- [Narrator] Funding for this program has been provided by the FS Foundation.

Bringing together adults of all abilities and backgrounds as they pursue passion, prosperity, and purpose.

Linda and Alvaro Pascotto.

The Carol Franc Buck Foundation.

Additional support provided by these funders.

(orchestral music) - My mom was a classical music buff, and had the classical music radio station on in the car.

And we were going to, and from East Lansing, Michigan.

And I remember specifically, she used to always point out the French horn on the radio.

She'd stop whenever she heard horn and she'd say horn, horn.

And then finally I was like, mom, what is this horn?

She's like, that's the horn.

She pointed it out.

I was like, oh, that's the greatest sound in the orchestra.

As you can see, we keep our hand in the bell.

And this is like one of those things that's like a mystery to everyone except for horn players.

Like what do you do with your hand in there?

Right, and we're basically just holding the horn up, but the hand actually changes the sound a little bit.

So, if I was to do it without the hand, (French horn buzzes) It sounds a little bit more like (indistinct), a little bit more brassy, right?

A little bit more like a bugle or a trumpet, or something like that.

But the hand kind of warms it up and it also brings the pitch down a little bit.

So it's a bit more even.

(French horn buzzes) So it's got a little bit more like of an envelope, a little bit more color, a little darker, a little bit more resonant.

So these are valves, right?

And the way that they work is you can see on this side, that when I push this lever, right, this turns so, it opens a port between this airflow here, and it sends the air into one of these tubes.

So if it sends the air into one of these tubes, it's going to make the horn longer.

And if you make the horn longer, longer is lower, right?

So this is obviously the shortest valve, the second valve.

This is the next shortest, and then this is the longest, right?

So I'll just demonstrate.

(French horn buzzes) No valves.

(French horn buzzes) I wanted an instrument that was close to the human voice and the horn has a quality about it.

It's very singing and very vocal.

So I've always tried to incorporate that into my playing you know, since I can't sing myself anymore, except for fun.

I sing on the horn and this is my voice.

(orchestral music) (audience applauds) - We arranged some French music pieces, it's with the flutist, Erik Gratton.

And so in these pieces, the harp is more like an accompanying instrument.

Like Erik as the main one, that I'm so happy to do that.

You know, it's like, it's you're sustaining another voice, it's a bit like opera.

And so there is this piece by Debussy called "Beau soir" like a beautiful evening, fair evening, so arranged by us for flute and harp.

And then the last piece is a famous, short peaceful flute by Gabriel Faure, another French composer.

They are all from the same time.

So beginning of the 20th century, and he's a Fantaisie by Gabriel Faure which is usually played on the piano with the flute.

And so I made the arrangement of the piano part because it's very challenging, but I'm having a great time with Erik.

(gentle instrumental music) (audience applauds) (gentle instrumental music) (bouncy instrumental music) (audience applauds) - I was really amazed and proud of my colleague Laura Hamilton.

(orchestral music) She is a violinist in a normal Classical Tahoe orchestra year.

She's the concertmaster.

- And this year, I've taken the new position of Interim Artistic Director to organize the 2020 chamber music season.

The fun part of my new role as Interim Artistic Director has been to build these programs.

And it also is an important part because we have to offer music that the people are gonna like.

- She knew Joel well.

She knew that he loved The Mendelssohn Octet.

- If you are a string player, that is one of the great pieces in the string chamber music repertoire.

You can't get out of school without learning it.

And it's gorgeous.

And Mendelssohn wrote it when he was a teenager, and it was a wonderful strike of genius at an early age but that's who Mendelssohn was.

For me as a musician, I was so looking forward (orchestral music) to hearing musicians of the Classical Tahoe caliber performing.

And that first violin part in the Mendelssohn is very challenging.

It's a solo unto itself, supported by seven other colleagues who also each get wonderful moments of their own many times throughout the piece.

- I mean, it's just this assemblage of eight players.

All of them doing soloistic work, from the moment they put their bows.

It's all strings, from the moment they put their bow on the string, to the end note.

It is just sheer beauty, sheer vibrancy, sheer everything that Joel was about in music.

(orchestral music) (audience applauds) - I can't tell you how many times over the course of the three weeks people would say, I feel his presence here.

I feel Joel and his presence here.

Joel, his last name is Revzen.

And occasionally we would joke with him, then call him the revzenator because there was a special thing that would happen all of a sudden in the music, (orchestral music) where he would like slip it into fifth gear.

And it was like, okay, everybody, here's my wingspan, get on board, we are just all of us going to go.

And bless their hearts.

They did that, themselves in the Mendelssohn, the last piece of the concert, which is just a beloved piece of Joel's.

They resonated it.

They made it happen.

It was a thrill.

(orchestral music) - [Narrator] Funding for this program has been provided by the FS Foundation.

Bringing together adults of all abilities and backgrounds as they pursue passion, prosperity, and purpose.

Linda and Alvaro Pascotto.

The Carol Franc Buck Foundation.

Additional support provided by these funders.