Anna Clyne: SHORTHAND The Knights & Eric Jacobsen

• Anna Clyne (b. 1980): Shorthand:
• 1Clyne: Shorthand11:47
• Three Sisters:
• 2Clyne: Three Sisters: One05:11
• 3Clyne: Three Sisters: Two05:14
• 4Clyne: Three Sisters: Three04:59
• Prince of Clouds:
• 5Clyne: Prince of Clouds14:22
• Within Her Arms:
• 6Clyne: Within Her Arms12:20
• Shorthand REDUX:
• 7Clyne: Shorthand REDUX06:19
• Total Runtime01:00:12

Info for Anna Clyne: SHORTHAND

SHORTHAND brings together a host of internationally acclaimed artists and presents a collection of Clyne's compositions, including its title-track, Shorthand, for cello and string orchestra recorded here with Yo-Yo Ma. Three Sisters is performed by its dedicatee mandolinist Avi Avital, and Clyne's double violin concerto Prince of Clouds places violinists Colin Jacobsen and Pekka Kuusisto in the spotlight. With works spanning more than a decade, SHORTHAND presents musical conversations between the soloists and the ensemble, as well as within the ensemble itself.

The album also features Clyne's most personal work, Within Her Arms, written as a tribute to her late mother. Scored for 15 individual string parts, the music is shaped around a simple motif which grows and moves around the listener throughout the piece. The title is taken from a poem by the Vietnamese Buddhist monk and peace activist, Thich Nhat Hanh.

Poetry, art and music are reflected throughout the album, with Prince of Clouds drawing on Baudelaire's poem L'Albatros. Three Sisters reflects on three stars found in the constellation of Orion, whilst Shorthand muses on Beethoven's Kreutzer Sonata and the novella by Tolstoy of the same name, taking its title from his statement, "Music is the shorthand of emotion." The album also features the premiere recording of Shorthand (Redux), a reimagining of Clyne's thoughtful work.

Composer Anna Clyne, and The Knights' Artistic Directors Colin Jacobsen and Eric Jacobsen, say: "SHORTHAND represents over two decades of artistic friendships and collaborations - each of the artists on this album has played an important part in our artistic lives. It has brought together so many creative spirits and it has been an honor to record these works with them all. Over the span of two years, starting at the Clark Art Institute in Massachusetts to Power Station Studios in New York City, we have come together to create this special album that we are excited to share with you."

Boldly bringing a contemporary take to classical music through cross-genre collaborations and new technology, Anna Clyne was named the world's most performed living female British composer in both 2022 and 2023 by Bachtrack. Her forthcoming year sees major instrumentalists and orchestras presenting her music to audiences across the globe, with highlights including the world premiere of a new work for orchestra, voices and electronics called The Gorgeous Nothings at the BBC Proms with the BBC Philharmonic (July 30, 2024); the world premiere of PALETTE - a Concerto for Augmented Orchestra by the St Louis Symphony Orchestra (February 14, 2025); and further performances of her new solo instrumental concertos across the world - Weathered for clarinetist Martin Fröst, Glasslands for saxophonist Jess Gillam and Time and Tides for violinist Pekka Kuusisto.

The Knights
Eric Jacobsen, direction
Avi Avital, mandolin
Colin Jacobsen, violin
Pekka Kuusisto, violin
Yo-Yo Ma, cello

The Knights
are a collective of adventurous musicians dedicated to transforming the orchestral experience and eliminating barriers between audiences and music. Driven by an open-minded spirit of camaraderie and exploration, they inspire listeners with vibrant programs that encompass their roots in the classical tradition and passion for artistic discovery. The orchestra has toured and recorded with renowned soloists including Yo-Yo Ma, Dawn Upshaw, Béla Fleck, and Gil Shaham, and has performed at Carnegie Hall, Tanglewood, and the Vienna Musikverein.

