The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: Canadian violinist James Ehnes and American composer John Harbison are spotlighted this coming weekend by the Madison Symphony Orchestra
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By Jacob Stockinger
Internationally recognized and Grammy Award-winning Canadian violinist James Ehnes returns to Overture Hall this weekend to perform the Brahms Violin Concerto with the Madison Symphony Orchestra (MSO, below in a photo by Greg Anderson).
The program opens with a performance of American composer John Harbison’s The Most Often Used Chords, and closes with Modest Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition.
This program is a continuation of MSO music director John DeMain’s 25th anniversary season.
Performances will be held in Overture Hall, 201 State Street, on Friday, Feb. 15, at 7:30 p.m.; Saturday, Feb. 16, at 8 p.m.; and Sunday, Feb. 17, at 2:30 p.m.
Tickets information is below.
“Mussorgsky’s masterpiece explores the colors of the orchestra — the correlation of an artist’s visual medium through the colors of sound and music. And its finale The Great Gate of Kiev (heard in the YouTube video at the bottom), is one of classical music’s greatest hits,” says DeMain (below, in a photo by Greg Anderson).
DeMain adds: “James Ehnes (below, in a photo by Benjamin Ealovega) is a violinist who is completely to my taste. With an absolutely gorgeous sound and consummate technique, he goes to the heart of the music. He will approach the Brahms violin concerto as a violinist’s violinist, adored by the public, by his colleagues and by me for the integrity in his playing.”
On this Friday afternoon, Feb. 15, from 2:30 to 4 p.m. in Mills Hall, Ehnes will give a free and public master class at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music.
DeMain continues: “We celebrate the 80th birthday of the internationally renowned — and Madison resident — composer John Harbison (below) with the first performance by the MSO of his delightful composition, The Most Often Used Chords.”
Harbison’s The Most Often Used Chords is a satirical piece of “anti-art art,” or “found object,” art. According to the composer, the found object that inspired this symphony (originally titled Fli Accordi Piu Usati) were the pre-printed “Fundamentals of Music” pages that he noticed in an Italian music-writing notebook. The work was originally composed in 1992 for the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra.
Written in 1878, the Brahms Violin Concerto was dedicated to his friend Joseph Joachim and premiered in 1879 in Leipzig, with Joachim soloing and Brahms (below) conducting.
An equal partnership between soloist and ensemble is on full display in this concerto; it is not a piece in which the orchestra serves as mere backdrop. Rather, the violinist and orchestra are a team, collaborating and interacting to recount an elegant and nuanced musical drama.
Originally written as a piano composition, Pictures at an Exhibition by Modest Mussorgsky was composed as a memorial to his friend, the Russian artist Viktor Hartmann, who died in 1873. The suite consists of 10 movements — each a musical depiction of one of 10 paintings by Hartmann. These movements are interspersed with a recurring promenade theme that represents a visitor strolling through the exhibition.
The arrangement by Maurice Ravel (below), produced in 1922, represents a virtuoso effort by a master composer. His instrumental colors — a trumpet solo for the opening Promenade, dark woodwind tones, the piccolo and high strings for the children’s “chicks in shells” — are widely admired. The influence of Ravel’s version may often be discerned in subsequent versions of the suite.
CONCERT AND TICKET DETAILS
The lobby opens 90 minutes prior to each concert. One hour before each performance, Randal Swiggum (below) will lead a 30-minute Prelude Discussion in Overture Hall to enhance concertgoers’ understanding and listening experience. It is free to ticket holders.
The symphony recommends concert attendees arrive early for each performance to make sure they have time to pass through Overture Center’s security stations, and so they can experience the Prelude Discussion.
Program notes for the concerts, written retired MSO trombonist J. Michael Allsen, are available online: http://bit.ly/feb2019programnotes
- Single Tickets are $18-$93 each and are on sale now at: https://madisonsymphony.org/ehnesthrough the Overture Center Box Office at 201 State Street, or by calling the Box Office at (608) 258-4141. Fees apply to online/phone sales.
- Groups of 10 or more can save 25% by calling the MSO office at (608) 257-3734. For more information, visit, https://www.madisonsymphony.org/groups.
