2026 Annual Henri Lazarof Chamber Concert at Slosberg Music Center – Waltham, MA

The Brandeis Music Department is proud to present the 2026 Annual Henri Lazarof Chamber Concert, a celebration of contemporary mastery and the enduring legacy of Henri Lazarof.

The annual Henri Lazarof Chamber Concert, at which the Henri Lazarof International Commission Prize winner’s composition will be premiered each year, continues the Brandeis music department’s mission of hosting professional performances that feature works by contemporary composers.

In addition to the commissioned work, each concert will feature music of Henri Lazarof and other composers with the same instrumentation.

This year’s performance centers on the World Premiere of a new work for violin and piano by Geli Li, the distinguished winner of the 2025 Henri Lazarof International Commission Prize.

The program features an extraordinary duo of internationally acclaimed artists. Violinist Irina Muresanu, praised by the Boston Musical Intelligencer for her “old-master elegance” and “gilded tones,” brings her secure, commanding virtuosity to the Slosberg stage. She is joined by the “pianistic powerhouse” Asiya Korepanova, a composer and transcriber known for her monumental technical depth and as the only pianist to have performed Rachmaninoff’s complete solo works in a single cycle.

In a program that bridges past and present, Muresanu and Korepanova will perform the new commission by Geli Li, a Chinese-born American composer whose music creates an “ecology of sound” between Eastern and Western traditions. Li, currently a Visiting Assistant Professor at Macalester College, was selected for this honor by a jury of esteemed composers including Yu-Hui Chang and Eric Chasalow. The premiere will be presented alongside masterworks by Henri Lazarof and Dmitri Shostakovich, highlighting the stylistic connections between these iconic 20th and 21st-century voices.

Join us on Sunday, May 3, at 3:00 PM for an afternoon of professional artistry and the birth of a new musical work.

Learn more about our featured artists by visiting our webpage: https://www.brandeis.edu/lazarof/concerts.html