music at emory university Alicia Svigals, klezmer violin, composer Donna and Marvin Schwartz Artist in Residence

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1 17 18 music at emory university Chris Randle The Yellow Ticket Alicia Svigals, klezmer violin, composer Donna and Marvin Schwartz Artist in Residence Marilyn Lerner, piano Laura DeLuca, clarinet thursday, september 7, 2017, 8:00 p.m. Emerson Concert Hall Schwartz Center for Performing Arts

2 The Yellow Ticket Live music composed by Alicia Svigals 1918 film directed by Victor Janson and Eugen Illés The Yellow Ticket courtesy of Deutsche Kinemathek Klezmer fiddler Alicia Svigals is the recipient of the Foundation for Jewish Culture s 2013 New Jewish Music Network commission for her new score to the rarely seen German silent film The Yellow Ticket. She, pianist Marilyn Lerner, and clarinetist Laura DeLuca bring new perspective to the film by performing the award-winning score live alongside a special screening this evening. Based on a Yiddish play and created as anti-soviet propaganda at the end of World War I, the film concerns a young Jewish woman who is constrained by anti-semitic restrictions to lead a double life in a Tsarist era St. Petersburg brothel while attempting to study medicine to save her father s life. The film features rare footage of the Jewish quarter of Warsaw later destroyed by the Nazis and boasts progressive criticism of sex trafficking and ethnic/religious discrimination. Most of all, however, The Yellow Ticket showcases in a rare ingénue role, the young Pola Negri, the Polish actress who within years would become one of the greatest exotic international film stars complete with a Hollywood career. Svigals s score is exquisite. From Lucid Culture website, review of Alicia Svigal s music and performance. I believe this accompaniment to The Yellow Ticket is one of the most powerful I have heard. It evokes not only a sense of the contemporary context of the culture in which the film took place, but our awareness of what was done to it afterwards. The sound of piano, violin, and the human voice evoke passion, energy, and a profound sense of mourning, bridging the historical distance between us and this film as eloquently as does Pola Negri s extraordinary face. Professor Tom Gunning, University of Chicago Department of Art History, Department of Cinema and Media Studies 2

3 Tina Chaden Boris Itskovich Alicia Svigals Alicia Svigals is the world s leading klezmer fiddler, a founder of the Grammy-winning Klezmatics, which she codirected for seventeen years, and a composer who was selected to be a 2014 MacDowell Fellow. She has collaborated with and composed for violinist Itzhak Perlman; the Kronos Quartet; playwrights Tony Kushner and Eve Ensler; the late poet Allen Ginsburg; Robert Plant and Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin; singer/songwriter Debbie Friedman; Avraham Fried; singer/songwriters Diane Birch, Gary Lucas, and Najma Akhtar; and many others. She has appeared on David Letterman; MTV; PBS s Great Performances; NPR s Prairie Home Companion, Weekend Edition, and New Sounds; and on the soundtrack for the L-Word. Her klezmer roots band, Alicia Svigals s Klezmer Fiddle Express, plays at festivals throughout the United States and the world. In addition to receiving the New Jewish Music Network commission from the Foundation for Jewish Culture for her original live score to the 1918 film The Yellow Ticket, Svigals also received a Trust for Mutual Understanding grant to bring that work to Poland next year. She has been a fellow at LABA a nonreligious house of study and culture laboratory at the 14th St. Y in New York City, which every year invites a group of artists to consider ancient texts and create work that pushes the boundaries of what Jewish art can be; while at LABA she composed a song cycle based on Yiddish poetry. MArilyn Lerner Jazz pianist/improviser Marilyn Lerner performs to acclaim internationally, from her native Montreal to Havana, from Jerusalem to Amsterdam and the Ukraine. Her musical career has been marked by a deep exploration of traditional and free jazz, new music tinged improvisation, and Ashkenazic folk music. Lerner has appeared with Tito Puente, Gerry Hemingway, and Steve Lacy. In the New Jewish music scene, she performs with Adrienne Cooper, Frank London, Alicia Svigals, and David Wall. A prolific recording artist, her most recent work includes: Live in Madrid, (Cadence records), with New York based Ken Filianobass and Lou Grassi-drums, and the Ugly Beauties Trio with Matt Brubeck (the late great Dave s youngest son), cello, and Nick Fraser, drums. She also tours and performs with the Dutch-based avant-garde Ig Henneman Sextet: with Axel Dorner, Wilbert de Joode, Lori Freedman, and Ab Baars. 3

4 Laura Deluca Clarinetist Laura DeLuca joined the Seattle Symphony in 1986 following her education at Northwestern University where she studied with the celebrated clarinetist, Robert Marcellus. She is also a cofounding member of Seattle Chamber Players, a contemporary music ensemble formed in 1989 boasting nearly one hundred commissioned works. She has performed in historic concert halls in Europe, Russia, China, and South America. Closer to home, DeLuca regularly performs with Music of Remembrance, Icicle Creek series, and she has soloed with Seattle Symphony, Seattle Youth Symphony, Cascade Symphony, and Rainier Symphony. On February 11, 2011, the day of historic political uprising in Egypt (and her birthday), she premiered a newly commissioned concerto, Freedom by Alissa Firsova with the Northwest Sinfonietta. DeLuca has performed on more than one hundred recordings, and she has worked with distinguished composers and performers such as Jake Heggie, John Luther Adams, John Zorn, Betty Olivero, Paul Schoenfield, and Artur Avanesov. 4

5 Upcoming Music Events Go to music.emory.edu to view the complete list of upcoming music events. Ticket prices are listed in the following order: Full price/discount category member price/emory student price (unless otherwise noted as the price for all students). For more information contact the Arts at Emory Box Office at , or visit arts.emory.edu. Friday, September 8, noon, the Museum, ECMSA: Cooke Noontime Series, Michael C. Carlos Museum, free Sunday, September 10, 4:00 p.m., Timothy Albrecht Performs Bach Live!, faculty recital, Schwartz Center, Emerson Concert Hall, free Saturday, September 16, 8:00 p.m., Twenty-fifth Anniversary Gala Concert and Reception, ECMSA: Emerson Series, Schwartz Center, Emerson Concert Hall, free Sunday, September 17, 4:00 p.m., Gary Motley Trio, Schwartz Center, Emerson Concert Hall, free Saturday, September 30, 8:00 p.m., Emory University Symphony Orchestra with Jonathan Keeble, flute, Schwartz Foundation Artists in Residence, Schwartz Center, Emerson Concert Hall, free Thursday, October 5, 6:00 p.m., Jazz on the Green, Patterson Green, free Saturday, October 7, 8:00 p.m., Alessio Bax, piano, and Chee-Yun, violin, Candler Concert Series, Schwartz Center, Emerson Concert Hall, $50/$40/$5 Wednesday, October 11, 8:00 p.m., Aster Duo, artist affiliate recital, Schwartz Center, Emerson Concert Hall, free Saturday, October 14, 8:00 p.m., Double Take, Atlanta Master Chorale, Schwartz Center, Emerson Concert Hall, $30/$25/$10 all students Arts at Emory Box Office/Audience Information arts.emory.edu IN CONSIDERATION Please turn off all electronic devices. PHOTOGRAPHS AND RECORDINGS Not permitted without advance permission. COUGH DROPS Available in the lobby. USHERS Members of Music at Emory Volunteers and Alpha Phi Omega, a national service and social fraternity. Call for ushering opportunities. event and program information Available online at arts.emory.edu. Back cover photos Courtesy of Emory Photo/Video. TREE LIGHTS and exterior in-ground building lights Made possible by a generous gift from Donna and Marvin Schwartz. 5