I remember the first time I heard Oakland pianist Audrey Vardanega play. It was 2006, and she was debuting with the prestigious Midsummer Mozart Festival in Berkeley playing Mozart’s “Piano Concerto No. 21 in C major, K. 467.”
She was only 11, by far the youngest solo performer in the festival’s 50-year history, but her musicality was that of a grown-up, world-class pianist. I was blown away. Afterward, I asked the festival’s founder and artistic director, George Cleve, “How good is she for her age?”“Martin,” he said, laughing, “She’s good for any age!”
Unlike the unhappy stories you hear about some child prodigies, she’s never outgrown her talent. She just kept learning and learning while scooping up as much wisdom and experience as she could, and today she’s at top of her game. The San Francisco Classical Voice calls her “musically eloquent … with the kind of freedom, authority and strength that one expects from the world’s finest pianists.”
Audrey leads a bicoastal life these days, living in New York but returning to the Bay Area often to see her mom and look after her latest venture, Musaics of the Bay, which brings composers, performers and visual artists together for “musical mosaic” collaborations, as Audrey calls them. The visual artist creates something pictorial; the composer writes music that expresses it; and the performer performs it.
Audrey will come home for a different reason this weekend, though. She’ll be here on Saturday to play at a gala 40th anniversary celebration to honor the place where it all began for her, the Crowden School in Berkeley, which she remembers as a place that was “just filled with love” and helped her overcome her childhood shyness. She and violinist Ariana Kim will play “Primavera Porteña,” a tango from Astor Piazzolla’s “The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires.”
The Crowden School was founded in 1983 by Scottish violinist Anne Crowden (with former monk and landless Italian count Piero Mancini) to provide a supportive environment for musically talented middle school kids by incorporating music into their daily curriculum.
Audrey won’t be the only returning alum. Composer Samuel Adams (Class of ’00) will be on hand too to present his latest work, “Arches,” specially commissioned for this occasion, which kaleidoscopically celebrates the school’s past, present and future. It will be played by acclaimed violinist Nora Chastain and David McCarroll (‘99), a co-concertmaster of the Pittsburgh Symphony, with an all-star orchestra of Crowden students, faculty and alums. Also on the bill:
• a welcome by the great mezzo-soprano Frederica von Stade;
• the Grammy-winning Catalyst Quartet, including Karla Donehew Perez (‘99);
• violinist Kenneth Renshaw (’08), winner of the Menuhin Competition;
• Abigail Rojansky (’03), a violist with the Verona Quartet (the current graduate resident string quartet at New York City’s Juilliard School);
• Jeremy Cohen, a founding violinist of Quartet San Francisco, who studied with Anne Crowden before the school was founded;
• “Carrot Revolution,” a string quartet composed by Gabriella Smith (’05) performed by the Friction Quartet
• four traditional pieces by Gordon Getty;
• “Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis” by Ralph Vaughan Williams (an Anne Crowden favorite);
• and Crowden’s traditional concert closer, “Fiddle Faddle” by LeRoy Anderson.
Crowden concerts customarily take place at the school’s beautiful concert hall, but that holds only 200 people. So instead it will be at the equally beautiful Hertz Hall on the Cal campus, which holds 400. The doors open at 6 p.m., and the music begins at 6:30. To find out more and get tickets, visit crowden.org/40th-anniversary online.
“My experience attending Crowden has left a permanent mark on my relationship with the piano and music-making,” says Audrey. “I remember the joy of playing chamber music with classmates and being part of a family bound by our love of music, learning and Berkeley.
“These feelings have stayed with me through my global journeys with music-making, and I can’t wait to be part of the 40th anniversary festivities!”
Martin Snapp can be reached at catman442@comcast.net.
