Han Chen & Roberta Michel to Perform at The Phillips Collection in 2026
Han Chen and Roberta Michel will present a musically inspired program by Joan Miró at The Phillips Collection.
GRAMMY-nominated pianist Han Chen will be joined by flutist Roberta Michel in a duo concert presented by The Phillips Collection in Washington D. C. (1600 21st Street, NW Washington, DC 20009) on Sunday afternoon March 22, 2026, 4 pm. This concert is part of the Phillips Collection's popular Sunday Concert series.
The two musicians built their program around the artist Joan Miró, who is being featured in an exhibition at the Phillips Collection: Miró and the United States (March 21-July 5, 2026). Mr. Chen and Ms. Michel will perform works by composers whom Miró admired or, in many cases, befriended, including Edgard Varèse, George Antheil, Pierre Boulez, Igor Stravinsky, and György Ligeti. The full program follows:
Edgard Varèse Density 21.5 for solo flute
George Antheil Sonata for flute and piano
Pierre Boulez Sonatine for flute and piano
~ Intermission~
Igor Stravinsky Quatre études, Op. 7
György Ligeti Selections from Études for Piano, Book I
No. 1 Désordre
No. 2 Cordes à vide
No. 3 Touches bloquées
George Antheil Piano Sonata No. 2, The Airplane
Igor Stravinsky Trois mouvements de Petrouchka
This event is sold-out. Limited Rush Tickets will be available on Friday March 20 before the concert at 4 pm, in-person, on the event page, or by phone: 202-387-2151 ext. 277. Limited in-person Standby Tickets might be available on a first come, first served base, starting at 3 pm in the admissions lobby on the day of the concert. For more information, please visit pianist Han Chen's website and flutist Roberta Michel's website.
A fearless performer with seemingly limitless imagination and possessed with uncanny energy, pianist Han Chen plays scores old and new with rare rigor and insight. This November, the Recording Academy announced that he has been nominated for a GRAMMY Award in the Best Classical Instrumental Solo category for Florence Price's Piano Concerto in One Movement in D Minor. The CD, released on the Naxos label, features the Malmö Opera Orchestra led by John Jeter.
He has appeared as soloist with the Calgary Philharmonic, Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, Lexington Philharmonic, Hong Kong Philharmonic, National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra, China Symphony Orchestra, and Xiamen Philharmonic. In December 2022 he made his Lincoln Center debut with Riverside Symphony at Alice Tully Hall performing Mozart's early masterwork, the Piano Concerto No. 9, le Jeunehomme. Mr. Chen has performed as solo recitalist internationally. In demand as a chamber musician, he is a core member of Ensemble Échappé while regularly collaborating with The Metropolis Ensemble. In 2021, Chen launched Migration Music, an ongoing series of performances and interviews with immigrant composers.
Han Chen has studied with Yoheved Kaplinsky, Wha Kyung Byun, and Ursula Oppens at The Juilliard School, New England Conservatory, and CUNY Graduate Center. He is represented by Black Tea Music.
Brooklyn-based flutist Roberta Michel is dedicated to the music of our time. She has commissioned and premiered hundreds of new works and has worked with many notable composers of our day. Roberta is the flutist and Co-Director of Wavefield Ensemble and is a member of Da Capo Chamber Players, PinkNoise, and Duo RoMi.
Roberta has also performed with: Art Ensemble of Chicago, Cadillac Moon Ensemble (founding member), SEM Ensemble, Bang on a Can All-Stars, Ecce Ensemble, Portland String Quartet, Newspeak, Wet Ink Ensemble, Argento, Iktus, Wordless Music Orchestra, Ensemble LPR, and Cygnus Ensemble among others. Recent venues include: Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, Alice Tulley Hall, Merkin Hall, The Kennedy Center, Roulette, Issue Project Room, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She can be heard on New Focus, Chandos, Innova, Tzadik, Bridge, Wide Hive, New Dynamic, and Meta Records. She played on the 2021 GRAMMY-winning album of Dame Ethyl Smyth's The Prison with Experiential Orchestra. Her recently released solo album Hush, on New Focus Recordings, "digs deep into the possibilities of flute on this gripping solo recital."
Originally from Maine, Roberta attended the University of Colorado at Boulder and SUNY-Purchase College and has studied with Robert Dick, Tara O'Connor, Alexa Still, and Jean Rosenblum. She holds a doctorate in music performance from the City University of New York Graduate Center and is a winner of the NFA Graduate Research Competition for her dissertation on the flute music of Salvatore Sciarrino.
Roberta is the Assistant Teaching Professor of Flute at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. She previously taught flute at Sarah Lawrence College, Brooklyn College, and music courses at St. Francis College. She plays a Brannen flute with a Mancke headjoint.
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