Cheng² Duo

The Cecilian Chamber Series presents the second concert of the 2024-2025 season: Cheng² Duo - Between Friends and Family

With their programme Between Friends and Family, Cheng² Duo explores the relationships between generations of composers across cultures and centuries, celebrating the friendships and admiration that they inspired. The first half juxtaposes two revolutionaries of their time: Dinuk Wijeratne and Ludwig van Beethoven. Wijeratne, who fuses elements of Indian and Middle Eastern music in his compositions, was inspired by Beethoven’s 3rd cello sonata to write his JUNO-nominated work, Portrait of an Imaginary Sibling; meanwhile, Beethoven blazed the trail for future composers, being the first to write sonatas for cello and piano that treated both instruments as equals. The brother-and-sister duo then take us to Paris in the 1910s—the ultimate melting pot of culture in the world at the time—where musicians, painters, poets, writers, choreographers from all over gathered regularly to exchange ideas. Claude Debussy was a central figure in that musical scene, which included his close friends Manuel de Falla and Igor Stravinsky. Revel in the unique musical soundworlds that each composer has to offer with their distinct and powerful voices, and witness the influence that endearment and adoration create in these classical masterworks!

Cheng² Duo is: Bryan Cheng (cello) and Silvie Cheng (piano)

Program

BEETHOVEN: Sonata for Piano and Cello No. 3, Op. 69

WIJERATNE: Portrait of an Imaginary Sibling

DE FALLA: Siete canciones populares españolas

DEBUSSY: Cello Sonata, L. 135

STRAVINSKY: Suite Italienne for Cello and Piano

Tickets are $68 for Level 1 seating, $63 for Level 2 seating, and $25 for Students, all fees and taxes included. Seating is assigned.