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By Jacob Stockinger
The 16th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition got under way this past Thursday, June 2, and will run through Saturday, June 18, when the winners will be announced.
2022 marks the 60th anniversary year of the competition, which the American pianist Van Cliburn founded at Texas Christian University after his 1958 Cold War victory in the Tchaikovsky International Competition in Moscow,.
You can follow it all online. The complete impressive competition is being broadcast on medici.tv and on YouTube.
But The Ear has used the competition’s own streaming website and finds the videos, sound quality, contestant biographies and background information very professional and helpful. So far, it has been a thoroughly satisfying, enjoyable and engaging experience. I highly recommendation it for students, amateur pianists and all music lovers.
For The Ear, one of the most impressive performances from yesterday was given by the 21-year-old Chinese pianist Yangrui Cai (below), heard in the YouTube video at the bottom. Such beautiful and subtly virtuosic but shaded Liszt and Brahms is not often heard.
From there you can hear live performances, past performances and many facts , including the complete schedule, about The Cliburn, as it is now called. All times are Central Daylight.
Starting at 10 a.m. today — Saturday, June 4 — will see the final 10 performances (3 in the morning and night, four in the afternoon) of the preliminary round, which has featured 30 pianists in 40-minute solo recitals. Except for a specially commissioned “Fanfare Toccata” by Sir Stephen Hough, who is also on the jury, the choice of programs is entirely up to the individual contestants.
The road to the Cliburn is not easy.
It started with 388 applicants. That was trimmed down to 72 by preliminary judges. Out of 72, 30 were chosen by jurors to compete.
After today, it will be on to the quarter-finals with 18 contestants in 40-minute recitals with no repetition from the preliminary round; then the semi-final round with 12 contestants in a combination of 60-minute solo recital along with a Mozart piano concerto accompanied by the Fort Worth Symphony conducted by the Nicholas McGegan, who is famous for his interpretations of Baroque and Classical era music; and the final concerto round with each contestant play two concertos with Fort Worth Symphony under famed conductor Marin Alsop, who is also the head juror.
The Ear will be posting his own thoughts as he experiences the extensive competition, maybe after each round or even each day.
But The Ear also wants to hear from you.
Do you have thoughts about the various contestants?
Who are your favorites and why?
Thoughts about the programs and repertoire being played?
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By Jacob Stockinger
“We are living in a Golden Age of pianists,” famed concert pianist, Juilliard teacher and frequent Madison performer Emanuel Ax (below) has said.
He should know. But you would never guess that from the recently announced next season at the Wisconsin Union Theater (below).
The WUT has not booked a solo pianist for the 2022-23 season.
Is The Ear the only one who has noticed and is disappointed?
Who else feels bad about it?
After all, this is the same presenting organization that brought to Madison such legendary pianists as Sergei Rachmaninoff, Ignaz Jan Paderewski, Percy Grainger, Arthur Rubinstein, Vladimir Horowitz, Dame Myra Hess, Guiomar Novaes, Egon Petri, Robert Casadesus, William Kapell, Claudio Arrau, Alexander Brailowsky, Gary Graffman, Glenn Gould, Rosalyn Tureck, Byron Janis, Misha Dichter, Peter Serkin, André Watts, Lili Kraus and Garrick Ohlsson
It is the same hall (below) in which The Ear has heard Rudolf Serkin, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Angela Hewitt, Alfred Brendel, Murray Perahia, Valentina Lisitsa, Andras Schiff, Joyce Yang, Yefim Bronfman, Jeremy Denk, Ingrid Fliter, Richard Goode, Leon Fleisher, Simone Dinnerstein, Wu Han and so many other great and memorable names including, of course, Emanuel Ax.
What a history!
As you can see and as The Ear likes to say, the Wisconsin Union Theater is “The Carnegie Hall of Madison.” For over 100 years, it is where the great ones play.
One irony is that many of those former bookings of pianists took place when the University of Wisconsin School of Music had many more pianists on the faculty and provided a major alternative venue for piano recitals.
Another irony is that so many young people take piano lessons (below) and are apt to want to attend, probably with their parents, to hear a live professional concert piano recital. You would think the WUT would also see the advantages of having such community outreach links to the public and to music education, especially since the WUT has hosted Open Piano Day for the public. (See the YouTube video of a Channel 3000 story in February 2020 at the bottom.)
From what The Ear reads, there are lots of up-and-coming pianists, many affordable names of various winners of national and international competitions. They should be affordable as well as worthy of being introduced to the Madison public.
