There will be a free concert offered by the Santa Barbara Music Club at 3 p.m. Saturday in the Faulkner Gallery of the Santa Barbara Central Library, 40 E. Anapamu St.
The concert will begin with two works for woodwind quintet — the Roaring Fork Quintet (1993) by Eric Ewazen (born in 1954), and the opening “Allegro” from Trois piéces bréves (1930) by Jacques Ibert (1890-1962) — played by the ensemble Sonos Montecito (Andrea Di Maggio on flute, Trey Ferrel on oboe, Joanne Kim on clarinet, Paul Mori on bassoon and Steven Gross on horn), and will end with the Violin-Piano Sonata No. 7 in C-Minor, Opus 30, No. 2 by Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827), performed by Nicole McKenzie on violin and Betty Oberacker on piano.
Ewazen’s attractive and utterly accessible Roaring Fork Quintet is in three movements: I. “Whitewater Rapids (Maroon Creek)”; II. “Columbines (Snowmass Lake)”; and III. “At the Summit (Buckskin Pass).”
It is a celebration of the valley the Roaring Fork River and its valley, in the state of Colorado. It was commissioned by the Borealis Wind Quintet, who gave the work its premiere in 1993.
Translating the sights and sounds of nature into music is one of Ewazen’s strongest suits, and the Quintet works very well as an elegant home movie of a camping trip.
The Beethoven is a dramatic work, with shifting moods, sudden flare-ups and equally sudden halts. I imagine it is the very devil to play.
The slow movement finds Beethoven at his most ravishingly sentimental, with his heart worn passionately on his sleeve.
— 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.