In March 2009, I was a Guest Lecturer at the Central Conservatory of Music (CCOM) in Beijing, China. My audience was a class of young conductors. My lecture, titled “Stokowski: the Limits of Interpretation,” considered the many changes that Stokowski had made in the scores of the music he conducted and how these changes might be defended and justified. Moments before my talk was to begin, I had a distinguished surprise visitor, 92-year old Huang Feili (photo above left: Feili on right), the man who had founded the conducting department of this institution back in 1956. His presence not only did me great honour, but gave me great joy. I was delighted to see an old friend whom I had first met in Toronto in 1987.

Western Music in China

China has made extraordinary progress in the last 20 years, particularly in the growth of its economy, the well-being of its vast population – 1.3 billion at last count in the census of 2010 – and in the transformation of its infrastructure. The explosion of Western classical music in China in that same time period has been no less remarkable; as recently as 1976, the Chinese communist authorities had denounced Western music as decadent and bourgeois, and a corrupting influence. Chairman Mao Zedong’s wife Jiang Qing had made it her business to suppress any music except that which served the political purposes of the country’s communist regime.

The general history of Western music in China has been well told in a recent book called “Rhapsody in Red,” but my specific interest over the years has been the struggle faced by Chinese conductors to find opportunities for training and growth, and ultimately to become masters in their own house. At the very centre of that struggle was my old friend Huang Feili.

Shanghai’s International Settlement & Maestro Mario Paci

(Photo: above) Nanking Road, Shanghai International Settlement, China 1930s.

When Mario Paci arrived in Shanghai and played a concerto with local musicians, the residents of the International Settlement realized that this was the man they needed to take the Shanghai Municipal Orchestra (SMO) to a higher level. Paci accepted the challenge, reorganizing and reinvigorating the SMO from 1919 until 1942, when war with Japan ruined everything.

The quality of the Shanghai Municipal Orchestra should not be underestimated. There is no doubt that for more than 30 years, it was the finest symphony orchestra in the Far East. Among its members was Walter Joachim, principal cello of the SMO for eleven years. After settling in Canada in 1952, he became principal cello of the Montreal Symphony. Concertmaster of the SMO was Arrigo Foa. Recruited by Paci from his native Italy, Foa made Shanghai his home for 21 years. I met Foa in Hong Kong in the 1960s when I played double bass for the Hong Kong Philharmonic, which he conducted.

Huang Feili’s Musical Journey:  Defining the Mission

Growing up in Shanghai in the 1930s, Huang became familiar with Paci only after the Maestro had already vastly improved the SMO. While still in Primary School, he heard the orchestra for the first time playing an outdoor concert in Hongkou Park. Later, in Middle School, he attended his first SMO indoor concert at the Lyceum Theatre. Now a violin student, and old enough to appreciate the role of the conductor, he recalls the experience: “That was the first time I came into contact with a symphony orchestra and with Paci (photo: above). I watched my violin teacher sitting to the left of the concertmaster and I watched Paci’s conducting. For the first time I heard the wonderful sound of an orchestra come out of the hands of a conductor. I was greatly impressed.”

Later, with the help of his violin teacher, Huang regularly attended Paci’s rehearsals. Huang never had formal training in conducting. As he puts it, “My conducting was ’stolen’, mostly from Paci!” Interestingly, given my reason for being in Beijing in 2009, Huang also recalls another important influence on his conducting education in the 1930s: Stokowski’s 1937 film with Deanna Durbin “One Hundred Men and a Girl.” Musical life in Shanghai in those days was surprisingly rich and varied. Huang recalls recitals and concerto performances by artists of the stature of Heifetz, Szigeti, Elman, Moiseiwitsch and Chaliapin.

After the war, Huang moved to the United States to study music at Yale University. Among his teachers was the distinguished composer Paul Hindemith. By this time, Huang played the violin well enough to join the New Haven Symphony and work with soloists such as Serkin and Primrose. There were also opportunities to watch Koussevitsky, Monteux, Stokowski, Mitropoulos and others at work in nearby Boston and New York.

Upon graduating from Yale in 1951, Huang had a big decision to make: should he go back to China or try to make a career in the West? By this time, the communists were in power and it was not yet clear what the New China would look like. Ma Sicong was then in charge of the Central Conservatory and offered him a job at the school: “New China has been established and things are good – come back.” The deciding factor for Huang was his family; he had been married before he left for Yale and hadn’t yet seen his first-born child.

