Allegra Lilly and Friends

Tournier: Deux Preludes Romantiques Op.17

Ravel: Piece en Forme de Habanera 

Fauré: Sicilienne Op.78

​Kesselman: Bagatelle No.1 

About the Program

Tournier: Deux Preludes Romantiques Op.17

​Marcel Tournier was a French composer born in Paris in 1879. He grew up in a musical family
of seven siblings. Tournier and his four brothers were required to play a musical instrument.
Apparently, his sisters were left off the hook. Tournier chose the harp at a young age and
became a successful teacher, composer, and performer. To this day, many of his harp
compositions are used in performance competitions. The Deux Preludes Romantques are
written for harp (or piano) and violin. They are true to their title, representing a French
romanticism that was a common compositional style of the time.

​-Ann Fink

Ravel: Piece en Forme de Habanera

Maurice Ravel born in 1875, a contemporary of Marcel Tournier, was also a French composer.
He was born in a Basque town, Ciboure, very near the Spanish border. His mother was Basque,
although she grew up in Madrid. Ravel’s Spanish heritage was a great influence on his compositions. There contain many references to Spanish folk tunes and traditional Spanish music. Piece en Forme de Habanera is based on a folk dance that originated in Cuba and was brought to Spain by sailors. The dance was extremely popular during the 19th century and was known by all levels of Spanish society. Originally, Ravel was commissioned to compose the work for piano and low voice. It was used as an etude in a vocal class at the Paris Conservatory! Later, Ravel composed an arrangement of Piece en Forme de Habanera for cello and piano. On this program it is performed by harp and double bass.


-Ann Fink

Kesselman: Bagatelle No.1

​Robin Kesselman, principal bassist of the Houston Symphony Orchestra, joins us on this program with his very own composition! The Bagatelle No. 1 is written as a double bass and harp duet and is based on a theme by Beethoven.

-Ann Fink

Fauré : Sicilienne Op.78

Gabriel Fauré, born in 1845, was a leading French composer of his time. He was also an organist, pianist and professor. His composition, Sicilienne Op. 78, was originally commissioned
in 1893 as incidental music for a play. Unfortunately, the theatre company went bankrupt before
the first performance. Subsequently in 1898, Fauré rewrote the piece for piano and cello. The piece became one of Fauré’s most famous compositions. It has been arranged (not by Fauré)
for an endless combination of instruments. Some of the more adventurous arrangements are
written for saxophone quartet, tuba and piano, flute and guitar, and panpipes and piano! For this
program you will hear a lovely arrangement of the original Sicilienne for cello and piano played on harp and double bass!

-Ann Fink

CONCERT ARTISTS

Allegra Lilly/Harp
Allegra Lilly joined the St. Louis Symphony as Principal Harp in 2013. She has appeared as Guest Principal Harp with the Chicago, Houston, Toronto and Charlotte symphonies, Boston Pops, and St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and has also performed with the New York Philharmonic, Pittsburgh Symphony, and All-Star Orchestra. A frequent substitute with the Boston Symphony, she acted as Guest Principal Harp for the BSO’s 2015 Tanglewood season and European tour, and she has earned the unique distinction of appearing as Principal Harp on back-to-back albums that won the GRAMMY Award for Best Orchestral Performance: the SLSO’s City Noir in 2015 and the BSO’s Shostakovich: Under Stalin’s Shadow in 2016.
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Since making her solo debut at the age of twelve with the Detroit Symphony, Lilly has appeared as soloist with the St. Louis Symphony, Juilliard Orchestra, National Repertory Orchestra, and numerous ensembles in New York and in her home state of Michigan. She has also taken prizes at the Concours International de Harpe in Nice, the American Harp Society’s Anne Adams Awards, and the American String Teachers Association National Solo Competition. Lilly’s summer festival appearances have included Brevard Music Center, Spoleto Festival USA, Festival dei Due Mundi (Spoleto, Italy), National Repertory Orchestra, Artosphere Festival, and Castleton Festival. She is also an active chamber musician and has been a featured guest artist with the Missouri Chamber Music Festival, Chamber Music Festival of Lexington, Innsbrook Institute Music Festival, Missouri River Festival of the Arts, Argento New Music Project, and Carnegie Hall’s EnsembleConnect. 
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In addition to holding the harp faculty position at Brevard Music Center since 2017, Lilly has given masterclasses at Northwestern University, Tanglewood Music Center, Boston University, and the University of Ottawa. She has also coached orchestral and chamber music for New World Symphony and the preparatory divisions of The Juilliard School and New England Conservatory. Born in Detroit, Lilly began her own study of the harp with Ruth Myers at age seven. She went on to join the studio of New York Philharmonic Principal Harpist Nancy Allen at The Juilliard School, where she earned Bachelor and Master of Music degrees.

