San Jose Mercury News talks West Coast Premiere of 'Harp Concerto'

San Jose Chamber Orchestra to present West Coast premiere of rare harp concerto

Despite being the most angelic of instruments, the classical repertoire for the harp is surprisingly limited. It's nothing compared to the manifold pieces that have been created for, say, the violin. Works for the modern harp were a rarity until composers like Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel came onto the scene in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

That's what makes a new piece like "Harp Concerto" by Canadian composer Vivian Fung so noteworthy. The composition, co-commissioned by the San Jose Chamber Orchestra plus four other musical groups from Alabama, Germany, Washington, D.C., and New York, will be the highlight of SJCO's 24th season opener. The featured artist is acclaimed harpist Bridget Kibbey, a Juilliard grad and instructor at Bard College Conservatory and New York University.The concerto's West Coast premiere takes place 7 p.m. Oct. 5 at Le Petit Trianon, 72 N. Fifth St., San Jose. SJCO, led by founder Barbara Day Turner, will also perform works by Eric Whitacre, Marjan Mozetich, Michael Touchi and Debussy.Fung, also a product of Juilliard, wrote the concerto for Kibbey at the musician's request. The two met when Kibbey performed a 2011 concerto written by Fung. "This is actually an extension of the Debussy," says Fung, a prolific producer known "for combining idiosyncratic textures and styles into large-scale works." The Bay Area resident (as of last year) is also partial to exotic influences like Tibetan chants and non-Western folk music."Before I composed the piece I really studied the harp repertoire," she says, noting that her concerto has similar instrumentation--strings and percussion--to the works of Debussy and Ravel."Harpists are constantly looking for pieces to perform," Fung continues. In Kibbey she seems to have found an ideal interpreter of her music. "Bridget is so adventuresome," she says.- by Crystal ChowRead article here...