But that seems a mission now largely left to the Salon Piano Series.
Plus, so many of the new pianists are young Asians who have never appeared here, which should be another draw for the socially responsible and diversity-minded WUT.
But that is another story for another day.
What do you think of the WUT not presenting a solo pianist next season?
Maybe there will be a pianist booked for the 2023-24 season.
What pianists would you like see booked by the WUT student programming committee?
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By Jacob Stockinger
He fights and defends his native country with beautiful sounds.
Ukraine’s most famous living composer has had to flee his war-torn country and — like some 3 million fellow Ukrainians in various other countries — is now living as a a war refugee in Germany.
He is Valentin Sylvestrov (below), 84, and has survived both World War II and the Nazi occupation as well as the Soviet rule experiencing democracy and freedom after the fall of the USSR and now the devastating Russian invasion five weeks ago.
The irony is that his music, which The Ear can’t recall ever hearing performed live in Madison — although Wisconsin Public Radio recently featured a beautiful choral work — seems calming and peaceful, even consoling.(Please correct me if I am mistaken.) Many people compare him to the style of Arvo Pärt, his Eastern European contemporary and colleague in Estonia.
Little wonder that his works have found a new popularity in worldwide concerts as the world hopes for the survival and victory of Ukraine — below is Ukraine’s flag — over Vladimir’s Putin’s army and war crimes.
His works have been particularly popular at fundraisers and memorials. They underscore the long history and importance of Ukraine’s tradition of making music, which has been recounted in the news features you find in the press, on TV, on radio and elsewhere in the media including live streams and recorded videos other media, especially the Internet.
As far as The Ear can tell, his most popular work in the concert hall these days is his hauntingly beautiful 1937 “Prayer for Ukraine.” You can hear it, in an orchestra version, in a YouTube video at the bottom.
As background here are two different interviews with the distressed and saddened Sylvestrov in exile.
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By Jacob Stockinger
The Ear has received the following announcement to post about this season’s final Just Bach online concert this Wednesday:
Greetings from Just Bach!
We hope this finds you all well, enjoying the spring, and ready to experience more of the timeless beauty of Bach’s music.
Our May concert features musical highlights from this extraordinary past season.
The complete program listing is below. It is organized in two parts, corresponding to the two semesters.
Indoor singing was risky during the pandemic, so the bulk of our programming was instrumental, with strings and keyboard for the most part (below in a photo by Barry Lewis).
The Sinfonia from the Christmas Oratorio was recorded at St. Matthias Episcopal Church in Waukesha, because of the Dane County Emergency Order prohibiting indoor gatherings in November and December during the pandemic.
We were back at Luther Memorial Church for the January concert, and by April we were able to include woodwinds (below, in a photo by Barry Lewis)
You can view the May concert here, starting at 8 a.m. this Wednesday, May 19, and then staying available indefinitely: https://justbach.org/concerts/
Viewing the concerts is FREE, but we ask those who are able, to help us pay our musicians by making a tax-deductible donation at: https://justbach.org/donate
Just Bach will take a break for the summer, and concerts will resume in September.
Here is the May program:
• Welcome
Part I – Fall Semester
• Cantata 146: Sinfonia
• Violin Sonata, BWV 1001: movement 4 Presto
• Double Violin Concerto: movement 3 Allegro (in the YouTube video, with an animated graphic, at the bottom)
• Christmas Oratorio, Part II: Sinfonia
• Christmas Oratorio: Chorale “Ich steh’ an deiner Krippen hier” (I stand here by your crib)
Part II – Spring Semester
• Cantata 35: Sinfonia
• Trio Sonata, BWV 526: movement 2 Largo
• Violin Sonata, BWV 1019: movement 5 Allegro
• Flute Sonata BWV 1034: movement 1 Adagio ma non tanto
• Cantata 42: Sinfonia
• Cantata 149: Chorale “Ach Herr, laß dein lieb Engelein” (O Lord, let your dear little angel)
Performers are: Kangwon Kim, Christine Hauptly Annin, Leanne League, Xavier Pleindoux, Nathan Giglierano and Aaron Yarmel, violin; Marika Fischer Hoyt, viola; Charlie Rasmussen and Lindsey Crabb, cello; Linda Pereksta and Monica Steger, traverse flute; Marc Vallon, bassoon; Grammy-winner Sarah Brailey, soprano; John Chappell Stowe and Jason Moy, harpsichord; Mark Brampton Smith, organ; and Bruce Bengston, organ.
