The Well-Tempered Ear
Check out the 2022 classical music Grammys for trends and suggested listening
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By Jacob Stockinger
No doubt you have already heard about the 64th annual Grammy Awards, which were awarded last Sunday night.
But chances are you haven’t heard much about the classical music Grammys.
That’s just not where the money and publicity are for major record companies and for the music industry in general, compared to other, much more profitable genres such as hip-hop, rock and pop.
But the classical Grammy nominations and winners can be a good source about what composers, performers and music you might want to check out via streaming or by buying a CD.
You can also get a good idea of trends in classical music.
Contemporary or new music is big again this year, dominating the old standard classics.
Just like local, regional, national and international performers, both individuals and groups, the Grammys show an emphasis on female composers and performers, and a similar emphasis on rediscovering composers and performers of color from both the past and the present.
You might also notice that the New Orleans-born, Juilliard-trained jazz pianist and singer Jon Batiste (below) — who plays on CBS’ The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and directs the house band Stay Human and who seems a one-man Mardi Gras — was nominated for a record 11 Grammys and won five in other categories, seems to be the new Wynton Marsalis. Like Marsalis, with whom Batiste worked, Batiste seems perfectly at home in classical music as well as jazz, soul, blues and pop. And his original classical work Movement 11 was nominated for a Grammy this year.
Social activism, in short, has finally brought diversity and inclusion into the Grammys in a way that seems permanent.
Below are the nominations and winners of the 2022 classical music Grammys. Winners are boldfaced. I have also offered a few examples of those musicians who have performed in Madison and for what venue, although there are many more connections than indicated.
If you want to see the nominations and winners in other categories, here is a link:
https://www.npr.org/2022/04/03/1090342877/2022-grammys-full-list-winners-nominees
75. Best Engineered Album, Classical
- Archetypes — Jonathan Lackey, Bill Maylone and Dan Nichols, engineers; Bill Maylone, mastering engineer (Sérgio Assad, Clarice Assad and Third Coast Percussion)
- Beethoven: Cello Sonatas – Hope Amid Tears — Richard King, engineer (Yo-Yo Ma and Emanuel Ax)
- Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 — Mark Donahue, engineer; Mark Donahue, mastering engineer (Manfred Honeck, Mendelssohn Choir Of Pittsburgh and Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra)
- Chanticleer Sings Christmas — Leslie Ann Jones, engineer (Chanticleer)
- Mahler: Symphony No. 8, ‘Symphony Of A Thousand’ — Alexander Lipay and Dmitriy Lipay, engineers; Alexander Lipay and Dmitriy Lipay, mastering engineers (Gustavo Dudamel, Fernando Malvar-Ruiz, Luke McEndarfer, Robert Istad, Grant Gershon, Los Angeles Children’s Chorus, Los Angeles Master Chorale, National Children’s Chorus, Pacific Chorale and Los Angeles Philharmonic)
76. Producer Of The Year, Classical
- Blanton Alspaugh
- Steven Epstein
- David Frost
- Elaine Martone
- Judith Sherman (below, who also recorded the UW-Madison Pro Arte Quartet’s centennial commissions)
CLASSICAL
77. Best Orchestral Performance
- “Adams: My Father Knew Charles Ives; Harmonielehre” — Giancarlo Guerrero, conductor (Nashville Symphony Orchestra)
- “Beethoven: Symphony No. 9” — Manfred Honeck, conductor (Mendelssohn Choir Of Pittsburgh and Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra)
- “Muhly: Throughline” — Nico Muhly, conductor (San Francisco Symphony)
- “Florence Price: Symphonies Nos. 1 and 3″ — Yannick Nézet-Séguin, conductor; Philadelphia Orchestra (below)
- “Strauss: Also Sprach Zarathustra; Scriabin: The Poem Of Ecstasy” — Thomas Dausgaard, conductor (Seattle Symphony Orchestra)
78. Best Opera Recording
- “Bartók: Bluebeard’s Castle” — Susanna Mälkki, conductor; Mika Kares and Szilvia Vörös; Robert Suff, producer (Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra)
- “Glass: Akhnaten” — Karen Kamensek, conductor; J’Nai Bridges, Anthony Roth Costanzo, Zachary James and Dísella Lárusdóttir; David Frost, producer (The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra; The Metropolitan Opera Chorus)
- “Janáček: Cunning Little Vixen” — Simon Rattle, conductor; Sophia Burgos, Lucy Crowe, Gerald Finley, Peter Hoare, Anna Lapkovskaja, Paulina Malefane, Jan Martinik & Hanno Müller-Brachmann; Andrew Cornall, producer (London Symphony Orchestra; London Symphony Chorus and LSO Discovery Voices)
- “Little: Soldier Songs” — Corrado Rovaris, conductor; Johnathan McCullough; James Darrah and John Toia, producers (The Opera Philadelphia Orchestra)
- “Poulenc: Dialogues Des Carmélites” — Yannick Nézet-Séguin, conductor; Karen Cargill, Isabel Leonard, Karita Mattila, Erin Morley and Adrianne Pieczonka; David Frost, producer (The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra; The Metropolitan Opera Chorus)
79. Best Choral Performance
- “It’s A Long Way” — Matthew Guard, conductor (Jonas Budris, Carrie Cheron, Fiona Gillespie, Nathan Hodgson, Helen Karloski, Enrico Lagasca, Megan Roth, Alissa Ruth Suver and Dana Whiteside; Skylark Vocal Ensemble)
