The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: UW-Madison’s first countertenor Gerrod Pagenkopf returns to perform on Sunday night as a member of the acclaimed choral group Chanticleer. Here’s how he got from here to there. Part 1 of 2
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ALERT: Madison Symphony Orchestra organist Greg Zelek did not announce his encore after he received a standing ovation at the MSO concert Sunday afternoon. It was the final movement from the Organ Symphony No. 1 by Louis Vierne.
By Jacob Stockinger
This coming Sunday night, Oct. 6, at 7:30 p.m. in the inaugural concert in the new Hamel Music Center’s main concert hall, the critically acclaimed a cappella singing group Chanticleer (below) will kick off the centennial anniversary celebration of the Concert Series at the Wisconsin Union Theater.
Tickets are $45 for the public; $40 for faculty staff and Union members; and $10 for students. For more information about the performers and the “Trade Winds” program, go to: https://union.wisc.edu/events-and-activities/event-calendar/event/chanticleer/
Among the 12 members of the San-Francisco-based Chanticleer is Gerrod Pagenkopf, who is in his fifth year with the group as both a countertenor and the assistant music director. (You can hear Pagenkopf singing music by Henry Purcell in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
For a biography of Gerrod Pagenkopf, go to: https://www.chanticleer.org/gerrod-pagenkopf
Pagenkopf (below) is a graduate of the UW-Madison. When he performed here as a student, his high, clear countertenor voice was a new experience and made those of us who heard him sit bolt upright and take notice. “He is going places,” we said to each other. And so he has.
But Pagenkopf’s story is not only about him. It is also about the rediscovery of countertenors, about the changing public acceptance of them, and about the challenges that young musicians often face in establishing a professional performing career. So today and tomorrow, The Ear is offering a longer-than-usual, two-part interview with Pagenkopf.
Here is Part 1:
When were you at the UW-Madison?
I was a student at the UW-Madison from the fall of 1997 until I graduated in May of 2002. Although I received a bachelor’s degree in music education, performing ended up being a huge part of my last few semesters.
Growing up in rural Wisconsin about 30 miles north of Green Bay, I always thought that if you liked music and were good at it, you were supposed to be a teacher. It wasn’t until I was a junior that my voice teacher, the late Ilona Kombrink, and I discovered that I had a viable solo voice. Although I received the music education degree, embarking on a solo career became more important to me.
What did you do and how well did your studies and performances here prepare you for the life of a professional musician?
I was very lucky to have ample opportunities for performing during my time at the UW. Singing in choirs was very important to me. For many years I sang in the Concert Choir under Beverly Taylor (below top) as well as in the Madrigal Singers under Bruce Gladstone (below bottom,, in a photo by Katrin Talbot). I think there was one semester where I sang in just about every auditioned choir.
Beverly Taylor also gave me a lot of solo opportunities in the large-scale works that the Choral Union performed: Bach’s “St. John” and “St. Matthew” Passions, and Handel’s “Israel in Egypt.” For a 23-year-old to have those masterworks, along with the B Minor Mass and “Messiah,” on his resume was very impressive.
I was also lucky enough to perform with University Opera, singing in the chorus at first, but then singing a solo role in Handel’s “Xerxes” my final semester, and then returning as an alumni artist to sing Public Opinion in Offenbach’s “Orpheus in the Underworld” and several years later Polinesso in Handel’s “Ariodante.” Director Bill Farlow took a lot of chances on my young, “raw” countertenor voice and gave me several opportunities to succeed.
I should also note the importance of the guidance and mentorship of Professor Mimmi Fulmer (below, performing at Frank Loyd Wright’s Hillside Theater at Taliesin in Spring Green) after I graduated from UW. She afforded me the opportunity to sing in recital with her numerous times — usually Brahms and Mendelssohn duets. But she also was a catalyst in bringing me back to Madison several years later to sing with the Wisconsin Baroque Ensemble. Our continued relationship is actually the primary reason Chanticleer is singing in Madison this fall.
How do you feel about returning to perform at your alma mater with Chanticleer?
I’m over the moon about it. It still feels like a dream that I’m singing in Chanticleer. To be able to bring a group that I’m so proud to be a part of back to Madison feels like a great personal triumph. And to be the opening performance in the new Hamel Center (below) is such an honor!
