Dawn Upshaw and Jing Jing Luo Expand Our Musical Universe at Princeton Symphony Concert

One of the most distinctive voices of our time filled the small, acoustically perfect space of Princeton University’s Richardson Auditorium on January 31. It was a controlled voice that murmured a Spanish lullaby, then rose to greet “a colorless moon” in a surrealistic love poem, and finally, modulated between whispers and shining tones against a harp ostinato in two stanzas by Emily Dickinson.

These are the Three Songs, settings of verses by three women poets, that title the Princeton Symphony Orchestra’s concert in a season dedicated to creative women. The singer is Dawn Upshaw, the work an appealing blend of South American and Eastern European influences, with a touch of minimalism, by the Argentinian composer, Gustavo Golijov.

The work, which came second on the program after Kodaly’s Dances of Galanta, is tonally elusive. There are places where it seems that an instrument—one of the strings, perhaps a woodwind—may have briefly wandered from the path, but it is all by design, a design which creates a sense of wondering as well as wandering, a sense of freedom lightly controlled. Under the direction of the PSO’s music director, Rossen Milanov, the orchestra at times supported the soprano soloist, sometimes floated beneath her like a cloud. Small dissonances faded as Ms. Upshaw caressed the words, a liquid clarinet solo gently tugged at our attention, and then the singer’s glorious voice swelled with a large, satiating sound. Sublime.

Impressive though a visit by Ms. Upshaw may be, the other three works on the program were each in their own way masterpieces of balance and feeling. The Kodaly, which opened the program, kept a moderate pace for its first expression, perhaps a tad too slow for my taste, but not for that of others. However, the variety of dynamics and tempi that followed made me realize this was a sensible, deliberate choice: passionate, heart-racing stuff!

The final work on the program, the Mozart Symphony #38, the Prague, painted the Viennese master in a robust and hearty mood. This is full, modern orchestra Mozart, and it is a memorable experience to see and hear.

Just before the Mozart, the nearly full-house audience was treated to a work by a contemporary, Jing Jing Luo, who has been composer in residence in Princeton for nearly two weeks. Ms. Luo’s work, Tsao Shu, refers to a form of Chinese calligraphy in which hundreds of characters are drawn with a single brush stroke. The piece was of modest proportions, about 10 minutes in length, and featured some tangy percussion sounds as well as the rarely seen technique of violins playing individually, little snips of glissandi, with some occasional bowing on the bridge. I liked the use of the bass drum, staggering dissonance in small doses, and what sounded to my ears like a toy piano (out of view). At times, the flutes fluttered like shakuhachi. A bright, spritely, well balanced composition, for which the composer took a well deserved bow.

My interviews with Ms. Upshaw and Ms. Luo appear in the Princeton Packet here: http://tiny.cc/o6qs8x

The PSO’s programs are just about ideal, combining intelligent, heart-felt interpretations of classical stalwarts with new music by living composers. The next concert in the series will feature Caroline Shaw, violinist-composer, and works by Sibelius, Shaw, and Brahms, at 4 p.m. Sunday, March 13. http://tiny.cc/vkrs8x There is abundant parking throughout Princeton, N.J., and metered parking is free on Sundays. Photo below of Dawn Upshaw with the Princeton Symphony Orchestra by Carolyn Dwyer.

                                                                                                                                                                --Linda Holt

Christmas carols in the farmland, classical music in the future

When I was a child, the closest thing to classical music we had was Christmas carols. In a village hard by New Jersey farmland, I looked forward each fall to the advent of carols in my Methodist Sunday school.

There were hymns, of course, throughout the year, but it wasn’t the same. “Rock of Ages, cleft for me,” just doesn’t have the magic of “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” Where was Bethlehem anyway? The picture in my Sunday school flyer showed guys in turbans riding on camels past palm trees. I knew it wasn’t near Imlaystown, New Jersey. Christmas carols came in foreign languages (“Adeste Fidelis,” “Stille Nacht”) and introduced mysterious chants otherwise unknown in the Protestant tradition (“Glo-oh-oh-ri-a,” O Come, O Come, Emmanuel..”). 

In fact the first sheet music book I ever purchased cost a quarter at the “five and ten-cent” store: a slim volume of Christmas carols, the pages of music alternating with public-domain etchings of angels. Yes, it was the sound of angels. Angels we have heard on high, from the realms of glory, bending near the earth, through the cloven skies. Even one named Harold (or so I thought). Angels with golden harps, opening the pearly gates, not necessarily to greater religious fervor, but to the unlimited and infinite world of music.

