The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: Free concerts of tuba, euphonium, electronic, wind and band music are on tap this week at the UW-Madison
Leave a Comment
By Jacob Stockinger
This week will see FREE concerts of tuba, euphonium, electronic, wind and band music at the University of Wisconsin-Madison‘s Mead Witter School of Music.
Here is a schedule:
THURSDAY
On Thursday night at 7:30 p.m. in Morphy Recital Hall, UW tuba professor Tom Curry (below top) will give a FREE faculty recital that features two world premieres, including a new work by Curry.
Joining Curry is UW alumnus Brett Keating (below bottom), who plays the euphonium, uses electronic music and also composes. A world premiere of a new work by Keating will be featured.
Here is a link to the full program of original works:
https://www.music.wisc.edu/event/faculty-concert-tom-curry-tuba/
FRIDAY
On Friday night at 8 p.m. in Mills Hall, the Wingra Wind Quintet will perform a FREE concert.
Members of the quartet (below, from left, in a photo by Katrin Talbot) are Marc Vallon bassoon; Timothy Hagen, flute; Alicia Lee, clarinet; Aaron Hill, oboe; and Joanna Schulz, horn.
Sorry, but no word on specific composers or works on the program. But here is a link to the official listing, where they may yet be posted before the concert:
https://www.music.wisc.edu/event/wingra-wind-quintet-3/
SUNDAY
On Sunday at 1 p.m. in Mills Hall, the University Bands will perform a FREE concert. Sorry, no word on the composers or works on the program.
Tags: #BassoonMusic, #ClarinetMusic, #ElectronicMusic, #EuphoniumMusic, #FluteMusic, #HornMusic, #MeadWitterSchoolofMusic, #TubaMusic, #UniversityofWisconsin, #UniversityofWisconsin-Madison, #WingraWindQuintet, #WorldPremiere, Arts, Bassoon, Chamber music, clarinet, Classical music, composer, Concert, Electronic music, Euphonium, flute, Horn, Jacob Stockinger, Madison, Madison Symphony Orchestra, Oboe, performer, program, Tuba, United States, University of Wisconsin–Madison, winds, Wisconsin, YouTube
Classical music: This weekend brings FREE concerts of viola music by Brahms; string quartets by Haydn, Mozart and Schubert from the Pro Arte Quartet; and electronic music by Varese
Leave a Comment
By Jacob Stockinger
This weekend brings a wide variety of music from different periods and in different styles, all for FREE.
Today from 12:15 to 1 p.m., the weekly Friday Noon Musicale at the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive, features violist Blakeley Menghini (below) and pianist Micah Behr playing music by Johannes Brahms and Nikolai Roslawez.
If you are looking for a Classical-style sampler of string quartets, you can’t beat the program by the UW-Madison’s Pro Arte Quartet (below in a photo by Rick Langer) on Saturday night at 8 p.m. in Mills Hall.
The program offers the String Quartet in E-Flat Major, Op. 50, No. 3, by Franz Joseph Haydn; the late String Quartet in B-Flat Major, K. 589, by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart; and the String Quartet in A Minor “Rosamunde”, D, 804, by Franz Schubert.
If more modern or contemporary music is your preference, Madison native and marimbist Nathaniel Bartlett (below) will perform his own works and the famous “Electronic Poem” by Edgard Varese (heard in the YouTube video at the bottom).
The concert is on Sunday afternoon at 3 p.m. at the Overture Center, 201 State St., in Promenade Hall on the second-floor. For more information about free reservations and the complete program, go to:
http://www.overture.org/events/poeme-electronique
Tags: #FranzSchubert, #UniversityofWisconsin-Madison, afternoon, Arts, Brahms, Cello, Chamber music, Classical music, Classical style, composer, Concert, contemporary, Edgard Varèse, electronic, Electronic music, First Unitarian Society of Madison, Friday, Haydn, Johannes Brahms, Le Corbusier, Madison, modern, Mozart, Music, musicale, New Music, night, Nikolai Roslawez, noon, Overture Center, period, Piano, poem, Pro Arte Quartet, program, reservation, Romantic, Saturday, Sonata, String quartet, style, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, UW, Viola, Violin, weekend, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, YouTube
Classical music: New faculty conductor Chad Hutchinson makes an impressive and promising debut with the UW Symphony Orchestra
2 Comments
By Jacob Stockinger
Last Saturday night, Chad Hutchinson (below), the new faculty conductor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music, made an impressive and promising debut with the UW Symphony Orchestra.
The ambitious program that Hutchinson put together says a lot about his priorities and instincts, and about his confidence in himself and the abilities of his student players, who performed superbly.
The varied works came from the early 19th century, the mid-19th century, the early 20th century and the 21st century. And it seemed that each piece in the ambitious program was chosen to put the spotlight on a different section – percussion, brass, strings and winds.
