BOSTON, MA February 26, 2001–Albert Kay Associates, Inc. today announced Clarinetissimo!, a classical and jazz extravaganza featuring virtuoso clarinetist Jonathan Cohler performing with friends at New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall on Saturday, March 31, 2001 at 8:00 PM. Tickets are available for $25, $20 or $15 from the Jordan Hall Box Office at 617-536-2412. Students may take advantage of a $5 discount off of the ticket price.

"Clarinetissimo!" is a classical and jazz extravaganza that features music from Schubert to Shaw including two pieces commissioned by Benny Goodman: the Copland Concerto and the Gould Derivations; two pieces with a swingin' big band: the Gould Derivations and the Artie Shaw Concerto; one of the great virtuoso pieces of the clarinet repertoire, the Weber Quintet for clarinet and string quartet; and the most beautiful piece ever written for clarinet, soprano, and piano: Schubert's Shepherd on the Rock. This concert highlights the incredible range of music, styles and combinations in which the clarinet excels. Virtuoso clarinetist Jonathan Cohler takes us on a wild ride through the world of clarinet featuring music with soprano, piano, string quartet, chamber orchestra and big band to boot!

Jonathan Cohler is recognized internationally as a virtuoso clarinetist. Through his performances around the world and on record, he has thrilled an ever-widening audience with his incredible musicianship and total technical command. Fanfare Magazine has compared him to one of the giants of classical music–"one thinks of Dinu Lipatti"– and the magazine dubbed Mr. Cohler’s performance "superhuman."

A highly acclaimed recording artist with an extraordinarily wide repertoire, his release, The Clarinet Alone, was a Nominee for the prestigious INDIE Award presented by the Association for Independent Music (AFIM). In addition to his work as a soloist, Mr. Cohler is an active chamber musician and conductor. He collaborates frequently with many well known musicians and ensembles including members of the Emerson String Quartet, the Muir String Quartet, The Lark Quartet, The Moscow Conservatory Trio, The Amadeus Trio, The New Jersey Chamber Music Society, The Boston Chamber Music Society, The Wavehill Trio, Boris Berezovsky, Ilya Kaler, Andres Diaz, Charles Neidich, Laurence Lesser, Randall Hodgkinson, Judith Gordon, Veronica Jochum and Karol Bennett.

He has toured the United States, Japan, Europe, China, Poland, Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Peru, Mexico and Cuba, and performed at many festivals including those of Tanglewood, Aspen, Rockport, Newport, Martha’s Vineyard and the Hamptons. He has been a frequent invited performer at the International Clarinet Association’s annual ClarinetFest. He has been featured on the prestigious Dame Myra Hess Memorial Concert Series in Chicago. This season he will release new recordings on the Ongaku Records label including the trios of Stravinsky, Bartok, Berg, Ives and Khachaturian as well as the Weber, Mozart and Copland Concerti.

Mr. Cohler is currently Music Director and Conductor of the Brockton Symphony Orchestra and Assistant Conductor of the Youth Philharmonic Orchestra of the New England Conservatory. He is a member of the clarinet, chamber music and conducting faculties of the Longy School of Music in Cambridge, and the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.

Soprano Andrea Delgiudice will be heard in her Jordan Hall debut performance. A native of Pembroke, Massachusetts, Ms. Delgiudice recently returned from Rome, Italy where she lived for ten years and enjoyed great success in many of the major opera houses of Europe. She performed the role of Cio-Cio San in Madame Butterfly all over Europe to rave reviews. In response to her debut with the Scottish Opera under Sir Alexander Gibson, Kevin Stephens of The Newcastle Journal said, "It’s not often we are privileged to hear an opera star in the making, but I reckon that’s just what we did hear in Andrea Delgiudice’s remarkable representation of Puccini’s doomed Butterfly." Other engagements have included Bonn Opera, Cologne Philharmonic, Arizona Opera, Austin Lyric Opera, RAI 1 Television in Italy, and Edmonton Opera in Canada.

The Diabelli String Quartet’s performance of the Brahms Quintet in B Minor, Op. 115 with clarinetist Jonathan Cohler at International Clarinet Connection 2000 (ICC 2000), was hailed by the Boston Globe as "supercharged, clear-headed, yet soulful." Formed in 1999, the Diabelli String Quartet has already established itself on the chamber music scene in Canada and the United States. The Diabelli Quartet was the quartet-in-residence from August to December 2000 at the Shaw Festival in Ontario, and in January 2001, they began an intensive two-year program as the only quartet-in-training under the Emerson String Quartet. They will be returning to ICC 2001 held at the Longy School of Music in June 2001. The quartet members are violinists Annie Trèpanier and Renée-Paule Gauthier, violist Steve Larson, and cellist Brian Snow.

Pianist Susan Shin has made solo appearances with the Hartt Symphony Orchestra, the Syracuse University Symphony Orchestra, and the Torrington Civic Symphony. She is a 1996 magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College. In 1999, she received her M.Mus. from The Hartt School, where she is currently a teaching fellow, a member of the full-scholarship 20/20 honors chamber music program, and a candidate for the Artist Diploma. She studies there with Luiz de Moura Castro.

Conductor James Gaffigan, a student at the New England Conservatory of Music, was recently selected as one of only two fellowship students chosen for the prestigious Tanglewood Music Center Conducting Fellowship program run by Seiji Ozawa and Robert Spano.

The Jonathan Cohler Big Band is comprised of some of the top players in the Boston area. The band played previously at Jordan Hall in 1998 and was featured live on WGBH Radio on Richard Knisely’s show Classical Performances. The band members include trumpeters Tom Cupples, Katherine Evans, and Kevin Tracy; saxophonists Eric Hewitt, Todd Brunel and Jonathan Girard; trombonists Will Scharen, Joe Stewart and Will Lombardelli; bassist Lemar Lovett; drummer Gary Fieldman; and pianist Susan Shin.

Formed for this event, the Clarinetissimo Chamber Orchestra includes top string players from the Boston area with pianist Susan Shin and the phenomenal young harpist Piper Runnion-Bareford. Orchestra members include violinists Tobias Steymans, Rimma Yermosh, Nelly Kim, and Virginia Diaz; violists Elizabeth Freivogel and Amanda Wilson; cellists Alexei Gonzalez and Tsao-lun Lu; and bassists Michelle Herrera and Lemar Lovett.