The Galaxy – A musician like no other

Charles Mingus

This week we find ourselves in the midst of an occasion that I enjoy observing annually.  Charles Mingus was more than a great bassist, or even a great jazz musician.  He was a man of passionate ideas.  He wore his heart out on his sleeve – at times maybe a little too much – but he also had a rare ability to channel his huge reservoir of passion into his music.  The result is a musical catalog like no other.  His music breathed, a unique sort of breath that balanced purposeful dissonance with natural harmonies.  His music was not sterile or calculated – it was frequently improvised on the spot, with little preparation.  His music gives testimony to the notion that life is full of its little dissonances, even as we seek harmony within ourselves and others – Mingus had the innate ability to harness that musical dissonance, to make it speak of matters of the soul.  So it is only appropriate that we celebrate what would have been Mingus’ 90th birthday on April 22nd.

The Clown (album) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We started the evening with one such soulful piece, Haitian Fight Song, a great song from The Clown.  Recorded in 1957 but released in 1961, this is but one example of how unique Mingus’ compositional style was.  As he put it in a letter to DownBeat Magazine:

“I write or play me, the way I feel, through jazz, or whatever Music is, or was, a language of the emotions.  If someone has been escaping reality, I don’t expect him to dig my music… My music is alive and it’s about the living and the dead, about good and evil.  It’s angry, yet it’s real because it knows it’s angry.”

In the liner notes for the Clown, Mingus said this about Haitian Fight Song:

My solo in it is a deeply concentrated one. I can’t play it right unless I’m thinking about prejudice and persecution, and how unfair is it. There’s sadness and cries in it, but also determination. And it usually ends with my feeling ‘I told them! I hope somebody heard me!’”.

Blues & Roots (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We then heard Eh’s Flat, Ah’s Flat Too, from Blues and Roots.  Like with Haitian Fight Song, Blues and Roots was an effort to do “a barrage of soul music, churchy, blues, swinging, earthy”.  After the album was issued, Mingus assembled his usual cast of players, adding Eric Dolphy, and went out on tour.  A live album for this tour was issued, Mingus at Antibes, from which we heard several classically representative cuts, Wednesday Night Prayer Meeting (featuring Dolphy, Ted Curson on trumpet and Booker Ervin on tenor sax (originally recorded for Blues and Roots), Prayer for Passive Resistance, and What Love (a reworking of What is This Thing Called Love?, featuring Curson and Dolphy interplaying – “conversing” brilliantly with Mingus’ bass and with each other).  After some consideration, we also heard I Remember April, also from the Antibes album, that features the great Bud Powell sitting in with Mingus’ band for an extended solo, before Mingus launches a set of solos and “conversations” between Curson, Dolphy, and his bass.

Cover of Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus

We next heard a cut from Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus, Better Get Hit In Yo’ Soul, from 1963.  Mingus stated that he “enjoyed the challenge of playing in 6/8 time faster than anybody had tried before… and I wanted to show that a band can swing as deeply in 6/8 as in the more usual time signatures.”  The recording is also notable for being one of Mingus’ earlier experiments with using a larger ensemble, experiments which would go on for much of the ’60s.  Better Get Hit In Yo’ Soul became one of his better-known songs.

Charles Mingus in the Studio, May 1959

A key aspect of Mingus’ music is his civil rights activism.  The roots of that trace all the way to his childhood, when he was denied the opportunity to learn how to read music, or to play symphonic classical music, due to his race (he was of mixed race, his mother being Chinese and English, while his father was of African and Swedish ancestry).  A number of his best songs were inspired by civil rights issues: Fables of Faubus was a protest directed at Orval Faubus, the segregationist governor of Arkansas who had been fighting desegregation of the schools in Little Rock, while Freedom is one of the few Mingus songs with an organized vocal part, sung by members of the band in unison).  While we were not able to play those two songs (owing mainly to time constraints), we heard another such song, Meditations on Integration, which at times had been given the title “Meditation on a Pair of Wire Cutters” (Mingus was notorious for his ornate titles).  This performance is from the April 1964 Paris concert recording that was infamously bootlegged for years until Mingus’ wife Sue formed a record company and issued a high quality recording of the set (bootlegging was a long-time Mingus pet peeve).

Related articles

• Katz of the Day: Reflections on Charles Mingus (irom.wordpress.com)
• The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady, or Integrity (mermaidssinging.wordpress.com)

Your Community Spirit 2012 April 20

News includes Occupy Updates Daily; Earth Day; 2 Year Anniversary of BP Oil Spil; Snake Migration in Southern Illinois. Happenings include Sexual Assault Awareness Month; International Coffee Hour; Earth Day With Eco-Dawgs at Rice and Spice; Friday Night Salsa; Habitat for Humanity; Farmer’s Market; Vigil for Peace; Carbondale Spring Clean-Up; St. Louis Earth Day; World Book Night; Green Earth Work Day; SIUC Earth Day.

WDBX Opera Overnight – All Strauss, all the time

Tonight we heard two pieces by Richard Strauss that I had been trying to incorporate into the show for several months now.  The fact that I am playing them both on the same night is really just happenstance – the way things fell, they fit together pretty nicely.

Strauss with his wife and son, 1910. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The first work of the evening is Die Frau Ohne Schatten (“The Woman Without a Shadow”).  Strauss began composition in 1911, working hand-in-hand with his frequent librettist Hugo von Hoffmansthall, who used a variety of sources, ranging from several works by Goethe to Grimm’s fairy tales and portions of the Arabian Nights set of tales.  But the composition became an extended effort, and was not completed until 1915.  Then, as Europe was in the midst of war, the piece would not be produced until 1919.  When this finally occurred, it met with mixed reaction.  The libretto was complicated and highly symbolic (something that Hoffmansthal had fought to maintain in the face of attempted changes by Strauss), the score was written for a 164 piece orchestra, and the staging is complicated and difficult, even for modern opera companies (one scene calls for children singing out of a frying pan).  Moreover, the opera calls for five top singers in the primary roles and first-rate singers in the secondary roles, something which is prohibitively expensive.

Yet, even with all these cons weighing against the work, the music itself ranks among Strauss’ most compelling works.  Strauss used a similar style of musical dreamscape to that which he achieved with Der Rosenkavalier (also written in 1911), replacing the waltzes and neo-classical staging with a sort of Wagnerian heft that few other composers could hope to achieve.  Yet the music was distinctly that of Richard Strauss, carrying stylistic tags that one hears in many of his works, operatic and otherwise.  So, while the opera is rarely staged, it is musically one of his best.

Tonight’s recording is a 1988 edition that features Rene Kollo, Cheryl Studer, Hanna Schwarz, Andreas Schmidt, and Alfred Muff, with Wolfgang Sawallisch conducting the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra & Chorus.

Playbill from the Premiere of Salome, Semper-Oper Dresden, 9. December 1905 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Our second opera of the evening is Salome, an opera in one act.  Strauss based the opera on his own translation into German translation of Oscar Wilde’s French play Salomé.  Wilde’s play was itself controversial, but the controversy was far exceeded by the December 1905 premier of Strauss’ opera.  In 1905, the controversy was caused by Salome’s “Dance of the Seven Veils“, essentially a striptease that many modern performers finish nude (others finish it in a body stocking).  This caused the work to be banned in London and New York, and Gustav Mahler was not allowed to conduct it in Vienna until 1918.  In our modern times, audience members may not be as startled by Salome’s dance as they are by the final scene, in which she famously received the beheaded head of John the Baptist (“Joachanaan” in the opera) on a silver platter and kisses it.

