ESPRIT ORCHESTRA PRESENTS RUNNER PRELUDE CONCERT AT KOERNER HALL
TORONTO, ON – On Sunday, February 23rd, 2025, Esprit Orchestra’s 2024/25 concert season continues with Runner, the second of two Prelude Concerts leading to the Edge of Your Seat International Festival in the Spring. Music Director Alex Pauk will lead the orchestra through three concerti featuring local soloists and a Canadian Premiere of a new work by American composer Steve Reich. This concert will be preceded by Musical Insights (formerly Pre-Concert Talks) with composer Alexina Louie and special guests at 7:15PM.
Composed in 2016 for a large ensemble of winds, percussion, pianos and strings, Steve Reich’s luminous Runner will receive its Canadian Premiere performance at the top of this concert. Comprising five continuous movements, the piece is built around different rhythmic durations beginning with sixteenths, then eighths, quarters, before following the same pattern in reverse to form an ABCBA structure. In classic Reich fashion, pairs of pianos and vibraphones serve as the rhythmic anchor for the music while the winds and strings shimmer and echo the melodies almost in the style of a round.
The concert will feature acclaimed Canadian harpist Erica Goodman performing the Concerto for Harp and Orchestra composed for her in 2005 by Esprit Music Director Alex Pauk. A virtuosic tour-de-force for one of the great harpists of our time, the piece draws on materials from the composer's richly varied musical background to form a kind of musical self-portrait.
Following acclaimed performances with Esprit last season, violinist Mark Fewer and pianist Kevin Ahfat return to perform Hans Abrahamsen’s introspective Double Concerto. Conceived in 2011, this work engages the soloists in delicate interplay through a series of distilled, poetic moments. On this piece, music critic Kate Molleson remarked, “Like a fairytale or a winter landscape, he takes what is familiar and transforms it, allowing us to experience it, and perhaps ourselves, afresh.”
This concert will conclude with a feat of invigorating virtuosity by way of Henryk Gorecki’s relentless Harpsichord Concerto. On this occasion, Esprit will be joined by the exceptional local harpsichordist Wesley Shen, among today’s champions of contemporary harpsichord performance. Set in two rapid movements, the work comprises driving rhythmic intensity and chordal dissonance to produce a striking musical explosion full of power and vigor.