Christmas songs were another matter altogether. “White Christmas,” “Silver Bells,” “Chestnuts roasting…” all had their place, and added to the festive frenzy of the holidays. Later, there were the songs of sarcasm and novelty, like “The Chipmunk Song,” “I saw momma kissing…” and every other song featuring Santa or reindeer. They were fine, but not in the same category as “real” Christmas carols. Christmas carols had parts you could sing in different voices and took on an even greater fascination when I learned to sing the silky alto line snaking between the soprano and tenor. What a feeling! 

At times, Mrs. Foultz would become enflamed with some celestial fire as she sat at the electric organ, and her fingers, cramped from years of “If you come to Jesus, you will outshine the sun,” would escape like cooped wild animals set free into the melodic lines and harmonies of Mendelssohn and Handel. I had never heard such music before. 

The holidays over, I was trying to remember the name of one of the carols as I fell asleep last night. It was the one with “Gloria in excelcis Deo” as the chorus. Where else would a farm girl have heard a melisma like that in the 1960s? Angels, plain, domain, high, sky: the lyrics of several carols tumbled together in my head and only a Google search this morning recalled “Angels we have heard on high.”

My cat, Max, leapt from my lap with a growl as I hummed the alto part, still vivid after all these years. I glanced at the walls of a room filled with scores and recordings, Vivaldi blasting from the Bose. Perhaps none of this would have existed had my friends and I not been handed those well-worn songbooks in fellowship hall and, to the accompaniment of a tinny piano with two broken keys, learned to warble “It came upon a midnight clear” and Handel’s “Joy to the World.” 

A more devious scheme to turn kids on to music was never devised!        --Linda Brown Holt

 

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Snack-sized reviews--Young, Lortie, Vienna Symphony

Snack-sized reviews from recent travels

All seats were sold out for Simone Young, the exciting Australian conductor, and the Vienna Symphony on Sunday, Oct. 25, 2015. No wonder: the Wunderfrau of the podium was leading one of Vienna’s top-flight ensembles in the rarely heard Dante Symphony by Franz Liszt. I managed to buy a ticket from an elderly woman who arrived at Vienna's Konzerthaus, rosy as Homer’s dawn, at the last moment.

The program began with an energetic performance of the Schrumpf-Symphonie by Austrian composer Kurt Schwertsik, but all was quickly overshadowed by the brilliance of Liszt’s transcription of Schubert’s Wanderer Fantasy, eloquently interpreted by Louis Lortie, a pianist who deserves to be more widely known in the States. European audiences truly crave encores, more than do their American counterparts, and Lortie provided a beautiful short work by Liszt, a world of subtlety, variety, depth in a few minutes that passed like a delightful dream.

The Dante Symphony? Meh. This work begins promisingly enough, but drones on and on until it remembers where it is and concludes in a captivating sweep of sound. A great concert overall, though, and while Young has conducted major operatic and symphonic orchestras for decades, I still am amazed every time I see a woman wield the baton. Hurrah for Simone, Marin, Joann, and all the women who now lead orchestras. For women of my generation, it is a miracle, but one long overdue.

Princeton Symphony Orchestra and Koh Soar in Stunning New Work & a Rachmaninoff Favorite

Women’s creativity in music—the theme of the new Princeton Symphony Orchestra season—knows no limits to judge by the concert series’ opener, “Graceful Pairings,” Sept. 27, 2015, in Alexander Hall on the Princeton University campus.

Rossen Milanov, music director, led what many call New Jersey’s finest symphonic ensemble in a remarkable new work by composer Anna Clyne, featuring a stand-out solo performance by the incredible Jennifer Koh, violinist. The Seamstress is basically a two-movement concerto for violin and what I call a “loaded” orchestra: four horns, harp, contrabassoon, and all the regulars.

I usually shy away from programmatic interpretations of music (“It sounds like a train!” and other banal comments come to mind), but this profound work, rich in modulations, textures, rhythmic variety, reminded me of nothing so much as Debussy’s La Mer, impressions of the sea.

This should not surprise, since the first three letters of Clyne’s masterful work are S-E-A. Yes, we can wax programmatic a bit, since the rhythms and patterns of a woman’s needlework wizardry recall the ebb and flow of ocean tides, the rhythm of waves that Matthew Arnold said “Begin, and cease, and then again begin/With tremulous cadence slow.”

Clyne (born in 1980) explains that she wanted to retain an organic sound, but her music says all this with immediacy and eloquence. There is the labor of the seamstress, there is the rhythm, rush, and roar of the sea, and there is also something else, something timeless, organic, but not to be named.

Structurally, the first section of this work sounded to me like a chaconne, a musical form that intersperses variations with a return to the main thematic material. Koh begins the work solo, with a riveting line of pure sonority. Violins sound so wonderful in Richardson Auditorium; you can almost smell the rosin and the fruity oils of the wood. The orchestra then steps in and both instruments (orchestra and solo violin) blend their distinctive sounds through a cascade of variations.

