October 1, 2018. CCCC.  It’s easy to remember and, if you’re interested in contemporary music, very much worth checking out.   CCCC stands for Chicago Center for Contemporary Composition.  The recently established organization will present its inaugural season starting with a concert on October 13^th by Yarn/Wire performing music by the Japanese composer Misato Mochizuki, Enno Poppe, a German composer and conductor, and two young Chicagoans.   Like most of the season’s concerts it will take place at the University of Chicago’s Logan Center for the Arts, 915 E 60th Street.

The UChicago has a long tradition of presenting new music, beginning with the Contemporary Chamber Players under Ralph Shapey in 1964 and continuing as Contempo in 2002 under Shulamit Ran and in 2015 under Marta Ptaszyńska.  CCCC is led by one of the most interesting contemporary American composers Augusta Read Thomas (here, for example, is her Angel Musings, performed by the Orion Ensemble, and here – Aureole, performed by the DePaul University Symphony, Cliff Colnot conducting). A key component of the Center’s performance series is the newly formed Grossman Ensemble which comprises 13 leading contemporary music specialists.  Even the selection of the instruments comprising the ensemble is unusual:  a flute,oboe, clarinet, saxophone, horn, two sets of percussion, harp, piano plus the Grammy-nominated Spektral Quartet. The ensemble is co-directed by Ms. Thomas and two other young composers, Anthony Cheung, and Sam Pluta, both from the University’s Music department.

Over the course of the season, the Grossman Ensemble will participate in three performances at the Logan Center for the Arts, all with a focus on the process of creating new work. Eight rehearsals will lead up to each performance, enabling composers to write, workshop, and review new works in close collaboration with the ensemble. The public will be invited to attend an open rehearsal before each concert, allowing them unprecedented access to the creative process.  In this inaugural season, the Grossman ensemble will workshop and perform 12 world premieres by University of Chicago faculty, students, and guest composers in the concert season.

In addition to the Grossman Ensemble and Yarn/Wire, Tyshawn Sorey, a composer and performer working at the intersection of classical and jazz music, will play with his trio.  And on February 5^th of 2019 nine UChicago composers will have a unique occasion to be heard in a performance by the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, a training orchestra for the Chicago Symphony: all of them were asked to create new works to be premiered by this outstanding professional ensemble.

Seven more established composers (“established” being a relative term for a contemporary classical composer) have been commissioned to write new works.  They include Steve Lehman, who writes jazz and experimental music (his most recent album was called the #1 Jazz Album of the year by NPR Music and the Los Angeles Times); David Rakowski, a two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and recipient of many international prizes; Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez, also a multiple prize-winner; composer and soprano Kate Soper, a Pulitzer Prize finalist whose works have been commissioned by many America orchestras; Chen Yi, known for blending Chinese and Western traditions in her music; and Shulamit Ran (here is her For an Actor: Monologue for Clarinet in a virtuosic performance by Alexander Fiterstein (Clarinet).

We strongly encourage our listeners to give this wonderful undertaking a try.

September 24, 2018.  On composers and performers.  Four composers were born this week, three of them active in the 20^th century and one in the 18^th.  The 20^th century composers are: Andrzej Panufnik, a Pole born on this day in 1914; the great Dmitry Shostakovich, born the following day, September 25th, in 1906; and George Gershwin, on September 26^th of 1898.  The composer from the 18^th century is Jean-Philippe Rameau, whose birthday is September 25^th of 1683.  We still believe in the supremacy of the creative genius over interpretive talent, but several great musicians of the latter category have their anniversaries this week, and we’ve never written about them.  First and foremost, is one of the greatest pianists of the 20^th century, Glenn Gould.  Even though his repertoire was broad, it’s his Bach that we all remember.  His phenomenal technique, which allowed him to voice separate lines in the most complex polyphonic compositions, his infallible rhythm, which, in combination with the evenness of his crescendos created such a palpable tension, his phrasing, idiosyncratic but in Bach always perfect, and the incomparable clarity of his sound – all of it created performances that were sensational in the 1950s when he burst on the classical scene and remain equally impressive today.  Gould was born in Toronto on September 25^th of 1932.  He started studying the piano very early.  When he was 10, he injured his neck in a fall, and from then on had to use a specially designed chair while playing.  He felt comfortable sitting very low, and his teacher, Alberto Guerrero came up with a technique (pulling the notes down, not striking from above) that was be suitable for Gould’s unusual posture.  Gould had a phenomenal memory (he remembered not just the piano solos but the orchestral parts as well, and often learned new pieces by reading the music without practicing the piano, taking to the instrument only at the end).  

September 17, 2018.  Looking back.  After the wondrous constellation we had last week, this one looks lacking (hopefully our British readers will forgive us for our lack of enthusiasm regarding Gustav Holst), so we’ll turn to some of the names we had previously only mentioned in passing.     One of the most interesting is, without a doubt, Girolamo Frescobaldi (you can read about him here, for example).  Frescobaldi was born on September 9^th of 1583 in Ferrara, where the active patronage of the Duke Alfonso II created a veritable mecca for musicians.  Luzzasco Luzzaschi, a fine composer, was the court organist (and, for a while, Frescobaldi’s teacher), Monteverdi spent several years there, and so did Orlando di Lasso, Carlo Gesualdo and many others.  In 1597 Duke Alfonso died, and soon after Ferrara reverted to the papacy; most of the local musicians left for Rome, Frescobaldi among them.  For a while he worked as the church organist at Santa Maria in Trastevere, but in 1607 the papal nuncio took him to Flanders.  The trip made him known to the public outside of Italy; he also published several new compositions (a volume of madrigals) in Brussels.  In July of 1608 Fescobaldi returned to Rome and was made the organist at the important Capella Julia, which performed at the St. Peter’s basilica.  He stayed in Rome for the next seven years.  As the organist, he wasn’t paid much, so Frescobaldi supplemented his income by teaching and performing in noble houses.  Sometime around 1611 he entered the service of Pietro Aldobrandini, a cardinal and a patron of the arts, who was a nephew of Pope Clement VIII and the owner of the magnificent Palazzo Doria Pamphilj.  Frescobaldi remained in Aldobrandini’s service till the cardinal’s death in 1621. 

