Descr:
Katrin Talbot
Hutchinson is pouring wine into plastic cups.
Hutchinson is a sommelier as well as a clarinetist.
When Jay Hutchinson and Dawn Wohn met at a music festival in Paris in 2014, they listened to music and talked about their lives. Hutchinson is a clarinetist with an interest in wine, and Wohn is a violinist. They began thinking about different ways of listening to music, including pairing music with wine. Given their backgrounds, the pairing seemed natural, and 10 years later, they formed Coppia Concerts (originally called Coppia Chamber Music). “Coppia means couple or pair,” says Hutchinson. “So pairing wine with music reflects our relationship.”
The couple is well-suited to this unusual task, even though Wohn enjoys studying wine more than drinking it. “In my conversations with Jay, I discovered that learning about wines is similar to learning about music,” she says. “They are both open-ended experiences.”
Wohn, Coppia Concerts’ artistic director, is on the UW-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music faculty. She studied at the Juilliard School with the iconic violin teacher Dorothy DeLay and holds music degrees from Juilliard as well as Yale and Stony Brook universities. Hutchinson, Coppia’s executive director, has a degree in clarinet performance from the New England Conservatory, an MBA from Ohio University, and is a master sommelier who served as the marketing director for Hart Davis Hart, a renowned wine auction house. Together, they work to provide a casual atmosphere for Coppia’s performances.
The group’s debut public performance took place on Jan. 13 at Four Winds Farm, an 80+ acre farm in Fitchburg focusing on permaculture and regenerative agriculture; in 2020 the farm’s owner, MaryAnn McKenzie, finished turning the barn into rustic yet elegant event space.
A winding drive leads to the refurbished 1930s dairy barn at 5735 Adams Road. “It’s had a ground-up renovation and has good acoustics,” says Hutchinson. The musicians that evening were Wohn on violin, James Waldo, cello, and pianists Alyona Waldo and Eric Tran.
The program paired American music with American wines, beginning with Florence Price’s Fantasie in G minor and Jennifer Higdon’s Pale Yellow — the color of the Failla Sonoma Coast Chardonnay that was served. As the program progressed to more complex music, Hutchinson switched the wine to a light-bodied red. When the show ended with Paul Schoenfield’s cheerful but devilishly difficult Café Music, Hutchinson chose a more complex red. The show received a well-deserved standing ovation.
Katrin Talbot
Three people playing chamber music in a well lit barn.
Dawn Wohn, left, Alyona Waldo and James Waldo at the inaugural concert.
For the next concert on March 2, Wohn has prepared a program focused on female composers in honor of Women’s History Month, and Hutchinson has chosen wines from women winemakers.
The music will include compositions of less familiar women, like Irene Britton Smith, an African American composer who was also a Chicago elementary school teacher, and Reena Esmail, an Indian American composer.
“Because Irene Britton Smith wrote music for herself and not for a commission or for money, I think her music shows more individuality,” says Wohn. “There is also a lot of quirkiness in it.”
Wohn and Reena Esmail attended Yale together. “Reena grew up in the United States,” says Wohn. “As she grew older, she found a balance between Western music and the music of her heritage and culture.” The sliding tones that you will hear Wohn play in Esmail’s piece titled Jhula Jhule are reminiscent of the Indian sarangi, a string instrument with a gentle sound.
Wohn says that Coppia’s future concerts might pair music with artwork, books or food, and venues might change. It all sounds like the makings of a moveable feast.
Tickets for the March 2 performance are available via the Four Winds Farm Fitchburg website, fourwindsfarmfitchburg.ticketleap.com. Wine is included in the price and is served in half-glass portions. The ticket price is less for those under 21 and non-drinkers.