Huang joined the Department of Composition at the Central Conservatory and among his other assignments, taught conducting. One of his early successes was a production of Tchaikovsky’s Eugen Onegin with students of the CCOM. Huang was the conductor on this historic occasion – the first performance of a Western opera in China, featuring Chinese singers and musicians.

(Photo: above) Central Conservatory of Music Concert Hall, Beijing, China.

By 1956, Huang had had such an impact on the Central Conservatory of Music, the musical life of Beijing and nearby Tianjin that he was asked to start a Department of Conducting. His dream was to create, as he put it, “a Chinese School of Conducting.” What he had in mind was an approach to conducting that was uniquely Chinese, a “school of conducting” analogous to the schools which existed in other art forms in China such as the Peking Opera and its various “schools” which each feature unique singing and acting.

With time and experience, Huang came to realize that his dream was “impractical, impossible and even unnecessary.” Even the “immutable” schools of the Peking Opera have changed and living in a global village as we are today, Huang finally understood that change is probably inevitable and healthy.

The Department of Conducting at the CCOM had only a handful of students in its early years, most of them training to become choral conductors; while there were very few orchestras in China in the 1950s, there were a large number of amateur choirs.

Founding Father of the Beijing Symphony

Huang Feili (photo: right) not only became a respected teacher at the CCOM. but also one of the most prominent conductors in China. In the mid-1970s, he was invited to head up the ensemble that later became one of the finest professional orchestras in China, the Beijing Symphony. When Huang took over, the orchestra was a student group created to accompany the Beijing Song and Dance Ensemble. Xianglin Li, head of the Department of Culture of the Beijing Municipal Government, asked Huang to lead it and improve it. Shocked by what he heard at the first concert he attended, Huang described the experience with an expression Chinese orchestral musicians used at the time to refer to wrong notes: “There was artillery fire all over the sky.” Huang accepted Li’s invitation to lead and improve the ensemble, but laid down several conditions: it must become a concert orchestra rather than an accompanying ensemble; it must be large enough to play the standard orchestral literature; and the administration must be run like a professional orchestra.

By 1985, under Huang’s leadership, the orchestra had improved to the point of becoming fully professional and was renamed the Beijing Symphony. Huang Feili then went back to his full-time job at the Central Conservatory but continued to make regular appearances as a guest conductor with the Beijing Symphony until his final concert on February 26, 2009.

Cultural Revolution: Western Orchestras Serve Communist Cause

Without a doubt, Huang Feili had made an enormous contribution to the creation of one of China’s finest orchestras. The other great conducting pioneer, by the way, was Huang Feili’s contemporary and friend Li Delun, the man who led the Central Philharmonic (later known as the Chinese National Symphony Orchestra) through the turbulent years of the Cultural Revolution and thereafter, until his death in 2001.

After years of turmoil in China through civil war, war with Japan, and the communist victory in 1949, it appeared that the New China would be more just and more stable. This was not to be. Under Mao’s leadership, millions starved to death in the 1950s and the turmoil continued. Then in 1966, came the Cultural Revolution, which the leadership of China today recognizes to have been a misguided attempt to restore the ideals of the communist revolution. For artists and intellectuals like Huang Feili, it was a terrible time. The Central Conservatory simply ceased to function; there was no music teaching and there were no concerts. Huang and his colleagues were sent to various military divisions to learn from the army.

The Cultural Revolution was really ten lost years in which meaningful artistic and intellectual activity was prohibited unless it conformed to prototypes or models determined by party officials, and frequently by Mao’s wife, Jiang Qing. Artists and intellectuals were subjected to both verbal and physical abuse. Huang’s library of books and music was almost totally destroyed by the Red Guards.

Finally, this period of madness gave way to the era of Openness and Reform. Work at the CCM resumed and China even began to make overtures to the West. Nixon and Kissinger arrived in 1972, and Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra soon after. In spite of all the public euphoria which greeted these developments, behind the scenes life was far more complicated and difficult for Chinese musicians. Li Delun tried to bend with the constantly changing political winds, but it was a soul-destroying process: “It was all a power struggle, all politics – Jiang Qing just used music…We were all used by her, to give her something to do. I worked hard, but in my heart it was difficult.” (”Rhapsody in Red,” p. 287)

China Welcomes Back the Best of the West

When Ozawa and the Boston Symphony visited China in 1979, it was a momentous occasion. Ozawa, born in China, had a special affection for the country and its people. He had already conducted Li Delun’s Central Philharmonic a few years earlier and he and Li Delun had become very close. Ozawa demanded to see Li, but the officials lied and claimed he was busy in the south. By this time Li had been stripped of all his positions and was out of favour with the government.

