Mendelssohn Italian Symphony
Saturday, May 6, 2023 at 8:00 p.m. Symphony in C concludes the 2022-23 Season with guest conductor Joseph Young. The concert opens with Antonin Dvořák’s Serenade for Winds, Op. 44, B.77, D Minor. The Serenade evokes the lighter, delicate style of the Rococo period. Violinist Ade Williams joins the Symphony in performing Mendelssohn's final and most renowned Violin Concerto in E minor, Op. 64. Mendelssohn’s evocative Symphony No. 4 in A Major, Op. 90, “Italian,” brings the composer’s musical memories of the color and atmosphere of 1830 Italy to us today, as fresh and alive as it was then.
Joseph Young, Guest Conductor
Adé Williams, Violin
PROGRAM:
Antonin Dvorak: Serenade for Winds, Op. 44, B.77, D Minor
Felix Mendelssohn: Violin Concerto in E minor, Op. 64
Felix Mendelssohn: Symphony No. 4 in A Major, Op. 90 "Italian"
Tickets for the Symphonic Series at Rutgers-Camden Center for the Arts and the Virtuosi Series are currently available and range in price from $25 - $52. All tickets may be purchased here or by calling 856-963-6683.
Symphony in C performances and programs are made possible in part by funds from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, the William G. Rohrer Charitable Foundation, The Presser Foundation, Holman Automotive Group, The Horizon Foundation for New Jersey, South Jersey Charitable Foundation, TD Charitable Foundation, and Subaru of America. Symphony in C is a member of the South Jersey Cultural Alliance (SJCA).
About the Soloist:
Violinist Adé Williams is a two-time Sphinx Competition laureate (1st place, Junior Division, 2012; 2nd place, Senior Division, 2019). She has won numerous other competitions in the US and Europe, beginning at age eight, and has placed in several chamber music competitions.
Adé has enjoyed a thrilling solo career, from her debut with the Chicago Sinfonietta at age six to her concerts with over 50 American orchestras including the Philadelphia and Cleveland Orchestras, the Detroit, Pittsburgh, New World, Indianapolis, and Nashville Symphonies, and Buffalo and KwaZulu-Natal Philharmonics (South Africa) by age 18. Most recently, she has made her debuts with the Lansing Symphony and with the Chineke! Orchestra at Southbank Centre’s Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, which was recorded and produced by Signum Records. In 2017, Adé premiered Guardian of the Horizon: Concerto Grosso for Violin, Cello, and Strings by Jimmy Lopez, a work commissioned by Carnegie Hall and New World Symphony. The New York Concert Review praised her as “an absolute winning champion of the work.” Adé made her White House debut in 2015 and Carnegie Hall debut in 2013 where she has since returned five times. She has attended the Pacific Music Festival (Japan), the Astona International Music Festival (Switzerland), Cambridge International String Academy (England), and the Chautauqua Institution (US).
Sought out as a classical music and humanitarian leader, Adé has participated in Rachel Barton Pine’s Music by Black Composers project as a recording artist, in the Milken Institute’s “Why Wait? Young People Blazing Trails” program as a panelist, and at University of Michigan as a guest lecturer. In 2012, she produced her first Adé & Friends benefit concert in support of a new school on Chicago’s south side, where she is also a charter member of the Junior Division of the Chicago Music Association. In 2004, Adé founded SugarStrings, a string trio of cousins known for exhilarating performances on 98.7 WFMT, CNN/Essence, NBC Nightly News, ABC7, WTTW’s Chicago Tonight and at numerous civic and charitable events around the US. She continues her work with young musicians by teaching in her joyful, expanding private studio.
Adé has received many honors, awards, and fellowships, including the Linda and Isaac Stern Charitable Foundation Award in memory of Isaac Stern, the first William Warfield Scholarship, and the Rachel Elizabeth Barton Foundation grant and instrument loan programs. She is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music where she served as concertmaster of the Curtis Symphony Orchestra in the 2018-2019 season and studied with Ida Kavafian. Prior to Curtis, Adé studied with Almita and Roland Vamos, Marko Dreher, and Rachel Barton Pine
Adé Williams, 17, had John Corigliano’s impetuous “Red Violin Caprices” all to herself and played it stunningly. – NY Time.
A Chicagoland wunderkind … known not only as a one-name performer but also as one singular sensation … played with a sweet tone and strength of character. – The Grand Rapids Press