Poster for a week-long festival of music by Richard Strauss, held in München, 1910. Salome is depicted holding a staff.

The title role is usually sung by dramatic sopranos (the sort usually heard in Wagnerian works), and is unusually demanding for sopranos in general.  The range goes from high B, normal for a dramatic soprano or a mezzo soprano, to a low G flat at the lowest, which normally falls in the contralto range.  Mezzos who attempt to sing this role strain to sing the higher parts, and are exhausted by the finale, which is crucial to the opera.  Hence, the soprano who is able to sing this role has to have sufficient strength to withstand the rigors of the role, leading to its popularity for dramatic sopranos.

Another interesting aspect of the role is the dance requirement established by the Dance of the Seven Veils.  The dance is such that one could easily be required to be a ballerina as well as a top dramatic soprano.  Historically, a number of sopranos have used body doubles (the creator of the role, Marie Wittich, refused both the dance and the kiss of Jochannaan’s severed head, saying “I won’t do it; I’m a decent woman.”), although some notable sopranos (i.e. Catherine Malfitano, and most recently Karina Matilla) have performed the dance themselves and finished in the nude.  But the situation, along with the vocal requirements, demonstrate the contradiction (also present in a number of Wagnerian roles) between the character’s description (that of a young woman), and the requirement for a soprano with years of training and seasoning that allow her to be able to handle the immense technical requirements of the role.

The famously dissonant chord and cadence occurring at the end of Salome's monologue at the end of the opera Salome (1905) by Richard Strauss.

Another thing of note in the opera again comes in the infamous finale.  After Salome kisses Jochannaan’s severed head, the score calls for a most unusual chord.  Marked in the reduced score shown above by the sfz marking (sfz = sforzando, a note with a sudden, strong emphasis – the word in Italian literally means “forcing”), the chord has been referred to as “the most sickening chord in all opera”, an “epoch-making dissonance with which Strauss takes Salome…to the depth of degradation”, and “the quintessence of Decadence: here is ecstasy falling in upon itself, crumbling into the abyss”.  The chord is polytonal, with a low A⁷ merged in with a higher F sharp major chord.  It forms part of a cadence in C sharp major, and is approached and resolved from C sharp major chords.  This is representative of Strauss’ use of keys and lietmotifs to represent characters and their feelings and emotions, and the revulsion inspired by Salome’s actions is reflected in this startling chord.

Birgit Nilsson as Salome, year unknown

(Don’t get the impression that, because I talk so much about Birgit Nilsson and the title role, that the opera is all Salome.  Fact is, Jochannaan is also a premium role that requires a strong voice.  Eberhard Wächter sings rather well in this recording.  But Strauss had a tendency to emphasize the female roles, and here is no different.)

Tonight’s recording is considered one of the best available recordings of the work, featuring the legendary Birgit Nilsson (yet another work that this great soprano was noted for) in a 1962 performance that also features Gerhard Stolze as Herod, Grace Hoffman, and Eberhard Wächter as Jochannaan.  Sir Georg Solti leads the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.

The Galaxy – Driving for pledges

Mark Morton, lead guitarist for Lamb of God, at Download Festival 2007 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It has been a while since I’ve been able to do something non-classical, owing in part to various events and observances.  But the fact is that I do in fact play much more than just classical, although I do consider classical to be part of the cornerstone of what I do here on the Galaxy.  One of the things that I like to do is to rock out, and we’ve been blessed with some really great new releases over the last year.  I began the evening with a few from the recent (2011) EP from As I Lay Dying, Decas.  We heard two new originals, Paralyzed and Moving Foward, and an excellent cover of a Slayer classic, War Ensemble.  We then heard a couple of songs from the recent Lamb of God album from January of this year, Resolution – Guilty and Undertow.

Troy Sanders from Mastodon at Nassaue Coliseum, June 2006. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We then heard a few songs from Mastodon.  From their recent album (2011) The Hunter, we heard Dry Bone Valley and Black Tongue.  Then we heard a set of songs from their recent live dvd/cd release Live at the Aragon (which was recorded in Chicago in October of 2009, just a few days after I attended their tour stop in St. Louis) – Circle of Cysquatch, Aqua Dementia, Where Strides the Behemoth, and Mother Puncher.

Kraftwerk concert in Zürich, 1976. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

At that point, we turned in a decidedly different direction.  Kraftwerk revolutionized the field of electronic music, blazing a path for what would be called “techno”, and setting the stage for numerous advances in electronic music technology.  Outside of the technology, their songs would also be quite influential, inspiring bands ranging from Orchestral Manouvres in the Dark and Duran Duran to Afrika Bambaataa.  We heard three songs from Kraftwerk – Musique Non-Stop (from 1986′s Techno Pop, later relabeled Electric Cafe), Its More Fun to Compute (from the 1981 album Computer World), and finally a 12 inch remix of Trans-Europe Express.

Aaron Copland (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Aaron Copland holds an interesting place in American music history, a composer whose works had a most singular influence among the American public during the mid to late 20th century.  He did a number of things that ranged from the avant garde to serialism, but he remains best remembered for a number of seminal works that captured the essence of the American spirit.  We heard two of these works.  Fanfare for the Common Man was written in response to a 1942 request by Eugene Goossens, conductor of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, who wanted a series of fanfares that would be used to begin each orchestral concert in a inspirational/patriotic vein.  Copland used as inspiration a recent speech by US Vice President Henry Wallace, who had declared the century the “dawn of Century of the Common Man”.  After premiering the piece in 1943 (in response to Goossen’s suggestion that the piece be premiered on Tax Day, Copland is said to have remarked, “”I [am] all for honoring the common man at income tax time”), Copland used the piece as the main theme for the fourth movement of his Third  Symphony, composed from ’44 through ’46, and has been used extensively in other forms of popular culture over the succeeding years.

Martha Graham, dancer and choreographer, 1948 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Appalachian Spring was written in 1944 as part of a commission by the great ballet choreographer Martha Graham.  It premiered in that same year, with Graham dancing the lead role.  Copland later assembled a suite consisting of highlights from the music for concert use, premiering that work in 1945.  Both the ballet and the matching suite were well received, with Copland receiving the 1945 Pulitzer Prize for his work.  Tonight’s recordings of the two Copland works come from 1981 and 1984 recordings by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, as conducted by Antal Dorati.

We finished the show with some 40′s era Frank Sinatra – Fools Rush In Where Angels Fear to Tread), a 1940 recording with Tommy Dorsey and his orchestra, and The Brooklyn Bridge, a 1946 recording featuring an Axel Stordahl arrangement (he also arranged the Tommy Dorsey tune, and was a frequent Sinatra collaborator during his Columbia years) that was featured in the movie It Happened in Brooklyn.

“It’s Too Damn Early” moving times!

Starting Sunday, April 15th, you can hear experimental music, avant-garde works, and sound art from 5-6 p.m. at the new “It’s Too Damn Early” showtime. Since it’s no longer “too damn early,” we’ll have a new name to go along with the time switch– be sure to listen Sunday, when I reveal the new name!

For everyone with a sentimental side, join me one last time on April 21st, from 4-6:30 a.m., for the “farewell” broadcast of my overnight hijinks. I’ll play the music, and you can dance while the ship goes down.

