A historic ice storm. The four seasons. Industrial sites colliding with the natural world. A farmer’s life and its links to the land. A glacier that melted away.
I caught up with musicians from nine distinctive ensembles in Houston to reflect on the past year and look to the future. In Part Three, I visited with the Axiom Quartet, Houston Brass Quintet and Texas New Music Ensemble.
Houston is home to numerous chamber music ensembles that have thrived alongside each other, carving out their own niches with unique visions of how to present music and connect with audiences.
Ask any leader of an arts organization what life has been like during the past year, and most will probably swear it has been one of the most demanding times of their lives.
The Fort Worth Symphony will spotlight Antonín Dvořák’s melodious but unfamiliar Serenade in E major on Jan. 8-10. The same weekend, Dallas Symphony performances of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Chamber Symphony in A-flat--a supersized version of the composer’s Quartet No. 10--will show how intense a string ensemble can be. The Houston Symphony will partner with onetime prodigy, now mature artist Midori in Beethoven’s Violin Concerto on Jan. 15-17.
Radical reinvention: That’s what Meg Booth, chief executive officer for Society for the Performing Arts, sees in this time when artists and audiences must stay separate to stay safe.