- Student rush tickets can be purchased in person on the day of the concert at the Overture Center Box Office at 201 State Street. Students must show a valid student ID and can receive up to two $15 or $20 tickets. More information is at: https://www.madisonsymphony.org/studentrush
- Seniors age 62 and up receive 20% savings on advance and day-of-concert ticket purchases in select areas of the hall.
- Flex-ticket booklets of 10 vouchers for 18-19 symphony subscription concerts are available. Learn more at: https://madisonsymphony.org/flex
Discounted seats are subject to availability, and discounts may not be combined.
Major funding for the February concerts is provided by: The Madison Concourse Hotel and Governor’s Club, BMO Harris Bank, Boardman and Clark LLP, Capitol Lakes, Dr. Robert and Linda Graebner, Marvin J. Levy, and Cyrena and Lee Pondrom.
Additional funding is provided by Martha and Charles Casey, and by the Wisconsin Arts Board, with funds from the State of Wisconsin and the National Endowment for the Arts.
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Classical music: You can celebrate Valentine’s Day this Thursday, Feb. 14, with live concerts of new music or old music in a large hall or a small cafe
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By Jacob Stockinger
If you are looking to celebrate Valentine’s Day on this coming Thursday, Feb. 14, with live classical music, there are at least two excellent choices facing you.
The larger event is a FREE concert at 7:30 p.m. in Mills Hall by the UW Symphony Orchestra (below top) under the award-winning conductor and professor Chad Hutchinson (below bottom) and two graduate student conductors, Michael Dolan and Ji Hyun Yim.
The program features the “Valse Triste” (Sad Waltz) by Finnish composer Jean Sibelius and the Symphony No. 39 in E-flat Major, K. 543, by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
But the main focus will be on two works by the living American composer Augusta Read Thomas (below), who lives in Chicago and whose music is widely performed because of its accessible style.
The two works by Thomas are “Of Paradise and Light” and “Prayer and Celebration.”
Thomas, who this week will be doing a residency at the UW-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music, will also hold a free and open master class in Music Hall, at the base of Bascom Hill, from 2 to 5 p.m. that same day. (You can listen to her discuss how she composes in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
For more information about the concert, the program and especially about Thomas – including an audio sample — go to: https://www.music.wisc.edu/event/uw-madison-symphony-orchestra/
A BAROQUE VALENTINE’S DAY
On Valentine’s Day, baroque chamber music enthusiasts can hear the music of the Kim-Kielson Duo as they perform a program on period instruments, titled Canons, Chaconnes and Chocolate!
Longtime friends and performers, baroque violinist Kangwon Lee Kim and recorder player Lisette Kielson (below top, right and left respectively) will be joined by viola da gambist James Waldo (below bottom).
The concert is on this Thursday, Feb. 14, at 7 p.m. at Chocolaterian Cafe, 6637 University Ave., in Middleton.
You can name your own ticket price — $20-$35 per person is suggested, payable in either cash or check.
There also will be Special Valentine’s Day Chocolate available for purchase.
The program celebrates the popular baroque forms of the canon and chaconne as composed by Italian, German and French masters.
The duo will perform three chaconnes by Tarquinio Merula, Antonio Bertali and Marin Marais plus canonic duos by Georg Philipp Telemann as well as an arrangement of canons from The Art of Fugue, BWV 1080, by Johann Sebastian Bach.
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Classical music: Do Stephen Sondheim musicals qualify as opera?
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By Jacob Stockinger
Do Broadway musicals by Stephen Sondheim (below) qualify as opera?
Granted, putting strict boundaries or criteria on certain musical genres only artificially limit their appeal.
But the question matters since this month will see two local opera companies stage two different works by Sondheim, who got his big break back when he collaborated with Leonard Bernstein on “West Wide Story.”
This Friday night at 8 p.m. and Sunday afternoon at 2:30 p.m., on Feb. 8 and 10 respectively, the Madison Opera will stage its production of the popular “A Little Night Music” – a great offering about many varieties of love so close to Valentine’s Day — in the Capitol Theater at the Overture Center.