Your Community Spirit 2012 April 13

News includes Occupy Updates Daily; A Villa Built Out Of Trash; Gonzo Urban Bike Racing; Hottest U.S. Winter On Record. Happenings include Sexual Assault Awareness Month; International Coffee Hour; Bengali New Year and Water Festival at Rice and Spice; Farmer’s Market; Vigil for Peace; Earth Day; Saluki Powwow; Women’s Center 40th Anniversary Tribute Garden; Cardboard City; Neighborhood Co-op’s Annual 5K and Kid’s K; Iron Chef.

WDBX Opera Overnight: Easter Music

Autograph of the first page of the Johannespassion by Johann Sebastian Bach. (Photo: Wikipedia)

Tonight we have an Easter special for you,  two works that fall within the top rank of compositions written for use during Easter observances.  Both of them take the form of Passion narratives, a musical tradition that dates all the way back to the 8^th century.  There are 9^th century manuscripts that indicate which part of the Passion narratives are to be intoned, and later manuscripts would specify exactly which notes to sing.  So, to a certain extent, , we can find one of the seeds of organized music within the tradition of the Passion narrative.

Among the numerous written Passion compositions, our two pieces are some of the best.  Both were written by Johann Sebastian Bach, and both are considered masterpieces of the Baroque era.  We will begin with a performance of Bach’s St. John’s Passion.  Bach wrote the piece in 1724 for the Good Friday Vespers service, and used John Chapters 18 and 19 (as found in the Luther Bible) as the guide for the composition, with the Evangelist part quoting those scriptures verbatim (Bach also inserted two events that were described in Matthew).  The writer of the additional poetry used in the piece is unknown.  After the initial composition and performance, Bach made three subsequent revisions (1725, 1728-1730, and finally in 1749), as well as a partial autograph score in 1739.  The fourth and last revision, from 1749, essentially returns the work to the original 1724 version, with modifications to remove some parts for instruments that were fairly antiquated even in 1724 (i.e. lute).

Adoration of the Trinity, by Albrecht Dürer, from 1511. Currently housed in the Art History Museum in Vienna

A major part of Bach’s compositional plan was his conscious effort to retain the spirit of a standard worship service.  The Passion was an important part of Lutheran tradition, an emphasis that began with Martin Luther himself, who placed special value on the Passion.  During the post-Reformation years, a number of Passion-related works were written for the Lutheran Church (one such work, Heinrich Schütz‘s St. Matthew’s Passion, we heard earlier on The Galaxy).  To that end, Bach used chorales from Johann Heermann, Martin Luther, Paul Gerhardt, Paul Stockman, Michael Weiße , Valerius Herberger and Martin Schalling.  In addition, he used a poem by Christian Weise, and adapted an aria from an existing Passion by Christian Heinrich Postel, fitting it to a melody by Johann Hermann Schein.  However, while he wanted the piece to have a congregational feel, the piece was not intended for congregational participation.

Bach appears to have intended the piece for a smaller orchestra, as small as 16 or 17 members, with a similarly small choir.  This is not surprising, given the stage of Bach’s career (1724, relatively early in the Leipzig period), and the use of smaller choirs and orchestras has become a fairly common performance practice for the work.  Tonight’s recording is a excellent 1993 recording, with Angela Maria Blasi, Marjana Lipovsek, Anthony Rolfe Johnson, Robert Holl, and  Anton Scharinger.  Nikolaus Harnoncourt directs the Concentus Musicus Wien, with the Schoenberg Choir.

Related articles

• Anthony Rolfe Johnson obituary (guardian.co.uk)

No. 71 from St. Matthew Passion from Johann Sebastian Bach, BWV 244 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

For our second work this evening, we’re going to hear one of the absolute epic works of the Baroque era, both in terms of length and content.  Bach’s St. Matthew Passion was first performed on Good Friday, April 11, 1727.  He revised and performed it again in 1736, and then again in 1742.  It received further revision between 1733 and 1746, during a late-life period during which Bach was making revisions to his major works.  This work was also a major part of the renaissance in the public awareness of Bach’s catalog, when Felix Mendelsson conducted a revised version of the work in Berlin.  It has since become a part of the Easter Week tradition in many churches around the world.

Bach scored the Passion for double orchestra and double choir, probably with 12-16 voices per choir.  The double-choir format is important to the integrity of the work, as Bach arranged the piece to create a sort of dialogue between the two sides.  In recent years we have seen a number of St. Matthew Passion recordings done in HCAD.  While it would certainly be helpful to hear the piece in surround sound, careful listening to the piece can allow the listener to detect the shift from one choir to the other – the dialogue effect is most interesting.

Tonight’s performance comes from a lovely 1999 Harmonia Mundi set, a package that includes a lovely CD-rom that goes into depth on the history of the piece.  Philippe Herreweghe leads the  Collegium Vocale Gent & Orchestra, with soloists Ian Bostridge, Franz-Josef Selig, Sibylla Rubens, Andreas Scholl, Werner Gura, and Dietrich Henschel.

Related articles

• Sellars’ on Bach’s Matthäus-Passion (operachic.typepad.com)
• Classical music: For Easter and Passover, for both believers and non-believers of all kinds, J.S. Bach offers the perfect piece of spiritual music. (welltempered.wordpress.com)
• What Catholics Owe Bach – and What Bach Owes the Catholic Tradition (catholicphoenix.com)

Heinrich Schütz

We close the show with a few selections from Heinrich Schütz‘s Kleine Gestliche Concerten (trans: Little Sacred Concertos).  Schütz, who wrote an early opera that is now lost, wrote two sets of these in the 1630′s, during the Thirty Years’ War.  They consist mostly of duos and trios, essentially chamber pieces that match duo and trio voices to organ accompaniment.  But the small scale of the composition in no way minimizes their quality – this is truly special music.  Tonight we heard four such pieces: Sei gegrüßet, Maria; Rorate Coeli Desuper; Joseph, Du Sohn David; and Hodie Christus Natus Est.  The Concerto Vocale was conducted by Rene Jacobs.

The Galaxy – Passion music for Easter

Albrecht Dürer: Die Auferstehung - The Large Passion: 12. The Resurrection of Christ (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I love to use appropriate selections for various religious holidays, when such music is available.  Happily, there is quite a bit of music written for the Easter, notably that written for Passion Week.  Passion observances are a tradition that goes all the way back to the 4th century, and we believe that they began to be “intoned” (sung) as early as the 8th century.  Source material dating back as far as the 9th century indicate “litterae significativae” (interpretive chant), and at some point after this chanters began to write down which notes to sing.  So one can say that Passion music is a key part of the history of written and organized music.  For me, given my interest in history, musical and otherwise, stuff like that is hard to ignore, and impossible to resist.  Given this, it has been a long-standing tradition of mine to find appropriate (and creative) Easter compositions, when I can get them.

Heinrich Schütz, c. 1650-1660 (Leipzig), by Christoph Spetner (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We start tonight’s show with a lovely recitation of the Passion story, in German, that was composed by Heinrich Schütz (1585 – 1672) in 1666.  Schütz was one of the most significant North German composers of the early Baroque era, and is credited in helping initiate a German compositional tradition that eventually resulted in J.S. Bach.  In a time when many composers were divided between asserting their musical creativity and cleaving to ecclesiastically-preferred tradition (thick choral counterpoint was quite a point of controversy in the Church at the time), his St. Matthew Passion manages to find the sweet spot between musicality and tradition: cleanly-sung solo a capella lines, with duets and brief choral passages interwoven throughout, emphasizing specific lines in such a manner that, when the chorus comes in, it is simultaneously startling, exhilarating, and touching.   Schütz, whose entire surviving catalog is comprised of vocal works (he was also a noted organist), gave an excellent display of his choral compositional ability in this work, while at the same time writing some compelling a capella lines for Jesus (bass, sung by John Ostendorf) and The Evangelist (tenor, sung by Grayson Hirst).  Tonight’s recording is from the Amor Artis Chorale, and was recorded in 1988.