Throughout my studies at UW-Madison, I was torn between the solo performance track and the choral career. I managed to straddle both, but my dream was always to make ensemble singing my career. Way back in the early 2000s, I heard Chanticleer sing at Luther Memorial Church, and I thought, “That’s what I want to do!”
I went down several other paths since that concert — mostly in the realm of solo, operatic singing — but it’s incredibly rewarding to be able to say I achieved my dream, and I’m coming back to place where the seed of that dream was planted almost 20 years ago.
Tomorrow: How countertenors re-emerged and were treated, the “Trade Winds” program and Pagenkopf’s future plans
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Classical music: Cellist Amit Peled and pianist Daniel del Pino open the Salon Piano Series this Friday and Saturday nights. TODAY the Edgewood College Chamber Orchestra opens its new season in a new hall
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ALERT: The Edgewood Chamber Orchestra opens its new season TODAY at 2:30 p.m. in the new McKinley Performing Arts Center at Edgewood High School, 2219 Monroe Street. Blake Walter will conduct the program that features Beethoven’s “King Stephen” Overture, composed to celebrate the opening of a new theater ; Handel’s “Water Music”; and Mozart’s Symphony No. 36 in C Major “Linz,” K. 425. Admission is $5 for the general public, FREE with an ID for Edgewood College or Edgewood High School.
By Jacob Stockinger
The Salon Piano Series will open its new and expanded season with a recital by cellist Amit Peled (below top, in a photo by Lisa Mazzucco) and pianist Daniel del Pino (below bottom) on this coming Friday and Saturday nights, Oct. 4 and 5, at 7:30 p.m.
The concerts, which are being dedicated to retired critic John W. Barker, will be held at Farley’s House of Pianos, 6522 Seybold Road, on Madison’s far west side near West Towne Mall.
Each artist has performed individually at Farley’s before, but this will be their first joint recital in Madison.
The program is:
John Eccles – Sonata in G Minor (1720)
Ludwig van Beethoven – Sonata No. 2 in G Minor, Op. 5, No. 2 (1796)
Gaspar Cassadó – Sonata in Old Spanish Style, G Minor, (1925)
Richard Strauss – Sonata in F Major, Op. 6 (1883)
A reception will follow the performances.
Tickets are $45 in advance and $50 at the door. Student tickets are $10 and can only be purchased online and are not available the day of the event.
You can buy tickets online, where service fees may apply, at: https://www.brownpapertickets.com/producer/706809
You can also call Farley’s at (608) 271-2626 to purchase tickets.
After hearing the Israeli-American Peled, The New York Times reported that he has “a glowing tone, a seductive timbre and an emotionally pointed approach to phrasing that made you want to hear him again.”
Daniel del Pino is a leading Spanish concert pianist on the international scene. He has performed in prestigious venues on five continents.
In the YouTube video at the bottom, you can watch a special concert preview and an enthusiastic message about specifically performing in Madison from Amit Peled.
You can also hear and see past performances from Peled and del Pino at the Salon Piano Series on YouTube:
From February 2016, Amit Peled performs on Pablo Casals’ cello: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Yb-SE80eDg
From November 2015, Daniel del Pino performs Chopin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tnvbk_v2Xk
For more information about this concert and the full season of six concerts, including subscription tickets, go to: https://salonpianoseries.org
This concert is supported in part by a grant from the Wisconsin Arts Board with funds from the State of Wisconsin and the National Endowment for the Arts.
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Classical music: Recitals of Scandinavian art songs and of tuba music are on tap at the UW this Sunday afternoon and Monday night
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By Jacob Stockinger
In the next few days, two noteworthy and free recitals, open to the public, are on tap at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music.
On this Sunday afternoon Sept. 29, from 4 to 6 p.m. in Morphy Hall, mezzo-soprano Jessie Wright Martin and pianist John O’Brien (both below) – who have performed together at Carnegie Hall – will give a FREE recital of Nordic art songs. (It includes the Grieg song performed by Anne Sofie von Otter in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Wright (below) will sing in Norwegian, Danish and Swedish.
This week, the two performed the same recital at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill’s School of Music. Wright spoke to the student newspaper The Daily Tar Heel.
“It started because I have Norwegian heritage and was interested in Norwegian music,” said Martin, a professor of music at Wingate University. “I thought it would be interesting to expand to Swedish and Danish music.”