For more information about the production (photos of it are by James Gill for Madison Opera) and performances, including ticket sales, go to: https://welltempered.wordpress.com/?s=sondheim
(Below are Charles Eaton and Katherine Pracht.)
Then later in the month, for five performances from Feb. 21 through Feb. 24 in Shannon Hall of the Wisconsin Union Theater, University Opera and University Theatre team up to stage Sondheim’s popular “Into the Woods,” based on classic fairy tales.
Find out more information here: https://union.wisc.edu/events-and-activities/event-calendar/event/into-the-woods/
So, do Stephen Sondheim musicals deserve to be included with operas by Mozart and Verdi, Wagner and Puccini?
The Madison Opera’s general director Kathryn Smith (below, in a photo by James Gill) — a Harvard graduate and an opera veteran who worked at the Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Metropolitan Opera before coming to Madison — agreed to discuss that question as it relates to her company’s production of “A Little Night Music” this weekend.
Smith writes:
A Little Night Music has been performed by opera companies around the world since 1983, so it is a natural part of the repertoire.
Sondheim himself says, “For me, an opera is something that is performed in an opera house in front of an opera audience. The ambience, along with the audience’s expectation, is what flavors the evening.”
A Little Night Music is particularly intriguing because it is a modern operetta; that’s what the New York Times called it when it premiered in 1973.
The costumes and scenery make it look a bit like traditional operettas such as The Merry Widow, but its story and wit are distinctly modern, with a clear-eyed view of the complexities of adult relationships. (Below, from left, are Cassandra Vasta, Benjamin Barlow, Sarah Day, Emily Pulley and Maddie Uphoff.)
Sondheim’s musical sophistication is on brilliant display; the Act I finale (“A Weekend in the Country”) reminds me of the way Mozart or Rossini finales build scene upon scene. (You can hear a concert version of “A Weekend in the Country,” performed at the BBC Proms, in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
I find A Little Night Music compelling for its beauty, style and humanity. The book and lyrics are laced with witty lines, but the underlying relationships are very real, as is the way people stumble on the way towards a happy ending.
It manages the trick of being simultaneously moving and entertaining, with glorious music underscoring it all.
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Classical music: This afternoon’s Schubertiade concert at the UW-Madison will be STREAMED LIVE because of the cold weather
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By Jacob Stockinger
The Ear has received the following announcement to post from co-founders, co-directors and performers Bill Lutes and Martha Fischer, and from other performers on today’s Schubertiade concert at the UW-Madison:
We are very much looking forward to welcoming you to our sixth annual Schubertiade in Mills Hall this afternoon – Sunday, Jan 27 — at 3 p.m.
It has been such a joy for all of us to prepare this music — all from the last year of Schubert’s life — to share with you, and to once again celebrate the genius of Schubert in your company.
For more information about today’s Schubertiade, including the pre-concert lecture, all performers and the complete program, go to:
Because of tomorrow’s forecast for very low temperatures, we are happy to share the news that the concert will be LIVE-STREAMED on the Internet. If you are unable to get to the concert in person, we hope you will join us online.
While it is always wonderful to have you with us in the hall to share the special feeling of community and love of this great music — not to mention hearing your voice joining us in our traditional audience sing-along of “An die Musik”! (see the YouTube video at the bottom) — we understand if the frigid weather makes going out an unadvisable option. So we would still like to know that you have the opportunity to tune in and be with us via the wonder of technology.
Use this link and you will be able to watch the live stream of the concert: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bA9n6wHCdDI
Best wishes — and stay warm!
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Classical music: The Met’s new music director is openly gay – here is why that’s good. Saturday on Wisconsin Public Radio, he conducts Debussy’s “Pelléas et Mélisande” with local singer Kyle Ketelsen. Read a rave review
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By Jacob Stockinger
This Saturday, Jan. 19, starting at noon on Wisconsin Public Radio, you can hear the Metropolitan Opera’s acclaimed new production of Claude Debussy’s only opera “Pelléas et Mélisande” (below, in a photo by Ken Howard for the Met).
The orchestra will be led by the French-Canadian conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin, who is the new music director of the Met and also received critical acclaim for his production of Verdi’s “La Traviata” earlier this season.
