American conductor Jeffrey Means (Berklee College of Music) leads ANAM musicians in this program tracing the musical world of Alban Berg — a composer who stood between centuries, traditions and ideas. His music mixes late-Romantic beauty with the sharper edges of modernism, finding feeling within structure and clarity within chaos.
The program begins with Berg’s Seven Early Songs, a work written in his twenties and steeped in the lush sound world of Mahler and Strauss. The Piano Sonata, op. 1 follows — a compact, restless work that already hints at the intensity and precision of his later style. Berg’s arrangement of Johann Strauss II’s waltz Wein, Weib und Gesäng peels back the glitter of old Vienna to reveal something stranger and more intimate beneath.
The concert closes with the Kammerkonzert, op. 8, written for his mentors Schoenberg and Webern — a piece that captures Berg’s transformation from student to master. In its intricate textures and fierce lyricism lies the “alchemy” of Berg’s art: the turning of emotion into form, and form back into emotion.
Alban BERG Sieben frühe Lieder
BERG Piano Sonata, op. 1
Johann STRAUSS II arr. BERG Wein, Weib und Gesäng, op. 333
BERG Kammerkonzert, op. 8
Jeffrey Means conductor
Timothy Young (Resident Faculty, Head of Piano) piano
Sophie Blades (guest) soprano *
ANAM Musicians
* Sophie Blades is a 2026 Melba Artist and appears courtesy of the Melba Opera Trust
Duration: approximately 1 hour and 45 minutes (includes a 20-minute interval)