Johann Sebastian Bach (aged 61) on a portrait by Elias Gottlob Haussmann, Copy or second Version of his 1746 Canvas, private ownership of William H. Scheide, Princeton, New Jersey, USA (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

When one is looking for Easter music, it is hard to avoid some of the numerous Easter-time compositions of Johann Sebastian Bach, especially as he wrote two of the most significant Passion works.  But he did not limit himself to the Passion works, which is only natural, given the fact that he completed four complete cycles of cantatas (a cycle is a full year’s worth of music, one composition for each week of the year, something that Bach did four times).  Bach’s Easter Oratorio (Kommt, eilet und laufet – “Come, hasten and run”), BWV 249, was first performed on Easter Sunday, April 1, 1725.  Its composition is a substantial departure from the form taken by his numerous cantatas, and in parts is a parody (in other words, a recycle) of a secular cantata that Bach had written a few months earlier.  But Bach’s practice of recycling music was far simpler than a cut and paste job – in many instances, music was rearranged to fit the libretto, instrumentation changed, parts added or removed.  Tonight’s recording is a rather striking rendition by the Bach Collegium Japan from 2005, directed by Masaaki Suzuki.  Soloists were Yukari Nonoshita (soprano), Patrick van Goethem (counter-tenor), Jan Kobow (tenor), and Chiyuki Urano (bass).

Johann Pachelbel

While Heinrich Schütz serves as an excellent representative of musical development in the North German region, Johann Pachelbel (1653 – 1706) was one of the leading organists and composers of the South German region.  While he is most well-known today for his Canon in D, he wrote a wide array of music, both instrumental and vocal, and is considered an important link in the Baroque era timeline.  Tonight we heard one of his several Easter works, Christ ist erstanden (trans: Christ has risen), a work for solo voice with violin and continuo.  He uses a compositional technique that was common around central and southern Germany around 1700, wherein he did away with the canctus firmus (a pre-existing melody that was used to form the basis of a contrapuntal composition; Bach’s compositions are ripe with canctus firmi, especially in the chorale sections wherein one can hear the underlying Lutheran hymn), and arranges the voice in a rather free-flowing manner, similar to what one might have done with a keyboard.  Tonight’s performance comes from a 2004 recording by La Capella Ducale, directed by Ronald Wilson, with Monika Mauch singing the solo vocal role.

SETLIST 3/31

Still Catching up but I thought you might like to know what you have missed by sleeping in on Saturday mornings 6:30-8!

In no particular order, it went like this

ELLA JENKINS-Miss Mary Mack

MARTY STUART – Hey Porter (With Johnny Cash singing)

David Grisman and Jerry Garcia – Freight Train

John Alex Mason – Whisper

The Human Revolution – Take Your Shoes Off

7 Walkers – 7 Walkers

Nina Simone – In The Morning

Chet Atkins – Smile

Bill Cosby – Karate   (Hi-Yah!)

Billy Kelly – It’s a Wonderful Life

 Hope Harris – Down In The Valley

Pete Seeger – ALl AroundThe Kitchen

Graham Nash – Be Yourself

Always Saturday – Snowcones In The Sun

Billy Kelly – Coney Island Washboard

Jerry Douglas – Little Martha

The Human Rvolution – Sparkle

Garcia and Grisman – HOt COrn, Cold Corn

Stylistics – Here Comes The Sunrise

Donna Britton and Family – Eek Eek Gock Gock  Boing Boing

 

 

KIDS KAMP SLOT IS NOW “What Momma Said”

Hope you have fun with my show of morning music. Whether you are just tapping your toes in bed, or off to your next great adventure, listen Saturday mornings from 6:30-8am with Momma C.

Setlist for 4/7/2012

Sinead O’connor #3

Love and Rockets – Welcome Tomorrow

Lyle Lovett – Bears

Luna 2 -Smile

Albert King – This Morning

Mae West – Rock Me Daddy

Carter and Connelly – The Gospel Didn’t Show

7am

The Judybats – Daylight

My Morning Jacket – Wordless Chants

Tiny Tim – Goodship Lollipop

John Greenberg and Mark Upchurch – The Lawnmower

Pete Seeger – Seek and You Shall Find

The Freddy Jones Band – In a Daydream

7:30

Cheap Trick – On The Radio

Paul Pena – I want To Move and Groove With You

Ralph Covert – The Robot Looked at the Stars

The Chips – Rubber Biscuit

The Band – Whatcha Gonna Do?

Railroad Earth – All These Storms We’ll Ride Together

Fish Heads

 

Your Community Spirit 2012 April 06

News includes Occupy Updates Daily; Flying Cars; FDA Hides GMO Labeling Signatures; Monsanto Threatens to Sue Vermont Over Labeling; Spring Makeover for Pantries. Happenings include International Coffee Hour; Malaysian at Rice and Spice; Farmer’s Market; Vigil for Peace; Fracking Town Hall Meeting; Earth Day; Women’s Center Tribute Garden.

Pete’s Place – 4/2/12 Playlist

Lafayette Gilcrest, “Assume the Position” from The Music According to Gilcrest (2004, Hyena Records). New Orleans-style jazz-funk.

Stanley Clark, “School Days” from the 1976 LP of the same name. Classic fusion from Return to Forever bassist.

Miguel Zenon, “Llavera” from Jibaro (2005, Rounder). Puerto Rican alto saxophonist. Nice modern jazz.

Marc Ribot y Los Cubanos Postizos (the Prosthetic Cubans), “Fiesta En El Solar” (1998). Irresistible.

John Coltrane, “Mr. Day” from Coltrane Plays the Blues (Atlantic, early 60s). Classic quartet with McCoy Tyner (piano), Jimmy Garrision (bass), and Elvin Jones (drums) working out a basic blues line.

Miles Davis, “Paraphernalia” from Miles in the Sky (1968). The 7 O’Clock stretch features the great 60s Miles group (Herbie Hancock, Tony Williams, Ron Carter, Wayne Shorter) with George Benson added on guitar. Last Davis record before moving into fusion.

Django Rheinardt, “Blue Drag”. Cartoon music of the best kind from Basque gypsy guitarist, recorded in 1920s.

Rodney Jones, “Ain’t No Sunshine” from Soul Manifesto (Blue Note, 1998). Guitarist with Maceo Parker on alto sax and Dr. Lonnie Smith on organ (Blue Note, 2001).

Freddie Hubbard, “Plexus” from Hub Cap (Blue Note, 1961). Great hard-bop/new thing recording by the Indianapolis-born trumpeter, with Ceder Walton (the composer) on piano.

Yusef Lateef, “The Plumb Blossom” from Eastern Sounds (Prestige, 1961). Exotic … one of the first records investigating “world music” sounds.

John Scofied with Medeski, Martin & Wood as rhythm section. Title track from A Go Go (Blue Note, 1998).

