Tucson Winter Chamber fest: 12 musicians play 5 concerts over 6 days

The 31st annual Tucson Winter Chamber Music Festival lineup includes the long-awaited return of the Miró Quartet and the encore of a trio that made a virtual Arizona Friends of Chamber Music debut during the pandemic.

The Sitkovetsky Trio was set to introduce itself at the 2021 winter festival, which turned into a virtual event courtesy the COVID-19 pandemic.

The group’s in-person debut came two years later when they returned for the 2023 festival with the Jupiter String Quartet and the Windscape quintet.

“The audience was fantastic, and very, very warm,” founding member Alexander “Sasha” Sitkovetsky recalled during a phone call last week from Poland. “We were very excited because it was sort of the first full year after the COVID restrictions were taken down so we were really happy to play for big audiences again.”

The 2025 festival kicks off Sunday, March 2, with nearly all of the festival artists performing a program of works by Debussy, Brahms, Saint-Saêns and Arensky. It is the first of five concerts to be performed from March 2-9 at Leo Rich Theater, 260 S. Church Ave.

In addition to the Miro and Sitkovetsky, the lineup includes cellist Daniel McDonough, violinist Martin Beaver, saxophonist/composer Steven Banks, violist Masumi Per Rostad and longtime festival pianist Bernadette Harvey.

The Grammy Award-winning Rostad is making his first Tucson appearance since 2012, when he was here with his former Pacifica Quartet ensemble. He played with the Pacifica from 2001-17.

At the 2023 festival, the Sitkovetsky performed the Arizona premiere of Julia Adolphe’s “New Piano Trio,” which the festival commissioned.

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This year the trio — Sitkovetsky on violin, his pianist wife Wu Qian and cellist Isang Enders — will perform a piano trio at each of the concerts: Anton Arensky’s No. 1 in D minor to open the festival; Shostakovich’s No. 2 in E minor on Tuesday, March 4; Brahms’s C minor on Wednesday, March 5, with Rostad; Schubert’s B-flat Major on Friday, March 7; and Beethoven’s No. 2 on the final day March 9.

“I think that every piece that we’ve chosen to perform means something special for us,” Sitkovetsky said, describing several works the trio will play throughout the week. “Every piece is going to have something about it that is very unique.”

Sitkovetsky described the music from 19th-century Russian composer Arensky, a contemporary of Tchaikovsky, as having “sweeping, beautiful, romantic melodies and lots of strings coming together to play beautiful unison and very beautiful texture.”

Shostakovich No. 2 reflects the horrowing times soon after World War II. The music is very, very dark, “but of course, it has also Shostokovich’s sort of sarcastic and doomsday” vibe that contrasts with the piece’s “incredibly beautiful and tender and very heartbreaking moments,” Sitkovetsky said.

At the March 8 Festival Celebration, the Sitkovetsky will perform early 20th-century French composer and pianist Cecile Chaminade’s Trio No. 2 in A minor, a piece Sitkovetsky says most in the audience will likely have never heard.

“She wrote this wonderful trio that not that many people know, but once they do hear it for the first time, they’re always amazed what a great piece that it is,” he said. “We’re looking forward to seeing the audience reaction because it probably will be a first listen for many of them.”

The 2025 festival marks the long-awaited return of the Miro Quartet, which was last here at the 2014 winter festival. The ensemble teams up with Rostad on the opening day for Brahms’ Viola Quintet in G major and will join Banks on the final day March 9 for the world premiere of Banks’ Saxophone Quintet, commissioned by Arizona Friends of Chamber Music.

The Miro also will team up with pianist Bernadette Harvey, who was named the festival’s co-director this year, for Finnish composer Olli Mustonen’s Piano Quintet on March 7 and will play the Harold Arlen Broadway classic “Over the Rainbow” at Saturday’s Festival Celebration, which also features collaborations with all of the festival musicians including Banks and the Sitkovetsky’s Wu Qian performing Pedro Iturralde’s spirited and virtuosic “Pequeña Czarda” for Alto Sax.

All festival events are held at Leo Rich, where you also can pop in between 9 and 11 a.m. on concert days to see the musicians’ rehearsals. There’s no cost for festival ticketholders; others are asked to make a donation.

Individual concert tickets, available through arizonachambermusic.org, are $45, $12 for students with ID, or $170 for all five concerts. It’s $150 for Saturday’s Festival Celebration, which includes post-concert food and drinks.

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