2017 Spring Residency: Ligeti Split mini-festival
The Birdfoot Festival continues its sixth season with Ligeti Split, a two-concert mini-festival exploring the music of György Ligeti, one of the 20th century’s wildest and most creative minds.
These two free concerts conclude Birdfoot’s third Artist Residency (February 9–16), during which celebrated British pianist Danny Driver, violinist Jenna Sherry (Birdfoot Festival co-founder and Artistic Director), and horn player Roy Femenella will spend seven days in New Orleans rehearsing, teaching, performing, and inspiring music lovers and the next generation of musicians alike.
Special features of the 2017 February Artist Residency include Birdfoot Backstage, Danny Driver’s solo recital, and an all-day workshop for Birdfoot’s award-winning Young Artist Program.
The two free Ligeti Split Community Concerts are made possible by the Selly Foundation Fund of the Greater New Orleans Foundation and are presented in partnership with the Tulane Newcomb Department of Music, Dillard University, and WWNO 89.9FM.
Listen to an interview with the artists with Diane Mack on Inside the Arts on WWNO 89.9FM.
Read about Ligeti Split in NolaVie.
Artist Bio’s:
Jenna Sherry, violin (Bio HERE)
Roy Femenella, horn
Roy Femenella holds the third horn chair at Symphony in C and has been a guest musician in some of the world’s most prestigious ensembles, including the Metropolitan Opera, l’Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, and the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra. A graduate of The Juilliard School, he has been third horn of the Aspen Festival Orchestra since 2015. In December, 2014 he was a guest soloist with the New York Symphonic Arts Ensemble performing Richard Strauss’ Horn Concerto no. 1. He appears regularly with the Princeton Symphony, and was a guest with the Boston-based chamber orchestra A Far Cry for their 2015 U.S. tour. As a chamber musician he has performed with the Jupiter Symphony Chamber Players, and as a guest with Sylvan Winds. He was a participant in Juilliard’s partnership with Guri Santa Marcelina Cultura in São Paulo, Brazil, and traveled there in 2014 to give masterclasses and coach the Orquestra Sinfônica Juvenil do Guri in addition to performing chamber music with his colleagues. He can be heard with the Swedish Radio Symphony on their upcoming release for Harmonia Mundi of selections from Wagner’s operas with conductor Daniel Harding and Baritone Matthias Goerne. His teachers have included Erik Ralske, Javier Gándara, and John Zirbel.
Danny Driver, piano
The international critical acclaim that Danny Driver’s recordings and performances have generated over recent years has cemented his reputation as one of Britain’s most respected and versatile pianists, with two Gramophone Award nominations, a National Public Radio Top 10 Award and Limelight Magazine’s Instrumental Recording of the Year 2014 Award for his recording of Handel’s Eight Great Suites.
Danny Driver’s recent concerto appearances have included the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Minnesota Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, and American Symphony Orchestra. He has appeared twice at the BBC Proms, most recently with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra under Charles Dutoit.
In recital Danny Driver has performed throughout the UK and in Germany, Italy, Israel, Sweden, the USA, and China. Highlights of Driver’s 2016-17 schedule include the Southbank International Piano Series (London), Music Toronto, the Museum of Fine Arts in Montreal, the Musée de l’Orangerie in Paris, and a USA tour featuring Ligeti’s Piano Études.
As a chamber musician Danny Driver has appeared at the Australian Chamber Music Festival, Bard Music Festival, Birdfoot Music Festival, Eilat Chamber Music Festival, and Stockholm’s Festival O/Modernt. He has collaborated regularly with violinists Chloë Hanslip and Jack Liebeck, cellist Oliver Coates, and with baritone Christian Immler.
Driver’s fruitful relationship with London-based Hyperion Records has spawned an internationally acclaimed discography of works by C P E Bach, Handel, Schumann, and Balakirev, and highly praised interpretations of neglected British composers York Bowen, Benjamin Dale and Erik Chisholm. His recording of piano concertos by Amy Beach, Cecile Chaminade and Dorothy Howell, with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Rebecca Miller, will be released in March.
Birdfoot Backstage
February 15, 2017, 7:00 PM
Dillard University’s Cook Auditorium
2601 Gentilly Boulevard
New Orleans
Free admission
Danny Driver in Recital
February 16, 2017 at 8:00 PM
Tulane University’s Dixon Hall
New Orleans
Free Admission