty at Eastern Michigan University, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Roosevelt University, and the University of California, Los Angeles. They have previously held principal positions in the San Diego and Cincinnati Symphonies as well as faculty positions at the University of Southern California, Taos School of Music, McGill University, and the Juilliard School.

Formed in 2002 when the four Taiwanese-descended founders came together for a concert tour of Taiwan, the Formosa Quartet’s cultural identity has since expanded to include broader American and pan-Asian roots. Their name “Formosa” is still a tribute to the culture of Taiwan, but is also largely taken in its most basic sense: Portuguese for “beautiful.” Learn more at www.formosaquartet.com.

About Peter Wiley
Peter Wiley, a 1974 graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, has played at leading festivals including the Marlboro Music Festival, for which he also tours and records. As a recitalist he has appeared at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall. A member of the Beaux Arts Trio from 1987 to 1998, Mr. Wiley also succeeded his teacher, David Soyer, as cellist of the Guarneri String Quartet from 2001 to 2009. He is a member of the piano quartet Opus One, with Curtis faculty members Ida Kavafian and Steven Tenenbom and pianist Anne-Marie McDermott. 

Mr. Wiley entered Curtis at age thirteen. At twenty he was named principal cello of the Cincinnati Symphony, after one year with the Pittsburgh Symphony. He made his concerto debut at Carnegie Hall in 1986 with the New York String Orchestra conducted by Alexander Schneider.

A past recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant, Mr. Wiley joined the faculty of the Curtis Institute of Music in 1996. He also teaches at the University of Maryland and Bard College Conservatory of Music.

About ASPECT Chamber Music Series
ASPECT Chamber Music Series was founded by Irina Knaster in London in 2011 and relocated to New York City in 2016. ASPECT presents a new concert format – one that transforms the traditional recital into an intimate, engaging, and thought-provoking blend of performance, speech, and image.

The series’ chamber-music events feature some of today’s leading musicians and music experts. For each concert, they set the works on the program in context with presentations supported by visuals. These “illustrated talks” reveal fascinating details about the composer, the music, and the cultural history of the period in question.

ASPECT aims both to support and promote artists, and to welcome audiences old and new to explore new aspects of a classical repertoire of endless riches. It’s more than a concert. To find out more, please visit www.aspectmusic.net.  

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