Apollo Chamber Players Presents Season Finale MUTED This May

Houston's Apollo Chamber Players will present its season finale, MUTED, on Friday, May 24, 2024 at 7:30pm at Duncan Recital Hall at Shepherd School of Music at Rice University. This program marks the culmination of Apollo's bold and thought-provoking Silenced Voices series, defining the ensemble's 16th year and serving as a response to our modern era's continued efforts to ban, censor and marginalize. MUTED uplifts voices that have been suppressed either by outside forces, or by inner struggles including mental illness. The Silenced Voices series at large was recently spotlighted in a feature by NPR.

Neherlands-based composer Joey Roukens' world premiere commission, Forgotten Dutch Melodies for string quartet, is inspired by Dutch folk songs previously erased from existence. Commissioned by Apollo Chamber Players and underwritten by Ed Schneider and Toni Oplt, the piece highlights Roukens' highly diverse influences and aesthetics - including the orchestral vibrancy of early Stravinsky and Ravel, the late-Romantic gestures of Mahler and Sibelius, the pulsating rhythms of American minimalism and the serenity of Renaissance polyphony, as well as elements of pop music and jazz.

The Roukens' premiere is paired with Trio à cordes by Dutch-Jewish composer Dick Kattenburg, who perished in Auschwitz because of his faith, as well as Robert Schumann's Piano Quintet with Turkish-born guest artist Tugçe Özcivan, honoring the composer's perpetual battle and ultimate defeat by mental illness.

Cultural expert and host St. John Flynn will lead a pre-concert Q&A at 7:00pm, and a portion of concert proceeds will benefit NAMI Houston, an organization addressing families and persons affected by mental illness.

Program Information
Apollo Chamber Players Present CONCERT 4: MUTED
Friday, May 24, 2024 at 7:30pm (Q&A Moderated by St. John Flynn at 7:00pm)
Duncan Recital Hall, Shepherd School of Music at Rice University | Houston, TX
Tickets: $10-$35
Link: www.apollochamberplayers.org/muted.html

Program:
Joey Roukens - Forgotten Dutch Melodies [World Premiere]
Dick Kattenburg - Trio à cordes
R. Schumann - Piano Quintet in E-flat Major

Apollo Chamber Players
Joey Roukens, composer
Tugçe Özcivan, piano
St. John Flynn, panel moderator

About Apollo Chamber Players

Celebrating its 16th season, Houston-based Apollo Chamber Players globally-inspired programming and multicultural new music commissions have garnered international acclaim, including sold-out performances at Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, and in Havana, Cuba, a Chamber Music America Residency Partnership award, and regular features on American Public Media's Performance Today. Ensemble members include Matthew J. Detrick, violin; Anabel Ramirez Detrick, violin; Matthew Dudzik, cello; and Aria Cheregosha, viola.

In March 2024, Apollo's censorship-inspired programming rose to national prominence as the featured story on NPR's Weekend Edition.

Released on the Grammy-winning Azica Records label, Apollo's fifth studio album, With Malice Toward None, reached No. 1 on Amazon's Hot New Release chart, and Strings Magazine praised the album's message, which tackles "politics, identity, and what it means to be a citizen of a nation balanced between an idealized past and a just and multicultural future." The ensemble's catalog of records has been featured on hundreds of radio and media stations worldwide.

A passionate advocate for contemporary music and underrepresented composers, Apollo successfully concluded a bold initiative to commission 20 new multicultural works by the end of the last decade. 20x2020 features a diverse roster of the world's leading composers and instrumentalists including Jennifer Higdon, Libby Larsen, Pamela Z, Jerod Impichchaachaaha' Tate, Hector Del Curto, Vân Ánh Võ, and Tracy Silverman. The ensemble's community partners include schools and universities, at-risk youth centers, refugee and veterans service organizations, and public libraries.

Apollo's community partners include schools and universities, at-risk youth centers, refugee and veterans service organizations, and public libraries. The ensemble's vanguard Library Voyage project is the first of its kind in the nation. Apollo was founded in 2008 by violinist and music entrepreneur Matthew J. Detrick. Learn more at www.apollochamberplayers.org.

Photo Credit: Ben Doyle

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