All Around Classical: A Classical Music Podcast with World-Class Artists Over Coffee

Classical musicians CAN improvise. But why should classical musicians learn to improvise? 4-Time Grammy Award Winner Eugene Friesen shares with us his why and how he made the cello cool!  If you enjoy the content, please leave a comment, click on like, and subscribe to the channel get notified for future episodes!  Follow us on Instagram & Facebook for performances, famous musician quotes and podcast updates. (@all.around.classical)  

Featuring Eugene Friesen, Cellist/Composer/Educator. Four-time Grammy Award-winner Eugene Friesen is active internationally as a concert and recording artist, composer, conductor and teacher. Eugene has worked and recorded with such diverse artists as Dave Brubeck, Martin Sexton, Toots Thielemans, Betty Buckley, Dar Williams, Will Ackerman, and Dream Theater.  

Eugene's passion for improvised music has been featured in concerts all over the world with the Paul Winter Consort and with Trio Globo (Friesen, Howard Levy and Glen Velez). He appeared on Garrison Keillor's "A Prairie Home Companion" playing with Keillor and superstar soprano Renée Fleming and has performed as a soloist at the International Cello Festival in Manchester, England; Rencontres d'Ensembles de Violoncelles in Beauvais, France; the World Cello Congress in Baltimore, Maryland; and the Rio International Cello Encounter in Rio de Janeiro.  

This is an inspiring conversation that touched upon important issues for classical musicians today re: visibilities, accessibilities, and why we make music.   

You can learn more about Eugene and find information on his music on his website: 

Continuing to celebrate the AAPI Heritage Month, joining me today for a new episode of Tuesday Conversation with Friends is violinist, Cory (Corin) Lee, not your regular violinist. Juilliard trained, founder of The Liberated Performer (an organization to work with performers to overcome performance and audition anxiety), and a member of the string quartet ETHEL which is acclaimed as “unfailingly vital” (The New York Times), “brilliant,” “downtown’s reigning string quartet” (The New Yorker), and “one of the most exciting quartets around” (Strad Magazine).   

In this interview we will start with an incredible work of ETHEL: CIRCUS WANDERING CITY, Cory’s beginning (you won’t want to miss this story!), managing performance anxiety, shifting from a skill centric conservatory mindset to be audience-focused. You get to watch him perform a humorous edition of Paganini’s Caprice No. 5 and finish with his arrangement of Steve Reich’s Violin Phase.     

Featured Guest Cory (Corin) Lee: 

Corin’s collaborations include performances with Grammy Award-winning artists such as Native American flute player Robert Mirabal, jazz pianist Laurence Hobgood, Latin jazz pianist Pablo Ziegler, Pulitzer Prize-winner David Lang, MacArthur Genius composer Julia Wolfe, and DJ Mako.   

Corin has performed on, FOX, NBC, From The Top, TED, TEDx, SiriusXM, and The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. In addition to concert work, he is the founder of Liberated Performer®, a program that guides and trains musicians to defeat performance anxiety, prepare for auditions and concerts, and achieve peak performance.   

He has taught at National YoungArts Foundation (New York and Miami), directs the audition preparation programs at the New York Youth Symphony, and has given lectures at conservatories like The Juilliard School and San Francisco Conservatory. Corin studied with Ani Kavafian, Hyo Kang, Naoko Tanaka, Wei He, Camilla Wicks, Robert Mealy, and Cathryn Lee. He received degrees from Juilliard (BM), Yale (MM), and an honorary doctorate from Denison University.  

Your Hostess: Shirley Wang, Operatic Soprano, Pianist, Educator, International Best Selling Author, and Content Creator.

Additional ways to stay updated with Tuesday Conversation with Friends:

Will LaDuke is the Executive Producer/Host - ACTIVE CULTURE at Riverwest Radio 104.1 WXRW. ACTIVE CULTURE is a weekly half-hour program highlighting various aspects of local culture from the artists' perspective. From actors to authors, musicians to artists, we'll bring you the lowdown on what's new in Milwaukee and Chicago. 

