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Pictured from left to right: Inbal Segev, Cynthia Koledo DeAlmeida, Lucas Richman and Jeffrey Biegel.Cover photo by Brian Hinrichs. Back cover photo by Michael Sahaida.

CONDUCTOR:Lucas Richman

SOLOISTS:Jeffrey Biegel, Piano Cynthia Koledo DeAlmeida, OboeInbal Segev, Cello

VIOLIN 1Mark HugginsHuei-Sheng KaoJeremy BlackKelsey BlumenthalEllen Chen-LivingstonIrene ChengSarah ClendenningAlison FujitoJennifer OrchardSusanne ParkKristina Yoder*Sarpouhi Pantikian

VIOLIN 2Jennifer RossLouis LevDennis O'BoyleLaura MotchalovEva BurmeisterCarolyn EdwardsAndrew FullerClaudia MahaveZhan ShuPeter Snitkovsky

VIOLATatjana ChamisJoen VasquezMarylene Gingras-RoyCynthia BuschPaul SilverStephanie TretickMeng Wang*Laura Fuller

CELLOAnne Martindale WilliamsDavid PremoMikhail IstominMichael DeBruynMichael LipmanCharles PowersAlexandra Thompson

DOUBLE BASSBetsy HestonJeffrey GrubbsPeter GuildMicah Howard*Joshua Tripp*Gerald Torres

FLUTELorna McGheeRhian KennyJennifer Steele

OBOE*Henry WardScott BellHarold Smoliar

CLARINETThomas ThompsonRonald SamuelsJack Howell

BASSOONDavid SoggPhilip Pandolfi

HORNWilliam CaballeroRobert LauverMark HoughtonJoseph Rounds

TRUMPETGeorge VosburghNeal BerntsenChad Winkler

TROMBONERebecca Cherian*James AlbrechtJames Nova

TUBACraig Knox

TIMPANIEdward Stephan

PERCUSSIONAndrew ReamerJeremy Branson*John Soroka

HARPGretchen Van Hoesen

LIBRARIANSJoann Vosburgh Lisa Gedris

Concerto for Piano and Orchestra: In Truth by Lucas Richman

Lucas Richman’s Concerto for Piano and Orchestra: In

Truth reflects upon truths perceived, truths accepted and truths verified, with the piano soloist serving as a protagonist who alternates between abiding by society's universal "truths" and railing against those who create new "truths" so as to avoid personal culpability.

The first movement, To One’s Self, places one’s inner honesty and faith in front of a musical mirror. Intermingled throughout are motifs derived from the word, “truth,” a rhythmic declamation of the Latin phrase “Veritas vos Liberatit” and a spiritual Indonesian chant, whose English translation is, simply: “Strengthen the bond between your inner feeling and the one who watches over you.”

The second movement, To One’s World, begins with a cadenza for the pianist, picking up on the dilemmas proposed in the first movement and applying them to the world at large. The cadenza builds to an articulation of the “truth” motif, soon thereafter transformed into a caustically rhythmic fast movement in 10:8 time. The “truth” motifs are continuously forced to face a musical mirror, ultimately resulting in a honky-tonk ragtime gone wrong.

It is the prevailing thought behind the quote of “Strengthen the Bond” that guides the progression of the final movement, To One’s Spirit. It begins with an instrumental setting of a line from Psalm 145: “The Lord is near to all who call to Him — to all who call

to Him in truth.” With introspection, the piano then declaims the “truth” motif in a harmonization that lifts gradually higher and higher, eventually coming back full circle to a proper balance between the outer self and the inner spirit.

Concerto for Piano and Orchestra: In Truth was commissioned by the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra and received its world premiere performances on October 17 and 18, 2013, with Jeffrey Biegel as the soloist and the composer conducting.

Concerto for Oboe and Orchestra: The Clearing by Lucas Richman

Psalm 23 figures prominently in the overall concept of the Concerto for Oboe and Orchestra: The Clearing. The psalm’s text conveys a moment of epiphany, expressed in gentle acceptance and understanding that becomes the quiet climax of the work. The “clearing” of the subtitle is the place in which that epiphany or spiritual reconnection occurs, and is meaningful on several levels. The more common understanding of a “clearing” on a physical level would be an open area one might reach after struggling through a dense forest, while the term also suggests a purification of mind and spirit after having fought through the trials and obstacles with which we are faced in life.

The concerto is constructed with five distinct sections linked together into one movement. The introduction presents a character prior to entering the symbolic forest of life. The surging tempo of the second section * Names are substitute musicians.

F E A T U R I N G T H E

York orchestral debut performing Prokofiev’s Concerto No. 2 in G Minor with the Juilliard Philharmonia, in Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall. Biegel is currently on the piano faculty at the Brooklyn Conservatory of Music at Brooklyn College, a City University of New York (CUNY) and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY). He resides in New York with his wife, Sharon, and their sons, Craig and Evan.

