Star of 'Speaking in Strings' will perform at State Theatre, April 10

Salerno-Sonnenberg Michael Tammaro

Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, subject of the award-winning 1999 documentary "Speaking in Strings" and one of classical music's most vital and intriguing violinists, will join Anne-Marie McDermott, "a pianist who balances qualities of excitement and spontaneity with clarity and elegance" (The New York Times), for a recital Thursday, April 10, at 8 p.m. in Historic Ithaca's State Theatre, 111 State St., in downtown Ithaca. The program includes violin and piano sonatas by Beethoven and Faure, as well as Franz Schubert's "Rondo Brilliant." The concert is sponsored by the Cornell Concert Series.

Tickets for the concert -- which range from $19 to $30 for adults and $11-$18 for students -- are on sale at the Willard Straight Hall ticket office (255-3430) and at the ticket center at Clinton House (116 N. Cayuga St., Ithaca; 273-4497 or 1-800-284-8422). Tickets also are available from the Cornell Concert Series Web site at http://www.arts.cornell.edu/ccs and through http://www.ithacaevents.com. Student Rush tickets (subject to availability) for $5 will be on sale April 8 and 9.

The New York Times noted in a February 2002 review of Salerno-Sonnenberg and McDermott that their partnership was a "harmonic friendship" that "brought out the best in each other." For their Ithaca program, Salerno-Sonnenberg, 42, and McDermott, 39, have chosen works by Beethoven (the Sonata in C Minor, op. 30, no. 3), Faure (the Sonata in A Major, op. 13) and Schubert that demand equal strength and projection from both pianist and violinist.

Salerno-Sonnenberg, born in Italy but raised primarily in the United States, has pursued passions both on and offstage that have kept her in the headlines since the mid-1980s. On stage, she is one of the most extroverted classical musicians ever. The Washington Post described Salerno-Sonnenberg as "a breathtakingly daring and original artist. ... one of the few classical artists who must be experienced in person."

"When I started," said Salerno-Sonnenberg, "I guess I was like Gunga Din. I didn't know that by wearing pantsuits, or by playing the way I play, or by going on 'The Tonight Show' and showing Johnny Carson that classical musicians have a sense of humor that I would be seen in such a specific way, a negative way almost. Now after 20 years, the establishment is saying, 'OK, we accept you because there's nothing we can do about it.'"

Winner of seven international awards including an Avery Fisher Career Development Award, McDermott is pianist who conveys great sensitivity and spirituality in her playing. McDermott pursues life and music with the same philosophy, paying attention to individual details as well as of overall shape and architecture. There is, she says, "great joy from being aware of every single note, why the composer has chosen that note and what its function is within the work as a whole. It is not unlike a tea ceremony, where everything is meaningful and important. In music, the attention to detail and the respect for every single note is very close to being aware of every moment that you experience in life -- in effect, being fully alive."