The Boston Herald
May 14, 1996"Young Audiences benefit offers the real thing"
"Serious music-making is unusual on a gala program. But the Young Audiences benefit on Sunday afternoon offered an uncommon amount, sandwiched in with the speechifying, the promotional video and the glitz.
The organization brings live performances to school audiences, and its Roster Sunday included the best of the pros and the best of the new generation. There were two string quartets: the ad hoc ensemble of violinists Pamela Frank and Lynn Chang, violist Marcus Thompson and cellist Yo-Yo Ma; and the extraordinary young and gifted, Boston-based Amaryllis Quartet, comprised of high school violinists Ayano Ninomiya and Mariana Gren, violist Melissa Reardon and cellist Wendy Law.
The Amaryllis is coached by BSO principal second violin Marylou Speaker Churchill and violist Eugene Lehner, formerly of the Kolisch Quartet and BSO.
The players shuffled and reshuffled themselves throughout the concert, with all eight joining together to play the "Primavera" section from Vivaldi's Four Seasons, " the Mendelssohn Octet and Dvorak's "Songs My Mother Taught Me."
The first half of the program consisted of single movements, and each half opened with an encore - "Dueling Fiddles" (an arrangement of the popular "Feudin' Banjos") and the Dvorak. The second half was supposed to be limited to a single movement from the Mendelssohn, but someone wisely decided that the music and the players were strong enough to warrant a full performance of all four movements from the Octet.
To conclude the first half, there was the Vivaldi in an elegant performance featuring Lynn Chang in the solo role and the rest of the ensemble making up a most accomplished "orchestra."
The Octet's performance was the most satisfying and complete, with Pamela Frank as first violin, the most exuberant with Yo-Yo Ma and Wendy Law laying down a passionate bass line.
It was in this piece, the most complete, fully realized and demanding of one's concentration, that the players and the audience seemed to have the most fun."
-Ellen Pfeifer