The Well-Tempered Ear
TODAY — Sunday, Jan. 24, at noon — a video concert by the Willy Street Chamber Players will kick off the Wisconsin Union Theater’s new concert series “Wisconsin Sound”
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By Jacob Stockinger
The Wisconsin Union Theater is excited to pilot “Wisconsin Sound,” a new video concert series featuring musicians from our very own state.
The series, which includes the UW-Madison’s Pro Arte Quartet, will have five concerts, once a month between January and May and begins with celebrated, locally grown Willy Street Chamber Players (WSCP, below in a photo by Lloyd Schultz) on TODAY — Sunday, Jan. 24 — at noon CDT.
You can see the full lineup with dates and purchase single tickets for the performance or discounted subscription for all Wisconsin Sound events here. Single tickets are $15 and subscription tickets to all five concerts are $50.
The Willy Street Chamber Players began just six years ago but has already made its mark on the Madison community, garnering accolades for its fun approach to music, accessibility and dedication to community partnerships.
The group will perform Fantasiestucke (Fantasy Pieces) for Cello and Piano, Op. 73, by Robert Schumann; Fantasy No. 2 for Violin and Piano by Florence Price (below top); Kiép Nào Có Yeu Nhau (Vietnamese Love Song) for Violin and Piano by Rachel Eubanks (below bottom); and Adagio and Allegro for Cello and Piano, Op. 70, by Robert Schumann. (You can hear the Fantasy by Florence Price in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
You may have heard these dynamic performers during our Summer Serenades at Memorial Union Terrace and other Wisconsin festivals.
The pandemic has not stopped this group from bringing beautiful music to the community; it has continued to perform virtually as well as give in-person “Micro-concerts” for one to two people and safety in mind.
“We are honored they agreed to be the first artist in this pilot series. We share in Willy Street Chamber Players’ goal of creating community through music and thought they’d be a great group to kick off the new series for that very reason,” says Wisconsin Union Theater director Elizabeth Snodgrass.
“Everyone in the arts is trying so hard to stay connected and the group’s music and positivity invite that connection,” Snodgrass adds. “I hope this will reach Wisconsin patrons as well as new listeners who may not have had the chance to hear Willy Street Chamber Players or who have not been to the Wisconsin Union Theater before.”
This blog named the Willys “Musicians of the Year” for 2016. The players were called “a fantastic breath of fresh air who invest their performances of even well-known works, such as the glorious Octet by Mendelssohn, with energy and drive, zest and good humor.” You can read that story here.
Click here for more information about Wisconsin Sound, including other upcoming performances.
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The Well-Tempered Ear 
Classical music: For reviving and securing Bach Around the Clock, The Ear names Marika Fischer Hoyt as “Musician of the Year” for 2017
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By Jacob Stockinger
Regular readers of this blog know how much The Ear likes to recognize community-based initiatives, amateur participation, and events that are affordable or free to the public and so help build and widen the audience for classical music.
On all those counts, the Musician of the Year for 2017 goes to Marika Fischer Hoyt (below) who revived Bach Around the Clock and has given it a seemingly secure future.
In Madison, Bach Around the Clock was originally sponsored and put on for several years by Wisconsin Public Radio’s music director Cheryl Dring. But when Dring left for another job five years ago, WPR ended the event, which got its national start in New Orleans and is now celebrated in many other cities to mark the March birthday of Baroque composer Johann Sebastian Bach.
Yet it is not as if Fischer Hoyt didn’t already have enough on her plate.
She is a very accomplished and very busy violist.
As a modern violist, she plays with the Madison Symphony Orchestra and is a founding member of the Ancora String Quartet (below), with which she still plays after 17 seasons. She is also a member of the Madison Symphony Orchestra.
As a specialist on the baroque viola, she is a member (below far left) of the Madison Bach Musicians who also plays for the Handel Aria Competition and the Madison Early Music Festival.
In addition, she is a private teacher who finds time to attend early music festivals around the country.
To get an idea of what she has done to put Bach Around the Clock (BATC) on a stable footing here, read the update posting from a couple of days ago:
https://welltempered.wordpress.com/2017/12/28/classical-music-bach-around-the-clock-2018-is-set-for-march-10-here-is-a-year-end-update-with-more-impressive-news/
Not only did Fischer Hoyt obtain the participation of some 80 performers — students and teachers, amateurs and professionals, individuals and groups– she also got cooperation, facilities, performers and help from St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, 1833 Regent Street, on Madison’s near west side.
She obtained donations of money and even food to stage the event.
She herself played in the event that drew hundreds of listeners.
She lined up local sound engineers who recorded the entire event, which was then broadcast in parts by Rich Samuels (below) on WORT-FM 89.9 and streamed live as far away as London.
She served as an emcee who also conducted brief interviews about the music with the many performers (below right, with flutist Casey Oelkers)
Recognizing she can’t keep doing so much by herself, the energetic Fischer Hoyt has turned BATC into a more formal and self-sustaining organization with a board of directors.
She has sought advice from experts about Bach and Bach festivals.
She applied for and won one of five national grants from Early Music America in Boston.
She has consulted legal help to make BATC a nonprofit charitable organization, which should help guarantee a steady stream of funding.
And artistically, she has added a back-up mini-orchestra to accompany singers and instrumentalists.
The event this year is on Saturday, March 10, a little early for Bach’s 333rd birthday (March 31, 1685) but a smart decision to avoid spring break in the schools and at the UW, and to help recruit the many performers who are also important, if secondary, Musicians of the Year.
But the center of the event, the force holds it all together, is Marika Fischer Hoyt and all the hard work, done over a long time, that she has invested in making Bach Around the Clock a permanent part of Madison’s classical music schedule and cultural scene.
If you didn’t go last year, try it this year. It is wonderful, inspiring and enjoyable.
Please join The Ear in congratulating Marika Fischer Hoyt for making Bach Around the Clock the success it now is and giving it the future it now has. Leave your comments about her and BATC in the COMMENT section.
To celebrate, here is a YouTube video of the Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 by Johann Sebastian Bach:
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