Classical Music Agenda
A good way to try to forget that the presidential election took almost two years to end is to listen to music. Here's where you can do that this week.
>> The Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir (pictured) and the Tallinn Chamber Orchestra will give a concert on Sunday (November 9, 3 p.m.) at the Clarice Smith Center. Their programs generally include composers with lots of diacritical marks in their names, like Pärt and Tüür, but there will also be some Vivaldi. Tickets: $20 to $40 (students, $7).
>> Pianist and notorious masochist Jeremy Denk will play his new program of extremely demanding music, the Concord Sonata of Charles Ives and Beethoven's Hammerklavier sonata, in the Barns at Wolf Trap on Friday (November 7, 8 p.m.). Tickets are $35, to see if he loses it.
>> Washington Concert Opera opens its fall season on Sunday (November 9, 6 p.m.) with a performance of Donizetti's rarely heard opera Maria Padilla at Lisner Auditorium. Tickets: $30 to $90.
>> It's a good week for string quartets, including a most welcome appearance by the Takács Quartet at the Corcoran Gallery of Art on Sunday (November 9, 5 p.m.). Yes, they will play Bartók, plus some Haydn and Schumann. Tickets: $55.
>> The Emerson Quartet is back this week to complete its complete cycle of the Shostakovich string quartets, in concerts on Wednesday (November 5, 7:30 p.m.) and Thursday (November 6, 7:30 p.m.) in the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater. Tickets: $42.
MAKE IT FREE:
>> The Friday Morning Music Club Orchestra will present a concert with pianist Wayne Weng at the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater tomorrow (November 3, 7:30 p.m.).
>> If it's the first Tuesday of the month, then it must be time for the free Noontime Cantata performed by members of Washington Bach Consort at the Church of the Epiphany (1317 G St. NW). This Tuesday (November 4, 12:10 p.m.) it will be Bach's Lobe den Herren (BWV 137), if you are feeling like praising the Lord because, thank God, the election is almost over.
>> On Friday afternoon (November 7, 1:15 p.m.) clarinetist Osiris Molina will perform on the Friday Music Series at Georgetown University's McNeir Auditorium.
>> The best free concert of the week will likely be on Friday (November 7, 8 p.m.), when the Tetzlaff Quartet plays at the Library of Congress.
>> Pianist Diane Walsh will play music by Schubert, Ravel, Beethoven at the National Academy of Science (2101 Constitution Ave. NW) on Sunday afternoon (November 9, 3 p.m.).
>> On Sunday (November 9, 4 p.m.) the Phillips Collection will host a free concert by ArcoVoce. As always, admission to the museum is not free.
>> The National Gallery of Art's Sunday concert (November 9, 6:30 p.m.) will feature the Coast Orchestra providing live music for a screening of the silent film In the Land of the Head Hunters.
>> For more concert information, go to Ionarts.