Faculty Recital: Paula Robison, Flute & Paavali Jumppanen, Piano | An Hour of Bach and Mozart

Artist(s)

“American Treasure” Paula Robison has played a major role internationally in redefining the flute as a solo instrument. A founding member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Robison was also a co-director of the Spoleto Festivals in the US and Italy for over 30 years, earning her the Premio Pegaso and the Adelaide Ristori prizes for her contribution to Italian cultural life. Robison has commissioned works for flute and orchestra by Leon Kirchner, Toru Takemitsu, Oliver Knussen, Kenneth Frazelle, and Robert Beaser, premiered music by Lowell Liebermann, Michael Tilson Thomas, Pierre Boulez, Thea Musgrave, Alberto Ginastera, Elliott Carter, William Schuman, Keith Jarrett, and Carla Bley, performed Leonard Bernstein’s Halil in Vienna and Carl Nielsen’s Concerto in Copenhagen, and presented a rich spectrum of music from Mozart concerti to Brazilian Samba in her many appearances at New York’s Carnegie Hall. Her “Paula and…” series at Alice Tully Hall was a sold-out New York tradition, and for over twenty years she celebrated the music of Vivaldi, Handel, and Mozart in her annual series with Chamber Orchestra in the Temple of Dendur at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Robison’s passion for teaching has taken her all over the world. She draws her inspiration from many sources and traditions including dance, the visual arts, and poetry. She carries with her the legacy of Marcel Moyse, and honors the complexity and richness of her own American heritage. She has taught at the Juilliard School, is DMA honoris causa from the San Francisco Conservatory, and now occupies the Donna Hieken Flute Chair at New England Conservatory.

Finnish virtuoso pianist Paavali Jumppanen has established himself as a dynamic musician who has already cut a wide swath internationally as an orchestral and recital soloist, recording artist, artistic director, and frequent performer of contemporary and avant-garde music. Mr. Jumppanen has performed in the United States, Europe, Japan, China, and Australia and collaborated with conductors including David Robertson, Sakari Oramo, Susanna Mälkki, Esa-Pekka Salonen, and Rafael Payare. He has play-directed the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and frequently collaborates with the Finnish Radio Symphony orchestra and the Helsinki Philharmonic. He has commissioned numerous works and collaborated with the composers Boulez, Murail, Dutilleux, and Penderecki. The Boston Globe praised the “overflowing energy of his musicianship” and The New York Times cited his “power and an extraordinary range of colors.” Mr. Jumppanen’s expanding discography includes “the best recorded disc of Boulez’s piano music so far” (the Guardian writing about the three sonatas recorded on a DGG disc made at the composer’s request) and the complete Beethoven Piano Sonatas on Ondine. He spent the 2011–12 season as a visiting scholar in Harvard University’s Music Department studying musicology and theory to deepen his immersion in Viennese 18th century music. He leads curation at the Väyläfestival, a multi-arts festival in northern Scandinavia and serves as the Artistic Director to the Australian National Academy of Music.