The tour began in Boulder, Colorado, at the University’s renowned 2,047 seat Macky Auditorium.

The hall has been the site of the distinguished University of Colorado Artist Series dating back generations, as the backstage collection of concert posters clearly shows.

The duo performed one of its signature “Unfolding of Music” programs, which traverses over 250 years of history, beginning with Bach and moving through Beethoven, Schumann and Debussy to Benjamin Britten’s 1961 Sonata in C. After the concert, the duo hosted for dinner at Boulder’s famous Frasca restaurant by Denver Friends of Chamber Music member Richard Replin and his wife Elissa, far right. Joining the duo for dinner was Takacs Quartet violist Geraldine Walther and her husband Tom.

The world-renowned Takacs Quartet is the ensemble in residence at Boulder. David was also joined for dinner by his great friend and colleague from the Takacs, cellist Andras Fejer.

Making the duo feel as much at home as anywhere in Boulder was Artistled’s recently departed Liisa Juola, who after five stellar years managing the duo’s travel and other projects, including production for Music@Menlo, returned to her beloved Midwest to take the position of Creative Coordinator for the company Crispin Porter and Bogusky.

On the morning following the concert, the duo awoke to a blizzard and a master class in the Grusin Music Hall on the University of Boulder campus. The duo heard first-class performances of Beethoven and Poulenc Sonatas.

The streets of Boulder were treacherous as the duo made its way by car east to Fort Collins.

In Fort Collins, the snow subsided, and the duo had time to enjoy the quaint old-west-style town, including the host hotel, the historic Armstrong.

Fort Collins is an extremely arts-conscious community, and the duo found itself advertised in every conceivable location.



The University Center for the Arts, in an old school building but completely renovated in 2004, was an acoustical delight, one of the highlights of the tour.

After a post-concert, late night drive to the Denver airport, and a few hours sleep, the duo boarded a plane bound for Charlotte, North Carolina. In their path was a major storm system that was wreaking havoc all the way from Florida to Maine. After an exciting landing, the duo began a 2 ½ hour car ride, in pouring rain, to Tryon. In Tryon they were welcomed by the charming and gracious Pine Crest Inn.

The Tryon Concert Association has been in existence for 52 seasons and has a devoted audience, sold out entirely on subscription. This year’s series also hosted the duo’s good friends the St. Lawrence Quartet.

The 335-seat concert hall is in a special building constructed specially for local arts groups, the Tryon Fine Arts Center.

The duo was warned backstage of the possibility of a tornado during the Grieg Sonata, but was assured that the concert hall’s basement was the safest place in town. The tornado bypassed Tryon, and the duo’s program, its second of the tour, went uninterrupted: sonatas by Schubert, Strauss, Grieg and the Rachmaninov Vocalise.

The following morning, the duo left early for Chicago, but not before staring at the weather map in the Greenville airport. The storm system that almost prevented them from getting to Tryon had headed off the coast (green), but the system they were flying into (left, blue) was a fierce snowstorm that resulted in the flight to Madison being cancelled.

The duo rented a car and headed for Madison as quickly as possible, trying to make an afternoon master class. Along the way, many cars had run off the road, and a surprising number of them had overturned, having hit patches of “black ice” and spun out of control.

Arriving in time in Madison, the duo was welcomed with separate master classes on chamber music and solo repertoire. The concert that evening was held in Wisconsin Union Theater, which, like Boulder’s Macky Hall, has had a long and distinguished history of concert presentation.

Backstage posters should be enough to make any musician appearing on this series proud.

After a late dinner with a small crowd of University faculty, the duo spent a restful night in Madison and headed off the next day by car for Appleton, the last stop on the tour. In Appleton, young musicians again awaited the duo’s arrival for coachings, this time in the concert venue, the 1,240 seat Lawrence Memorial Chapel.

After the concert, which was part of The Performing Arts at Lawrence's Artist Series, the duo signed many CD’s for an enthusiastic audience.

[ Back to What's New ]