Huang Feili also got to know Ozawa during his many visits to China. Ozawa gave a master class for conductors at the CCOM and soon became a conducting icon for young Chinese conductors. Huang Feili has great admiration for Ozawa, but felt that his students venerated the Maestro for the wrong reasons. They loved his flamboyant style on the podium and soon began to emulate it. Huang spent a good deal of time trying to get his students to understand that what made Ozawa great was not just the podium choreography – that was the superficial part; the more important part was his grasp of the music.

Huang Feili’s Love of Western Music Continues to Bear Fruit

In 1987, Huang made a return visit to Yale University, his alma mater, and to Toronto, where I met him for the first time. The connection was made through Huang’s son, An-lun, now a professional musician and an exciting young composer living in Toronto. I had the honour of conducting the first performance of Huang An-lun’s Symphonic Overture No. 2 in 1989.

Remember the son Huang Feili had never seen when he agonized over whether to return to China in 1951? That was An-lun, a gifted young man who grew up in China in troubled times and who, like his father, suffered the misery of the Cultural Revolution. Huang An-lun today is one of China’s foremost composers.

(Photo: above) The Golden Sail Youth Orchestra performing Beethoven's 9th"; Huang Feili, conductor

Huang Feili is now 94 years old and living in Beijing. He was appointed conductor for life of the Golden Sail Youth Orchestra, but relinquished his conducting role with this orchestra four years ago. Every Saturday, however, he continues to conduct a rehearsal of the 80-voice Beijing Yuying Beimang Alumni choir, an ensemble that combines alumni from two schools founded by the American Congregational Church: Yuying (boys) and Beimang (girls) high schools.

Maestro Huang Feili did not create a “uniquely Chinese” school of conducting as he had originally dreamed of doing; he chose instead to train several generations of Chinese conductors well enough to lead their own orchestras around the world – an impressive achievement by any standard, but particularly given the social and political challenges faced by China in his lifetime.

Paul E. Robinson is the author of “Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar,” and ”Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music.” For friends: The Art of the Conductor podcast, “Classical Airs.”

Photo of Maestro Huang Felli with Paul E. Robinson by Marita

This entry is an excerpt from the first (”The Art of the Conductor: China”) in an upcoming series of books by Paul E. Robinson tracking the musical journeys of noteworthy conductors of Western classical music in various countries around the world.

Tchaikovsky (orch. Glazunov): Méditation in D minor Op. 42 No. 1
Glazunov: Violin Concerto in A minor Op. 82
Messiaen: Turangalîla-Symphonie
Joshua Bell: violin
Angela Hewitt: piano
Jean Laurendeau: ondes martenot
Orchestre symphonique de Montréal (OSM): Kent Nagano, conductor

La Maison symphonique
Place des Arts
Montréal, Quebec
September 13, 2011

Ever since its premiere in 1949, audiences have been moved and thrilled by Olivier Messiaen’s massive “Turangalîla” Symphony. More than 60 years later, it remains an extraordinarily original and peculiar piece. Montreal has heard it before – Charles Dutoit championed the piece in 2000 at Place des Arts. Kent Nagano has a special relationship with the composer and his music, and conducted this latest performance with both love and authority. The OSM responded with spectacular playing.

La Maison symphonique, the new home for OSM and others, including OSM’s rival, the Orchestre Métropolitain (still led by Philadelphia-bound Yannick Nezet-Seguin) opened last week with OSM performances of the Beethoven Ninth. The following week the OSM gave us the Turangalîla Symphony, an apt choice to really test the hall’s ability to handle both great masses of sound and a vast range of instrumental colours.