September 10, 2018.  Schoenberg and so much more.  One of the mild frustrations we have with this page is the unevenness with which nature spreads musical talent across the calendar.  Just last week we wrote about Bruckner, Perlman and Ozawa, but had to omit any mention of the fine French composer Darius Milhaud, a member of Les Six; Johann Christian Bach, the so-called “London Bach,” Johann Sebastian’s youngest son and one of the most important composers of the Classical era; the pioneering American, Amy Beach; Giacomo Meyerbeer, who as some point was the most celebrated opera composer; and Antonin Dvořák, probably the greatest Czech composer.  Maria Yudina, an influential Russian pianist, and the wonderful conductor, Christoph von Dohnányi, were also born last week.  This week turns out to be not much easier: Henry Purcell and another Englishman, William Boyce; Arvo Pärt, an Estonian Minimalist (Wikipedia claims that he’s the most performed living composer in the world); Girolamo Frescobaldi, a great keyboard composer of the late Renaissance; Arnold Schoenberg, one of the most important composers of the 20^th century; and the fine opera composer Luigi  Cherubini.  That’s not counting the talented Clara Schumann; Michael Haydn, Franz Joseph’s younger brother, and the very interesting Swiss-Dutch composer Frank Martin.  Plus, Jessye Norman, one of the greatest Wagnerian sopranos of all time.

Under these circumstances we try to present a composer or a performer whom we haven’t featured before or had mentioned only in passing.  Surprisingly, we haven’t written about Arnold Schoenberg at any length for many years.   And when we’ve done it, here and here, it was of necessity rather sketchy.   We’ll try to add some specifics to our narrative.  

September 3, 2018.  Bruckner and more.  Anton Bruckner was born on September 4^th of 1824.  We’ve written about several of his early symphonies; this time we’ll focus on the Sixth, which was written between September of 1879 and September of 1881.  At that time, Bruckner, who had lived in Vienna since 1868, was teaching at the Conservatory; he was also on the faculty of the Vienna University, teaching harmony and counterpoint.  In addition to teaching, Bruckner was one of the organists in the Hofkapelle, so he hadn’t much time left for composition.  Bruckner started working on the Sixth symphony after the period marked by the disastrous first performance of his Third (the one dedicated to Wagner) which he so ineptly conducted.  For three years he didn’t write anything new, revising his older compositions (we’ve written about Bruckner’s insecurities and his tendency to revise his own music based on the sometimes uniformed opinion of others many times, for example here).  The Sixth isn’t performed very often, clearly not as often as either the Fourth or the last three (Seventh through Ninth).  Still, it’s a magnificent work, with most beautiful themes throughout the composition.  Sergiu Celibidache was a champion of this work, but in the spirit of the recent centenary, we’ll play it in the performance by the New York Philharmonic under the direction of Leonard Bernstein.  The symphony consists of four movements: Majestoso (here); Adagio: Sehr feierlich (Very solemnly), here; Scherzo: Nicht schnell (Not fast) — Trio: Langsam (Slowly), here; and Finale: Bewegt, doch nicht zu schnell (With motion, but not too fast), here.

August 27, 2018.  In the afterglow of Bernstein’s centenary.  Bernstein was unique – a composer, conductor, pianist, educator, a communicator par excellence.  No musician before him has occupied such a position on this country’s cultural scene, and we can safely assume that nobody ever will again.  And here is one lessons we learn as we celebrate his life.  While we don’t want to over-generalize, one thing becomes clear when you look at Bernstein’s life: the importance of classical music within our culture has diminished.  Bernstein was the most important classical music figure when classical music itself was important.  Today, we also have stars, but they are dimmer and not as significant.  We even have the hard numbers that concur with this assessment.  There was a time in the history of this country when owing a piano was a must.  It was one of the major purchases Americans made, right after the house and practically on par with the purchase of a car.  In 1956, 210,00 pianos of different kinds – verticals, grands, even some pneumatic instruments – were sold in this country.  In 2007, the last year for which we have statistics – 62,500 pianos were sold.  In 1956 the population of the US was just over half of that in 2007.  In other words, seven times more pianos were sold per person in 1956 than in 2007.  We can assume that things have only gotten worse in the last 10 years.  We don’t want to over-dramatize the situation: while people clearly are not making music the way they were doing it in the middle of the past century, they still listen to the classical music.  They do it differently, thanks to the development of the Internet: they download it, or, what is more common, listen to streaming music.  And they don’t just listen, they express themselves – one could find millions of opinions on YouTube, for example.  This is wonderful, but this doesn’t change the basic notion of the diminishment.  As we mentioned in our previous post, in 1960 Bernstein could talk to kids about Gustav Mahler and play his music.  Today Mahler is established as one of the most important composers of all time (in large measure thanks to Bernstein), but you rarely hear him on major radio stations.  Classical music is in troubled waters; Leonard Bernstein’s inspirational example is helpful, but it will be up to us and future generations of musicians and listeners to make things right and prevent it from becoming a relic like kabuki.