ComposerJones

A beautiful, sunny afternoon in Cazenovia greeted all who attended Family Arts Day, the last day of events for the Cazenovia Counterpoint Festival.  A poetry round-robin, a string masterclass, a reading of a new piece from a young composer, and a stage filled with music, song and dance, all taking place at the Stone Quarry Hill Art Park, ensured there was something to please everyone attending.

First up was the Poetry Round-Robin, hosted by local poet David Hitchcock.  Nearly a dozen poets and enthusiasts gathered at Stacks, by David Harper, the new installation just off the Vista Trail.  It was a perfect spot for the group to sit and share their poetry.  Time almost stopped as the words and imagery flowed from one to another.

Following the round-robin was a string masterclass, conducted by Julliard masters graduate Elinor Frey and held in the music room.  Elinor is not only a hugely talented cellist, she showed what a fine and sensitive teacher she is as well.  Her first student, Reilly, is only 8 (and this is his second masterclass with Elinor!)  He performed Breval’s Sonata,  a piece he had obviously worked on diligently, and he was very comfortable with it.  Reilly really knew the notes and rhythms, so Elinor worked to help him start feeling the dance-like motion of the music, even giving him a little dance as a demonstration.  By the time they finished, his playing had already become more light and nuanced.

After Reilly was Moriah, a much more advanced player, performing Bach’s Prelude from Suite #3.  Bach presents a particular challenge, as his music (as most music of his day) gives no instruction for performance practice – no dynamics, little or no phrase markings, essentially just a page full of sixteenth notes.  This gave Elinor the opportunity to discuss various ways of determining how to shape the performance of such a piece.  By asking Moriah to emphasize, and then over-emphasize, different beats and rhythms through both sustained notes and dynamics, a clear shape very quickly began to emerge.  I must remark on Elinor’s outstanding teaching, not only for her talent in speaking appropriately to the age and experience level of each student, but for her fine ear and ability to focus in during a very short lesson with each student.

The feature from the Young Composers Corner was next.  Of course this was my favorite feature, as I had been mentoring our only participant for two weeks.  Elizabeth is 14, and a pianist, and brought a piece she had been working on to our first meeting.  In just two weeks she successfully brought the piece from a rough sketch to a full-fledged piano solo, ready for performance.  We handed the piece to Sar Shalom Strong (whose name you’ve seen a lot in these recent blogs) just before we asked him to perform it, which in itself was a test of Elizabeth’s composition.  Did she have it notated well enough to be played with no instruction from her?  Well, it was!  Sar gave quite a sensitive first reading.  We then put Elizabeth on the hot seat, and Sar and members of the audience gave her some excellent feedback and very kind compliments.  With a bit more information from the composer, Sar played Memories of a Dead Heart once more, and it truly resonated with the group.  I sincerely hope that Elizabeth will participate again next year, along with other young area musicians.

After a very short break and some refreshments, we gathered by the outdoor stage for the final hour of this closing day.  The Upstate NY Ballet, accompanied by Gerard Moses (narrator), David Abrams (clarinet), and Elinor Frey (cello) danced to Gwyneth Walker’s rendering of the Little Red Riding Hood story, entitled An Adventure at Grannies.  Opening with the Big Bad Wolf chasing the cellist across the stage, these young apprentice dancers showed both their dancing and acting talents.  After successfully chasing off the BBW, the dancers adjourned for a quick costume change, followed by a rousing performance of a medley from Leonard Bernstein’s On The Town.  Bridging the gap between the Upstate Ballet and Wacheva was Daniel Dorff’s 3 Little Pigs for narrator (Moses), violin (Alyssa Blount), and cello (Frey).  Dorff’s music and lyrics brought new personalities to the familiar little pigs, and Gerard Moses asked the children in the audience to help the BBW as he tried to blow down the brick house of the third pig.  They were, alas, unsuccessful, and so the audience applauded as the pigs finally enjoyed their wolf soup!