Dave Parminter is the videographer and Barry Lewis is the photographer.
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
The Ear has received the following announcement to post:
The Wisconsin Chamber Choir (WCC, below) with a special guest — Grammy Award-winning soprano and UW-Madison graduate Sarah Brailey – will perform this Saturday, May 15, at 7 p.m.
“Music She Wrote” is a celebration of music composed by a highly diverse group of women from many ages.
Choir members will sing from their individual cars using wireless microphones, listening to the sound of the whole choir via their car radios.
The audience is invited to listen in live on YouTube and to let us know they are interested by sending an RSVP to our Facebook event.
There is no charge to view the livestream, but donations will be welcome.
Here are the links to hear the performance LIVE on YouTube or Facebook:
The WCC had scheduled a regular concert with an all-female cast of composers for May 2020, which fell victim to Covid-19. As it became obvious that the pandemic would last longer, the WCC started exploring new ways of making and disseminating music.
From September 2020, we resumed activity in the shape of the Parking Lot Choir, generating local media coverage from WKOW-TV and Madison Magazine, whose story was headlined “Forget tailgates, parking lots are for choir practice.”
The result of this first rehearsal run was the widely acclaimed “Car Carols” concert in December 2020, whose format is the model for “Music She Wrote.”
In addition to the Parking Lot Choir, three smaller groups from the WCC assembled at the Edgewood College Amphitheater on Saturday mornings to rehearse (below) in widely spaced formations, wearing specially designed singer masks.
Another such group, made up of our members from southeastern Wisconsin, met in Whitewater on Sunday afternoons. Recordings by those four small groups will be aired during the May 15 broadcast in addition to live singing by the Parking Lot choristers.
The program includes: the Garden Songs by Fanny Hensel, née Mendelssohn (Felix’s sister, below), which were intended for outdoor performance; and Ethel Smyth’s March of the Women, the anthem of the women’s suffrage movement in the English-speaking world.
In addition to works by African American composers Ysaÿe M. Barnwell (below top) and Rosephanye Powell and by Cuban composer Beatriz Corona (below second), the program includes samples from outside the Western tradition — Lamma Badaa Yatathannaa, sung in Arabic, by Shireen Abu-Shader (below third), who hails from Jordan but received her academic education in the U.S. and Canada; and two pieces by Japanese composer Makiko Kinoshita (below bottom).
Western early music is represented by Italian composers Raffaella Aleotti (below top) and Chiara Cozzolani (below bottom), who lived in the 16th and 17th centuries.
Finally, there is singer-songwriter Judy Collins with her Song for Sarajevo, composed for the children of the war in Bosnia in 1994 and arranged by her longtime collaborator, Russell Walden. (You can hear it in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Sarah Brailey (below, in a photo by Miranda Loud), a native of Wisconsin, studied at the Eastman School of Music and the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where she has just completed her doctorate. A consummate musician and internationally acclaimed soloist, she recently won a Grammy Award in the Best Classical Vocal Solo Album category for her role as The Soul in the world premiere recording of Ethel Smyth’s The Prison.
She is familiar to Madison audiences not only as a performer and co-founder of Just Bach but also as the co-host of WORT’s Musica Antiqua show on FM 89.9 and the director of Grace Presents.
As a graduate student, she joined the WCC for two seasons from 2004 to 2006. We are thrilled to welcome her back! For more information on Sarah, see her website at https://sarahbrailey.com
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.
ALERT: This Sunday, April 25, from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. the five winners of this year’s Beethoven Competition at the UW-Madison will perform in a winners’ concert. Included in the program are the popular and dramatic “Appassionata” Sonata, Op. 57, and the famous and innovative last piano sonata, No. 32 in C minor, Op 111. Here is a link to the YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMF0Hd1MJwMg. Click on “Show More” and you can see the full programs and biographical profiles of the winners.
By Jacob Stockinger
The concert could hardly be more timely or the subject more relevant.
Think of the events in and near Minneapolis, Chicago and elsewhere in the U.S.; of the Black Lives Matter movement and social protest; of the political fight for D.C. statehood and voting rights – all provide a perfect context for an impressive student project that will debut online TONIGHT, Saturday, April 24, at 7 p.m.
The one-hour free concert “Verisimilitudes: A Journey Through Art Song in Black, Brown and Tan” originated at the UW-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music. It seems an ideal way for listeners to turn to music and art for social and political commentary, and to understand the racial subtexts of art.