The production also stars local bass-baritone Kyle Ketelsen – who lives in the Madison suburb of Sun Prairie – in a major male role.
Here are two stories that pertain to the production that might interest local readers.
One is a rave review by The New York Times’ senior critic Anthony Tommasini, who singles out Ketelsen (below) for praise. Ketelsen last sang here in December during the Madison Symphony Orchestra’s Christmas program. Here is a link:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/16/arts/music/review-pelleas-et-melisande-met-opera.html
Another interesting angle to this Saturday’s production is that Nézet-Séguin is openly gay and agreed to a joint interview with his longtime partner and fellow musician Pierre Tourville (below left and right, respectively, in a photo by Jeenah Moon for the Times) at a famous gay bar in Manhattan.
It is interesting in Zachary Woolfe’s story to see why the two men see the issue of sexuality as socially and artistically relevant.
Here is a link:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/15/arts/music/yannick-nezet-seguin-met-opera-gay.html
Finally, here is YouTube video of a preview of the production, given by Nézet-Séguin:
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Classical music: Starting this Thursday, Madison Opera offers FREE preview events leading up to its staging of Stephen Sondheim’s “A Little Night Music” on Feb. 8 and 10
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ALERT: This Friday’s FREE Noon Musicale at the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive, features harpsichordist Trevor Stephenson, artistic director of the Madison Bach Musicians, will play selections by Johann Sebastian Bach for solo harpsichord. He will be joined by baroque flutist Kristen Davies for Bach’s Sonata in C major for Flute and Harpsichord. The concert runs from 12:15 to 1 p.m.
By Jacob Stockinger
The Ear has received the following announcement to post:
The Madison Opera will present Stephen Sondheim’s classic A Little Night Music on Friday, Feb. 8, at 8 p.m. and Sunday, Feb. 10, at 2:30 p.m. in the Capitol Theater of the Overture Center for the Arts, 201 State Street.
One of the most popular stage pieces of the 20th century, this modern operetta waltzes through a story of the complications of love across generations, spiced with sparkling wit and rueful self-awareness.
Set in Sweden in the early 1900s, A Little Night Music tells of multiple couples with mixed ideas of love. During a weekend in the country, marriages are made and unmade and the summer nights smile on the young and old alike. Through delicious humor and a ravishing score, human folly eventually gives way to happily-ever-after.
“A Little Night Music is an absolutely delicious piece,” says Kathryn Smith (below, in a photo by James Gill), Madison Opera’s general director. “I think of it as a grown-up operetta, with some of the best dialogue and lyrics ever written, all to Sondheim’s brilliant score. It’s a delightful way to spend a winter evening, and I’m so thrilled with our cast and production team, who are creating a new production for the Capitol Theater.”
“A Little Night Music” opened on Broadway in 1973 to rave reviews. The New York Times wrote: “At last, a new operetta! A Little Night Music is heady, civilized, sophisticated, and enchanting.”
It has since been performed by both theater and opera companies all over the world and was revived on Broadway in 2009. Sondheim composed the score entirely in variations of waltz time, and it includes several now-classic songs, such as “Send in the Clowns,” “A Weekend in the Country,” and “The Miller’s Son.” (You can hear Dame Judi Dench singing a restrained but deeply moving rendition of “Send in the Clowns” in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
“Can you imagine? An entire musical composed in some form of waltz time,” says John DeMain (below, in a photo by Greg Anderson), Madison Opera’s artistic director. “I love this score, which feels like Johann Strauss meets the harmonies of Ravel. It’s an incredible verbal and musical achievement that gets better every time I hear it. Madison Opera’s cast should prove to be sensational as we bring this Sondheim masterpiece to life. I so look forward to conducting it.”
Madison Opera’s cast features both returning artists and debuts.
Emily Pulley (below top) returns to Madison Opera as Desirée Armfeldt, a famous actress searching for “a coherent existence after so many years of muddle.” Daniel Belcher returns as Fredrik, Desirée’s ex-lover, who is currently married to the 18-year-old Anne, played by Wisconsin native Jeni Houser (below bottom), who recently made her debut at the Vienna State Opera.
