The Well-Tempered Ear
Remember Marika with Bach Around the Clock 2023. The FREE five-day, in-person and online birthday celebration begins today
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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:
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.
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See and hear The Cliburn piano competition for FREE via streaming. It runs through June 18
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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.
Here is a link to the home page (below): https://cliburn.org
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?
Other thoughts about the competition in general?
The Ear Wants to hear.
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Should the 1812 Overture be played this Fourth of July?
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By Jacob Stockinger
The Ear recently noticed that the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra has once again scheduled the 1812 Overture by Tchaikovsky (below) as part of the finale of its Fourth of July concert on the evening of July 6, 2022.
The performance is part of this summer’s FREE Concerts on the Square (COS) by the WCO that run on six consecutive Wednesday nights from June 29 through Aug. 3. Concerts start at 7 p.m. on the King Street corner of the Capitol Square in downtown Madison, and will be conducted by Andrew Sewell.
For more information about the series and individual performers and programs, go to: https://wcoconcerts.org/concerts-tickets/concerts-on-the-square
An asterisk says programs are subject to change.
Which got The Ear to thinking: Should Tchaikovsky’s perennial favorite, the flashy and loud 1812 Overture, be played again this year?
It is a tradition that was started on Independence Day in 1974 by Arthur Fielder and the Boston Pops, according to reputable sources.
But this year might be a very different case because of a quandary that might cause organizers, including PBS’ “A Capitol Fourth,” to rethink the program.
It is a choice that will confront many musical groups across the U.S., given the current unprovoked brutality and and war crimes being committed by Russia against Ukraine.
After all, many music groups, including the Metropolitan Opera, have already banned Russian performers who support Russian President Vladimir Putin and his unjustified war in Ukraine (below).
So here’s the question: Is it appropriate to play a favorite work celebrating a Russian military victory while Ukraine, the United States and Western allies, including NATO, are desperately trying to defeat Russian forces?
As you may recall, the overture was inspired by Russia’s victory over the invading forces of Napoleon who was attempting go conquer Russia. Like Hitler and the Nazis, Napoleon failed and the Russians prevailed. That is why, in the work, you hear the French national anthem “La Marseillaise” overcome by the chimes and cannons of the Russian victory hymn. (There was no Russian national anthem until 1815.)
Here is a link to more background in Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1812_Overture
Will the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra or other orchestras as well as radio and TV stations around the U.S. find a substitute piece? Perhaps it could be the Ukrainian national anthem that is performed (as in the BBC Proms concert in the YouTube video at the bottom and as many other orchestras around the world, including the Madison Symphony Orchestra and John DeMain, have done).
What else could the WCO and other groups play — especially since Sousa marches are already usually featured on The Fourth?
Do you have a suggestion?
The Ear will be interested to see how the quandary is solved — with explanations and excuses, or with alternative music?
Meanwhile, as comedian Stephen Colbert likes to say: What do you think?
Should the “1812 Overture” be played on this Fourth of July?
Why?
Or why not?
The Ear wants to hear.
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The famed International Tchaikovsky Competition has been expelled from the World Federation of International Music Competitions
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By Jacob Stockinger
One of the granddaddies of all international music competitions — probably the best known and most prestigious — has been disowned.
The International Tchaikovsky Competition — the one that catapulted the young American pianist and first winner Van Cliburn (below, during the competition) to worldwide fame during the height of the Cold War, for which he received the only ticker tape parade in New York City ever given to a musician — has been expelled from the World Federation of International Music Competitions, which was founded in 1957 and represents 110 music competitions and programs to help young musicians build a career.
The move comes in response to recent events in Ukraine — including alleged Russian war crimes during its brutal, deadly and unprovoked invasion.
The famed Tchaikovsky Competition — which started in 1958 and is now for pianists, violinists, cellists, vocalists as well as woodwind and brass players — is held in Moscow and St. Petersburg and is financed and organized by the Russian government. It has launched the careers on many great musicians.
It is co-chaired by the discredited Russian conductor Valery Gergiev (below right, in 2014), a close friend and avid supporter of Russian President Vladimir Putin (below left) and of the conflict in Ukraine.
The expulsion came about because the Tchaikovsky Competition refused to condemn the Russian invasion, as the federation requested.
