Tucson Desert Song Festival landed one of the world’s preeminent composers to write a piece for one of the world’s most famous violinists.
Next April, violinist Joshua Bell and his soprano wife Larisa Martinez will perform the world premiere of John Corigliano‘s new song cycle, co-commissioned by the song festival and Arizona Friends of Chamber Music.
The story of how Tucson landed two of classical music’s biggest names on the same stage, thousands of miles from the country’s classical music epicenter, is part luck, part who you know and a good dose of fate.
It all started in 2022. The festival had just commissioned the final work in its Wesley Green Composer Project, sponsored by Green, who lives in Green Valley.
Over its five years, starting in 2019 with composer Richard Danielpour, the festival and its performing arts partners premiered new works by notable composers Jake Heggie, Jennifer Higdon, Ricky Ian Gordon and Jimmy López Bellido.
With the project ended, Tucson Desert Song Fest board president Jeannette Segel and festival coordinator George Hanson were spitballing ideas for the 2025 commission when Hanson reached out to Corigliano.
Around the same time, Segel was in Michigan when she saw a poster advertising a recital with Bell and his wife.
That got her to thinking: Wouldn’t it be cool to create a work for Bell and his wife of five years, who had been making music together since the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown and started doing recitals together in 2022.
“I just got this idea so I called George,” Segel recalled.
Hanson, the former longtime Tucson Symphony Orchestra music director, had a long history with Bell, including working with him when he guested with the TSO several times during Hanson’s tenure. Hanson led the TSO for 19 seasons before leaving in 2016.
Hanson reached out to Bell’s people and arranged for Segel to go backstage and meet the violinist and his wife at the Michigan concert.
The meeting lasted just long enough for Segel to make her pitch: “We have this idea: Would you be interested if we commissioned a piece for you and Larisa?”
“He lit up and I could tell he was interested,” Segel recalled.
Hanson, meanwhile, was waiting to hear from Corigliano’s people about the possible Bell-Martinez commission. The composer initially said yes, but a few weeks later, he circled back and said he would have to put it off after suffering a hand injury.
In classical music, Hanson said, postponing a commission or performance usually means the idea is dead in the water.
That’s where this story takes a turn to fate.
Not long after that last exchange with Corigliano, the composer and the violinist ran into one another in New York City. The conversation turned to the Tucson commission.
We’re not privy to exactly what transpired, but apparently, both sides became excited at the prospect.
Hanson got a call not long afterward that the project was back on.
“It’s kind of like getting everybody to hold hands and jump in the pool at the same time,” Hanson said.
The song festival, which in its first dozen years has garnered an international reputation for the caliber of singers it attracts, put up the bulk of the commission costs. Segel and Arizona Friends of Chamber Music filled in the gaps and a Friends donor put up the money to pay Bell and Martinez’s performance fees.
Arizona Friends of Chamber Music President Alan Hershowitz said his group’s involvement was “a no-brainer.” The Friends, which has been presenting chamber music concerts in Tucson for 76 years, has a long history of commissioning new works.
“We have our name on so many scores I’ve lost count,” Hershowitz said, noting that in recent years, the organization has done as many as four commissions a year.
Whoever commissions a work gets their name in the footnotes so that whenever it is played, the name is mentioned.
Hershowitz and Hanson said that they anticipate this work by Corigliano will have life beyond its April 2, 2025, Tucson premiere at the University of Arizona’s Crowder Hall, 1017 N. Olive Road, in the UA School of Music.
“Not all of our commissioned works will get dozens and dozens of downstream performances,” Hanson said. “This one, I think, will because of the ongoing touring expectations of Josh and Larisa.”
The piece reunites Corigliano and Bell, who became a household name after he performed Corigliano’s soundtrack for the 1998 film “The Red Violin.”
Five years later, Corigliano, who won an Academy Award for the film, reworked the music into a concerto for Bell.
“The coming together of one of the most famous violinists in the world and one of the most famous composers in the world who collaborated on this fantastic ‘Red Violin,’ and now they are coming together again, and we are making that happen,” said Segel, who said the fact they were able to do it speaks volumes about the festival’s growing reputation. “We are very proud of this; we’re excited.”
Tickets ($75 for in-person or streaming) are available now through arizonachambermusic.org.
Grammy-winning soprano Angel Blue performed a recital with Arizona Opera as part of the 2023 Tucson Desert Song Festival
