Saratoga Springs, NY
Beethoven’s Quintet for Piano and WindsSun, July 20, 2025, 3:00 pm
Spa Little Theatre, Saratoga Performing Arts Center
Two hours with intermission
This program explores the interplay between wind instruments and piano, beginning with Mendelssohn’s Concert Piece No. 1 in F minor for Clarinet, Bassoon, and Piano, Op. 113, a lyrical work showcasing dynamic exchanges between the instruments. Next is Schulhoff’s Divertissement for Oboe, Clarinet, and Bassoon, a lively piece by the Czech composer known for blending jazz, folk, and classical influences. Selections from Divertimento of Mozart Arias for Wind Quintet offers elegant melodies, while Dutilleux’s Sonatine for Flute and Piano combines delicate beauty with moments of intensity. The French composer, known for his sophisticated use of orchestral colors and textures, blends subtle harmonies and emotive soundscapes, showcasing his influence on 20th-century French music. The program concludes with Beethoven’s Quintet in E-flat Major for Oboe, Clarinet, Bassoon, Horn, and Piano, highlighting vibrant dialogue between the wind instruments and piano.
Program
Felix Mendelssohn
(1809–1847)Concert Piece No. 1 in F minor for Clarinet, Bassoon, and Piano, Op. 113
(1832)Erwin Schulhoff
(1894-1942)Divertissement for Oboe, Clarinet, and Bassoon
(1927)Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
(1756–1791)Selections from Divertimento of Mozart Arias for Wind Quintet
(arr. Schottstädt & Manz)Henri Dutilleux
(1916-2013)Sonatine for Flute and Piano
(1943)Ludwig van Beethoven
(1770–1827)Quintet in E-flat major for Oboe, Clarinet, Bassoon, Horn, and Piano, Op. 16
(1796)
Sahun Sam Hong
Tara Helen O'Connor
James Austin Smith
Sebastian Manz
Marc Goldberg
Nathaniel Silberschlag
Pianist Sahun Sam Hong was the winner of the 2017 Vendome Prize at Verbier, and a prizewinner of the 2023 Naumburg International Piano Competition and 2017 International Beethoven Competition Vienna. He was also the recipient of a 2021 American Pianists Award. He has been invited to perform at major chamber music festivals and is a prolific arranger of chamber music and orchestral works. He is the Co-Artistic Director of ensemble132, a chamber music collective that presents his transcriptions on annual tours. At the age of 16, Hong graduated from Texas Christian University, studying with John Owings. He also studied with Leon Fleisher and Yong Hi Moon at the Peabody Institute. A member of CMS’s Bowers Program, Hong is currently based in New York City and serves on the faculty of CUNY Queens College.
Tara Helen O'Connor, who Artmag has said "so embodies perfection on the flute that you'll forget she is human," is an Avery Fisher Career Grant recipient, a two-time Grammy Award nominee, and, as a member of the New Millennium Ensemble, a recipient of the Walter W. Naumburg Chamber Music Award. A Wm.S. Haynes artist, she was the first flutist selected to participate in the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center's Bowers Program and is currently a season artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and a member of the Windscape woodwind quintet.
O'Connor serves as Visiting Associate Professor, Adjunct, of Flute at the Yale School of Music, and is Artistic Director of the Music from Angel Fire Festival. A champion of contemporary music, Ms. O'Connor has premiered hundreds of works and has appeared on numerous recordings and film and television soundtracks including Barbie, Respect, The Joker, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Only Murders in the Building, and Schmigadoon! to name only a few.
An avid chamber musician, O'Connor regularly appears include the Bravo! Vail festival, Chamber Music Northwest, Music@Menlo, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Chamber Music Festival of the Bluegrass, Spoleto Festival USA, the Banff Centre, Rockport Music, Bay Chamber Concerts, Manchester Music Festival, the Great Mountains Music Festival, Chesapeake Chamber Music Festival and Music From Angel Fire.
O'Connor has appeared on A&E's Breakfast with the Arts and PBS' Live from Lincoln Center. She has recorded for Deutsche Grammophon, EMI Classics, Koch International, CMS Studio Recordings with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and Bridge Records. She also serves on the faculty at Bard College Conservatory of Music, and the Contemporary Performance Program at Manhattan School of Music.
She lives with her husband, violinist Daniel Phillips and their two miniature dachshunds, Chloé and Ava on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.
Performer, curator, and on-stage host James Austin Smith “proves that an oboist can have an adventurous solo career.” (The New Yorker). Smith appears at leading national and international chamber music festivals, as Co-Principal Oboe of the conductor-less Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and as an artist of the International Contemporary Ensemble. As Artistic and Executive Director of Tertulia Chamber Music, Smith creates intimate evenings of music, food, and drink in New York and San Francisco, as well as an annual festival in a variety of global destinations. He serves as Artistic Advisor to Coast Live Music in the San Francisco Bay Area and mentors graduate-level musicians as a professor of oboe and chamber music at Stony Brook University and as a regular guest at London’s Guildhall School. A Fulbright scholar and alum of Carnegie Hall’s Ensemble Connect and CMS’s Bowers Program, he holds degrees in music and political science from Northwestern and Yale University.
