In the recent article entitled “Cello Nation: The Piatigorsky Festival, in Los Angeles” by Alex Ross, Annie Jacobs-Perkins, cello received mention. Ms. Jacobs-Perkins, along with her ensemble Trio Brillante were the 2016 Frances Walton Competition Ensemble Winners
“…That same day, Laurence Lesser, a Piatigorsky pupil who serves as the cello sage at the New England Conservatory, advised Annie Jacobs-Perkins, another Kirshbaum protégée, on Martinů’s Second Sonata. Jacobs-Perkins delivered the desolate Largo with hypnotic lyricism, causing listeners to forget where they were for a moment. Lesser made a technical suggestion, asking her to bow more evenly across the first falling phrase. He also pushed her to give the entire opening melody an archlike shape, so that it sang toward a climax, then subsided. Some people in the audience may have wondered why Lesser was tinkering with an already gorgeous rendition, but he offered a credo: “When someone plays as beautifully as you do, it’s easy for me to be fussy, because no matter how far we are there’s always more.”…”