Thursday, October 22, 2009

Perquimans County Restoration



Several weekends ago, I presented a lecture-recital for the Perquimans County Restoration Association. The event took place in a lovely setting - Hertford United Methodist Church, and was arranged by a friend I met through our chapter of the American Guild of Organists, Lynwood Winslow. Jonathan Johnston joined me once again for several of the works.

The program as well as a few reflections follow.

Life Let Us Cherish - Mozart


Kinlock of Kinlock - Arranged with Variations

This is a lovely set of variations that always seems a variation or two short.


Tyrolean Waltz from La Cenerentola - Rossini/Herz

Two German Waltzes - Henri Herz

This was the first concert on which I have played these two Herz Waltzes. I thought they worked rather well on the bright piano and the lively acoustic of the church.


Buonaparte’s Coronation March

Bonaparte’s Retreat from Moscow

Battle of Warterloo - G. Anderson

Duke of Wellington’s March and Quickstep - M. Holst

This suite surveys high and low points of Napoleon's career. The pomp and pride of the Coronation March make a silly contrast with the immediate reversal of musical fortunes in the childish-sounding retreat that follows. The audience, which was particularly attuned to the humorous aspects of the concert, had a good laugh at the juxtaposition.

A few days after playing this collection of Napoleon pieces, I had the idea of arranging them for Chowan's string group (The Meherrin Chamber Orchestra) and maybe adding a fiddle tune and composing one more piece for Napoleon's time in exile. If I get around to doing it, the title of the orchestral suite will probably be "Napoleon Complex."

The Cottage Rondo - M. Holst


Intermission


Waltz - Mozart


Overture to Caliphe de Bagdad - Boieldieu

One audience member told me he thought the piano was too loud for the violin in this piece. While that may be the case, it might also be that this type of piece calls for a type of balance that we are not so accustomed to today. The violin part here is not so much a solo to be accompanied as one voice adding color to a more orchestral piano texture. This is typical of violin parts for a number of parlor pieces that mostly double what is already happening in the piano. In fact, the pieces usually stand alone just fine without the part, although the added color definitely gives them a very nice new dimension.


Storming of Monterey - Francis Buck

This is not in the bound anthology but was owned by the same ancestors and was passed down alongside it.

Auld Langsyne with Variations - D. Ross


Virginia Reels - Arranged by G. P. Knaupf

Natchez on the Hill

Republican Spirit

Love in the Village

After the concert, we were treated to a reception with tasty food and interesting stories. The audience had been rather large for a Sunday afternoon concert of parlor music, and among its number were several people with Skinner connections. The original owner of most of the music was actually a resident of the Perquimans region, so it was exciting and fun to present the music back in her area.

One colorful story that was shared involved some Skinners who have a property between Hertford and Edenton, I think. They named their place "Skinner Cat." The reason for the name, of course, was so that when they give directions to their home, they can say "There's more than one way to Skinner Cat!"

Saturday, May 30, 2009

Battles of Prague

I included "The Battle of Prague" on two concerts in the last several weeks. The first was at Galilee Lutheran Church in Pasadena, MD. The theme of that concert was the outdoor life and the concert also included Satie's Sports et Divertissements. Both works require narration, and Joel Borrelli-Boudreau (a friend from Peabody who is now in the Naval Academy Band and serves as the music minister at Galilee) did the narration in a spirited fashion.

Another friend, Myja Thibault, rode up to Pasadena with me. He reminded me that I had prepared myself for work in the parlor music world through a series of three Mozart concerts Kathy and I presented in our small house in Richmond during 2006. We invited folks from the neighborhood and church and had refreshments and fellowship after each concert. Those were very fun times.

I showed Myja the place in the score where one hand is labelled "The Prussians" and the other "The Imperialists." I had mostly dismissed this as being a little silly since there is no real conflict between the hands. However, the piece took on a distinguishing layer of interest for Myja once he knew about this labelling. It seems that the two registers in which the hands spend most of their time provide a musical depiction of opposing lines of soldiers facing each other in formal 18th century battlefield style. Then, when one hand crosses into the other's register, we understand it to represent material - cannon or flying bullets - making its way from one line over into the other.

The second concert was at Woodland Heights Baptist Church in Richmond, VA where Kathy and I used to work and where we met Myja. This concert was a part of the church's centennial celebration. My theme there was to think about that church, its community, and my relationship with them. I started my research into the Skinner Anthology while living there. I also played the Satie as the church is full of sportsmen and women.

Myja did a great job with the narration characterised by a spirit of almost mischevious enjoyment. He also added a layer of increasing intensity of delivery as the stages of the battle escalated - an excellent insight into the structure of the piece and how to perform it more compellingly.

