“When concertmaster Frank Almond, the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, and former music director Andreas Delfs perform the Midwest premiere of American composer Pierre Jalbert’s Violin Concerto this weekend, they will be taking part in a phenomenon picking up steam in the classical music world: the consortium commission,” writes Elaine Schmidt in Wednesday’s (2/14) Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “Jalbert, who teaches composition at Rice University, explained that consortium commissioning of new works ‘is really appealing for performers and organizations.’ Sharing the expense of a commission allows an organization such as the Milwaukee Symphony to commission more works than it could if it had to pay the entire cost of each commission…. For composers, consortium commissions have an extremely significant appeal. ‘A consortium commission gets your piece played multiple times in multiple places,’ he said. ‘You want to get your music out there and this does that.’ The world premiere of Jalbert’s two-movement Violin Concerto was performed last June by St. Paul Chamber Orchestra concertmaster Stephen Copes…. Following Milwaukee’s performance, the West Coast premiere will occur on March 17, played by Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra concertmaster Margaret Batjer.”
Posted February 15, 2018