With “Turangalîla,” La Maison symphonique emerged a winner as it easily handled the enormous volume throughout the work without distortion, and most instruments could be clearly heard in both soft and loud passages; however, from my seat in the back of the Balcony – the highest tier in the hall – the overall orchestral sound was overly bright. I was reminded of the hard-edged early digital recordings from the 1980s: plenty of clarity, but not much warmth. In spite of the wood on the walls and floors all around me and on the stage below, the sound reaching the top tier was more steely than woody. As with most halls, the sound likely varies – sometimes considerably – depending on seat location. We’ll see.

“Turangalîla,” with an approximate playing time of  80 minutes, is often the sole piece on a programme. Not so on this occasion. In the first half of the concert, we had violinist Joshua Bell playing music by Tchaikovsky and Glazunov. This meant not only that the evening’s programme was very long, but also that it was expensive; Bell, one of the few classical artists likely to sell out a concert these days, doesn’t come cheap, and “Turangalîla,” with an exceptionally large orchestra including 11 percussionists, not to mention two featured keyboard soloists, is costly to mount.

“Turangalîla” is an event in itself. With nearly all OSM concerts conducted by Nagano selling very well, and with listeners eager to hear the new hall, why did the OSM management combine Bell and “Turangalîla” in one concert? Either one on its own is very costly and the two together would be tough on any orchestra’s budget. At a time when orchestras everywhere are struggling to avoid deficits, this programming looks like utter foolishness. The irony is that the OSM almost certainly would have sold out Joshua Bell and “Turangalîla” in separate concerts; to combine them in one concert probably jacked up their costs inordinately, while raising hardly a dollar more in revenue.

“Turangalîla” is a made-up word from Sanscrit meaning “love song.” There are love songs in the symphony, but no explicit programme or story. What makes this piece symphonic is the recurrence and development of themes. Messiaen, in many of his works, was inspired by both bird song and Indian music. The themes in his pieces are often easily recognizable, occasionally approaching what some would call “smaltzy.”

“Turangalîla” is odd in its harmonies and rhythms and in its unusual sounds. It is also very difficult to play, even for a virtuoso orchestra. The OSM musicians were equal to everything the composer threw at them and played superbly. The piano part is very demanding but ultimately unrewarding for the soloist with everything else that is going on in the piece. Angela Hewitt was a surprising soloist given her reputation for Bach and Mozart, but she made a very strong impression. Québec ondes martenot specialist Jean  Laurendeau, positioned at the front of the orchestra, seemed in total command of this unusual instrument.

Joshua Bell, in great form, gave Tchaikovsky and Glazunov accurate and heartfelt performances. The OSM accompanied with sensitivity and panache. Associate principal horn Denys Derome contributed some beautiful solo playing.

It will likely take time for musicians and listeners alike to accustom themselves to La Maison symphonique. As I have said already, one concert experienced from one location in the hall does not provide enough information for firm conclusions about acoustical strengths and weaknesses. My impressions of the non-acoustical features of the hall, however, are another matter.

To begin with, anyone thinking of attending a concert La Maison symphonique should know that (as of September 13^th) the building and its environs are by no means finished. The outdoor surroundings are still walled off by wooden hoardings, and the lobby space is still under construction, especially at the top level. On the night I attended, the few existing escalators were not in service. Unfortunately, even putting the unfinished state of the building aside, the overall concept and layout of La Maison symphonique are, in my opinion, disappointing.

The new hall is part of Place des Arts and many patrons will enter through the dark, claustrophobic passages with low ceilings linking all the theatres. The main lobby of La Maison symphonique is so small and unimaginative that I was reminded of the worst of the Soviet era public buildings. To say the hall is uninviting would be an understatement. The audience enters through purely functional glass doors and almost immediately bumps up against a purely functional staircase. The message is ‘Get in or get out but don’t hang around here. Nothing to see here. Just keep moving.’ Emergency rooms in hospitals are designed with more aesthetic flair than this new arts facility.

There are only a single staircase and a few elevators leading to all floors. Getting 2,000 people in or out in a hurry is a problem. The beechwood lobby floors look nice, but after a few Montreal winters and a thousand cups of coffee spilled on them, will they still be attractive? The lobby space on each of the upper floors is tight and Spartan.

My general impression? Most of the money may or may not have been spent getting the acoustics right. We’ll see about that. Almost no money has been spent making the lobbies friendly and interesting, nor on moving people around the building quickly and safely. I see that the architectural design is credited to Jack Diamond. Was this really the best he could do?

