2022/2023

‍Guest Curator Harry Cooper, senior curator of modern art at the National Gallery of Art

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Paris in the 1920s was a place of great artistic conflict and excitement. While some like Igor Stravinsky and Pablo Picasso embraced Neo-Classicism and a "return to order" in the aftermath of the Great War, others launched bold new experiments. Under the leadership of André Breton, Surrealism sought to shock the bourgeoisie, while a passion for African and African American art and culture, from jazz to art to dance, galvanized the city, personified above all by Josephine Baker. Join PCE for a screening of the classic Surrealist film Entr’acte (René Clair, 1924) with the original score by Erik Satie performed live. The program also includes film footage of Baker dancing and a tribute to jazz great Sidney Bechet. It culminates with Maurice Ravel's partly-jazz-inspired Piano Concerto in G featuring soloist Drew Petersen, winner of the 2018 Avery Fisher Career Grant and the 2017 American Pianists Award.

‍Guest Curator Stanley J. Thurston, pianist, composer, and conductor

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PCE rings in 2023 with a new season tradition. We present a stirring program for chorale and orchestra that celebrates the universal expression of the human spirit through music. Amazing Grace, perhaps the most universal of folk hymns, has inspired people all around the world for centuries. Hear versions of it woven throughout the program and join the whole ensemble at the end of the program. Featuring African-American spirituals, and works by Adolphus Hailstork, Evelyn Simpson Curenton, William Grant Still, and J. S. Bach.

PostClassical Ensemble celebrates the 100-year anniversary of a seminal opera, a life-long creative friendship, and an artistically explosive era in Spanish history with two performances in one night: the world-premiere of Entwined: Love’s Magicians by Derek Goldman and El retablo de maese Pedro (Master Peter’s Puppet Show) by Manuel de Falla.

PCE is honored to have been selected by the government of Spain to lead the centennial celebration of “Master Peter’s Puppet Show” in the United States. Presented in partnership with The Embassy of Spain and Georgetown University.