Violinist Sergey Khachatryan raises high expectations at the Chamber Music Society of Detroit
By Vivian DeGain
Published Journal Register Newspapers Nov. 10, 2011
The Chamber Music Society of Detroit will host a “spectacularly gifted” artist Saturday, said the new CMSD president and classical musician Stephen Wogaman.
“Violinist Sergey Khachatryan is arguably the most young and talented performer ever from Armeniaon the international stage,” Wogaman said. “This will be a very exciting concert, as one of his only two stops in the United States this season. He just appeared in Chicago and nearby in Toronto.”
The 27-year-old Khachatryan, born in Yerevan, Armenia, won First Prize in the Jean Sibelius Competition in Helsinki in 2000, the youngest winner ever in the history of the competition.
Khachatryan also garnered First Place in 2005 at the Queen Elisabeth Competition in Brussels. His international recognition intensifies with performances along side the major orchestras in Berlin, Amsterdam, France, Paris, London, Tokyo, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco and L.A.
The violinist will be accompanied by his sister Lusine Khachatryan on piano, as each make their Detroit debut in this season’s Chamber Music series. Ms. Khachatryan, an international award winner in her own right, shares the distinction with her brother of recording two CDs.
“Our program features Bach’s Chaconne for Solo Violin, a Shostakovich sonata — music written for the chamber music setting, composed in secret as Shostakovich really wanted to write music living within in the context of Soviet Russia – and a very early Beethoven,” Wogaman said.
The program includes Beethoven’s Sonata No. 2 in A major for Violin and Piano, Op. 12, No. 2; Bach’s Partita No. 2 in D minor; and Shostakovich’s Sonata for Violin and Piano, Op. 134.
“Shostakovich’s work is full of his inner most passions. The story goes that he kept this composition packed in a suitcase by the front door, ready to flee sudden arrest to the gulag, as artists feared in those times,” he said. “It’s very unlike his State-mandated orchestrations.”
The Bach Chaconne will be familiar to the Detroit Chamber audience because it was performed by Arnold Steinhardt and discussed by actor Alan Alda and Steinhardt at the CMSD in March 2010.
They described the chaconne as intensely passionate, fiery and heart-rippingly sad, probably written as Bach grieved his wife’s sudden death.
“This Detroit audience is very familiar with the chaconne,” Wogaman said. “This is a remarkable, sophisticated audience that has been listening together for 40 years. They have such an informed passion for the music. They listen to every single note. Collectively, their ear surpasses audiences in New York and many places internationally.
“Of course, the artists respond to the appreciation and expectations of the audience.”
Wogaman took the helm as CMSD president in May. Prior, he served as chief executive of the Canton Symphony Orchestra in Ohio and the Allentown Symphony Orchestra in Pennsylvania.
He’s also performed as piano recitalist, chamber musician and teaching artist throughout the eastern United States and Spain and Central America.
As pianist of the Whitney Trio in 1989, Wogaman’s performing debut in a live broadcast concert was at the National Gallery of Art in his home town of Washington D.C. He studied at the Eastman School of Music, the Universityof Louisville and the Indiana University School of Music, where he completed a Doctor of Music degree. He and wife Michele developed New Performing Arts in the 1990s, a non-profit music outreach organization reaching an audience of 2 million Kentucky children with live performing arts programs in their schools. He often transported his own grand piano on a rented truck. He’s also developed programmatic partnerships with several classical music institutions including the Eastman School of Music, Oberlin Conservatory, Indiana University Opera Theater, New England Conservatory, and New World Symphony.
Saturday’s CMSD concert features a Pre-Concert Talk at 6:45-7:30 p.m.with Dr. Steven Rings, assistant professor of music at University of Chicago, who will discuss the evening’s repertoire.
Sergey Khachatryan performs at the CMSD at 8 p.m. Saturday (Nov. 12) at the Seligman Performing Arts Center, 22305 West 13 Mile Roadin Beverly Hills, on the campus of the Detroit Country Day School. Single concert tickets, $75-$43. Call 248-855-6070 or visit www.ComeHearCMSD.org.