- “Mahler: Symphony No. 8, ‘Symphony Of A Thousand'” — Gustavo Dudamel, conductor; Grant Gershon, Robert Istad, Fernando Malvar-Ruiz and Luke McEndarfer, chorus masters (Leah Crocetto, Mihoko Fujimura, Ryan McKinny, Erin Morley, Tamara Mumford, Simon O’Neill, Morris Robinson and Tamara Wilson; Los Angeles Philharmonic; Los Angeles Children’s Chorus, Los Angeles Master Chorale, National Children’s Chorus and Pacific Chorale)
- “Rising w/The Crossing” — Donald Nally, conductor (International Contemporary Ensemble and Quicksilver; The Crossing)
- “Schnittke: Choir Concerto; Three Sacred Hymns; Pärt: Seven Magnificat-Antiphons” — Kaspars Putniņš, conductor; Heli Jürgenson, chorus master (Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir)
- “Sheehan: Liturgy Of Saint John Chrysostom” — Benedict Sheehan, conductor (Michael Hawes, Timothy Parsons and Jason Thoms; The Saint Tikhon Choir)
- “The Singing Guitar” — Craig Hella Johnson, conductor (Estelí Gomez; Austin Guitar Quartet, Douglas Harvey, Los Angeles Guitar Quartet and Texas Guitar Quartet; Conspirare)
80. Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance
- “Adams, John Luther: Lines Made By Walking” — JACK Quartet
- “Akiho: Seven Pillars” — Sandbox Percussion
- “Archetypes” —Sérgio Assad, Clarice Assad and Third Coast Percussion
- “Beethoven: Cello Sonatas – Hope Amid Tears” — Yo-Yo Ma and Emanuel Ax (who have frequently performed individually and together at the Wisconsin Union Theater)
- “Bruits” — Imani Winds
81. Best Classical Instrumental Solo
- “Alone Together” — Jennifer Koh (below, who has performed with the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra)
- “An American Mosaic” — Simone Dinnerstein
- “Bach: Solo Violin Sonatas and Partitas” — Augustin Hadelich (a favorite of the Madison Symphony Orchestra)
- “Beethoven and Brahms: Violin Concertos” — Gil Shaham; Eric Jacobsen, conductor (The Knights)
- “Mak Bach” — Mak Grgić
- “Of Power” — Curtis Stewart
82. Best Classical Solo Vocal Album
- Confessions — Laura Strickling; Joy Schreier, pianist
- Dreams Of A New Day – Songs By Black Composers — Will Liverman (who has sung with the Madison Opera); Paul Sánchez, pianist (below at in the YouTube video at the bottom)
- Mythologies — Sangeeta Kaur and Hila Plitmann (Virginie D’Avezac De Castera, Lili Haydn, Wouter Kellerman, Nadeem Majdalany, Eru Matsumoto and Emilio D. Miler)
- Schubert: Winterreise — Joyce DiDonato; Yannick Nézet-Séguin, pianist
- Unexpected Shadows — Jamie Barton; Jake Heggie, pianist (Matt Haimovitz)
83. Best Classical Compendium
- American Originals – A New World, A New Canon — AGAVE and Reginald L. Mobley; Geoffrey Silver, producer
- Berg: Violin Concerto; Seven Early Songs and Three Pieces For Orchestra — Michael Tilson Thomas, conductor; Jack Vad, producer
- Cerrone: The Arching Path — Timo Andres and Ian Rosenbaum; Mike Tierney, producer
- Plays — Chick Corea; Chick Corea and Birnie Kirsh, producers
- Women Warriors – The Voices Of Change — Amy Andersson, conductor; Amy Andersson, Mark Mattson and Lolita Ritmanis, producers (below)
84. Best Contemporary Classical Composition
- “Akiho: Seven Pillars” — Andy Akiho, composer (Sandbox Percussion)
- “Andriessen: The Only One” — Louis Andriessen, composer (Esa-Pekka Salonen, Nora Fischer and Los Angeles Philharmonic)
- “Assad, Clarice and Sérgio, Connors, Dillon, Martin & Skidmore: Archetypes” — Clarice Assad, Sérgio Assad, Sean Connors, Robert Dillon, Peter Martin and David Skidmore, composers (Sérgio Assad, Clarice Assad and Third Coast Percussion)
- “Batiste: Movement 11′” — Jon Batiste, composer (Jon Batiste)
- “Shaw: Narrow Sea” — Caroline Shaw, composer (Dawn Upshaw, Gilbert Kalish and Sō Percussion)
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This Saturday afternoon, the Wisconsin Chamber Choir presents a free online parking lot concert of “Car Carols” with an emphasis on African-American composers
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By Jacob Stockinger
The Ear has received the following announcement to post:
Join the Wisconsin Chamber Choir (below) this Saturday afternoon, Dec. 12, at 2 p.m. for Car Carols, a unique holiday concert featuring live, socially-distanced performances of music by African-American composers and seasonal favorites.
Choir members will sing from their individual cars using wireless microphones (below), listening to the sound of the whole choir via their car radios. The audience is invited to join our Facebook event or listen in live on YouTube.
There is no charge to view the live-stream, but donations would be welcome.
You can find the concert on this Saturday, Dec. 12, a 2 p.m. via the following links: live on YouTube at https://youtu.be/ZonVn1cvgb8, or on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/events/1561155960751974/
This unusual concert format was necessitated by the Covid-19 pandemic, but the WCC is grateful for the opportunity to continue singing together in safe ways.
Since September, the choir has been rehearsing as a Parking Lot Choir, generating local media coverage from WKOW-TV at https://wkow.com/2020/10/13/wisconsin-chamber-choir-making-adjustments-to-prepare-for-performance/ and Madison Magazine, whose story was headlined “Forget tailgates, parking lots are for choir practice: https://www.channel3000.com/forget-tailgates-parking-lots-are-for-choir-practice/
This past September and October, smaller groups from the WCC assembled on Saturday mornings at the Warner Park Pavilion to rehearse in widely spaced formations.