Composers on the program are Edvard Grieg, Peter Heisse and Gunnar de Frumeri.
For more information about the performers and the program, go to: https://www.music.wisc.edu/event/jessica-martin-john-obrien-nordic-song-recital/
On Monday night at 7:30 p.m. in Morphy Hall, guest artist Beth Weise (below) will give a FREE tuba recital.
Unfortunately, no program is listed.
For more information about the concert and about Weise, a distinguished and very accomplished musician who did her undergraduate work at the Lawrence University Conservatory of Music in Appleton, Wisconsin, go to:
https://www.music.wisc.edu/event/beth-wiese-tuba-guest-artist-recital/
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Classical music: The Madison Symphony Orchestra opens its 94th season this weekend with the sonic sensuality of music by Wagner, Dvorak, Debussy and Barber
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By Jacob Stockinger
It has been warmer than the usual fall weather, so why not go sultry?
That’s what the Madison Symphony Orchestra (below, in a photo by Peter Rodgers) will do when it opens its 94th season this coming weekend.
The program “Love, Lust and Redemption” will combine the power of the Klais organ (below top) with MSO principal organist and curator of the Overture Concert Organ Greg Zelek who opens the season with Samuel Barber’s Toccata Festiva.
The all-orchestral program also features the Madison Symphony Orchestra exploring the sonic sensuality of Wagner’s “Tannhäuser”Overture, Debussy’s “Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun” and Dvorak’s Symphony No. 7.
Performances will are in Overture Hall, 201 State Street, on Friday, Sept. 27, at 7:30 p.m.; Saturday, Sept. 28, at 8 p.m., and Sunday, Sept. 29, at 2:30 p.m.
Tickets are $19 to $95. For more information, see below.
MSO music director and conductor John DeMain (below) says of the program:
“Our opening concert is both festive and gorgeously romantic as we present our star organist Greg Zelek (below) in his MSO concerto debut.
“We open with one of the most beautiful overtures ever written, Wagner’s Overture to the opera Tannhäuser and then, after intermission, the great Symphony No. 7 in D Minor by Dvorak.
In between is the little jewel by Debussy, his quintessential impressionistic masterpiece, Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun. All are favorites of mine, and I look forward to making them favorites of yours, if they aren’t already.”
“Tannhäuser: Overture and Venusberg Music” by Richard Wagner (below) is frequently performed as a separate work in orchestral concerts, the first such performance having been given by Felix Mendelssohn conducting the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra in February 1846.
Wagner began revisions to the opera immediately, which resulted in two more versions: the Paris version in 1861 and the Vienna version in 1875. Members of the Madison Symphony Orchestra Chorus also perform in this piece.
TheToccata Festiva was written by the American composer Samuel Barber (below) as an occasional work for the Philadelphia Orchestra and Eugene Ormandy. It pairs organ and orchestra, and celebrated the inauguration of a new organ for the Academy of Music in Philadelphia, a gift from longtime patron Mary Curtis Zimbalist who had also commissioned the new piece.
Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faunby French composer Claude Debussy (below) is a musical evocation of Stephane Mallarmé’s poem “Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun,” in which a faun — a half-man, half-goat creature of ancient Greek legend — awakes to revel in sensuous memories of forest nymphs. Debussy begins the piece with a sinuous and well-known flute melody evocative of a graceful female form.
Symphony No. 7 by Czech composer Antonin Dvorak was greatly influenced by Johannes Brahms. Dvorak decided to compose this symphony after hearing Brahms’s new Symphony No. 3.
The piece is distinguished for its somber and dramatic atmosphere and its lack of Slavic-inspired melodies, a characteristic with which the composer’s style is usually associated. (You can hear the vivacious Scherzo in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
TICKETS AND EVENT DETAILS
The lobby opens 90 minutes prior to each concert. One hour before each performance, Randal Swiggum (below) will lead a 30-minute Prelude Discussion in Overture Hall to enhance concertgoers’ understanding and listening experience. It is free to ticket holders.
The MSO recommends that concert attendees arrive early for each performance to make sure they have time to pass through Overture Center’s security stations, and so they can experience the Prelude Discussion.
Program notes for the concerts are available online: http://bit.ly/msosept19programnotes.