Here is a link to the story that was published on the website Classical Music, an online publication of the BBC Music Magazine. It contains background on both the competition and the current state of affairs regarding Russian musicians and the Russian conflict in Ukraine. It has a lot of noteworthy links:
And here is the response from the organizers of the Russian competition, which takes place every four years. The 16th competition was held in 2019, and the 17th is still scheduled for 2023. (The announcement of the 2019 piano winners — by the Russian former piano winner Denis Matsuev, who has been boycotted because of Ukraine — is in the YouTube-Medici.TV video at the bottom.)
The response — which accuses the federation of “persecuting” Russian musicians and promises that it will be held as usual and remain open to contestants worldwide — is posted on the competition’s website:
https://tchaikovskycompetition.com/en/news/415.htm
It makes one wonder what the effects on the next Tchaikovsky competition will be.
Will potential jurors outside Russia boycott the competition?
Will non-Russian contestants — with the exception perhaps on Chinese and Belarusian performers — avoid participating?
And what will be the effect on the inaugural Rachmaninoff Competition for pianists, composers and conductors that is scheduled to take place this June in Moscow?
What do you think?
Is it the right call by the international federation?
Or the wrong call?
Why do you think so?
The Ear wants to hear.
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WORT-FM 89.9 now has a Monday morning show of modern and contemporary classical music with Paul Baker
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By Jacob Stockinger
The listener-sponsored, community radio station WORT-FM 89.9 — long a home for classical music from all eras, from the earliest to the newest — has a new program to join its many others about music in all genres and all periods as well as news and commentary about public affairs.
It airs on Monday mornings from 5 a.m. to 8 a.m. with Paul Baker (below, in his WORT studio). He is well-known radio host, music critic and amateur musician.
Baker recently shared with The Ear some insights into his new show “Listen Adventurously”:
Are you still doing your show for WSUM, the student-run FM radio station at the University of Wisconsin-Madison?
I hosted Only Strings on WSUM-FM 91.7 to focus on chamber music at a time when I was taking cello lessons. I wanted to absorb as much chamber music as possible, and preparing for, and hosting, a radio program was one good way to do that. I ended the show in 2019 when I reached the five-year mark.
How did the new WORT show come about?
I’ve been a WORT fan for more than 30 years. I know many of the program hosts and have been in touch with the music director, Sybil Augustine, for some time.
I had hosted a WORT Sunday early morning show briefly about 20 years ago. The Monday morning classical slot recently became available when Christopher Delamarter stepped down, so I raised my hand.
What can you tell us about the content of the show?
The show has been billed as 20th-century classical music. I am extending that to include pieces from the 2000s as well — things written as recently as last year. There is just so much good material. Younger composers and performers deserve to be heard.
So the show will feature Bartok and Shostakovich and Samuel Barber, of course, but also Philip Glass and Arvo Pärt and Jennifer Higdon and Laura Schwendinger (below, who teaches at the UW-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music and whose music is widely performed) and Chicago’s Third Coast Percussion Ensemble. In my opinion, there’s a lack of local availability to hear this music.
I enjoy sharing music with people. When I worked on campus, I programmed three shows for WSUM-FM. Now that I’m retired, I’m happy to have this opportunity on WORT. The only drawback is that I must get up at 4 a.m. for the 5 a.m. air time. But I’m a morning person, so it’s not that bad.
Editor’s note: If you want to see a sample playlist, as well as WORT’s daily show schedule, here a link to the one from this past Monday: https://www.wortfm.org/on-air-schedule/
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Just Bach free concert series seeks Interim Co-Artistic Director. Apply by July 5
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By Jacob Stockinger
The Ear has received the following announcement to post about an interim job at Just Bach:
Do you love the music of Johann Sebastian Bach (below)?
Would you love to perform it every month in one of the most beautiful churches (below, in a photo by Barry Lewis) in Madison?
Are you a professional instrumentalist with training and experience in period performance practice?
Do you have strong organizational skills?
If the answer to all these questions is yes, then Just Bach needs you!
Because Co-Artistic Director Marika Fischer Hoyt (below) will leave on a sabbatical starting in November, Just Bach is looking for an instrumentalist to join the Artistic Team. (You can check out the typical format by using the search engine on this blog or going to Just Bach’s Facebook page or YouTube Channel.)
