At Constellation’s Frequency Series, violist Michael Hall and pianist Shi-An Costello will join forces for the first time, in a stylistic varied program of contemporary works for viola and piano, and solo prepared piano. Written by some of the leading voices in contemporary music, this program includes a North American Premiere of THOMAS ADES’s Three Berceuses for the Exterminating Angel, AUGUSTA READ THOMAS’s Cantos for Slava, and STACY GARROP’s The Solitude of Stars. Rounding out the colorful set is the classic 20th century work by PAUL HINDEMITH (Sonata Op. 11, No. 4), MARIO CARRO’s Luna de Abajo, and short works for prepared by ALEX TEMPLE, NOMI EPSTEIN and DOROTHY CHAN, as well as one by COSTELLO commissioned by and presented in partnership with Sana Healing Collective.

PROGRAM

ADES, Thomas: Three Berceuses for the Exterminating Angel (North American Premiere)
THOMAS, Augusta Read: Cantos for Slava
GARROP, Stacy: The Solitude of Stars
HINDEMITH, Paul: Sonata Op. 11, No. 4
CARRO, Mario: Luna de Abajo (viola solo)
COSTELLO, Shi-An: Reappearance (piano solo)
COSTELLO, Shi-An: Improvisations for Ketamine Assisted Therapy, for prepared piano
CHAN, Dorothy: Letter (2021), for prepared piano
EPSTEIN, Nomi: inter (2018), for prepared piano
TEMPLE, Alex: when I was twenty I briefly dabbled in ceremonial magic… (2021), for prepared piano

Michael Hall, viola
Shi-An Costello, piano

Artist and Organization Bios

Michael Hall lives in Chicago and has performed and taught across Europe, Asia and the United States. Described by the New Music Connoisseur as “utterly masterful,” and Chamber Music Today as having “superb technique,” he recently made his Chicago Orchestra Hall solo debut performing the world premiere of Kim Diehnelt’s “Montegar,” and concluded a recital tour to Vienna, Austria and Udine and Tolmezzo, Italy. Hall is Co-Artistic Director and Director of Education for the Bandung Philharmonic in Indonesia, and serves on the Board of the American Viola Society. Hall received his Doctorate degree from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, graduated from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music with a Masters and received his Bachelor degree from Ball State University. His teachers include Michelle LaCourse, Scott Rawls, Peter Kamnitzer, Linda Geidel and the LaSalle and Tokyo string quartets.

Shi-An Costello is a musician with deep roots in contemporary art practices. A versatile pianist, composer and sound artist, Shi-An has been described as a “precise, engaged, welcoming performer, unafraid of deep ambiguities“ (The Reader), and “a tour de force … steely and granitic” and “dreamy and sensitive” (Boston Musical Intelligencer). As a composer, his music tends to incorporate mysterious fragments from voice memo recordings, imaginary transcriptions of lost or forgotten sound, elements of American Minimalism and Neo-Romanticism, Contemporary Pop Music, and larger-than-music thematic ideas like existentialism, race/ethnicity, the natural world, and personal identity.

Sana Healing Collective (SHC) is aiming to change the paradigm of mental health treatment in Chicago by making novel and time-tested approaches to healing accessible to all. Sana Healing Collective is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization and contributions are tax-deductible.