The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: There was so much to like about the Grand Tour finale of the 2019 Madison Early Music Festival. But where were the high notes in Allegri’s legendary “Miserere”?
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By Jacob Stockinger
Fair is fair.
Before he talks about last Saturday night’s conclusion of the successful 2019 Madison Early Music Festival – which marked its 20th anniversary — The Ear has a confession to make: He generally prefers later Baroque music and he generally prefers instrumental music to vocal or choral music.
That said, he nonetheless had a memorable and very enjoyable time on the “Grand Tour” during the well-attended All-Festival concert. There was so much to like and to admire.
The concert used the conceit of a Grand Tour by a composite 17th-century traveler going to London, Venice, Rome, Naples, Paris and Dresden to take in the local sights and local music, and included lesser-known composers such as William Lawes and William Child as well as such famous figures as Claudio Monteverdi, Giovanni Gabrieli , Jean-Baptiste Lullyand Heinrich Schütz.
Like most journeys, this one – once again assembled in an ingenious scissors-and-paste job by early music specialist Grant Herreid (below) – had many entertaining and uplifting moments.
But it also had one big disappointment.
The Ear really looked forward to hearing a live performance of the famous “Miserere” by Gregorio Allegri (below) as a high point. But those haunting, ultra-high descant notes that give you goosebumps and that you never forget hearing just never materialized.
Maybe it had to do with the different ornamentation that the MEMF forces used. Maybe it was based on a different manuscript or score. Maybe there was no one capable of singing those spellbinding and unforgettable high notes.
Whatever the reason, The Ear’s hope for a live performance of the dramatic and iconic work were dashed and the famous, even classic, recorded versions – the 1980 recording by the Tallis Scholars is heard in the YouTube video at the bottom — remain for him the unsurpassed standard.
The evening also had its ironies. That same night on the NBC TV news The Ear saw a story about “overtourism” in Europe and China. Venice, for example, has now shrunk to only about 50,000 unhappy residents who put up with some 20 million tourists a year.
But centuries ago, travel was a rare and exotic luxury of the wealthy and well-educated, not an affordable indulgence or curiosity by ever-expanding middle classes. And this metaphorical trip proved an ideal vehicle to sample 16th- and 17th-century music in England, France, Germany and Italy.
Combining high culture and low, Herreid chose witty and detailed travelogue texts that gave the audience the rich flavor of various cultures at the time.
Details mattered to the four sharp-eyed travelers on which this tour was based. So as “our hero” wandered, we got to hear about the “libidinous ladies” of Naples and the musical talented courtesans of Venice as well as the richly attired archbishop of Paris attending a feast day service in the newly finished Notre-Dame cathedral.
Such descriptions were well delivered by unnamed narrators (below) from the chorus and proved a refreshingly earthy and entertaining counterpoint to the more serious spiritual and religious music of the era.
Another big satisfaction was the exceptional quality of the ensemble playing – exhibited even in large amounts of less interesting music — by the many singers and instrumentalists on the stage of Mills Hall, and, at one point, in the hall’s balcony.
Whether the players and singers were conducted by Herreid or by assistant conductor Jerry Hui — a UW-Madison graduate who is now a tenured professor at UW-Stout — the music sounded tight, authentic and expressive.
As for more superficial pleasures, it is great visual fun watching such early versions of modern string, wind and percussion instruments being played — trombone-like sackbuts, oboe-like shawms, flute-like recorders and lute-like theorbos. (Below are cello-like viols.)
The players, both faculty and students, were particularly convincing on their own in the sound painting done to depict battle scenes and political upheaval. And who will ever forget the surprise of loud foot-stomping by all the performers and conductor?
Herreid was absolutely spot-on to keep the program to about 80 minutes with no intermission. It helped the audience stay in the spirit of the Grand Tour and added cohesion to the program.
The Grand Tour, in short, proved outstanding in concept and excellent in execution.
But was The Ear alone in missing to those high notes?
