Sticky Concert Situation

I thought I had exhausted the possibilities for things that can go wrong with a concert venue, but today’s topped them all. Our program this afternoon had been rescheduled twice, and moved to a time to assure the smallest possible audience--the Sunday before a college’s Spring Break. On top of that there was a chance that the building wouldn’t have light and heat because of a scheduled (and then rescheduled) power outage on campus. Never mind. I came armed with stand lights, a sweater, and a sense of adventure.

What a surprise it was to hear the sound of the heating system, and to feel that the building wasn't cold. It was even a bit toasty inside. We thought all was well until John David noticed that one of the piano keys was sticking. It was sticking because the inside of the piano showed evidence of something sticky having been spilled on it. Nobody wanted to reach in and taste it, but it looked like pancake syrup to me. It was all over the hammers and the strings, causing some notes not to sound at all. We couldn’t figure out how something like this might have happened, and certainly couldn’t understand why anybody would spill syrup inside a baby grand piano.

We had to find a new location for the concert. Luckily we had an understanding audience, and everyone waited patiently while we tried to contact university administrators (who were mostly out of town) to see if we could find another hall with a piano on campus.

Suddenly our page turner came to the rescue. Her father happens to be the pastor of a local church, and the church happens to have one of the better pianos in town. She called him, and everyone hied over to the church. We began the program only 30 minutes behind schedule: a triumph of music over syrup.

Oh the struggles of trying to arrange performances of music by women.

UPDATE: You can hear the Tailleferre here:

Tailleferre Allegro non troppo
Tailleferre Adagietto
Tailleferre Allegro

and the Pejacsevich here:

Pejacsevich Allegro
Pejacsevich Andante
Pejacsevich Allegro molto

and the Boulanger encore:

Boulanger Nocturne

If you would like to hear a recording of the whole concert, send me an email message, and I’ll send you an invitation to a dropbox folder with the a recording of the rest of the concert and a PDF of the program.

Concert of music by Farrenc, Tailleferre, Hensel, and Pejacsevich March 13 at 3:30

I don't believe there are that many Musical Assumptions readers in my immediate geographical area, but if any of you who might be in the area are free, I guarantee that you will be impressed by the music on this program.


Here's a map, and here's some information about the composers:

Louise Farrenc
Germaine Tailleferre
Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel
Dora Pejacsevich

Ah! fuggi il traditor!

Pay special attention to the recitative between "La ci darem la mano" and "Ah! fuggi il traditor," and see if it doesn't recall the antics of a certain politician.

DONNA ELVIRA
Leave her, thou vile seducer!
By heav'n I'm sent, thy perfidy to witness;
And to prevent thee
From deluding this poor girl's inexperience
With thy treacherous language.

ZERLINA
I wonder says she truly!

DON GIOVANNI
Cupid, inspire me!
softly to Elvira
Can you chide, dear Elvira,
A little harmless pastime?

DONNA ELVIRA
Harmless pastime? Indeed, Sir!
Harmless pastime! Deceitful man
I know too much of your pastime.

ZERLINA
But, my lord, please to tell me,
Has she the right to say this?

DON GIOVANNI
She's so infatuated!
But I must treat her kindly,
She cannot bear from my side to be parted,
Unfortunately I am too tenderhearted.

Fritz Kreisler and the Musical Ethic of his Time

When asked to give an evaluation of his best work, Fritz Kreisler speaks volumes

"When I’m judging other artists it’s easy for me because I judge them by the standards. . . present standards: by the beauty of their tone, by their musicality, and by their technical achievements. With me it's different. When I play I always try to achieve a certain ideal, and I have never been able to achieve it. When I came near it, and when I advanced in age, well, the ideal had progressed too, so that I came never near it."

Perhaps it might be fair to say that Fritz Kreisler (1875-1962) helped mold the musical ethic of his time. He exuded humility. He understood that music is, at its very core, a humble art. Bach understood this, as did Haydn and Schubert.

I wonder if the world of music will, once again, put someone with the humility and humanity of Fritz Kreisler in an influential position. Current standards are very high, and musical ideals are still there, but I feel that more value has been placed on grabbing and holding onto the "brass ring" than on the act of reaching for it. Many people don't quite understand the difference. The proof is in the playing.

Streaming Summer Strings

Last summer the local television station made a portion of a documentary film about our Summer Strings program in Charleston, Illinois. It aired this past Sunday, and now is capable of streaming all over the world. Around nine minutes into the program there is a piece about my friend Nina Marshall (one of the co-directors of Summer Strings) making harps with her father. The Summer Strings portion begins at around the 16-minute mark, and lasts around eight minutes. [If you are reading through a reader you will need to click through to the post to see it.]

Violinists' Speaking Voices

This WQXR radio interview from February 2, 1955 was part of a celebration of Fritz Kreisler's 80th birthday. Before the Kreisler interview begins there are audio birthday greetings from Mischa Elman, Yehudi Menuhin, Nathan Milstein, Erica Morini, Joseph Szigeti, Ruggiero Ricci, and Isaac Stern. What an ear-opening experience it is to hear the speaking voices of these violinists, particularly after being so familiar with their violinist voices. I had no idea that Isaac Stern's voice could be so rich and mellow, and I noticed that Menuhin's voice sounds significantly more American than it sounded when he became older. Don't you just love the way Kreisler pronounces "works" as "woiks," and "first" as "foist?"