They wore specially designed singers masks, and occasionally harmonized with nearby sandhill cranes that seemed unsure what to make of the a cappella music floating through their habitat.
Recordings by five distinct small ensembles — minus the cranes — will be aired during the Dec. 12 Car Carols broadcast, in addition to live singing by the Parking Lot choristers.
The Car Carols repertoire highlights music by African-American composers spanning nearly a century. Idiomatic pieces in the style of spirituals and contemporary gospel alternate with “non-idiomatic” motets and anthems by Nathaniel Dett (below top), William Dawson, Undine Smith Moore (below middle) and Carlos Simon (below bottom, with an oral self-portrait in the YouTube video at the bottom).
The remainder of the Parking Lot Choir selections consists of carol arrangements by WCC favorites — the late Stephen Paulus (below) and Peter Blotch — and feature virtual harp and violin accompaniment.
Live and virtual performers will also unite to sing Craig Hella Johnson’s moving arrangement of the songs I Love You and What a Wonderful World.
Interspersed between the live Car Carols will be a wide variety of pre-recorded selections, including the world premiere of WCC member Linda Palmer’s arrangement of Sussex Carol, plus music by Johannes Brahms, John Rutter, 17th-century female composer Chiara Cozzolani (below), and Tleycantimo choquilia, a carol from colonial-era Mexico, sung in Spanish and Nahuatl.
Founded in 1998, the Wisconsin Chamber Choir has established a reputation for excellence in the performance of oratorios by Bach, Handel, Mozart and Brahms; a cappella works from various centuries; and world-premieres.
Artistic director Robert Gehrenbeck (below), who heads the choral program at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, has been hailed by critics for his vibrant and emotionally compelling interpretations of a wide variety of choral masterworks. WCC members have acknowledged Gehrenbeck for his intrepid conducting in freezing temperatures during Parking Lot Choir rehearsals.
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Classical music: The Madison Choral Project will sing and celebrate young people’s “Hope for the Future” at its concerts this Saturday night and Sunday afternoon
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By Jacob Stockinger
Christmas is for the children, goes the old saying — and in more than one way such as gift-giving. The birth of Jesus represents the birth of hope and salvation in Christianity.
Other holiday traditions can claim the same — the extra light theme of Hanukkah in Judaism and the harvest theme of the African celebration of Kwanzaa, for example — and of course the New Year will soon be here with its promise of hope and change.
Now the critically acclaimed and professional Madison Choral Project (below top, in a photo by Ilana Natasha) and its founder, artistic director and conductor Albert Pinsonneault – who used to teach at Edgewood College and now works at Northwestern University near Chicago while living in Madison – has taken that saying to a new level and given it new meaning.
You can hear the results for yourself this Saturday night, Dec. 15, at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday afternoon, Dec, 16, at 3 p.m. in Madison, and at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday night, Dec. 18, in Milwaukee.
The Madison performances are at Christ Presbyterian Church, 944 East Gorham Street. The Milwaukee performance is at the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist, 812 Jackson St.
Tickets are $24 in advance online; $28 at the door. Students with ID are $10. Preferred seating is $40.
The theme of the sixth holiday concert by MCP is “Hope in the Future,” which is relevant at any time but seems particularly so this year. So it includes specially commissioned writings by young people, middle school and high school students from grades 6 through 12. Their work will be read by Noah Ovshinsky (below), the news director at Wisconsin Public Radio.
There’s no need to reinvent the wheel, so The Ear wants instead to direct you to a fine story about the MCP concert by reporter Gayle Worland for The Wisconsin State Journal.
There you will find out much more about the identities of the young writers, with a couple of examples of their work, and the inspiration or background of the theme that Pinsonneault (below) came up with.
Here is a link:
Unfortunately, what you will not find in that story or at the MCP’s home web page is the music program. No composers or specific works are mentioned.
But judging from past performances, you can count on outstanding repertoire of both classics and new music.
For more information about the MCP and its past concerts as well as it personnel and singers, go to: http://themcp.org
Here is a sample of the outstanding work by the Madison Choral Project:
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Classical music: UW Concert Choir performs a FREE concert with dancers on Friday night. Friday at noon a piano, viola and cello trio gives a FREE concert
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ALERT: The week’s FREE Friday Noon Musicale at the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive, features cellist Morgan Walsh, violist Shannon Farley and pianist Kyle Johnson in music by Tchaikovsky, Schumann and Rebecca Clarke. The concert runs from 12:15 to 1 p.m.
By Jacob Stockinger
At 8 p.m. on Friday night in Mills Hall, the UW-Madison Chamber Choir (below top), under the direction of Beverly Taylor (below bottom), who heads the choral program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, will give a FREE concert.
Guest dancers will join the singers.
Here is the program:
Laudibus in sanctis (Paraphrase of Psalm 150) by William Byrd
Choral Dances from “Gloriana” by Benjamin Britten (Text by William Plomer), as seen in the YouTube video at bottom
“Totentanz” (Dance of Death) by Hugo Distler (original dialogue by Johannes Klockig after the Lübeck Totentanz)
“Dance to My Daddy,” English folksong, arranged by Goff Richards
“Begin the Beguine” by Cole Porter, arranged by Andrew Carter
“Der Tanz” (The Dance) by Franz Schubert
“Verano Porteño” by Astor Piazzolla, arranged by Oscar Escalada
“Fa una canzone” by Orazzio Vecchi
Tags: arrangement, Arts, Astor Piazzola, Ástor Piazzolla, Begin the Beguine, Benjamin Britten, Beverly Taylor, canzone, Cello, Chamber choir, Choir, choral music, Classical music, Cole Porter, Concert, Daddy, dance, dancer, death, Early music, First Unitarian Society of Madison, folk, folksong, Franz Schubert, Hugo Distler, Madison, Orazzio Vecchi, Piano, Psaml, Rebecca Clarke, Schumann, song, Tchaikovsky, Totentanz, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Viola, vocal music, William Byrd, Wisconsin, YouTube
Classical music: The Ear likes very old Christmas music more than newer music. What do you prefer?