(for all Pete’s Place playlists see peteplace.wordpress.com)

WDBX Opera Overnight – Haydn, Donizetti

Sheet music for the opening of The Creation (from sheetmusicplus.com)

We began tonight’s show with a masterpiece, The Creation, by Joseph Haydn.  He was inspired to write an oratorio during his first visit to London in 1791-92, when he was able to attend several performances of Handel’s great oratorios.  He used a libretto that was based on the Biblical books of Genesis and Psalms, and on John Milton’s Paradise Lost.  At one point he had been given a poem by Johann Peter Salomon, but he couldn’t use it because the resulting work would have been 4 hours in length.  But upon his return to Vienna, he gave the poem to Baron Gottfried van Swieten, who used it as the basis for the German language Die Schöpfung.  Upon the work’s completion, Haydn then had the libretto retranslated into English, and the work was published bilingually (a first) in 1800.

Tonight’s recording is by the Gabrielli Consort and Players, with Chetham’s Chamber Choir, under the conduction of Paul McCreesh, with soloists Neil Davies, Sandrine Piau, Mark Padmore, Peter Harvey, and Miah Persson.

It is interesting to take a moment here to note the presence and influence here of Gottfried van Swieten.  Outside of the librettos he wrote for Haydn (in addition to The Creation, van Swieten also wrote librettos for The Seven Last Words of Christ and The Seasons), and the financial and occasional logistical assistance he provided to Haydn, van Swieten figures into the classical timeline in several notable places:

• van Swieten commissioned the first six symphonies of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, who also dedicated a sonata to him in 1781.  Johann Nikolaus Forkel also dedicated his influential biography of Bach to van Swieten.
• van Swieten met W.A. Mozart when Mozart was 11, and was involved with the planning of an opera that was never performed.  Mozart and van Swieten met again in 1781 – with van Swieten and other Viennese dignitaries in the audience, Mozart performed extracts from his opera Ideomeneo.  This helped lead to Mozart receiving the commission to write The Abduction from the Seraglio, his first great compositional success.
• By 1782, Mozart was visiting van Swieten at his home, using the opportunity to transcribe van Swieten’s collection of Bach and Handel manuscripts that van Swieten had acquired while in diplomatic service in Berlin.  Performances were also held, in the presence of others; Mozart mentions the visits in a 1782 letter to his father Leopold:

“I go every Sunday at twelve o’clock to the Baron van Swieten, where nothing is played but Handel and Bach. I am collecting at the moment the fugues of Bach–not only of Sebastian, but also of Emanuel and Friedemann”

• This is seen as being a major influence on Mozart’s compositional style.  Mozart would eventually demonstrate those influences in the composition of his C Minor Mass.
• van Swieten commissioned Mozart to make arrangements of several works of Handel.  This includes Mozart’s well-known arrangement of Messiah.  While these arrangements are not performed anymore, they probably played a major role in keeping Handel’s music in the realm of public awareness.
• After Mozart’s death in 1791, van Swieten arranged for the funeral, and then arranged for the benefit performance of the unfinished Requiem Mass.  The concert brought in 300 ducats, which was then a considerable sum.  This benefit also served as a motivator for Mozart’s widow Constanze to arrange for the completion of the work.  He also arranged for the education of Mozart’s son Karl.
• In 1776, van Swieten offered encouragement to a 43 year old Joseph Haydn, whose works were not being received well critically.  Haydn was appreciative, and states as much in 1776 writings.
• After the death of Prince Nikolaus Esterházy, during Haydn’s visit to London, some of the Handel concerts that Haydn attended (and may have participated in) may have been funded in part by the Gesellschaft der Associierten, a group of music lovers founded in part by van Swieten.  When Haydn began writing concertos, using van Swieten’s librettos, van Swieten offered Haydn compositional suggestions that the composer accepted in a few instances.  Gesellschaft der Associierten also funded the premieres of the three oratorios that were inspired by the time in London.
• Just as with Mozart 12 years earlier, the young Beethoven also spent time in van Swieten’s home, performing Bach fugues for van Swieten and the Gesellschaft group.  This relationship is actually captured in a letter from van Swieten to Beethoven that has survived (as have many of Beethoven’s papers).  Also like Mozart, Beethoven came to consider Bach as a primary influence.

Illustration of Act III of Donizetti's Dom Sébastien as presented in the original production at the Paris Opera's Salle Le Peletier on 13 November 1843. Engraving published in L'Illustration. The Grand Inquisitor orders the arrest of Dom Sébastien. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Our second work of the evening is the last work by Gaetano Donizetti, Dom Sébastien, Roi de Portugal.  The libretto was written by Eugène Scribe, and was based on a 1838 play by Paul Foucher that was a historical fiction about King Sebastian of Portugal, and his ill-fated military expedition to Morocco, in which he led 17,000 men against a 50,000 Turkish army.  His army was routed, and he was last seen riding headlong into battle, his remains never to be found.   Donizetti took the source material and turned it into a heavily fictionalized 5 act French Grand Opera.  The title role was written for Gilbert Duprez, the tenor who developed the technique that allowed tenors to sing high-C “from the chest” (i.e. not with a falsetto-like voice).  The opera premiered on November 13, 1843 at the Salle Le Peletier in Paris, but Donizetti was unable to particpate, as he had begun to display the effects of syphilis and associated mental issues that would result in his being institutionalized in 1845, and his death in 1848.

The Salle Le Peletier during the cloister scene of Meyerbeer's opera Robert le diable (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Dom Sébastien a is a pretty fair representation of what the French grand opera tradition was like.  French grand opera developed from the stylistic standards established by composers such as Jean-Baptiste Lully and Jean-Philippe Rameau, but also included more contemporary aspects.  It was big on spectacle, and often featured significant ballet elements (in keeping with a tradition established by Lully and Rameau) in the opera’s Act 2, a tradition about which the French were rather picky.  Notably, Wagner attempted to restage Tannhäuser in the grand opera mode in 1861, but his rewrite had to be withdrawn after 3 performances – not because there wasn’t a ballet (there was), but because the ballet was placed in Act 1. Donizetti wrote two successful works in the grand opera mode, Dom Sébastien and La Favorite, but not many works in the grand opera sub-genre are performed today, owing to the length, the costs and logistics involved in the production, and the fact that they often require multiple top-level talents.  In fact, while grand operas are recorded more often than they are performed (cost is not as prohibitive when recording), this is the first such recording that I’ve been able to acquire.

Drawing of Gilbert Duprez (1806-1896), French tenor, the originator of the role of Dom Sébastien. He revolutionized opera by developing a technique that allowed a tenor to sing high C "from the chest", without going into falsetto. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Tonight’s recording  is a 2007 disc that features Giuseppe Filianoti in the title role (with all the resulting high-Cs, especially in Seul sur la terre, the aria that closes Act 2), along with Vesselina Kasarova, Alastair Miles, Simon Keenlyside, Carmelo Corrado Caruso, Andrew Slater, and Lee Hickenbottom.  It was recorded live at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, in September of 2005, and the recording was nominated for the 2008 Grammy for Best Opera Recording.

The Galaxy – Remembering “Papa Haydn”

Joseph Haydn, Portrait by Thomas Hardy, 1791 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I do love celebrating birthdays.  For the purposes of this radio program, birthdays are handy for giving nice examinations of what the artist accomplished, even if one can’t possibly go into the entire depth of those accomplishments.  Even if we get just a hint, that hint can be quite enlightening.  Of course, my purpose is not to just give a hint, but to celebrate that person’s achievements through an ample demonstration of the subject’s creative powers.

