The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: Wikipedia and WFMT in Chicago offer reviews of classical music in 2016 that include important performances, new music and deaths
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By Jacob Stockinger
Is there a better way to greet the New Year than to take a look back at the past year?
2016 was a year of big losses: composer and conductor Pierre Boulez (below top), conductor Sir Neville Marriner (below middle) and early music pioneer and conductor Nikolaus Harnoncourt (below bottom) among the many whose names you might recognize.
What better way to start 2017 than to recall the figures we lost and hope that the coming year is kinder.
Here is a list from WFMT, the famed classical radio station in Chicago. It includes pictures and quotes along with dates:
And here is an entry from, of all places, Wikipedia that includes an exhaustive and detailed list of important events, performances and compositions as well as of classical musicians who died.
It seems as good a summing up as any that The Ear has seen, and demonstrates just how prolific the composers of new classical music are:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_in_classical_music
We remember and we revere.
Which is why The Ear has included the Funeral March movement from the Symphony No. 3 “Eroica” by Ludwig van Beethoven on a YouTube video below that features an intriguing graphic arts representation of the music.
We are lucky: We have the music even when we no longer have the musicians.
Tags: 2016, 2017, Arts, Bach, Baroque, Beethoven, Cello, Chamber music, Chicago, choral music, Classical music, Compact Disc, concerto, conductor, death, Early music, Eroica, Eroica Symphony, Franz Schubert, funeral, funeral march, George Frideric Handel, graphic arts, Jacob Stockinger, Johann Sebastian Bach, Johannes Brahms, Ludwig van Beethoven, movement, Mozart, Music, Musician, Neville Marriner, New Music, New Year, New York City, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, opera, Orchestra, Piano, Pierre Boulez, pioneer, review, Sonata, symphony, United States, Viola, Violin, vocal music, Wikipedia, Wisconsin, WMFT
Classical music: The Oakwood Chamber Players perform an unusual holiday program with a Wisconsin premiere twice this coming Sunday afternoon
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By Jacob Stockinger
The Oakwood Chamber Players (below) will perform a concert titled Looking Back and Forward on Sunday, Nov. 27, 2016 at 1 p.m. and 3:30 p.m.
The performances will both be held at the Oakwood Village University Woods Center for Arts and Education, 6209 Mineral Point Road, on the far west side of Madison near West Towne Mall.
An innovative recipe for A Christmas Carol is a perfect addition to the Thanksgiving holiday weekend.
Outstanding musical theater actor/singer baritone Bobby Goderich (below, seen on the right in Madison Opera‘s production of Stephen Sondheim‘s “Sweeney Todd”) will give a tour-de-force characterization of the entire cast of personalities for a rendition of Dickens’s tale in The Passion of Scrooge. A dozen musicians will give Goderich’s flair an abundant platform to show off his singing, humor, and dramatic effects.
The Passion of Scrooge by New York composer Jon Deak (below) is performed annually for holiday concerts at the Smithsonian, and the Oakwood Chamber Players are delighted to present the Wisconsin premiere of this memorable work.
Deak is known for weaving a variety of tales into “concert dramas,” turning words into music and giving instrumentalists the power to evoke speech through their sounds.
The Passion of Scrooge is laid out in two acts as the character struggles to come to grips with the past, present and future, to transform a life of avarice to one of human warmth.
Additionally, the Oakwood Chamber Players will perform music mentioned in the text of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol.
When the Ghost of Christmas Past shows Scrooge a celebration hosted by his employer, Mr. Fezziwig, the fiddler plays the tune Sir Roger de Coverley. (You can hear a chamber orchestra version of the work, played by the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields under Sir Neville Marriner, in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
This traditional English country dance, set for string quartet by British composer Frank Bridge (below) in 1922, will provide an energetic introduction to The Passion of Scrooge. The musical pairing illustrates how creative expression can transform historic works to give fresh perspectives.