Paul E. Robinson is the author of “Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar,” and ”Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music.” NEW for friends: The Art of the Conductor podcast, “Classical Airs.”

When the Knowlton Festival folded two years ago, the Orchestre symphonique de Montreal (OSM) and its chief conductor, Kent Nagano, needed to find an alternative venue for some of their summer music-making. An inspired choice was the Orford Festival. While last season’s appearances were uneven, this summer everything came together and the results were impressive.

Last summer at Orford, the OSM gave two full concerts under Nagano, who also worked with the Orford Academy Orchestra (OAO) on a third concert. The venue for all three performances was the Saint-Patrice Church in Magog. This year, the OSM gave only one full orchestra concert, which was presented at the University of Sherbrooke. Some OSM members were also involved in chamber music performances. The OAO concert under Nagano was presented at the Saint-Jean-Bosco Church in Magog. The three concerts I attended were packed, even with a top price of $85 in Sherbrooke.

Tan Dun Gives Schafer’s “Soundscape” New Dimension

The highlight for me was the Sherbrooke concert. The OSM has not appeared in this city for many years and it was gratifying to see such an enthusiastic response. Nagano’s theme for the evening’s programme was a “Journey to the Heart of Nature;” hence the selection of (photo: right) Tan Dun’s “Water Music,” Debussy’s “La Mer” and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6 “Pastoral.” Tan Dun’s “Water Concerto” is a complex and strange piece for any audience, but the folks in Sherbrooke clearly found it entertaining, as did I. Although the Salle Maurice-O’Bready at the University of Sherbrooke has extremely dry acoustics, and lacks the warmth, blend and presence one expects from a first-class concert hall, it did provide a clarity of sound that served the Tan Dun piece quite well.

I was reminded of Canadian composer R. Murray Schafer’s term “Soundscape” while listening to Tan Dun’s “Water Concerto.” Schafer was a pioneer in encouraging audiences to appreciate all the fascinating sounds in our world. In his piece, Tan Dun explores virtually all the ways one can use water to make music. There are three solo percussionists in the piece and each one works with what looks like a very large and transparent plastic salad bowl full of water. With their hands, they tap out all sorts of rhythms. They also use water glasses instead of hands to beat out sounds in the water. Finally, the lead percussionist – the astonishing Wang Beibei (photo: below right)– placed some wooden salad bowls of various sizes upside down in the large plastic bowl and using drumsticks, created still more fascinating sounds.

One might well ask how delicate water sounds could possibly compete with the accompaniment of a symphony orchestra. The answer is that each of the bowls of water has a microphone attached, and that Tan Dun’s orchestral scoring is complementary rather than combative.

One of the most effective episodes in the piece has the percussionists beating out galloping horse sounds in their water bowls while wind players in the orchestra contribute the sounds of neighing horses. Corny? Maybe in the telling, but certainly not in the playing. To my ears it was artful and good-humoured.

It should be emphasized that in too many contemporary concertos, the orchestra is given little to do, much of it elementary if not inconsequential. Not so here. Many of the techniques and rhythms could only be executed by a first-rate body of players. Nagano and the OSM played brilliantly.

Sea a Little Dry, but Sounds in Countryside Lush and Fresh

Debussy’s “La Mer” was also well played but suffered from the dryness of the hall. The timpani riff at the end of the piece, although pounded out with authority, sounded like someone beating on a table top with a pair of hammers.

The OSM under Nagano recently made a recording of Beethoven’s “Pastoral” Symphony, scheduled for release this fall, and the orchestra’s performance on this night certainly reflected the most detailed preparation, giving a sense that Nagano had personally inscribed dynamic markings in every bar of each player’s part. There were sounds I felt I was hearing for the first time simply because Nagano and his players had taken such care over balances. This performance was not only well-rehearsed; it was beautiful and joyful.

As will everything that the OSM played this season at Orford, the “Pastoral” will be repeated August 16-18 at the Edinburgh Festival. With that international exposure in mind, I must mention that the horn playing in the Beethoven and in several other works was unacceptably shaky. While Beethoven calls for just a pair of horns in the “Pastoral,” in many performances a third, even a fourth player is often added to spell off the others. Nagano might consider that option for Edinburgh.

