Knoxville Symphony Orchestra Concertmaster William Shaub, host and performer of the orchestra’s Concertmaster Series, wrapped up the 2024-25 season of three concerts this week with an eclectic program of works that once again featured showcase pieces for violin and piano followed by a notable ensemble work chosen from the gems of chamber music history. The opening virtuosic pieces, picked by Shaub to both impress and whet the listeners’ appetite, were delicious musical morsels that amazed with technique and interpretation.
First up was a work by Spanish violinist and composer Pablo Sarasate, Zapateado, from his Spanish Dances. Shifting gears and textures, Shaub followed with Tambourin Chinois, a work by Fritz Kreisler that was influenced not by a trip to China but rather by a visit to a Chinese theatre in San Francisco. Leaping forward, Shaub and pianist Kevin Class contrasted with Ramin Djawadi’s Theme from Game of Thrones for Violin and Piano.
To close out the first half of the concert, Shaub was joined by KSO Principal Viola Kathryn Gawne for the 2010 commissioned work, Five Postcards for Violin and Viola by Errollyn Wallen.
Among the many chamber music works composed by Robert Schumann in 1842 was his Piano Quartet in E-flat Major. Embraced here by Shaub, violist Gawne, cellist Sarah Senn, and pianist Class, Schumann wrote it with wife and pianist Clara in mind, but dedicated it to the gifted amateur cellist and patron, Count Mathieu Wielhorsky.
In what was a magnificent performance of the Schumann, one immediately noticed the rich balance of the strings, an acoustic fact that remains a happy mystery in the Knoxville Museum of Art great room with its hard floor and glass. Perhaps more important, though, was the modestly clean and cheerful personality that Shaub and friends were able to extract and magnify, a personality that oozed freshness without betraying its lush Romantic underpinnings. Class and Shaub were clearly conscious of the tempos and the world of movement they communicated. Texturally, Senn and Gawne’s contribution was especially beautiful in the Andante cantabile movement where the give and take of melody is discussed with the violin. The finale flows over the listener like a waterfall, although this listener would have unabashedly walked through one to hear the entire piece again.
The Concertmaster Series returns in October with a Spanish-themed program of works by Sarasate, de Falla, Gonzaga, Martinu, and Nino Rota. The three-concert series is currently available for subscribers here. Single tickets go on sale in August.