- Single Tickets are $19-$95 each and are on sale now at: https://madisonsymphony.org/event/love-lust-redemptionthrough the Overture Center Box Office at 201 State Street, or by calling the Box Office at (608) 258-4141. Fees apply to online/phone sales.
- Groups of 10 or more can save 25% by calling the MSO office at (608) 257-3734. For more information, visit, https://www.madisonsymphony.org/groups.
- Student rush tickets can be purchased in person on the day of the concert at the Overture Center Box Office at 201 State Street. Students must show a valid student ID and can receive up to two $15 or $20 tickets. More information is at: https://www.madisonsymphony.org/studentrush
- Seniors age 62 and up receive 20% savings on advance and day-of-concert ticket purchases in select areas of the hall.
- Flex-ticket booklets of 8-10 vouchers for 19-20 symphony subscription concerts are available. Learn more at: https://madisonsymphony.org/flex
- Subscriptionsfor the 2019–2020 season are available now. Learn more at: https://madisonsymphony.org/19-20
Discounted seats are subject to availability, and discounts may not be combined.
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Classical music: Autumn arrives today. The Ear thinks Richard Strauss’ poignant orchestral song “September” is perfect for greeting Fall. What music would you choose?
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By Jacob Stockinger
Fall officially arrives today.
The autumnal equinox takes place at 2:50 a.m. CST.
If you listen to Wisconsin Public Radio, it’s a certainty that you will hear music appropriate to the season. WPR does these tie-ins very well and very reliably — even during a pledge drive.
At the top of the list will probably be the “Autumn” section of three violin concertos from the ever popular “The Four Seasons” by the Italian baroque composer Antonio Vivaldi.
But there are lots of others, including late songs, piano sonatas and chamber music by Franz Schubert; slow movements from symphonies by Gustav Mahler; and many of the “autumnal” late works by Johannes Brahms, especially the short piano pieces and chamber music such as the Clarinet Trio, Clarinet Quintet and the two sonatas for clarinet or viola and piano.
Here is a link to a YouTube video with more than two hours of autumn music. You can check out the composers and the pieces, some of which might be new to you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fddGrDV2gw
And if you want less music with some unusual choices, complete with individual performances, try this much shorter compilation:
http://www.classical-music.com/article/best-classical-music-inspired-autumn
Yet this time of year, when the days end earlier and the mornings dawn later, one work in particular gets to The Ear: It is “Four Last Songs” by Richard Strauss (below), one of the great masterpieces of the 20th century.
The second of the four songs is “September” and fits the bill very nicely.
In the YouTube video at the bottom, you can hear it sung by Renée Fleming, who will perform a recital next spring in Madison at the Wisconsin Union Theater. She is accompanied by the Houston Symphony Orchestra under conductor Christoph Eschenbach.
Here are the lyrics of the poem, in which summertime is the protagonist, by Nobel Prize winner Hermann Hesse:
The garden is in mourning
Cool rain seeps into the flowers.
Summertime shudders,
quietly awaiting his end.
Golden leaf after leaf falls
from the tall acacia tree.
Summer smiles, astonished and feeble,
at his dying dream of a garden.
For just a while he tarries
beside the roses, yearning for repose.
Slowly he closes
his weary eyes.
Is the Ear the only person who wishes that the Madison Symphony Orchestra and maestro John DeMain, who has a gift for finding great young voices, would perform Strauss’ “Four Last Songs” some autumn?
With the right vocal soloist it could make for a memorable season-opening concert.
What music do you identity with the fall season?
The Ear wants to hear.
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Classical music: The Beethoven Year in Madison will include complete cycles of string quartets and piano trios as well as many other early, middle and late pieces. Here is a partial preview
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By Jacob Stockinger
As you may have already heard, 2020 is a Beethoven Year. It will mark the 250th anniversary of the composer’s birth. (He lived from mid-December of 1770 to March 26, 1827. Dec. 17 is sometimes given as his birthday but it is really the date of his baptism. No one knows for sure the actual date of his birth.)
Beethoven, who this year overtook Mozart as the most popular composer in a British radio poll, clearly speaks to people — as you can see at the bottom in the YouTube video of a flash mob performance of the “Ode to Joy.” It has had more than 16 million views.
Locally, not all Beethoven events have been announced yet. But some that promise to be memorable are already taking shape. Many programs include early, middle and late works. And you can be sure that, although nothing formal has been announced yet, there will be special programs on Wisconsin Public Television and especially Wisconsin Public Radio.