Curiously, The Ear found the most successful pieces were the most traditional ones.
The Prelude to the opera “Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg” by Richard Wagner received the right mix of horn pomp and string zest. It made The Ear realize again how much more he prefers Wagner’s instrumental music to his vocal music. Let’s hear more Wagner preludes, since we are unlikely to hear more Wagner operas.
The orchestral transcription by Leopold Stokowski (below) of the piano prelude “The Sunken Cathedral” by Claude Debussy was the least successful work of the night. This is the second overblown and bombastic Stokowski transcription that The Ear has heard performed live in a month.
Clearly, Stokowski’s aesthetic was Bigger is Better. This particular transcription strips away the mystery, sensuality and subtlety, the watery softness, of the original. It works more as an etude for orchestra than as an authentic expression of Impressionism. The Ear’s objections are to the transcription, not to the performance, which was well voiced, precise and tightly controlled.
“Mothership” by the popular American composer Mason Bates (below), who wrote the recent successful opera based on the life of the late Apple guru Steve Jobs, proved an interesting foray into contemporary music culture. It was also the Madison premiere of the 2011 work.
The electronic music in the pulsating and highly atmospheric score, including the computer-generated disco dance beat, highlighted the percussion section and the UW’s new Electro-Acoustic Research Space (EARS), which collaborated with the symphony orchestra.
The dramatic work, a novelty that is pop-infused and resembles music by John Adams a little too closely, has its pleasing and engaging moments. But overall it seems a triumph of style over substance. (You can judge for yourself from the performance with Michael Tilson Thomas in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
That said, Hutchinson nonetheless held the complex and coordinated score together, and the young audience seemed to take to the new music — a major achievement in itself.
Expect to hear many more contemporary works from Hutchinson, who says he is an unabashed champion of new music. He will include other living composers in many other concerts, including the next one on Nov. 4 and then again on Feb. 22.
To these ears, the most impressive performance came in the Symphony No. 3 “Eroica” by Ludwig van Beethoven. In its day, the difficult and long work proved revolutionary and perplexing. More recently, more than 100 conductors named it the best symphony ever written. You can’t get more establishment than that.
Yet despite being so mainstream, the “Eroica” remains a difficult and challenging work, both technically and interpretively. And this performance succeeded on both counts. That is no small feat for a new conductor and his young students to pull off in the first six weeks of school.
Especially impressive was Hutchinson’s choice to skip any pause between the third movement and the finale. It worked dramatically to maintain momentum. Such exciting attacks should be a more common practice in performing symphonies and concertos as well as chamber music.
Hutchinson seems a congenial and humorous concert hall host. His pre-concert talk (below), which he is slated to do at all performances, was helpful and informative, even if he repeated some major points when he introduced the actual performances. Hutchinson, intent on expanding the audience for classical music, is worth listening to.
Hutchinson may not possess an especially graceful or fluid podium presence that is pleasing to watch, but he gets results. Certainly both the student players and the large audience (below) seemed pleased and excited by these performances.
In the end, the concert provided plenty of reasons to look forward to hearing more from Chad Hutchinson and seeing how he develops and leaves his mark on programming and performing at the UW.
Were you there as either a performer or an audience member?
What did you think of the concert and of Chad Hutchinson’s debut?
The Ear wants to hear.
Tags: 19th century, 20th-century, 21st century, aesthetic, African American, air, Apple, arrangament, Arts, attack, audience, Beat, Beethoven, brass, Cello, century, Chamber music, champion, Classical music, composer, computer, concert hall, concerto, conduct, conductor, contemporary, control, culture, Debussy, debut, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, disco, egg, electronic, Electronic music, Eroica Symphony, esthetic, etude, excitement, exciting, expression, faculty, fance, finale, guru, hi tech, Horn, host, Impressionism, Impressionist, impressive, instrument, instrumental, interpretation, Jacob Stockinger, lecture, live, living, Ludwig van Beethoven, Madison, Mason Bates, Mead Witter School of Music, Michael Tilson Thomas, Mothership, movement, Music, musical, mystery, New Music, novel, opera, operatic, Orchestra, original, percussion, performer, Piano, podium, pomp, Prelude, premiere, professor, program, programming, promising, revolution, revolutionary, Richard Wagner, school, soufflé, Steve Jobs, Stokowski, string, strings, subtlety, symphony, talk, technology, The Sunken Cathedral, transcription, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, UW Symphony Orchestra, Viola, Violin, vocal, vocal music, water, winds, YouTube, zest
Classical music: A busy week at the UW-Madison brings the debut of a new conducting professor with the UW Symphony Orchestra plus a major voice recital, a string quintet and two master classes.