Such is the case with Joseph Haydn.  Haydn is really a key figure in the development of music in the western world, as he was instrumental in the development of the symphonic form, and in the development of the string quartet.  He also made important contributions to the piano trio and the sonata forms.  All of these things would become basic, essential building blocks of what we now see as “classical music.”

Interior Rococo interior of the Ottobeuren Abbey in Ottobeuren, Bavaria, Germany

Interestingly enough, given these facts, the music that I started the evening off with was neither a symphony, nor a string quartet.  Haydn was a passionately religious man, and while he did not restrict himself to religious writing, the music that he did write for religous purposes ranks among his best.  However, tonight’s first work is a relatively new addition to Haydn’s catalog, a formerly lost Missa Solemnis that was discovered in a Benedictine abbey in Ottobeuren, Bavaria (in Germany) in 2000.  The composer’s name is written as Joseph Haiden (Haiden being the name of Haydn’s great-grandfather, it is one of the common spelling variants of the Haydn surname).  While musicological evidence points to Haydn as being the composer, there remains just enough uncertainty that the composer’s identity will never be fully known (a copy of the mass was found in Hungary that attributes it to Mozart).  But the mass does follow the compositional patterns that Haydn used, and the quality of the work easily ranks with that of Haydn or Mozart.  Even the presence of the mass on the Ottobeuren Abbey might serve as a clue, given the abbey’s extensive music program, which includes an 18th century double organ built by Karl Joseph Riepp.  Honoratus Goehl, the abbot of the abbey during the late period of Haydn’s life, was a promoter of church music, and might have been the sort to have collected this work.  Tonight’s recording, the 2000 premiere recording of the work, is by the Collegium Cantorum St. Gallen and the Southwest German Philharmonic Orchestra Konstanz, under the conduction of Mario Schwarz.  Soloists were Judith Graf (sop), Ingrid Alexandre (alto), Lukas Albrecht (tenor), and Michael Haag (bass).

Haydn wrote his Symphony No. 94, also known as “The Surprise”, in 1791.  It was the second of a series of symphonies that Haydn wrote while in London, a visit caused in part by the death of his long-time benefactor, Prince Nikolaus Esterházy, and the decision of his successor Anton to dismiss most of the court musicians.  Haydn remained in the Esterházy’s employ, with a (reduced) salary of 400 florins, and he also received a 1,000 florin pension from Nikolaus’ estate.  Anton was willing to allow Haydn to travel, and Haydn was given a rather lucrative offer to go to London and conduct a series of concerts with a large orchestra.  The concerts, with Haydn conducting from the piano-forte, was such a success that Haydn became financially secure for the rest of his life.  This should not be surprising, as Haydn wrote some of his most well-known works during this time frame, including the Military, Drumroll, and London, in addition to the Surprise, as well as several string quartets.  He also wrote an opera that was as favorably received.  Tonight’s recording of Symphony No. 94 was recorded in 1999 by the Heidelberg Symphony under the direction of Thomas Fey.

It would behoove me to, during the course of an examination of the impact of Joseph Haydn, to include one of his great chamber works, especially a string quartet.  This we do in the form of his String Quartet No. 1 in G Major, Op. 77, No. 1, and the unfinished Quartet, Op. 103.  The quartet is part of a set of quartets that was commissioned in 1799 by a Prince Lobkowitz, who was a major patron of both Haydn and Beethoven, and who was himself an accomplished musician who had sung bass in The Creation on several occasions, and who could also play violin and cello.  Haydn completed two of the quartets by the end of 1799, but by mid-1800 began having physical difficulty in composing.  Haydn had began work on the third of the requested six quartets by July of 1801, but by April 3, 1802, he had put aside the quartet project to work on the Harmoniemesse, which was to be premiered in September of that year.  The first two quartets were published in that same month, and were given the opus number 77.  The third quartet was never completed, with only two movements (Andante grazioso and Menuetto ma non troppo presto), and was given the opus number 103.  Both quartets were performed in a 1995 recording by the Alcan String Quartet.

The Galaxy – Congratulations!

Illinois High School Association (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I would like to take the opportunity to congratulate the young musicians of Carbondale Community High School, who placed 2nd in Class A Music Program Overall (Solo/Ensemble + Organizational) at the IHSA Solo and Ensemble Music Festival.  They received 84 Division 1 ratings and 10 Division 2 Ratings, earning 2nd Place Band, 2nd Place Strings, as well as 2nd Place Overall.  In addition, I’d also like to congratulate Carterville High School, which received 41 Division 1 Ratings and 13 Division 2 Ratings, earning 10th place Band, 8th Place Vocal, and 9th Place Overall Class B Music Program.  Both of these are substantial achievements for these schools, and can serve as an indicator of the strength of their music programs.  Good job, guys!

In addition, the following local (or at least fairly local) schools also did well:

• Waterloo (up near St. Louis – I’m including them because I have friends up there) finished 23rd in Class A
• Mt. Vernon HS finished 25th in Class A, tied with Mattoon HS.
• Jacksonville HS (way up north, but my cousin is on the school board, so I should be inclusive here too) finished 32nd in Class A
• Herrin HS finished 55th in Class A
• Nashville placed 10th in Class B, one behind Carterville.
• Pinckneyville placed 20th in Class B
• Duquoin HS placed 36th in Class B
• Christopher placed 42nd in Class B
• Massac County placed 56th in Class B
• Sparta placed 68th in Class B.
• Sesser-Valier placed 20th in Class C.
• Chester placed 33rd in Class C.
• Trico placed 68th in Class C.
• Egyptian HS (in Tamms) tied for 33rd in Class D.
• Pope County HS (that’s Golconda) placed 38th.

In addition, the following soloists and ensembles were given special recognition at the regional event hosted at Carbondale Community High School:

• Alina Tichacek, Marian Repp, Trevon Sherrill - Carbondale  (Trumpet Ensemble) 
• Alex Taylor, Chris Glennon, Jacob Criddle, and Tyler Anderson - Carterville (Mixed Brass Ensemble) 
• Kelsey Crawford, Amanda Halter and Marissa Roath - Anna (A.-Jonesboro) (Treble Ensemble) 
• Pinckneyville Men’s Octet - Pinckneyville (Bass Ensemble) 
• Murphysboro Madrigal Choir - Murphysboro (Madrigal Group) 
• Carbondale Guitar Choir - Carbondale (String Choir) 
• Yenna Cho - Carbondale (Flute) 
• Aaron Kennedy - Massac County (E-Flat Alto Sax.) 
• Rachel Brady - Murphysboro (Trumpet) 
• David Blaise - Carbondale (Marimba) 
• Nick Ginsburg - Carbondale (Piano) 
• Carbondale Percussion Choir - Carbondale (Percussion Choir) 
• Emily Fink - Carbondale (Female Voice) 
• Shannon Nehrkorn - Pinckneyville (Female Voice) 
• Anne Visser - Herrin (Female Voice) 
• Marian Repp - Carbondale (Female Voice) 
• Quinlan Monk, John Sarvela, Stephen Blair - Carbondale (Mixed Wind Ensemble)

Each of these schools and their students should be congratulated for doing so well.  Having participated in that competition myself when I was in high school, I remember the experience – the nerves, the hours of practice time.  To that end, I take  great joy in seeing young musicians striving to develop their musical potential.  In my eyes, it gives us all hope for the future.