Here is a partial round-up:
The UW’s famed Pro Arte String Quartet (below, in a photo by Rick Langer), for example, will perform a FREE and complete cycle of Beethoven’s 16 string quartets in six concerts. It will start later this fall.
This is not the first time that the Pro Arte has done a Beethoven cycle. But it is especially fitting since that is the same Beethoven cycle that the Pro Arte was performing in Madison at the Wisconsin Union Theater in May of 1940 when World War II broke out and the quartet was stranded on tour in the U.S. after its homeland of Belgium was invaded and occupied by the Nazis.
That is when the ensemble was invited to become musical artists-in-residence at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and accepted – thereby establishing the first such association in the world that became a model for many other string quartets.
The Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society with the San Francisco Trio (below) plans on performing a cycle of piano trios next summer. No specific dates or programs have been announced yet.
The 20th anniversary of the Ancora String Quartet (below, in a photo by Barry Lewis) will coincide with the Beethoven Year. That is when the Ancorans will complete the cycle of 16 string quartets that they have been gradually programming over the years. Three quartets remain to be performed: Op. 59, No. 2 “Rasumovsky”, Op. 130 and Op. 131.
Adds violist Marika Fischer Hoyt: “We’ll perform Op. 130 in February (with the original final movement, NOT the “Grosse Fuge”), and we plan to do the remaining two quartets in the summer and fall of 2020.”
Here are some other Beethoven dates to keep in mind:
On Nov. 2 in Shannon Hall at the Wisconsin Union Theater, and as part of the WUT’s centennial celebration of its Concert Series, pianist Emanuel Ax (below, in a photo by Lisa-Marie Mazzucco), who since 1974 has played many solo recitals, chamber music recitals and piano concertos in Madison, will play Beethoven’s first three solo piano sonatas, Op. 2.
On Dec. 6 at the Wisconsin Union Theater, the Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson Piano Trio will perform the famous “Archduke” Trio, Op. 97. Also on the program are works by Felix Mendelssohn and Robert Schumann.
On Feb. 1, UW-Madison pianist Christopher Taylor, who has performed all 32 piano sonatas in Madison, will continue his cycle of Beethoven symphonies as transcribed for solo piano by Franz Liszt. He will perform Symphony No. 1 and the famed Symphony No. 9, the ground-breaking “Choral” Symphony with its “Ode to Joy.” No chorus will be involved, but there will be four solo singers. Taylor said he will then complete the cycle with Symphony No. 2 at some future time.
The Mosaic Chamber Players (below, in a photo by John W. Barker) will perform two all-Beethoven programs: on Feb. 21, a FREE program offers two sonatas for violin and piano (Op. 12, No. 3 and Op. 30, No. 2, and one sonata for cello and piano (Op. 5, No. 1); on June 13, a ticketed program features three piano trios (Op. 1, No. 1; Op. 70, No. 2; and Op. 121a “Kakadu” Variations).
On May 8, the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra (below top, in a photo by Mike Gorski), under conductor Andrew Sewell (below bottom, in a photo by Alex Cruz), will perform the popular Symphony No. 6 “Pastoral” – a pioneering piece of program music — to commemorate the Beethoven Year.
There is one very conspicuous absence.
You will notice that there is nothing by Beethoven programmed for the new season of the Madison Symphony Orchestra (below, in a photo by Peter Rodgers).
But The Ear hears rumors that music director John DeMain (below, in a photo by Greg Anderson) is planning something special for the following season that might involve both symphonies and concertos, both original Beethoven works and perhaps “reimagined” ones.
(For example, pianist Jonathan Biss, who has just completed recording the piano sonata cycle and who performed with the MSO several years ago, has commissioned and will premiere five piano concertos related to or inspired by Beethoven’s five piano concertos.) Sorry, but as of now only rumors and not details are available for the MSO. Stay tuned!
The Ear would like to hear complete cycles of the violin sonatas and cello sonatas performed, and a couple of the piano concertos as well as the early symphonies and the famed Ninth Symphony with its “Ode to Joy” finale. He fondly remembers when DeMain and the MSO performed Symphonies Nos. 1 and 9 on the same program. Talk about bookending a career!
What Beethoven would you like to hear live?
What are your most favorite or least favorite Beethoven works?