The popular monthly concert series, which made it to the final round of the 2021 “Best of Madison” awards, seeks an Interim Artistic Co-Director for its upcoming fourth season.
POSITION SUMMARY
The Interim Artistic Co-Director works with the Just Bach team and the staff at Luther Memorial Church to program, produce, promote and perform monthly Bach concerts (below) from September through May.
The Interim Co-Artistic Director helps finalize the programming, contract any remaining needed players, schedule rehearsals and performances, perform in the concerts as needed, and upload the concert video to the Just Bach YouTube channel.
The Co-Artistic Director devotes about 4 hours per month to administrative tasks, on a volunteer basis.
The Co-Artistic Director rehearses and performs as needed in the monthly concerts — and is paid $100 per concert. (You can hear and see the closing concert of this past season in the YouTube video at the bottom. Click on Show More to see other instruments, players, singers and the program.)
The current Artistic Team will provide training for this position, and will be available for assistance once the season begins.
A detailed job description is available at:: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1CDis-RSY5FUnfUGCBvYunWZ1fR4EtyfzSo3xYiMyjUs/edit#
For more information, please contact and apply to Just Bach at: justbachseries@gmail.com
APPLICATION ARE DUE BY JULY 5.
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Going live! Here are some links to newly announced summer concerts and 2021-22 seasons
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By Jacob Stockinger
Get out your datebooks.
Now that the pandemic is fast abating, at least locally, music groups and music presenters in the Madison area have been announcing a return to live music and their new seasons and summer events in a relentless way.
The Ear had been out of commission since mid-May until this week. But in any case, The Ear was overwhelmed and just couldn’t keep up with a separate post for each one.
Still, he thought it might be helpful to be able to check the dates, performers, programs, tickets and other information in one place.
Remember that the Madison Early Music Festival is no more. It has been absorbed into the regular music curriculum at the UW.
Please know that many groups – including, but not limited to, the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music (below is the UW Symphony Orchestra — masked, socially distanced and virtually streamed — during the pandemic), University Opera, Edgewood College, Just Bach, Grace Presents, the Salon Piano Series, the First Unitarian Society of Madison, Bach Around the Clock, the Festival Choir of Madison, the Wisconsin Chamber Choir and the Madison Bach Musicians – have not yet released details of their new seasons.
But most of their websites say that an announcement of their new season is coming soon.
There are also some trends you may notice.
Many of the groups are raising prices and persistently seek donations as well as subscribers, no doubt to help make up for the loss of revenue during the pandemic.
The Madison Symphony Orchestra and the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra have reduced the number of concerts or start later.
Some have simply rescheduled events, like the Wisconsin Union Theater closing its season with soprano Renée Fleming. And the Madison Symphony Orchestra’s new season is largely the same one they were planning to have to celebrate the Beethoven Year in 2020-21.
The Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society, the Middleton Community Orchestra and the Willy Street Chamber Players all have pop-up concerts and scheduled outdoor concerts in parks. Some have also scheduled individual mini-concerts or personal sessions.
If you look at programs, you will see an emphasis on Black composers and performers by almost all groups. (The Madison Symphony Orchestra has scheduled “Lyric for Strings” by George Walker, below. You can hear it performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic under Gustavo Dudamel in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
What is most disappointing is that no group seems to have announced a special concert or event to pay homage to the public ordeal, health care workers and victims of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Ear keeps thinking a performance of a suitable requiem (by perhaps Mozart, Faure, Brahms, Verdi or Britten) or Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony would have been an appropriate way to start the in-person season and, at the same time, acknowledge the more than 7,000 deaths in Wisconsin and almost 600,000 deaths in the U.S. and almost 4 million worldwide as of now. Maybe even Barber’s overplayed Adagio for Strings would suffice.
Finally, very few groups seem to be offering online virtual concert attendance as a possibility for those listeners who found that they actually enjoyed at least some the music in their own homes and at their own times.
IN ANY CASE, HERE IS WHAT HAS ALREADY TAKEN PLACE OR IS STILL ON TAP. CHECK IT OUT!
Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society in free live and for-pay recorded concerts: https://bachdancing.org
Middleton Community Orchestra’s summer concerts at Fireman’s Park (below) in Middleton: https://middletoncommunityorchestra.org
Madison Bach Musicians summer workshops (below): https://madisonbachmusicians.org/2021-summer-chamber-music-workshop/
Concerts on the Square with limited paid admission at Breese Stevens Field (below): https://wcoconcerts.org/concerts-tickets/concerts-on-the-square
Madison Symphony Orchestra (below, in a photo by Peter Rodgers): https://madisonsymphony.org/concerts-events/madison-symphony-orchestra-concerts/
Madison Opera and Opera in the Park (below): https://www.madisonopera.org/oitp21/; and https://www.madisonopera.org/21-22/
Wisconsin Union Theater: https://union.wisc.edu/visit/wisconsin-union-theater/seasonevents/concert-series/
Willy Street Chamber Players (below) at Orton Park: http://www.willystreetchamberplayers.org/2021-summer-concert-series.html
If you know of more entries or have observations to make about these, please leave word and, when possible, a link in the comment section.
The Ear wants to hear.
Tags: #AdagioforStrings, #African-AmericanComposer, #AncoraStringQuartet, #BachAroundtheClock, #BachDancingandDynamiteSociety, #BeethovenYear, #BenjaminBritten, #BlackComposer, #Blackcomposers, #BlogPost, #BlogPosting, #BreeseStevensField, #ChristianChurch, #CollageNewMusic, #ConcertsontheSquare, #CoronavirusPandemic, #COVID-19, #EdgewoodChamberOrchestra, #FacebookPost, #FacebookPosting, #FestivalChoirofMadison, #FiremansPark, #GabrieFaure, #GiuseppeVerdi, #GraceEpiscopalChurch, #GracePresents, #GustavoDudamel, #HealthCare, #JacobStockinger, #JohannesBrahms, #JohannSebastianBach, #JustBach, #LiveMusic, #LosAngeles, #LosAngelesPhilharmonic, #MadisonBachMusicians, #MadisonEarlyMusicFestival, #MadisonOpera, #MadisonSymphonyOrchestra, #MeadWitterSchoolofMusic, #MiddletonCommunityOrchestra, #MusicEducation, #NewMusic, #NinthSymphony, #OperaInThePark, #OrtonPark, #RecordedMusic, #RenéeFleming, #SalonPIanoSeries, #SamuelBarber, #ShannonHall, #SocialDistance, #SopranoSinger, #StringMusic, #StringQuartet, #TakePlace, #TheEar, #TheU.S., #TheUW, #UnitedStates, #UniversityofWisconsin-Madison, #UniversityOpera, #UWSymphonyOrchestra, #WillyStreetChamberPlayers, #WisconsinChamberChoir, #WisconsinChamberOrchestra, #WisconsinUnionTheater, #YouTubeChannel, #YouTubevideo, abate, absorb, acknowledge, Adagio for Strings, admission, African American, America, Ancora String Quartet, Arts, audience, Bach, Bach Around the Clock, Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society, Barber, Baroque, BDDS, Beethoven, Beethoven Year, Benjamin Britten, black, black composer, blog, Blog post, blog posting, Brahms, Breese Stevens Field, Britten, celebrate, Chamber music, choral music, Christia, church, Classical music, comment, commission, composer, Concert, concerto, Concerts on the Square, coronavirus, COS, curriculum, death, deaths, details, donation, Dudamel, Early music, Edgewood College, enjoy, entry, Facebook, Facebook page, Facebook post, fast, Faure, Festival Choir of Madison, Firemans Park, for-pay, forward, free, funding, Gabriel Fauré, Giuseppe Verdi, Grace Episcopal Church, Grace Presents, group, Gustavo Dudamel, health care, homage, Home, indoors, information, Jacob Stockinger, Johann Sebastian Bach, Johannes Brahms, Just Bach, later, like, limited, link, listener, live music, live-stream, local, Los Angeles, Los Angeles Philharmonic, loss, Ludwig van Beethoven, Madison, Madison Bach Musicians, Madison Early Music Festival, Madison Opera, Madison Symphony Orchestra, mask, MCO, Mead Witter School of Music, MEMF, Middleton, Middleton Community Orchestra, Mozart, Music, Music education, new, New Music, Ninth Symphony, notice, opera, Opera in the Park, Orchestra, ordeal, Orton Park, outdoors, overplay, Overture Center, overwhelm, overwhelming, paid, pandemic, performers, persistent, personal, Pianist, Piano, pop-up, presenter, price, program, public, recorded music, Renée Fleming, Requiem, revenue, Salon Piano Series, Samuel Barber, schedule, Season, seating, seek, separate, Shannon Hall, share, singer, Singing, social distance, Sonata, soprano, start, stream, string music, String quartet, strings, subscriber, suffice, summer, symphony, tag, take place, tap, The Ear, ticket, tickets, times, trend, U.S., United State, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, University Opera, UW, UW Symphony Orchestra, Verdi, victim, Violin, vocal music, Website, Willy Street Chamber Players, Wisconsin, Wisconsin Chamber Choir, Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, Wisconsin Union Theater, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, workers, workshop, YouTube
This Saturday night the Wisconsin Chamber Choir and Grammy winner Sarah Brailey perform a free live-streamed concert of music by women
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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:
https://youtu.be/Iaz0wZhuG18 or:
https://www.facebook.com/events/1561155960751974/
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.)