The Oakwood Chamber Players welcome guests Wes Luke, violin; Katrin Talbot, viola; Brad Townsend, bass; Mike Koszewski, percussion; Mary Ann Harr, harp; Bobby Goderich, baritone; and Kyle Knox, conductor (below).
This is the second of five concerts in the Oakwood Chamber Players 2016-2017 season series entitled Perspective. Remaining concerts will take place on Jan. 21 and 22, March 18 and 19, and May 13 and 14.
The Oakwood Chamber Players are a group of Madison-area professional musicians who have rehearsed and performed at Oakwood Village for over 30 years.
The program lasts about 1 hour and 15 minutes.
Tickets can be purchased with cash or personal checks at the door: $20 for general admission, $15 for seniors and $5 for students.
Also, conductor Kyle Knox will discuss the music on Norman Gilliland’s show, The Midday, on Wisconsin Public Radio, 88.7 FM WERN, on this Friday, Nov. 25, from noon to 1 p.m.
Visit www.oakwoodchamberplayers.com for more information.
The Oakwood Chamber Players are a professional music ensemble proudly supported by Oakwood Lutheran Senior Ministries and the Oakwood Foundation.
Tags: A Christmas Carol, Academy of St Martin in the Fields, Arts, baritone, bass, Broadway theatre, Cello, Chamber music, chamber orchestra, Charles Dickens, Christmas and holiday season, clarinet, Classical music, conductor, country dance, dance, Egnlish, fiddle, Frank Bridge, Ghost of Christmas Past, harp, Holiday, Horn, Jacob Stockinger, Jon Deak, Kyle Knox, Lutheran, Madison, Madison Opera, Music, Neville Marriner, New York, Norman Gilliland, Oakwood Chamber Players, Oakwood Village, Orchestra, Passion, percussion, premiere, recipe, Scrooge, singer, Smithsonian, Stephen Sondheim, String quartet, Sweeney Todd, Thanksgiving, The Midday, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Viola, Violin, wisconsin public radio, YouTube
Classical music: Ten Mozart performers name their favorite Mozart works to mark the composer’s 259th birthday this past week for the BBC Music Magazine.
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By Jacob Stockinger
This past week -– on Tuesday to be exact -– we celebrated the birth of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who was born in 1756 and died in 1791.
It was his 259th birthday.
For all his fame, familiarity and popularity, Mozart is a curiously underestimated composer. His best work is so sublimely beautiful that it is easy to overlook how different and revolutionary it was in its day. Mozart changed music, and we don’t always appreciate that fact.
Anyway, a lot of radio stations, including Sirius XM Satellite Radio, WFMT in Chicago, WQXR in New York City and Wisconsin Public Radio, broadcast a lot of Mozart on that day.
But one of the most interesting celebrations that The Ear saw came from BBC Music Magazine. It asked 10 celebrated Mozart performers — including pianist and conductor Daniel Barenboim, conductor Sir Neville Marriner, pianist Dame Mitsuko Uchida, conductor Sir Roger Norrington and singer Barbara Bonney — to name their favorite work.
It covered the range of Mozart’s enormous output: piano music, string quartets, operas, symphonies, violin works, operas and of course choral works. And the website provided generous sound samples of the works.
Here is a link:
http://www.classical-music.com/article/which-your-favourite-piece-mozart
At the bottom is a YouTube video of one of my favorite Mozart works — the Piano Sonata in C minor, played by Daniel Barenboim. It was also a favorite of Ludwig van Beethoven who seemed to use some of it in the slow movement of the familiar “Pathetique” Sonata.
What is your favorite Mozart work?
What else do you want to say about Mozart?
The Ear wants to hear.
Tags: Arts, Barbara Bonney, BBC Music Magazine, Beethoven, Chicago, choral music, Classical music, Compact Disc, composer, Daniel Barenboim, Jacob Stockinger, Ludwig van Beethoven, Madison, Mitsuko Uchida, Mozart, Music, Neville Marriner, New York City, opera, Orchestra, Piano, Roger Norrington, Sirius XM Radio, String quartet, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Vienna, Violin, vocal music, wisconsin public radio, WMFT, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, WQXR, YouTube
Classical music: Opera director David Ronis of CUNY is named to succeed William Farlow. University Opera’s production of Hector Berlioz’ charming “Beatrice et Benedict” is a fine and fitting tribute to the longtime tenure of retiring director William Farlow. The last performance is tonight at 7:30 p.m.