Do you know of other Beethoven programs during the Beethoven Year? If so, please leave word in the Comment section.
And, of course, there is the inevitable question: Can you have too much Beethoven?
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Classical music: Soprano Sarah Brailey and nine UW-Madison cellists team up for the FREE concert of songs at Grace Presents this Saturday at noon
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By Jacob Stockinger
This Saturday, Sept. 21, at noon, a FREE one-hour program in the Grace Presents series will feature soprano Sarah Brailey (below) in “My Loyal Heart,” a recital of songs by Arvo Pärt, John Tavener, Guillaume de Machaut, Dmitri Shostakovich and Heitor Villa-Lobos.
The concert is at Grace Episcopal Church (below), located downtown on the Capitol Square at 116 West Washington Avenue.
Brailey is an acclaimed professional singer who often tours and who is doing graduate work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music.
Brailey will be joined by friends and colleagues. They include UW baritone Paul Rowe and members of the UW Madison Cello Ensemble, featuring nine local Madison cellists who include Grace Presents program coordinator James Waldo. (Below is a summer cello choir at the UW-Madison from several years ago.)
The works will be sung in Russian, Portuguese, and both modern and medieval French.
Here is an introduction from Waldo:
“It is often said that the cello is the instrument most like the human voice.
“My Loyal Heart,” devotes an entire program to music for soprano Sarah Brailey and cello from the 14th century to the 20th century.
“It opens with Arvo Pärt’s L’abbé Agathon about the legend of Father Agathon from the 4th century book “The Desert Fathers,” followed by a new arrangement by Brailey for soprano and cello trio of Guillaume de Machaut’s elegant love song Se quanque amours puet donner.
“This intimately ardent piece is followed by a more tragic love story, that of Shakespeare’s Ophelia, in the opening movement of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok.
“The program continues in Russian with Sir John Tavener’s powerful and darkly spiritual Akhmatova Songs with poetry by Russian-Soviet Modernist poet, Anna Akhmatova.
“The concert concludes with the hauntingly beautiful and famous first movement and the playful concluding dance of Bachianas Brasileiras (Brazilian Bach Suites) No.5 for soprano and eight cellos by Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos. (You can hear the Villa-Lobos aria in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
“Text and translations will be provided.
“This program will not be performed anywhere else in Madison.”
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Classical music: This Sunday afternoon, the annual Opera Props Showcase features well-known alumna Ariana Douglas and current UW students singing arias from great operas and musicals
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By Jacob Stockinger
The annual University Opera’s Student Showcase will take place this coming Sunday afternoon, Sept. 22, at 3 p.m. at the Madison Christian Community, 7118 Old Sauk Road, on the far west side.
Tickets are $30 if purchased in advance or $35 if purchased at the door; and $10 for students. Additional ticket information is provided at the website UWOperaProps.org
The event is sponsored by UW Opera Props, the friends group that helps support the opera program at University of Wisconsin-Madison.
The benefit opera program, the concert will feature guest artist and soprano alumna Ariana Douglas (below). In addition, eight current voice students will join Douglas in a program assembled by David Ronis, the Karen K. Bishop Director of Opera at UW’s Mead Witter School of Music.
UW-Madison piano graduate student Thomas Kasdorf, who coaches the singers, will provide the piano accompaniment.
The concert will include arias and duets by Puccini, Offenbach, Rodgers and Hammerstein, Wagner, Mozart, Gounod, Verdi and others.
Ariana Douglas is well known for her “clarion sound and striking stage presence” in performances at Milwaukee’s Florentine Opera (Zerlina in “Don Giovanni,” Mrs. Vance in Aldridge’s “Sister Carrie,” and, upcoming in October, Susanna in “The Marriage of Figaro”).
Next April, she will sing Diana in Jacques Offenbach’s “Orpheus in the Underworld” for the Madison Opera.
And after two summers in the Glimmerglass Festival’s Young Artists program, she was invited last year to return to help workshop J. Tesori’s highly anticipated opera “Blue,” which premiered there this July.
In the YouTube video at the bottom, you can hear Ariana Douglas perform while still a UW student. She sings the famous Puccini aria “O mio bambino caro” with the UW Varsity Band under now-retired director Mike Leckrone, who admired Douglas’ big, expressive voice and invited her to perform at the band’s huge annual concerts in 2013.
