Putnam County Courier - May 2010
Brewster Musicians Have International Roots, Local Focus

With a decade of successful seasons, it is this kind of accessibility to music that has been the mission and standard of Camerata New York, whether promoting talented musicians from all over the world or reaching a local audience.

When the couple founded the professional orchestra in 2000 in Vienna, Austria, it was called Camerata Internazionale. Mr. Owen is the conductor and Ms. Owen is the principal cellist and orchestra’s executive director. When they moved to America the name was adjusted to Camerata New York, but the high-caliber concerts remained their priority.

Their paths to becoming musicians are two different stories, yet there is something in their vivaciousness when discussing their musical backgrounds that is the same.

Mr. Owen grew up in New York City in a musical family—his father wrote nine operas, while also a federal judge, and his mother was an opera singer. As a boy he sang in operas and began competing as a pianist. He went on to attend Dartmouth College to study piano. “I decided somewhere along the way that music was what I pretty much wanted to do as a career,” he says.

After earning a masters degree at the Manhattan School of Music, he went with his mother to a summer music festival in Germany where he began conducting orchestras. “I met my dear wife there,” he says, gently patting her hand with a playful smile. “She was there with the Warsaw Conservatory and was engaged to play for the summer festival.” She smiles back.

“I have, maybe, a little bit simpler way of starting,” Ms. Owen begins. She grew up in a small town in Poland, and at 11 her parents heard there was a test for musical talent for a primary music school. She liked music, in fact Ms. Owen had taught herself to play guitar at the age of 9 and sang in a children’s chorus at a local church. The test determined she had good hands for cello.

“Actually, I wanted to learn to play the guitar, but they didn’t have a teacher so they took me to a classroom where there was a young cellist playing,” she recalls. “They asked me if I liked it, and I was 11 so I said ‘sure!’ It looked like a guitar, but sort of like a violin, a big version. That’s all I really knew of instruments at that time.”

She attended specialized music schools through high school and emerged with 10 years of music education in cello, piano, chorus, ear training, music history, harmony, and chamber music. She went on to earn her masters degree from the F. Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw, Poland.

Having met in Germany at the festival, both went to Vienna to study at the University for Music and the Performing Arts—he for conducting, she for cello. They married in Vienna and co-founded Camerata New York.

With extensive international careers, they moved back to the States when Mr. Owen was offered a conducting job. Since then, he has conducted for numerous orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, and is now the music director of the Amore Opera in New York. She has an impressive resume of concerts as a soloist and as a freelance musician, and is also a devoted music teacher.

Ms. Owen gives music lessons in their home, offering education in various instruments, and also teaches voice lessons (she was a soprano soloist herself and coach of the Columbia University Glee Club). It is with her own education and experience as an active musician that allows her students to not only appreciate, but enjoy music.

This fall, Camerata New York will be celebrating their 10th anniversary season, and it is due to the Owens’s leadership that the accomplished orchestra has performed at theaters like Carnegie Hall and Alice Tully Hall. With musicians mainly from the City, they do engage some from Westchester and Putnam County. And while funding is not always in abundance they have never compromised on their original mission to give emerging musicians the opportunity to make music on the highest level.

One of the most inspiring initiatives is the orchestra’s “Music for Everyone” program where free concerts are held at local venues. In the past they have included the Brewster Public Library and the Southeast Museum. Having lived in Brewster for almost seven years, it’s the Owens’a hope that with live performances the community can appreciate the richness of music—in an extremely intimate setting, no less. In fact, they will be performing on June 4 at the Katonah Village Library.

“We realize that not every person, adult or child, is super excited to come to a classical concert,” Mr. Owen says. “So, we wanted to make it super accessible and wanted to mix up the repertoire.”

Ms. Owen points out that the first half of their local concerts tend to be shorter pieces that are more recognizable to the audience. The second half delves into traditional classical works. Most importantly, they always make a point to provide their audiences with ample background and information on the music.

“We always want people to understand the music, and enjoy, and learn something from it,” she says. He quickly adds, “And hopefully take it one step further in their own life.”

See soloists of Camerata New York Orchestra in concert. Artists Richard and Katarzyna Owen will be performing at the Katonah Village Library on Fri. June 4 at 7pm. Admission is free.

http://www.putnamcountycourier.com/news/2010-05-06/Cultural_Events/Brewster_Musicians_Have_International_Roots_Local_.html

-----------------------
Camerata New York Featured at Brewster Library
By Dorothy Killackey
October 2009
Putnam County Times

On Saturday afternoon, October 24, 2009, the Brewster Public Library presented a delightful concert program featuring Camerata New York soloists Katarzyna Owen, cellist, and Richard Owen, Jr., pianist and conductor.

Katarzyna is the principal cellist and Executive Director of Camerata New York Orchestra and the Music Director of the Columbia University Glee Club Chorus. She maintains a private music studio teaching cello, piano, guitar, voice, violin and viola.

Richard is Music Director of the Camerata New York Orchestra and cover conductor for the New York Philharmonic. This Brewster couple has performed at Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall, Merkin Hall and the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City.