Related reading:

• IHSA Music State Final School Results

Your Community Spirit 2012 March 30

News includes Occupy Updates Daily; Hunger Games and Climate Change; Spring Cleaning DIY; Country’s Dirtiest Air. Happenings include International Coffee Hour; Pie Day at Rice and Spice; Farmer’s Market; Vigil for Peace; Girls Make Movies Benefit Screening; Green Programming on WSIU-TV; Revenge of the Electric Car.

Pete’s Place – 3/26/12 Playlist

Herbie Hancock, “Watermelon Man” from Takin’ Off (Blue Note, 1962). Soul jazz from Herbie’s debut record.

James Farm with Joshua Redman (Nonesuch, 2011), “Plliwog”.

Steve Lacy, “Bye-a” from Reflections: Steve Lacy Plays Thelonious Monk (Prestige, 1959). Soprano saxophonist along with Mal Waldron on piano and Elvin Jones on drums. The first recording to feature Monk compositions throughout.

Stanton Moore, “Green Chimney’s” from All Kooked Out (1998), the former Galactic drummer’s debut recording as a leader. Great New Orleans back-beat funk-jazz, with Charlie Hunter on 8-string guitar and Sherik on sax.

Stanton Moore, “Stanton Hits the Bottle”. Make it a double.

Chico Hamilton, “Lady Gabor” from Passin’ Through (Impluse, 1962). The 7 O’Clock stretch at Pete’s featuring a long jazz jam. Charles Lloyd on flute and Gabor Szabo on guitar.

Charlie Hunter, “Let’s Get Medieval” from Ready, Set, Shango (Blue Note, 1996). More 8-string guitar grooves.

Arthur Blythe, “Bush Baby” from Illusions (Columbia, 1980). The California alto sax player’s band with tuba, cello, and chunk guitar (Blood Ulmer).

Rahsaan Roland Kirk, “Prelude Back Home” from Natural Black Inventions: Roots Strata (Atlantic, 1971). Kirk playing multiple reeds simultaneously, with thundersheet back ground reminding of us the May 2009 “inland hurricane” in Carbondale.

Ursula Dudsiak, “Shenkansen” from Future Talk (Inner City, 1979). Wordless vocals. Weird. But cool.

Bennie Wallace, “All Night Dance” from Twilight Time (Blue Note, 1980). New Orleans tenor sax player with Stevie Ray Vaughn on guitar.

Robert Mazurek, “Blow Up” from Playground (Delmark, 1998). Cornet/trumpet player leads band of Chicago musicians on the local Chicago jazz label. Song composed by Herbie Hancock to close up Pete’s for the week.

(archived playlists at peteplace.wordpress.com)

WDBX Opera Overnight – Mozart, Puccini

Emanuel Schikaneder as the first Papageno in Mozarts Die Zauberflöte. Front page of the original edition of the libretto of the Zauberflöte. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We’re going to start the evening with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte, The Magic Flute.  This opera was premiered in September of 1791, using a libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder, who also was the original Papageno.  Mozart had been involved with Schikaneder’s theatrical troupe since 1789, and constructed the opera so that it could be sung by both virtuosos and ordinary comic actors.  The notable exception is the Queen of the Night role, which was originated by Mozart’s sister in law Josepha Hofer (sister of Mozart’s wife Constance, both of whom were half-sisters to composer Carl Maria von Weber), and is noted for its difficulty, which includes a rare high F6 in the aria Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen.  In this manner the opera takes the form of a singspiel, with both spoken and sung elements.  The opera is infused throughout with a number of Masonic elements, which should not be surprising as Schikaneder and Mozart were both in the same Masonic lodge.  It was an immediate success, and had already been performed 100 times by November of 1792.

Dorothea Röschmann

Tonight’s recording is a well-regarded set that was made in 2005, and features a fine cast of current generation singers, including Dorothea Röschmann (a soprano with a lovely voice, who can range from Mozart to Wagner), Christoph Strehl, Erika Miklósa (a noted Queen of the Night specialist), Rene Pape (Sarastro), Hanno Müller-Brachmann (Papageno), Julia Kleiter (Papagena), and Kurt Azesberger (Monostatos).  The Mahler Chamber Orchestra was conducted by Claudio Abbado.

Adolfo Hohenstein: poster for Madama Butterfly by Giacomo Puccini (1904). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Our second opera of the evening is Madama Butterfly, by Giacomo Puccini.  The opera used a libretto by frequent Puccini collaborators  Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa, and was based in part by a story by John Luther Long, which had been dramatized by David Belasco, and was premiered at La Scala in Milan on February 17, 1904.  It was poorly received due to lack of rehearsal time, so Puccini made revisions, including splitting the 2^nd act into two parts.  The revision was premiered on May 28, 1904 and was quite successful.  Puccini made other revisions over time, and eventually produced five different revisions, with the fifth now considered as the “standard version” that is most frequently performed, although the original 1904 version is also occasionally staged.  It currently ranks as the 8^th most performed opera in the repertory, and the Act 2 soprano area “Un bel di Vedremo” is one of the most popular soprano arias in the literature.

Solomiya Krushelnytska, who sang the title role of Madama Butterfly in the May 28 1904 premiere of the 2nd revision. An prodigious talent who could learn a new role in two days, develop a character for a new opera in four days, and could speak 8 languages. Her repertory included an amazing 63 roles.

It is interesting to note the location of the opera.  Puccini enjoyed exotic locations, and as a result many of his operas actually take place outside of Italy (even though they are still sung in Italian).  So, like with Turandot, you have a notably ethnic character that is rarely sung by a person of the same ethnicity.  The difference in ethnicity is usually resolved through the use of makeup, although this has not always been the case (Japanese opera singer Tamaki Miura was well known for her performances in the title role between 1915 and 1920).  Given the popularity of the Un bel di vendremo aria, the opera is considered a favorite vehicle for major soprano stars, especially Italian sopranos.  Also, as with Turandot, Puccini infused a number of local folk tunes into the music, and one will also hear the use of the Star Spangled Banner as a lietmotif when Pinkerton, the lead male character, first enters the action.

Angela Gheorghiu, the Madama Butterfly album cover photo

Tonight’s performance is from 2009 (in a lovely package), and features Angela Gheorghiu, Jonas Kaufmann (a rather popular German tenor with excellent vocal power), Enkelejda Shkosa, Fabio Capitanucci, Gregory Bonfatti, and Raymond Aceto.  Antonio Pappano conducts the St. Cecilia Academy Orchestra & Chorus.

The Galaxy – a Tribute to Gustav Leonhardt

Tonight we are going to take a few minutes and pay tribute to a great keyboardist, and a musicologist whose research has done much to impact our awareness of how beautiful early classical music truly is, or can be.

Gustav Leonhardt (30 May 1928 – 16 January 2012) - image obtained from musicianmilestones.blogspot.com

Gustav Leonhardt was born in Holland on May 30, 1928.  He studied harpsichord with Eduard Miller at Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, and made his debut as a harpsichordist in Vienna in 1950.  He worked as Professor of Harpsichord at the Academy of Music in Vienna from 1952 to 1955, and at the Amsterdam Conservatory from 1954 onward.  He began issuing major harpsichord recordings in 1953, with recordings of Bach’s Goldberg Variations and Art of Fugue (this being the first ever recording of that work).  Later on he worked with Nikolaus Harnoncourt to record the first ever complete set of Bach’s cantatas, an effort which took many years to accomplish.  Among his many awards, he was awarded the Medal of Honour for the Arts and Sciences from the Netherlands in 2009.