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By Jacob Stockinger
Each year in the Madison area there are so many wonderful concerts with holiday themes performed by the Madison Symphony Orchestra, the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, the Madison Choral Project, the Madison Bach Musicians, Edgewood College and by many, many others that you just can’t get to all of them.
And it doesn’t help if you have a winter cold or aren’t feeling well, as happened this year to The Ear.
But I did get to two memorable performances.
The first was the terrific annual Choral Prism holiday concert (below) put on at Luther Memorial Church by various choirs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music. They performed under several conductors, including Beverly Taylor, Bruce Gladstone, Anna Volodarskaya and Sara Guttenberg.
The second was the satisfying “Welcome Yule” concert at Grace Episcopal Church by the Wisconsin Chamber Choir under conductor Robert Gehrenbeck, who also teaches at the UW-Whitewater.
Both events were excellent, and drew full and enthusiastic houses.
A lot of beautiful music in a wide variety of styles was offered by each of the two groups. That included homages to the St. Paul, Minnesota composer Stephen Paulus (below), who died at 64 this past year and who had close ties to Madison’s vocal groups that commissioned and performed his music. And because programs strive for ethnic diversity today, spirituals and jazz arrangements were also included. (I often cringe when I see something has been “arranged.”)
But when all was said and done, the “winners” so to speak –- for The Ear at least -– were the old ones. I mean the very old ones, generally those works dating from the Medieval period and Renaissance period over the Classical, Romantic, Modern and Contemporary eras with the Baroque falling somewhere in between.
Why did I like the old music so much?
One reason was the performances. The straight-ahead singing, mostly a cappella or unaccompanied but sometimes with a bit of percussive drum or lyrical harp added, was much more convincing than when I saw modern largely white singers stiffly swaying and awkwardly stomping their feet and clapping the hands to get into the swing of things and show some unconvincing imitation of gospel singing.
But I started thinking.
Maybe it goes back to the Bible and that old verse about “The Word made Flesh.”
That seems a much more successful formula for effective Christmas music than the modern approach, which I am starting to think of as “The Flesh made Word.”
That means that what gets to me is the very simplicity, the strength of the rhythms and melodies as well as the simpler harmonies and compositional techniques.
Simpler is simply better. No better proof was offered that a souped-up jazz arrangement of “Silent Night.” That venerable and quietly emotional carol cannot be improved upon by complicating it. Keep it simple. That seems to be the way to go. Another case of inferior “arranging,” I am afraid.
I think of the old Medieval hymns about a mother simply rocking her baby Jesus to sleep as she sings to him. Can there be anything more touching or poignant, more to the point or direct, especially at a historical period when there was no nighttime lighting and so many babies died.
More than nostalgia, such music offers the art of reducing things to the essential. And the essential, as the old composers seemed to know, is often the path to the universal.
Of course, the plain song or chant-like harmonies also add to the appeal.
But it still goes back to simplicity of the act and the simplicity of the metaphor.
That is why the great 20th-century modern English composer Benjamin Britten (below) used so many older carols in his “Ceremony of Carols” to such great effect.
That is also why 100 times out of 100 I will prefer the simple 16th-century German tune “Lo how a Rose Ere Blooming” (at bottom in a YouTube video) over, say, the long and tedious “Magnificat” No. 20 with its overworked harmonies and complexities for chorus and organ by another 20th-century English composer Herbert Howells (below).
What do you make of the old music versus new music debate when it comes to holiday music?
Do you agree or disagree with The Ear?
And what is your favorite local holiday concert to recommend for next year?
The Ear wants to hear.
Tags: A Ceremony of Carols, Adam lay ybounden, arragements, Arts, Bach, Baroque, Benjamin Britten, Carol, Chamber choir, Chamber music, Child of God, Christmas, Christmas music, Classical era, Classical music, England, English music, German music, Germany, Holiday, Jacob Stockinger, Johann Sebastian Bach, Lo How a Rose, Lo How a Rose Ere Blooming, Madison, Madison Bach Musicians, Madison Choral Project, Madison Symphony Orchestra, Medieval, Middle Ages, Minnesota, modern music, New Music, Romantic music, Saint Paul, Silent Night, Stephen Paulus, transcriptions, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, YouTube, Yule
Classical music: The 87th annual Christmas Concerts at Edgewood College are this Friday night and Saturday night. Plus, this week’s FREE Friday Noon Musicale at FUS features music for double reeds.
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ALERT: This week’s FREE Friday Noon Musicale, to be held from 12:15 to 1 p.m. in the Landmark Auditorium of the historic Frank Lloyd Wright-designed First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive, will feature “Music for Double Reeds and Piano” with Scott Ellington, Ruth Dahlke, Willy Walter, Rozan Anderson and Ann Aschbacher playing music by Johannes Brahms, George Frideric Handel, Alyssa Morris and more. Double reed instruments include the bassoon, the oboe, the oboe d’amore and the English horn.
By Jacob Stockinger
The Edgewood College Music Department will give the 87th annual Christmas concerts (below is a photo from last year’s concert) on this Friday night, Dec. 5, at 7 p.m., and again on this Saturday night, Dec. 6 at 7 p.m., in St. Joseph Chapel, 1000 Edgewood College Drive.