Leave a Comment
By Jacob Stockinger
It will be a busy week for classical music in Madison, especially at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Mead Witter School of Music.
Certainly the standout event is the debut of Chad Hutchinson (below). He is the new conducting teacher and succeeds James Smith.
The FREE concert by the UW Symphony Orchestra will take place on Saturday night at 8 p.m. in Mills Hall.
The intriguing program features the Prelude to the opera “Die Meistersinger” by Richard Wagner (you can hear George Solti perform it with the Vienna Philharmonic the YouTube video at the bottom); the orchestral arrangement by Leopold Stokowski of the piano prelude “The Sunken Cathedral” by Claude Debussy; the “Mothership,” with electronics, by the American composer Mason Bates; and the Symphony No. 3 “Eroica” by Ludwig van Beethoven, a work that was recently voted the best symphony ever written by more than a hundred conductors.
Here is a link to more about Hutchinson’s impressive background:
http://www.music.wisc.edu/chad-hutchinson/
And here is a schedule of other events at the UW:
WEDNESDAY
At 7:30 p.m. in Mills Hall conductor Scott Teeple leads the UW Wind Ensemble (below top) in its FREE season opener featuring music by Percy Grainger, Aaron Copland, Roger Zare and Jennifer Higdon. Also featured is guest oboist, faculty member Aaron Hill (below bottom).
Here is a link to program notes:
http://www.music.wisc.edu/event/wind-ensemble/
Also at 7:30 p.m. in nearby Morphy Recital Hall, the internationally renowned guest violist Nobuko Imai (below), from Japan, will give a free public master class in strings and chamber music.
THURSDAY
At noon in Mills Hall, guest violist Nobuko Imai (see above) will perform a FREE one-hour lunchtime concert with the Pro Arte Quartet, which has San Francisco cellist guest Jean-Michel Fonteneau substituting for the quartet’s usual cellist, Parry Karp, who is sidelined temporarily with a finger injury.
The ensemble will perform just one work: a driving and glorious masterpiece, the String Quintet No. 2 in G Major, Op. 111, by Johannes Brahms.
At 1 p.m. in Old Music Hall, Demondrae Thurman (below), a UW alumnus who is distinguished for playing the euphonium, will give a free public master class in brass.
For more information, go to:
http://www.music.wisc.edu/event/master-class-demondrae-thurman-euphonium/
NOTE: The 3:30 master class for singers by Melanie Helton has been CANCELLED. The UW hopes to reschedule it for late fall or spring.
FRIDAY
At 8 p.m. in Mills Hall, UW baritone Paul Rowe (below top, in a photo by Michael R. Anderson) and UW collaborative pianist Martha Fischer (below middle) will give a FREE concert of three songs cycles by Robert Schumann (the famed “Liederkreis); Maurice Ravel; and UW alumnus composer Scott Gendel (below bottom).
For the complete program, go to:
http://www.music.wisc.edu/event/faculty-recital-paul-rowe-voice-martha-fischer-piano-2/
SATURDAY
At 8 p.m. in Mills Hall, the UW Symphony Orchestra (below) will perform under its new conductor Chad Hutchinson. See above.
SUNDAY
At 3 p.m. the afternoon concerts by Lyle Anderson at the UW Carillon (below) on Observatory Drive will resume.
Here is a link with a schedule and more information:
http://www.music.wisc.edu/event/carillon-concert/2017-10-08/
Tags: Aaron Copland, alumnus, America, American, arrangement, Arts, Asia, baritone, Beethoven, Brahms, brass, Campus, carillon, Cello, Chad Hutchinson, class, Classical music, composer, conductor, Debussy, Demondrae Thurman, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Don Quixote, electronic, Electronic music, ensemble, Eroica, Eroica Symphony, Euphonium, faculty, Finger, free, guest, hour, injury, international, Jacob Stockinger, Japan, Jennifer Higdon, Johannes Brahms, Ludwig van Beethoven, lunch, Madison Symphony Orchestra, Mason Bates, Master, master class, masterpiece, Mead Witter School of Music, Mothership, Music, Nobuko Imai, Oboe, oboist, opera, Orchestra, Paul Rowe, Percy Grainger, Piano, Prelude, Pro Arte Quartet, program, public, quintet, Ravel, Roger Zare, San Francisco, schedule, Schumann, Season, Solti, song cycle, Stokowski, strings, Teacher, The Sunken Cathedral, time, U.S., United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, US, Vienna, Vienna Philharmonic, Viola, Violin, vocal music, Wagner, winds, Wisconsin, YouTube
Classical music: The second annual Madison New Music Festival will take place this Thursday through Sunday
1 Comment
By Jacob Stockinger
The summer classical season in Madison just keeps getting busier and more interesting.
