Freeman Sunday Concerts

Throughout the academic year you can enjoy concerts by UofSC’s renowned music faculty in fresh and vibrant chamber music programs that pair canonic masterpieces alongside brand new works. Named for philanthropist Cornelia Freeman, the concerts raise scholarship money for gifted music students. The five concerts take place at 3 p.m. in the School of Music Recital Hall from September to April.

2020-2021 Concerts

Due to health concerns raised by the spread of COVID-19, for everyone's safety, no in-person audiences are allowed for indoor performances at this time. To keep the music playing for you, we will be streaming Freeman Sunday Concerts.

As a result of the generosity of one of our donors, Freeman Sunday Concerts are now FREE to live-stream.

The UofSC School of Music Channel

September 27, 3:00 p.m.
Live-Streaming on our Music Channel

Paul Hindemith - Symphony "Mathis der Maler" (arranged for piano four hands by Hindemith)
Lynn Kompass and Phillip Bush, piano

Ludwig van Beethoven - Trio in B-flat Major, op. 97 "Archduke"
Ari Streisfeld, violin; Claire Bryant, cello; Phillip Bush, piano

The opening program of the Freeman Sunday Concert Series continues UofSC School of Music's celebration of Ludwig van Beethoven's 250th birthday with a performance of his monumental "Archduke" Trio for violin, cello, and piano. Truly a symphony for three players, the "Archduke" revolutionized the piano trio genre when it was written in 1811 and pointed the way forward for all the Romantic period chamber music that followed throughout the 19th century.

The concert opens with Paul Hindemith's own arrangement for piano four hands of his Symphony "Mathis der Maler." The Symphony is based on music from Hindemith's opera by the same name ("Matthias the Artist") about the life of the 16th-century German Renaissance artist Matthias Grünewald. By telling the story of Grünewald's struggle for artistic freedom of expression under a repressive regime, Hindemith drew the ire of the Nazi regime in Germany. Soon afterwards Hindemith left his native country, eventually settling in the US and teaching for many years afterwards at Yale University.

October 25, 3:00 p.m.
FREE Live-Streaming on our Music Channel

Ravel - Duo for Violin/Cello
Ari Streisfeld, violin; Claire Bryant, cello

Beethoven - Quintet, op. 16
Rebecca Nagel, oboe; Joseph Eller, clarinet; Michael Harley, bassoon; Dakota Corbliss, Phillip Bush, piano

The Freeman Sunday Concert Series presented by the UofSC School of Music continues on October 25 with a final salute to the 250th anniversary of Ludwig van Beethoven's birth: a performance of his Quintet for Piano and Winds. This buoyant, exuberant work was an homage to Mozart's own Quintet of the same instrumentation, right down to the very key in which it is written. It is, quite simply, one of the happiest works in all of Beethoven's output.

The concert opens with Maurice Ravel's four-movement Sonata for Violin and Cello. It was written in the early 1920's and dedicated to the memory of Claude Debussy, who had died just a couple of years earlier. The Sonata shows Ravel moving away from the lush Impressionism of his younger years and exhibiting the influence of contemporaries such as the Hungarian composers Bela Bartok and Zoltan Kodaly (the latter of whom had just written his own duo for violin and cello a few years earlier). Ravel's Sonata is a virtuosic showpiece for these two instruments and quickly established itself as a staple of the violin-cello duo repertoire.

January 24, 2021

TBA

February 21, 2021

TBA

School of Music