Camerata Pacifica Closes Its 36th Season With a Rare Shostakovich at The Huntington

Camerata Pacifica caps its 36th season Tuesday at Rothenberg Hall, the San Marino chamber room tucked inside The Huntington, with a program built around a piece almost no California audience has heard live: Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 15, Op. 144, in Viktor Derevyanko’s 1972 arrangement for piano trio and percussion.

The 47-minute reduction, personally approved by Shostakovich after its Moscow premiere, has been performed only a handful of times in the Western Hemisphere. Tuesday’s performance is the California premiere and the closing stop of a four-city Southern California tour. Pianist Gilles Vonsattel opens the evening with Ludwig van Beethoven’s Sonata in A Major, Op. 2, No. 2, the season’s final entry in Camerata Pacifica’s “Beethoven 32,” a three-year cycle in which Vonsattel will perform all 32 Beethoven sonatas.

Between the Beethoven and Shostakovich, the program leans into rhythm. Belgian composer Thierry De Mey’s “Musique de Table” turns percussionists into tabletop drummers, with small tables serving as the only instruments. American composer Kenji Bunch’s “Transcontinental for Violin and Percussion Quartet” follows, pairing violinist Grace Park with the ensemble’s four percussionists. The full performer roster also includes cellist Ani Aznavoorian and percussionists Ji Hye Jung, Ayano Kataoka, Svet Stoyanov and Jason Treuting.

Camerata Pacifica, founded as Southern California’s pioneering chamber music collective by Adrian Spence, mounts the series each season across Santa Barbara, Thousand Oaks, Los Angeles and San Marino. Tuesday’s Huntington performance is the final stop.

Camerata Pacifica will perform on Tuesday, May 19 at 7:30 p.m. Rothenberg Hall at The Huntington, 1151 Oxford Road, San Marino. For more information and to purchase tickets, call (805) 884-8410 or visit cameratapacifica.org. Tickets: $35 to $75.