The young son of another friend at the concert enjoyed "The Battle of Prague" the most as he said he could hear the cannons.

I reflected a bit on this occasion that the work was written for instruments that sounded really differently than the modern pianos on which I get to play it most of the time. On the modern piano it's a little hard to reconcile the combination of the very polite and elegant-sounding passages and the more expanded descriptive and explosive passages. Thinking of the chaos that could ensue when battle really broke out between two very formal lines helps. But I also imagine the two qualities I've described would come across very differently on the original instruments.

At the end of June, I am playing it once more, this time with string bass and my neighbor Ken Wolfskill doing the narration at the Lasker Summer Music Festival. Dr. Wolfskill teaches literature and writing at Chowan and will be a superb narrator. We are also performing the Satie on that occasion. Another great friend, Ariel Dechosa, will be playing Prokofief's Sixth Sonata - one of Prokofief's "war sonatas." We have entitled the program "War and Peace."

Prague and the Satie could make a nice short program with narrator with the same title.

Saturday, April 11, 2009

College Music Society

In March, I had the privilege of presenting music from the Skinner Anthology during the annual conference of the Mid-Atlantic Chapter of the College Music Society, which took place at George Mason University. I enjoy my involvement with CMS as the organization includes people from all branches of the college music scene - theory, musicology, performance, ethnomusicology, music industry, etc.


My presentation quickly painted the parlor music landscape by highlighting three of its personalities -

Henri Herz: the successful Parisian musical elite

George Knauff: the struggling musical pioneer in Farmville, VA

Franticek Koczwara: the roaming rogue whose Battle of Prague stayed near the top of the parlor hit parade


I also shared a list of uses I've found for my research, which I will copy below.

1. The technical demands of most parlor music are such that intermediate piano students can enjoy playing it. Knowledge of intermediate repertoire is an acknowledged weak point for many piano teachers, thus an introduction to the range of parlor music could be very helpful for piano pedagogy students.

2. As much parlor music is literal in form and formulaic in development, it is an excellent source of straightforward scores for theory students to analyze.

3. As much parlor music was designed for collaboration, it provides lots of options for creative work with students and colleagues in music, drama, dance, literature, history, etc.

4. Parlor music can provide contrast in our own recitals full of Brahms, Busoni, and Boulez. Listeners enjoy a respite from aesthetic challenge, and hearing about music-making in the parlor setting seems to spark their imaginations.

5. In the context of college-level piano study or music history classes, parlor music can provide perspective on the quality of the works that have survived in the canon. It can also introduce discussion of the 19th century struggle between commercial music for home use and the rise of the symphony as the hallmark of high art in the concert hall.

6. Working in an area with few traditional concert venues, I need to find other settings in which to connect with the public and to recruit students. Historical associations, museums, and history teachers are often interested in presentations that involve live music. Such opportunities allow me to meet a broader range of people than I would if I were limiting myself to the recital hall.

7. Facing the limited nature of the materials of the music, and contemplating the parlor setting, I have been refreshed in my appreciation of the sometimes simple joys of making music. This attitude is exemplified by a song text attributed to Johann Usteri and found in the anthology. In it we are exhorted to enjoy the simple gifts of life while there is still time to do so.


Several colleagues shared interesting remarks after my presentation. One probably shares ancestors with me. Another commented on the need for a lighter charming sort of repertoire today. A third provided some wise counsel regarding what sort of place ought to eventually be entrusted with the anthology.

Sunday, March 1, 2009

Lafayette's Journey


On Thursday, I presented a short recital of Skinner Anthology materials at the Hertford Academy at the request of the Murfreesboro Historical Association. The Society is one of the things that makes Murfreesboro a great place to live. It preserves our heritage and plans events that give our town lots of charm, including the Christmas Tour, the Watermelon Festival, and Porkfest. I've been wanting to get involved with the Historical Association, so I was excited about the opportunity.

The occasion was the visit of a tour group from Suffolk. The group is retracing Lafayette's journey through our region in 1824, and they came to Murfreesboro on the precise date that Lafayette did, February 26. They were treated to several museums in historic buildings in town that would have been here when Lafayette visited, and they were served a fine lunch at the Hertford Academy.

The Hertford Academy is the building in which several schools have held classes over the years, including some of the earliest classes of Chowan University. The Academy was decorated with several images and artifacts relating to Lafayette, including the pretty portrait from the Roberts-Vaughan House that always makes me think of Beethoven.