In short, says one OperaProps organizer, “Douglas seems to getting fine reviews everywhere. And student recruiting seems to be successful, with the students getting more impressive every year lately.” (Below is the group of Showcase students in 2018 with director David Ronis on the far right.)
Here is the program, with performers and pieces, that is subject to change:
Lindsey Meekhof – “C’est l’amour vainqueur” from (Offenbach: Les contes d’Hoffmann)
Benjamin Galvin – “Amorosi miei giorni” (Donaudy)
Ariana Douglas – “Quando m’en vò” (Puccini: La bohème)
Benjamin Hopkins – “A mes amis” (Donizetti: La fille du régiment)
Shelby Zang – “If I Loved You” (Rodgers and Hammerstein: Carousel)
DaSean Stokes – “Winterstürme” (Wagner: Die Walküre)
Julia Urbank – “Parto, parto” (Mozart: La clemenza di Tito)
Ariana Douglas – “Till There Was You” (Meredith Wilson: The Music Man)
Cayla Rosché – “Nun eilt herbei” (Nicolai: Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor)
Benjamin Galvin – “If Ever I Would Leave You” (Lerner and Lowe: Camelot)
Carly Ochoa – “Je veux vivre” (Gounod: Roméo et Juliette)
DaSean Stokes – “Deep River” (Spiritual)
Ariana Douglas and Benjamin Hopkins – “Libiamo” (Verdi: La traviata)
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Classical music: The Apollo Chamber Players perform Croatian-inspired music this Saturday night in Edgerton. Plus you can now sign up for piano day at the Wisconsin Union Theater
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ALERT: The sign-up site for Open Piano Day – to be held this coming Sunday, Sept. 22, from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Wisconsin Union Theater — is now available. Slots are for 15 minutes. Here is a link: https://nam04.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fsignup.com%2Fgo%2FfpUcsfW&data=02%7C01%7C%7C8ca06003be8b432ab9b408d73ba390d3%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C637043445996735650&sdata=3qwBf6GVLZK6iN0UUywLtlKEfUnIPLfssaug5b3XTl0%3D&reserved=0
Memorial Union members and their guests are invited to attend to play the piano and to listen to the music. Here is a link to a story with more details and background: https://welltempered.wordpress.com/2019/09/07/classical-music-the-wisconsin-union-theater-will-hold-an-exercising-or-playing-session-for-the-public-on-its-steinway-piano-on-sunday-sept-22-details-are-pending/
By Jacob Stockinger
The Ear has received the following announcement about a special concert of Croatian music that includes a world premiere and a Wisconsin premiere.
The Apollo Chamber Players (below) will perform this Saturday night, Sept. 21, at 7:30 p.m. at the Edgerton Performing Arts Center, 200 Elm High Drive, where they will give the Wisconsin premiere of Croatian Connections.
The program of chamber music is:
Medley of Croatian Folk Songs (2019, a world premiere), by Lorento Golofeev (b. 1976)
String Quartet Op. 33, No. 3 “The Bird” by Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809). You can hear the last movement of the “Bird” quartet in the YouTube video at the bottom.
Intermission/Prekid
Pannonia Boundless (1997) by Aleksandra Vrebalov (b. 1970)
String Quartet No. 4 “Obala” (No. 6 in the 20×2020 project and a Wisconsin premiere) by Alexandra du Bois (b. 1981)
Introduction: “Out of sea-mist, in medias res” (Aria: Adagio lugubre)
“Istria: Hrvatska Obala” (Croatian Coast) (Rondo: Allegro assai)
“Uspavankas” (Lullabies) (Waltz: Larghetto cantabile)
“Dalmatian Hinterland” (Scherzo: Allegro pesante con fuoco)
“Tempo di Gusle” (Finale: Presto all’ungherese)
Tickets are $30 each and can be purchased online at www.edgertonpac.comor by phone at (608) 561-6093.
Croatian Connections was underwritten by Frederic Attermeier, a native of Cudahy, Wis., and was first premiered in Houston, Texas in 2016. It explores the Croatian inspirations of the “Father of the String Quartet” Franz Joseph Haydn (below), and music celebrating Croatian cultural heritage.
The Wisconsin premiere of this new string quartet inspired by folk music from Croatia and Serbia by New York City-based composer Alexandra du Bois (below, in a photo by Nick Ruechel), adds a contemporary perspective – a bridge to common ground through ethnic folk music – between often-warring cultures.