Will has had an extended and captivating career in and out of broadcasting. In this conversation, we learn about how he got into broadcasting, why he got out, and how the love of broadcasting lured him back in. 

The landscape of audio programming has changed with the rising of podcasting. It brings us back to the era where we appreciate listening to storytelling and using our imagination to fill in the blanks. So, instead of a visual podcast, this episode is released audio-only. 

Thank you for watching. Please subscribe, hit that like button, and get notifications for new episodes! If you're new to Tuesday Conversation with Friends, it is an interview series featuring world-class musicians with their work and a glimpse into who they are as people. 

You can watch the video version of this interview on YouTube or listen to it on the go on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or Google Podcast.  

I am excited to release this interview with Dr. Donald Brinegar, Choral Conductor, Tenor Soloist, Voice Instructor, Master Class Clinician, and Author of multiple books, including "Pitch Perfect: A Theory and Practice of Choral Intonation."   

With an extensive background as a performer both as a soloist and a conductor internationally, he is genuinely a "Singer's Conductor." I sang at the Carnegie Hall with Dr. Brinegar's Chamber Singers when I was only 18 years old. It was an extraordinary experience for a young person.   

In 1997, he founded The Brinegar Singers, a choral ensemble, later became the resident chorus for Pasadena Symphony and POPS. The Singers have given premiere performances of the music of Bruce Babcock, Neely Bruce, David Childs, Emma Lou Diemer, Morten Lauridsen, Z.Randall Stroope, and Eric Whitacre among many others.    

Chapter List: 0:00 Opening (Cloudburst by Eric Whitacre, Performed by The Brinegar Singers, Conducted by Dr. Donald Brinegar) 

8:20 The Career: Started by teaching in secondary schools, then moved into. college/university teaching. The advancement demanded more education and degrees. Burning out and getting out of it. The key to success is to go where the success is, and never stop learning. Be the best musician you can be and the rest will follow. 

24:26 The Next Chapter: Becoming a writer during retirement.  

27:53 Approaching repertoire and styles.  

31:03 O Magnum Mysterium by Morten Lauridsen. Performed by The Brinegar Singers, Conducted by Dr. Donald Brinegar.  

Social Media: 

Thank you for listening. Please subscribe, hit the like button, and get notifications for the new episodes! If you're new to Tuesday Conversation with Friends, it is a conversation series featuring world-class musicians with their work, and who they are as people. It is like overhearing a very interesting chat two people are having at a coffee house! You can watch the video version of the interview on YouTube. Please see link in description. 

Joining me here is award-winning American composer, Glenda Austin from Joplin, Missouri. As a composer, pianist, and educator, Glenda is known and loved by piano teachers and students through out The United States and Canada. 

But did you know she has a CD, "William Gillock: New Orleans Jazz Style," released in Japan (1998) as a solo pianist? You can find it on Apple Music!

Many of you have come to know Glenda through her work, and her Facebook Lives. In this episode, we will get to know her more personally. We will learn how she grew up, her early music education (by ear as well as by reading, the golden oldies from the 40s as well as the classical composers!) We will hear about her special friendship and collaboration with William Gillock. How her first compositions came about, and the transition to go from someone who composed incidentally, to working with commissions, requirements, and deadlines. 

Glenda graduated from The University of Missouri (Columbia) with a bachelor's degree in music education, and a master's degree in piano performance. She is a frequent adjudicator and clinician, having presented workshops for teachers and students through out the US, Canada, and Japan. In addition, she serves as an adjunct faculty member at Missouri Southern State University, accompanying jazz and choral groups as well as individual vocal students. 

Many of her compositions appear on state repertoire lists, (MTNA) published by Willis Music Company. In addition, "Jazz Suites No.2" and "Sea Nocturne" are perennial favorites on the National Federation (NFMC) list. 

Because of her association and friendship with William Gillock, renowned composer, she was chosen by Willis to simplify the ever-popular New Orlean Jazz Styles and arrange it for four-hand duets. You will hear 2 selections from her CD by the same name in this episode. I hope you enjoy this conversation between Glenda and I. Below is a chapter list, and links to both mine, and Glenda's social media. Stay connected, and stay tuned!