Tags: #All-FestivalConcert, #ArgentineanComposer, #BaroqueEra, #BaroqueMusic, #BaroqueOrnamentation, #BaroqueRecorder, #BaroqueSingingStyle, #BlogPost, #BlogPosting, #BlogReview, #ChineseTourism, #ChoralMusic, #ClassicalRecording, #ClaudioMonteverdi, #DresdenGermany, #EnsemblePlaying, #FacebookPost, #FacebookPosting, #FacultyMember, #FeastDay, #GiovanniGabrieli, #GrandTour, #GrantHerreid, #GregorioAllegri, #HeinrichSchütz, #HighCulture, #HighPoint, #InstrumentalMusic, #Jean-BaptisteLully, #JerryHui, #LivePerformance, #LondonEngland, #LowCulture, #MadisonEarlyMusicFestival, #MeadWitterSchoolofMusic, #Middle-Class, #MillsHall, #Musicfaculty, #MusicReview, #NaplesItaly, #NBCNews, #NotreDame, #NotreDamedeParis, #ParisFrance, #ReligiousMusic, #RomeItaly, #SaturdayNight, #Scissors-and-Paste, #Sharp-eyed, #SistineChapel, #SoundPainting, #TallisScholars, #TelevisionNews, #theorbomusic, #UniversityofWisconsin-Madison, #VeniceItaly, #VocalMusic, #WealthyPeople, #Well-Attended, #Well-Education, #WilliamLawes, #YouTubevideo, ago, All-Festival concert, anniversary, anonymous, archbishop, Arts, attire, audience, authentic, balcony, Baroque, Baroque music, battle, blog, capable, cathedral, Cello, centuries, century, China, choral music, chorus, classic, Classical music, Claudio Monteverdi, cohere, cohesion, Compact Disc, composer, composite, concept, Concert, conduct, conductor, confession, counterpoint, courtesan, culture, cultures, deliver, delivered, description, detail, detailed, disappointment, drama, dramatic, Dresden, Early music, earthy, England, enjoyable, ensemble, entertaining, era, Europe, evening, excellent, execution, exotic, expressive, Facebook, faculty, fair, famous, feast day, fine, finish, flavor, flute, foot, forces, forget, forward, France, fun, Germany, Giovanni Gabrieli, goosebumps, Grand Tour, Grant Herreid, Gregorio Allegri, haunting, Heinrich Schütz, high, high culture, high notes, high point, iconic, ideal, ingenious, instrumental, instrumental music, instrumentalists, interesting, intermission, ironies, irony, Italy, Jacob Stockinger, Jean-Baptiste Lully, Jerry Hui, journey, ladies, lesser-known, libidinous, libido, like, link, live performance, local, London, loud, low, low culture, Lully, lute, luxury, Madison, Madison Early Music Festival, manuscript, materialize, matter, Mead Witter School of Music, MEMF, memorable, metaphorical, million, Mills Hall, Miserere, moment, Music, music review, Naples, narrator, NBC, new, news, nightly, Notre Dame, Notre Dame de Paris, Oboe, Orchestra, ornamentation, outstanding, overtourism, Paris, percussion, performer, playing, pleasurer, political, post, posting, prefer, professor, program, rare, reader, recorder, recording, refreshing, religious, religious music, resident, review, rich, Rome, sackbut, sample, satisfaction, Saturday night, scene, score, serious, service, share, shawm, short, sights, singers, Singing, Sistine Chapel, Sound, sound painting, spellbinding, spirit, spiritual, stage, standard, stomp, string, successful, superficial, surprise, tag, talented, Tallis Scholars, Television, television news, tenure, texts, theorbo, tight, time, tourism, tourists, traveler, travelogue, trip, Trombone, TV, unforgettable, unhappy, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, unknown, unnamed, unsurpassed, upheaval, uplifting, UW-Stout, Vatican, vehicle, Venice, version, Viol, Viola, Violin, vocal music, watch, wealth, wealthy, well-educated, William Lawes, Wind, Wisconsin, witty, year, YouTube
Classical music: The Middleton Community Orchestra and UW duo-pianists showcase the remarkable music of Camille Saint-Saens and Mozart in the popular concert that closes its season
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By Jacob Stockinger
Here is a special posting, a review written by frequent guest critic and writer for this blog, John W. Barker. Barker (below) is an emeritus professor of Medieval history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He also is a well-known classical music critic who writes for Isthmus and the American Record Guide, and who hosts an early music show once a month on Sunday morning on WORT-FM 89.9. For years, he served on the Board of Advisors for the Madison Early Music Festival and frequently gives pre-concert lectures in Madison.
By John W. Barker
The mostly amateur Middleton Community Orchestra (below, in a photo by Margaret Barker) closed its season Thursday night at the Middleton Performing Arts Center with a promising and well-received program.
The centerpiece featured two graduate student soloists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music, pianists Thomas Kasdorf (below right) and Satoko Hayami (below left), who joined in Mozart’s Concerto in E-flat Major, K. 365, for two pianos and orchestra. The two soloists were alert and polished collaborators. (You can hear the energetic and catchy final movement, used in the Academy Award-winning film “Amadeus,” in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Conductor Steve Kurr (below) set a bouncy pace but a rather fast and overpowering one, and with an orchestra — especially strings — quite overblown by the standards of Mozart’s day.
The MCO was blessed by the loan of a very special model of a Model B Steinway instrument, now owned and lovingly restored by Farley’s House of Pianos. This was paired against a Steinway of much later vintage, owned by the hall. But nowhere was there identification about which piano was which as they sat onstage, much less which pianist was playing which piano (and they switched between the two works utilizing them.) This was disappointing for it prevented making an informed comparison of the two instruments.
