Winners of both the Banff and Fischoff Competitions, and recipients of an Avery Fisher Career Grant, the Jupiter Quarter has performed around the globe and become a major creative voice in chamber music since its founding in 2001. Their playing style combines an accessible warmth with deep musical knowledge and an adventurous spirit. The New Yorker described them as “an ensemble of eloquent intensity” and one of the mainstays of the American chamber-music scene. Their program for us will include Dvorak’s Viola Quintet in E-flat Major, excerpts from Wynton Marsalis’s String Quartet No. 1, and a piece by composer Su Lian Tan.

Camerata Deia, is the ensemble in residence at the Festival International de Musica, in Deia, Spain. The group comprises musicians from both Spain and the United States. Their program on the New Millennium Series includes the Turina Piano Quartet, the Granados Piano Quintet and the remarkable Mendelssohn Octet for Strings. Conrad Wilson said about the Mendelssohn, "Its youthful verve, brilliance and perfection make it one of the miracles of nineteenth-century music."

Since his triumph as winner of the 1970 Chopin International Piano Competition, pianist Garrick Ohlsson has established himself worldwide as a musician of magisterial interpretive and technical prowess. Although long regarded as one of the world’s leading exponents of the music of Frédéric Chopin, Mr. Ohlsson commands an enormous repertoire, which ranges over the entire piano literature. A student of the late Claudio Arrau, Mr. Ohlsson has come to be noted for his masterly performances of the works of Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert, as well as the Romantic repertoire. To date he has at his command more than 80 concertos, ranging from Haydn and Mozart to works of the 21st century, many commissioned for him.

Described by the San Francisco Chronicle in 2017 as “…an incredibly valuable addition to the cultural landscape” and “powerfully adept…with a combination of brilliance and subtlety,” the Telegraph Quartet was most recently awarded the prestigious 2016 Walter W. Naumburg Chamber Music Award. Past prizes include the Grand Prize at the 2014 Fischoff Chamber Music Competition. The Telegraph Quartet gave its first Carnegie Hall appearance in Weill Recital Hall in 2015. They will perform works of Dvorak, Schulhoff and Weinberg.

The Calefax Reed Quintet is a pioneering wind group from Amsterdam, famed throughout Europe. Calefax has released 19 CDs under the renowned German MDG label and its own RIOJA Records label. Their recordings have earned critical acclaim from the international press. The group has given concerts in virtually every country in Europe, as well as touring Russia, China, India, Turkey, Japan, South Africa, Brazil and the United States, performing at major venues such as Wigmore Hall, the Oriental Arts Centre (Shanghai) and Lincoln Center. 

The Grammy award winning Takács Quartet, now entering its forty-third season, is internationaly renowned for the vitality of its interpretations. They are the first string quartet to win the Wigmore Hall Medal. Their touring this season includes stops in Copenhagen, Vienna, Luxembourg, Rotterdam the Edinburgh Festival, the Aspen and Tanglewood Festivals and Carnegie Hall. The first string quartet to win the Wigmore Hall Medal, their inaugural visit to Sacramento will find them performing works by Mozart, Mendelssohn and Beethoven’s monumental Opus 131.

Five time Grammy winner Dawn Upshaw has achieved worldwide celebrity as both a recitalist and performer of opera, with a repertoire spanning 250 years. She has received awards and distinctions accorded to only the most distinguished artists. In 2007 she was named a Fellow of the MacArthur Foundation, the first vocal artist to be awarded the organization's five-year “genius” prize, and in 2008 was named a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. She will be joined on the New Millennium Series by her longtime collaborator, the legendary pianist Gilbert Kalish, in a program of songs by Franz Schubert, Bela Bartok, Rebecca Clarke and William Bolcom.

For many Sacramento concertgoers the annual Faculty, Alumni, and Friends Gala is the highlight of the New Millennium Series. This year’s gala will highlight virtuoso Flautist Laurel Zucker, who will join forces with pianist John Cozza in a performance of Francis Poulenc’s elegant Sonata for Flute and Piano, which was originally premiered by Jean-Pierre Rampal and the composer. Percussionist Daniel Kennedy will also bring his consummate skill and extraordinary musical range to our concert stage.

The New Esterházy Quartet, recognized as one of the world's top period-instrument string quartets, presents "The Birth of the String Quartet," performing three quartets: Mozart's Quartet in D, K575, Haydn's String Quartet in C, Op. 20 No. 2, and Boccherini's Quartet in A, Op. 8 No. 6. The members of NEQ are internationally-known period-instrument and chamber music specialists Kati Kyme and Lisa Weiss, violins, violist Anthony Martin, and cellist William Skeen.

Continuing our tradition of featuring the world's finest string ensembles, we are proud to present the Grammy award-winning Ying Quartet. The quartet, currently artists-in-residence at the distinguished Eastman School of Music, will present a marvelous and varied program comprising Borodin's D Major Quartet, Prokofiev's F Major Quartet, and Beethoven's powerful masterpiece, Op. 59, No. 3 in C Major "Rasumofsky."

This year's Gala will include performances by alumni cellist Jia-mo Chen and vibrant young french hornist Sadie Glass. Stellar pianist Eric Zivian will team up with faculty members Anna Presler, violinist, and Andrew Luchansky, cellist, for a performance of Felix Mendelssohn's powerful masterpiece, the Trio in D minor, Op. 49. 

The multiple Grammy-winning Pinchas Zukerman is equally respected as violinist, violist, conductor, pedagogue and chamber musician.  His musical genius, prodigious technique and unwavering artistic standards have inspired audiences and critics alike over four decades. Mr. Zukerman will be joined by acclaimed pianist Angela Cheng, with the pair performing Mozart’s G Major Sonata, K. 301, Beethoven’s E-flat Major Sonata Op. 12, No. 3 and Brahms’ D minor Sonata, Op. 108.

We are honored to welcome Mexico's most distinguished wind ensemble, the Mexico City Woodwind Quintet, in their Northern California debut. Currently, the Mexico City Woodwind Quintet is in residence at the National Arts Center and has gained critical acclaim for recordings of Mexican quintet literature. Their program entitled, Danzas Latinamericans, will feature a rich array of music including, Astor Piazzolla's Teme de Maria.

The Gala will once again feature this year's AJ and Susana Watson Chamber Music Competition prizewinners as an opening act.  We will also be treated to the world premier of Leo Eylar's "Two Klee Sketches" to be performed by percussionists Daniel Kennedy and Artie Storch. And the evening concludes with a performance of Brahms's masterpiece, the Piano Quartet No. 3, Op. 60 by faculty members Anna Presler, Anna Kruger, and Series Artistic Director Andrew Luchansky.

Acclaimed baritone Scarlata and legendary pianist Kalish will perform a set of songs by Charles Ives, and Schubert's extraordinary final work, Schwanengesang ("Swan Song").