The Ear has received the following announcement from Zachary Green (below), a native Madisonian and composer who graduated from Oregon High School and the Juilliard School, which awarded him a grant to start the first Madison New Music Festival last year. He now directs the event:
Dear friends, family, colleagues, and mentors,
I am extremely pleased to invite you to the second season of the Madison New Music Festival, taking place this Thursday-Saturday, Aug. 10-12.
The Madison New Music Festival is an annual weekend-long concert series dedicated to strengthening Madison’s cultural vitality through the celebration of fresh classical music from our lifetimes.
The festival strives to affordably and accessibly share music by the world’s leading living composers with the Madison community, with special emphasis placed on Wisconsin-based composers and performers.
This year, over the course of four concerts, we will be featuring 30 performers playing the music of over 20 composers— including the music of a different living Wisconsin composer at every concert.
The concerts will take place Thursday at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art (8 p.m.), Friday at Bethel Lutheran Church (8 p.m.), and Saturday at the Memorial Union Terrace (3 p.m.) and Robinia Courtyard (7:30 p.m.).
PROGRAM AND TICKET INFORMATION:
Thursday, Aug. 10, at 8 p.m., Madison Museum of Contemporary Art in the Overture Center. (Below is a photo at MMoCA from last year’s festival)
After an incredibly successful launch in 2016, the Madison New Music Festival is set to return to MMoCA for a concert combining contemporary visual art and new music.
The festival presents brand new pieces by emerging composers, underplayed classics of the contemporary repertoire, and shines a spotlight on new music created here in Wisconsin.
The concert at MMoCA features music with thematic ties to MMoCA’s current exhibitions, including politically charged works such as “But I Still Believe” by composer Zachary Green and inspired by Hillary Clinton’s concession speech, and “Drums of Winter” from Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and environmentalist John Luther Adams (below). You can hear “Drums of Winter” in the YouTube video at the bottom.
There will be a cash bar and opportunities to walk around the exhibits. Tickets are $10, $5 for students and FREE for MMoCA members.
Tickets: https://www.artful.ly/madison-new-music-festival/store/events/13011
Friday, Aug. 11, at 8 p.m. in Bethel Lutheran Church, 312 Wisconsin Avenue
The festival’s second night features an eclectic range of music, from the inventive, folk-inspired music of Romanian composer Doina Rotaru (below top) to the improvisatory soundscapes of recently departed legend Pauline Oliveros (below bottom).
Also featured is local composer Scott Gendel (below top) , who will present a set of his own music with frequent Madison Opera guest soprano Emily Birsan (below middle). Both are graduates of the UW-Madison.
Other performers include Chicago-based new music ensemble Chartreuse (below top), local flutist Iva Ugrcic (below middle) and local violinist Lydia Sewell (below bottom). Tickets are $10, $5 for students.
Tickets: https://www.artful.ly/madison-new-music-festival/store/events/13028
Saturday, Aug. 12, at 3 p.m., Memorial Union Terrace
Local new music wind quintet Black Marigold (below top) will perform “Beer Music” by Brian DuFord (below bottom), inspired by different kinds of beer– and you can sip as you listen!
But first, get your groove on with rhythmic works by emerging composer Andy Akiho (below top), Wilco drummer Glenn Kotche, and local percussionist Dave Alcorn (below bottom) of Clocks in Motion — interspersed with interactive interpretations of Renaissance motets and an electroacoustic work for vibraphone. Featured musicians include percussionist Garrett Mendelow and Chicago-based new music ensemble Chartreuse. Admission is FREE.
Saturday, Aug. 12, at 7:30 PM, Robinia Courtyard (Jardin Restaurant) at 827 East Washington Avenue.
Join us at Jardin Restaurant, part of the newly redeveloped Robinia Courtyard to hear local ensemble Mr. Chair (below) present an eclectic, head-banging set ranging from original compositions to versions of Erik Satie, Olivier Messiaen and Igor Stravinsky.
