- [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.

(gentle music) Linda and Alvaro Pascotto.

The Carol Franc Buck Foundation.

Additional support provided by these funders.

(upbeat classical music) - And so Chamber Music, of course are small groups.

In this case, the largest group that we have during the entire festival is eight, an octet.

But the smallest groups are two.

So anywhere between two and eight people.

- Chamber Music is truly democratic.

There's no boss, there's no one laying down the law.

It's really just a collection of people of equals coming together and trying to make something work.

- Each person has their own discrete part.

You're not playing in unison with another person.

Each person has their own role and we're conversing musically with the other people in the group.

And so there's tremendous variety.

The oboist, for example, he's playing a Mozart quartet with strings on one concert and then the other concert he's playing a Bach concerto with violin and oboe.

It's a very, it's a different instrumental combination.

So it's interesting, it's interesting for the audiences and it's interesting for the musicians.

- I think that one of the things especially in Chamber Music that the audience likes seeing is the relationship between the people.

It's sort of like watching a marriage.

Like when you see a quartet you see the people playing together, it's very intimate.

- The flow matters, right?

So based on how the piece goes, in this moment the violinist is somebody really leading or maybe the cellist and the violist here are a unit that really pulls the pulse a certain way.

So it flows from person to person and in the best performances and the most satisfying groups there's this kind of intuitive understanding like in a good conversation.

Somebody is not hogging the conversation all the time and at the same time, there's this even flow, and there are strong personalities and people calming each other down or instigating things.

And it very much mimics the human conversation.

- And I think that idea of watching us play together and listening to the music is a good evening.

Music can be a language to bring people together.

I think that classical music can bring pleasure to people who don't know it.

In the same way you can go into a museum and see Monet and really enjoy it.

And I think it's a matter of exposure.

There is something pleasing that I think that I would like to share with other people.

I'm gonna keep playing classical music 'cause it's the thing I love.

("Quintet for Horn and Strings") ("Allegro") ("Adagio") - I would like the audience to enjoy the interplay between the musicians, between each other but also between the musicians and our listeners because it really does make a difference for each of us on the stage to the listeners, and from them to be able to be brought into our experience as we're communicating with each other.

It's really wonderful.

I'm enjoying hearing them all play.

And some of them are featured in some juicy repertoire that I haven't heard them do before.

So that's really fun for me and satisfying since I helped to bring them here.

("Rondeau Allegro") (audience cheers and applauds) - We're performing Ralph Vaughan Williams' song cycle "On Wenlock Edge", which is for tenor and piano quintets.

- And this was a piece that I had not played before and I didn't know about, so I have just been loving it.

I mean, it's beautiful, it's gorgeous.

And to get to play with this level of... My colleagues are all so wonderful.

- It's settings of poetry by A. E. Housman, and it's a song cycle he wrote very shortly after he returned from studying in Paris with Maurice Ravel.

So it marks a really important moment in Vaughan Williams' compositional career.

There's a bit of a shift in the way he's writing.

Even though it's very still distinctly British music, it has this sort of tinge of French impressionism in it that's really beautiful.

("On Wenlock Edge") ♪ On Wenlock Edge the wood's in trouble ♪ ♪ His forest fleece the Wrekin heaves ♪ ♪ The gale, it plies the saplings double ♪ ♪ And thick on Severn ♪ Snow the leaves ♪ 'Twould blow like this through holt and hanger ♪ ♪ When Uricon the city stood ♪ 'Tis the old wind in the old anger ♪ ♪ But then it threshed another wood ♪ ♪ Then, 'twas before my time ♪ The Roman at yonder heaving hill would stare ♪ ♪ The blood that warms an English yeoman ♪ ♪ The thoughts that hurt him, they were there ♪ ♪ There, like the wind through woods in riot ♪ ♪ Through him the gale of life blew high ♪ ♪ The tree of man was never quiet ♪ ♪ Then 'twas the Roman ♪ Now 'tis I ♪ The gale, it plies the saplings double ♪ ♪ It blows so hard ♪ 'Twill soon ♪ Be gone ♪ Today the Roman ♪ And his trouble ♪ Are ashes ♪ Under Uricon - Audiences all around the world are very different.

As a performer, playing day in and day out, we thrive on that electricity, and it happens when the people are sitting there and we get the feedback, whether it be from your body or an expression on your face or a laugh, that's what makes it so organic.

And of course, you're playing to the trees and you're hearing the rustling.

And then of course there might be the occasional wind that blows your music across to an audience member's lap or whatever it may be.

And there's no performance is going to be the same.

They're all unique in its own way, and they're all special.

("From far, from eve and morning") ♪ From far, from eve and morning ♪ ♪ And yon twelve-winded sky ♪ The stuff of life to knit me ♪ Blew hither ♪ Here am I ♪ Now for a breath I tarry ♪ Nor yet disperse apart ♪ Take my hand quick and tell me ♪ ♪ What have you in your heart ♪ Speak now, and I will answer ♪ How shall I help you ♪ Say ♪ Ere to the wind's 12 quarters ♪ ♪ I take my endless way ("Is my team ploughing") ♪ Is my team plowing ♪ That I was used to drive ♪ And hear the harness jingle ♪ When I was man alive ♪ Ay, the horses trample ♪ The harness jingles now ♪ No change though you lie under ♪ ♪ The land you used to plow ♪ Is my girl happy ♪ That I thought hard to leave ♪ And has she tired of weeping ♪ As she lies down at eve ♪ Ay, she lies down lightly ♪ She lies not down to weep ♪ Your girl is well-contented ♪ Be still ♪ My lad, and sleep ♪ Is my friend hearty ♪ Now I am thin and pine ♪ And has he found to sleep ♪ In a better bed than mine ♪ Yes, lad, yes, lad, I lie easy ♪ ♪ I lie as lads would choose ♪ I cheer a dead man's sweetheart ♪ ♪ Never ask me whose - These poems by Housman, they were written about country folk who did not necessarily have the guarantee of a long life.