Ending the day on an exciting note was the performance by Wacheva Cultural Arts, a West African Dance and Drum ensemble.  Director Biboti Ouikahilo brought three members with him, in full regalia, and they brought an amazing amount of energy with them as they drummed and sang down the hillside and onto the stage.  The audience clapped and moved as the rhythms enveloped them, and cheered as the dancers leapt and spun on the stage.  Like a good jazz ensemble, the performance ebbed and flowed between individual exhibitions of dance and drumming, and tight ensemble performance.  As the performance neared its end, Ouikahilo invited the audience to join him onstage to learn a group dance.  Folks were slow to get their courage up, but eventually the stage was packed full of participants.  We learned the moves, one by one, finally putting them all together for the full dance.  We laughed, we clapped, and I’m pretty sure the drummers sped up at the end, just to see if we could keep up!  After the dance, Wacheva played their closing piece – but the audience wouldn’t let them go just yet.  We cheered them into an encore, and it was well worth the effort.  They took the opportunity to give each member one more feature, and were met by rousing applause and cheers as they took their final bows.

This was the final event of the 29th Season of Cazenovia Counterpoint, and it exemplified the spirit of the festival.  It was an experience of art in its many forms, touching many people.  But you don’t need to wait for next year to hear new music!  I encourage you to bookmark the Society for New Music webpage to keep abreast of upcoming events (as well as details on next year’s Cazenovia Counterpoint festival).  And check out Fresh Ink, the weekly radio broadcast of new music, sponsored by the Society for New Music and broadcast on WCNY-FM.

Friday night Cazenovia Counterpoint presented a concert titled Lincoln’s Shadow in honor of the bicentennial of Lincoln’s birth as well as celebrating the return of Dorothy Riester’s statue of Abe Lincoln to the Stone Quarry Hill Art Park.  As lovely as it would have been to have the concert at Stone Quarry Hill, logistics brought audience and performers together at St. Peter’s Episcopal Hall once again.    Performing were Sar Shalom Strong, piano (of course!); Cristina Buciu, violin; Elinor Frey, cello; David Neal, bass-baritone (you may remember him as FDR in Eleanor from last week!); and Sabina Kranz, also on piano.

Opening the program was a trio, Lincoln’s Two Americas, written by Eric Sawyer.  The two movements of this work bear titles taken from two of the sections of Walt Whitman’s famous elegy for Lincoln, “When Lilacs Last In the Dooryard Bloom’d,” and were chosen by the composer to represent two aspects of Lincoln’s life.  The first movement speaks to Lincoln’s youth, and the lilting, flowing music fit the sentiment beautifully.  The piano, violin and cello parts waltzed in and around each other, almost dancing as they went.  The second movement was much more somber, speaking to the horrors of the civil war.  Sawyer portrayed the sober mood quite effectively, while still maintaining a triple meter.  Each movement could have stood alone, yet together they became quite powerful.  Even without the text to refer to, this piece tells a compelling story.  This was only the second performance of this work, and the composer complimented the performers afterward on their skill and tremendous interpretation of the piece.

Next the trio accompanied bass-baritone David Neal on Stephen Paulus’ The Long Shadow of Lincoln.  Commissioned in 1994 by the Friends of Music at the Supreme Court, Paulus took his text from Carl Sandburg’s poem of the same name.  We heard David sing the role of FDR in Eleanor last week, but tonight he had the chance to truly shine!  The piece fit his voice perfectly, and he did an outstanding job of changing moods and colors with each new movement.  His voice was haunting as he sang the final line, “We must disenthrall ourselves.”  One audience member likened the composition of this piece to some of the works of Britten, not so much in terms of the style of writing, but in the remarkable craftsmanship in setting the text so well.

Finally, the trio was joined by a second pianist, Sabina Kranz to perform Death Mr. President by Ernst Bacon.  I must give great kudos to Sabina for stepping up and putting in an incredible performance on short notice.  Sabina replaced the original pianist, who suffered a hand injury just last week.  This is a difficult piece, made even more difficult by the score itself.  Hand-written, it seemed to have been done in such a hurry (a deadline to meet, perhaps?) that notes are often mis-written, key signatures are missing most of the time, and the writing is so small it is nearly impossible to read.  (I have seen the score, and did not envy any of the performers their parts!)  Yet Sabina and Sar were so attuned to each other, it was as though they had been performing this forever.  Kudos, also, to the piano tuner, who did such a fine job of matching the Steinway grand to the Yamaha upright so they blended nearly seamlessly – no mean feat!