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EDITOR’S NOTE: Please note that some reviews of productions last weekend are being delayed to make room for previews of the many upcoming concerts and musical events this week.
NEWS: David Ronis (below) of Queen’s College and the Aaron Copland School of Music at the City University of New York (CUNY) has just been named as the interim one-year visiting director of University Opera, to succeed William Farlow. Here is a link to the official press release with his impressive resume on the blog Fanfare:
http://uwmadisonschoolofmusic.wordpress.com/2014/04/14/ronis_press_release/
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 every other Sunday morning on WORT FM 89.9 FM. He serves on the Board of Advisors for the Madison Early Music Festival and frequently gives pre-concert lectures in Madison.
By John W. Barker
The University Opera at the University of Wisconsin-Madison has a long history of including rarities in its productions, rarities that audiences are not likely to see elsewhere.
For his farewell offering as he retires at the end of this academic year, director William Farlow (below, in a photo by Katherine Esposito) has put on a particularly enterprising novelty. That “Beatrice et Benedict: — is the last and most successful of the three operas by the early French Romantic composer Hector Berlioz.
Berlioz (below) wrote the libretto as well as the music, freely adapting his stripped-down version from the play “Much Ado About Nothing by” Shakespeare — an author whose works he adored. Berlioz cast it in the form of the opéra comique, combining set-piece musical numbers with spoken dialogue. It was the same form used not only by Jacques Offenbach, but also by Georges Bizet for his “Carmen.” Nevertheless, Berlioz infused the form with his own individual wit, imagination, and personality. The score is full of absolutely beautiful music, with a dip into satire as well. (You can hear the opera’s Overture performed by Sir Neville Marriner and the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields at Carnegie Hall in You Tube video at the bottom.)
The UW Opera presented this opera before, in 1988, in the days of Karlos Moser, in a semi-staged concert performance. This time, Farlow has given it a complete staging, employing mostly exemplars of the gifted vocal talent the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music has been drawing lately.
(The last of three performances is tonight at 7:30 p.m. in Music Hall at the foot of Bascom Hill.)
In the performance I attended Sunday night, the feuding lovers, the two title characters, Shakespeare’s Beatrice and Benedick, were sung by the agile soprano Lindsay Metzger and high tenor Daniel López-Matthews. (Below right and left, respectively, in a photo by Max Wendt). The other pair of lovers, Hero and Claudio, were portrayed by the powerfully voiced soprano Anna Whiteway and tenor Jordan Wilson. The local commander, Don Pedro, was taken by bass Erik Larson.
To these the cast added two veterans. Edgewood College teacher and mezzo-soprano Kathleen Otterson (below) is a long-standing veteran of UW Opera and Madison music-making, always welcome any time, in anything, including the role here of Ursula, Hero’s friend. And baritone Benjamin Schultz, a returned alumnus, sang the comic role that Berlioz invented, Somarone, as a caricature of the pompous rivals and academics who were the composer’s life-long opposition.
Following a frequent practice when this opera is presented outside of France, the vocal numbers were sung in the original French, while the revised dialogue was given in English. It’s a workable solution to a problem for singers who can sing in French, but really can’t speak it well. Fine as the singing was, it was clear that they were not uniformly comfortable singing French.
Still, many moments were truly gorgeous, notably the Hero-Ursula duet in Act I, and the ladies’ trio in Act II, as well as the offstage wedding chorus.
By and large, Farlow’s stage direction was careful: in the vocal set pieces often relatively static, though, that was certainly preferable to too much action. In the case of Somarone’s Act I scene, Schulz was made to go much too far beyond satire, into exaggerated silliness. And Beatrice’s over-acting in Act I really compromised the character’s self-assured sassiness before her “fall.”