Sarah Day (below), a member of the core acting company of American Players Theatre in Spring Green, makes her debut as Madame Armfeldt, the elegant ex-courtesan who is Desirée’s mother. Charles Eaton returns as Count Carl-Magnus Malcolm, Desirée’s current lover; his wife Charlotte is played by Katherine Pracht in her Madison Opera debut.
Rounding out the cast are Quinn Bernegger as Henrik, son of Fredrik; Emily Glick as the maid Petra; and Maddie Uphoff as Fredrika, Desirée’s 13-year-old daughter.
The Liebeslieders, who function as a waltz-prone Greek chorus throughout the show, are portrayed by Emily Secor, Cassandra Vasta, Kirsten Larson, Benjamin Liupaogo, and Stephen Hobe.
Doug Schulz-Carlson (below) returns to direct. The artistic director of the Great River Shakespeare Festival, his most recent Madison Opera production was Romeo and Juliet in 2016.
The original set is designed by R. Eric Stone (below top) and is being built in the Madison Opera Scene Shop. The costumes are designed by Karen Brown-Larimore (below bottom), who most recently designed costumes for Madison Opera’s production of Florencia en el Amazonas.
Members of the Madison Symphony Orchestra accompany Sondheim’s gorgeous score.
PREVIEW EVENTS
Events leading up to the performances can help the community learn more about A Little Night Music.
A FREE community preview will be held this Thursday, Jan. 17, from 7 to 8 p.m. at Capitol Lakes Retirement Community, 333 West Main Street.
Opera Novice, also FREE, takes place this Friday, Jan. 18, from 6 to 7 p.m. at the Madison Opera Center (below), 335 West Mifflin Street, and offers a free, entertaining look at the works of Stephen Sondheim including A Little Night Music.
Opera Up Close — which is free to season subscribers and costs $20 for others — provides an in-depth discussion of the production, including a cast roundtable, and takes place on Feb. 3 from 1-3 p.m. at the Madison Opera Center, 335 West Mifflin Street.
Pre-Opera Talks will take place at the Overture Center one hour prior to each performance.
For more information, including interviews with cast members and the production team, and to get tickets ($25-$115), go to: https://www.madisonopera.org/2018-2019-season/a-little-night-music/
Madison Opera’s production of “A Little Night Music” is sponsored by Thompson Investment Management, Inc., Fran Klos, David Flanders and Susan Ecroyd, and Charles Snowdon and Ann Lindsey.
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Classical music: Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra music director and conductor Andrew Sewell launches his own website
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By Jacob Stockinger
Just two weeks before he mounts the podium on Friday, Jan. 25, for the first Masterworks Concert by the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra this season, maestro Andrew Sewell (below) has launched his own website.
Sewell, who was born in New Zealand and became a naturalized American citizen, is the music director and conductor of the WCO, and is also now in his second season as music director and conductor of the San Luis Obispo Symphony in California. Plus, he has many guest appearances, from London to Hong Kong, and numerous awards to his credit. (You can hear an interview with Sewell in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
The homepage of his new website, which features becoming black-and-white photos of Sewell, looks deceptively simple to navigate.
But there is much more than is apparent at first to learn there.
Under BIO you can read about his life in detail and also listen and watch archival videos of him conducting the Wichita and the San Luis Obispo orchestras in major works by Haydn, Beethoven, Berlioz and Brahms, along with critical praise for his performances and programming.
Under SCHEDULE, you see concert dates and soloists but no programs — at first. But if you click on the yellow words for PURCHASE TICKETS and either MASTERWORKS or CONCERT, you will be directed to full information about all the concerts by both of the orchestras he heads.
And by clicking on GALLERY you will find a generous montage of color photos, both serious and playful, of the friendly and talented Sewell at work and at ease.
Here is a link to the website:
https://www.andrewsewell.net/?fbclid=IwAR3zaRVX5psZMfYQNBW2XKIj6AvgY5fiVMQXZw-yOALDQDmZTvBElX6U3us
The Ear finds this a useful and appealing tool to learn more about a Madison maestro whose achievements have consistently stood out for almost 20 years and have altered the landscape of local music-making for the better.
The handsome new website is a job well done, and is well worth your time to check out, bookmark and use regularly.