The lunch consisted of very tasty pork loin, lima beans, rolls, pickled fruit, and exquisite sweet potato soufflee, followed by a dessert of Pineapple Cake with fluffy white frosting - all prepared and served by members of the Historical Association.

After lunch, I spoke and played. The dates of the anthology fit very well with the timeframe of Lafayette and his post-American Revolution life, which included his visit to Murfreesboro.

I played two of reels that Knauff wrote down which were favorites from the Farmville area - "Love in the Village" and "Mississippi Sawyer." If he heard these, it would have been at some fete in Virginia or North Carolina.

Next I played the Herz Sontag Waltz. It is quite likely that Lafayette would have heard some Herz in some Eurpoean parlor as Herz was the best-selling composer of parlor music for piano in the era. Herz also toured the U.S. when his fortunes weren't going so well in France.

My third selection was Ogilvy/Anderson's "Battle of Warterloo." In preparation for this event, I read a bit about the relationship of Lafayette and Napoleon . Their relationship was definitely rather complicated. Being a strong supporter of representative government, Lafayette could not fully support all that Napoleon did. Napoleon must have also been concerned abot Lafayette's ideas and fame. When Napoleon held a memorial service for Washington, he didn't invite Lafayette whose own son was named for Washington! Still, after Lafayette fled to Belgium and was imprisoned, Napoleon freed him. In general, it seems that Lafayette tried to chart a course of moderation for the events of the French Revolution, and such a position must have been extremely hard to maintain and must have also been misunderstood by people on all sides of the conflict.

The last piece I played was the set of tunes from La Muette de Portici. This opera was popular towards the end of Lafayette's life, and is particularly relevant to his life journey as it deals with revolution, and revolution in Belgium in particular.

A few musical insights regarding this event:

One reel (Love in the Village) would probably have been enough!

I think all of the pieces I played on this occasion probably work best when played elegantly and with refined sound.

Hearing the "Lamentation for the Slain" in the "Battle of Warterloo" always deepens the experience in a serene way.

The picture above shows Sophie with me outside the Hertford Academy. In spite of her interest in Lafayette, I didn't take her to the performance.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Virginia Reels






These are images of rehearsals of Virginia reels for Life Let Us Cherish at Chowan.

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Life Let Us Cherish


Friday night I presented a lecture-recital entitled "Life Let Us Cherish: Parlor Music in Antebellum North Carolina" as part of the 2009 Chowan University Pianofest. Click here for the full text of the lecture.

In the morning I got up and walked our beagle. Then I spent the rest of the day tending to details so that the evening would go smoothly. This was the most involved of the Skinner Anthology events yet. A singer, twelve dancers, a timpanist, a bassist, and a reader collaborated with me.

The dancers were Chowan students, coordinated and taught by Ashley Brooks. They worked hard and did an excellent job of dancing Virginia reels in period costume. Programming the reels was more problematic than I anticipated as it takes about eight minutes for six couples to dance a full round of the reel. That means eight minutes of constant sixteenth notes for the pianist. Playing that much fast music accurately during performance can tire the pianist's hand and mind, not to mention playing the music for several rehearsals in which we did the entire reel several times in a row! Nonetheless, a high point of the evening was the presence of these young dancers and their interest in the project.

Steve Harders, who also teaches at Chowan, read the Twain quotation with an excellent accent and also declaimed the various headings in the "Battle of Prague" with appropriate drama.

Lori Parker sang a few verses of "Life Let Us Cherish" at the beginning of the concert. We decided to transpose the song, and since the piano part is pretty easy, that worked out fine, although I rarely practice transposing these days.

Our version of "Battle of Prague" included another colleague, Dr. James M. Guthrie, on bass, and our student, Alex Welch, on timpani. Dr. Guthrie imrpovised/composed his part as we rehearsed, and Alex started by improvising. Dr. Guthrie and I gave a little input along the way.

Other colleagues attended and were encouraging in their feedback. One commented on the Daniel Hall piano sounding better than usual, which I believe is mostly due to the repertoire, much of which is transparent in texture and stays in the middle third of the keyboard.

Saturday, February 14, 2009

Serenade

I performed two concerts recently with tenor and good friend Jeff Prillaman. Following a Bizet aria, I played Iucho's work based on themes from La Muette de Portici. At another point, I played Herz's "Mademoiselle Sontag's Waltz" Playing this waltz in the context of a vocal recital focused my attention on the fact that a lot of the writing sounds like sparkly coluratura - appopriate for a work there bears the name of one of the mnost famous sopranos of her day.

Last night we performed at historic St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Petersburg, VA. Robert E. Lee attended worhsip there and his son was married there.