The Houston-based Apollo Chamber Players “performs with rhythmic flair and virtuosity” (The Strad) and has “found fruitful territory” (Houston Chronicle) through innovative, globally-inspired programming and multicultural new music commissions.
A recent winner of the Chamber Music America’s prestigious Residency Partnership award, this quartet has performed for sold-out audiences at Carnegie Hall twice in the past five years, and holds the distinction of being the first American chamber ensemble to record and perform in Cuba since the embargo relaxation. The string quartet is featured frequently on American Public Media’s nationally-syndicated program “Performance Today.”
This concert is in honor of the late William J. Wartmann (below) whose parents immigrated to America from Croatia. This concert is partially funded by the William and Joyce Wartmann Endowment for the Performing Arts.
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Classical music: Legendary Austrian pianist and scholar Paul Badura-Skoda dies at 91. In the 1960s, he was artist-in-residence at the UW-Madison School of Music
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By Jacob Stockinger
Paul Badura-Skoda, the celebrated Austrian pianist who was equally known for his performances and his scholarship, and who was artist-in-residence at the UW-Madison in the mid-1960s until 1970, died this past Tuesday at 91.
A Vienna native, Badura-Skoda was especially known for his interpretations of major Classical-era composers who lived and worked in that city including Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert.
He was the only pianist to have recorded the complete sonatas by those composers on both the modern piano and the fortepiano, the appropriate period instrument.
If memory serves, Badura-Skoda’s last appearances in Madison were almost a decade ago for concerts in which he played: the last piano sonatas of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert; a Mozart piano concerto with the UW Chamber Orchestra; and a solo recital of Bach, Mozart, Schubert and Chopin at Farley’s House of Pianos.
But he also performed and recorded Bach, Chopin and Schumann among others. And Badura-Skoda was also renowned as a conductor, composer, editor and teacher.
You can find many of his recordings and interviews on YouTube. Normally, this blog uses shorter excerpts. But the legendary Paul Badura-Soda is special. So in the YouTube video at the bottom you can hear Badura-Skoda’s complete last recital of Schubert (Four Impromptus, D. 899 or Op. 90), Schumann (“Scenes of Childhood”, Op. 15) and Mozart (Sonata in C Minor, K. 457). He performed it just last May at the age of 91 at the Vienna Musikverein, where the popular New Year concerts take place.
Here are links to several obituaries:
Here is one from the British Gramophone Magazine:
https://www.gramophone.co.uk/classical-music-news/pianist-paul-badura-skoda-has-died-at-the-age-of-91
Here is one from WFMT radio station in Chicago, which interviewed him:
https://www.wfmt.com/2019/09/26/pianist-paul-badura-skoda-dies-at-age-91/
Here is one, with some surprisingly good details, from Limelight Magazine:
https://www.limelightmagazine.com.au/news/paul-badura-skoda-has-died/
And here is his updated Wikipedia entry:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Badura-Skoda
But you will notice a couple of things.
One is that The Ear could not find any obituaries from such major mainstream media as The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. But each had many other feature stories about and reviews of Badura-Skoda’s concerts over the years in their areas.
The other noteworthy thing is that none of the obituaries mentions Badura-Skoda’s years at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music in the 1960s, where he helped to raise the profile and prestige of the School of Music. Getting Badura-Skoda to join the university was considered quite an unexpected coup.
So here are two links to UW-Madison press releases that discuss that chapter of his life and career.
Here is an archival story from 1966 when Badura-Skoda first arrived at the UW-Madison:
http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/cgi-bin/UW/UW-idx?type=turn&entity=UW.v67i8.p0011&id=UW.v67i8&isize=text
And here is a press release that came from the UW-Madison News Service eight years ago on the occasion of one of Badura-Skoda’s many visits to and performances in Madison:
https://news.wisc.edu/writers-choice-madison-welcomes-badura-skoda-again-and-again/
Rest in Peace, maestro, and Thank You.
It would be nice if Wisconsin Public Radio paid homage with some of Badura-Skoda’s recordings since a complete edition was issued last year on the occasion of his 90th birthday.
If you wish to pay your own respects or leave your memories of Paul Badura-Skoda and his playing, please leave something in the comment section.
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