MARLBORO — Artistic Director Mitsuko Uchida and one-third of the 75 artists in residence at the Marlboro Music School and Festival will be heard in opening concerts of Marlboro's 64th season on Saturday, July 19, at 8:30 p.m., and Sunday, July 20, at 2:30 p.m.
Both concerts centered on Vermont's famed musical retreat are at Persons Auditorium, Marlboro College.
Marlboro programs reflect the variety of repertoire suggested by participating artists; the weeks, not days, spent exploring each work in depth; and the discoveries made in those works the musicians feel should be shared with others on the weekend concerts.
Decisions are made only a week in advance.
Saturday night's program offers the Piano Quartet in G minor, Op. 25, composed by Johannes Brahms between 1856 and 1861. Here Uchida is joined by violinist Francisco Fullana, violist Daniel Kim, and Mendelssohn Quartet founding cellist Marcy Rosen.
As well, this marks the American premiere of the Quintet for Clarinet and Strings by Russian composer Alexander Lokshin, whose music, until recently, was little known due to political problems he encountered through much of his life.
His Clarinet Quintet was first performed in the West two years ago in Germany by Charles Neidich, who will be heard in the Marlboro performance with violinists David McCarroll and Anna Lee, violist Rebecca Albers, and cellist Jay Campbell.
Opening the concert is the Mozart Quintet in E flat for Horn and Strings, K. 407, with Rebekah Daley and a string group including violinist Hye-Jin Kim, violists Albers and Sally Chisholm of the Pro Arte Quartet, and cellist Zhou Yi.
Sunday afternoon's concert is pure Marlboro, with a delightful mix of works for strings, voice woodwinds and piano and strings by Haydn, JanáÄek, and Schumann.
It opens with a lesser-heard Haydn String Quartet, the A Major, Op. 20, No. 6, with former Juilliard Quartet violist Samuel Rhodes joined by violinists Maia Cabeza and Hye-Jin Kim and cellist Zhou Yi.
The second half of the program offers two delightful Italian duets for soprano and tenor by Haydn with soprano Sarah Shafer, tenor Spencer Lang, and pianist Lydia Brown, and the Schumann Piano Trio in D Minor, Op. 63 with pianist Zoltán Fejérvári; Joseph Lin, first violinist of the Juilliard Quartet; and cellist Ahrim Kim.