Also featured are the genre-bending Echelon String Quartet(below) and a mesmerizing solo bass piece performed by Grant Blaschka. Cash bar. ($10/$5 student)
Tickets: https://www.artful.ly/madison-new-music-festival/store/events/13029
Tags: 2016, acoustic music, alcorn, Andy Akiho, Art, Arts, bar, bass, Beer, beer music, Black Marigold, Brian DuFord, cash, Cello, Chamber music, Chartreuse, Chicago, church, Classical music, Clocks in Motion, colleague, composer, concerto, contemporary, courtyard, culture, Dave Alcorn, Doina Rotaru, double bass, Dramatic Soprano, drums, Drums of Winter, Echelon String Quartet, eclectic, Electronic music, Emily Birsan, environment, environmentalist, Family, festival, flute, Folk music, friend, Garrett Mendelow, Glenn Kotche, Grant Blaschka, high school, Hillary Clinton, Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, improvisation, interactive, interpretation, Iva Ugrcic, Jacob Stockinger, John Luther Adams, Juilliard School of Music, local, Lutheran, Lydia Sewell, Madison, Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Madison New Music Festival, Madison Opera, Memorial High School, Memorial Union, mentor, Messiaen, motet, Mr Chair, Museum, Music, New Music, New York City, opera, Overture Center, Pauline Oliveros, percussion, Piano, Pulitzer Prize, Renaissance, repertoire, restaurant, rhythm, Romania, Satie, Scott Gendel, singer, Singing, Sonata, song, soundscape, speech, spotlight, Stravinsky, summer, symphony, terrace, ticket, Union Terrace, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Vibraphone, video, Viola, Violin, vocal music, Wilco, Wind quintet, winds, winter, Wisconsin, YouTube, Zachary Green
Classical music: The 14th annual Wisconsin Flute Festival takes place this Saturday and offers a FREE concert at 5 p.m. Plus, a FREE recital of French flute music is this Friday at noon
3 Comments
ALERT: This week’s FREE Friday Noon Musicale, at the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive, will feature flutist Iva Ugrčić, flute and pianist Kyle Johnson performing an all-French program of music by Francis Poulenc, Olivier Messiaen, Claude Debussy and Jules Bouquet. The concert runs from 12:15 to 1 p.m.
By Jacob Stockinger
The Ear has received the following information to post:
The 14th annual Wisconsin Flute Festival will take place this coming Saturday, March 4.
The Wisconsin Flute Festival brings together flutists and music lovers of all ages from Wisconsin and the greater Midwest.
The day’s events include workshops, performances, youth and collegiate competitions, a master class, and a 2,300-plus square foot exhibition hall with purveyors of fine flutes, music and accessories.
This year’s Festival will feature guest artist Lorna McGhee (below), principal flute of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and Artist Lecturer in Flute at Carnegie Mellon University.
The 14th annual Wisconsin Flute Festival will begin at 8 a.m. in the Pyle Center at UW-Madison and will culminate in a FREE public concert beginning at 5 p.m. in Mills Concert Hall, in the Mosse Humanities Building, at UW-Madison.
This concert, “Landscapes and Love Songs,” will be performed by featured guest artist Lorna McGhee. (Sorry, The Ear has no details on the program.)
This year, an expanded variety of workshops and performances will be offered. Workshop topics will include circular breathing, articulation and vibrato, in addition to sessions on maximizing practice time, musicians’ health and interpreting musical pieces.
Participants will also have the opportunity to experience an interactive session with low flutes including; alto flutes, bass flutes and a contrabass flute (below).
Performances during the day will feature: electro-acoustic music; Telemann (below top) on historical flutes; lesser-known modern masters; Romanian composers; Latin music; Bach (below bottom) transcriptions; contemporary interpretation; and works for flute, clarinet and voice. Student soloists and chamber ensembles from UW-Whitewater and UW-Madison will present concerts.
For flutists shopping for an instrument, music or accessories, over a dozen companies and organizations from across the US will be on-site in the Festival’s exhibit hall. Technicians will be also available to evaluate instruments and conduct minor repairs.
Exhibitors include Altus Flutes, Atlantic Crossing Records, Brannen Brothers Flutemakers, Inc., Burkart Flutes & Piccolos, Di Zhao Flutes, Flute Center of New York, Flute Specialists, Flute World, Heid Music, The National Flute Association, Ward-Brodt, White House of Music and Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras.
Tickets are $20 to $35 for Festival participants. Tickets for non-flutist family members of participants (parents, siblings) are available for at a special rate of $5. Registration information is available online at wisconsinflutefestival.org. Tickets can be purchased at the Festival.
The evening concert beginning at 5 p.m. in Mills Hall, is FREE and OPEN TO THE PUBLIC.
The Wisconsin Flute Festival is a program of the Madison Flute Club.
About the Madison Flute Club
The Madison Flute Club was founded in 2002 and currently presents over 20 concerts each year to an audience of more than 1,500 community members. The club involves, on average, 35 active adult members and over 30 youth from the surrounding area.
To advance and achieve its mission, the Madison Flute Club has undertaken several large projects and partnered with numerous organizations and events in Dane County.
These projects include the commissioning and world premiere of a work for flute choir for Design MMoCA, successfully fundraising for a contrabass flute (the first such instrument in Wisconsin) and performing at the National Flute Association Convention.
Madison Flute Club ensembles and members have been featured on Wisconsin Public Radio’s The Midday with Norman Gilliland, WORT 89.9FM Madison and in the publication The Flutist Quarterly.