Seymour Barab's La Pizza con Funghi

This hilarious parody of Italian opera by Seymour Barab is performed here (in its one-hour entirety) by the Greensburg American Opera.

Enhanced Digital Metronome

There's nothing quite as satisfying to practice with as a truly loud and precise metronome. I used an electric bakelite Franz Metronome for years and years. It had a great sound, but it also had a few drawbacks. It was heavy, and it needed an outlet for its permanently-attached power cord (that didn't always remain permanently attached). After a few falls (the Franz would sometimes vibrate itself to the edge of a table), my Franz no longer worked, and I couldn't find anybody who could repair it. The succession of metronomes that accompanied my practicing since the 1980s have been more portable, but none of them had the volume of the Franz.

A few weeks ago I decided to enter the 21st century and buy myself an inexpensive ($24.00) Korg digital metronome. It is very light, but it is also rather quiet. Yesterday, just to see (and hear) what would happen, I hooked it up to some old computer speakers that I plugged into an outlet. The result was metronome Nirvana. There's nothing quite like a digital "pop" and a good stream of real electricity to give a metronome the kind of power it needs to iron out my rhythmic inaccuracies.

Great post about Leon Theremin

If you know a little about Leon Theremin you'll want to read David Ocker's post about him. If you don't know anything about Theremin, you'll definitely want to read this post. Ocker has a picture of a "Trojan Seal," a link to a video of Theremin playing (beautifully), as well as a link to the superb full-length film, Theremin: An Electronic Odyssey.

David Munrow: Must-Hear Early Early Music on YouTube

For people who have heard David Munrow but have never seen him, here's a 14-minute film of Munrow and his fellow early music pioneers. The bagpipes at the beginning are really something, but the Saltarello at 6:35 is "something else" entirely. After some restrained quiet playing (by other people in the Early Music Consort of London) the insanity continues at 9:35 with a double pipe of some sort, followed by another kind of bagpipe, and the film ends with some wild and frenzied recorder playing.

After the Medieval madness, check out the Early Music Consort of London's film of Elizabethan music, their film of early 17th-century Italian music, and their film of 17th-century German music.

Winter Conversation #3

Here is the third of the six Winter Conversations that I wrote for Marjorie Kransberg-Talvi and Ilkka Talvi (the violinists on this recording). The images are from Olaus Magnus's History of the Nordic Peoples from 1555, but the subtitle of the Conversation is "Chopin and Wieniawsky talk about the Weather," (winter wind and wild horses).


Links to a PDF of the music will be available here soon.

How Much is that Doggy on the Piano?

This one's for you, Moe!

(Thanks to Rachel for sending this.)

Winter Conversation #5

Here is a recording of Winter Conversation #5 made by Marjorie Kransberg-Talvi and Ilkka Talvi:



These are links to four of the other Winter Conversations:

Winter Conversation #1
Winter Conversation #2
Winter Conversation #4
Winter Conversation #6

What are Emerging Composers?

Alexandra Gardner asks a good question:

And how does an "emerging composer" turn into a straight up "composer"? By finishing a doctoral degree? With a tenure track teaching position or other substantial music-related gig? Upon receiving a commission from a major orchestra or signing with a major publisher? A big award such as a Guggenheim fellowship or Rome Prize? I have no idea!

I keep forgetting my passwords to the various sites I read, so I'm posting my answer here.

The whole "emerging composer" thing is a construct. When my music first got published, I sort of thought of myself as something like an "emerging composer" (but that before the snappy term--that really means nothing--started being used). Now that I have achieved the level of recognition that I will probably have for most of my life (miracles could happen, I suppose), I am no longer an emerging composer. I'm just a composer. I know many older composers (older than me) who have had music performed and recorded by lots and lots of people and published by lots and lots of publishers, who have never "emerged" because their names have never become household words. They are just composers too.

The handful of composers who become household names in the classical music world are people who have excellent people doing excellent publicity work for them. Some of the people just under "household" status do an excellent job of doing publicity work for themselves. Some are affiliated with institutions, and some are not. There are composers who are able to raise money to pay publicity people (and there are composers who must have access to personal fortunes, but they never talk about it), and there are composers who have spouses or partners who do the necessary publicity work gratis, but money (in some shape or form) is still a factor in their "visibility."

21st Century Performance Practice

Ilkka Talvi compares a photograph of the Takacs Quartet with the Joachim Quartet in his post "Then and Now," and makes a truly valid point about the way high-profile concerts have essentially "devolved":

We seem to have gone back in time, as nowadays we unfortunately enjoy our musical encounters more with our eyes than with our ears, as if concerts were intended for deaf people. Everyone should enjoy a blind person's experience: bouncing around and madly waving bows or batons obviously would be of no use.

Talvi's "time travel" refers, of course, to the extravagances and showmanship of the 19th century. Now that we are a decade into the 21st century, I'm becoming nostalgic for the 20th century of my youth. I remember (with deep fondness) the experience of going to hear concerts rather than going to see concerts. I also remember (with deep fondness) when "classical music" was not "cool" and was not "sexy." It was about substance over surface--for the most part. The "stars" were often ordinary looking, and sometimes they were downright homely, but we loved them because of the way they played.