The program began with the romantic music of Robert Schumann and moved into the modern American composers such as Jerome Kern, George Gershwin, and Richard Rodgers, with one of the selections sung by Katarzyna. After the intermission, Claude Debussy's Arabesque No.1 was presented and the program concluded with Cesar Franck's Sonata in A Major.

Old and young attended the concert program and attentively listened as Richard discussed the backgrounds and histories of the composers and linked their music and themes to their backgrounds.

As the concert progressed into the modern impressionist music, he asked the audience their thoughts and feelings. The deep, rich sonorous tones of the cello and the melodious piano elicited audience reactions, but to this writer, most memorable, were the rapt expressions and attention of the attending children. The public was fortunate to have this moving, memorable program in Putnam County.

The program was made possible, in part, with public funds from New York State Council on the Arts Decentralization Program, administered in this county by the Putnam Arts Council. In November, a travel talk program will be presented by the Brewster Public Library.

Camerata New York Orchestra is proud to announce that it will receive a grant in 2009 from the New York State Arts Council for a concert series entitled "Music For Everyone" to take place in the Brewster Public Library. This is the fourth Camerata NY series sponsored by NYSCA.

The orchestra also has received a renewal grant in the amount of $15,000 from the Gordon and Harriet Greenfield Foundation for general activities in 2009.

DANBURY -- With a splendid sampling of musical material spanning from the 16th to 20th centuries, Camerata New York (CNY) gave an excellent demonstration Sunday of how a small orchestra can deliver a full sound. The selections CNY performed ranged from Renaissance to Ravel, and each piece had its own distinctive character. Danbury Concert Association President Marcia Klebanow said it was a real treat having a group like the philharmonic open their season at Ives Hall at Western Connecticut State University. Consisting of only about 30 musicians, Camerata New York manages to create amazingly rich tonal qualities usually found in orchestras twice their size. In explaining the program for their second performance in Danbury, Music Director Richard Owen announced that the complete "Manfred Overture and Suite" by Robert Schumann (1810 -- 1856) had never been performed before in Connecticut.

A modern electronic keyboard replicated a harpsichord with reasonable authenticity. Owen's wife, Katarzyna, gave a lovely cello solo in "Villanella -- Andante cantabile." Brass fanfares were brisk and bright, blending well with the strings.

With exquisite orchestration, Maurice Ravel (1875 -- 1937) made musical magic in his "Ma Mere L'Oye (Mother Goose Suite)." The woodwinds got a workout, but were wonderful, with their delightful diaphanous textures. No one was sleeping for these enchanting arrangements of children's bed time stories. In the dream tableau "Conversation of Beauty and the Beast," with some help from the harp, the transformation of the beast from ultra-deep contrabassoon to handsome prince violin was marvelous. CNY blended the colors of the instruments from the simple melodies and motifs, with incredibly beautiful results. After a brief intermission, they gave a bold and upbeat performance of "Symphony No. 41 in C major, K. 551 (Jupiter)," the last symphonic composition by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756 -- 1791). Earlier, Owen noted how it was a beautiful day for music to take our minds off Wall Street.

Mozart also had the ability to transcend the troubles of his own harsh existence with his compositions. This grand outpouring of triumphant hopefulness and unified ebullience was a strong affirmation of positive energy. In the fourth movement, five complex parallel fugal themes were woven together seamlessly. From where I was sitting in the balcony at Ives Hall, the acoustics were balanced and enhanced the orchestra's sound. Owen formed CNY about nine years ago while in Vienna, but the group has since resettled near Danbury, much to our good fortune.

Orchestra gives high-caliber performance
By Howard Tuvelle

SPECIAL TO THE NEWS-TIMES
Last Friday evening the Pawling Concert Series presented the "Camerata New York," a small orchestra of highly skilled performers, in a program of staples from the orchestral repertory.

The performance, given on the campus of Trinity-Pawling School and in their new Gardiner Theater, was one of the most satisfying I've heard by this size ensemble in many years. There was a good audience turnout in spite of a rather appalling evening of semi-snow and rain.

The conductor, Richard Owen, has appeared internationally with orchestras of distinction, and his wife, principle cellist in the orchestra, created the idea of starting an ensemble with young and talented musicians making music on the "highest level." This, to be assured, they did.

The program began with "The Hebrides Overture (Fingal's Cave)," by Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847). Mendelssohn was 21 and visiting Scotland when he got the idea for the overture. He was on an excursion to the famous basalt cavern on the tiny island of Staffa in the Hebrides, when the powerful waters and starkness of this imposing island stirred his imagination. He excitedly wrote to his sister, Fanny, and scrawled out the opening 20 measures of the overture. Completed and once revised, it is one of the finest seascapes ever written.

The Camerata captured the dark and somber moods and what also seemed to be the crashing of waves against the island's shores. With great precision conductor Owen and the orchestra had perfect control over contrasts and dynamics and all the subtleties in between; not just your basic fortes and pianissimos (louds and softs).

