Chamber Music Society Of Detroit Announces Resumption Of Live Concerts In May

The Chamber Music Society of Detroit announces the resumption of live concerts with two events in May. On May 8, Cuban brothers Ilmar Gavilán and Aldo López-Gavilán will perform an evening of Aldo's genre-defying compositions for violin and piano that are rooted in classical, Latin jazz and Afro-Cuban traditions.

The concert will be held at 8:00 PM at the recently renovated Flagstar Strand Theatre in downtown Pontiac. Then on May 15 the Verona Quartet, winner of the Cleveland Quartet Award, performs Dvořák's "American" String Quartet, Reena Esmail's Quartet, and Strauss' sumptuous Sextet from "Capriccio," joined by two young Sphinx Competition laureates, violist Jordan Bak and cellist Nicholas Mariscal. That concert will be held at Seligman Performing Arts Center in Beverly Hills. There will be two performances, at 5:00 and 8:00 PM.

Tickets for each concert are $30 for adults, $25 for seniors and $10 for students, and are available online at www.CMSDetroit.org or by phone at 313-335-3300.

All concerts will be an hour in length without intermission, presented to a socially distanced, reduced-capacity audience in compliance with public guidelines. Attendees at both venues will be required to wear facial masks.

Both live events will also be live-streamed and available digitally for anyone unable to attend in person. In addition, the CMSD will present, via livestream only, a third event on Saturday, May 1 featuring cellist Zuill Bailey and pianist Bryan Wallick performing music of Mendelssohn, Debussy, Foss and Rachmaninoff.

Digital tickets for all three webcasts are available by phone at 313-335-3300 or online at www.CMSDetroit.org. Digital tickets for the May 8 concert are $15 for adults and $5 for students; digital tickets for the May 1 and 15 concerts are "pay what you can."

Ticket-holders to either the May 8 webcast or live concert by the Gavilán brothers will also receive a digital pass, at no additional cost, to an award-winning documentary film about the brothers, called "Los Hermanos - The Brothers." the film explores of the story of virtuoso brothers Ilmar Gavilán and Aldo López-Gavilán, whose lives have long been separated by geopolitics. Though they were both born in Cuba, classical violinist Ilmar left Cuba in the 1980s to play with orchestras around the world before settling in New York. Younger brother Aldo, a piano prodigy, made a career on the island. Produced by San Francisco-based PatchWorks Films, Los Hermanos captures the Cuban-born brothers as they navigate living on opposite sides of a geopolitical chasm a half-century wide. Tracking their parallel lives in New York and Havana, their poignant reunion, and their momentous first performances together, Los Hermanos/The Brothers offers a nuanced view of estranged nations through the lens of music and family. Featuring an electrifying score by Aldo López-Gavilán, performed with Ilmar, the film also features guest appearances by Joshua Bell and the Harlem Quartet.

Los Hermanos contains several scenes filmed in Detroit during a memorable residency by the Harlem Quartet with Aldo Lopez- Gavilán in October of 2016 hosted by the Chamber Music Society of Detroit. Because of its strong Detroit connections, the film was selected to be a highlight of the 2020 Freep Film Festival, but the event did not take place because of the pandemic. The Chamber Music Society of Detroit is pleased to partner with the Festival to present the official Detroit premiere of Los Hermanos on May 5. Immediately following the virtual premiere, the Freep Film Festival will host a Facebook Live Q & A event with the artists, the filmmakers, CMSD President Steve Wogaman, and representatives of the Festival.

Tickets at 313-335-3300 or online at www.CMSDetroit.org.