The Knights evolved from late-night chamber music reading parties with friends at the home of violinist Colin Jacobsen and cellist Eric Jacobsen. The Jacobsen brothers, who are also founding members of the string quartet Brooklyn Rider, serve as artistic directors of The Knights, with Eric Jacobsen as conductor. The Knights are committed to creating unusual and adventurous partnerships across disciplines; they perform in traditional concert halls as well as parks, plazas, and bars, all in an effort to reach listeners of all backgrounds and invite them into their music-making. Since incorporating in 2007, the orchestra has toured consistently across the United States and Europe.

Counted among the highlights from recent seasons are: a performance with Yo-Yo Ma at Caramoor; the recording of Prokofiev’s Second Violin Concerto on master violinist Gil Shaham’s Grammy-nominated 2016 release, 1930s Violin Concertos, Vol. 2, as well as a North American tour with Shaham; residencies at Dartmouth, Penn State and Washington DC’s Dumbarton Oaks; and a performance in the NY PHIL BIENNIAL along with the San Francisco Girls Chorus (led by composer Lisa Bielawa) and the Brooklyn Youth Chorus, which featured world premieres by Rome Prize-winner Bielawa, Pulitzer Prize-winner Aaron Jay Kernis, and Knights violinist and co-founder Colin Jacobsen. The ensemble made its Carnegie Hall debut in the New York premiere of the Steven Stucky/Jeremy Denk opera The Classical Style, and has toured the U.S. with banjo virtuoso Béla Fleck and Europe with soprano Dawn Upshaw. In recent years The Knights have also collaborated with Itzhak Perlman, the Mark Morris Dance Group, Joshua Redman, Silk Road virtuoso Siamak Aghaei, and pipa virtuoso Wu Man. Recordings include 2015’s “instinctive and appealing” (The Times, UK) the ground beneath our feet on Warner Classics, featuring the ensemble’s first original group composition; an all-Beethoven disc on Sony Classical (their third project with the label); and 2012’s “smartly programmed” (NPR) A Second of Silence for Ancalagon.

The Knights are proud to be known as “one of Brooklyn’s sterling cultural products…known far beyond the borough for their relaxed virtuosity and expansive repertory” (The New Yorker). Their roster boasts musicians of remarkably diverse talents, including composers, arrangers, singer-songwriters, and improvisers, who bring a range of cultural influences to the group, from jazz and klezmer to pop and indie rock music. The unique camaraderie within the group retains the intimacy and spontaneity of chamber music in performance. Through the palatable joy and friendship in their music-making, each musician strives to include new and familiar audiences to experience this important art form.

Eric Jacobsen
Hailed by the New York Times as “an interpretive dynamo,” conductor and cellist Eric Jacobsen has built a reputation for engaging audiences with innovative and collaborative programming.

Jacobsen is Co-Artistic Director and conductor of The Knights, and also serves as the Music Director for the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra and the Greater Bridgeport Symphony. Jacobsen founded the adventurous orchestra The Knights with his brother, violinist Colin Jacobsen, to foster the intimacy and camaraderie of chamber music on the orchestral stage. As conductor, Jacobsen has led the “consistently inventive, infectiously engaged indie ensemble” (New York Times) at Central Park’s Naumburg Orchestral Concerts, Celebrate Brooklyn! Festival, (Le) Poisson Rouge, the 92nd Street Y, Carnegie Hall, and Lincoln Center, at major summer festivals such as Tanglewood, Ravinia, and Ojai, and on tour nationally and internationally, including at the Cologne Philharmonie, Düsseldorf Tonhalle, Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, Salzburg Großes Festspielhaus, Vienna Musikverein, National Gallery of Dublin, and the Dresden Musikfestspiele. Recent collaborators include violinists Itzhak Perlman and Gil Shaham, singers Dawn Upshaw, Susan Graham, and Nicholas Phan, and pianists Emanuel Ax and Jean-Yves Thibaudet. Also in demand as a guest conductor, Jacobsen has led the symphony orchestras of Baltimore, Detroit, Virginia, Alabama, the New World, Naples, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra, and the Deutsche Philharmonie Merck.

