The Verde Valley Sinfonietta concludes its season with a concert on Sunday, May 15, at 2:30 p.m. at the Sedona Performing Arts Center, located at 995 Upper Red Rock Loop Road in Sedona.

The concert features world-renowned guest artist Arnaud Sussmann as violin soloist. Conductor Russell Fox will lead the orchestra in a program titled, “A Swarm of B’s,” as each piece performed was written by a composer with a last name beginning with the letter “B.”

Rather than the usual “3 B’s,” — Bach, Beethoven and Brahms — the Sinfonietta program includes works by Bach, Beethoven, Berlioz, Bizet and Bruch.

General admission tickets are $30 at the door for adults and $25 if purchased online in advance at the Sinfonietta’s website. Students age 18 and under are free of charge when accompanied by an adult. Tickets are available at the door the day of the concert and online through the website.

Opening the program is “Le Voici,” the rousing music that introduces the fourth act of George Bizet’s most famous opera, “Carmen.” In this scene, set in Seville, Spain, the crowd is awaiting the arrival of the bullfighters. Catchy, tuneful and exciting, this music is well known to audiences around the world. It serves as a festive beginning to the concert.

The next piece is Johann Sebastian Bach’s Fugue in G minor, BWV 578, “The Little.” Popularly known as the “Little Fugue,” it is one of Bach’s most recognized pieces, written when he was a young up-and-coming organist. The piece has been arranged for other voices including the orchestral version by Leopold Stokowski that will be performed at the concert.

Hector Berlioz’s Hungarian March, from “The Damnation of Faust,” follows. It has a convoluted history. Enamored of Johann Goethe’s “Faust,” Berlioz planned to write an opera based on it. Initially, he received discouragement from Goethe, and dejectedly considered abandoning the project. However, a Hungarian musician suggested that Berlioz write a march based on Hungarian folk tunes in order to ingratiate himself with the Hungarians, whose audiences he was trying to attract. It proved so successful that Berlioz moved it into his Faust opera project. The Hungarian March is the only surviving music that is widely heard from Berlioz’s “The Damnation of Faust.”

Continuing the B’s, Ludwig van Beethoven’s Eighth Symphony in F major, Op 93, is not as widely performed as many of his other symphonies — the most well known of which are the Fourth, Seventh and Ninth. When asked by his pupil Carl Czerny why the Eighth was less popular than the Seventh, Beethoven is said to have replied sarcastically, “because the Eighth is so much better.” Beethoven was growing increasingly deaf at the time of the premier of this composition in 1814, but nevertheless led the premiere. The orchestra largely ignored his out of sync gestures and followed the concertmaster instead. The music is lighthearted and cheerful and reveals nothing about the difficult times Beethoven was undergoing in his everyday life at the time.
In the first movement, Beethoven uses triple meter, an unusual choice for the first movement of a symphony in sonata form. That choice is usually reserved for the minuet or scherzo of a symphony. He also accentuates the return of the opening melody, or “recapitulation,” by instructing the musicians to play it “fortississimo,” or extremely loud, something that composers seldom do for fear the orchestra will overpower audience ears. The second movement is said to be a parody of the recently developed metronome, with its clocklike beat. It may be more accurate to assume that Beethoven was paying homage to Joseph Haydn’s “Clock” symphony, which also has a clock-ticking movement. The third movement, ostensibly an expected minuet in triple time, is deliberately made clunky and uncharacteristic by off-beat placement of accents. The trio section contains solos for clarinet and horns, unusual for the time. Beethoven’s fourth movement demonstrates Beethoven’s out-of-the-box composing, going against the tried and true forms of the day. Tchaikovsky called this movement, “one of the greatest symphonic masterpieces of Beethoven.”

Following an intermission, the final work on the program is Max Bruch’s Violin Concerto No. 1 in G minor, Op. 26, one of the most popular works in the violin concerto repertoire and the work for which Bruch is most known. Written in 1866, and then edited by the famous violinist of the time, Joseph Joachim, it has received an untold number of performances around the world. It continues to be beloved because of its passionate melodies and beautiful integration of solo line and orchestra.

Sussmann will solo in the concerto as a fitting close to the concert and the 11th season for the Sinfonietta.

This is his second performance with the Sinfonietta and will closely follow his time on the Colorado River performing with two of his friends on a rafting/hiking adventure for patrons of the organization, made possible by sponsorship from Neil and Mary Pope. Sussmann resides in New York City and intends to hike out from Phantom Ranch up the Bright Angel Trail for a true once-in-a-lifetime experience. The Sinfonietta admires his tenacity in undertaking this challenge and experience of nature in the west!

Winner of a 2009 Avery Fisher Career Grant, Sussmann has distinguished himself with his sound, bravura and profound musicianship. Minnesota’s Pioneer Press wrote, “Sussmann has an old-school sound reminiscent of what you’ll hear on vintage recordings by Jascha Heifetz or Fritz Kreisler, a rare combination of sweet and smooth that can hypnotize a listener. His clear tone is a thing of awe-inspiring beauty, his phrasing spellbinding.”

A thrilling young musician capturing the attention of classical critics and audiences around the world, Sussmann has appeared with the American Symphony Orchestra, Stamford Symphony, Chattanooga Symphony, Minnesota Sinfonia, Lexington Philharmonic, Jerusalem Symphony and France’s Nice Orchestra.

Further concerto appearances have included a tour of Israel and concerts at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, Dresden Music Festival in Germany and at the Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C. He has been presented in recital in Omaha on the Tuesday Musical Club series, New Orleans by the Friends of Music, Tel Aviv at the Museum of Art and at the Louvre Museum in Paris.
He has also given concerts at the OK Mozart, Mainly Mozart and Moritzburg festivals and appears regularly at the Caramoor, Music@Menlo, La Jolla SummerFest, Seattle Chamber Music, Moab Music and Bridgehampton Chamber Music festivals.
Tickets for the concert are available online at the Sinfonietta website or at the door. For additional information, visit the website.