Port City explores tango music throughout the genre’s history, and features bandoneon visionary Heyni Solera as soloists and composers. Palaver will perform danceable classics alongside contemporary tango-inspired compositions. We will also welcome powerhouse dancers Phi Lee Lam and Carla Marano to join us for a full tanda, or series of tango dances. This performance will celebrate tango’s ongoing evolution and the powerful interplay between music and dance.

This program explores the African-American experience in classical music, through the eyes of Black composers. It begins with the “blues” movement of Ravel’s Violin Sonata No. 2, arranged for string orchestra and solo violin, and continues with our arrangement of Julia Perry’s Prelude for Piano, a nuanced, neoclassic gem full of anticipation and reflection. At the heart of the program is Clarence White’s Bandana Sketches, a four-movement arrangement of Negro Spirituals. We conclude with the lush romantic string writing of Adolphus Hailstork and William Grant Still, linked by themes of spirituality, meditation, and familial bonds. The Apple of their Eyes encapsulates the beauty and resilience of the African-American experience, and celebrates the richness and depth of Black classical music.

Featuring Grammy award-winning tenor Nicholas Phan, this program explores our country’s rich legacy of protest songs. Repertoire includes traditional songs of protest and music inspired by social movements and historical events, including Nico Muhly’s Stranger, Akenya Seymour’s Fear the Lamb, and a new commission by Errollyn Wallen. Spanning genres, eras, and movements, A Change Is Gonna Come provokes conversation, confronts our past and present, and celebrates the act of protest as one of our most precious rights.

Sinfonia Fantastica addresses themes of gender, power, fear, and desire through the medium of chamber music. Sinfonica Fantastica, a world premiere by Palaver’s own Teagan Farran, is a response to Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique, retold from the perspective of the pursued woman. It draws on themes from the original Berlioz as well as Farran’s deep knowledge of tango idioms, relating them to Paris’s role in globalizing and exoticizing tangoian tastes during Berlioz’s time. Sinfonica Fantastica turns the Romantic fascination with the exotic and the masculine hero on its head. Our program continues with Nina Shekhar’s Above the Fray, which takes Bach’s famous cello prelude and transforms, degrades, and reshapes it. Llyllyth’s Canary Resuscitator is an ambient chorale-like piece that refers to the use of canaries in coal mines to warn of gas leaks. She compares the canary to the US trans population, especially around issues of healthcare and wellness, and her piece is intended both as a response to and a respite from the political turmoil surrounding trans rights.

Dancing Home explores themes of heritage, belonging, displacement, and resilience through the lens of dance. At the heart of this program is the world premiere of ḥawwāsh by Kareem Roustom. Inspired by the ḥawwāsh, or lead dancer of a traditional dabke dance, this piece allows any musician to lead the ensemble at any given moment, sharing fluid leadership through physical and sonic cues. This program also features Palaver’s arrangement of Bartok’s Romanian Dances, original tunes by Maya French and Jamie Oshima, and Kinan Azmeh’s Syrian Dances, commissioned by Palaver in 2022. Dancing Home celebrates social dance as a meeting place for tradition and innovation, and a vehicle for building resilience, joy, and trust.

Featuring acclaimed jazz vocalist Vuyo Sotashe and Grammy-nominated pianist Chris Patishall, Songbook celebrates the rich musical heritage of Sotashe’s home country, South Africa. The program includes traditional folk songs in Zulu, Sepedi, and Xhosa, choral works by Michael Moreane and Bheki Mseleku, a new string orchestra arrangement of Bongani Ndodana-Breen’s Apologia at Uzimvubu, and originals by Vuyo Sotashe, all presented in fresh arrangements for voice, piano, and strings by Chris Patishall. Songbook explores connections between American jazz, South African traditional music, and European classical music, moving fluidly between traditions in a spirit of exploration and joy.

Serenades explores the serenade through a broad lens, across genres, eras, and styles in a changing world. At its heart is Josef Suk’s Serenade for Strings. We juxtapose this Romantic classic with Carlos Simon’s Between Worlds, a meditative work inspired by visual artist Bill Traylor, whose life and work spanned the end of slavery through the beginning of the Civil Rights movement. In our arrangement, different string parts “serenade” one another antiphonally across the ensemble. Ravel’s Troi Chansons, written at the outbreak of World War I, reflects on loss of life, innocence, and continuity in a changing world. Our arrangement of Laurie Anderson’s O Superman, fused with the third movement of Bach’s A Minor Violin Sonata, explores human relationships with machines and with one another. The program concludes with modern-day “moonlit serenades” by Glen Miller and Laura Mvula. Serenades is a musical call for a new and brighter world.