Composer Adrienne Albert’s New Work Follows Mother/Daughter Theme

Composer Adrienne Albert will premiere her new chamber work with the Pacific Serenades Chamber Ensemble on Tuesday, April 24, 8 p.m., at The UCLA Faculty Center. A long celebrated vocalist known particularly for her collaborations with Igor Stravinsky and Leonard Bernstein, Albert began composing her own music in the early 1990s. In little more than a decade, her concert works have been widely performed throughout the United States, Europe, Thailand, and South Africa. Albert’s piece, ‘Between the Dark and Daylight,’ is a mother/child-themed work for flute, harp, violin, viola, and cello. It was inspired by the program’s title, “We all cherish our children’s future,” a line from a John F. Kennedy speech which Pacific Serenades Founder/Artistic Director Mark Carlson chose as the theme for the 2007 season. Albert’s work centers on the idea that every child deserves to be brought into a world free of strife, disease, and hunger and takes its musical references from lullabies of cultures all over the world. Most recently, Albert, a Palisades resident, has been awarded a National Endowment for the Arts grant through The American Composers Forum. She is former composer-in-residence for both the Wagner Ensemble and The Los Angeles Doctors Symphony Orchestra which commissioned two orchestral works that were premiered on the West Coast and have had numerous performances across the country. Igor Stravinsky discovered Albert’s “perfect boy alto” voice and hired her to be the alto soloist on his Mass. She worked with him on numerous occasions and recorded three more solo recordings with him, including his Four Russian Songs For Flute, Harp, Guitar, and Voice, Cantata, and his last song, “The Owl And The Pussycat.” Albert also enjoyed a long working relationship with Leonard Bernstein as a singer and contractor on his celebrated recordings of Mass and ‘West Side Story,’ on which she performed with Kiri Te Kanawa and Jose Carreras. She also sang at Bernstein’s 70th birthday celebration in Tanglewood under the baton of John Williams. Other solo recordings include songs of Charles Ives with the Columbia Symphony and Phillip Glass’ opera ‘The Photographer’ with Glass conducting. Pacific Serenades Chamber Ensemble is now in its 21st season. One of its most distinctive aspects is that it has commissioned and presented 86 world premieres by 44 different composers since its inception, more than any other organization of its kind in the country. The ensemble consistently draws Los Angeles’ top musicians into Pacific Serenades’ stable of performers, including principals of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Pasadena Symphony and Long Beach Symphony. Tickets are $32. Student rush tickets are available for $5 (at the door only) Contact: (213) 534-3434.