Clyne’s symphonic writing is truly gripping; instead of mild modulations, entire sections of the orchestra seem to drop, like tectonic plates falling in sheets during an earthquake. It is startling, almost like a blow to the chest, but the music rises, and there are healing glissandos that always land on precisely the right note.

Koh’s physical presence also contributed to the beauty of a work which is sometimes serene, other times agitated and uneasy. She wore a pale champagne tinted gown, strapless to reveal muscular shoulders. Her black hair, short, was frequently tossed a la Beatles.

Milanov cut a commanding, but elegant figure at the podium, an image of dignity and grace, with reserved motions and a controlled approach quite different from his stance in the second work on the program, Rachmaninoff’s sumptuous Second Symphony. What a luxurious indulgence it is for audiences to surrender to the power and almost overwhelming beauty of its melodies and sonorities. In this work, Milanov melted into sweeping gestures, embracing and letting go, as though releasing the music from his heart into the pit. A pit is a kind of heart, isn’t it. It’s a long work, almost an hour, but a lively one, with patches of frenzy to offset the lyricism, some splendid percussion work providing the skeleton on which all the lushness drapes.

The last hushed whispers of the end of the third movement: have they ever been captured so eloquently? I thought of the sobs ending the funeral movement of Beethoven’s Eroica, but these final notes were more austere and visceral, a series of fading heart beats culminating in silence.

The fourth movement, in contrast, is almost raucous, wildly captivating, fast and racy. I have seldom seen a conductor enjoy himself and have so much fun as Milanov did in the extended cymbal crash sequence that leads to the conclusion of a highly satisfactory symphony splendidly performed.

The next concert in the series will be “Heartfelt Virtuosity” at 4 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 8, preceded by a 3 p.m. talk for ticket holders. See www.PrincetonSymphony.org for more details. (Photo of Maestro Milanov and the orchestra at the conclusion of the concert.)

Czech quartet to perform in Princeton on Oct. 15, 2015

The Pavel Haas String Quartet from the Czech Republic will perform works by Martinu, Dvorak, and Beethoven in concert 8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 15, in Alexander Hall on the Princeton University campus.

The program will feature Martinu’s String Quartet No. 3, Dvorak’s String Quartet No. 9 Op. 34, and Beethoven’s Quartet Op. 59, No., 2, one of the Razumovsky quartets. Princeton University Professor Scott Burnham will offer a pre-concert talk, free to all ticketholders, at 7 p.m.

Tickets are available online at princetonuniversityconcerts.org, by phone at 609-258-9220, or in person two hours prior to the concert at the Richardson Auditorium Box Office. (Photo by Marco Borggreve)

Innovation, tradition with a twist of Limón: American Repertory Ballet sails into 2015-16 season

by Linda Holt

Wanted: Performance partners, no experience necessary. Without leaving your seats, engage with professional dance and have an in-person conversation with the arts.

So might a classified ad read for the new season of the American Repertory Ballet (ARB), a community-based professional dance company with an international influence. The Season Premiere is 7:30 p.m. Sept. 25 and 26 in Rider University’s Bart Luedeke Student Center.
“Dance…this art…is really about participation,” explains Douglas Martin, now in his sixth year as artistic director of an organization that includes a professional dance company (also called ARB), a world-class dance school (the Princeton Ballet School), and an educational outreach component (DANCE POWER and On Pointe).

“The audience is in fact 50 percent of the performance,” said Martin. “This is live, exciting art at its best, where the performers draw energy and encouragement from the responses of the audience, while viewers are themselves transported by the creation of living works of art.”

Martin began dancing with the Princeton group 22 years ago, rising to ballet master, and eventually joining the renowned Joffrey Ballet in New York City. In his early years, Martin studied with Dmitri Romanoff at the San Jose Ballet School. Romanoff was the “dharma heir” of greats such as Michel Fokine, who choreographed Petrushka for Stravinsky, Léonide Massine, who choreographed the Rite of Spring.

This season Martin has brought in Sarah Stackhouse, long-time dancer and assistant with José Limón (1908-1972), to stage There is a Time, one of Limón’s most famous choreographies. Stackhouse studied with Limón, who in turn studied with the great Doris Humphrey (1895-1958), providing another example of the importance of lineage and legacy in the creative world. “Our dancers in this major performance are just two dancers away from Doris Humphrey,” Martin noted. During her three week residency with ARB, Stackhouse is coaching today’s ARB dancers to recreate the nuances of Limón’s unique choreography, which was often customized to fit the physical and psychological nature of individual dancers.

There is a Time expresses the themes of a section of the biblical Book of Ecclesiastes which begins, “To everything there is a season… A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted…”

ARB will perform this acclaimed modern dance production, rich with moving images of birth, life, death, and renewal, October 20 through 22 as part of the José Limón Festival at the Joyce Theater in New York City. Even more exciting, the dancers will repeat this performance April 8 in Princeton’s McCarter Theatre.