Still, even with so much of the dueling wordplay of Shakespeare’s original removed, Metzger and López-Matthews engaged well as the couple who had to be tricked into discovering that their outward hostility covered a profound attraction.
A particular asset was the pit orchestra that conductor James Smith (below) was able to work up very successfully to Berlioz’s tricky requirements.
William Farlow departs leaving us with many debts to him, including this demonstration that Berlioz’s gem of a comic opera really deserves more regular presentation.
Tags: Aaron Copland School of Music, Academy of St Martin in the Fields, American Record Guide, Arts, Bascom Hill, Beatrice, Beatrice et Benedict, Berlioz, Carnegie Hall, City University of New York, Classical music, Early music, Edgewood College, France, Georges Bizet, Hector Berlioz, Jacob Stockinger, James Smith, Kathleen Otterson, Madison, Madison Early Music Festival, Mezzo-soprano, Much Ado About Nothing, Neville Marriner, opera, Orchestra, Romantic, Romanticism, soprano, sorano, tenor, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, University Opera, William Farlow, William Shakespeare, YouTube
Classical music: The early music group Ensemble Musical Offering of Milwaukee will make its Madison debut this Sunday in an all-Handel program. Plus, the Madison Symphony Orchestra’s FREE “Final Forte” concerto competition is tonight at 7 on Wisconsin Public Television and Wisconsin Public Radio, and University of Wisconsin-Madison violist Mikko Utevsky performs a FREE recital Thursday night at Capitol Lakes.
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ALERTS: Our good friend and frequent contributor Mikko Utevsky writes: Dear Friends, I am giving a viola recital this Thursday, March 27, at 7:30 p.m. in the Grand Hall of the Capitol Lakes Retirement Community (333 West Main Street, near the Capitol Square). The program includes works by Franz Joseph Haydn, Ernest Bloch (the Suite Hebraïque), and viola sonatas of Johannes Brahms (Op. 120, No. 2) and Darius Milhaud (No. 1). I will be joined by pianists Jeff Gibbens and Adam Kluck. I hope the short notice will not prevent some of you from joining me there. Best, Mikko
Also, The Madison Symphony Orchestra‘s “Final Forte” young artist competition will be broadcast LIVE tonight at 7 p.m. on Wisconsin Public Television and Wisconsin Public Radio.
For more details, here is a link to a previous post:
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 every other Sunday morning on WORT-FM 89.9 FM. He serves on the Board of Advisors for the Madison Early Music Festival and frequently gives pre-concert lectures in Madison.
By John W. Barker
Here’s a Handelian heads-up, and with a Madison accent!
The Milwaukee-based Ensemble Musical Offering is to make its first appearance in Madison on this Sunday afternoon, March 30, at 2 p.m., at the First Unitarian Society of Madison’s new and crisply designed Atrium auditorium (below, in a photo by Zane Williams) at 900 University Bay Drive.
Tickets are $15, payable at the door, and available in advance from www.ensemblemusicaloffering.org or by calling (414) 258-6133.
The group, whose supplemental title is the Midwest Bande for Early Music, was founded in 2000 by harpsichordist and director Joan Parsley. As she herself defines the ensemble: “Its mission is to foster appreciation for early music, circa 1580-1750, through professional performance on period instruments, educational activities, and community outreach.”
Winner of several grants, the ensemble not only performs regularly in its home city, but supports the Greater Milwaukee Baroque Festival, which is a competition for students of string and keyboard instruments, plus a one-week Summer Baroque Institute.
The instrumental membership of the ensemble (below) consists of about 10 players — divided between strings and winds — including harpsichord. All play baroque instruments, and use the one player per part approach.
For their Madison appearance, the EMO will present a program aptly titled “Hallmarks of Handel.” It will contain a balanced survey of the great composer’s instrumental and vocal music.
The most familiar music will be the G-major Suite, the third and last division of George Frideric Handel’s beloved and popular “Water Music” (at bottom in a YouTube video played on modern instruments by Sir Neville Marriner and the Acadmey of St. Martin in the Fields) — the set that features only woodwinds, without brass, against the strings.
