Chamber Series:
Our Composers Close to Home
Sunday, March 30, 2025 | 3 PM
French Library, Boston
The Program
Our Composers Close to Home
Allison Voth, Chamber Series Director
Experience the musical brilliance of Boston’s own in this special chamber recital, featuring works by composers with deep ties to the city. The program highlights the influential Boston Six, including John Knowles Paine, Horatio Parker, George Chadwick, Edward MacDowell, and Amy Beach, whose music helped shape America’s classical tradition.
We also celebrate the contributions of 20th-century Boston composers, such as Elena Ruehr, Marti Epstein, Peter Child, and John Harbison, whose works continue to inspire and challenge audiences today.
Additionally, discover the fresh and innovative voices of Boston’s contemporary composers, including Gregory Zavracky, Omar Najmi, Jonathan Bailey Holland, and Tony Salitro, who are defining the city’s musical future.
Join us for an evening that brings Boston’s rich musical heritage to life, performed by the exceptional voices of Kayleigh Bennett, Angelica Grau, Jennifer Webb, Heming Cao, Max Rydqvist, and James Liu.
Meet the Chamber Series Director
Allison Voth, piano
Allison Voth is an associate professor of music at Boston University’s School of Music, and principal coach at Boston University’s Opera Institute. She widely concertized with Lucine Amara of the Metropolitan Opera. She is widely known as a diction coach in Boston and throughout the U.S. She has worked as diction coach and/or répétiteur with such companies as Opera Boston, Boston Lyric Opera, Emmanuel Music, Chautauqua Opera, Providence Opera, Granite State Opera, the Verismo Opera of New Jersey and Opera North. Festivals include Opera Unlimited, The Florence Vocal Seminar and the Athens Music Festival. Ms. Voth is well recognized for her supertitles, which have been used in both national and international opera productions including Washington Opera, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Barbicon Festival in London, Opera Boston, Palm Beach Opera among many others. For several years she had a unique, ongoing collaboration with John Conklin as supertitle co-writer and designer for Boston Lyric Opera. Since 2023, Ms. Voth has been the pre-performance lecturer for Boston Lyric Opera. As a champion of new music, she has performed and assisted in many premieres with ALEA III, Collage New Music, The New Music Consort, The Group for Contemporary Players and The National Orchestra Association New Music Project. She is a specialist in the music of Paul Bowles and was on the cutting edge of the Paul Bowles revival movement in the 1990’s when she produced and performed in a multi-media production of music and readings entitled Paul Bowles: One Man, Two Minds at Merkin Hall in New York. The EOS Ensemble consequently invited her to participate in its Paul Bowles Festival in New York where she premiered a set of piano preludes. In 2011 as part of the Boston University Fringe Festival, she co-produced and music directed a Paul and Jane Bowles centennial celebration which included a multi-media performance entitled Two Stars in the Desert (also performed at BU’s yearly Incite Festival in New York), as well as a fully staged Boston premiere of his theatre work Yerma. Ms. Voth, recognized for her innovative programming, is the Chamber Series Music Director for the well-known Cantata Singers in Boston. She can be heard on CRI recordings.
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Approx. 1 hour
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Parking is available at the Boston Common Parking Garage on Saturdays all day for $12. Buy your discounted ticket from the French Library receptionist. Free street parking on Sundays.
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Approx. 8 minute walk from Arlington on the MBTA Green Line
Approx. 16 minute walk from Back Bay on the MBTA Orange Line
Approx. 15 minute walk from Charles/MGH on the MBTA Red Line
Nearby bus lines: 9, 10, 39, 43, 55, 57
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Wear what makes you feel comfortable!