Soprano Quanda Dawnyell Johnson (below) created, chose and performs the cycle of songs by Black composers with other Black students at the UW-Madison.
Click on “Show More” to see the complete program and more information.
Here is the artist’s statement:
“Within the content of this concert are 17 art songs that depict the reality of the souls of a diasporic people. Most of the lyricists and all of the composers are of African descent. In large part they come from the U.S. but also extend to Great Britain, Guadeloupe by way of France, and Sierra Leone.
“They speak to the veracity of Black life and Black feeling. A diasporic African reality in a Classical mode that challenges while it embraces a Western European vernacular. It is using “culture” as an agent of resistance.
“I refer to verisimilitude in the plural. While syntactically incorrect, as it relates to the multiple veils of reality Black people must negotiate, it is very correct.
“To be packaged in Blackness, or should I say “non-whiteness” is to ever live in a world of spiraling modalities and twirling realities. To paraphrase the great artist, Romare Bearden, in “calling and recalling” — we turn and return, then turn again to find the place that is our self.
“I welcome you to… Verisimilitudes: A Journey Through Art Song in Black, Brown, and Tan”
Here, by sections, is the complete program and a list of performers:
I. Nascence
Clear Water — Nadine Shanti
A Child’s Grace — Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson
Night — Florence Price (below)
Big Lady Moon — Samuel Coleridge-Taylor
II. Awareness
Lovely, Dark, and Lonely — Harry T. Burleigh
Grief –William Grant Still (below)
Prayer — Leslie Adams
Interlude, The Creole Love Call — Duke Ellington
III. The Sophomore
Mae’s Rent Party, We Met By Chance –Jeraldine Saunders Herbison
The Barrier — Charles Brown
IV. Maturity
Three Dream Portraits: Minstrel Man, Dream Variation; I, Too — Margaret Bonds (below)
Dreams — Lawren Brianna Ware
Song Without Words — Charles Brown
Legacy
L’autre jour à l’ombrage (The Other Day in the Shade) — Joseph Boulogne (Chevalier de Saint-Georges, below)
The Verisimilitudes Team
Quanda Dawnyell Johnson — Soprano and Project Creator
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
The Ear has received the following notice from Just Bach about the FREE concert they will post starting at 8 a.m. this Wednesday morning, April 21.
Our April concert program opens with a welcome and overview from our co-director, Grammy-winning soprano and UW-Madison graduate student Sarah Brailey (below, in a photo by Miranda Loud).
And then comes the music: after a season of pieces for strings and keyboards, we’re delighted to welcome woodwinds back to our stage! (Below from left, in a photo by Barry Lewis, are Monica Steger, Linda Pereksta and UW-Madison Professor Marc Vallon.)
The exuberant Sinfonia from Cantata 42 was composed for the first Sunday after Easter, and its jubilant writing is the perfect way to celebrate spring and the expanded musical forces (below, in a photo by Barry Lewis) made possible by the vaccine.
Linda Pereksta follows this up with a performance of the Sonata in E Minor for Flute and Keyboard, BWV 1034. Her musical partner is harpsichordist Jason Moy (below, in a photo by Barry Lewis), making his Just Bach debut.
The program closes with our popular chorale sing-along, this time “Der Herr ist mein getreuer Hirt” (The Lord Is My Faithful Shepherd), BWV 104. (You can hear it in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Sarah Brailey introduces the text, Andrew Schaeffer plays the music on the organ, and then Sarah and Andrew perform it together. The music and text are displayed on the computer screen, so please join in, if you’d like!
Concert viewers are invited to a half-hour live Zoom Post-concert Reception is this Wednesday night, April 21, at 7 p.m. Chat with the performers and other audience members, via this link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85490470546…
Viewing the concerts is free, but we ask those who are able, to help us pay our musicians with a tax-deductible donation: https://justbach.org/donate/
The final Just Bach concert of this season launches on Wednesday, May 19.
Performers are: Linda Pereksta, traverso 1; Monica Steger, traverso 2; Marc Vallon, bassoon; Leanne League, violin 1; Aaron Yarmel, violin 2; Marika Fischer Hoyt, viola; Lindsey Crabb, cello; Jason Moy, harpsichord; Sarah Brailey, soprano; Andrew Schaeffer, organ.
Dave Parminter is the videographer and Barry Lewis is the photographer.
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
Starting tonight and over the next two weeks, as the spring semester at the UW-Madison comes to a close, there will be more than two dozen student recitals to listen to. (Below is the YouTube video for the concert this Thursday night, April 15, at 6:30 p.m. of the Marvin Rabin String Quartet that is comprised of graduate students.)