Related stories

• “A Long and Beautiful Life”: A tribute to Gustav Leonhardt by Ton Koopman
• Gustav Leonhardt (1928–2012), the end of an era

We started the show with a 1973 pipe organ recording of a set of Partitas that Bach based on O Gott, du Frommer Gott (“O God, Thou Righteous God”), BWV 767.  The work is believed to be one of Bach’s early compositions, possibly dating back to 1700, and is an excellent example of Bach’s skill at creating a diverse set of variations upon a simple theme, a concept that Bach would return to repeatedly over the course of his life.  One cannot say that Leonhardt was more masterly at pipe organ or harpsichord – he demonstrated equally great skill on each.  So it is good that we can represent both his harpsichord and pipe organ work, as both were equally important.

Pastel of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach drawn by his godson Johann Philipp Bach, currently in the Staatsbibliothek, Berlin (Preußischer Kulturbesitz) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Leonhardt recorded a lot of Bach, and most of what I have available to me for tonight’s show consists of Bach.  But we do have some samplings of other composers, including one of the few occasions in which he ventured past the Baroque era in a recording.  Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (son of Johann), a key figure in the post Baroque era, wrote three keyboard concertos in D minor between 1745 and 1748.  Tonight we heard the third of these, Wq 23, in a 1987 recording with Leonhardt conducting an unnamed ensemble from the harpsichord.  The differences between C.P.E. Bach and his father are quite strikingly demonstrated here (J.S. Bach also wrote a keyboard concerto in D minor), yet at the same time the keyboard still rules the day.

Portrait of François Couperin "the Great" (nephew of Louis Couperin) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Leonhardt put a great deal of effort into researching composers who may have slid into obscurity, and over time demonstrated that, with an effective performance, such obscurity was often undeserved.  One such composer that Leonhardt championed was François Couperin.  Couperin (b. 1668, d. 1753) was greatly admired in his day, and J.S. Bach even had copied one of Couperin’s rondeaus into the notebook that he was assembling for his young wife Anna Magdalena.  In addition to his harpsichord literature, he also wrote a book, L’art de toucher le clavecin (1716) that gives us fundamental information about keyboard performance practice of the day.  This book also contains eight preludes, which we heard in a 1987 recording by Leonhardt.  I am particularly struck by the tone that Leonhardt gets out of his instrument here, a particularly beautiful sound that really frames the music quite well.

Gustav Leonhardt in 1972

Not only was Leonhardt a keyboardist, but from time to time he also conducted, often from his keyboard.  Conducting was not his preferred activity, but there are a number of available recordings that Leonhardt conducted (which includes the C.P.E. Bach we’ve already heard).  In the case of the complete Bach cantata set, conducting was probably a creature of necessity, given the amount of time that was required to record the huge number of cantatas that Bach wrote (at one point Bach was writing a cantata each week, which he did for a total of four year-long cycles that were based on the Lutheran religious calendar).  It is notable that Leonhardt did this in cooperation with Nikolaus Harnoncourt, who Leonhardt is known to have thought to play too much to popular sentiment – this probably reflects the challenge involved with performing the huge volume of music involved.  Tonight we heard one of those recordings, Süßer Trost, mein Jesus kömmt (“Sweet comfort, my Jesus comes”), BWV 151, in a 1985 recording that sees Leonhardt leading his own Leonhardt Consort.  BWV 151 is actually a Christmas cantata, written for the third day of Christmas, and uses a libretto by Georg Christian Lehms.  So, yes, we may hear this one again come Christmas time.

Frontispiece of Bach's Clavier-Büchlein vor Anna Magdalena Bach, composed in 1722 for his second wife (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In preparing tonight’s show, I stumbled upon a recording of the Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach.  I find this quite startling, as I’ve long wanted to see such a recording, dating back to my teenage years.  This “notebook” was a piano exercise book that J.S. Bach prepared for his young second wife Anna Magdalena, whom he had married in the winter of 1721-22.  She was the daughter of a trumpet player in the Zerbst court, and had been active as a singer prior to her marriage to Bach.  There are two known such notebooks, one dated 1722, and a second that was dated 1725, with the title pages in Anna Magdalena’s hand.  The music was in a mixture of Bach’s and Anna’s handwriting, and include a number of his own works, as well as works by the aforementioned François Couperin and a few by son C.P.E Bach.  There are other works that may be from other writers (which may include Johann Adolph Hasse), but in many instances it is quite challenging to establish actual authorship, as Bach did not intend this for public consumption.  From this compilation, we heard a Polonaise in G minor (BWV anh 119), a March in E flat major (BWV Anh 127), a Menuet in G minor (BWV anh 114/115, which is believed to have been written by Christian Petzold), and “Willst du dein Herz mir schenken” (BWV 518), an aria.  Most of this is done solo by Leonhart, while Elly Ameling performed the aria to Leonhardt’s accompaniment.

Main organ of Saint Thomas Church (Strasbourg), by Johann Andreas Silbermann, 1741 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We closed the show with a 1973 recording of one of J.S. Bach’s more monumental works for pipe organ, his E minor Prelude and Fugue, BWV 548.  Believed to have been written after Bach’s 1723 move to Leipzig, the piece is a fine example of organwerke at its finest, both in terms of its composition and in terms of Leonhardt’s performance.  The composition of the work is interesting – while most preludes tend to be relatively free-wheeling while the fugue is locked into technical precision, BWV 548 is the opposite, with a rather strict prelude that then opens up into a fugue of three sections – an initial fugual section, a toccata-like middle, then a third section that includes a complete recapitulation of the first section.

Upcoming on the Galaxy!!!!! A tribute to a great master!

Gustav Leonhardt (Cité de la Musique, Paris) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This coming Sunday night/Monday morning, we’re going to have a special edition of the Galaxy, as we’ll be paying tribute to the important musicologist and keyboardist Gustav Leonhardt, who passed away back in January 16th.  Leonhardt was a pioneer in the period instrument movement, as a soloist, ensemble member and as a conductor.  His  collaborations with Nicholas Harnoncourt, which include recording the complete set of Bach canatas (a process that took many years, and the first time that had ever been done), rank among some of the most prestigious achievements of the late 20th century.  He was a preeminent performer on the harpsichord and pipe organ, with numerous important recordings of many works of the baroque era and earlier.  He also was a noted instructor of keyboard technique, and his students include many of today’s most important keyboardists musicologists and conductors, including Christopher Hogwood, Alan Curtis, Richard Egarr, John Fesperman, Davitt Moroney, Martin Pearlman, Colin Tilney, Bob van Asperen, Philippe Herreweghe, Ton Koopman, among others, many of whom are regularly featured on this program.  His recordings and research constitute a primary influence on the direction of this show – even when I wasn’t playing his recordings (which I have on numerous occasions over the years), I have often used selection criteria that is influenced in part by the movement that he helped launch back in the 1950s.  He might not be as big a name as, say, Luciano Pavarotti, but his influence on performance and recording practices is probably much greater.

A Tribute to Gustav Leonhardt – coming up Sunday night, March 25/26, on the Galaxy on WDBX.

Related articles

• In Memoriam Gustav Leonhardt (musicproject365.com)
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