On Saturday, December 5, 2015, Music at the Institute presented a concert “Destination: U.S.A.” Lions Gate Trio. Works by Haydn, Beethoven, Kolomiiets and Ravel performed by violinist Katie Lansdale, cellist Darrett Adkins and pianist Florence Millet.
The program included the world premiere of Ukrainian composer Maksym Kolomiiets’ Das Ende/The End (2015).
The Lions Gate Trio, an internationally-acclaimed ensemble in both the U.S. and Europe, enjoys a combination of performing, recording, and working with young musicians in educational settings for 25 years. Winners of the Koussevitsky Award for recording and lauded by the press for its CDs, the Trio has recorded for Triton and Centaur labels, featuring new American trios, duo and trio music of French composer Nicolas Bacri, and the complete trios of Robert Schumann.
The Trio has performed in Germany, France, Belgium, Finland, and most of the eastern U.S. The ensemble has presented live radio broadcasts on Norddeutscher Rundfunk in Hamburg, France Musique at Radio France in Paris, and participating on National Public Radio stations in the United States. The Trio’s performance at the Organization of American States was televised in nine states and sixteen Latin American countries.
The three musicians pursue separate careers as highly-acclaimed soloists and accomplished teachers. As a group, the Lions Gate Trio explores not only the piano trio repertory, but duo, solo, and expanded ensemble repertory with guest artists. Passionate advocates of new music, the Lions Gate Trio has worked closely with a number of leading composers, among them Ralph Shapey, Andrew Imbrie, Alexander Goehr, Augusta Read Thomas, Robert Helps, Eric Moe, Tamar Diesendruck, and Nicolas Bacri. Each member of the Lions Gate Trio is a respected teacher, and collectively they hold faculty positions in Köln, (Germany), Oberlin, New York, and Hartford.
The Trio has served residencies at Tanglewood, Yale University, and the University of Pittsburgh, and is currently the trio in residence in Connecticut both at the Hartt School (University of Hartford) and at the Fairfield Library. Having recently presented complete cycles of the piano chamber music of Schumann, Fauré, and Brahms, the Trio is currently doing so with the music of Beethoven.
MAKSYM KOLOMIIETS is an acclaimed composer, oboist, and organizer. Born in 1981 in Kyiv, he graduated from the National Music Academy of Ukraine in 2005 as oboist and in 2009, as composer. Since 2014, he has been studying composition in the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln (Germany) with Johannes Schöllhorn. Mr. Kolomiiets’ music has been performed internationally, at such festivals as “Other Space” (Moscow), “Hoholfest” (“Gogolfest”) (Kyiv), “Contrasts” (Lviv), “Randfestspiele” (Zepernick, 2012), “World Music Days” (Leuven, 2012), and at the summer New Music Courses in Darmstadt (Germany). His music has been performed by the National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine, Kyiv Chamber Orchestra, Syrinx Flute Quartet (Moscow), Ensemble Nostri Temporis (Kyiv), GAM-Ensemble (Moscow), Moscow Contemporary Music Ensemble (Moscow), musikFabrik (Cologne), Vladislav Pesin (Moscow), Ian Pace (London), and others. Maksym Kolomiiets is the co-founder of Ensemble Nostri Temporis and of the ensemble of ancient music, Luna Ensemble. He is the winner of the national competitions “Gradus ad Parnassum” (Kyiv, 2000), “Step to the Left” (Saint Petersburg, 2012) and 3rd Prize in the Vareler Komponistenpreis (Oldenburg, 2015). As an oboist, he has performed in many Ukrainian and foreign festivals, as well as master classes, including Darmstadt (2010), Impuls Academy (Graz, 2011), Per Suonare l’Oboe (Freiburg, 2011), and the “Ensemble-Akademie” (Freiburg), where he participated both in historical performance practice events (Freiburg Baroque Orchestra) and contemporary music performances (Ensemble Recherché).