The evening of seasonal music will feature the Guitar Ensemble, Chamber Singers (at bottom in a YouTube video), Women’s Choir, Men’s Choir, Concert Band and Jazz Ensemble.
Sorry, The Ear has received no word on the program or specific works or composers to be performed.
According to a press release: “This annual Christmas celebration is one of the College’s oldest traditions. A highlight each year is the invitation for audience members to join in singing traditional carols.”
Please visit www.edgewood.edu.
All proceeds for these concerts benefit Edgewood College music students through the Edward Walters Music Scholarship Fund.
Classical music Q&A: Choral director Robert Gehrenbeck talks about how composer Ralph Vaughan Williams sparked TWO renaissances or revivals of British music. You can hear the results when the Wisconsin Chamber Choir performs works by Vaughan Williams and his followers this Saturday night. Part 1 of 2.
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By Jacob Stockinger
This Saturday night, the Wisconsin Chamber Choir will wrap up its current season with a special concert of “Ralph Vaughan Williams and Friends.”
The concert is at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, May 31, in the acoustically resonant Grace Episcopal Church, West Washington Avenue at Carroll Street on the Capitol Square, downtown Madison.
The soloists include violinist Leanne League and organist Mark Brampton Smith.
Admission is $15, $10 for students.
One of the best loved choral composers, Ralph Vaughan Williams was renowned not only for his compositions, but also for his friendship and advocacy on behalf of countless other musicians.
The concert features some of Vaughan Williams’ best-known works including, “Serenade to Music,” Mass in G Minor, and the powerful anthem, “Lord, Thou Hast Been Our Refuge.”
Vaughan Williams shared a passion for collecting folksongs with his close friend Gustav Holst, whose heartfelt setting of “I Love My Love” will be heard alongside several of Vaughan Williams’ own folksong arrangements.
Works by Herbert Howells and Vaughan Williams’ students Imogen Holst and Elizabeth Maconchy will demonstrate Vaughan Williams’ influence on succeeding generations.
Finally, selections from the motets and anthems of Thomas Tallis exemplify Vaughan Williams’ debt to his English predecessors, notably Tallis’ “Third Mode Psalm Tune,” the inspiration for Vaughan Williams’ “Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis.” (You can hear that “Fantasia” performed in a popular YouTube video at the bottom.)
Joining the WCC in this performance are violinist Leanne League, associate concertmaster of both the Madison Symphony and the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra; and organist Mark Brampton Smith.
Advance tickets are available for $15 from www.wisconsinchamberchoir.org, via Brown Paper Tickets, or at Willy Street Coop (East and West locations) and Orange Tree Imports. Student tickets are $10.
Founded in 1998, the Madison-based Wisconsin Chamber Choir has established a reputation for excellence in the performance of oratorios by Johann Sebastian Bach, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Franz Joseph Haydn; of a cappella masterworks from various centuries; and of world-premieres. Dr. Robert Gehrenbeck, who teaches and directs choral activities at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, is the Wisconsin Chamber Choir’s Artistic Director.
Gehrenbeck recently agreed to an email Q&A about the upcoming concert:
Why did you choose to do a program based on the influence of Ralph Vaughan Williams (below)? How and why was he so influential?
First and foremost, the music of Ralph Vaughan Williams (below) music is extremely rewarding to perform — it’s thrilling for players, singers and audiences alike. He seemed to have a special knack for writing for voices, and he composed an enormous amount of vocal music, from folksong settings, hymn tunes, and solo songs to large-scale operas, oratorios and choral symphonies.
He was the leading figure in the “English Renaissance” of the early 20th century, a movement that began with Sir Edward Elgar and which extended beyond Vaughan Williams to those he influenced, including Gustav Holst, Herbert Howells, and Gerald Finzi (below).
Even Benjamin Britten (below top) and Michael Tippet (below bottom), although they consciously distanced themselves from the style of Vaughan Williams, followed his pioneering embrace of earlier English composers as models, looking back to the luminaries of Tudor and Stuart periods for inspiration just as he did.
tippett
It is as if the musical genius of Thomas Tallis (below top), William Byrd, and Henry Purcell (below bottom) was reawakened after a long slumber in the works of Vaughan Williams and his successors.
How would you describe the individual musical style and historical importance of Ralph Vaughan Williams, especially given the modernist age?
The issue of Vaughan Williams’ relationship to musical modernism is an interesting one. It’s worth noting that Vaughan Williams, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Arnold Schoenberg, and Charles Ives were all born within two years of one another, between 1872 and 1874.
Although their music is vastly different, they all responded to a similar crisis facing composers after the heyday of the Romantic era -– namely, the challenge of writing music that would be original and distinctive while taking into account the fact that most concertgoers still embraced the Romantics.
One might call this the central dilemma of musical modernism: the need to break with the past while also acknowledging it.
Vaughan Williams’ response to this dilemma, while different from Schoenberg’s or Ives’, was nevertheless highly original and unique.
Comparing Vaughan Williams’ development to Schoenberg’s is instructive. Schoenberg (below) famously broke with tonality — an approach that Vaughan Williams vehemently rejected — but Schoenberg saw himself carrying on the tradition of Bach, Mozart, and Brahms, and he wrote in many of the same forms and used similar techniques as his German forebears. For Schoenberg, simply ignoring the music of late Romantics such as Brahms and Wagner was not an option; in the eyes of his German-speaking public, he was their competitor as much as their heir. Schoenberg thus felt compelled to transcend the highly chromatic musical language of Wagner by rejecting its central feature — tonality — while preserving its chromaticism and emotionalism.
