Chamberfest in Rohnert Park celebrates Mozart, Schubert and Mendelssohn

Last year, the debut season of the GMC Chamberfest showcased a few heavyweights of the chamber music repertoire - the three B’s of Bach, Beethoven and Brahms.

This year, the festival has lined up another stellar trio of chamber music composers - Mozart, Schubert and Mendelssohn. In a series of seven concerts from June 22 to 26, chamber music fans will enjoy 20 of their most iconic works, from well-known masterpieces to hidden gems.

“Between the three of them, they wrote a significant percentage of the most beloved chamber music ever written,” said Jeffrey Kahane, artistic director of the festival. “You could easily come up with five times that many works and not cover all the masterpieces.”

Kahane, who also will perform piano and conduct during the festival, said he chose the three composers because they represent three clearly defined eras of music, yet have much in common because they influenced each other.

“There is a wonderful chain of interconnectedness,” he said. “Mozart was the height of the Classical period. Schubert really stands on the cusp of the Classical and Romantic period. And Mendelssohn really represents the quintessential early Romantic composer.”

Kahane, who performs piano recitals and chamber music all over the world, has invited a few of his renowned friends to perform these masterpieces, along with a few works that may be less familiar.

“I wanted to choose the towering monuments, like the great Cello Quartet and the Trout Quintet of Schubert, and the Mendelssohn Octet,” he said in a phone interview from Florida. “But I also wanted to do some works that are of comparable stature that audiences don’t get a chance to hear, like the great G Major Schubert Quartet ... so it’s a lovely balance.”

Artists making their return to the festival include young American violinist Benjamin Beilman, who made an impression last year during the Brandenburg Concerto No. 4. This year, he will be playing the Mendelssohn Piano Trio No. 1 as well as Mozart’s Divertimento for String Trio.

“That’s a piece you don’t hear very often because it’s not often that you find string virtuosi who have the skill and interpretive insight to master it,” Kahane said. “It’s going to be a very special opportunity.”

One of the new faces at this year’s festival will be Hai-Ye Ni, a Bay Area cellist who studied at the San Francisco Conservatory and now serves as principal cellist of the Philadelphia Orchestra.

Pianist Jon Kimura Parker also is new to the festival, but he will be familiar to those who attended Santa Rosa Symphony concerts when Kahane served as music director for 10 seasons.

Parker and Kahane will team up throughout the festival and during the final concert, an unusual program of four Mozart concerti that features the Santa Rosa Symphony led by Kahane.

“He will join me for three different piano works for four hands, as well as for the Mozart Double Concerto,” Kahane said. “I thought it would be wonderful to do an afternoon of Mozart concerti by a variety of instruments, so we have a brass, woodwind, string and piano.”

Also performing in the all-Mozart finale will be Benjamin Jaber, performing Mozart’s Horn Concerto No. 1; violist Paul Neubauer and violinist Beilman, performing Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante for Violin and Viola; and clarinetist David Shifrin, performing Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto in A Major.

“David Shifrin is widely acknowledged to be one of the two or three greatest living masters of the clarinet,” Kahane said. “He will also be playing in the Mozart Quintet for Piano and Winds.”

The final concert will be held in Weill Hall, while the rest of the festival takes place in the 250-seat Schroeder Hall, which is also part of the Green Music Center at Sonoma State.

“Weill Hall is magnificent, and I love playing and conducting and listening to music there,” Kahane said. “But Schroeder is a perfect hall for chamber music, and everybody is knocked out by the quality of the sound.”

This year, the festival is offering a special pass to all seven concerts for $200, which comes out to about $28 per concert.

“It’s a bargain beyond belief,” Kahane said.

“I don’t know very many places where you can buy a series of seven concerts for $200, and every single concert is going to be stellar.”

Staff writer Diane Peterson can be reached at 521-5287 or diane.peterson@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @dianepete56.