This a not-to-be-missed concert at Carnegie Hall: Symphony in C, featuring world-renowned Italian-Norwegian soprano Elizabeth Norberg-Schulz and famous conductor Mattia Rondelli. It is sponsored by the Italian Cultural Institute and Pastificio Cocco: Carnegie Hall, Tuesday Feb 2, 2010 at 7:30pm.

The purpose of this concert is to promote rarely performed Italian classical and contemporary music and make it accessible to a wider audience - not only to "insiders". Mattia Rondelli realized that the perception of Italian "high" music is probably too skewed towards Opera and that so many masterpieces written by Italian composers could be somewhat re-discovered, especially by non experts.   

The program includes three rarely performed pieces for string orchestra: Riccardo Luciani's Le Tombeau Perdu, Giuseppe Verdi's String Quartet in E minor, and Boccherini's Stabat Mater for soprano and orchestra.  

Don't miss this chance to enjoy these truly "hidden gems" of musical Italy, played by top level soprano conductor and orchestra.

CarnegieCharge (212) 247 - 7800  

http://www.carnegiehall.org/article/box_office/events/evt_

15352.html?selecteddate=02022010 

Elizabeth Norberg-Schulz has performed at the most prestigious opera houses in the world: the Metropolitan Opera, Teatro alla Scala, the Lyric Opera of Chicago, Covent Garden, Opéra Bastille, Teatro Real di Madrid, Vienna Staatsoper and many others. She has collaborated with some of the greatest conductors of our time: Abbado, Colin Davis, Muti, Maazel, Mehta, Gergiev, Levine, Chung, Bychkov, Sinopoli, Solti, Masur, Ozawa, and Kleiber. Her many concert appearances include the Berlin Phiharmonic, Vienna Philharmonic, Munich Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony, and San Francisco Symphony.

Mattia Rondelli recently recorded Boccherinis Stabat Mater for SONY Classical. His credentials include appearances with Beijing Opera Theater Symphony Orchestra, St. Petersburg Philharmonic, Parma Teatro Regio Symphony Orchestra, Arturo Toscanini Symphony Orchestra, La Fenice Orchestra, at the Bologna, MITO and Ravenna Festivals.

Luciani's Le Tombeau Perdu was written in 1991, the year when the classical music world marked the bicentennial of Mozarts death. In instrumental music, tombeau, which in French means tomb, signifies a musical tombstone. In true neoclassical spirit, A. Riccardo Luciani selected this instrumental genre, much popular in 17th century France, to pay tribute to the great composer.

Verdi's Quartet is the only surviving chamber music work in his catalogue. Written during a decade long pause in his operatic writings, it strikes the listener with its impressive sculptural vigor of the Allegro, the dancing advancement of the second movement that fades out into a moonlight-atmosphere reminiscent of Don Carlo, and the severity, sometime almost Beethovenian, of the ending Fuga. Better known to the wider public for his prolific instrumental output than for his vocal works,  

Boccherini creates a true masterpiece in his Stabat Mater for soprano and strings. In his rendition of the medieval text, the 18th century Italian master captures in an unsurpassed manner the immediacy, awesome power and heartrending intensity of the maternal sorrow that makes the Passion of Christ so emotionally involving.