Bravo, maestro!
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Classical music: Wikipedia offers a comprehensive overview of classical music in 2018. Plus, the annual New Year’s Day concert by the Vienna Philharmonic airs this morning on radio and tonight on TV
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By Jacob Stockinger
Today – January 1, 2019 – brings just two items or stories to the blog.
NEW YEAR’S DAY FROM VIENNA
The first item is a kind of ALERT.
One of the most popular and beloved worldwide musical traditions is the annual Great Performances broadcast by National Public Radio (NPR) of “New Year’s Day From Vienna” with the Vienna Philharmonic.
This year’s conductor is Christian Thielemann (below top) of the Munich Philharmonic and the host is Hugh Bonneville (below bottom in a photo by Nick Briggs) of PBS’ “Downton Abbey.”
The concert is a sold-out feast of waltzes, polkas and marches (including the famous clap-along “Radetzky March,” with Herbert von Karajan conducting in 1987, in the YouTube video at the bottom).
The radio version will be broadcast on Wisconsin Public Radio from 10 a.m. to noon THIS MORNING, Tuesday, Jan. 1, 2019.
Then at 8-9:30 p.m. TONIGHT, Wisconsin Public Television will broadcast the visual version of the event, complete with ballet and wonderful landscape, interior and architectural shots in and around Vienna. There will also be encore performances: https://wptschedule.org/episodes/48242142/Great-Performances/From-Vienna-The-New-Years-Celebration-2019/
For a playlist and more background, go to: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/gperf/from-vienna-the-new-years-celebration-2019-about/9076/
2018 IN REVIEW
The first day of the new year seems like the perfect time to look back and see what happened in classical music during the past year.
And this year, The Ear found something truly comprehensive and international.
Wikipedia has put together a year-end overview that is astonishing for its amount of detail.
You will find a global day-by-day calendar that includes links, in blue, for more details.
You will find news items and major events – including the effect of the #MeToo movement as well as deaths and obituaries, jobs and retirements.
You will find a list of new music.
You will find a list of new operas.
You will find lists for several major awards for classical recordings.
It is a terrific resource — a good long read, both informative and entertaining. Perfect for New Year’s Day.
Here is a link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_in_classical_music
Happy New Year!
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Classical music: Combining a ticket to a live music performance with a book or recording that is tied to the concert’s program makes a great holiday gift
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By Jacob Stockinger
The holidays seem to arrive earlier each year.
The Ear isn’t sure why that is.
Whatever the reason, a lot of holiday gift shopping can by now seem last-minute and somewhat frantic.
But if you are shopping for a classical music fan, you are in luck if you go local.
The best way to please the recipient and also to support the local arts is to give a ticket to a live concert – always the most powerful and exciting musical experience — perhaps coupled to a related book or recording. (Below is UW-Madison pianist Christopher Taylor in a photo by Michael R. Anderson).
This blog doesn’t have room to list separately all the many musical groups in the area. But here are some samples that might interest you.
Through Monday, Dec. 24, the Madison Symphony Orchestra (below, in a photo by Greg Anderson) is once again offering a special deal for the remainder of the season. Tickets to both the “Beyond the Score” program and the remaining four season concerts, including Mahler’s mammoth “Symphony of a Thousand,” have been reduced to two price ranges: $10 and $25 for the former; $25 and $50 for the latter.
For more information, go to: https://madisonsymphony.org/concerts-events/buy-tickets/offers-discounts/holiday-tickets-sale/
If you want to see what other performers and presenters are offering – say, the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra (below), the Oakwood Chamber Players, the Madison Bach Musicians, the Middleton Community Orchestra, the Wisconsin Baroque Ensemble, the Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society, the Willy Street Chamber Players, the Wisconsin Union Theater, the Overture Center and the Madison Opera, to name just a few of the more prominent names – just go to Google and type in their name to search and go to their home page on the web.
Many of them have all sorts of other discounts for students, seniors, subscribers, groups and others.
Don’t forget that Madison features many FREE concerts, especially at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
True, a few of the most attractive and gift-worthy UW concerts are ticketed ($17 for adults, $7 for UW students) – including the annual Schubertiade, the yearly recital by pianist Christopher Taylor and the world premiere of the new Viola Sonata by John Harbison (below). But you could offer to take someone to a free chamber music or orchestral concert and provide companionship, transportation and maybe even dinner.
