The Well-Tempered Ear

FREE birthday bash for Johann Sebastian Bach is this Saturday in Madison

March 7, 2024
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By Jacob Stockinger

The Ear thinks of this week’s Bach Around the Clock — which runs March 6-10 — as a double celebration.

The primary one is to mark the 339th birthday of composer Johann Sebastian Bach (below, March 20, 1685-July 28, 1750), whom many consider to be the Big Bang of Western classical music.

The second celebration is to honor the late Madison violist Marika Fischer Hoyt (below), who with help resurrected Bach Around the Clock in Madison after it had been dropped by Wisconsin Public Radio.

Talented, hard-working and congenial, Fischer — who died a year ago of cancer — was a fixture of the local music scene. She was a member of the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra and spent 20 years playing in the Madison Symphony Orchestra. An outstanding chamber musician, she also helped found and played in the Ancora String Quartet.

An avid proponent of early music using period instruments and historically informed performance practices, Fischer Hoyt helped found and play in the weekly free Just Bach concerts. She performed regularly with the Madison Bach Musicians and with an early music string group she helped found, Sonata à Quattro.

Here is a link to a complete schedule on the BATC website:

The Ear thinks Marika would be very pleased and proud of this year’s event.

It will feature Bach’s original choral and instrumental music in many genres and transcriptions. Soloists and groups of varying sizes will take part. And Bach’s music — so central to the repertoire and all levels of musicianship — will be performed by students (below are members of the Suzuki Strings), by amateurs and by professionals (in the YouTube video at the bottom) — making BATC a truly community-wide celebration of Bach.

The hours for the Birthday Bash concert, which used to run 12 hours, have been cut back to a reasonable and accessible 10 a.m.-5 p.m. at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, 1833 Regent St., on Madison’s near west side. But a birthday cake will still be cut at the end.

And in case you want to duck in and out or catch certain performances or performers, here is a full program schedule for Saturday:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CIRby29h6wZjyngZgyMPpTrLNiMC_1OR/view

You can find links to all other events and programs — printed in blue — on the main website for the March 6-10 festival.

Performances by performers in their own homes and studios will air online as part of the Virtual Festival held of BATC’s YouTube channel, starting at midnight on this Sunday, March 10. Its runs without a time limit and can be accessed worldwide.

Here is a link to the YouTube channel, which also has past performances

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHBRPHSGd_fNECp-qrWsqlQ

Have you attended or heard other Bach Around the Clocks?

What do you think of the celebration?

The Ear wants to hear.


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Remember Marika with Bach Around the Clock 2023. The FREE five-day, in-person and online birthday celebration begins today

March 8, 2023
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NOTE: You can see and hear the Madison Symphony Orchestra’s Final Forte concert with four youth concerto finalists at 7  tonight on PBS Wisconsin and Wisconsin Public Radio. For complete information, including other airings, go to these websites: https://madisonsymphony.org/education-community/education-programs/young-artist-competitions/the-final-forte/ and https://pbswisconsin.org/the-final-forte/

By Jacob Stockinger

The seventh annual Madison-based Bach Around the Clock festival — a celebration of the March 31 birthday of composer Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1756, below) —- will start today and run through Sunday both in-person and online.

All events and streaming are free and open to the public.

As usual, it will feature professional and amateur performers of all ages and levels of proficiency in all kinds of repertoire and arrangements, including Bach on the Marimba.

It begins today, Wednesday, March 8, at noon with a Bach motet sung in Luther Memorial Church, 1021 University Ave.

The live portion, which will also be live-streamed, will end on Saturday, March 11, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. with continuous performances at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church (below) at 1833 Regent Street on the near west side.

Then on this Sunday, March 12, the virtual online festival will premier.

For more details — including a full schedule with times, venues, pieces, performers and other links — go to:

Home

The Ear thinks of the entire festival as a life celebration and memorial not just for Bach but also for his avid local advocate, violist Marika Fisher Hoyt (below). 

