Classics I – November 4th and 5th
Piano Concerto No. 5 in E-flat, Op. 73 Emperor – Ludwig van Beethoven
Pianist Max Levinson is known as an intelligent and sensitive artist with a fearless technique. His international career was launched when he won First Prize at the Dublin International Piano Competition. He is also recipient of other prestigious prizes including the Avery Fisher Career Grant and the Andrew Wolf Award. He has performed as soloist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, St. Louis Symphony, Detroit Symphony, San Francisco Symphony, Baltimore Symphony, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Oregon Symphony, Indianapolis Symphony, Colorado Symphony, New World Symphony, Utah Symphony, Boston Pops, the Sun Symphony (Hanoi, Vietnam). and National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, and in recital at New York’s Alice Tully Hall, Washington DC’s Kennedy Center, London’s Wigmore Hall, Zürich’s Tonhalle, the Musee d’Orsay in Paris, and throughout the US, Canada, Europe and Asia. He is highly sought after as a performer of chamber music, and is an Artist-Member of the Boston Chamber Music Society, and has collaborated with such musicians as James Ehnes, Augustin Hadelich, Anne Akiko Meyers, Pinchas Zukerman, Stefan Jackiw, Lynn Harrell, and the Tokyo, Vermeer, Mendelssohn, Borromeo, Muir, and Ulysses Quartets.
Max Levinson is a graduate of Harvard and the New England Conservatory. His principal teachers were Patricia Zander, Aube Tzerko and Bruce Sutherland. He serves on the faculty at both the Boston Conservatory and New England Conservatory, and gives master classes at conservatories and colleges throughout the world. He also frequently serves as a jury member for competitions. Max Levinson is a Steinway Artist.
Classics II – February 24th and 25th
I Had a Dream – Lee Hoiby
Old American Songs – Aaron Copland
Baritone Philip Lima has regularly garnered critical acclaim for his performances on both concert and operatic stages: “His singing was glorious” (The Boston Globe) – “vibrant baritone and a commanding presence” (Cleveland The Plain Dealer) – “keen musicianship along with total dramatic intention.” (Opera News Online).
He has sung leading operatic roles in Germany and for regional American opera companies in repertoire ranging from traditional favorites by Handel, Mozart, Puccini, and Verdi; to important works of twentieth century masters such as Samuel Barber, Benjamin Britten, and Viktor Ullmann; to the comic masterworks of Gilbert and Sullivan. Of particular note have been his featured roles in the world premieres of operas and songs by jazz greats Leslie Burrs, Nathan Davis, and Mary Watkins, and by award-winning composers Larry Bell and Julius Williams.
Mr. Lima has appeared as soloist with the Boston Pops and over seventy orchestras, choral societies, and concert series across the United States and in Korea and Ukraine in beloved choral works of Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Fauré, Handel, Mendelssohn, Orff, and Vaughan Williams, as well as works by Bernstein (Arias and Barcarolles and major excerpts from Mass), Dave Brubeck (The Light in the Wilderness), Mahler (Kindertotenlieder), Ravel (Don Quichotte à Dulcinée), and Lee Hoiby (his setting of the “I Have a Dream” speech of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.).
Mr. Lima is featured on the recording of pioneering African-American composer Florence Price’s Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight that won the 2020 American Prize for the Performance of American Music.
The Assistant Chair of Berklee College of Music’s Voice Department, Mr. Lima is a frequent recitalist whose performance of Schubert’s Winterreise with pianist Beverly Orlove was cited by The Boston Phoenix in an annual summary of Boston’s “Unforgettable Classical Events.”
More information about Mr. Lima is available at philiplima.com, and at his YouTube channel, PhilipLimaSings.