The 2017 Wisconsin Flute Festival is co-hosted by Madison Flute Club and UW-Madison Flute Studio.
Major funding is provided by: Heid Music, American Printing Company, Eric and Tobi Breisach, Distillery Marketing and Design, Karl Sandelin in honor of Joyce Sandelin and Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras.
Additional funding is provided by Altus Handmade Flutes, Breisach Cordell PLLC, and Dane Arts with additional funds from the Endres Mfg. Company Foundation, The Evjue Foundation, Inc., charitable arm of The Capital Times, the W. Jerome Frautschi Foundation and the Pleasant T. Rowland Foundation.
Tags: accessories, acoustic, alto, articulation, Arts, Bach, Baroque, bass, breathing, Carnegie Mellon University, Chamber music, choral music, circular breathing, clarinet, Classical music, composer, contrabass, Dane Arts, Debussy, Early music, Electronic music, Evjue Foundation, exhibition hall, First Unitarian Society of Madison, flute, Health, interpretation, Jacob Stockinger, Johann Sebastian Bach, Jules Bouquet, landscape, Latin, lecturer, Lorna McGhee, love song, Madison, Madison Flute Club, master class, Messiaen, Mozart, Music, New York, Norman Gilliland, Orchestra, Piano, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Pleasant T. Rowland, Poulenc, practice, Romania, Sonata, The Capital Times, transcription, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, UW-Whitewater, vibrato, vocal music, voice, Wisconsin, wisconsin public radio, Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras, workshop, WORT-FM 89.9, YouTube
Classical music: Five alumni composers return to UW-Madison for two FREE concerts of their work this Thursday and Friday nights. On Tuesday night, UW trombonist Mark Hetzler and friends premiere four new works.
2 Comments
ALERT: On Tuesday night at 7:30 in Mills Hall, UW-Madison trombone professor Mark Hetzler with be joined by Anthony DiSanza, drums/percussion; Vincent Fuh, piano; Ben Ferris, bass; Tom Ross-percussion; Garrett Mendelow, percussion.
Mark Hetzler and friends present a FREE concert titled “Mile of Ledges” with the premiere of four new works. Two new compositions (Falling and Mile of Ledges) by Mark Hetzler will feature lyrical and technical trombone passages, soulful and spirited piano writing, complex percussion playing and a heavy dose of electronics. In addition, the group will showcase new music by UW-Madison alum Ben Davis (his $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ for quartet and electronics) and Seattle composer David P. Jones (a chamber work for trombone, piano, bass and two percussionists).
Read a Wisconsin State Journal about Mark Hetzler. Download PDF here.
By Jacob Stockinger
If The Ear recalls correctly, alumni who return to the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music are generally performers or scholars.
All the more reason, then, to celebrate this week’s major UW event, which was organized by UW-Madison composer and teacher Stephen Dembski (below). It features five composers who trained at the UW-Madison and who are now out in the world practicing their art and teaching it to others.
Steve Dembski’s class
Dembski writes:
This week, the UW-Madison School of Music will welcome back five graduates of the composition studio who have developed creative, multi-dimensional careers in a range of fields: acoustic and electronic composition, musicology, theory, audio production, conducting, education, concert management and administration, performance, and other fields as well.
The two-day event is intended to show the breadth of talent at UW-Madison as well as demonstrating that music students focus on much more than performance as a way to shape successful careers.
The composers include: Jeffrey Stadelman (below), who is now associate professor of music composition at the University at Buffalo.
Paula Matthusen (below, BM, 2001), who is assistant professor of music at Wesleyan University.
William Rhoads (below, BM, 1996), who is vice-president of marketing and communications for Orchestra of St. Luke’s in New York City.
Andrew Rindfleisch (below, BM, 1987), who is a full-time composer living in Ohio. (You can hear his introspective and microtonal work “For Clarinet Alone” in a YouTube video at the bottom.)
Kevin Ernste (below, BM, 1997), who is professor of composition at Cornell University.
The UW-Madison School of Music will present two FREE concerts of their music, performed by the Wisconsin Brass Quintet (below top), the Wingra Woodwind Quintet (below bottom, in a photo by Michael Anderson), the UW Wind Ensemble, and other faculty members and students.
Wisconsin Brass Quintet
The FREE concerts are on this Thursday, Nov. 5, at 7:30 p.m. in Mills Hall; and on this Friday, Nov. 6, 7:30 p.m. in Mills Hall. There will be workshops and colloquia yet to be announced.
