World-renowned conductor Kazem Abdullah will make his debut in Madison with the Madison Symphony Orchestra this weekend for “Christopher Taylor Plays Brahms” at the Overture Center for the Arts.
Abdullah will conduct his first event in Madison, but not his first time in Wisconsin, later this week. Originally, Adbullah would have been the guest conductor for “Bronfman Plays Brahms” performances by Israeli-American pianist Yefim Bronfman playing the works of Johannes Brahms. Bronfman has since been replaced at the last minute with the University of Wisconsin-Madison professor and concert pianist Christopher Taylor.
Abdullah looks forward to coming to Madison for the second time, the first time being a casual visit, as an avid biker. He was struck by the city’s beauty, with its many lakes, bike trails, UW-Madison, the Arboretum, and Epic’s campus. But he’s most excited to come to Madison for one of his favorite pieces.
“This is a really fantastic concert, one that I think has some of the most beautiful pieces in the classical music repertoire,” Abdullah said.
Abdullah describes the concert as having a “fire and pomposity” but in concerto form. It features a soloist interacting with the orchestra to create a strong and dramatic dynamic that exemplifies the totality of what classical music is, he said.
Unfortunately, Bronfman cannot make it to the concert due to a slower-than-expected recovery from a recent medical procedure. He vows to make it to Madison in the future, but for now, Taylor will take the reins as pianist for the planned performance.
Taylor has been heralded as “frighteningly talented” by the New York Times and a “great pianist” by the Los Angeles Times. He has worked with orchestras all over the world and is known for taking on memorable and unusual projects, such as a tour where he performed the complete transcriptions of Beethoven symphonies by Frank Liszt by memory alone.
“This is kind of the Mt. Everest of piano concertos in some ways. It’s an incredible piece. One of my all-time favorites,” Taylor said. “I haven’t played it in quite a few years, 20 years, but it’s a piece that’s always been very close to my heart. It was a very important piece in the development of my career.”
Taylor first performed the piece at the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in 1993. It’s been a wild week with practice, but he’s excited to perform, work with Abdullah and fill in for Bronfman, Taylor said.
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Other pieces planned will include Richard Strauss’ “Suite from Der Rosenkavalier” and Gabriela Frank’s “Escaramuza.”
The former is from an early 1900s opera that follows a love triangle between three people. The opera is around four hours, but will be condensed into about 25 minutes.
“This opera really encapsulates some philosophical themes, and also this love theme as well. And so this suite is about 25 minutes or so, and it really has all the big musical highlights that are from this opera,” Abdullah said.
“Escaramuza” is a more modern piece written by Jewish-Peruvian composer Gabriela Frank. It takes inspiration from the achampa music stylings of Andean Peru and embodies its name of escaramuza, which translates to “skirmish.”
Frank wrote the piece after witnessing the kachampa dance, which is a spiritual warrior dance of Peru’s native people.
“This piece celebrates the pre-Hispanic Inka warrior,” Abdullah said. “I remember she said that she tried to evoke this kind of athletic visceral dance by writing this piece with an unusual time signature, seven-eight. So it’s very asymmetrical.”
Abdullah describes the piece as fiery and high octane, where no section of the ensemble has much time to rest.
Three concerts will be held from Jan.23-25 at the Overture Center for the Arts. Tickets are currently on sale.