As for the piece itself, this is one of two incarnations, and the original scoring.  The orchestral version, available on Naxos, is beautiful, and I highly recommend you listen to it.  But this arrangement is slightly different, with some orchestral movements omitted, and other movements added.  It is a complex piece, intricately woven, particularly for the two pianos, and the performers did an outstanding job.  The individual movements are relatively short, and much like Sawyer’s piece, each conveys the mood and story eloquently.  The highlights are too many to mention here, but I feel I must, absolutely must, praise the work of Strong and Kranz on “The Telegraph Fugue.”  Rapid, percussive, stretching far over both keyboards, this is the movement where disaster loomed for the performers.  Yet they flew through it, seemingly easily (although I know it wasn’t), and the excitement went through the listeners like the electricity through telegraph wires.  I think neither the audience nor the performers drew a breath until the last note was played, then we all seemed to take a deep breath at once!

And so concludes another successful event for the Society for New Music and Cazenovia Counterpoint.  The programming this year (as usual) is exciting and cohesive, and the pieces on this concert truly complimented one another as though they were intended to be performed all together.

Tomorrow is Family Arts Day, beginning at 1:00 pm at Stone Quarry Hill Art Park.  Come, hear poetry, music by a Young Composer, and experience dance and West African Drumming.  Hope to see you there!

Wednesday brought the second of the annual Rising Stars Concert Series at Cazenovia Counterpoint, and the room was absolutely filled.  Three more outstanding young musicians played to an enthusiastic audience.  Asked to hold their applause until the end of each individual’s set, the audience could not be contained, and broke into applause between each piece.

First on the program was Alicia Friedrichs on violin.  Alicia’s brother, Andrew, performed on trombone last year (Open Space, which I was privileged to write for him), and Alicia proved to be equally talented.  She is only 17, and has one year of high school left, yet she performs with grace and aplomb.  She began with Lalo’s Symphonie Espagnole, played from memory, and gave a sensitive performance.  Bach’s Partita No. 2 in D Minor for unaccompanied violin followed, and she gracefully filled the hall with music.

Last on Alicia’s program was the premiere of Diego Davidenko’s The Story of a Joke.  The movement titles will tell you a lot about the piece:  I. Betty told a joke about Tom; II. Tom’s feelings were hurt; III. But Joseph thought it was funny.  The first movement was lyrical and conversational, and a bit fun-loving – exactly as you would tell a joke.  The second was wildly dramatic and melancholy, and you found yourself thinking “poor Tom” as the movement progressed.  The third began with pizzicato strings, and the bouncing melody, slides, and rapid-fire accompaniment told the story marvelously well.  I love to hear a piece so well-written that you don’t need to know the titles of the movements to understand it.

Next up on the program was tenor Dominick Corbacio.  This is Dominick’s second year performing on Rising Stars (he premiered To . . . by James Welsch last year), and having completed his first year at Eastman he brings even more depth to his performance now.  Dominick impresses me both for his fine voice, and for his programming choices.  He not only programs pieces that are lyrical and dramatic, most of them are 20th or 21st century pieces as well.  He opened with selections from Gerald Finzi’s A Young Man’s Exhortation, Op. 14, which fit his voice and his age extremely well.  This is the second time I’ve heard him perform this work, and I am still impressed.  He followed with Donaudy’s Quando ti rivedro, O bei nidi d’amore, and Spirate pur spirate, showcasing his bel canto training.