Hoyt — who was also a member of the Madison Symphony Orchestra, the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, the Madison Bach Musicians, the Ancora String Quartet, Just Bach and Sonata à Quattro — died Feb. 21 from cancer. She was one of the kindest and most caring persons, one of the hard-working and most energetic, talented musicians, that The Ear has ever known and worked with.

After Wisconsin Public Radio abandoned BATC in 2013, Fischer Hoyt rescued it in 2017, raised money and support, and expanded its offerings and performers as well as took it into a virtual online format as well as remaining an in-person event.

You can find many tributes online. You can also plug in her name on this blog’s search engine to get some idea of her overwhelming and inspiring contributions to the area’s cultural life. In 2017, The Ear named her Musician of the Year:

Classical music: For reviving and securing Bach Around the Clock, The Ear names Marika Fischer Hoyt as “Musician of the Year” for 2017

But the best tribute of all will be to listen to Bach’s extraordinarily inventive and beautiful music — her abiding passion and the gift she never stopped wanting to give to others — with Marika in mind.

You can also find videos from past BATC’s. But she once told me that the piece she loved most is the St. John Passion. So a YouTube video of the final chorus from that oratorio is posted at the bottom.

Have you attended or heard BATC before?

What did you especially like and would you recommend the event to others?

Did you know Marika Fischer Hoyt?

What would you like other people to know about Marika?

The Ear wants to hear.


Just Bach concludes its season this Wednesday morning with highlights of the past season

May 18, 2021
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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/

Please join us for a half-hour live Zoom post-concert reception on Wednesday night, May 19, at 7 p.m. Chat with the performers by following the link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85144014343?pwd=RmVURXBBU1hMcloyalJhbUdCQ1NmQT09

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.

For more information, go to:

https://justbach.org

facebook.org/JustBachSeries

youtube.com/channel/UCcyVFEVsJwklHAx9riqSkXQ


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This Sunday at 4 p.m., the Salon Piano Series debuts an online recital by pianist Kangwoo Jin. He plays music by Scarlatti, Beethoven, Liszt and Schumann. It is up until May 9

April 22, 2021
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By Jacob Stockinger

This Sunday afternoon at 4 p.m. CDT, the Salon Piano Series, hosted by Farley’s House of Pianos, will debut an online concert by pianist Kangwoo Jin (below, in a photo by Andy Manis).

The concert, which was recorded at Luther Memorial Church, costs $10 and will be available online through May 9.

The program is:

Scarlatti – Sonatas in D minor and D Major, K. 213 and 214 (ca. 1756-1757)

Beethoven – Sonata in C-sharp minor, Op. 27, No. 2, “Moonlight” (1801)

Liszt – Transcriptions for solo piano of the songs “Widmung” (Dedication) by Robert Schumann and “Litanei” (Litany) by Franz Schubert

Schumann – Symphonic Etudes, Op.13 (1830)

Bishop – Home, Sweet Home

Tickets are only available online at eventbrite.com. Service fees apply. Complete program and concert information is at salonpianoseries.org

PROGRAM NOTES 

Jin has written the following program notes for The Ear:

“As a musician, I am always eager to share music with the public. I am very excited to be able to reach out to the audience with this unprecedented Salon Piano Series Virtual Concert. 

“I believe music soothes our mental health in difficult times regardless of age, gender or race. I very much hope my performance will contribute to this collective healing we feel through music.

“I wanted to include three different styles, as I usually do for recitals. This time I have Baroque, Classical and Romantic music.

“I chose one of the most famous Beethoven sonatas in order to celebrate his 250th birth year (2020), which I did not have a chance to mark last year.