By virtue of geography, Vaughan Williams (as well as Rachmaninoff and Ives) did not feel so shackled to the legacy of German Romanticism. For composers on the periphery, as it were, rejecting the dominant German tradition and embracing native influences were virtues in the eyes of their compatriots, especially given the rise of nationalism throughout Europe during this period.
Thus, Vaughan Williams developed a kind of modernism that was infused with elements of his own English heritage. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Vaughan Williams’ music owes very little to Wagner, but he does carry on the symphonic tradition of Ludwig van Beethoven (Vaughan Williams wrote nine symphonies too!); he was a great admirer (and conductor) of Johann Sebastian Bach (below top); and he was strongly influenced by Johannes Brahms (below bottom).
Crucially, Vaughan Williams’ abiding interest in English folksong, in Tudor polyphony, and in writing music that would speak to the common people resulted in a style that was uniquely his — more conservative than other composers’, perhaps, but no less original because of that fact.
Three of the main characteristics of Vaughan Williams’ mature style are the primacy of melody; the retention and enrichment of triadic harmony; and his interest in creating large-scale forms and dramatic tension through non-traditional means. I’ll attempt to illustrate these traits in my answer to the following question.
Tomorrow: Favorite works by Ralph Vaughn Williams; his influence on his contemporaries and his students; and plans by the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra for the next season.
Tags: Ancora String Quartet, Arnold Schoenberg, Arts, Bach, Beethoven, Chamber choir, Chamber music, Choir, choral music, Classical music, Edward Elgar, Gustav Holst, Imogen Holst, Jacob Stockinger, Johann Sebastian Bach, Johannes Brahms, London, Ludwig van Beethoven, Madison, Madison Symphony Orchestra, mass, Music, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Thomas Tallis, vaughan williams, Wisconsin, Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, YouTube
Classical music: Choral music, wind music and brass music add to the season-ending events this super-busy weekend.
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By Jacob Stockinger
This weekend brings more season-closers. The groups concluding their concert seasons include the First Unitarian Society of Madison’s FREE Friday Noon Musicales; the Festival Choir of Madison; the UW Chamber Orchestra; and Edgewood College.
Here is a round-up of yet another busy weekend.
FRIDAY
On Friday afternoon, from 12:15 to 1 p.m., the last FREE Friday Noon Musicale of the season at the first Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive, will feature Driftless Winds, a University of Wisconsin-Platteville Faculty Reed Trio.
Members are Laura Medisky, oboe; Corey Mackey, clarinet; and Jacqueline Wilson, bassoon.
The program, performed in the historic Landmark Auditorium designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, includes music by Wolfgang Amadeus, Jacques Ibert, Erwin Schulhoff and Ludwig van Beethoven.
Bring your lunch; coffee and tea are provided.
On Friday night, the Madison Chamber Choir will perform at 7:30 p.m. at Christ Presbyterian Church (http://www.madisonchamberchoir.com) . It will be directed by Adam Kluck.
On Friday night, May 2, at 7:30 p.m. in the First Congregational United Church of Christ, 1609 University Avenue, the University of Wisconsin-Stout Choirs come to Madison on a mini-tour, with a program titled “An Ode To The Bard: Shakespeare in Music.”
The concert will feature musical settings of Shakespeare’s words, popular music of his time (including tunes that are referenced in his plays), and works inspired by the legacy of William Shakespeare (below).
Performers include the Stout Symphonic Singers (an open-seat choir of about 30 singers) and the Stout Chamber Choir (an auditioned choir of 20 singers), both directed by composer-conductor Jerry Hui (below), with pianist Michaela Gifford.
Admission is free with a free-will donation welcomed.
SATURDAY
On Saturday at 11 a.m. at Oakwood Village West, 6209 Mineral Road, on Madison’s far west side, the UW-Stout Choirs will give a second performance of their Friday night program. See directly above.
On Saturday afternoon at 4 p.m. in Mills Hall, the All-University String Orchestra will perform a FREE concert under conductor Janet Jensen (below, in a photo by Katrin Talbot). Sorry, no word on a specific program.
On Saturday, May 3, at 7 p.m. in the St. Joseph Chapel at 1000 Edgewood College Drive, the Edgewood Concert Band and Jazz Ensemble will perform under the direction of Walter Rich and Daniel Wallach. Included will be works by Paul Dukas, Jenkins, Williams, Van der Roost and Franz von Suppe.
Admission is $7 to benefit music scholarships at the college.
On Saturday night at 7:30 p.m., the FESTIVAL CHOIR OF MADISON (below) will conclude its 40th season in the First Baptist Church, 518 North Franklin Avenue, in Madison. It will perform with the Pecatonica String Quartet and winds, and under the baton of artistic director Bryson Mortensen, who is the Director of Choral Activities at the University of Wisconsin-Rock County.
The program is entitled “Gloria” and features two Glorias: the well-known one by Antonio Vivaldi and a rarely heard one by Luigi Boccherini. A pre-concert lecture, begins at 6:30 p.m. The Ear hears there will also be an encore performance of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart‘s “Ave Verum Corpus.”
Tickets are $18 general public, $14 for seniors and $8 for students if bought in advance – call (608) 274-7089; the day of the concert, tickets are $20, $15 and $10, respectively.
For more information, visit the link: http://festivalchoirmadison.org/index.htm
On Saturday night at 8 p.m. in Mills Hall, the UW Women’s Chorus and the University Chorus will perform a FREE concert under the direction of Anna Volodarskaya and Adam Kluck (below), respectively. Sorry, no word yet on a specific program.
