Noon Concerts: Women Composers Collective

• Irene Sazer, violin
• Jessica Ivry, cello
• Rebecca Hass, piano

This Noon Concert presents a concert in honor of women's history month. Four award-winning Bay Area women composers present their globally diverse piano trios. You will travel to Argentina, Brazil, Asia, and Africa as you listen to these innovative new works by composers D'Arcy Reynolds, Lillian Yee, Rebecca Hass, and Irene Sazer, performed by a powerhouse piano trio of composer/world music aficionados: Irene Sazer, violin; Rebecca Hass, pianist; Jessica Ivry, cello

About Noon Concerts – Throckmorton Theatre

Throckmorton Theatre's signature Noon Concerts series fills the theater with the intimate warmth and beauty of superbly talented Bay Area, national, and international talent. All concerts are free to the pubic, we welcome everyone through our doors. Join us to celebrate the transcendent power of live music.

About Irene Sazer, violin

Known internationally as a founding member of Turtle Island String Quartet, Sazer is an acclaimed soloist, recording artist, composer and educator. An in-demand genre-hopping violinist , she founded Real Vocal String Quartet in 2005. In 2019 Sazer was awarded a Gerbode Special Award in the Arts for cultural collaborative work and continues to create with artists around the world. She has recorded/performed with Ali Akbar Khan, Ella Fitzgerald, Ray Charles, Frank Sinatra, Smoky Robinson, David Grisman, Linda Rondstadt, and Bjork and performed at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center. Creating eco-art films with original soundtracks has become a passion project.

About Jessica Ivry, cello

Jessica Ivry teaches orchestra and strings in Oakland Unified School District. Previously she was on faculty at Las Positas College and College of Marin, leading the string orchestra and chamber music programs. Jess is a longtime Bay Area freelance cellist, having performed in local orchestras and in productions at American Conservatory Theater (SF) and Berkeley Repertory Theater. For 10 years, she played with Real Vocal String Quartet including performances at Stern Grove and an overseas US State Department tour. She has played and/or recorded with many artists including Feist, Bauhaus, Nneena Freelon, and Sharon Jones. Jessica received a Bachelor of Arts from Skidmore College, a Masters in cello performance from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and a Masters of Art in Teaching from Longy School of Music of Bard College.

About Rebecca Hass, piano

Rebecca Hass is a pianist and composer in the San Francisco Bay Area whose work has "a witty sensibility, lyricism, and joy." Her debut Brazilian album, Florescer (Bloom), was described as "thoughtful as it is clever and original" and "a delightful 43 minutes of musical sunshine," and includes guests Tim O'Keefe, Jenny Klukken, and Laura Harada.

Her new album of original piano music, Bright Little Worlds, is an imaginative, heart-filled collection of 22 compositions in various styles (Brazilian, jazz, impressionistic, neo-classical, and more) and is arranged in a hero’s journey-style narrative trajectory where each one is its own character or little world - something for every mood. It features guest musicians Debbie Gold (flute) and Brian Rice (pandeiro), and is inspired by influences as diverse as Hermeto Pascoal, Laercio de Freitas, Claude Debussy, Aaron Copland, Vince Guaraldi, and Thelonious Monk.

With a deep passion for Brazilian rhythms, Rebecca has been part of the Brazilian music scene in the Bay Area for the last 5 years, having been a guest with the Berkeley Choro Ensemble, and soloist with the Diablo Symphony and Echo Chamber Orchestra on Brazilian and Latin pieces written by living composers. Rebecca also performs solo shows of her own compositions and arrangements of classic Brazilian sambas, choros, and baiãos.

Rebecca works as a collaborative pianist and educator in the Bay Area, and has been a founding member of Modern Spark Trio, a piano trio with diverse repertoire in Minneapolis, as well as the Brazilian percussion group Batucada do Norte.

As a curious human, she is always designing new practices for herself, her students, and her creative coaching clients, and is dedicated to following and spreading creative curiosity and joy.