“This piece is popular with the title of “Moonlight,” which Beethoven (below) never intended. Five years after his death, the German critic Ludwig Rellstab used the word “Moonlight” in order to describe the first movement. But it was really inspired by the funeral march in Mozart’s opera “Don Giovanni.” I try to bring out the tragic color of the first movement. (You can hear Jin play the exciting final movement of the sonata in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

“I also wanted to play the virtuosic masterpiece “Symphonic Etudes,” Op. 13, by Robert Schumann (below), including the beautiful posthumous variations 4 and 5.

I find this piece special in the sense that Schumann intended to make this piece “symphonic.” He created multiple layers of voices in various ways through each etude and created orchestral sounds. This polyphonic writing with multiple layers and a thick texture is what makes this piece difficult to play.

“I also specifically wanted to include one of the piano transcriptions by Franz Liszt (below) of Schubert’s Litanei auf das Fest Aller Seelen (Litany for the Feast of All Souls), D. 343.

“Schubert (below) used the poem “Litany” by Johann Jacobi (1740-1814). It is written for comforting the deceased. Robert Capell, the author of the book “Schubert’s Songs” (1929), said about this lied: There was never a truer or more touching expression of simple devotion and consoled grief … “The music rises from a pure well of affection and humility.” 

“I would like to dedicate this piece to all the people who  suffered from Covid 19.”

BACKGROUND

Here is a link to Kangwoo Jin’s impressive website where you can see many photos, learn about his extensive career as a teacher and hear many samples of his playing: https://www.pianistkangwoojin.com

Praised for his “refined tone quality with powerful energy” (Chosun Daily Newspaper), Jin (below, in a photo by Steve Apps for the Wisconsin State Journal) concertizes nationally and internationally, including performances in Germany, Italy, China, Indonesia and South Korea.

He gave his debut concert at the Sejong Arts Center in Seoul, South Korea, sponsored by the Chosun Daily Newspaper. He has given live performances on Wisconsin Public Radio and WORT 89.9 FM. 

Jin appears frequently as a guest artist at music festivals, universities and various concert series. Recent invitations include UW-River Falls, Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi, and Tongji University in Shanghai. Kawai Pianos USA has also invited him as a guest artist at the annual Piano Technicians Guild Convention and Technical Institute in Florida.

Jin completed the Bachelor of Music degree at Hanyang University in South Korea, then earned his Performer Diploma and Master’s of Music at Indiana University, where he worked as an associate instructor.

He is the recipient of the J. Battista Scholarship for performance excellence at Indiana University and received the Collins Distinguished Fellowship for his doctoral studies, completed last year, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he studied piano with Christopher Taylor and piano pedagogy with Jessica Johnson.


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This Wednesday, Just Bach debuts its free 30-minute online concert of solo and chamber organ music with a sing-along cantata chorale

January 19, 2021
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By Jacob Stockinger

The Ear has received the following announcement to post: 

Happy New Year from Just Bach!

We hope this finds you all well, and ready to experience more of the timeless beauty of music by Johann Sebastian Bach (below, 1685-1750) in 2021, because we have a lovely new program ready to debut on this Wednesday, Jan. 20, at 8 a.m. (It will stay up indefinitely after the premiere, so you can listen to it before or after the Inauguration of President Joe Biden and Vice-President Kamala Harris.)

As regular performers on Luther Memorial Church’s weekly “Music at Midday” concert series, Just Bach presents half-hour programs on the third Wednesday of each month. The spring semester’s dates are: Jan. 20, Feb. 17, March 17, April 21 and May 19. 

Our online concerts — Dave Parminter is the videographer — are posted early Wednesday mornings at 8 a.m. on the Just Bach and Luther Memorial YouTube Channels. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcyVFEVsJwklHAx9riqSkXQ

Viewing the virtual concerts is free to the public, but we ask those who are able to help us pay our musicians with a tax-deductible donation at https://www.paypal.com/donate/?cmd=_s-xclick…

Our January concert opens with Just Bach co-founder and Grammy-nominated soprano Sarah Brailey (below) – a graduate student at the UW-Madison — providing welcoming remarks. 