The third piece on his program was the premiere of Endings and Beginnings, written by your humble (cough) blogger.  I have already blogged a bit about the personal aspects of writing this piece, and I (obviously) cannot be objective in reviewing the piece itself.  I will say, however, that Dominick did an amazing job.  I asked him to tell a story expressing emotions that are well beyond his years and experiences, and he did so with a depth of emotion and understanding – well, I could not have asked for more.  By the end of the piece I was in tears, and he received a well-deserved standing ovation for his overall performance.

Following Dominick was Brenna Ardner on flute, a student of Kelly Covert.  She opened her program with Muczynski’s Sonata for Flute and Piano, Op. 14.  As a flutist, having played this piece myself, I listened with great anticipation and excitement.  This is a difficult piece, requiring a trememdous amount of energy, dexterity, and grace from the performer.  Well, Brenna blew me away.  The three quick movements were fast and furious, while the Andante was beautifully lyrical.  She has obviously put in a LOT of work to make it sound this effortless.

She closed her program with the premiere of Tomas I. Gueglio-Saccone’s 273″ of purple light (after J.C.), a piece that is an homage to – John Cage.  This piece surely stretched Brenna again, but in a very different direction from the Muczynski.  Filled with extended techniques such as flutter tonguing, multiphonics, whistle tones – the list goes on – it was a marked change from the rest of the program.  Yet it fit the program very, very well.  Too often pieces such as this seem to be technique for technique’s sake, but Gueglio-Saccone successfully avoided that trap.  The piece had definite shape, form, and genuinely took the audience on a journey.

This is it for Rising Stars until next season, so I need to mention again the wonderful performers . . . Rhimmon Simchy-Gross, piano; Daniel Fields, tenor; Dave Raschella, horn; Alicia Friedrichs, violin; Dominick Corbacio, tenor; and Brenna Ardner, flute . . . and the talented composers . . . Alex Graham, Paola Marquez, Elizabeth Luttinger, Diego Davidenko, Tomas I. Gueglio-Saccone, and yours truly, Diane R. Jones . . . who worked together to premiere loads of new music this year.

I want to also make particular mention of Sar Shalom Strong, who accompanied all six performers, and will be playing during the Lincoln’s Shadow concert Friday Night, as well as reading for the Young Composer’s Corner on Saturday during Family Arts Day.  Sar is an integral part of Cazenovia Counterpoint, the Society for New Music, and the music community in Central New York.

Finally, in an act of shameless self-promotion, I invite you to visit the “List of Works” page on my own website, where you can hear Endings and Beginnings sung by Dominick Corbacio, as well as Open Space performed by Andrew Friedrichs from last year’s Rising Stars.  (And a lot of other music as well!)

An appreciative audience gathered Tuesday evening at St. Peter’s Episcopal Hall on Mill Street in Cazenovia to hear works from author Roy Kesey and poet Philip Memmer.  Despite the light rain and the unexpected closing of the parking lot (couldn’t they have waited a week to resurface?!), about two dozen people came to listen.

Philip Memmer opened the program, reading from his books Threat of Pleasure and (my personal favorite), Lucifer: A Hagiography.  The latter is a series of poems based on a re-evaluation of the personage of Lucifer.  Memmer explained that, rather than viewing Lucifer simply as a fallen angel, he saw him as a child of God (perhaps Jesus’ older brother, in fact), who went through a sort of teenage rebellion before storming away.  In his writing, Memmer utilized imagery and, at times, stories directly from the bible.  The collection is broken into three sections; the first, Lucifer as a child; the second, his youth and teenage years; and the third, his rebellion and turning away from God.  The poems show respect, humor, and a real understanding of mythos.

Memmer also read from Threat of Pleasure, containing poems from women’s perspectives about the men in their lives.  Keeping with the biblical theme, his poem from the view of Cain’s wife was touching and amusing.

Second on the docket was fiction writer Roy Kesey.  He began by reading Hat from his collection of short stories, All Over.  Hat was instantly captivating, drawing the listeners in immediately.  It is the story of a man learning craftsmanship, patience, and an almost zen-like understanding of life.  It was particularly well-crafted, and I was tickled as the protagonist was tasked with making an airplane from a paperclip – a working airplane – imagining my own brother (an aeronautical engineer) given that same task.  Hat was a beautiful story with just enough hint of absurdity to make it absolutely true.