Camille Saint-Saens (1835-1921, below) is backhandedly treated as being on the margins of composer greatness. But his scope was remarkable, as witnessed by the two works that were the program’s bookends.
The opener was his humorous Suite, “Carnival of the Animals.” This set of 14 short pieces was written for one private performance, in chamber terms, one player per part. So the orchestra that was used — of 87 listed musicians, 60 of them were string players — became a crushing distortion. The two pianists were a bit formal, but ideally facile.
Saint-Saens made no provision for any kind of spoken text, certainly not in French. In the middle of the last century, the American poet of high-spirited doggerel, Ogden Nash, wrote wickedly funny verses with offbeat rhymes and puns to go with each movement.
It was these Nash verses that Wisconsin Public Radio host Norman Gilliland (below), who was only identified as the “narrator,” read with a good bit of tongue-in-cheek. Nowhere are these at all identified or credited in the bumbling program booklet. (Many in the audience might have just thought that they were written by Gilliland himself.)
In many of the suite’s movements, Saint-Saens quoted or alluded to hit tunes by earlier composers, for parodistic purposes. Unfortunately, there are no program notes in the booklet, so these tidbits would easily go unnoticed by many listeners.
Saint-Saens composed, among his numerous orchestral works, a total of five symphonies, only three of which are numbered. I had originally been given to expect No. 2, a charming work I love, as the program closer. All but the last of them are early works in a graceful post-Classical style.
But No. 3 was composed much later in his life, and in a more expansive style. This is a frequently performed spectacle, unconventional in plan and in scoring. It adds the two pianists and an organ — hence the nickname the “Organ Symphony.”
Unfortunately, the hall has no organ of its own, so the substitute was a rig of electronic organ with its own booming speakers and exaggerated pedal notes. Again totally unmentioned is that this contraption was played by MCO sound technician Alex Ford (below, with the portable electronic organ keyboard from Austria with its computer-screen stops).
This kind of organ could never be integrated into the full orchestral texture and served only to allow the orchestra to play this grandiose score. Such ambition was backed by really splendid and well-balanced orchestral playing.
As intended, the large local audience, with many children and families, was wildly enthusiastic.
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Classical music: The Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras (WYSO) perform their annual Winterfest concerts this Saturday afternoon — with guest clarinetist Amitai Vardi — and on Saturday, March 2
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By Jacob Stockinger
The Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras (WYSO, below is the Youth Orchestra) will present the Diane Ballweg Winterfest Concerts this Saturday, Feb. 16, and Saturday, March 2, in Mills Concert Hall in the Mosse Humanities Building, 455 North Park Street in Madison, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music.
WYSO orchestras will perform pieces by Carl Maria von Weber, Antonin Dvorak, Georges Bizet, Sergei Prokofiev, Richard Wagner, Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Manuel DeFalla, Johann Strauss, Modest Mussorgsky and others. For a complete program listing, go to: https://www.wysomusic.org/diane-ballweg-winterfest-2019-repertoire/
“These are wonderful works and the orchestras are progressing beautifully in rehearsal,” said WYSO music director Kyle Knox (below). “It looks to be a memorable concert series.”
Guest clarinetist Amitai Vardi (below) will perform Weber’s Concertino for Clarinet and Orchestra, Op. 26, with the Youth Orchestra during their Feb. 16 concert. (You can hear Weber’s Concertino in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Amitai Vardi — his father Uri Vardi teaches cello at the UW-Madison — is a WYSO alumnus who grew up in Madison. He performs regularly with the Cleveland Orchestra and is currently a professor at Kent State University in Ohio.
“WYSO was the first orchestra I ever played in,” Vardi said. “The experience developed my listening skills, knowledge about ensemble playing, love for orchestral music, and taught me how to be a well-rounded musician.”
Concert tickets are available 45 minutes prior to each concert, and are $10 for adults and $5 for youth 18 and under.
Visit www.wysomusic.org to learn more about the various orchestras and about the WYSO program.
WYSO students travel from communities throughout southern Wisconsin and northern Illinois each weekend throughout the concert season to rehearse on the UW-Madison campus.
Each orchestra performs three concerts per season, with additional performance opportunities available to students, including ensembles and chamber groups.
Diane Ballweg Winterfest Concerts
Saturday, Feb. 16 in Mills Hall
4 p.m. Youth Orchestra
With guest artist Amitai Vardi, clarinet
Saturday, March 2, 2019, Mills Hall
11:30 a.m. Opus One and Sinfonietta
1:30 p.m. Concert Orchestra
4 p.m. Philharmonia Orchestra and Harp Ensemble
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The Well-Tempered Ear 