Rick Ferguson

Juliet White-Smith

The Ohio State University School of Music

Juliet White-Smith, professor of viola, and guest pianist Rick Ferguson present "Mid-Century Modern" — works for viola and piano from 1939–1975 by Ulysses Kay, Florence Price and Dmitri Shostakovich.

This program features early works for viola and piano by Ulysses Kay: his Sonatine (1939) and Sonata (1942), the former a romantic work written while at student at the Berkshire Music Festival (now Tanglewood) and the latter while a student of Paul Hindemith. The three works by Florence Price are a collection of two of her vivid and luxurious art songs (including "Songs to the Dark Virgin" with poetry by Langston Hughes; and "Night," setting of a poem by Louise C. Wallace) offered here as purely instrumental works alongside a transcription of her Elfentanz, originally for violin and piano. And finally, the program closes with Dmitri Shostakovich's swan song, his Sonata for Viola and Piano (1975), which traverses his musical influences in reverse chronological order beginning with a 12-tone row around which the first movement is organized to a middle movement transcription of a scene from his unfinished opera The Gamblers, and ending with an ethereal movement quoting the opening of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, Op. 27 No. 2, which served as a competition piece for Shostakovich as a young pianist.

Faculty and Guest Recital: Juliet White-Smith, viola and Rick Ferguson, piano