For more details, visit: https://www.wisconsinchamberchoir.org/music-she-wrote.
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
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As the semester ends, virtual concerts allow UW students to reach many more family members, friends and listeners. Here is how the public can connect to them
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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.
Here is a link: https://www.music.wisc.edu/events/
Try it and see for yourself. Below is the YouTube link for pianist Mengwen Zhu, who performs his recital this Saturday, April 17, at 6 p.m.)
Happy listening!
Let us know what you think, especially if it is encouraging for the students.
The Ear wants to hear.
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The Well-Tempered Ear 
Live music continues its comeback from the pandemic. Today is Make Music Madison with free concerts citywide of many kinds of music. Here are guides with details
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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.
By Jacob Stockinger
Live music continues to make its comeback from the restrictions of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The past week saw live outdoor concerts by Con Vivo, the Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society and the Middleton Community Orchestra.
Today – Monday, June 21 –is Make Music Madison 2021.
It is part of an annual worldwide phenomenon that started in France in 1982. It has since spread globally and is now celebrated in more than 1,000 cities in 120 countries.
Yet in the U.S., Wisconsin is one of only five states that celebrate Make Music Day statewide. The other states are Connecticut, Hawaii, New Mexico and Vermont. In there U.S., more than 100 cities will take part in presenting free outdoor concerts. Globally, the audience will be in the millions.
The day is intended to be a way to celebrate the annual Summer Solstice, the longest day of the year. Technically, the solstice occurred in Wisconsin last night, on Father’s Day, at 10:32 p.m. CDT.
But The Ear is a forgiving kind. This will be the first full day of summer, so the spirit of the celebration lives on despite the calendar.
You can see – the composer Igor Stravinsky advised listening with your eyes open – and hear 38 different kinds of music. The choices include blues, bluegrass, Celtic, roots music, gospel, rock, jazz, classical, folk, African music, Asian music, world music, children’s music (see the YouTube video at the bottom) and much more. It will be performed by students and teachers, amateurs and professionals, individuals and groups.
Here is a link to a press release about the overall event: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/make-music-day-2021-announces-updated-schedule-of-events-301304107.html
And here is a link to the global home website — with more background information and a live-stream video of a gong tribute to the who died of COVID — about the festival: https://www.makemusicday.org
The local events will take place from 5 a.m. to midnight. All are open to the public without admission, and safety protocols will be observed.
Here is a guide to local events that allow you to search particulars of the celebration by area of the city, genre of music, performers, venues and times. If you are a classical fan, in The Ear’s experience you might want to pay special attention to Metcalfe’s market in the Hilldale mall.
Here is a link to the home webpage of Make Music Madison: https://www.makemusicmadison.org
Here is a link to the event calendar with maps and schedules as well as alternative plans in case of rain and various menus for searching: https://www.makemusicmadison.org/listings/
Happy listening!
In the Comment section, please leave your observations and suggestions or advice about the quality and success of the festival and the specific events you attended.
The Ear wants to hear.
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