For complete composer biographies, along with comments about their works, and more information about the two-day event, visit this site:
http://www.music.wisc.edu/2015/10/08/uw-madison-composers-return/
Tags: acoustic, alumni, Andrew Rindfleisch, Arts Administration, Audio, Bachelor of Music, bachelor's, bass, Bassoon, brass, Brass quintet, Campus, careers, clarinet, communications, composer, composing, concert manager, Conducting, Cornell University, double bass, drum, electronic, electronic composition, Electronic music, flute, French horn, Horn, Jeffrey Stadelman, Kevin Ernste, Mark Hetzler, marketing, microtonality, microtones, Music education, music history, music theory, musicology, New Music, New York City, Oboe, Ohio, Orchestra of St. Luke's, Paula Matthusen, percussion, performance, Piano, reed, Seattle, Stephen Dembski, Teacher, teaching, theory, tonality, Trombone, Trumpet, Tuba, Undergraduate education, University of Buffalo, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Wesleyan University, William Rhoads, winds, Wingra Woodwind Quintet, Wisconsin Brass Quintet, Wisconsin State Journal, Woodwind quintet, woodwinds, YouTube
Classical music: The well-named Nonesuch Records turns 50 –– and keeps being a pioneer in music from budget baroque, electronic music and contemporary classical music to folk, ragtime, rock and world music.
2 Comments
By Jacob Stockinger
If you judge solely by the size of an operating budget and the number of albums released in a year, Nonesuch Records surely does not rank among the industry titans like Deutsche Grammophon, Decca or Sony Classical.
But what the label does, it does exceptionally well.
Of late, I am especially taken with Nonesuch because they feature two of my favorite pianists -– Richard Goode and Jeremy Denk (below) –- and of one my all-time favorite singers, soprano Dawn Upshaw, as well as the great Kronos Quartet.
Here is a link to the label’s website with forthcoming releases and a list of recording artists:
In addition, I find the sonic engineering Nonesuch provides is also top-notch. Much as I loved the old Emerson Quartet, when it moved from DG to Sony, it received inferior sonic engineering that favored an echoing or overly resonant ambient sound. Myself, I prefer a clean and close-up microphone that lets my own living room provide the performance space acoustics.
Anyway, I was listening to National Public Radio Wednesday afternoon last week and heard this terrifically informative report on the 50th anniversary of Nonesuch, which is based in New York City and the anniversary of which is being celebrated with special concerts and special releases.
The story particularly emphasized the foresight of the label’s longtime top boss Robert Hurwitz (below, on the left next to Kronos violist Hank Dett and producer Judith Sherman, who also recorded the world premiere commission of the Pro Arte Quartet centennial at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music.)
Using his own taste and instinct, Hurwitz anticipated the best-selling popularity of electronic music, Cuban music, ragtime music and many other genres. (Below in an interview he did at the Brooklyn Academy of Music that can be found on YouTube.) One person, it seems, can make a huge difference.
I do wish Hurwitz had offered a fuller explanation of why the wonderful and cheap budget recordings of Baroque music and early music that Nonesuch issued in the 1960s and 1970s -– the ones with the great art on the covers and the ones that hooked so many of us on relatively littkle-known works as well as masterpieces –- have not been remastered and reissued on CD.
But in any case, the NPR story provided a fascinating look at how a record company continued to expand and branch out – not by following listeners’ tastes and desires, but by ANTICIPATING them. It is kind of like what happened with Sony and the success of the Walkman.
Some things you just cannot judge by polls and surveys, no matter what the branding and PR experts say. They take personal vision and leadership and risk-taking. That is what the Nonesuch way.
Anyway, here is the link to the NPR story. I hope you find it compelling as The Ear did.
http://www.npr.org/2014/09/10/347155810/nonesuch-at-50-a-record-label-without-borders
Tags: Arts, Baroque, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Chamber music, Classical music, Cuban music, Dawn Upshaw, Deutsche Grammophon, Early music, Electronic music, Jacob Stockinger, Jeremy Denk, Kronos Quartet, Music, New Music, New York City, Nonesuch, Nonesuch Records, NPR, Piano, Pro Arte Quartet, Ragtime, Richard Goode, Singing, song, SONY, soprano, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Viola, vocal music, YouTube
Classical music: Next Friday night, Madison percussionist and marimba player Nathaniel Bartlett will explore the electronic music of Karlheinz Stockhausen in a concert at the Overture Center. Plus, this afternoon (Saturday, May 11) WYSO chamber musicians perform two FREE and PUBLIC concerts on the UW campus.
Leave a Comment
ALERT: This afternoon (Saturday, May 10), members of the Chamber Music Program (below) of the Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras (WYSO) will perform two FREE and PUBLIC concerts at 1:30 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. in Morphy Hall in the UW-Madison Humanities Building. Sorry, no word about programs and pieces.
By Jacob Stockinger
Next Friday, May 17, at 6 p.m. in Promenade Hall at the Overture Center, the Multi-Channel (Surround) Electronic Music of Karlheinz Stockhausen (below) will be performed by the Madison percussionist Nathaniel Bartlett.
