Fou Gallery cordially invites you to attend the Mixed Signals: Thanksgiving Violin Duo Concert. It will take place on November 28, Sunday afternoon. Echoing the theme of Fou Gallery's current exhibition, Cathleen Clark: Whatever Hour You Woke There Was a Door Shutting, violinists Maya Lorenzen and Concetta Abbate will adapt the nostalgic and mysterious temperament of Kathleen Clark's work with a carefully selected program and melodious timbre of violins, distilling the meaning of time passed, and the longevity of one’s memory.

​​In Cathleen Clarke's solo exhibition:  Whatever Hour You Woke There Was a Door Shutting, Cathleen Clark captures lively occasions in her paintings: weddings of her family's previous generation, the lake she played around in her childhood, the ambiguous expressions of teenage friends, etc. These vague memories of people and events from her past are painted in a mysterious and haunting manner. At the same time, Maya Lorenzen and Concetta Abbate will perform from a wonderful classical and contemporary music repertoire, including Abbate's original music. We hope the combination of these paintings and music will help the audience explore the powerful juxtapositions of love and sorrow, loneliness and comfort, struggle and relief — to experience the inner workings of the human soul. Thus, with sight and sound complementing each other, Fou Gallery will provide a perfect place for the audience to wander around the banks of their river of memories.

*The concert is a collaborative project with Groupmuse, a social network that directly connects classical musicians with private venues. All the proceedings go to the musicians.

Maya Lorenzen

Maya Lorenzen received her undergraduate degree in music performance from Tel Aviv University and continued her master’s studies at HfMT Hamburg.  Now a doctoral student of musical arts at Stony Brook University as a student of Philip Setzer.

As a member of the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra (WEDO) since 2016, Israeli/German violinist Maya Lorenzen has performed around the world as a soloist and ensemble player.  With WEDO, Lorenzen has performed under the baton of Daniel Barenboim in venues such as the Royal Albert Hall during the BBC Proms, Lucerne Festival, Salzburg Festival, Philharmonie de Paris, Pierre Boulez Hall, Waldbühne Berlin, Carnegie Hall, John F. Kennedy Center, Chicago Symphony Center, and Walt Disney Concert Hall. 

She is a prizewinner of the 2016 Karl-Adler Competition (Germany) and the 2013 Mehta Chamber Music Competition (Israel). Since 2004, she has received annual awards and scholarships from the America-Israel Cultural Foundation. Her festival experience includes Musica Mundi (Belgium, 2005), IMAYO (the USA, 2006), JMC Young-Excellence program (Jerusalem, 2005-2008), Keshet Eilon (Israel, 2006-2013), ISA (Vienna, 2011-2012), and IMSS (Hamburg, 2012-2015) and ClasClas (Vilagarcia, Spain, 2018).

Concetta Abbate

Concetta Abbate is a classically trained violinist turned improviser and composer. Grammy.com describes her original performances as a mix of “Violin and delicate vocals that float between the worlds of Modern Classical, Neo-Folk, and poignant and poetic verse”. Abbate is also a voting member of the Grammys Recording Academy. She holds degrees in Music, Education, and Cultural Studies from Smith College (BA) as well as Columbia University (MA). 

She has performed with ensembles in NY including PARK Quartet, Femmelody Chamber Music Collective, and the Creative Music Orchestra. The studio albums of her original music span genres of New Classical, Jazz, Experimental, and Folk. Her Dance and Film scores have been performed at Lincoln Center, the Fashion Film Festival of Milan as well as Theatre for the New City. Notable music composition residencies include TAKT Gallery in Berlin (2016 and 2018) as well as the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation in Captiva Island, Florida (2019).