Give Empire Wild an hour with about a dozen kids on violins, cellos, trumpet, and drum at a summer music camp in Iowa, and you will get a passable rendition of Train’s “Soul Sister,” learned by ear. And one heck of a good time. The good times continue to roll when the ensemble brings its “genre-defying” chamber music to the CMLV stage. As comfortable with Chick Corea and George Gershwin as with Bach, Schubert, and Debussy, these two cellists and a pianist deliver “original music, inventive covers, and twists on the classical canon” through crossover programming that includes “pop, folk, Broadway, and more.” Founded by the cellists while at Juilliard, Empire Wild was awarded the Ambassador Prize in the 2020 Concert Artists Guild Victor Elmaleh Competition. Combining community engagement, teaching, and collaborations with performing, the trio has toured from New York to Oregon and, more recently, from Indonesia to Nova Scotia, appearing, along the way, next to a pond, at a distillery, and in a crypt—from Morning Musicales in Bryn Mawr to Candlelight Concerts in Baltimore. Their time with us in the Lehigh Valley will be fun.

‘Boundless’

• Jounetsu Tairiku – Taro Hakase
• ‘S Wonderful – Gershwin
• Song for Claire (2022) – Empire Wild
• Selections from The Gymnopedies – Satie
• Sarabande from Suite 6 – Bach
• For Chiaki/North Beat – Empire Wild/Lewis
• Armando’s Rhumba – Corea
• Shadow Play – Eugene Friesen
• All of Me – Porter
• Taconic – Empire Wild
• Fly Me to the Moon – Bart Howard
• La Fes des Dents – Brunet
• Julie-O – Summer
• Pavane pour une infante défunte – Ravel
• The Boxing Reels – Kittel