The program offers two trio sonatas from the set of six that Bach composed for solo organ. Bruce Bengston (below) will perform Sonata No. 4 in E Minor, BWV 528, on the big Austin organ up in the church’s balcony.

Then Bruce will switch to the small portative organ and join violinist Kangwon Kim (below top) and violist Marika Fischer Hoyt (below middle) in a performance of Sonata No. 2 in C Minor, BWV 526, arranged for violin, viola and organ continuo (a rehearsal photo is below bottom).

Sarah, who also recorded herself paying a cello part, closes the program with the final chorale from Cantata 149 —Ach Herr, laß dein lieb Engelein (Ah, Lord, let your dear little angel) — a powerfully transcendent movement that Bach also used to close the St. John Passion. (You can hear it in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

We encourage viewers to sing along by following the chorale sheet music, which will be displayed on the computer screen as Sarah sings and Bruce accompanies on the organ.

The world needs this soul-centering music now more than ever. Please join us this Wednesday, Jan. 20.

 


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November’s “Just Bach” FREE online concert is this Wednesday morning at 8 instead of noon. It features two favorites: “Air on the G String” and the Concerto for Two Violins

November 17, 2020
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This Wednesday, Just Bach again shares the timeless beauty of the music by Johann Sebastian Bach (below) from their home in the nave of Luther Memorial Church (LCM), 1021 University Avenue.

The group participates in LMC’s weekly ‘Music at Midday’ concert series at https://www.luthermem.org/music-at-midday. (Please note: Now that the concerts are online instead of in person, the videos will be posted early Wednesday mornings at 8 a.m., instead of at noon. They will remain online indefinitely so viewers can see them at their convenience.).

As part of this series, Just Bach concerts take place on the third Wednesday of each month. Remaining concerts are: Nov. 18, Dec. 16, Jan. 20, Feb. 17, March 17, April 21 and May 19. The programs last approximately 30 minutes. 

It is still too risky to have in-person audiences. So in addition to the Luther Memorial website, they will be posted on:

The Just Bach home website at: https://justbach.org/concerts/

The Just Bach Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/JustBachSeries

And the Just Bach YouTube Channel, where previous concerts are still posted, at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcyVFEVsJwklHAx9riqSkXQ

Viewing the concerts is FREE, but the group asks those who are able, to help pay the musicians with tax-deductible donations at: https://www.paypal.com/donate/?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=7A4R7CA8VDRMG&source=url

PLEASE NOTE: New this month will be a half-hour live ZOOM post-concert reception on this Wednesday night at 7:30 p.m. CST. Those who would like to join us and chat with the performers can follow this link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87144868956?pwd=aHUrR3BNZFF5Y1hlVG1EWkNvMklkQT09

The November concert opens with Just Bach co-founder, UW graduate student and nationally concertizing soprano Sarah Brailey (below), who will provide welcoming remarks and an overview of the program.

Our guest artists this month (below, in a photo by Barry Lewis) are a quartet of string players from the Madison Symphony Orchestra: violinists Leanne League and Xavier Pleindoux; violist Marika Fischer Hoyt; and cellist Lindsey Crabb. Also performing is harpsichordist John Chappell Stowe, a professor in the UW-Madison Mead Witter School of Music. Dave Parminter is the videographer.

League and Pleindoux (below, in a photo by Barry Lewis) will play the solo parts in the familiar and beautiful Concerto in D Minor for Two Violins (the ‘Bach Double’), BWV 1043.

Madison Symphony Orchestra audiences will remember their gorgeous performance of this piece at a Christmas Spectacular concert a couple of years back. (You can hear the beautiful and poignant slow movement in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

The ensemble will continue with a movement from the Orchestral Suite No. 3 in D major, BWV 1068, the serenely transcendent “Air on a G String.”

Sarah Brailey returns to lead the final chorale from Cantata 139, composed for the 23rd Sunday after Trinity, which happens to be this coming Sunday. The stirring title, Dahero Trotz der Höllen Heer! translates as “Therefore Defiance to the Host of Hell.”