Tickets are $16, $9 for students and seniors. Call the Overture Box Office at (608) 258-4141 or visit http://overturecenter.com/production/nathaniel-bartlett
Nathaniel Bartlett – who studied and worked with Stockhausen — and the Sound-Space Audio Lab will present a performance featuring the multi-channel (surround) electronic compositions GESANG DER JÜNGLINGE (Song of the Youths, 1955-1956) and KONTAKTE (1958-1960) by Karlheinz Stockhausen (1928-2007).
This concert will also include a performance of “Autumn Island” (1986) for solo marimba, by Roger Reynolds (b. 1934), performed by Nathaniel Bartlett.
For more on Nathaniel Bartlett: www.nathanielbartlett.com
For more on Roger Reynolds: www.rogerreynolds.com
For more on Karlheinz Stockhausen: www.stockhausen.org
In advance of the event, Nathaniel Bartlett (below) agreed to an email Q&A with The Ear:
Can you briefly introduce yourself and your career?
I perform, compose, improvise, engineer, and record music with a special focus on the nuances and inner details of sound and its expression in a physically immersive listening space. My main creative avenue is my music for marimba plus three-dimensional, high-definition, computer-generated sound. I have recorded four albums (all on multi-channel, high-resolution media), and will be releasing my fifth album at my May 17 event.
I was born, in 1978, and raised in Madison, Wisconsin. In addition to studying privately with marimbist Leigh Howard Stevens, I studied at the Eastman School of Music (Rochester, New York), the Royal Academy of Music (London). I hold a doctoral degree in music composition from the University of WisconsinMadison School of Music. I currently live with my wife Lisa in Madison, where I m a postdoctoral associate at the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery.
For more information, I invite you to visit my website: www.nathanielbartlett.com
What is the appeal of percussion in general and especially the marimba (below) for you?
The appeal of percussion is its huge palate of sounds, which importantly include all varieties of non-pitched sounds.
The appeal of the marimba specifically for me is harder to capture in a few words. One aspect to the marimba is its immediately impressive sonic beauty, especially when played in a nicely reverberant acoustic space.
A five-octave marimba (starting at a cello’s lowest note), like the one I use in performance, has a sonic scope and depth which allows the performer/composer to create extremely visceral, earthy and elemental sonic expressions that give the instrument the power to produce profound musical statements.
What is the appeal of new music and electronic music for you, and why should audiences pay attention too it?
This question is also a difficult one to tackle succinctly, but here are some brief thoughts. New (and recent) music is the cornerstone of a healthy musical culture, and the concert music (or art music, or whatever term one uses) culture in the US right now is profoundly sick.
The organizations in our culture that seem to think so highly of themselves — orchestras, NPR “classical” stations — are essentially zombies. They are dead bodies that only appear alive to a casual observer because they are still staggering around.
The appeal of electronic musical resources is actually similar to the appeal of percussion. Through the use of electronics, I have access to a huge sonic palate, not only in terms of timbres, but whole sonic concepts, for example, the complex kinetic spatialization of sound, and the exact repetition of a musical fragment via live recording and playback.
Tell us what you think of and would like audiences to know about Karl Stockhausen and his importance and beauty as a composer?
In short, Stockhausen (below) was a composer (1928-2007) who produced a large body of work that included pioneering endeavors with: electronically produced/manipulated sound, sound spatialization, musical structure, concert presentation, and more. He had a great deal of influence on many other composers, and part of understanding the music of today is understanding its lineage.
Is there anything special audiences should listen for in your upcoming program of specific works by Stockhausen?
Talking about specific musical characteristics with only the text I am writing here might be a little too abstract. I will, however, talk briefly about the works at the concert before they are projected.
What I can say here is that I will encourage listeners to meditate on how old this music is (1955-1960) and what that means from both artistic and technological perspectives.
For listeners new to this music, I think my only advice would be to listen to the sounds Stockhausen (below, with pre-digital electronic equipment) created for his works, as opposed to thinking about what sounds or parameters he is not using.
This is not metric, tonal music. Listening to this kind of music through a “Mozart framework” would be like attending a Shakespeare play and remarking that it did not make sense because there was no tennis being played.
Is there more you would like to say or add?
Yes! Thank you very much for asking about the upcoming performance, I really appreciate it, and it has been my pleasure to answer your questions!
Tags: Chamber music, Eastman School of Music, electronic, Electronic music, GESANG DER JÜNGLINGE, Jacob Stockinger, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Leigh Howard Stevens, London, Madison, marimba, Orchestra, Overture Center, Royal Academy of Music, Stockhausen, symphony, symphony orchestra, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras, WYSO
Recent Comments
The Well-Tempered Ear 