Bruce Wolosoff, photo by Jamie Lopez; Amy Barston, photo courtesy the artist; Deborah Buck, photo courtesy the artist; Mark Tan photo by Andrej Grilc.
Tickets
General Ticket: $30
This program is sponsored by Steve Pesner, in loving memory of his wife Michele Pesner.
The Reflections in Music series, led by artistic director Bruce Wolosoff, returns for a program that considers the ‘Opus One’ – the first published work by a composer. From Beethoven’s assured early chamber writing and Paganini’s brilliant self-portrait as a violin virtuoso, to Rachmaninoff’s expansive lyricism and Alban Berg’s late-Romantic intensity breaking through into modernism, each work performed in this invigorating concert reveals a composer defining a public voice. Wolosoff will play piano and introduce music with his signature spoken commentary, joined by violinists Max Tan and Deborah Buck, and cellist Amy Barston.
“An ‘opus one’ is a moment of arrival, when a composer steps forward and declares ‘this is who I am,” according to Wolosoff. The program also includes first published works by Bach and Vivaldi, as well as Wolosoff’s own Opus One, the piano trio Bodhisattva. The Washington Post wrote that the work, “Drawing on the starkness of Beethoven’s late quartet language and the sorrowful language of the blues, is a moving, well-crafted piece that offers accessibility without being simple-minded.”
ABOUT THE PERFORMERS
AMY BARSTON
Cello
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Praised as “passionate and elegant” by The New York Times, cellist Amy Barston has performed as a soloist and chamber musician on stages all over the world, including Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall, Ravinia, Caramoor, Haan Hall (Jerusalem), the Banff Centre, Prussia Cove (England), the Power House (Australia), and Chicago’s Symphony Center. At seventeen, she was a soloist with the Chicago Symphony on live television, won Grand Prize in the Fischoff International Chamber Music Competition. Amy earned her Masters at Juilliard with Joel Krosnick. She also worked with YoYo Ma. She has performed as soloist with dozens of orchestras all over the world and made her first solo appearance with orchestra in Guelph, Canada when she was twelve. Amy is a devoted teacher at the Juilliard School Pre-College Division; her students commute for lessons from hundreds of miles away, some as far as Alaska and Japan. She is visiting cello professor at Xiamen University, artists in residence at Swarthmore College, and artistic director of both ChamberFest Canadaigua in NY and Park Ave Concerts in PA. For 12 years she was the cellist of the Corigliano Quartet, hailed by Strad Magazine as having “abundant commitment and mastery,” and whose Naxos CD was named recording of the year by both the New Yorker and Gramophone Magazine. Amy’s recent recital performances include Bali, Australia, Taiwan, New Zealand, Canada, New York, Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, Baltimore, Rochester, Seattle, Chicago, and China.
DEBORAH BUCK
Violin
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Equally at home in recital halls, symphony stages, recording studios, opera houses—and even on Saturday Night Live— violinist Deborah Buck maintains a versatile career as a chamber musician, recitalist, concertmaster, and educator. Recent highlights include recitals with pianist Orli Shaham at BargeMusic (NYC), guest concertmaster appearances with American Composers Orchestra and Palm Beach Opera, a string quartet masterclass at the Cleveland Institute of Music, and regular appearances at Reflections in Music (NYC) and Telluride’s MusicFest series. She was recently named Artist in Residence for Pro Musica Detroit for the 2026-27 season and has served as tenured concertmaster of Orchestra Lumos since 2022. In June 2026, her recording of September by Curtis Steward will be released on the Bright Shiny Things label. Her debut solo album, Tracing a Legacy, will be released by Avie Records in May 2027. Buck is Co-Executive Director and Artistic Advisor of Kinhaven and serves on the faculty of Montclair State University.
MAX TAN
Violin
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Praised as “eloquent” (New York Times) and “warmly rhapsodic” (Boston Globe), American violinist Max Tan maintains an international career as performer, educator, and curator. He is concertmaster of Opera Philadelphia and founder and artistic director of Soundbox Ventures. Notably, he made his Carnegie Hall recital debut with pianist Marisa Gupta in 2024 and released his debut album of unpublished manuscripts for violin, piano, and organ on Centaur Records. A published essayist, guest lecturer at Tianjin Juilliard, and assistant violin faculty at Juilliard Pre-College, Dr. Tan is committed to nurturing the next generation of music curators, lovers, and advocates. He was just appointed as interim concertmaster of the Auckland Philharmonia starting this June. An alumnus of Havard and Juilliard, his passion for music was fostered at the Perlman Music Program, most notably by Itzhak Perlman, Catherin Cho, and Donald Weilerstein.
BRUCE WOLOSOFF
Piano, Composer
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Bruce Wolosoff is "a formidable pianist and composer" (Gramophone) known internationally for his integration of classical, jazz, blues, and contemporary influences. He often composes in response to visual art and collaborates with leading artists across various disciplines. His music is regularly heard on classical radio stations worldwide.
Bruce's newest album Blue Mantra, released on Avie Records on October 11th, features music for the clarinet performed by Narek Arutyunian, including Matisse Fantasies, Blues for the New Millennium, and Blue Mantra, inspired by a painting by the composer’s wife Margaret Garrett. Matisse Fantasies and Blue Mantra received their world premiere performances at The Church.
Following the Avie Records release of Rising Sun Variations—a large-scale set of solo piano variations on House of the Rising Sun—All Music Guide wrote that "Wolosoff revives in spectacular fashion the Romantic tradition of the pianist-composer." He recently performed the work to great acclaim in Bilbao, Spain.
His 2023 solo piano album Memento continues to receive global airplay, while his 2022 Avie release Paradise Found: Cello Music of Bruce Wolosoff, with cellist Sara Sant'Ambrogio, reached #6 on the Billboard Classical Chart. Their earlier collaboration on his Concerto for Cello and Orchestra with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra also became a Billboard Top 10 album and was hailed by Fanfare as "an instant masterpiece."
Wolosoff's discography includes Songs Without Words (18 divertimenti for string quartet) on Naxos American Classics and a celebrated recording of Busoni's piano music on the Music & Arts label. Of the latter, Hannah Busoni wrote: "All those who love Busoni's work owe it to themselves to hear Bruce Wolosoff's compelling and beautiful interpretations. They are exemplary."
A frequent collaborator with the late choreographer Ann Reinking, Wolosoff composed The White City, which toured nationally to critical acclaim and was named "Best Dance of 2011" by the Chicago Sun-Times, and A Light in the Dark, an Emmy-nominated ballet inspired by Helen Keller and Ann Sullivan. At the time of Reinking's passing, the two were developing a ballet based on the life of John Keats.
Born in New York City in 1955, Wolosoff played in jam bands as a teenager while pursuing studies in classical piano. He earned degrees from Bard College and the New England Conservatory, studying with German Diez (a student of Claudio Arrau), as well as Evelyne Crochet, Richard Goode, Jorge Bolet, and jazz pianists Charlie Banacos and Jaki Byard. After an active performing career in his twenties, he stepped away from the concert stage at age 30 to focus on composition, returning to performance in 2011 with a recital of his own music, released as Many Worlds.
Since 2020, Wolosoff has served as artistic director of Reflections in Music, curating and performing in a series of programs that explore new ways of thinking about and engaging with the classical music experience.
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Reflections is a 501(c)3 nonprofit which hopes to bring the appreciation of classical music to new audiences and to spark new ways of thinking about and engaging with the classical music experience to those who are already music lovers. For more information visit reflectionsinmusic.org.