Sinfonia Toronto continues their 27th season with Baroque & Beyond, a concert of seasonal music on December 11. They’ll be joined by guest artists The Ezra Duo, who will perform Mendelssohn’s Double Concerto for Violin and Piano.
Maestro Arman comments on the music in a statement.
“I am really looking forward to collaborating with the Ezra Duo on the beautiful and fascinating Mendelssohn Concerto for Violin and Piano. Our first three concerts are linked in a sense. In November we followed Dvorak with a youthful work by Janacek and for this wonderful program we salute the young genius of Mendelssohn again, after his lively 2nd Symphony opened our new season in September.”
The Program
After the opening Mendelssohn work, the rest of the program features an emphasis is on melodic tributes to the holiday season.
The program in full:
- Mendelssohn: Double Concerto for Violin and Piano in D Minor
- Correlli: Concerto Grosso Op. 6, No. 8 (Christmas Concerto)
- Vivaldi: Sinfonia L’incoronazione di Dario
- Larry Strachan: Lament for Souls of Sauteurs
- Handel: Messiah — Overture and Pifa
- Jenkins: Palladio (Ontario Premiere)
Mendelssohn wrote his Double Concerto, also known as Concerto for Piano, Violin, and Strings in D minor, MWV O4, in 1823 at the tender age of 14. It was composed for a private concert held at the family home in Berlin, featuring his violin teacher and friend Eduard Rietz. He would later modify the score to include winds and timpani, along with strings, and a public performance followed later the same year.
Arcangelo Corelli was commissioned to write his Christmas Concerto by Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni, and it was published in 1714, after his death. On the manuscript, he wrote Fatto per la notte di Natale, or “made for the night of Christmas”. It’s not known exactly when he composed the work, although there is documentation of his performance of a piece with a similar title in 1690 for his then new patron.
Vivaldi’s Sinfonia L’incoronazione di Dario is the overture from his opera L’incoronazione di Dario, RV 719. The sinfonia is written in three movements, and has become a work that is often performed alone. It’s the composer’s seventh opera, written in 1717 for the carnival season in Venice.
Winnipeg composer Larry Strachan’s Lament for the Souls of Sauteurs is the composer’s musical reflections on the events that took place in Grenada in May 1650. French invaders ambushed and killed a group of about 40 Indigenous Caribbeans, and several more jumped from a cliff about 87 metres high to escape the same fate. The town the French established there was named Sauteurs, which translates as “jumpers”. Larry Strachan’s family roots are in Grenada, and he wrote the work after visiting the town, now with a population of about 1,300.
Handel’s beloved Messiah (1741) is seen as a choral work, but it includes lovely instrumental movements as well. The overture or sinfonia is written in the style of a French overture, while the Pifa, comes around the middle of Part I. The latter is often called the pastoral symphony.
Welsh composer Karl Jenkins wrote Palladio for string orchestra in 1995. The title refers to Andrea Palladio, an architect who was prominent in the Venetian Renaissance. The work is written in three movements, in the form of a concerto grosso. In his notes, Jenkins comments on the mathematical principals of harmony incorporated by the Renaissance architect that were inspired by classical antiquity. Jenkins’ Palladio is the music used in the famous A Diamond is Forever commercials by the De Beers company.
The Ezra Duo
The Ezra Duo is Jacob Clewell (viola/violin) and Sasha-Bult Ito (piano). The duo met in 2016 as student at The Glenn Gould School, and have since gone on to tour North America extensively, including performing coast to coast in Canada.
Laureates of the 2018 Città di Pinerolo e Torino – Città Metropolitana International Chamber Music Competition in Turin, Italy, the Ezra Duo took home first prize at the 2019 Arcady Emerging Artist Competition.
They have performed recital tours in the US and Canada of their Women in Music and Art of the Duo programs in 2019, and their Colorfully Contemporary program in 2022. The duo appeared in New York’s Carnegie Hall in 2017, and performed at the Royal Ontario Museum as guest artists of the G7 Summit in 2018.
The Ezra Duo are also dedicated to music education, and have given masterclasses at Berry College, the University of Tulsa, and for the Albuquerque Youth Symphony. They have also served as guest instructors at Harding Fine Arts Academy in Oklahoma. The duo are co-artistic directors of Florida’s Emerald Coast Chamber Music Festival.
The Concert
Baroque and Beyond takes place on December 11 at Trinity-St. Paul’s Centre.
- Find more details and tickets [HERE].
Are you looking to promote an event? Have a news tip? Need to know the best events happening this weekend? Send us a note.
#LUDWIGVAN
Get the daily arts news straight to your inbox.
Sign up for the Ludwig Van Toronto e-Blast! — local classical music and opera news straight to your inbox HERE.
- PREVIEW | Sinfonia Toronto Baroque & Beyond Celebrates the Season With Guest Artists The Ezra Duo - December 4, 2025
- INTERVIEW | Director Peter Phillips Talks About The Tallis Scholars And Their Toronto Concert - December 4, 2025
- PREVIEW | The Royal Conservatory Of Music Launches Orchestrated With Cory Wong - December 3, 2025
