Cellist Inbal Segev Releases “20 for 2020” Volume IV

Released on AVIE Records, this is Segev’s fourth and last album from a commissioning project started in 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic

 

In 2020, cellist Inbal Segev — co-founder of the Amerigo Trio and prize winner at the Pablo Casals, Paulo, and Washington International Competitions — commissioned 20 composers to musically document their responses to the year’s social crises.

Aimed to support her fellow artists and provide solace to audiences, “20 for 2020” involves composers of different styles, ages, and backgrounds, writing music on the pandemic, loss, racial injustice, and mass protests. 

Volume IV is the last installment of the commissioning project and has world premiere works including Oscar Bettison’s La Hija Del Neon for Cello, Piano, and Electric Guitar, Stewart Goodyear’s The Kapok for Cello And Piano, Molly Joyce’s It Has Not Taken Long for Cello And Electronics, Immanuel Wilkins’ Exhale for Solo Cello, and Camille El Bacha’s Dance Between The Worlds for Piano Trio.

“At the height of the first wave of the pandemic in April of 2020, I received an email from the wife of the head of Paris hospitals,” Segev posted on Facebook on El Blacha’s work. “She wrote that her husband had been working non-stop for a month and was near emotional collapse, and she wanted to cheer him on. Would I be willing to meet him and give him a cello lesson (over Zoom of course)? ‘Of course,’ I said.

“I was so moved by this request and the fact that I could help in the global crisis in some small way,” Segev continued. “It then transpired that Camille El Bacha is the son-in-law of these wonderful people that I had just met and befriended. When I told them about my project, they immediately suggested him as a contributor. Camille is a fantastic pianist, and his family is Arab and Jewish — a mix that is, of course, unique, and his music is also unique.”

 

On November 11, 2022, all four volumes of the project, plus a bonus track Behold for Cello Quartet by Segev, will be available as a physical 2-disc set on AVIE Records. To purchase and listen to the album, click here.

 

The album trailer can be viewed below. 

 

Segev recently gave a world premiere performance of Vijay Iyer’s Human Archipelago (from Volume II about climate change and forced migration) with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and will also perform it again with the Oregon Symphony and Boise Philharmonic in January 2023.

Her other performances include Anna Clyne’s DANCE, a cello concerto — commissioned by Segev and recorded in 2020 to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Taki Alsop Conducting Fellowship. Her latest recording of Gity Razaz’ Legend of Sigh can be watched here.