There will also be no less than two of the Op. 3, Concerti Grossi, Nos. 4 and 6, which give strong roles to winds (as well as harpsichord in the latter). It will be interesting to hear these works, usually treated as “orchestral,” in this more intimate chamber-music character.
One more instrumental work is a composite of music that Handel used in his opera “Ottone.” Because of the prominence of the bassoon in the scoring, it will be presented in this program as a Sinfonia for Bassoon, Strings and Continuo.
The other side of the program is vocal, and touches upon what was, for Handel, his major areas of composition, his Italian operas and English oratorios. There will be two arias drawn from Handel’s first London triumph, “Rinaldo,” composed in 1711.
The oratorio realm will be represented indirectly. The program will allow a rare opportunity to hear examples of some two-dozen chamber duets and trios, with continuo, that Handel composed over the years to Italian texts, following patterns set by role model Agostino Steffani.
Handel seemed to use these brief, three-movement mini-cantatas as tryouts of some vocal ideas, and he then incorporated many of those ideas into larger works. The two to be offered, composed in July 1741, contain musical germs that Handel allowed to blossom as three choral movements in “Messiah,” composed later that year. Listeners will surely be surprised and delighted to recognize those inimitably Handelian ideas in their first form.
Though headquartered in Milwaukee, the EMO draws upon musicians from beyond their city, as, indeed, so many early music groups do — witness the Madison Bach Musicians. For EMO, there is a particular reliance on personnel from around our state, and from Madison in particular.
Thus, two admired Madison early music players are involved: Baroque violinist Edith Hines (below top) as leader of the strings, and Teresa Koenig (below bottom), a specialist in Baroque wind instruments.
In addition, this program offers two sopranos for the vocal pieces, each with a Madison connection. Sarah Richardson is currently a doctoral candidate at the UW School of Music, studying with University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music professor and baritone Paul Rowe. And Chelsea Morris Shephard, who has sung with the Madison Bach Musicians, will be remembered as a finalist in in last summer’s Handel Aria Competition for the Madison Early Musical Festival.
Such a rich menu of Handel is bound to appeal to lovers of this fabulous composer’s wonderful music, and attract those who should be such lovers.
Tags: Agostino Steffani, American Record Guide, Arts, Baroque, Bloch, Brahms, Chamber music, Classical music, Darius Milhaud, Early music, Ensemble Musical Offering, Ernest Bloch, First Unitarian Society of Madison, Franz Joseph Haydn, George Frideric Handel, Handel, Handel Aria Competition, Haydn, Jacob Stockinger, Johannes Brahms, London, Madison, Madison Early Music Festival, Madison Symphony Orchestra, Mikko Utevsky, Milhaud, Milwaukee, Music, Music education, Neville Marriner, Sarah Richardson, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Viola, Water Music, Wisconsin Public Television, WORT-FM 89.9, YouTube
Classical music Q&A: Violinist Rachel Barton Pine talks about music education, her new projects, reaching new audiences, playing rock music and the Brahms Violin Concerto that she will perform Saturday night with the the UW-Madison Symphony Orchestra.
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ALERT: Radio host Rich Samuels, whose show “Anything Goes” airs from 5-8 a.m. on Thursday mornings on WORT 89.9 FM (it can also be streamed live) sends the following word: “I’ll be airing back-to-back recorded interviews on my Thursday (10/31) WORT show with violinist Rachel Barton Pine and conductor Kenneth Woods, in anticipation of their Mills Hall performance with the UW Symphony Orchestra on Saturday night. Tracks from their latest CDs with be included.”
By Jacob Stockinger
Both in recordings and in live concerts, the acclaimed Chicago violinist Rachel Barton Pine (below) has the gift of making the familiar seem new and unusual, unfamiliar and exciting.
