The Stravinsky Years
Epilogue: Page 4
1991 and 1992—Two Italian Tours, Featuring “Les Noces”
In 1991, Silvio Piovesan (whose uncle had commissioned Stravinsky in the late 1950s) wanted the Gregg Smith Singers to tour “Les Noces” in Italy. The result was a wonderful collaboration between GSS, the Strasbourg Percussion Ensemble, GSS soloists Rosalind Rees, April Lindevald, Sam Hutcheson and Rhys Ritter, and our then-current pianist, Jonathan Sherry, plus three former GSS pianists, Oresta Cybriwsky, Paul Suits and Thomas Wise who had all received Fulbright scholarships and were living in Europe. After one day’s rehearsal (!) we performed “Les Noces” in Rimini, Piacenza, Ferrara and Napoli.
In April 1992, the Gregg Smith Singers repeated the Stravinsky tour of Italy with almost the same forces as above (pianist Christopher Kabalo substituted for Paul Suits). This time, we started with a concert in Rome, and then three in beautiful, springtime Sicily—Palermo, Messina and Catania.
Shortly afterwards, the Gregg Smith Singers began the previously mentioned SUNY recording sessions of “Les Noces” and other Russian works for a new Stravinsky CD series for MusicMasters, with Robert Craft conducting.
