I’m not sure that some of the guests in the audience last night realized how rare it is to get to hear a violinst of Livia’s caliber perform from a few arm-lengths away.

Almost thirty people arrived just before 8pm to hear Livia run through the Rosza Violin Concerto with Dmitri Cogan, including members of another quartet who had come over a couple hours earlier to run through a Brahms Piano Quartet. Rosza was the dude who wrote the music for BenHur, and Geoff said that the music was sort of like… “Bartok meets film score.” :)

I won’t say much else, but you can check out a very short clip of her playing, if you have Real Media Player installed. See the clip now, before her management finds this and sues me. hehehe.

Artist Bios
————
Livia Sohn, Violin [management page]

At the age of 12, Livia Sohn was named first prize winner of London’s 1989 Yehudi Menuhin International Violin Competition. Since then, she has been guest soloist with such orchestras as the Boston Pops, Cincinnati, Pittsburg, Oregon, and Phoenix Symphonies, the Aspen Festival and Chamber Orchestras, as well as numerous others. In 1999, NPR did a week-long feature of Livia and broadcasted it to over 400 cities in the United States. Abroad, she has been soloist with orchestras in England, Germany, the Czech Republic, Iceland, New Zealand, South Africa, Israel, Cyprus, Mexico, Finland, and Korea. She has appeared in recitals at New York’s Mostly Mozart Festival, and Chicago’s Ravinia Festival, and gave a recital as part of the inauguration of the new Harris Hall at the Aspen Music Festival. Highlights of this season include a return engagement with the Phoenix Symphony under James DePreist, a two week tour of England with the Czech National Orchestra, and an appearance with the Budapest Symphony in their famed opera hall. Livia went to the Juilliard School where she studied with Dorothy DeLay.

Dmitri Cogan, Piano

Pianist Dmitri Cogan studied with Vladmir Pleshakov and Maria Cysic at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music after immigrating with his family from Russia in 1974. He later received both an undergraduate and graduate degree in music from the Juilliard School, where he studied with Martin Canin. Cogan has performed in Russia and throughout the Northwestern United States, California, France and Asia. He is the recipient of numerous awards including the Robert Casadesus International Piano Competition and the Jose Iturbi International Piano Competition.

Photos tagged with a ‘*’ were taken by Adam Tow. Thanks, Adam!

Brahms Quartet performance	Brian Babcock and Jen Shyu*
Me and Rachel*	Livia, performing*
Applause, post-performance*	Tulips I bought for the occasion*
Bill Rivard, Wally Tseng, Rachel*	A relatively normal (!) photo of Justin Min!*
Oliver’s posse*	Oliver, Justin, and their friends*
Socializing…*	Elliot Sather and Mandy Knox*
BenJAmin Chen and Jen Shyu*	Why I get 4 hrs of sleep a night