Pine will put that talent on display this Saturday night at 8 p.m. in Mills Hall when she performs Johannes Brahms’ justly famous and beautiful Violin Concerto with the University of Wisconsin Symphony Orchestra under the baton of returning native son conductor Kenneth Woods (below), who will also conduct Dmitri Shostakovich’s powerful Fifth Symphony and British composer Philip Sawyer’s “Gale of Life.” (For more about Woods, the The Ear’s Q&A with him that was posted Monday. Here is a link:
The concert is the season opener for the Wisconsin Union Theater, which is using Mills Hall while the regular historic and landmark hall is undergoing extensive renovations.
For more information here is a link to the Wisconsin Union Theater’s website:
http://www.uniontheater.wisc.edu/Season13-14/Rachel-Barton-Pine.html
For information and tickets, call the Box Office at 608-265-ARTS (2787) for more information. Tickets are: $25 General Public, $21 Union Members, UW-Madison Faculty & Staff, and non UW-Madison Students, $10 UW-Madison Students. Buy online, call the Box Office at 608-265-ARTS (2787), or purchase in person at the Campus Arts Ticketing box office in Vilas Hall, 821 University Ave.
Celebrated as a leading interpreter of great classical works, Rachel Barton Pine’s performances combine her gift for emotional communication and her scholarly fascination with historical research. Audiences are thrilled by her dazzling technique, lustrous tone, and infectious joy in music-making.
Pine is a former violin prodigy who performed with the Chicago Symphony at the age of 10, and at numerous other important venues throughout her teens. Her broad range includes classical and baroque music, but unexpectedly for a classical musician, Barton Pine also performs with a heavy metal band, Earthen Grave.
Along with her regular performance schedule, Barton Pine has also turned her attention to classical music advocacy. The Rachel Elizabeth Barton Foundation and Global HeartStrings are dedicated to promoting the study and appreciation of classical music.
Barton Pine recently granted an email interview to The Ear:
Could you briefly introduce yourself, touching on some highlights include when you started violin lessons, honors and awards,
When I was three years old, I saw some older girls in beautiful dresses who were playing violin at church. I immediately stood up in the pew and announced, “I want to do that!” That summer, my parents let me start lessons with a teacher in the neighborhood.
By age five, I knew this is what my life would be about. I made my professional debut at age seven with the Chicago String Ensemble and my earliest appearances with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra were at age 10 and 15.
Like many young violinist I took part in international competitions. I was the youngest person (at age 17) and the first American to win a gold medal at the 1992 J.S. Bach International Competition in Leipzig, Germany, and I won top prizes in the Szigeti (Budapest), Paganini (Genoa), Queen Elisabeth (Brussels), Kreisler (Vienna), and Montreal international violin competitions.
Closer to home, I’ve been honored with the Great Performer of Illinois award and twice as a Chicagoan of the year. I had the pleasure of playing my own version of the Star-Spangled Banner for various events including Chicago Bulls playoff games. I’ve also received the Studs Terkel Humanities Service Award for my work in music education.
What are your current and future projects?
For the last two seasons, my tour dates included performances of two demanding cycles, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s five Violin Concertos and the Paganini’s 24 solo Caprices (see the YouTube video below), each cycle in a single evening. Exploring a composer’s entire output in a single genre gives extra insight to both the interpreter and the listeners. In August, I recorded the complete Mozart concertos with Sir Neville Marriner and the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields; the album will be released in the spring. This winter, I will record the Paganini caprices.
What things do you think make you special or unusual?
I like to think that every violin soloist is individual and unique; hearing my Brahms Concerto will be a little different from any other Brahms you’ve heard before because I’m a different person.
With that being said, I believe I’m the only international violin soloist who also plays in a doom/thrash metal band! When I’m not off playing concertos and recitals, I love rocking out (below) with my band Earthen Grave, playing my electric six-string flying V violin.
On the other end of the spectrum, I love indulging in early music when I get a chance. In fact, in 2009, I performed on the rebec (an ancestor of the violin from the 1200s) for a concert of medieval music at the Madison Early Music Festival.