Hannah Ji/Violin
Violinist Hannah Ji joined the first violin section of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra in 2020 after spending two seasons as a one-year replacement member. Ji’s playing has been hailed by critics as "engaging, mature, well thought-out, and honed down to the finest details" (głos na Wieniawskiego,Polish Radio Journal). She holds a Bachelor of Music degree from Curtis Institute of Music, studying with the late Aaron Rosand, a Master of Music degree from The Juilliard School, studying with Ida Kavafian, and an Artist Diploma degree from The Colburn School, studying with Robert Lipsett. She began her musical studies at the age of seven in South Korea and previously attended Manhattan School of Music's Precollege Division, studying with Grigory Kalinovsky.

As a soloist, Ji's performances have been widely publicized on NPR’s “From the Top,” Philadelphia’s WHYY, Taos’ KTAOS Solar Radio, and “Live from Lincoln Center” by PBS, which broadcast throughout North America. She performed in Canada Day concerts with Maestro Pinchas Zukerman in Centre National des Artes, with pianist Jeremy Denk for the non-profit organization, "The Art of Giving Back,” and a gala concert with cellist Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble at Lincoln Center. Additional venues at which Ji has performed include: The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, David Geffen Hall, Carnegie Hall, Steinway Hall, Walt Disney Concert Hall and A. Mickiewicz University Hall in Poland. She has also recently performed at the United States Embassy of Canada.

As a classical and contemporary chamber musician, Ji has collaborated with renowned groups and artists such as Jamie Laredo, Jennifer Koh, Roberto Díaz, The Borromeo String Quartet, The Calidore String Quartet and Time for Three. She has worked with members of the Borromeo, Brentano, Shanghai, Emerson, Guarneri and Orion String Quartets, respectively. Ji has been an active participant in The Juilliard School's ChamberFest and Focus! Festival, which features U.S. and world premieres of works by composers around the world. She was also a contemporary ensemble artist at Atlantic Music Festival. As an orchestra musician, she served as Concertmaster and Principal Second with Symphony in C, Spoleto Festival USA, YMF Debut Orchestra, The Colburn School, The Juilliard School Orchestra and Curtis Symphony Orchestra. She has been a participant at the Sarasota Music Festival, Music Academy of the West, Artosphere Festival Orchestra, Taos School of Music Festival, Bowdoin International Music Festival, Summit Music Festival and the National Arts Centre's Young Artist Programme.
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Additionally, Ji has held Artist Faculty positions at The Danbury Music Centre's Chamber Music Intensive, The Bronx Conservatory of Music, Manhattan in the Mountains, and The Curtis Institute's SummerFest Young Artists Program & Adult Chamber Music Program. She was a substitute faculty member at The Manhattan School of Music Precollege Division, and had a large studio in New York City, the students of which have been accepted to conservatories and summer festivals across the country. She currently enjoys working as a mentor through the SLSO’s Mentoring the Music: Peer to Peer program.

Robin Kesselman/Bass
Robin Kesselman was appointed Principal Bass of the Houston Symphony Orchestra by Music Director Andrés Orozco-Estrada in 2014. He has performed as Guest Principal Bass with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra and Israel Philharmonic, travelled internationally with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Los Angeles Philharmonic, and appeared with the National, Atlanta, and Baltimore Symphonies.
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Kesselman frequently performs as a soloist and chamber musician and presents recital programs and masterclasses at the top universities across the country. He has already appeared twice as soloist with the Houston Symphony, in subscription performances of the Koussevitzky Concerto for Double Bass and Missy Mazzoli’s bass concerto Dark with Excessive Bright. Previous season highlights include Krzysztof Penderecki’s Duo Concertante during the composer’s Carnegie Hall residency in collaboration with the Curtis Institute and Bottesini’s Concerto No. 2 with the Houston Civic Symphony. Recent festival engagements include leading the bass sections of the Grand Teton, Mainly Mozart, and Arizona Musicfest festival orchestras. He has also serves as faculty for the National Youth Orchestra - USA, Curtis Institute’s Summerfest, the Richard Davis Bass Conference, and the summer residency of the Youth Philharmonic of Colombia. 

Kesselman holds a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Southern California and an Artist Diploma from the Curtis Institute of Music. His primary teachers have included David Allen Moore, Harold Robinson, Edgar Meyer, Paul Ellison, Chris Hanulik, and Virginia Dixon.