Every once in awhile (not nearly often enough!), the Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra’s maestro, Heiichiro Ohyama, sets down his baton, picks up his viola and joins the cream of his Chamber Orchestra on the stage.
The next time this will happen is at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 9, for an evening of sublime “Chamber Music at the Museum” at the Fleischmann Auditorium at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, 2559 Puesta Del Sol.
The program and personnel of this concert are as follows:
Wolfgang Mozart’s Horn Quintet in Eb-Major, K. 407 (1782) (Jenny Kim, horn; Amy Hershberger, violin; Ohyama and Erik Rynearson, violas; Jacqueline Greenshields, cello); François Devienne’s Quartet for Bassoon and Strings in g-minor, Opus 73, No. 3 (1800) (Judith Farmer, bassoon; Sooah Kim, violin; Ohyama, viola; Paula Fehrenbach, cello); and Mozart’s String Quintet No. 4 in g-minor, K. 516 (1787) (Hershberger and Kim, violins; Ohyama and Rynearson, violas; Fehrenbach, cello).
An elegant program, I must say: sweet, mellow, and free of cliches or vulgarity.
Devienne (1759-1803) was, according to Wikipedia, “a flautist (sic), bassoonist and composer, and played bassoon at the Paris Opera. He wrote successful operas in the 1790s, including Les visitandines (1792), which brought him much success.”
He was also a respected professor of flute and administrator at the National Institute of Music, which was renamed the Paris Conservatory in 1795.
His music is lyrical, melodic, and cast within the classical sonata-allegro format invented by Franz Joseph Haydn, yet with occasional surges of romantic urgency. Not having attached himself too closely to the aristocracy, his career weathered the French Revolution without disruption, and he flourished thereafter.
Tickets to the concert are $61.50, general admission. Click here to purchase tickets online. Tickets also may be purchased at the door or by calling 805.963.0761.
— 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.