You have recorded the Brahms Violin Concerto along with a concerto by Brahms’ friend and mentor Joseph Joachim. Can you explain what makes the Brahms a special work for you?
I have been fascinated with the Brahms Concerto since my earliest violin lessons. I began studying it when I was 14, and it rapidly became a mainstay of my repertoire. It was with the Brahms Concerto that I won several of my international prizes and made many of my debuts in Europe and America. It remains one of the most fulfilling works I perform.
My teacher in Berlin, Werner Scholz, was a student of a student of Joachim. I feel fortunate to have gained knowledge about the Brahms Concerto from one so close to the original source. In my lessons, Professor Scholz would say, “My teacher said that Joachim said that Brahms said to play it like this!”
In addition, I have been playing a very special violin since 2002, the 1742 “ex-Soldat” Guarneri del Gesu (below), on loan from my generous patron. In the 19th century, it was chosen by Brahms for his protégé, Marie Soldat. She was one of the first champions of the Brahms Violin Concerto, which became her signature piece. Marie Soldat and Brahms frequently played chamber music together, with Brahms at the piano, which means that my violin actually got to jam with Brahms! It’s amazing to play the music of Brahms on an instrument whose voice he personally selected.
I will be performing my own cadenza for the Brahms. Playing my own cadenza is the most organic way I can express my feelings about the music. I’m very honored that my cadenzas to great violin concertos such as Mozart, Beethoven, Paganini and Brahms have been published in “The Rachel Barton Pine Collection” along with others of my compositions and arrangements and editions. This sheet music book is part of Carl Fischer’s Masters Collection series; I am the only living artist (other volumes are the collections of works by Kreisler, Heifetz, etc.)
In 2004, I had the great pleasure of releasing my recording of the Brahms Concerto with my “hometown” orchestra, the mighty Chicago Symphony. That was really a dream come true, to do one of my favorite concertos with one of my favorite orchestras! For that album, I recorded both my own cadenza as well as that by Brahms’s friend and collaborator Joachim.
What was the relationship between Brahms and Joachim?
When Joseph Joachim and Johannes Brahms met in 1853, the 21-year-old Joachim was already an established violin virtuoso and composer. The extremely gifted Brahms, two years younger, was virtually unknown. They quickly became close friends and began a musical interchange that lasted throughout their lives.
Brahms and Joachim challenged each other constantly, trading counterpoint exercises along with their correspondence. In 1853, they roomed together in Göttingen, and Brahms began to study orchestration with Joachim. Joachim served as a mentor to Brahms, introducing him to Schumann and other leading musicians of the day.
Throughout their friendship, Joachim was unwavering in his support of Brahms’s compositions. He performed Brahms’s chamber works, premiering many of them, and conducted Brahms’s symphonies. Joachim was particularly fond of the Brahms Violin Concerto. He described the work, which Brahms dedicated to him, as one of “high artistic value” that roused in him “a peculiarly strong feeling of interest” (Joseph Joachim and Andreas Moser, Violinschule, 1902-05).
Brahms (below) began composing his Violin Concerto in the summer of 1878, during a vacation on Lake Wörther in Pörtschach, Carinthia (Austria). On August 22, Brahms sent the manuscript of the violin part to Joachim with this note: “Naturally I wish to ask you to correct it. I thought you ought to have no excuse – neither respect for the music being too good nor the pretext that orchestrating it would not merit the effort. Now I shall be satisfied if you say a word and perhaps write in several: difficult, awkward, impossible, etc.” Thus began one of the most intriguing musical exchanges in history.
By the time Joachim (below) premiered the concerto in Leipzig on January 1, 1879, the piece had undergone considerable changes. Two middle movements had been removed and replaced by a newly written Adagio, resulting in the three-movement concerto we know today. (Both of the original middle movements are now lost. Many scholars think that the Scherzo may have been converted into the Allegro appassionato of the Second Piano Concerto.) The score was passed back and forth at least a half-dozen times before the premiere, and the two friends’ debate over revisions, which is clearly evident in the surviving manuscript, has been left for posterity. In the end, Brahms incorporated most of Joachim’s suggested orchestral changes but considerably fewer of his revisions to the solo violin part.