We encourage viewers to sing along by following the chorale sheet music, which will be displayed on the screen, as Stowe accompanies on the organ. 

 


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Classical music: The Choir of Trinity College Cambridge sings a varied program with organ accompaniment this Wednesday night in Overture Hall

September 9, 2019
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By Jacob Stockinger

The new season of the popular Overture Concert Organ series, sponsored by the Madison Symphony Orchestra and curated by MSO organist Greg Zelek, begins this Wednesday night, Sept. 11, at 7:30 p.m. in Overture Hall.

All single tickets are $20. (A subscription to all four organ concerts is $63.)

The opening program features the world-famous Choir of Trinity College Cambridge (below), on tour from its home in the United Kingdom.

Adds Zelek:

“Our season opens with the amazing Choir of Trinity College Cambridge, named by Gramophone Magazine as one of the best choirs in the world.

“Conducted by the choir’s music director Stephen Layton (below top) and accompanied on the mighty Klais concert organ (below bottom), this 25-voice choir will present a program of music spanning many centuries that will display its beauty of tone and depth of feeling. These rich voices will make this varied program soar through Overture Hall and leave everyone in the audience breathless.”


Here are some sample reviews:

Virtuoso is the right word. I, for one, can’t immediately think of any more appropriate way of describing singing of such staggering accomplishment.  – BBC Music Magazine

Sitting front and center at a recent Trinity Choir of Cambridge concert at Grace Cathedral was, sonically speaking, a heavenly experience.                    -The New York Times

Here is Wednesday night’s eclectic program:

William Byrd | Sing joyfully
William Byrd | O Lord, make thy servant, Elizabeth
Thomas Tallis | Salvator mundi
Henry Purcell | Thou knowest, Lord
Arvo Part | Bogoroditse Djévo
John Tavener | Mother of God, here I stand
Vasily Kalinnikov | Bogoroditse Djevo
Robert Parsons | Ave Maria
Eriks Esenvalds | The Heavens’ Flock (You can hear a different Esenvalds work, “Only in Sleep,” sung by the Trinity College Choir, in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Morten Lauridsen | O magnum mysterium
Jaakko Mantyjarvi | Stuttgarter Psalmen
Herbert Howells | Take him, earth, for cherishing
Herbert Howells | Trinity St. Paul’s

For more information about the Overture Organ Series, detailed background about the Trinity College Choir and how to purchase tickets, call (608) 258-4141 or go to: https://madisonsymphony.org/concerts-events/overture-concert-organ-performances/ or https://madisonsymphony.org/event/organ-trinity-choir/ 


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Classical music: Thursday night, the Middleton Community Orchestra closes its season with duo-pianists in music by Mozart and Saint-Saens, and the latter’s “Organ” Symphony. Wednesday is the last Just Bach concert of the season 

May 28, 2019
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ALERT: This Wednesday, May 29, at 1 p.m. in Luther Memorial Church, 1021 University Avenue, is the last FREE Just Bach concert of the season. The one-hour early music program includes: the cantata “Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen” (Praise Ye God in All Lands), BWV 51; Duetto II in F Major, BWV 803; and the cantata “Wachet! Betet! Betet! Wachet!” (Watch! Pray! Pray! Watch!), BWV 70. For more information, go online to the home website: https://justbach.org

By Jacob Stockinger

This Thursday night, May 30, the largely amateur but critically acclaimed Middleton Community Orchestra (below, in a photo by Brian Rupert) will close its ninth season with a special family-friendly concert.

The concert, under the baton of conductor Steve Kurr (below), takes place at 7:30 p.m. in the Middleton Performing Arts Center that is attached to Middleton High School, 2100 Bristol Street.