Often two or more concerts a day are scheduled, often at 3:30 p.m. and 6:30 p.m.
That much is typical.
What is not typical during the pandemic is that technology will allow the recitals to be presented live-streamed and virtual.
The downside is that the students will not experience performing before a live audience.
But there is an upside.
Going virtual also means that the recitals will be available longer to family, friends and interested listeners here as well as around the country and — especially for international students — the world. (Below, in a photo by Bryce Richter for the UW-Madison, is the Mead Witter Foundation Concert Hall in the Hamel Music Center.)
It also means you can hear them when it is convenient for you and not at the actual scheduled times.
The Ear has heard his share of student recitals and often finds them to be exceptional events.
If you go to the Mead Witter School of Music’s website, you can see the concerts and the lineups.
You will see that there will be student recitals of vocal music, brass music, wind music, string music and piano music. There are solo recitals, chamber music and even a symphony orchestra concert. (Below, in a photo by Bryce Richter for the UW-Madison, is the Collins Recital Hall in the Hamel Music Center.)
There are too many details for each concert to list them all here individually.
But if you go to the Concerts and Events page on the music school’s outstanding website, you can hover the cursor over the event and then click on the event and get everything from the performers and programs to program notes, a performer biography and a photo with a link to the YouTube performance.
On the YouTube site, if you click on “See More” you will see more details and can even set up an alarm for when the concert starts.
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
Yesterday – Sunday, March 21 — was the actual birthday, the 336th, of Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750).
But the 10-day virtual and online celebration being held by Bach Around the Clock (BATC) continues.
Here are the pieces and performers that will take place.
The Ear is especaially pleased by some of the transcriptions, which offer more proof of just how indestructible and versatile Bach’s music remains.
Particularly interesting is the string quartet version of the famous cantata “Wachet auf” (Sleepers, Wake) and the Three-Part Inventions or Sinfonias transcribed for marimba, and played by Sean Kleve (below), a UW-Madison graduate who performs with the critically acclaimed experimental Madison-based percussion ensemble Clocks in Motion.
• Minuet 2 in G Major, Anh 116; Suite in G Minor, BWV 822; Gavotte from Double Concerto in D Minor, BWV 1043, I. Vivace. Suzuki Strings Sonora Ensemble
• Cantata 140: “Wachet Auf” (Sleeper, Wake), arranged for string quartet. St. Croix Valley String Quartet: Janette Cysewski and Debbie Lanzen, violins; Dianne Wiik, viola; and Joel Anderson, cello.
• French Suite No. 3 in B Minor for keyboard, BWV 814: Sarabande, Anglaise, Menuett and Trio. Kris Sankaran
• Sinfonia 1 in C Major, BWV 787; Sinfonia 7 in E Minor, BWV 793; Sinfonia 10 in G Major, BWV 796; Sinfonia 11 in G Minor, BWV 797; Sinfonia 15 in B Minor, BWV 801. Sean Kleve, marimba. (You can hear Glenn Gould playing the original version of the first Sinfonia in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
• Chorale: We thank Thee, Lord, for sending. Katie Hultman, soprano, and Kenneth Stancer, organ
BATC audiences will remember pianist Lawrence Quinnett (below) from his exquisite renderings of selections from The Well-Tempered Clavier, at the 2018 Festival.
Quinnett, on the piano faculty of Livingstone College, returns in 2021 to give a brief talk on his approach to ornamentation in the six French Suites, as a prelude to his live performance of Suite No. 5. The floor will open for questions, followed by Quinnett’s recorded performance of the remaining five Suites.
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
Here is the schedule for Day 2 of the 2021 virtual, online Bach Around the Clock festival, which is today — Thursday, March 18:
Today’s program will be available starting at 8 a.m. and then throughout the festival.
• Musette (from Suzuki Book 2); Ossian Rogers, violin; Faolan Rogers, harp; Kara Rogers, piano
• Sheep May Safely Graze, from Cantata 208; Gift Akere, piano
• Sonata No. 3, BWV 1005: Largo; Rebekah May, viola
• Cello Suite V in C minor, BWV 1011: Prelude, Gavottes I and II, Gigue; Cindy Cameron-Fix, bassoon
• Anna Magdalena Bach Notebook: Menuet, BWV anh 114; Tim Farley, clavichord
• Chorale: Now God be with us; Katie Bultman, soprano, and Kenneth Stancer, organ
Live Evening Keynote Discussion at 7 p.m.Jonathan Øverby, (below) distinguished Wisconsin Public Radio host of “The Road to Higher Ground,” will discuss building The Bridge To and Through Bach with BATC Artistic Director Marika Fischer Hoyt.