Cynthia Koledo DeAlmeida has been principal oboe of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra since 1991. For two years prior, she was associate principal oboe of the Philadelphia Orchestra. DeAlmeida has been featured with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra in concertos by Bach, Haydn, Vaughan Williams, Strauss, Mozart and Francaix. She has performed Bach’s Concerto for Violin and Oboe with the Pittsburgh Symphony and Vladimir Spivakov, Andrés Cárdenes, Pinchas Zukerman and Noah Bendix-Balgley. DeAlmeida has been honored with the commissioning of three oboe concerti for her by the Pittsburgh Symphony. She has also appeared as soloist with the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Haddonfield Symphony, the Cayuga Chamber Orchestra, the Concerto Soloists of Philadelphia and the Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic. DeAlmeida is an avid chamber musician, having performed nine full recitals at Carnegie Mellon University since 1993. Each summer since 2002, she performs and teaches as a faculty member of the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, California. Several of her performances there have been featured on NPR’s “Performance Today.” DeAlmeida has also performed at the Strings Festival in Steamboat Springs, Colorado; the La Jolla Festival in La Jolla, California; and the Marlboro Music Festival

in Vermont. She has been associate teaching professor at Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Music since 2012, and a faculty member there since 1991. She has held teaching positions at Temple University in Philadelphia and Trenton State College in New Jersey, and has also been invited to teach at the National Orchestral Institute at the University of Maryland as well as the New World Symphony. She is frequently asked to teach masterclasses at universities in the United States and abroad. DeAlmeida received the Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Michigan, studying with Arno Mariotti, and the Master of Music degree from Temple University, as a student of Richard Woodhams. She proudly plays on F. Loree oboes of Paris, France.

Israeli-American cellist Inbal Segev’s playing has been “characterized by a strong and warm tone . . . delivered with impressive fluency and style,” by The Strad. Equally committed to new repertoire for the cello and known masterworks, Segev brings interpretations that are both unreservedly natural and insightful to the vast range of solo and chamber music that she performs. She has performed as a soloist with orchestras across the United States, Latin America, Europe and with all the major orchestras of Israel. Segev is also a founding member of the Amerigo Trio with New York Philharmonic concertmaster Glenn Dicterow and violist Karen Dreyfus. Segev’s many honors include the America-Israel Cultural Foundation Scholarship (which she began receiving at the age of seven), and top prizes at the Pablo Casals International Competition, the Paulo International Competition and the Washington International Competition. She began playing the cello in Israel at age five and at 16 was invited by Isaac Stern to come to

stirs the character to life through to the onslaught of earthly reality, climaxing with a broad declamation of the Hebrew phrase, “Gam ki aylach b’gay tzalmavet…” (“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death”). The character has now reached the clearing and intones the entire psalm in the form of a prayer-aria. With acknowledgement of innocence lost and then re-found, a brief recapitulation leads to the concerto’s final dance of affirmation.

Concerto for Oboe and Orchestra: The Clearing was commissioned by the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and received its world premiere performances on February 16-18, 2006, with Cynthia Koledo DeAlmeida as the soloist and Sir Andrew Davis conducting.

Three Pieces for Cello and Orchestra by Lucas Richman

The evolution of Three Pieces for Cello and Orchestra

occurred over the course of nearly 25 years, beginning with the composition of a work entitled “Prayer,” written in 1989 for cellist David Low. An additional movement, “Freylach,” was subsequently added and orchestrated, transforming the melody from “Prayer” into a folk dance and virtuoso showcase for the soloist. Prayer and Freylach received their orchestral world premiere in December 1999 by the Los Angeles Jewish Symphony with David Low, soloist, and Noreen Green, conductor. Over time, the composer acknowledged that one more movement was needed for this set, which could serve as a prelude to the Prayer and Freylach. As there are melodic similarities between the original two movements, this new movement was written in

such a way as to foreshadow melodic material yet to be heard. The new prelude, “Declaration,” gained its name from the solo cello’s enunciation of “Sh’ma Yisrael,” the watchword of the Jewish faith.

Inbal Segev was the soloist for the world premiere of Three Pieces for Cello and Orchestra as a set on May 16 and 17, 2013, with the composer leading the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra.

Jeffrey Biegel has a multi-faceted career as a pianist, recording artist, chamber music collaborator, composer and arranger. His electrifying technique and mesmerizing touch have received critical acclaim and garnered praise worldwide. His most recent venture is the creation of the Dicterow-DeMaine-Biegel piano trio, joined by violinist Glenn Dicterow and cellist Robert DeMaine. A specialist in the music of George Gershwin, Biegel is a member of the touring ensemble for To Stay: The Gershwin Experience with Sylvia McNair, Ryan VanDenBoom and David Snyder, taking the show to symphony orchestras. Until the age of three, Biegel could neither hear nor speak, until corrected by surgery. The “reverse Beethoven” phenomenon can explain Biegel’s life in music, having heard only vibrations in his formative years. Born a second-generation American, Biegel’s roots are of Russian and Austrian heritage. Biegel was the unanimous recipient of the prestigious First Grand Prize in the 1989 Marguerite Long International Piano Competition and the First Prize in the 1985 William Kapell/University of Maryland International Piano Competition. He studied at The Juilliard School with the legendary artist/teacher Adele Marcus, herself a pupil of Josef Lhevinne and Artur Schnabel. He made his New