Here is a link to the very busy lineup and informative previews at the UW-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music: https://www.music.wisc.edu
To top it off, you could add one of two outstanding local books The Ear puts at the top of the holiday gift guide.
The first is John Harbison’s “What Do We Make of Bach” (below top) which is short, very readable, thoroughly engaging and wonderfully informative in an autobiographical way that helps us celebrate both the 80th birthday of Harbison and the upcoming 334th birthday of Johann Sebastian Bach.
The second book, now in its second printing, is a comprehensive history of the Pro Arte Quartet (below) done by John W. Barker, who often writes for this blog as well as Isthmus.
Of course, a CD with one of the composers or works on a program also makes a fine complement, whether it is a Mahler symphony, a Bach suite or Schubert’s “Swan Songs” from his final year.
Finally, The Ear wants to know: What are your suggestions for a for holiday gift of classical music?
It could be a live concert or a recording, either something new or an old favorite.
It could be a particularly informative and enjoyable or entertaining book, including biographies of Leonard Bernstein (including one by his daughter Jamie Bernstein, below), whose centennial has been celebrated this season.
Over the next few days, The Ear will post suggestions and Top 10 lists by professional critics. But in the end, it is the audience, the ordinary public, that many people want to hear from.
So perhaps you will leave your ideas in the COMMENT section.
Thank you! And have Happy Holidays — a Merry Christmas, a joyous Kwanzaa and a Happy New Year.
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Classical music: The amateur Middleton Community Orchestra performs a non-traditional “holiday” concert of Mahler and Kodaly this Wednesday night
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By Jacob Stockinger
During the holiday season, many — maybe even most — classical music groups program music that goes with the theme of the holidays from Christmas and Hanukkah to Kwanzaa and the New Year.
But some groups wisely give listeners a respite from holiday fare.
That happened one week ago when the University of Wisconsin-Madison Choral Union and the UW Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of Beverly Taylor, performed a memorable program that featured the brassy “Te Deum” by Zoltan Kodaly and especially the calming Requiem by Maurice Duruflé.
Something similar will happen again this Wednesday night, Dec. 19, at 7:30 p.m. in the comfortable Middleton Performing Arts Center, attached to Middleton High School, 2100 Bristol St.
That is when the mostly amateur but critically acclaimed Middleton Community Orchestra (below, in a photo by Brian Ruppert) will perform its “holiday” concert that is holiday-ish more as a matter of timing than of content or theme, since you won’t hear any carols or sing-alongs or the usual or traditional holiday fare. The Ear thinks it’s a smart approach and a welcome break.
The non-holiday “holiday” program includes “Songs of a Wayfarer” by Gustav Mahler, sung by UW-Madison baritone Paul Rowe (below).
Also on the program is “Le Boeuf sur le Toit” (The Steer on the Roof) by Darius Milhaud with violinist soloist Naha Greenholtz (below, in a photo by Greg Anderson), who is the concertmaster of the Madison Symphony Orchestra.
Matthew Coley (below top), a member of the acclaimed Madison-based percussion group “Clocks in Motion,” will perform two pieces of Hungarian music that use the rarely heard cimbalom (below bottom): the “Czardas” by Vittorio Monti and the “Hary Janos Suite” by Kodaly. (You can hear Monti’s familiar “Czardas” in a version for violin and piano in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Kyle Knox (below), who is the new music director of the Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras and the new associate conductor of the Madison Symphony Orchestra, and who is also the husband of Naha Greenholtz, will once again be the guest conductor.
Admission is $15 for the general public with students and young people getting in for free. Tickets can be bought at the Willy Street Co-op West and at the door. The box office opens at 6:30 p.m. and doors to the hall open at 7 p.m.
As usual, there will be a meet-and-greet reception (below) – complete with Christmas cookies, you can be sure – at the end of the concert.
For more information about future MCO concerts, reviews of past concerts and details about how to join the orchestra or support it, go to: http://middletoncommunityorchestra.org/home
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