(Continue here from homepage.) The term "Camerata" is a 16th century word meaning "academies," or small groups of musicians or people with literary interests. Applied to orchestras and by today's standards of very large orchestras, (of between 50 to 120 players) it does refer to a smaller ensemble. Yet in the program's second work, the "Symphony No.1 in C Major, Op.21," by Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827), this size orchestra is exactly what the composer wanted and for what he scored (wrote) the symphony. It is the typical size orchestra of Haydn and Mozart as well.

With almost flawless technique and razor-sharp togetherness, its performance was breathtaking. I felt as if hearing Beethoven's music, at last, as it was meant and for the instrumentation the composer conceptualized in his mind. Of course I could rhapsodize about the performance, the perfect ensemble playing, the sweeping gestures by the conductor, but suffice it to say the music was more intimately satisfying and immediate than what it would have been from the inflated sonorities of a large orchestra.

After a brief intermission the closing work was the "Serenade No.1 in D Major, Op. 11," by Johannes Brahms (1833-1897).

A serenade is one of those lighter types of music formulated in the 18th century. It is music for the evening and contains six separate pieces, in mood if not in style.

Brahms was in his 30s and living in a restful town called Detmold outside Hamburg, Germany when he composed Serenade No. 1. Clara Schumann's influence helped him obtain a "job" in the town, which had been the center of a princely court that flourished during the 16th and 17th centuries. Such courts always encouraged and supported the arts, and Detmold continued the tradition.

If any work on the program presented a challenge, this one did. Brahms is always challenging and often rhythmically complex in order to get the sound he desires. There were a few unconvincing moments perhaps only to my Brahmsian prejudices but never any faltering.

Conductor Owen exacted every ounce of sonority and power the players could give, and here again there was greater clarity because of fewer instruments.

It was an evening of the most satisfying and highest quality music-making any ensemble might achieve, and surely Camerata New York fully deserves a triple star rating.


(http://leisure.newstimes.com/story.php?id=66766&category=Entertainment)

New Concert Series

New York Times Features Camerata NY

"New Orchestra's Debut"

by Roberta Hershenson

New York Times - Westchester Footlights
Sunday, July 27, 2003

"A new orchestra, Camerata New York, is taking root in Northern Westchester."

The group began in 1999 in Vienna as a project of Richard Owen, Jr. and his wife, the Polish-born cellist Katarzyna Owen, and moved to Peekskill in 2000. In part a family affair - Ms. Owen is the executive director and principal cellist, and Mr. Owen is the music director and conductor - the orchestra has already played at Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall and the Cathedral of St. John the Divine.

"It was a dream of my wife to start a small, collaborative orchestra, like the ones she played in in Poland," Mr. Owen said.

The number of players in Camerata fluctuates between 10 and 50. The musicians are under 35, like the Owenses themselves, and are recent graduates of conservatories like Juilliard and the Manhattan School of Music.

The repertory is standard classical, with an occasional new commission. The group recently performed and recorded the world premiere opera, "Rain," by Richard Owen Sr., the conductor's father, who is a federal judge in Manhattan. (It will be released by Albany Records.)

As a boy, the younger Mr. Owen sang as a soloist with the Metropolitan Opera, the New York City Opera and the Santa Fe Opera. He also sang in his father's operas, as did his mother, Lynn Owen, a singer and voice teacher. He holds a master's degree in piano accompaniment and studied conducting in New York and Vienna.

How can an orchestra hope to succeed when others like it are folding? "I have a lot of young musicians who want to perform music on the highest level," Mr Owen said. Foundation grants, like one from the Florence Gould Foundation for $25,000, also help.

Camerata will make its Westchester debut at a free concert sponsored by the Pulvermann Foundation on Oct. 5 at 3 p.m. at Rye High School.

Information: (914) 788-5635.




Florence Gould Foundation Award

The Florence Gould Foundation has awarded a grant of $25,000 to support the activities of Camerata New York in season 2003-4.

Coming from one of the foremost music foundations in the nation, this grant represents a milestone for the orchestra following our first full season of operations.

Dear Friends of Camerata New York,

It is with great pleasure that I announce that the Florence Gould Foundation has renewed its grant of $25,000 for general support of the activities of Camerata New York in season 2004.

Coming from one of the foremost music foundations in the nation, this renewed support is a real vote of confidence and affirmation of the importance of Camerata NY projects and activities.

I also would like to invite you to listen to an imminent interview between announcer Delphine Marcus and myself to take place on WMNR Fine Arts Radio (New York/Connecticut/Long Island) on Sunday, September 28, 2003 at 5pm. The program will present excerpts of Camerata NY performances and a discussion of Camerata activities and upcoming events

Finally, I enclose a recent article featured in the New York Times.
(Westchester - Footlights) describing Camerata New York activities and highlighting our upcoming Westchester debut in the Pulvermann Foundation Concert series taking place in Rye, NY on October 5, 2003 at 3pm.

I hope this note finds you well.

Warm regards,

Richard Owen
Music Director

CONTINUE TO MORE CURRENT NEWS AND REVIEWS!