Maine Perspective Front Page
Le Stagioni
Last year at this time, violinist Patricia Shih was giving concerts in Germany and violinist Weronika Knapik was studying at the Conservatory in Mainz.
Cellist Inna Nassidze was completing her fifth year at the Curtis Institute of Music and headed to a concert career in New York City.
Nikita Pogrebnoy was finishing his scholarship studies at the Longy School of Music in Massachusetts, and his first year as assistant principal violist with the Portland Symphony Orchestra.
That's when the University of Maine/Bangor Symphony Orchestra String Quartet program came into their lives.
Since last fall, UMaine has been home to four of the most exciting young string musicians in the world. The four students are here as the first of four music graduate students selected for the debut of the UMaine/BSO String Quartet program, sponsored by the University of Maine School of Performing Arts and the Bangor Symphony Orchestra.
For two years, students receive free tuition and a stipend as the School of Performing Arts Graduate String Quartet, and as members of the string section of the Bangor Symphony Orchestra.
The quartet also performs off campus, representing both the School and the Symphony as it travels to public schools and communities for live performances.
The UMaine/BSO Quartet, publicized internationally, attracted numerous applicants from around the world. Applications for the four graduate positions were reviewed by School Director Diane Roscetti and Associate Professor of Music Anatole Wieck, and by Christopher Zimmerman, Bangor Symphony music director and conductor. Winners joined the University community in September.
"All four are consummate musicians who have a great deal of training, awards and experience," says Roscetti, who was instrumental in the creation of the UMaine/BSO String Quartet program. "They are all committed to a full-time career in performance, which at this time they hope to be a professional quartet of international acclaim. They have such a zest for life and are really enthusiastic.
"It is important to have the state's land-grant university working with a major community organization like the Bangor Symphony. This program provides educational opportunities to schools and communities in Maine."
The formation of the quartet represents a new chapter in the professional lives of all four performers, who up until now have had solo careers. The effects of this new musical experience in Maine is already evident in the name they chose for their group - Le Stagioni, Italian for "the seasons" - and their excitement in having the artistry of four musicians from different parts of the world "now combined into one whole, a quartet."
What audiences will hear when the four take the stage is a depth of musical talent that has cultivated and matured in some of the finest music schools and venues in the world.
"There is such a great repertoire for quartet. But it also is so different from performing solo and expressing yourself," says Shih, 28, who grew up in Canada and is based in Toronto. "In a quartet, you have to listen to everyone else. It requires more communication.
"When we first played together, I thought our sounds all blended," says Shih of the quartet's first professional recording session, which has been made into a promotional CD. "We communicated right away. Our musicology is important in how we understand each other. That will come across when people hear us performing as a quartet."
Shih was 4 when she started playing violin like her older sister, Anne. At age 5, Patricia came to the attention of the world when she was invited to perform the Bach Double Concerto. After years of winning international competitions, Patricia debuted in Carnegie Hall at the age of 15.
Patricia entered Indiana University when she was 14, joining her sisters Anne, 18, a violinist and pianist, and Connie, 12, a pianist. After studies with Josef Gingold, she received a graduate degree in music six years later.
"I love the sound of the violin," says Shih, who also plays piano. "It is close to the sound of the singing voice. The violin is so much a part of my life, it is like an extension of my body."
For Knapik, 28, of Poland, it was an older brother studying piano and percussion who introduced her to music. She started on the piano, then moved to the violin. From her mentors, Knapik says she learned "to be spontaneous and express myself in a free way as a musician. I learned to have the courage to say what I want in my music."
Knapik was in Germany at the Hochschule in Mainz for three- and-a-half years with Patricia's sister, Anne. The UMaine/BSO String Quartet program was an opportunity for her to do something new with her career. It also is her first experience living in the United States.
Nassidze began improvising on the piano at age 3. She took up the cello, the instrument her father plays, at 7. When she was 15, her family moved from the former Soviet republic of Georgia to Mexico, where her parents are professional musicians. Beginning in 1994, Nassidze studied under David Soyer at the Curtis Institute of Music. Also at Curtis Institute was Patricia's sister, Connie, whom Nassidze performed with for five years.
"I never doubted that I was on the right track," says Nassidze of her music. "My life would not be fulfilled unless I was doing what I am now."
Nassidze graduated from Curtis Institute in May and was on her way to New York to begin her concert career. The UMaine/ BSO Quartet program was an opportunity to combine her solo career with chamber music.
Nassidze performs with a cello willed to her by Raya Garbousova. Garbousova was a world-renowned Russian concert cellist and a professor with whom School of Performing Arts Director Diane Roscetti studied in graduate school.
"The quartet sound - the feeling of four instruments - is unbelievable," says Nassidze, 25. "I was expecting something less when we came together to play for the first time. We played like we'd been together for years.
"First thing I said when I called home was that nature is beautiful in Maine," says Nassidze. "It is the perfect place for making music, with its quiet, space, and inspiring and calming beauty.
"I'm used to big cities like Philadelphia," Nassidze says. "New York is hard, with the extra pressure that affects playing. Here, you just look at the colored leaves and you can't be nervous."
Pogrebnoy started playing piano at age 5. A year later, he switched to the violin. His father, an engineer, was a professional musician in his youth.
"My father wanted me to be a musician," says Pogrebnoy, 26, who grew up in St. Petersburg. "From him I learned the aspects of music. Even today, I know I can trust his opinion about my playing."
At 15, Pogrebnoy turned to the viola, an instrument he appreciates for its deeper sound. "Compared to the violin, it also suits my personality - more calm, laid-back."
Pogrebnoy spent five years at the St. Petersburg Conservatory, where his graduate work was done with A.V. Liudewig. Beginning in 1997, he studied with Michael Zaretsky at Longy School of Music, Cambridge, Mass.
He has performed with the Portland Symphony for the past two years.
"This is what I want to be - a chamber musician," says Pogrebnoy.
Shih and the others admit that Le Stagioni, the professional name this first quartet in the program will go by when it records and enters international competitions, is "a new experience, full of the unknown." And it is a unique opportunity, bringing four rising stars together based on their talent, aspirations and fate.
"I have lots of hopes for this group, not just for the two years we're here but for longer," says Shih. "We can see the potential and we're very optimistic.
"We do it for the love of music," says Shih. "The music I play takes the place of language. I can say so much more with music. After a concert, I have a feeling of completeness, of giving myself to the audience. When you can take the audience to that ethereal world, it is such an inspiration."
Music is not materialistic but spiritual, and there is no limit to it, Nassidze says. "There is no small or big concert; it doesn't matter if you're performing for 100 or for two people. They all are equally important.
"Maine audiences can expect to hear what we feel - enthusiasm for the music," Nassidze says.