AT&G 2023-2024 Season

Tickets for all performances are available online at the “Buy Tickets” link or in person in Ames at Chcolaterie Stam or Rieman Music. Tickets for musicale must be purchased from AT&G directly.

 THE BALTIMORE CONSORT -- The Food of Love

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 29.   7:30 P.M.   FIRST UNITED METHODIST CHURCH, 516 Kellogg Ave., Ames

A Town & Gown favorite now in its 40th season, this “rambunctious Renaissance sextet,” (Washington Post) brings us into Shakespeare’s world, offering a lively evening of songs, dances, and fancies performed on authentic instruments with solo vocalist.

Photos from the concert, courtesy of williamjenksphotos.com

 THE CASTALIAN STRING QUARTET

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 3.   7:30 P.M.   FIRST UNITED METHODIST CHURCH, 516 Kellogg Ave., Ames

International prize winners, the Castalian Quartet is praised for interpretations “full of poetry, joy and sorrow, realised to such perfection” (The Observer).  We welcome them to our stage following their much-appreciated “virtual” performance from England in 2021.

Janacek Quartet No. 1 (“Kreutzer Sonata”)  |  Mark-Anthony Turnage “Awake” (composed for the Castalian Quartet)  |  Beethoven Quartet Op. 130 (with Grosse Fuge, Op. 133)

THE CANELLAKIS-BROWN DUO, cello and piano

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 1.   7:30 P.M.   TYE RECITAL HALL, Estes Music Hall, Iowa State University

Nicholas Canellakis and Michael Stephen Brown both enjoy highly successful solo and collaborative careers. A unique aspect of their programming is the inclusion of their own highly original compositions and arrangements. Michael Brown is described by the New York Times as “one of the leading figures in the current renaissance of performer-composers.”

Grieg Sonata for cello and piano  |  Works by Lukas Foss, Saint-Saens, Clara Schumann, Debussy, Michael Stephen Brown, Nicholas Canellakis, Paganini, and Don Ellis

35th ANNUAL TOWN & GOWN MUSICALE, Annual gala fundraiser

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 17,   7:00 P.M.   ST. JOHN’S EPISCOPAL CHURCH

Not part of season subscription, this annual event features the abundant talent of central Iowa.

The performers on our upcoming 2024 Musicale will include AMY CHRISTENSEN, oboe;  PAULA FORREST, piano;  SONJA GILES, flute; JODI GOBLE, piano; AARON LOTT, piano; CALEB POLASHEK, violin; KEVIN SCHILLING, oboe; CHAD SONKA, baritone; JONATHAN STURM, violin; JULIE STURM, cello; MIRIAM ZACH, organ; and more, including oustanding young artists. 

 THE NEW CENTURY SAXOPHONE QUARTET

SATURDAY, MARCH 23.  7:30 P.M.    TYE RECITAL HALL, Estes Music Hall, Iowa State University

The New Century Quartet has performed worldwide, from New York to Zurich to Hong Kong.  In this return visit to Ames, they will again engage our audience with repertoire that ranges from exciting arrangements of Bach’s Art of the Fugue to works they have commissioned to expand the repertoire.  

J.S. Bach from The Art of the Fugue  |  Shostakovich Folk Dances  |  Dvorak Quartet Op. 96 (“American”)  |  Works by Jun Nagao, John Mackey, Paul Harvey, Marcelo Zarvos, and Barbara Kolb

 MICHELLE CANN, solo piano

Performance: FRIDAY, APRIL 12.  7:30 P.M.   TYE RECITAL HALL, Estes Music Hall, Iowa State University

“A compelling, sparkling virtuoso” (Boston Music Intelligencer), Ms. Cann is equally passionate as a scholar and pedagogue.  Chair of Piano Studies at the Curtis Institute and winner of the Sphinx Medal of Excellence, her wide-ranging program will include music of Florence Price, of whom she is a champion. PUBLIC LECTURE by Ms. Cann co-sponsored by Iowa State Lectures

Ginastera Piano Sonata No. 1  |  Joel Thompson “My Dungeon Shook: Three American Preludes”  |  Chopin Ballade No. 3  |  Florence Price Sonata  |  Liszt Mephisto Waltz No. 1

Public Lecture: Thursday April 11, at 7:00.  Martha-Ellen Tye Recital Hall. Co-sponsored by Iowa State Lectures

The Musical Legacies of Phenomenal Women of Color. Enjoy works by phenomenal women of color such as Florence Price, Margaret Bonds, and many more; learn about their journeys and the legacies they left behind.

Town and Gown gratefully acknowledges support from the Discover Ames Community Grant Award Program for Ms. Cann’s lecture and recital.

AT&G Book Club

In 2018 Ames Town & Gown Music Association began hosting book club loosely related to music or musicians featured in its concerts, and extending to other issues of classical music. Over time the book club has covered a lot of ground as reflected in the books we have discussed listed below. Regular members have enjoyed just about every minute of our conversations together about these books and the subject of music. One need not be an expert to participate, nor does one need to read every book. All are welcome. Please let us know if you would like to be included in information about future book club events. Contact Joe Merchant about the book club

The next Ames Town & Gown book club will be Sunday afternoon October 15th from 3:00-4:30 PM in the PEO room of the Ames Public Library. 

The meeting will be December 10th from 3:00 - 4:30PM at the public library.

Our book will be Uncommon Measure by Natalie Hodges.

“If you want to change the past,” writes Hodges, “all you have to do is try to record what happened in it.” So begins this memoir in essays in which the author excavates her personal history in order to come to terms with her complex relationship with the violin. From an early age, she dreamed of becoming a violin soloist, practicing for hours each day as a child. Hodges traces her love of music to her Korean American mother, who played violin in high school until her punishing schedule made it impossible to continue. In contrast, the author’s White father disparaged her passion, a tactic that backfired: Hodges now believes that the possibility of defying his hatred of music is part of what spurred her on for so many years. Throughout the collection, Hodges chronicles how her father’s abuse, her mother’s experiences of racism, and her own intense stage fright ended her professional aspirations but could not sway her love of music. That love led her to attempt everything from campus tango lessons to teaching herself an incredibly challenging piece of music four months after putting away her violin. Hodges interweaves these memories with concepts of quantum physics, focusing on theories about time and space that elegantly illustrate the inability she often felt to be present in her own life. “Music itself embodies time,” she writes, “shaping our sense of its passage through patterns of rhythm and harmony, melody and form. We feel that embodiment whenever we witness an orchestra’s collective sway and sigh to the move­ment of a baton, or measure a long car ride by the playlist of songs we’ve run through.” The author’s writing is deeply intelligent and exquisitely personal, expertly balancing emotional vulnerability with trenchant analysis, and her lyrical prose and clarity of thought render each page a pleasure to read.

A gorgeously written, profoundly felt essay collection about time, memory, and music.

 
Click here for a listing of recent and upcoming books.

Archive Links

• Beethoven 250. See our project with Karl Gwiasda’s Program Notes for a variety of Beethoven compositions, plus YouTube links to performances of each. Click here to go to the link.

• Iowa CARES. Ames Town & Gown is very grateful to be one of 173 recipients of Iowa CARES funds from the Iowa Department of Cultural Affairs. Please see our full announcement here.

Support for AT&G

• AT&G is supported in part through local option tax funds provided by the City of Ames through the Commission on the Arts

• Please see our Give/Donors page to make a personal contribution