Local music lovers, who have been suffering the pangs of withdrawal since the last Music Academy concert, can rejoice to learn that relief is on the way in the form of a recital by cellist Karen Yeh and pianist Bridget Hough at 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 26, in Trinity Episcopalian Church, 1500 State St.
This will be the opening concert in Music at Trinity’s 2018-19 season, but the musicians — both UCSB graduates — are also members of the Santa Barbara Music Club, and that excellent organization is also on board for sponsoring the event, though not as part of its regular series of free concerts.
On the program are a cello and piano arrangement of the “Träumerei” movement (No. 7),” from Robert Schumann‘s piano suite, “Scenes from Childhood, Opus 15 (1838)” Ludwig Beethoven‘s “Cello and Piano Sonata No. 5 In D-Major, Opus 102, No. 2 (1815);” and Sergei Rachmaninov‘s “Cello and Piano Sonata in g-minor, Opus 19 (1901).”
If you search YouTube for either/both these musicians, you’ll find quite a lot to make you want to attend this concert, but you will not find them playing together — at least I didn’t.
Whether as soloists or collaborators, they are impressive. Hough seems to favor the romantics — Chopin, Mendelssohn, Rachmaninov — but she is equally adept with the moderns — Milhaud, Stravinsky, Khatchaturian.
Yeh is also drawn to Rachmaninov, and the passionate, throaty tone of her cello is a perfect fit with the grand melancholy of the Russian master.
I have no doubt the two will give stellar accounts of the Schumann and the Beethoven, either. This concert is more than a relief; it’s a blessing.
This is not a free concert, but is not prohibitively expensive, either. There is a $10 suggested donation at the door.
Those who cannot come up with the stipulated sum are not likely to be turned away, but neither can those proffering a $20, $50, or even $100 bill, reasonably expect to receive change back. Classical musicians are notoriously underpaid.
— Gerald Carpenter covers the arts as a Noozhawk contributing writer. He can be reached at gerald.carpenter@gmail.com. The opinions expressed are his own.