The Fair Trade Trio specializes in creating accessible performances for all audiences and has a mission to champion the works of living female composers alongside the standard chamber music canon. The program begins with Jessica Meyer’s I Only Speak of the Sun, which was inspired by Rumi’s Ode by the same title while exploring the palette of colors the string trio can produce, followed by Schnittke’s searing String Trio, and the deeply emotional yet restrained lyricism of Faure’s first piano quartet.
PROGRAM
JESSICA MEYER (b. 1974) I Only Speak of the Sun
SCHNITTKE String Trio
FAURE Piano Quartet No. 1, Op 15
PERFORMERS
Fair Trade Trio
— Ashley Windle, violin
— Hannah Levinson, viola
— Madeline Fayette, cello
with guest Taisiya Pushkar, piano
All of the musicians appearing on the program (including composer Jessica Meyer) are current or former long-time residents of Washington Heights and Inwood.
About Fair Trade Trio
The Fair Trade Trio’s 2019-20 season will highlight works written by living female composers including Jessica Meyer’s I Only Speak of the Sun, Kaija Saariaho’s Cloud Trio, and Missy Mazzoli’s Lies You Can Believe In with performances at Music at Our Saviour’s Atonement (MOSA) and The DiMenna Center for Classical Music. In addition to the works by living female composers, programming will include Schnittke’s String Trio and Faure’s Piano Quartet No. 1 with pianist Taisiya Pushkar.
Last season the Trio made its debut at the new music venue MISE-EN_PLACE in Brooklyn, NY and also presented the world premiere of Alon Nechushtan’s Fractured Fairy Tales, a work which is dedicated to the Fair Trade Trio. In the spring, the Trio was in residency at Smith College where it collaborated with the composition students to create new works for string trio. The Trio coached the students on the best composition practices, allowing the students to hear their music come to life through experimentation during the workshop days and culminating in a final performance of the students’ works. Additionally, the Fair Trade Trio performed a concert featuring works of living female composers, including Cheryl Frances-Hoad’s The Ogre Lover, based on a poem by Ted Hughes about Smith College graduate Sylvia Plath.
The Fair Trade Trio has completed two tours, in 2015 and 2017, of the Pacific Northwest where it performed at the Silk Purse Arts Centre in Vancouver, BC; the Oak Bay chamber music series in Victoria, BC; and the KidsQuest museum in Seattle, WA. The Trio also made its debut in 2017 at the Old Church in Portland, OR and at the Resonance at SOMA Towers in Seattle, WA with Seattle Symphony pianist Li-Tan Hsu. For this tour, as part of its mission to champion the works of living female composers, the Fair Trade Chamber Music Society commissioned composer Emily Doolittle to compose a piece for its 2017 tour and it performed the world premiere of her work, Field Guide, in Vancouver.
As passionate about teaching as it is about performing, the Fair Trade Trio has developed partnerships with several area music programs including the WHIN Music Project, the Corona Youth Music Project, the Bronx Global Learning Institute for Girls, and the Frank Sinatra School of the Arts. All educational partner schools receive free performances at their schools and complimentary admission to Fair Trade concerts. Each season, the Fair Trade Trio performs for Music for Autism, a concert series focused on enhancing quality of life and raising public awareness through free, autism-friendly, interactive concerts developed specifically for individuals with autism and their families.
