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Friday, January 22 • 7:00 pm

Fire and Grace: From C. P. E. Bach to Brahms
St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, Charlotte
1001 Queens Rd, Charlotte, NC 28207

Bach’s legacy, carried forward in brilliance, beauty, and expressive depth.

Bach’s legacy did not end with Bach. It passed through his sons, inspired Mendelssohn and Brahms, and became a living language of brilliance, beauty, and expressive depth. Fire and Grace follows that inheritance from the quicksilver imagination of C. P. E. Bach to the autumnal warmth of Brahms, showing how the master’s influence continued to ignite new forms of musical expression across generations.

This is also a rare opportunity to hear four extraordinary artists in one richly varied evening. Clarinetist Maryse Legault brings a performer-scholar’s command of 19th-century sound worlds to Brahms’s beloved F minor Sonata, a late masterpiece of glowing lyricism, intimacy, and emotional depth. At the piano, Esther Jeehae Ahn offers the sensitivity, brilliance, and architectural clarity that Bach Charlotte audiences know so well, moving from the mercurial fire of C. P. E. Bach’s A major keyboard sonata to the deep chamber-music partnership Brahms demands. Making their Bach Charlotte debuts, soprano Sonja DuToit Tengblad and baritone David McFerrin add Mendelssohn’s elegant vocal duets, bringing two acclaimed and vividly expressive voices into the WinterFest fold. Rooted in Bach, carried forward by artists of exceptional range, this Friday night program promises beauty, fire, and uncommon musical intimacy.

Featuring

Clarinet Sonata No. 1 in F minor, Op. 120, No. 1
Johannes Brahms

Keyboard Sonata in A Major, W.55/2
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach

Selections from Six Duets, Op. 63
Felix Mendelssohn

Sonja Dutoit Tengblad, Soprano
David McFerrin, Baritone
Maryse Legault, Clarinet
Esther Jeehae Ahn, Piano

Concert Duration: Approximately 65 minutes without intermission​

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