In fact, a long life was not a given at all.

And he wrote them in the context of the Boer Wars in which these young men from the British countryside would go off to fight and many of them were killed and wouldn't come home.

So there's a lot in this poetry about loss.

And I know Classical Tahoe has lost its founder and that's a great tragedy for this organization and for the world at large.

And in a way, I hope that these pieces are a fitting tribute because they talk about the beauty of life, how life is a short gift and one that must be cherished.

And also they talk about the pain of grief and the pain of loss and all the emotions that go with that.

♪ Oh, when I was in love with you ♪ ♪ Then I was clean and brave ♪ And miles around the wonder grew ♪ ♪ How well did I behave ♪ And now the fancy passes by ♪ And nothing will remain ♪ And miles around they'll say that I ♪ ♪ Am quite myself again ("Bredon Hill") ♪ In summertime on Bredon ♪ The bells they sound so clear ♪ ♪ Round both the shires they ring them ♪ ♪ In steeples far and near ♪ A happy noise to hear ♪ Here of a Sunday morning ♪ My love and I would lie ♪ And see the colored counties ♪ And hear the larks so high ♪ About us in the sky ♪ The bells would ring to call her ♪ ♪ In valleys miles away ♪ Come all to church, good people ♪ ♪ Good people come and pray ♪ But here my love would stay ♪ And I would turn and answer ♪ Among the springing thyme ♪ Oh, peal upon our wedding ♪ And we will hear the chime ♪ And come to church in time ♪ But when the snow's at Christmas ♪ ♪ On Bredon top were strown ♪ My love rose up so early ♪ And stole out unbeknown ♪ And went to church alone ♪ They tolled the one bell only ♪ ♪ Groom there was none to see ♪ The mourners followed after ♪ And so to church went she ♪ And would not wait for me ♪ The bells they sound on Bredon ♪ ♪ And still the steeples hum ♪ Come all to church, good people ♪ ♪ Oh, noisy bells be dumb ♪ I hear you ♪ I will come ♪ I will come Altitude is tough on the voice.

I'm always a little sensitive to it.

It's mostly the lack of oxygen.

You tank up to sing a long phrase and you just don't have as much air as you do down at sea level, and so you have to make adjustments.

But even though it feels a little uncomfortable, it's not something that you can't work around.

And as one of my teachers said, "Technique is for very bad days."

So you just rely on that and it gets you through and you can still enjoy.

("Clun") ♪ In valleys of springs of rivers ♪ ♪ By Ony and Teme and Clun ♪ The country for easy rivers ♪ The quietest under the sun ♪ We still had sorrows to lighten ♪ ♪ One could not be always glad ♪ And lads knew trouble at Knighton ♪ ♪ When I was a Knighton lad ♪ By bridges that Thames runs under ♪ ♪ In London, the town built ill ♪ ♪ 'Tis sure small matter for wonder ♪ ♪ If sorrow is with one still ♪ And if as a lad grows older ♪ The troubles he bears are more ♪ ♪ He carries his griefs on a shoulder ♪ ♪ That handselled them long before ♪ ♪ Where shall one halt to deliver ♪ ♪ This luggage I'd lief set down ♪ ♪ Not Thames, not Teme is the river ♪ ♪ Nor London, nor Knighton the town ♪ ♪ 'Tis a long way further than Knighton ♪ ♪ A quieter place than Clun ♪ Where doomsday may thunder and lighten ♪ ♪ And little 'twill matter to one ♪ (audience applauds) - The Brahms Trio is a really special piece for me because Brahms wrote this piece, the Brahms Horn Trio as an homage for his mother who just recently passed away, and her two favorite instruments were horn and violin.

- He had been called to come to her and he didn't make it in time.

She had died by the time he reached there.

And he fell into a deep depression and he went off to the Schwarzwald in Germany and tried to just heal his soul.

- I had some personal tragedy in my life.

My father passed away suddenly.

I just really struggled with that.

I struggled with dealing with grief and just kinda growing up and dealing with feelings.

And I took some time off the horn.

And for me, that was a moment where I kinda had to do some self-reflection and some healing.

And after really taking a good deep look at myself I came back to the horn because it was one of those things that I did to express myself.

And it was one of those things I did to express my feelings and where words end, that's where the horn begins for me.

And that's where I can truly just let out those feelings, that grief that I might not have words for.

I like to think about the Brahms Trio a lot, and I think about my father when I play this piece.

("Brahms Horn Trio") The last movement is the celebration of life.

And I think it's very appropriate for this festival especially at this time.

- To have that piece be there for all of us who were grieving the loss of Joel and also just in this strange in-between time.

And the end of that piece is very uplifting.

- So this Brahms Trio really is an homage to Joel.

So, when we play this we can think about how Joel affected us all and how he brought us all together and how loving and caring, and everyone just loved him, right?

Everyone loved Joel.

We're not playing anywhere else in the country except for here.

And I can't help but to think we're doing this for Joel, and yeah, it's really a gift that he brought us all together again, even through the midst of all this pandemic and terrible crisis we're in right now.

But we're gonna get through with music.

("Allegro Con Brio") (audience cheers and applauds) (upbeat classical 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.