The Seasons Sempre Concert series for 2021-22 kicks off with a huge concert of two masterworks for Clarinet Quintet — one by familiar Romantic composer, Johannes Brahms, and another by a recently re-appreciated turn of the 19th Century Afro-British composer, Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

Angelique Poteat is a composer of note and a featured performer with many orchestras in the northwest — including first chair clarinetist for the Yakima Symphony Orchestra. Denise Dillenbeck — an important contributor to The Seasons chamber music programs for the last decade — is concertmaster of the Yakima Symphony Orchestra (and a few others) and a featured violin soloist nationally and internationally. Vanessa Moss, violin, plays with symphonies around the Northwest and is a Seasons Board of Directors member who curates Sempre Chamber Music — a repertory company of regional musicians dedicated to regular performances of diverse and important chamber music. Together with Jessica Jasper, viola and Mika Hood, cello they are presenting two major clarinet quintets from the late Romantic/early modern era.

This concert is part of a six performance Sempre Chamber Music series running through May of 2022.

Program:

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor.....................Clarinet Quintet, Op. 10

Composed in 1895 Coleridge-Taylor’s Clarinet Quintet was one of the composer’s first steps into chamber music. Written when he was just 20 years old, the quintet is a display of some of Coleridge-Taylor’s finest writing. Rave reviews came in from the London premiere in 1895, as well as more recent performances in the modern day. Many have said that this work is the product of an experienced composer, not a student.

Johannes Brahms...............................Clarinet Quintet in B minor, Op. 115

At the time Brahms started composing his Clarinet Quintet, only a few works had been composed for this type of ensemble. Brahms had retired from composing prior to listening to Richard Muhifeld play. Brahms may have met Muhifeld already when Hans von Bulow was directing the Meiningen Court Orchestra. But it was Fritz Steinbach, von Bulow's successor, who brought Muhifeld's playing to the attention of Brahms in Marc 1891. Brahms was very enthusiastic about Muhifeld. That summer at Bad Iachi, he composed the Clarinet Quintet and his Clarinet Trio, Op. 114 both of them for Muhifeld. This icon of the Romantic era composed the piece just four years before the 20-year old Coleridge-Taylor premiered his Clarinet Quintet, Op. 10.

Add a 3-course Dinner from The Seasons Bistro

The 6 PM start time of the concert gives The Seasons Bistro an opportunity to offer a full three-course dinner as an optional add-on to your concert ticket, using the musical origins of the concert as a jumping off point for the menu. 

Appetizer: A pear and roast beet salad on a bed of baby arugula, with horseradish dressing. 

Entrée:

(Meat) English shepherds pie with African flavors in the form of shredded beef gumbo topped with delicately spiced mashed sweet potatoes.

(Vegetarian) Portobello schnitzel filled with a cheese and vegetable filling, double breaded, with brie/havarti cheese filling. Served with garlic mashed potatoes 

Dessert: Ginger spice cake is a common dessert in Africa, England, Germany, and America — a recipe from Sierra Leone, the country of Coleridge-Taylor's father’s birth.