Theme of Social Landscapes, Real and Imagined

The Orford Academy Orchestra (OAO) concert began with Karl Amadeus Hartmann’s lugubrious Symphony No. 4. I can’t imagine what led Nagano to choose such a dreadful piece for a summer concert in Magog. It was written in 1946 in response to the terrible war years in Germany. Clearly, noble sentiments do not always translate into great music. This 33-minute piece for string orchestra certainly challenged the young players – perhaps that was the point of the exercise – but the Symphony No. 4 seems to me academic and tedious.

The OAO is much improved this season, and the Saint-Jean Bosco Church is a much better venue for a symphony concert than last year’s Saint-Patrice. Under Nagano’s direction, the OAO gave an accurate and exciting rendition of Stravinsky’s “Petrouchka.”

Guest artist on the OAO programme was the superb pianist Benedetto Lupo, whom I had heard several times in Austin, Texas. On this occasion he played Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 27 with verve and just the right amount of flexibility in dynamics and tempo. Nagano’s accompaniment, however, was lighter and more period-oriented than the Mozart style offered by his soloist.

Schubert Octet a Priceless “Prelude”

On the same evening and in the same venue – August 4, Saint-Jean Bosco Church (photo: right) – members of the OSM played Schubert’s Octet. The Schubert was played at 6 pm and the OAO concert at 8 pm. I assumed – wrongly, as it turned out – that the Schubert was a prelude to the orchestra concert. But, in fact, even though it was only an hour long and devoted to only one piece, it was sold as a separate concert with tickets costing $22. This bit of programming comes perilously close to price-gouging.

On the other hand, the Schubert Octet was played so well it could very accurately be described as priceless. With Andrew Wan in the leader’s chair, phrasing was consistently shapely and the players responded to each other with the utmost concern for timbre and balance. Equally impressive was the choice of tempi. With illustrious performances by the Vienna Octet and the Berlin Octet still ringing in my musical memory, I have long been convinced that this music needs time to breathe and that moderate tempi pay enormous dividends. The OSM players obviously feel the same way and gave us sublime Schubert.

So this was a great week for Nagano, the OSM and Orford, not to mention the music-lovers of Magog and Sherbrooke. The venues have been sorted out, the qualitative bar has been raised and just a little more tinkering needs to be done in programming and marketing. I am looking forward to 2012!

Paul E. Robinson is the author of “Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar,” and ”Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music.” NEW for friends: The Art of the Conductor podcast, “Classical Airs.”

Every summer Marita and I drive from Austin, Texas back to our native Canada, varying our route each year according to events of particular interest on the road and the availability of friends we enjoy visiting.

This year we decided to make a stop in Charlottesville, Virginia, a favourite place we hadn’t visited in too many years. This charming, lively, petite (pop: 40,000) mountain town is home to the University of Virginia where we fondly recalled once having inspected the tiny room inhabited by Edgar Allen Poe during his short tenure as a student here. The literary stature of Poe notwithstanding, Charlottesville is most famous for Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson, one of the founding fathers and the third president of the United States.

Castleton Farms Home to Castleton Festival

As we plotted our route from Charlottesville to the Eastern Townships of Quebec, we decided it would be unconscionable to pass within a few miles of Lorin Maazel’s new Castleton Festival without seeing what all the excitement was about; with Maazel in mind, we set out along the back roads of western Virginia.

The town of Castleton turned out to be little more than a general store. Mostly, we were greeted by lush green rolling hills and farmland, with just enough signage to remind locals where they are and to give visitors the feeling that one wrong turn could get them hopelessly lost.

There were few signs directing one to the Castleton Festival. Upon arrival at what we took to be the festival headquarters, our first impression was that everyone had either gone for a walk in the woods or was attending to farm chores. We walked through the small lobby into a tiny jewel of a theatre. We could hardly believe that “La Bohème” had been performed here the day before. The pit could scarcely hold more than a dozen players and the house appeared to have no more than 100 seats.

Back outside, looking off the deck, we could see well-tended gardens and a pond in the distance. Further along the deck we could see a fair number of people in the cafeteria attached to the theatre. It was lunchtime and dozens of young people were either enjoying a meal or working away on laptops – some doing both at once. All in all, it was a beautiful estate, a glorious place for work and leisure.

We continued our explorations, looking now for someone in administration. Across the road from the theatre building was a small barn. Lots of out-of-state license plates in the driveway indicated visitors, but this was clearly a working farm. There were pigs in pens, some cattle, and a zebra – or was it a “zonkey?” Someone with a sense of humour had put up a sign describing an even more unusual animal on the premises – a zonkey – an exotic blend of donkey and zebra. There was even a picture to aid in recognition.