Guest artists are University of Wisconsin-Madison students and duo-pianists Satoko Hayami (below top) and Thomas Kasdorf (below bottom). They will perform the witty and entertaining “Carnival of the Animals” by Camille Saint-Saens and then the Concerto for Two Pianos, K. 365, by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

Wisconsin Public Radio host Norman Gilliland (below) will be the narrator in “The Carnival of the Animals.” (In the YouTube video at the bottom, you can hear the opening Introduction and Royal March of the Lion, with the late Sir Roger Moore — aka James Bond or 007 — as the narrator plus an all-star cast of musicians and some very cool animal videos in back-and-white.) 

The concert concludes with the always impressive, ambitious and popular Symphony No. 3  — the famous “Organ” Symphony – by Saint-Saens (below, seated at the piano in 1900).

Adds MCO co-founder Mindy Taranto: “We are really excited to share a special concert with the community as we celebrate the end of MCO’s ninth season.

“It took a village to make this concert possible. Farley’s House of Pianos is donating the use of an 1890 Steinway to match the Steinway at the hall. WPR radio host Norman Gilliland is generously volunteering to narrate the ‘Carnival of the Animals’ and Full Compass is offering us a discount on the sound equipment we need to play the “Organ” Symphony. Our very own recording engineer, Alex Ford, is playing the organ.

“Please bring your kids and share this information to invite all students free of charge to hear this concert.”

Admission is $15 for adults; all students get in for free. Tickets are available at the Willy Street Coop West and at the door. The box office opens at 6:30 p.m. and the auditorium opens at 7 p.m.

As usual, after the concert there will be a free meet-and-greet reception for musicians and the public.

For more information about this concert, and about how to join or support the Middleton Community Orchestra, call 608 212-8690 or go online to: http://middletoncommunityorchestra.org


Posted in Classical music
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Classical music: This week brings three period-instrument concerts — two of them FREE — of early music from the Baroque and Classical eras including works by Bach, Telemann and Haydn

April 23, 2019
3 Comments

CORRECTION: The concert listed below by Sonata à Quattro on Thursday night at Oakwood Village West, near West Towne Mall, is at 7 p.m. — NOT at 8 as erroneously first listed here. The Ear regrets the error.

IF YOU LIKE A CERTAIN BLOG POST, PLEASE SPREAD THE WORD. FORWARD A LINK TO IT OR, SHARE or TAG IT (not just “Like” it) ON FACEBOOK. Performers can use the extra exposure to draw potential audience members to an event.

By Jacob Stockinger

This week features three concerts of music from the Baroque and early Classical eras that should attract the attention of early music enthusiasts.

WEDNESDAY

This Wednesday, April 24, is the penultimate FREE Just Bach concert of the semester. It takes place at 1 p.m. in Luther Memorial Church, 1021 University Avenue.

This month’s program, featuring the baroque flute, presents the program that was canceled because of the blizzard in January.

First on the program is the Trio Sonata in G Major, BWV 1038, for flute, violin and continuo, a gorgeous example of baroque chamber music.

Following that comes the Orchestral Suite No. 2, BWV 1067, for flute, strings and harpsichord, really a mini flute concerto.

The program ends with Cantata 173 “Erhoehtes Fleisch und Blut” (Exalted Flesh and Blood), scored for two flutes, strings and continuo, joined by a quartet of vocal soloists: UW-Madison soprano Julia Rottmayer; mezzo-soprano Cheryl Bensman-Rowe; tenor Wesley Dunnagan; and UW-Madison bass-baritone Paul Rowe.

The orchestra of baroque period-instrument specialists, led by concertmaster Kangwon Kim, will include traverse flutists Linda Pereksta and Monica Steger.

The last Just Bach concert of this semester is May 29. For more information, go to: https://justbach.org

THURSDAY

On Thursday night, April 25, at 7 p.m. — NOT 8 as mistakenly listed here at first –at Oakwood Village West, 6209 Mineral Point Road, the Madison group Sonata à Quattro (below) will repeat the Good Friday program it performed last week at a church in Waukesha.