SUNDAY
On “Sunday Afternoon Live From the Chazen” Museum of Art on the campus of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, from 12:30 to 2 p.m., members of the music faculty at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire will perform the second-to–last concert of that series this season. As always it will be broadcast live on Wisconsin Public Radio. The concert itself is FREE in the Brittingham Gallery No. 3. Sorry, no word on a program.
On Sunday afternoon at 2 p.m., in Mills Hall, the UW Concert Band will perform a FREE concert under director Mike Leckrone (below). Sorry, no word on the program.
On Sunday, May 4, at 2:30 p.m. in the St. Joseph Chapel, 1000 Edgewood College Drive, the Chamber Singers, Men’s Choir, Women’s Choir and Campus-Community Choir.
Kathleen Otterson (below) will conduct the Women’s Choir, while Albert Pinsonneault will lead the Chamber Singers, Campus-Community Choir, and Men’s Choir.
Pinsonneault (below) will also conduct the combined choirs and the Edgewood Chamber Orchestra in a performance of Franz Joseph Haydn’s “Te Deum.”
Admission is $7 to benefit music scholarships at Edgewood.
On Sunday evening at 6:30 p.m. in Music Hall, at the foot of Bascom Hill, the Lincoln Chamber Brass of Chicago will perform a FREE concert, just a week before they compete at the prestigious Fischoff Chamber Music Competition.
All of them are members of Civic Orchestra of Chicago; at 21, the horn player already substitutes for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Four are students at Northwestern University, the fifth at DePaul. Four of the five, including Ansel Norris, who was born in Madison and in high school studied with UW-Madison trumpeter John Aley, will attend the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s Tanglewood Festival this summer.
Musicians of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago. The program includes Victor Ewald’s Brass Quintet No. 3; David Sampson’s “Morning Music”; Franz Biebl’s “Ave Maria” (arranged by Barker); and Giles Farnaby’s Suite of Dances.
Members (below, from left) are Ansel Norris and William Cooper, trumpets; Kevin Haseltine, horn; Joseph Peterson, trombone; and Scott Hartman, bass trombone.
For more information, visit: http://lincolnchamberbrass.wordpress.com/home/
At 7:30 in Mills Hall, the UW Chamber Orchestra (below) will perform its last concert of the season and its last concert before being either mothballed or terminated.
The performance is FREE and will be under the baton of director James Smith.
The program includes: Jacques Ibert’s “Hommage to Mozart”; Richard Strauss’ “Dance Suite After Francois Couperin”; and Mozart’s Symphony No. 39 in E Fat Major. (In a YouTube video at the bottom, you can hear the first movement performed by the legendary conductor Karl Bohm and the Vienna Philharmonic.)
For more about the news significance of the event, here is a link to yesterday’s blog post:
Tags: Antonio Vivladi, Arts, Ave Verum Corpus, band, Beethoven, Boccherini, Boston Symphony Orchestra, brass, Chamber choir, Chamber music, Chicago, Chicago Civic Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Choir, choral music, Classical music, Concert Band, DePaul University, Dukas, Early music, Edgewood College, encore, Erwin Schulhoff, First Unitarian Society of Madison, Fischoff Chamber Music Competition, Frank Lloyd Wright, Franz Joseph Haydn, Friday, Gloria, Horn, Jacob Stockinger, Jacques Ibert, Karl Böhm, Lincoln Chamber Brass, Ludwig van Beethoven, Luigi Boccherini, Madison, Mozart, Music, Northwestern University, Paul Dukas, Piano, reed, Richard Strauss, Saturday, Schulhoff, Shakespare, Symphony No. 39 in E Flat Major, Tanglewood, Te Deum, trio, Trumpet, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, UW-Eau Claire, UW-Platteville, UW-Rock County, UW-Stout, Vienna Philharmonic, von Suppe, William Shakespeare, wisconsin public radio, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, YouTube
Classical music: The Wisconsin Chamber Choir will perform a concert of Russian and Baltic music this Saturday night — in the shadow of political events and turmoil in Ukraine. Plus, the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Wisconsin Brass Quintet also performs a FREE concert of Bach, Gershwin and others on Saturday night.
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By Jacob Stockinger
Two fine and FREE concerts are on tap this Saturday night:
WISCONSIN CHAMBER CHOIR
On this Saturday night, March 29, in the critically acclaimed Wisconsin Chamber Choir (below) will perform its spring concert.
The concert takes place at 7:30 p.m. at Grace Episcopal Church (below top is the exterior, below bottom the acoustically terrific beautiful interior), located at the corner of West Washington Avenue at Carroll Street, on the Capitol Square in downtown Madison.
The concert features Russian music. But it worth noting that even an event this small and this local shows the ripples of the political situation in Ukraine where Russia has illegally annexed Crimea. Tickets are $15 for general admission; $10 for students. “Because of the situation in Ukraine (below), the choir made a decision to change the title of the concert from “Back to the U.S.S.R.” to just “Spring Concert,” the choir says. “We are confident the change will help our audience focus on the beautiful music and not current politics.”
The riches of Russian choral music will be represented by selections from the Vespers by Sergei Rachmaninoff (below top) along with ravishingly beautiful works by Alexander Grechaninov (below middle in 1912) and Pavel Grigorievich Chesnokov (below bottom and at bottom in a YouTube video).
The scope widens to include sacred and secular music from various former Soviet Republics. Works by Veljo Tormis (below top) of Estonia), Pēteris Vasks of Latvia (below middle) and Vytautas Miškinis of Lithuania (below n bottom) exemplify the vibrant choral traditions of the Baltic states.
Sacred and secular works from Armenia, Georgia, Ukraine, and Belarus round out this fascinating and varied program. There is also the possibility of something by the Beatles John Lennon and Paul McCartney (blew left and right, respectively) to bring things to a rousing close.