0:00 Sea Nocturne Performance

0:55 Welcome

1:11 Early Start - Childhood

2:37 "You Make Me Feel So Young / Frank Sinatra" Special edition by Glenda Austin for this episode

3:34 Prolific composer? Other aspects of Glenda's Music Life and meeting William Gillock

6:04 More On The Friendship with William Gillock

6:04 New Orlean Blues (William Gillock/Glenda Austin)

7:54 After Midnight (William Gillock/Glenda Austin)

11:42 How Did Glenda Start Writing Music?

16: 37 Her Creative Process and Jazz Suite No.3

24:27 Jazz Suite No.3 Performance

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Shirley Wang, Your Host: 

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Hello! Welcome to Tuesday Conversation with Friends. Joining me today is a very special guest, Zsolt Bognar! He is a pianist, author, and the host to the award winning film series “Living The Classical Life” which has over 2.3 million subscribers on YouTube. This is what looks like to be a musician in the 21st century. 

We go deep into piano concert history in the US through the legends: Horowitz, Rachmaninoff, Josef Hoffmann, Glenn Gould, etc.. Discussing repertoire by Schubert, Schumann, Beethoven, etc.. The culture of social media and how it has impacted classical music experiences. 

As a concert pianist, Zsolt frequently gives inspiring performances in North America, Europe and Asia. We spoke about finding an unique path as a modern day classical musician, dealing with performance anxiety, working with the greats, the way Steinway Piano has impacted the concert history in the US, and much much more. You will get to hear a completely performance of DREI IMPROMPTUS D. 946: I. ALLEGRETTO BY FRANZ SCHUBERT

Hello! Welcome to Tuesday Conversation with Friends. Joining me today is a very special guest, Zsolt Bognar! He is a pianist, author, and the host for the award winning film series “Living The Classical Life” which has over 2.3 million subscribers on YouTube. This is what looks like to be a musician in the 21st century.

We go deep into piano concert history in the US through the legends: Horowitz, Rachmaninoff, Josef Hoffmann, Glenn Gould, etc.. Discussing repertoire by Schubert, Schumann, Beethoven, etc.. The culture of social media and how it has impacted classical music experiences.

As a concert pianist, Zsolt frequently gives inspiring performances in North America, Europe and Asia. We spoke about finding an unique path as a modern day classical musician, dealing with performance anxiety, working with the greats, the way Steinway Piano has impacted the concert history in the US, and much much more. You will get to hear a completely performance of DREI IMPROMPTUS D. 946: I. ALLEGRETTO BY FRANZ SCHUBERT

Welcome to the newest episode of Tuesday Conversation with Friends. Today I have the privilege to have International Concert Pianist Laurent Boukobza with me.   In today's conversation, we open with his performance of Chopin's Etude in C# Minor (Op. 10 #4). 

Today's offering is a chat about the making of a concert pianist. How he started as a precocious little boy in Paris, France, where's he's been, who he is today and his philosophy on teaching and the lifelong work of a concert pianist. We also get to hear Debussy’s Clair de Lune, the grand ending of Liszt's "Apres une lecture de Dante" and to finish with Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata 3rd Movement (47:44) in its entirety at the end.   

Laurent Boukobza’s Bio:   A Parisian native, Laurent Boukobza is a prize-winner of many international competitions, including First Prize in Piano and Chamber Music from the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique de Paris and from the prestigious International Academy Maurice Ravel in Saint-Jean-de-Luz, France. A recording artist with many CDs, Laurent tours widely in Europe, the Americas, and the Far East. His teachers included Catherine Collard, Germaine Mounier, Yvonne Loriod, and Michel Beroff.  Laurent is in the process of recording the complete cycle of 32 Beethoven's Piano Sonatas endorsed by a major record label, releasing at the end of 2022.  

Your Hostess: Shirley Wang, Operatic Soprano, Pianist, Educator, International Best Selling Author, and Content Creator.  

Additional ways to stay updated with Tuesday Conversation with Friends: 

Twitter:@SG_MusicStudio

Clubhouse: @MsShirleyWang