arts & entertainment
From Lincoln Center
To The Berman Center
I
Suzanne Chessler
Contributing Writer
C
larinetist David Shifrin grew up
in New York City, but the path of
his career brought him through
Michigan —studying at the Interlochen
Center for the Arts, teaching at the
University of Michigan and performing
in various venues, most recently with the
Detroit Symphony Orchestra in Orchestra
Hall.
His next visit will be Thursday evening,
Jan. 31, at the Berman Center for the
Performing Arts in West Bloomfield, where
he will appear with the Chamber Music
Society of Lincoln Center.
"We've got this set up as a repertory com-
pany, in which we're not all playing all the
pieces" says Shifrin, 63, in a phone conversa-
tion from his Connecticut home.
"One of the pieces being played is among
my favorites — Poulenc's Trio for Oboe,
Bassoon and Piano. I'll be a member of the
audience for that one.
"I play a lot of Poulenc's music, and this
piece is full of the characteristics of his com-
posing because it's very jovial, sometimes
alternating between extremely funny and
almost silly.
"It's so one of my favorite pieces that I've
played it in transcription with clarinet play-
ing the oboe part; but, of course, we'll have
one of the great oboists, Steve Taylor, with
us.
Also on the program will be Gilles
Vonsattel on piano, Tara Helen O'Connor
on flute, Peter Kolkay on bassoon and Bill
Purvis on horn.
Clarinetist David Shifrin
comes to town with many
Michigan connections.
"Gilles Vonsattel will be featured on the
major work of the second half of the pro-
gram, Mozart's Quintet in E-flat Major for
Oboe, Clarinet, Bassoon, Horn and Piano,
K52:' says Shifrin, whose recording of
Mozart's Clarinet Concerto with Lincoln
Center's Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra
was named Record of the Year by Stereo
Review.
"There is a famous letter that Mozart
wrote to his father saying he was quite cer-
tain the Quintet was the best thing he had
ever written, and it came at a time when
Mozart was enjoying tremendous success as
a composer and virtuoso pianist."
Filling out the program will be two more
20th-century French works — Canteloube's
Rustiques for Oboe, Clarinet and Bassoon and
Milhaud's La cheminee du roi Renee, Suite for
Wind Quintet, Op. 205 — and one 20th-cen-
tury Hungarian piece, Ligeti's Six Bagatelles
for Wind Quintet.
"Ligeti is known for writing in many con-
trasting genres" says Shifrin, one of only two
wind players to win the prestigious Avery
Fisher Prize. "His music is heard in film
scores for very scary-sounding, atmospheric
music, and he experimented with electronic
music.
"I have coached students playing the Ligeti
piece and have heard colleagues playing it,
but I've never performed it before this tour.
That's very exciting"
Shifrin has been excited about playing the
clarinet since he saw The Benny Goodman
Story on film as a 10-year-old.
"One of the highlights of that movie is that
Goodman wanted to play Mozart at Carnegie
Hall" recalls Shifrin, who already had begun
studying instrumental music with a private
teacher. "I always wanted to play Mozart
while loving all of Goodmaris jazz music"
Shifrin went on to study at the Curtis
Institute of Music in Philadelphia.
"I was working while I was at Curtis"
he recalls. "I had auditioned for Leopold
Stokowski, who gave me the position of
co-principal clarinet with the American
Symphony Orchestra in New York I was
commuting from Philadelphia, and it was a
great experience for a kid to play in Carnegie
Hall and Lincoln Center.
"After that, I got successive positions in
Honolulu, Dallas and Cleveland over half-
a-dozen years. I decided to do more things
on my own, and I was very fortunate to be
offered a teaching position at the University
of Michigan"
Shifrin, who taught in Ann Arbor during
the 1970s while building a solo and chamber
music career that spans the continents, now
teaches at Yale. Before leaving Michigan, he
became a founding member of the Fontana
Ensemble based in the western part of the
state.
Between 1992 and 2004, the clarinetist
served as the artistic director of the Chamber
Music Society of Lincoln Center. He also
has worked with the Guarneri, Tokyo and
Emerson string quartets.