The Knight’s 2019-20 season featured appearances at Tanglewood and at the Ravinia Festival, including a fully-staged centennial production of Bernstein’s Candide directed by Alison Moritz, as well as a Florida tour with Gil Shaham, with whom Jacobsen and The Knights are recording the Beethoven and Brahms violin concertos. Jacobsen and The Knights also performed in Madison, WI; Montreal; and in their annual concerts at Washington’s Dumbarton Oaks. With the Bridgeport Symphony, Jacobsen performed and recorded with the renowned kamancheh player Kayhan Kalhor. Jacobsen also guest conducted the Juilliard Pre-College Orchestra, of which he is an alumnus, and was scheduled to conduct the Arkansas Symphony. He has been re-engaged to conduct the Virginia Symphony and the Detroit Symphony, where Jacobsen will perform Gabriel Kahane’s emergency shelter intake form, which he will also conduct in Orlando with Kahane as composer-in-residence there. The 2019-20 season in Orlando also included two new initiatives: Inside the Score, in which Jacobsen led the audience on a guided exploration of Hector Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique, and Resonate, which featured a unique blend of old and new orchestral and chamber works, performed in standard and more intimate concert formats.

During the 2018-19 season, Jacobsen undertook a 15-concert European tour with The Knights and mandolin virtuoso Avi Avital, including performances at Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie and Vienna’s Musikverein. In New York, Jacobsen and The Knights performed at Carnegie Hall’s Zankel Hall; with groundbreaking countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo at National Sawdust in music of Handel and Philip Glass; and at the Park Avenue Armory, where they helped create the music for William Kentridge’s The Head and the Load. With the Bridgeport Symphony, Jacobsen performed with Gil Shaham, with star pianist Yuja Wang, and with his brother Colin, with whom he recorded a video of Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending that was featured on London’s Classic FM and The Violin Channel. Guest conducting engagements included the New World Symphony, the Knoxville Symphony, Santa Fe Pro Musica, the Deutsche Philharmonie Merck and the Tonkunstler Orchestra, with whom Jacobsen appeared at Vienna’s legendary Musikverein.

At the close of a successful fifth season with the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra, Jacobsen has continued to pioneer the orchestra’s programming and community engagement in new and exciting directions. The 2018-19 season featured Puerto Rican-born composer and multi-instrumentalist Angélica Negrón as composer-in-residence, and included appearances by Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Rhiannon Giddens and internationally acclaimed cello virtuoso Jan Vogler.

Under Jacobsen’s baton, The Knights have developed an extensive recording collection, which includes the critically acclaimed albums Azul, with longtime collaborator Yo-Yo Ma, as well as the Prokofiev Concerto in the Grammy-nominated Gil Shaham album 1930s Violin Concertos. The Knights issued three albums for Sony Classical including Jan Vogler and The Knights Experience: Live from New York; New Worlds, and an all-Beethoven album, as well as the “smartly programmed” (National Public Radio) A Second in Silence on the Ancalagon label. Jacobsen’s first release on Warner Classics was the ground beneath our feet. We Are The Knights, a documentary film produced by Thirteen/WNET, premiered in September 2011.

A dedicated chamber musician, Jacobsen is a member of the Silk Road Ensemble, founded by Yo-Yo Ma, participating in residencies and performances at the Hollywood Bowl, Carnegie Hall, and across the U.S., Central Asia, Middle East, Far East, and Europe. In addition, as a founding member of the string quartet Brooklyn Rider – dubbed “one of the wonders of contemporary music” (Los Angeles Times) – he has taken part in a wealth of world premieres and toured extensively in North America, Europe, and Asia, and is credited with helping to ensure “the future of classical music in America” (Los Angeles Times).

In December 2012, Jacobsen and his brother Colin were selected from among the nation’s top visual, performing, media, and literary artists to receive a prestigious United States Artists Fellowship. Eric splits his time between New York and Orlando with his wife, singer-songwriter Aoife O’Donovan, and their daughter.

This album contains no booklet.