A little light music

Briefer evenings, casual settings and more diverse programming should enable the Encore series to further open the door to chamber music.

[Times photo: Toni L. Sandys]

Mark Sforzini, a composer and principal bassoonist with the Florida Orchestra, is part of a group of orchestra principals that will premiere his Octet on Thursday at St. Petersburg’s Palladium Theater as part of the 2003 Encore Series.

By JOHN FLEMING, Times Performing Arts Critic
© St. Petersburg Times
published January 19, 2003

ST PETERSBURG -- If playing in a symphony orchestra is like being a cog in a wheel or working in a bureaucracy, then chamber music represents artistic liberation.

"We all enjoy playing chamber music whenever we have the opportunity," said Mark Sforzini, principal bassoon of the Florida Orchestra. "It's a contrast to what we normally do. In chamber music, your part's very independent, and there's a greater sense of intimacy. There can be intimacy in the orchestra, too, but when you're playing chamber music, it's really heightened."

On Thursday, Sforzini and seven other principals from the orchestra will perform in the first concert of the 2003 Encore Series at the Palladium Theater. Sforzini also is a composer, and topping the program is the premiere of his Octet for violin, viola, cello, bass, flute, clarinet, bassoon and horn. It is paired with the masterpiece that, in part, inspired Sforzini, Beethoven's Septet for the same instrumentation except flute.

"Beethoven was a master of motivic composition," Sforzini said. "He'd take one motif and turn it into an entire symphony movement. My style of composing is also based on developing motifs. So he has obviously influenced how I compose music."

Sforzini's Octet was commissioned by Ray Murray, former chairman of the orchestra's board of trustees, and his wife, Nancy. It is one of several pieces by local composers on the Encore series of eight concerts, featuring bay area performers.

"What is always amazing to anyone who comes to this community is what an incredible resource we have in local musicians," said Dar Webb, whose real estate company, Loftsville, sponsors the series. "The Florida Orchestra has gotten so good and other local musicians are so good. Our goal was just trying to make that resource available in a comfortable way to people who love this kind of music."

Chamber music is pretty well served in the Tampa Bay area. The Museum of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg has a Sunday afternoon series that frequently draws sellout crowds to its Marly Room. Tarpon Springs Performing Arts Center presents an excellent lineup of chamber music ensembles.

"I think it's a case of a rising tide raising all boats," Webb said. "I don't see any problem with competition. I think the more of this kind of music we have, the more people are going to pick and choose and support them."

Encore concerts are designed to go down easily, with free wine and cheese beforehand and a talk-back session with musicians afterward. Most performances will run about an hour without intermission.

"Don't dress up -- the Palladium is as casual as you are!" reads a line in the series brochure.

"We wanted to get the musicians off a pedestal and connect them with the community," said Brent Douglas, the Palladium program manager. "We know that getting a new audience for classical music can be difficult, especially chamber music, and we thought by not making it a super-long, drawn-out evening, they'd be more likely to come and get a taste of it."

The Encore series, now in its third year, has a steering committee that includes musicians such as Sforzini who seek to bring balance and diversity to its programming. Each ensemble is encouraged to include one work by a living composer along with chamber music masterworks.

"Last year we let the musicians play whatever they wanted, and several of them just did sonata after sonata. It was too heavy," Douglas said.

Along with a string quartet, piano trio, violin-piano duo and other standard ensembles, the series includes a few unconventional groups. Nay Palm Bones, for example, is a trombone quartet that plays transcriptions. Would you believe a Shostakovich string quartet or a set of Debussy songs arranged for trombones?

"Their whole goal is to make people understand that the trombone can be a virtuosic instrument," Douglas said. "We threw them on the program just because they have a little bit different edge. It might draw some people who simply don't want to listen to another quartet."

Last year, the best-attended Encore concert drew about 150 people. This year, Webb is hoping for average attendance of 200-plus.

"My goal is to turn it into such a popular series that it will become an image-defining series for the Palladium," she said.

If you go

The Encore series has eight Thursday evening concerts at the Palladium Theater, 253 Fifth Ave. N, St. Petersburg. Thursday, Florida Orchestra Chamber Players; Feb. 6, Russian Heritage Ensemble; Feb. 13, Moretti-Chang Duo; Feb. 27, Atlantis; March 13, Nay Palm Bones; March 27, Tre Donne Musicanti; April 3, Alafia Trio; April 10, McCormick-Beauchamp Duo.

A season pass is $72 for adults, $56 for seniors, $35 for students. Single tickets are $10. Pre-concert reception at 6:30 p.m. and concert at 7:30 p.m. Call (727) 822-3590 or see www.palladiumtheater.com.

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