Clarinetist Sebastian Manz has been praised for his “enchantingly beautiful intonation and technical prowess” by Fono Forum. He has performed as a soloist with major European orchestras such as the Nuremberg Symphony Orchestra, the Munich Chamber Orchestra, and the National Youth Orchestra of Germany. On the chamber music stage, he has given performances at Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Beethovenhaus Bonn, and has appeared at festivals including the prestigious Festspiele Mecklenburg Vorpommern and the MDR Musiksommer in Germany, collaborating with artists like Sebastian Studnitzky, Sarah Christian, Julian Steckel, Danae Dörken, the Danish String Quartet, and the Armida Quartett. At the ARD International Music Competition in 2008, he won not only first prize in the clarinet category, which had not been awarded for 40 years, but also the coveted Audience Prize and other special prizes. He is Principal Clarinet of the SWR Symphony Orchestra in Stuttgart. He is also active in the “Rhapsody in School” organization founded by Lars Vogt, which is committed to bringing classical music into schools. His recording A Bernstein Story was awarded with the Opus Klassik award in 2020. He recently released his recording of clarinet concertos by Carl Nielsen and Magnus Lindberg, as well as a recital recording of works by Brahms and Schumann with pianist Herbert Schuch. Manz was born in Hanover, and his teachers include the acclaimed clarinetists Sabine Meyer and Reiner Wehle. He is an alum of CMS's Bowers Program.
A member of the New York Woodwind Quintet and St. Luke’s Chamber Ensemble, Marc Goldberg is principal bassoonist of Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, American Ballet Theater, NYC Opera, Orchestra of St. Luke’s, and a member of the American Symphony Orchestra. Previously the associate principal bassoonist of the New York Philharmonic, he has also been a frequent guest of the Metropolitan Opera, Boston Symphony Orchestra, and Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, touring with these ensembles across four continents and joining them on numerous recordings. Solo appearances include performances throughout the US, in South America, and across the Pacific Rim with the Brandenburg Ensemble, Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, Saito Kinen Orchestra, American Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Riverside Symphony, Jupiter Symphony, New York Chamber Soloists, and the New York Symphonic Ensemble. A longtime season artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, he has been a guest of the Da Camera Society of Houston, Musicians from Marlboro, Music@Menlo, the Brentano Quartet, Carnegie Hall’s Zankel Band, and the Boston Chamber Music Society. Summer festival appearances include Spoleto, Ravinia, Chautauqua, Tanglewood, Caramoor, Saito Kinen/Ozawa Music Festival, Bard Music Festival, and Marlboro. Goldberg is on the faculty of the Juilliard School Pre-College Division, Mannes College, New England Conservatory, the Hartt School, and the Bard College Conservatory of Music.
Nathaniel Silberschlag was appointed principal horn of The Cleveland Orchestra in May 2019, and took up the position in August prior to the start of the 2019–20 season. He previously served as assistant principal horn of the Washington National Opera/Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra, where he was the youngest member ever to win a position with the ensemble, at the age of 19.
Born in Leonardtown, Maryland, in the Chesapeake region, he comes from of a family of sixteen professional musicians across several generations. These include former principal players of the New York Philharmonic, Italian National Orchestra RAI, and Jerusalem Symphony. He made his debut in Italy at age 9, with news of the performance appearing on the front page of Italy’s newspaper La Stampa.
As soloist, Nathaniel has performed with the Juilliard Orchestra, Bulgarian Philharmonic, Romania State Symphony, New York’s Little Orchestra Society, and the Chesapeake Orchestra. He has also played concerts with a variety of ensembles, including the New York Philharmonic and Orpheus Chamber Orchestra.
At the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, he became a graduate of the National Symphony Orchestra Youth Fellowship program under the tutelage of Sylvia Alimena as part of her "Brass of Peace" scholarship program. He also spent two summers in the Kennedy Center’s Summer Music Institute. He was a fellow at the Music Academy of the West in the summers of 2017 and 2018, and in 2018 was named one of ten Zarin Mehta Fellows to perform with the New York Philharmonic as part of their 2018 Global Academy.
In 2015, he was the first recipient of the Edwin C. Thayer / Laurel Bennert Ohlson award for artistry and excellence in horn performance. Since 2007, he has been a full participant fellow at Italy's Alba Music Festival, and also attended the Eastern Music Festival in 2016. He is also a member of the New York Festival Brass Quintet.
Silberschlag completed his bachelor of music degree from New York's Juilliard School in May 2019, where he was a student of Julie Landsman and recipient of the Kovner Fellowship.