How do you feel about performing with a student orchestra such as the UW Symphony? Do you see advantages or drawbacks?
There is nothing more energizing than youthful talent and enthusiasm, and I always welcome the opportunity to perform with young people. These student musicians may not be as experienced with the Brahms Violin Concerto as older artists, but I’m sure they’ll learn it quickly and play it with great spirit. (Below are the UW Symphony Orchestra and the UW Choral Union under the direction of conductor Beverly Taylor.)
Do you have any experience with conductor Kenneth Woods or know his reputation?
I was not previously familiar with Maestro Woods. One of the great pleasures of being a touring soloist is performing in a different city or country every week, experiencing the wonderful variety of reuniting with musicians with whom I have previously worked and collaborating with new colleagues. Fresh perspectives are always inspiring, and I really look forward to exploring the Brahms with Maestro Woods in a few weeks.
Do you have an opinion of Madison and its audiences? Do you have any personal or professional history here? Or will this be your local debut?
I have performed in Madison a number of times over the last decade as soloist with the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra (below top). Maestro Andrew Sewell (below bottom), his wife and children have become close family friends. In fact, his son (six years old at the time, now a teenager) was the ring bearer at my wedding. I always enjoy visiting Madison. I’m looking forward to returning this month, and coming back to the WCO again next season.
My daughter Sylvia has been touring with me since she was three weeks old; she just turned two. This will be her first trip to Madison, and I’m sure she’ll enjoy it, too.
Was there an Aha! Moment that told you – a piece or performance or performer – that let you know that you wanted to be a professional concertizing violinist?
I began violin lessons at age three, and by the time I was five, I was signing my kindergarten papers “Rachel, Violinist.” I didn’t consider myself to be someone who played the violin; rather, being a violinist was my entire identity. It was through playing in church that I had come to the belief that creating music and sharing it was others to uplift their spirits is my calling, and that’s what I still believe.
What advice would you give to young violinists?
Commit to a daily minimum amount of practice and stick to it; inconsistency will slow your progress. Be focused, observant and goal-oriented when practicing; merely logging in the hours won’t magically cause improvement. Structure your practice sessions to include a balance between technical work and expressive work … and don’t forget to include a little creative time too, such as writing your own music, jamming along to the radio, or trying out a fun non-classical style of playing.
And how do you think classical music can attract bigger and younger audiences?
Much has been written about this important topic. Traveling around the U.S., I’ve observed many efforts that have been successful in different communities. Being creative with programming and concert presentation is important, while always preserving what makes classical special in the first place.
It’s also important to find creative ways to connect with others so we can express our passion for classical music and get them excited about it, too. I do this in a variety of ways: visiting schools, participating in pre-concert talks, being accessible through social media such as Twitter and my Violin Adventures podcast, and playing classical pieces on rock radio stations or in alternative venues such as bars and cafes.
It’s the best feeling in the world when someone comes up to me after a concert to say that it was the first time they ever attended an orchestra performance and they loved it!
What else would you like to say or add?
I’m very excited to have just released my latest album, the Mendelssohn and Schumann Violin Concertos along with both Beethoven Romances. My last album, Violin Lullabies (see the YouTube video at the bottom to hear Rachel Barton Pine play Brahms’ Lullaby) debuted at No. 1 on Billboard magazine’s classical chart, which was a thrill. With all of my recordings, I hope that they will be enjoyed by classical music connoisseurs as well as by those who might be newly discovering the joys of classical music.
Tags: Andrew Sewell, Beethoven, Brahms, Caprice, Chicago, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Dmitri Shostakovich, Early music, Felix Mendelssohn, Jacob Stockinger, Johannes Brahms, Kenneth Woods, Neville Marriner, Paganini, Philip Sawyer, Rachel Barton Pine, Robert Schumann, Romance, Star-Spangled Banner, Thursday, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Violin concerto, Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, Wisconsin Union Theater, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, YouTube
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