From the light-hearted to the sublime

An integral part of Princeton and surrounding communities for 61 years, the American Repertory Ballet is launching its Season Premiere Sept. 25 and 26 with a fresh program that embraces three forms of dance: classical, neo-classical, and modern.

“The three ballets in the Season Premiere are in different styles,” Martin noted during an interview at APB’s spacious studios at the Princeton Shopping Center. “One of the things I did in the Joffrey Ballet was to the show the audience the diversity of the company. It’s quite impressive that we do such varied, diverse repertoire whether it’s classical, 20th century, or very contemporary. Our company prides itself in being able to represent those three styles in a very true fashion. It’s not like we’re a modern company trying to do ballet. We want you to see the ballet and feel like you are seeing a top-notch ballet company, and same for the other styles.”

The Season Premiere program features:
• Martin’s lyrical choreography, Ephemeral Possessions, set to Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings (“Dance is ephemeral, fleeting,” noted Martin. “When it is over, all we have are memories”);
• Kirk Peterson’s Glazunov Variations, set to the music of Glazunov for the classical ballet, Raymonda; and
• ARB Resident Choreographer Mary Barton’s light-hearted Straight Up with a Twist, set to music by contemporary folk music composer Kaila Flexer.

“It’s wonderful music,” said Martin. “Three years ago, she came over and performed it with her band. It has Klezmer, gypsy airs, all sorts of things..lots of fun.”

By design, ARB will perform the same program 10 days later at the Union County Performing Arts Center’s Hamilton Stage in Rahway. “We’re truly a repertory company, and that’s a dying breed because companies can’t tour anymore,” Martin said. “The community concert series money (that once sustained these groups) is now gone. Fortunately, our ‘misfortune’ in not having a home theater to live in allows us to perform all over and to offer our ballets in different settings over the years.”

And then there’s Nutcracker

The ballet most associated with ARB and the Princeton Ballet School is Nutcracker. “We’re talking about a real five-week season of Nutcrackers during November and December,” Martin said. “It’s such a wonderful family tradition that has been embraced by people of many diverse cultures and religious backgrounds. In fact, it’s so widely loved and part of the winter holidays, many people don’t even realize it’s a ballet, and that’s fine: just enjoy!”
Choreographed by Martin, this year’s production also will include the original party scene, choreographed by company founder Audrée Estey. Nutcracker will be offered at McCarter Theatre in Princeton on Wednesday, Nov. 25, at 7 p.m.; Friday , Nov. 27, at 2 and 5:30 p.m.; and Saturday, Nov. 28, at 1 and 4:30 p.m. The company also will offer its first Sensory Friendly performance of Nutcracker for children and adults with special needs on Sunday, Nov. 22 at 1 p.m., at UCPAC in Newark. Additional ARB performances of Nutcracker will be held in other New Jersey locations between Nov. 21 and Dec. 20.

ARB’s ambitious program continues in the New Year with A Midsummer Night’s Dream March 18 and 19 in Branchburg; Spring into Dance, April 1, in Rahway; Masters of Dance and Music, featuring There is a Time choreographed by José Limón, April 8, in McCarter Theatre; and Echoes of Russian Ballet, April 15, in the State Theatre in New Brunswick.


Dancing for life and to be alive

Concurrent with the professional dance company, the Princeton Ballet School continues to offer classes to children and adults of all ages, “from morning to night,” Martin said. “Don’t be surprised to hear that a 70-year-old friend is taking classes here, either for enjoyment or to experience the thrill of a walk-on part in one of our productions.” Classes include classical ballet but also modern and contemporary forms, all celebrating the ABS philosophy of art as a face-to-face conversation among people.

“Involved audiences are half the equation,” said Martin. “When we are here, the dancers are simply working and taking direction. But when the audience is present, it’s quite extraordinary. There’s that moment when the audience gasps or breaks into applause: then, there is a communication with the dancers that is pure magic.

“Television is fine,” he said, “it will be there. But turn it off. Go out and participate in other people’s lives. Help make this living art happen. It’s about communicating your relationship in person to people. The world is getting so computerized, people think they are communicating on Facebook! You need live conversation. With the performing arts, you know you are alive and living in the moment.”

Additional opening events include “Meet the Dancers” as part of the On Pointe series, 5:15 p.m. Sept. 23; an Open House Dress Rehearsal, 4:30 p.m. Sept. 24; and the State of the Art Address, 6 p.m. Sept. 24, all at Rider University’s Bart Luedeke Center in Lawrenceville, N.J., free of charge and open to the public.

Further information on the ARB Fall and Winter Season, including Nutcracker ticket information, may be obtained at www.ARBallet.org .