Cello-piano duo Annie Hyung and Ariel Mo will perform and discuss Katherine Balch’s Prelude and its companion piece, Brahms’ E Minor Cello Sonata, on the CCHK’s enigmatic 1857 Streicher piano, similar to one that Brahms owned. Balch's Prelude was composed to proceed attacca into the Brahms, providing a shocking antithesis that asks us to listen anew to Brahms as subjects rooted in the 21st century, rather than reenacting the 19th. Likewise, the Streicher piano, while featuring a Viennese action, differs remarkably in touch and tone from other pianos of its time--but was this the original intent, or the result of over a century of posthumous intervention? Is this “historical keyboard” an artifact of the past, or does it, too, like Balch’s Prelude, reimagine Brahms for our own time? 

At the A.D. White House, Cornell University.

Special thanks to the CCHK, CCA, Cornell Music, and Hans Bethe House for making these events possible.