Classical Underground, the highly personal and pleasantly renegade performance series housed in an loft in the industrial heartland of Los Angeles, has a cozy evening of chamber music on tap Monday night.
Sakura, an ensemble of five cellists — Jonathan Dormand, Michael Kaufman, Yoshika Masuda, Peter Myers, and Sarah Rommell — attributes its name to a poetic gesture to the master with whom the musicians all studied at USC, Ralph Kirshbaum.
Kirshbaum is German for cherry blossom, we are informed. Swapping to Japanese, that becomes sakura.
Valiantly upholding the UCLA side of the musical spectrum, professor and performer Inna Faliks will play Ravel’s ravishing and devilishly difficult Gaspard de la nuit.
Violinist Mark Kashper of the Los Angeles Philharmonic rounds off the program acompanied by Kanae Matsumoto on piano. The duo will perform the Third Sonata Edvard Grieg, by turns dramatic and lyrical and full of folksy Norwegian themes.
CU soon, CU!
Classical Underground | Alexey Steele grand atelier | Mon Dec 14, 8 pm