The one-hour concert – featuring “The Seven Last Words of Christ” by Franz Joseph Haydn — is FREE and OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. (You can sample the first part of the Haydn work in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

Commissioned by the southern Spanish episcopal city of Cadiz, this piece was originally scored for orchestra, but it enjoyed such an immediate, widespread acclaim, that the publication in 1787 also included arrangements for string quartet, and for piano. In nine movements beginning with an Introduction, Haydn sets the phrases, from “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” to “Into Thy hands I commend my spirit,” concluding with one final movement depicting an earthquake.

Performers for this program are:  Kangwon Kim, Nathan Giglierano, Marika Fischer Hoyt and Charlie Rasmussen. Modern string instruments will be used, but played with period bows.

The period-instrument ensemble Sonata à Quattro was formed in 2017 as Ensemble-In-Residence for Bach Around The Clock, the annual music festival in Madison.

The ensemble’s name refers to baroque chamber music scored for three melody lines plus continuo. The more-familiar trio sonata format, which enjoyed great popularity in the 17th and 18th centuries, employs a continuo with only two melody instruments, typically treble instruments like violins or flutes. 

In contrast, a typical sonata à quattro piece includes a middle voice, frequently a viola, in addition to the two treble instruments and continuo; this scoring has a fuller, richer sonority, and can be seen as a precursor to the string quartet. For more information, go to: https://www.facebook.com/sonataaquattro/

SATURDAY

On Saturday, April 27, at 7:30 p.m. at Saint Andrew’s Episcopal Church, 1833 Regent Street, the veteran Wisconsin Baroque Ensemble (below) will perform a concert of baroque chamber music.

Tickets are at the door only: $20 for the public, $10 students.

Performers are: Brett Lipshutz, traverse flute; Sigrun Paust, recorder; Monica Steger, traverse; Anton TenWolde, baroque cello; and Max Yount, harpsichord.

The program is:

Johann Baptist Wendling – Trio for two flutes and bass

Johann Pachelbel – Variations on “Werde Munter, mein Gemuethe” (Be Happy, My Soul)

Friedrich Haftmann Graf – Sonata or Trio in D major for two German flutes and basso continuo

Daniel Purcell – Sonata in F Major for recorder

INTERMISSION

Georg Philipp Telemann – Trio for recorder, flute,and basso continuo TWV 42:e6

Franz Anton Hoffmeister – Duo for two flutes, Opus 20, No. 1

Joseph Bodin de Boismortier – Trio Sonata, Op. 37, No. 5

Telemann – Trietto Methodicho (Methodical Sonata) No 1. TWV 42: G2

After the concert, a reception will be held at 2422 Kendall Avenue, second floor.

For more information, go to: https://wisconsinbaroque.weebly.com


Posted in Classical music
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Classical music: Easter is a perfect time to ask: How religious was Johann Sebastian Bach?

March 31, 2018
5 Comments

By Jacob Stockinger

This Sunday is Easter 2018.

It seems a perfect time ask: How religious was the great Baroque composer Johann Sebastian Bach (below)?

It also seems a perfect time to listen to Bach.

After all, has any composer written more Easter music or greater Easter music than Bach did in his passions, oratorios and cantatas?

According to the new book “Bach and God” by Michael Marissen, Bach — who was composing prolifically in the early days of the Protestant Reformation and Lutheranism — was far more religious than many Bach specialists, especially modern ones, have believed.

Here is a long and highly informative book review from The New York Times:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/30/arts/music/bach-religion-music.html

And while you are reading the book review, you can listen to Bach’s “Easter Oratorio,” BWV 249. Here it is in a YouTube video that features the Bach specialist and scholar John Eliot Gardiner conducting singers and instrumentals — for soloists plus the Monteverdi Choir and the English Baroque Soloists — in a wonderful period-instrument performance, with historically informed performance practices.


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