"My cousin, Lao Schifrin, who grew up
in Buenos Aires, is a great composer, well
known for his film scores as well as his
concert music and conducting" says Shifrin,
who connected with his Strichartz cous-
ins while living in Michigan. "We've done
albums together.
"He wrote two concertos for clarinet and
David Shifrin
orchestra and a piece for clarinet and piano
that I've recorded as Shifrin Plays Schifrin.
"About six years ago, we did a tour togeth-
er called 'Letters from Argentina: He wrote
all kinds of tango music and Argentinian folk
music for the tour, and we recorded all that
with a small ensemble and using the tour
title"
Shifrin, married with a 19-year-old son
and 7-year-old triplets, is learning more
klezmer music since agreeing to play for his
local temple. Away from music, he likes to
swing a golf club.
"Returning to Michigan feels like flying
home" says Shifrin, who has commissioned
and championed the works of 20th- and
21st-century American composers. "I know
the airport and how to get on 1-94 or just
head north. I hope to see some old friends
when I'm there"
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The Chamber Music Society of
Lincoln Center performs at 7:30 p.m.
Thursday, Jan. 31, at the Berman
Center for the Performing Arts in
West Bloomfield. $36-$46. (248)
661-1900; www.theberman.org .
Jews
Nate Bloom
Special to the Jewish News
Quite A Cast
Opening on Friday, Jan. 25, is Movie
43, officially described
as "an outrageous new
ensemble comedy not
for the easily offended."
The film has 12 dif-
ferent segments and
12 credited directors,
Banks
including Elizabeth
Banks, 38, and Brett
Ratner, 43. The huge
cast includes Banks,
Liev Schreiber, 45, and
Christopher Mintz-
Plasse, 23, whose
Mintz-Plasse
36
mother is Jewish.
Other A-listers in the
January 24 • 2013
cast include Naomi Watts (Schreiber's
real-life partner), Hugh Jackman, Halle
Berry, Richard Gere, Kate Winslet, Uma
Thurman and Josh Duhamel. The film
was shot over four years so the direc-
tors could work with these stars as
their schedules allowed.
Honoring Actors
The 19th Annual Screen Actors Guild
Awards airs live at 8 p.m. Sunday, Jan.
27, on TNT and TBS. The film and TV
nominees do not differ much from the
Golden Globe nominees.
One highlight will be the presenta-
tion, by Carl Reiner, 90, and Alec
Baldwin, of the SAG lifetime achieve-
ment award to Dick Van Dyke, 87.
Reiner made Van Dyke a star when he
cast him in The Dick Van Dyke Show,
which Reiner created and mostly
wrote.
In film, Golden Globe winner Daniel
Day-Lewis, whose mother was Jewish,
is nominated for best actor (Lincoln);
Globe nominee Alan Arkin, 78, is up
for best supporting actor (Argo); and
Helen Hunt is up for best supporting
actress for playing therapist Cheryl
Cohen-Greene in The Sessions.
The Screen Actors Guild includes
awards for best ensemble casts as well.
For film, Arkin, along with the rest of
the Argo cast, competes with the casts
of Les Miserables (Sacha Baron Cohen,
41) and Lincoln (Joseph Gordon-Levitt,
31).
Julianna Margulies, 46 (best lead
actress, drama, The Good Wife) is the
only Jewish individual TV nominee.
However, quite a few members of
the tribe are up for a SAG trophy as
ensemble cast members.
Drama nominees include Michael
Stuhlbarg, 44,
Boardwalk Empire;
Mandy Patinkin, 60,
Homeland; and Ben
Feldman, 32, Mad Men.
Comedy nomi-
nees
include Judah
Feldman
Friedlander, 43, 30
Rock; Simon Heiberg,
32, Mayim Bialik, 37, and Melissa
Rauch, 32, Big Bang Theory; Paul
Liberstein, 45, and B. J. Novak, 33,
The Office; and Dianna Agron, 26, Glee.
Footnotes: Kevin Sussman, 42, who
plays comic-book store owner Stuart
Bloom on Big Bang, was promoted to
series regular this season. Julianne
Margulies' father, Paul Margulies,
wrote the famous Alka Seltzer "plop,
plop, fizz, fizz" jingle for ads that ran in
the 1970s. It has just been revived and
is featured in new Alka Seltzer ads.
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