A Chamber Music Potpourri

The first three works on this chamber program form a unique retrospective: Poulenc’s Suite Française emulates the music of the Renaissance dance suite;
Britten’s Nocturne (a song cycle for tenor) is set to the poetry of English literary masters from centuries past, including Shelley, Tennyson, Coleridge, and Shakespeare;
and Respighi’s Trittico Botticeliano is inspired by three paintings from 15th-century Italian master Sandro Botticelli. The evening closes with a reinterpretation of a classic,
University of Illinois faculty member Jim Pugh’s arrangement of Elgar’s Enigma Variations for brass choir and percussion.