Advance tickets are available for $15 from www.wisconsinchamberchoir.org, via Brown Paper Tickets, or at Willy Street Coop (East and West locations) and Orange Tree Imports. Student tickets are $10. Founded in 1999, the Madison-based Wisconsin Chamber Choir has established a reputation for excellence in the performance of oratorios by Johann Sebastian Bach, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Franz Joseph Haydn; a cappella masterworks from various centuries; and world-premieres. Robert Gehrenbeck (below) is the Wisconsin Chamber Choir’s artistic director.
WISCONSIN BRASS QUINTET
The Wisconsin Brass Quintet (below, in a 2013 performance photo by Jon Harlow) in residence at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, will perform a FREE concert on Saturday night, March 29, 8 p.m. in Mills Hall on the University of Wisconsin-Maidson campus.
WBQ members include John Aley, trumpet; Jessica Jensen, trumpet; Daniel Grabois, horn; Mark Hetzler, trombone; John Stevens, tuba; and special guest Abby Stevens, soprano, who is the daughter of John Stevens, who is retiring this May.
The program offers “Distant Voices” by David Sampson; “Brass Calendar” by Peter Schickele, aka P.D.Q. Bach); “Contrapunctus” by Johann Sebastian Bach; and a selection of songs by George Gershwin sung by Abby Stevens.
Tags: Arts, Bach, Baltic states, Baroque, Beatles, Brass quintet, Chamber choir, Choir, choral music, Classical music, Daniel Grabois, Estonia, folk songs, George Gershwin, Gershwin, Horn, Jacob Stockinger, Johann Sebastian Bach, John Lennon, John Stevens, Latvia, Lennon and McCartney, Lithuania, Madison, Mark Hetzler, Mozart, Paul McCartney, Pēteris Vasks, Saturday, Sergei Rachmaninoff, songs, Trombone, Trumpet, Tuba, Ukraine, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Wisconsin, Wisconsin Brass Quintet, Wisconsin Chamber Choir, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, YouTube
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Classical music: Meet Mariana Farah, the new choral director at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
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PLEASE HELP THE EAR. IF YOU LIKE A CERTAIN BLOG POST, SPREAD THE WORD. FORWARD A LINK TO IT OR, SHARE IT or TAG IT (not just “Like” it) ON FACEBOOK. Performers can use the extra exposure to draw potential audience members to an event. And you might even attract new readers and subscribers to the blog.
By Jacob Stockinger
Following a national search, Mariana Farah (below) has been chosen to succeed Beverly Taylor as the new director of choral activities at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music.
Due to prior commitments, Farah cannot start her duties until the fall of 2021. But the delay is understandable given that the coronavirus pandemic continues and group singing remains a particularly hazardous or high-risk activity during the public health crisis. (See her comments about choral singing during Covid-19 in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
(In case you are wondering, Taylor, who retired from the UW-Madison last spring, will continue as director of the Madison Symphony Chorus. One wonders if she will still have a chance to do performances of the requiems by Verdi and Dvorak, both of which were canceled due to Covid-19.)
At a time when more focus is being placed on diversity, the Brazilian-born Farah (below) seems an especially apt choice.
Here is the official UW press release about Farah’s appointment along with much biographical material:
“Mariana Farah is the Associate Director of Choral Activities at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas, where she teaches courses in graduate choral literature and conducting, directs the university’s Concert Choir and Women’s Chorale (below bottom), and helps oversee all aspects of the choral program.
Born in Brazil, Farah received her Bachelor of Music degree from the Universidade Estadual de Campinas; her Master’s degree from the University of Iowa; and her Doctor of Musical Arts from the University of Missouri-Kansas City.
Her choirs have successfully performed at the Missouri and Kansas Music Educators Association conventions and at the 2008 and 2018 Southwestern ACDA conferences.
Farah’s research focuses on Brazilian choral music, particularly the a cappella choral works of Ernani Aguiar (b. 1950, below). Her edition of Aguiar’s “Três Motetinos No. 2” has been published by Earthsongs, and she expects to introduce more of his music to the United States through performances, recordings, editions and future publications of his unknown choral literature.
In addition to her work at KU, Farah (below) maintains an active schedule as a clinician for festivals in Brazil and in the U.S., where she is often sought out for her expertise in Brazilian choral music.
Farah has presented at several conferences for the National Association for Music Education and the American Choral Directors Association.
Recent engagements include appearances as a conductor at the 2019 Northwest Kansas Music Educators Association High School Honor Choir; the 2018 Southwestern ACDA conference, 2016 and 2014 Kansas Music Educators Association Convention; Universidade de São Paulo-Ribeirão Preto; Universidade Estadual de Campinas; Universidade Estadual de Maringá; Festival de Música de Londrina; Adams State Honor Choir Festival; the 2015 Kantorei Summer Choral Institute, a residency with the Harvard-Radcliffe Collegium Musicum; and the 2014 Idaho All-State Treble Choir.
Farah is the music director at First Presbyterian Church in Lawrence, Kansas, where she directs the Chancel Choir and oversees a thriving music program. She also serves as the interim 2019-20 conductor for the Wichita Chamber Chorale (below) and as a board member of the National Collegiate Choral Organization.
She has served as the president elect (2018-2020) and R&R Chair for Ethnic and Multicultural Perspectives (2014-2018) for the ACDA Southwestern Division.
As a singer, Farah performed with the Kansas City Te Deum Chamber Choir (2015-2018) and participated in their 2016 recording of Brahms’ “A German Requiem” (Centaur Records). The recording was recognized by The American Prize, naming Te Deum a semi-finalist for best Choral Performance (community division) for the 2019-20 contest.
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