The journey from the concert hall to a commercial recording is not one of which many new musical works are granted the opportunity to take. In the case of Lucas Richman’s Concerto for Piano and Orchestra: In Truth, that journey began with a simple question posed by two devoted patrons of the arts: “What will it take to get this piece recorded?” Following the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra’s rousingly successful presentation of the piano concerto’s world premiere in 2013, the concert’s sponsors, Tom and Evelyn Shaw, were eager to do what they could in order to make a recording a reality. Through Richman’s long-term association with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra as resident conductor and frequent guest conductor, Robert Moir (then the symphony’s senior vice president for artistic planning) was approached with the possibility of creating an album that featured not only Richman’s piano concerto but his Concerto for Oboe and Orchestra: The Clearing (a Pittsburgh Symphony-commissioned work) and his Three Pieces for Cello and Orchestra as well. As a result, through the wonderful graces of the Shaws, the incredible musicians and stalwart administrative staff of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and three brilliant soloists, IN TRUTH: LUCAS RICHMAN has now taken that elusive journey from the ephemeral stage to recorded permanence.

Radio International, produced by Classical WQED-FM 89.3, made possible by the musicians of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. With a long and distinguished history of touring both domestically and overseas since

1900 — including 36 international tours to Europe, the Far East and South America — the Pittsburgh Symphony continues to be critically acclaimed as one of the world’s greatest orchestras.

the United States to continue her studies. Segev earned a bachelor’s degree from The Juilliard School and a master’s degree from Yale University, studying with noted masters Joel Krosnick, Harvey Shapiro, Aldo Parisot and Bernhard Greenhouse. Segev lives in New York with her husband and three young children. She performs on a cello made by Francesco Rugeri in 1673 and is managed by Barrett Vantage Artists. Please visit inbalsegev.com for more information.

Lucas Richman has served as music director for the Bangor Symphony Orchestra since 2010 and recently completed a 12-year tenure as music director for the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra from 2003 to 2015. Richman received a Grammy Award (2011) in the category of Best Classical Crossover Album for having conducted the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra on Christopher Tin’s classical/world fusion album, Calling

All Dawns. He has also appeared as guest conductor with numerous orchestras including the New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Baltimore Symphony, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, the Oslo Philharmonic, the Iceland Symphony Orchestra and the Zagreb Philharmonic. Richman served as assistant and resident conductor for Mariss Jansons and the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra between 1998 and 2004 and, from 1988 to 1991, he was the assistant conductor for the Pacific Symphony Orchestra. Also an accomplished composer, Richman has had his music performed by over 200 orchestras across the United States including the New York Philharmonic, the Boston Pops and the symphonies of Detroit, Atlanta, New Jersey and Houston. In November 2009, as the result of an NEA commission, the San Diego Symphony Orchestra

premiered his Behold the Bold Umbrellaphant, a setting of poetry by Children’s Poet Laureate Jack Prelutsky, which Jahja Ling and the SDSO subsequently recorded and released in December 2011. He has fulfilled commissions for numerous organizations including the Pittsburgh Symphony, Knoxville Symphony, Johnstown Symphony, the Debussy Trio, the Seattle Chamber Music Society and the Organ Artists Series of Pittsburgh. A listing of Richman’s compositions can be found through LeDor Publishing at www.ledorgroup.com.

The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, known for its artistic excellence for more than 120 years, is credited with a rich history of the world’s finest conductors and musicians, and a strong commitment to the Pittsburgh region and its citizens. Past music directors have included Fritz Reiner (1938-1948), William Steinberg (1952-1976), Andre Previn (1976-1984), Lorin Maazel (1984-1996) and Mariss Jansons (1995-2004). This tradition of outstanding international music directors was furthered in fall 2008, when Austrian conductor Manfred Honeck became music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony. The orchestra has been at the forefront of championing new American works, and gave the first performance of Leonard Bernstein’s Symphony No. 1 “Jeremiah” in 1944 and John Adams’ Short Ride in a Fast Machine in 1986. The Pittsburgh Symphony has a long and illustrious history in the areas of recordings and radio concerts. As early as 1936, the Pittsburgh Symphony was broadcast on the airwaves coast-to-coast and in the late 1970s it made the groundbreaking PBS series “Previn and the Pittsburgh.” The orchestra has received increased national attention since 1982 through network radio broadcasts on Public

Special thanks:This recording would not have been possible without the extreme kindness and generosity of Tom and Evelyn Shaw and Thermal Label Warehouse. Special thanks also to Manfred Honeck, Robert Moir, Edward Cumming, Declan McGovern, Katie McGuinness, Sonja Winkler and the extraordinary musicians and administrative staff of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra.

Recorded live February 12, 2015, Heinz Hall for the Performing Arts, Pittsburgh PA Recording Producer Elizabeth Ostrow Recording Engineer John Newton (Soundmirror, Boston)Editing Daniel Frank Davidsen (Soundmirror, Boston)Mixing & Mastering Mark Donahue (Soundmirror, Boston)