Duo Concertante
Nancy Dahn, violin & Timothy Steeves, piano
"Duo Concertante play exceptionally well together...The unifying element here is not so much the attractive repertoire as the exceptional warmth and intimacy of its presentation."
The Ottawa Citizen
Tuesday, March 23, 2010 at 8 PM ~ Academy Hall
[Program]
Admission $20 -
STUDENTS: 18 & under free with student ticket voucher (excluding Carols by Candlelight)
Tickets are available at the
Academy Box Office 7280 Kemano Street, Monday – Thursday 9:30 - 4:30
Tel 604 485 9633
And at the door 30 minutes before the concert
Since forming in 1997, Duo Concertante has been acclaimed for performances characterized by brilliance, subtlety, passion, and stunning ensemble. Hailed for their "artistry, poetry, and impeccable technique" (La Scena Musicale), "exceptional warmth and intimacy" (Ottawa Citizen), violinist Nancy Dahn and pianist Timothy Steeves have been described as "superb musicians" (Wholenote), who "work together with uncanny perfection" (Waterloo Gazette). Their extraordinary teamwork and “powerfully-charged performances” (The Musical Opinion) set them apart from more conventional violin/piano collaborations, with critics observing: "One doesn't listen to a program of violin music here, but to real chamber music, as it should be"(La Scena Musicale) and "Brilliant, saucy and soulful . . . you hear splendid sweet nuances everywhere; Duo Concertante makes a powerful case for thinking of violin/piano sonatas as duo music, rather than as music for a pianist and a violinist" (San Francisco Classical Voice).
Dahn and Steeves have performed hundred of recitals across Canada, the United States, and abroad. They have appeared in London (Wigmore Hall), Chicago (Dame Myra Hess Series), New York City (Music of the Americas and Trinity Church), Ottawa (National Arts Centre), Beijing (Forbidden City Concert Hall), Los Angeles (Los Angeles County Museum of Art), San Francisco (Old First Church), Toronto (Walter Hall and the Four Seasons Performing Arts Centre), Winnipeg (Groundswell and Virtuosi series), Montreal (Chapelle du bon Pasteur), and across eastern and western Canada. They have also been featured at the Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival, the Huntsville Festival of the Arts, the Colours of Music Festival, the Collingwood Music Festival, the Cactus Pear Music Festival (Texas), Sound Symposium, the Baie des Chaleurs Chamber Music Festival and the Tuckamore Festival. Guest artists-in-residencies include those at the Guelph Spring Festival, the Glenn Gould Professional School in Toronto and at Bishop’s University, and they have given master classes at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto, the University of British Columbia, Mount Royal College, the University of Victoria, Ithaca College, McMaster University, the University of Western Ontario, and the Maritime Conservatory.
As part of their 10th anniversary in 2007-08, the Duo recently presented all 10 Beethoven sonatas in a number of venues in central and eastern Canada including the Kitchener-Waterloo Chamber Music Society. Highlights of 2008-2009 included performances at the Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival where they gave the world premiere of Murray Schafer’s Duo for Violin and Piano, a six-city return tour of China, recitals throughout western Canada, Germany and the U.K., and summer appearances at the Indian River Festival and the Cactus Pear Music Festival (Texas).
The Duo’s recordings and live performances are heard frequently on national and regional programs of CBC radio, Radio-Canada International, Société Radio-Canada, as well as in the United States on NPR, WNED (Buffalo), Classical 105.1 K-Mozart (Los Angeles), and WFMT “The Fine Arts Network” (Chicago). Their ATMA Classique recordings- À deux, Of Heart and Homeland, and Wild Honey- all received nominations for Best Classical Recording at the East Coast Music Awards (2000, 2003, 2005). In April 2009, they released a fourth disc, It Takes Two on Marquis Classics/EMI Canada, featuring encore pieces arranged especially for the Duo by Canadian composer Clifford Crawley.
A central part of Duo’s artistic vision is its commitment to the creation and performance of new music. Since its inception ten years ago Duo Concertante has commissioned 14 new works for violin and piano from many of Canada’s leading composers including Chan Ka Nin, Kati Agocs, Kelly-Marie Murphy, Alice Ho, Omar Daniel, Clark Ross, Andrew MacDonald, David Scott, Linda Bouchard, and Jean Lesage. Duo Concertante’s disc, Wild Honey (2005), is comprised entirely of works especially written for them; their fifth recording will be another all-Canadian CD featuring works by R. Murray Schafer, Kati Agocs, and Chan Ka Nin and is slated for release in early 2010. In 2011 a new works will be written for them by Rob Teehan.
Professors at Memorial University, Dahn and Steeves are also Artistic Directors of the Tuckamore Chamber Music Festival.
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SINGLE TICKETS are available through the Academy Box Office and at the door
SAVE 25% with the TEN CONCERT TICKET PACKAGE - $135
STUDENTS: 18 & under free with student ticket voucher (excluding Carols by Candlelight)
Academy Box Office
7280 Kemano Street
Tel 604 485 9633
Monday – Thursday 9:30 am – 4:30 pm
For more information call the Academy of Music at 604.485.9633