Click here to join the Zoom call, starting at 7 p.m. tonight, Thursday, March 18. Viewers are encouraged to submit questions in the chat for Overby to address.
Songs by Black composers trace their cultural realities in a free online UW performance TONIGHT of “Verisimilitudes.” Plus, the five winners of this year’s Beethoven Competition perform Sunday.
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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.
ALERT: This Sunday, April 25, from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. the five winners of this year’s Beethoven Competition at the UW-Madison will perform in a winners’ concert. Included in the program are the popular and dramatic “Appassionata” Sonata, Op. 57, and the famous and innovative last piano sonata, No. 32 in C minor, Op 111. Here is a link to the YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMF0Hd1MJwMg. Click on “Show More” and you can see the full programs and biographical profiles of the winners.
By Jacob Stockinger
The concert could hardly be more timely or the subject more relevant.
Think of the events in and near Minneapolis, Chicago and elsewhere in the U.S.; of the Black Lives Matter movement and social protest; of the political fight for D.C. statehood and voting rights – all provide a perfect context for an impressive student project that will debut online TONIGHT, Saturday, April 24, at 7 p.m.
The one-hour free concert “Verisimilitudes: A Journey Through Art Song in Black, Brown and Tan” originated at the UW-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music. It seems an ideal way for listeners to turn to music and art for social and political commentary, and to understand the racial subtexts of art.
Soprano Quanda Dawnyell Johnson (below) created, chose and performs the cycle of songs by Black composers with other Black students at the UW-Madison.
Here is a link to the YouTube video: https://youtu.be/-g5hjeuSumw
Click on “Show More” to see the complete program and more information.
Here is the artist’s statement:
“Within the content of this concert are 17 art songs that depict the reality of the souls of a diasporic people. Most of the lyricists and all of the composers are of African descent. In large part they come from the U.S. but also extend to Great Britain, Guadeloupe by way of France, and Sierra Leone.
“They speak to the veracity of Black life and Black feeling. A diasporic African reality in a Classical mode that challenges while it embraces a Western European vernacular. It is using “culture” as an agent of resistance.
“I refer to verisimilitude in the plural. While syntactically incorrect, as it relates to the multiple veils of reality Black people must negotiate, it is very correct.
“To be packaged in Blackness, or should I say “non-whiteness” is to ever live in a world of spiraling modalities and twirling realities. To paraphrase the great artist, Romare Bearden, in “calling and recalling” — we turn and return, then turn again to find the place that is our self.
“I welcome you to… Verisimilitudes: A Journey Through Art Song in Black, Brown, and Tan”
Here, by sections, is the complete program and a list of performers:
I. Nascence
Clear Water — Nadine Shanti
A Child’s Grace — Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson
Night — Florence Price (below)
Big Lady Moon — Samuel Coleridge-Taylor
II. Awareness
Lovely, Dark, and Lonely — Harry T. Burleigh
Grief –William Grant Still (below)
Prayer — Leslie Adams
Interlude, The Creole Love Call — Duke Ellington
III. The Sophomore
Mae’s Rent Party, We Met By Chance –Jeraldine Saunders Herbison
The Barrier — Charles Brown
IV. Maturity
Three Dream Portraits: Minstrel Man, Dream Variation; I, Too — Margaret Bonds (below)
Dreams — Lawren Brianna Ware
Song Without Words — Charles Brown
Legacy
L’autre jour à l’ombrage (The Other Day in the Shade) — Joseph Boulogne (Chevalier de Saint-Georges, below)
The Verisimilitudes Team
Quanda Dawnyell Johnson — Soprano and Project Creator
Lawren Brianna Ware – -Pianist and Music Director
Rini Tarafder — Stage Manager
Akiwele Burayidi – Dancer
Jackson Neal – Dancer
Nathaniel Schmidt – Trumpet
Matthew Rodriguez – Clarinet
Craig Peaslee – Guitar
Aden Stier –Bass
Henry Ptacek – Drums
Dave Alcorn — Videographer
Here is a link to the complete program notes with lyrics and composer bios. And a preview audio sample is in the YouTube video at the bottom: https://simplebooklet.com/verisimilitudesprogramnotes#page=1
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