Join us for a powerful and passionate program of Russian music with a wonderful cellist named Alicia Ward who directs the Peabody Prep String program in Baltimore and has performed around the world.   We will perform the amazing Rachmaninoff Cello Sonata, filled with some of the most incredible melodies in all of the literature as well as some truly virtuosic writing and over the top emotion.  Also included is the Shostakovich Cello Sonata from 1934 that brings us to Soviet Russia under Stalin and some incredible contrasts in styles and idioms from a long bleak winter to an exciting peasant dance to some of his most romantic writing as well, since Shostakovich had just fallen in love.  Finally, we perform an early work by Balakirev, one of the Russian Five, who helped create the new idea of Russian Nationalist composers.  Come join us on this great tour to Russia from 1850-1935.