Unfortunately, Kesey chose a difficult work to end the night.  He is currently working on a novel, and chose to read part of that work for us.  I struggled in part, I think, because his reading began partway into the novel, and therefore the audience didn’t have a terribly clear understanding of the set-up leading to that particular scene.  It seemed to me, as well, that some of the language he chose in writing this was almost too complex, especially in light of the Spanish phrases and names sprinkled throughout.  This probably would not have been as noticable in reading the work, but in listening, it posed a bit of a challenge.

In all, however, it was quite a successful evening.  The audience posed some interesting questions to the writers after the readings, and both Kesey and Memmer were gracious and enthusiastic in their answers.

Saturday was a big day at Cazenovia Counterpoint.  Unfortunately, your intrepid blogger was not able to attend the Writers Corner, but reports say it was a huge success.  Audience members stayed well after the “official” end of the program, continuing their discussions with poet Michael Jennings and fiction author Jennifer Pashley.  Have no fear, however.  Tuesday night is another writer’s corner, with fiction writer Roy Kesey and poet Philip Memmer, so if you missed the last Writers Corner, here’s your chance to make up for it.  Maybe I’ll even see you there!

I was able to attend the concert at First Presbyterian Church on Saturday night, however.  What a treat!  The concert opened with The Poet and the War, Norbert Palej’s settings of Polish poet Krzysztof Kamil Baczynski’s poems, written during Hitler’s occupation of Poland leading up to and during World War II.  Originally set in their original Polish, Palej explained that he was unsatisfied with other translations of the poems, so he translated them himself in order that the English would fit appropriately with the music he had written.  The result is superbly effective.

Of course, contributing to the power and emotion of the piece was an amazing performance by Soprano Judith Kellock.  Ms. Kellock gave a stirring performance, keeping the audience rapt as she brought to life the images from Baczynski’s poems.  Adding strength and support to her performance was the composer himself accompanying on the piano.

Next on the program were scenes from the new chamber opera Eleanor, by Persis Parshall Vehar (based on a play and historical novel by Rhoda Lerman, with librettist Gabrielle Vehar).  Eleanor explores the life of Eleanor Roosevelt, and the aspects of her life portrayed are extremely well chosen.  With Vehar at the piano, the opera was a marvelous pairing on the program, as it centers around the consequences of war, both personally and nationally.  The opera ends as Eleanor decides to accept President Truman’s request to work with the United Nations to “fight for peace.”

Soprano Corrie Grillo Raulli sang the role of Eleanor, and was outstanding in the role.  Not only was she in fine voice, but in fine acting form as well.  Eleanor is a complex character, a strong woman struggling in a time when women were expected to be submissive, and Raulli communicated this internal struggle most effectively.  A strong performer in this role is key, as Eleanor: Her Secret Journey was originally a one-woman play.  FDR (sung by David Neal), Duckworth (Jonathan Howell), and Mama (Lori Larson), although important to the story, are definitely secondary characters.  David Neal proved a strong and effective FDR, while Howell and Larson gave just the right voices to their respective characters.  Rounding out this performance were Sangeetha Ekambaram, Elizabeth Sutphen, and Carolyn Webber as the French Women.

The opera builds gradually, keeping one’s interest and driving toward the finale, where Eleanor accepts Truman’s offer while the ghosts of her past sing behind her.  This is where you realize the extent of Vehar’s talent.  Seven performers are behind her (the above characters plus Teddy Roosevelt, whose part was cut for this reading), singing passages from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (which Eleanor was instrumental in shaping).  In the midst of this, Eleanor is on the phone with Truman.  Vehar wove the two texts as well as balancing the voices masterfully, with neither overpowering the other, and without jarring entrances and exits.  This is the mark of an exceptional talent.

I sincerely hope that this opera receives a full performance run.  Whether in its full form or in this shortened form, however, it is one that is well worth attending.  Keep your eye out for it, and don’t miss any opportunity that arises to attend!