Northwestern State University
Baldwin-Carsillo Duo
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| Wesley Baldwin, Cello |
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| Jennifer Carsillo, Violin |
Program
Duo for Violin and Cello in C Major .... Beethoven
Allegro commodo
Larghetto sostenuto
Rondo: Allegretto
Hungarian Folk Melodies .... Bartok
Allegro ironico
Allegretto
Moderato
CHORAL: Andante
Allegretto
Con moto
Vivace
Eight Duets for Violin and Cello, Op. 39 .... Reinhold Glière
I. Prelude
II. Gavotte
III. Cradle Song
IV. Canzonetta
V. Intermezzo
VI. Impromptu
VII. Scherzo
VIII. Etude
~Intermission~
Duet for Violin and Cello (2006) .... Lucas Richman
I.
II.
Sonata for Violin and Cello .... Ravel
Allegro
Très vif
Lent
Vif, avec entrain
Biographies
Jennifer Carsillo’s versatility and wide-ranging musical interests have shaped a diverse career spanning the gamut of styles from Baroque to contemporary popular idioms. Critics called her performance of Bach's E-major violin concerto with the Shreveport Symphony "athletic and evocative" and “an impressive showcase for violinist Jennifer Carsillo,” noting, “its three movements came off as a unified, often rhapsodic whole, making Bach's mysterious gifts of counterpoint all the more magical."
Ms. Carsillo has appeared as a soloist with orchestras in Russia, Jamaica, Austria, California, Florida, Texas, Ohio, Indiana, Virginia, Georgia, Arkansas, and Louisiana, and has performed recitals throughout the United States and in England, France and Italy. Last season, Ms. Carsillo performed Beethoven’s Violin Concerto with Centenary’s Hurley Orchestra and was invited to perform another Beethoven work this year: the Triple Concerto, featuring her Evangeline Trio with cellist Ruth Drummond and pianist Gay Grosz.
Ms. Carsillo will also join cellist Wesley Baldwin in a series of duo recitals throughout the southern United States. Earlier in the 2010-2011 season, Jennifer Carsillo will perform Bach's E-Major Concerto with the Old Bridge Chamber Orchestra in Northern Virginia, as part of the orchestra's October Music Festival, for which she will also give a masterclass.
An advocate for new music, Ms. Carsillo is a founding member of Rhythmic Salt, a string quartet and percussion group that debuted in October of 2003, introducing premieres by Iranian and Lebanese composers, works by Luciano Berio, Steve Reich and Peter Sculthorpe, and the concert premiere of a piece from a recent NBC movie score. Ms. Carsillo is also a founding member of the Ava (Audio-Visual-Arts) Ensemble, a chamber music group devoted to exploring the connections between music and other forms of art.
In 2002, Jennifer Carsillo was in residence as the violinist for the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, performing and recording seven world premieres written for the group, together with the standard works of living composers. She was also a featured artist at the Prince Albert Chamber Music Festival in Hawaii, and in 2003, traveled to France and Italy to perform a series of violin and harp duo recitals with Parisian harpist Isabelle Perrin for the Chateau de Montcaud and the Maestro Foundation Cremona.
The success of these recitals led to a new collaborative project: a concerto for harp and violin by the French master composer, Jean-Michel Damase, written for the duo and debuted in October 2007. Ms. Carsillo has also performed with the Ritz Chamber Players and was featured with the band Metro Area at Miami Beach’s Winter Music Conference—the dance music industry’s signature annual event.
Ms. Carsillo spent three seasons at the Wintergreen Music Festival, where she performed as a soloist, chamber musician, and Concertmaster of the Festival Orchestra. Jennifer also enjoyed three summers as a Faculty Artist at the Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music in New Hampshire, performing and coaching for Apple Hill's "Playing for Peace" project, a program designed to bring musicians from different countries together—in friendship, as well as in music.
A native of the San Francisco Bay Area, Ms. Carsillo was introduced to the violin through the public school system, and her passion for music led her to the Oberlin Conservatory as a student of Marilyn McDonald. After winning the Oberlin Concerto Competition, Ms. Carsillo continued her education as a fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center and under the tutelage of the legendary pedagogues Franco Gulli and Josef Gingold at Indiana University, earning her Master’s Degree in violin performance.
Jennifer Carsillo’s newest CD project is “Lullabies for Little Dreamers,” a jazz-inspired lullaby album that she recorded with her sister, San Francisco-based jazz vocalist Lori Carsillo. Also an actress, Jennifer Carsillo is a frequent narrator with orchestras around the country and is recording a commercial CD with the Rochester (New York) Philharmonic, due for release in the 2011-2012 season.
Cellist Wesley Baldwin performs throughout the United States and Europe as soloist and chamber musician. As a soloist he has appeared with conductors including Dan Allcott, James Fellenbaum, Serge Fournier, Cyrus Ginwala, Francis Graffeo, Adrian McDonnell, Daniel Meyer, Jorge Richter, Richard Rosenberg, Brendan Townsend, Kirk Trevor, and David Wiley, with the Laredo Philharmonic, the Oregon Mozart Players, the Symphony of the Mountains, the Bryan Symphony, the Oak Ridge Symphony, and the Wintergreen and Hot Springs Festival Orchestras.
Upcoming concerto appearances in the 2010-11 season include repeat appearances with the Wintergreen and Oak Ridge Symphonies, and concerts with the New River Valley and Bismarck-Mandan Symphony Orchestras. As a recitalist and chamber musician Wesley performs this season in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Indiana, Lousiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North and South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia.
An advocate for great music from all eras, Mr. Baldwin performed the North American premier of the Jacob ter Veldhuis “Rainbow” Concerto in 2008 with the Bryan Symphony. In 2009 Baldwin added to his repertoire the Ranjbaran Cello Concerto, as one of its first performers. Wesley’s performances of cello music by Alan Shulman, the first such commercial recording, was released by Albany records in the Spring of 2010. He has also recorded for the Naxos, Zyode, Centaur, and Innova labels.
Wesley was the founder of the Plymouth String Quartet, with whom he was a top prizewinner in the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition and a finalist in the Paolo Borciani International String Quartet Competition.
Other performing honors Baldwin has received include the Prix Mercure at the Mercure Wettbewerb in Vienna and the first prize in the Homer Ulrich Performance Award Competition.
As a member and principal cellist of the New World Symphony, Baldwin performed with many of the world¹s great conductors, and toured Japan, Scotland, England, Argentina, and Brazil. His orchestral colleagues there selected him as the recipient of the New World Symphony's Community Board Award for artistic integrity and leadership.
Wesley is now cellist of the James Piano Quartet, the resident ensemble at Sweet Briar College and the Wintergreen Festival. Wesley has performed chamber music at the Aspen, Cazenovia, Ojai, Sandpoint, Mainly Mozart, May in Miami, Skaneateles, and Subtropics Music Festivals, and internationally in Italy, France, Monte Carlo, Spain, Austria, Brazil, Argentina, the United Kingdom and Costa Rica.
In the summers he performs and teaches at the Hot Springs Music Festival, the Michigan City Chamber Music Festival, and at the Wintergreen Festival, where he serves as principal cellist and faculty member of the Wintergreen Academy.
A passionate teacher, Wesley serves as associate professor of cello at the University of Tennessee. His former cello students play and teach throughout the U.S.
In Knoxville he founded and directs the Tennessee Cello Workshop, an annual gathering of roughly 100 cellists of all ages from throughout the United States held each February.
Mr. Baldwin plays on a cello by J.B. Vuillaume. He lives in Knoxville with his wife (soprano Melisa Barrick), three great children, and three dogs.