Next door, as we stepped out of the car, one of two young women walking towards us stopped to introduce herself as “one of the Maazel children” and kindly offered to find someone to help us. She disappeared through a hedge and emerged a few minutes later with a strikingly attractive woman, who introduced herself as Dietlinde Maazel. I knew that Dietlinde was the maestro’s wife of 23 years and that she was one of the masterminds of the festival. Lorin Maazel is the president and artistic director and she is vice-president and associate artistic director.

Ms. Maazel (photo: right) exuded tremendous pride in and enthusiasm for the Castleton Festival, and in spite of being interrupted in the middle of what must have been another hectic day, she offered to give us a tour of the facilities. The first thing she set us straight about was the role of the little theatre we had just seen. It was indeed the starting point for all the musical activities at Castleton Farms and many concerts had been held there over the years, and some of the festival’s chamber operas were still presented there.

The main festival performance space, which from the exterior looks like a massive modern barn, was just a half mile up the road. A barn as an opera venue? What an ingenious concept! We entered through the reception area, which had been set up for a gala dinner preceding the opening of “La Bohème” the night before, and then stepped into the auditorium, where a rehearsal for Ravel’s “L’enfant et les Sortilèges” was in progress.

This facility, we learned, had been completed just in time for this year’s Castleton Festival. The centre of attention was the very large performance space with ample backstage area for storing and moving sets, and a pit that seated about 100 musicians. While, for the time being, the 400 seats in the venue are little more than benches and the walls are bare, some upgrading will doubtless take place in years to come.

There was only piano accompaniment at this rehearsal, with the resident festival director, William Kerley, blocking moves for some of the soloists and chorus. Soprano Cecelia Hall, who sings the lead role of the child, sounded wonderful. All the voices projected easily from the stage.

Ms. Hall is typical of participants at the Castleton Festival. She, like most of the other 100 or so singers and the 89 members of the festival orchestra, is a young artist well into a professional career. In most cases, participants have completed their college or conservatory studies and have some professional experience. What they need to really advance their careers is more training from the best in the business, and this is the exceptional opportunity that the Castleton Festival provides: two months working almost daily with Maestro Lorin Maazel and his associates.

The Castleton Festival is a summer music school primarily for opera singers and orchestral players but also for stage directors and administrators. The intensive workload is undertaken in a very nurturing environment designed to enrich young lives. Married participants are encouraged to bring spouses and children, and all performers are housed either in buildings on the 600 acre Maazel farm property or at neighbouring farms. Ms. Maazel acknowledged that the responsibility of keeping track of the 200 plus young artists at Castleton Farms over the summer, particularly given the propensity of some for fast driving on winding country roads, was quite a challenge.

Castleton Festival participants, including singers and orchestra members, are often recruited personally by Maazel as he travels the world guest conducting. The current orchestra, for example, includes players from Qatar, Turkey, China and London.

As we watched the Ravel rehearsal with her, Ms. Maazel seemed to have all the time in the world to answer our questions and to point out the features of her festival, casually remarking at some point in our conversation that the Castleton Festival Orchestra and some of the singers had to be in Toronto, Canada the following evening for a major performance at the BlackCreek Festival, and that the ensemble of about 110 would be leaving that very night. Enviable calm under pressure!

We know that Lorin Maazel is a force of nature among conductors. At the age of 81 he is conducting as much as he ever did, and even finding time to compose and to create a new festival. In his wife Dietlinde, he has obviously found the ideal partner; a magic-making multi-tasker who also thrives on a busy schedule.

After Ms. Maazel’s gracious introduction, we came away anxious to hear a performance by the Castleton Festival participants. We didn’t have long to wait; we had only to drive to Toronto by the following night. A second incentive was the BlackCreek Festival itself, which had opened the week before with a highly-praised event featuring Placido Domingo. Garth Drabinsky’s enterprising new summer offering, the coming together of two major but very young festivals with very different visions – the Castleton, with a focus on mentoring young classical music talent and the BlackCreek, with a focus on big-name extravaganzas and music of many genres – is a new and exciting concept for Toronto.

Sky Traffic, Sound Technology and Top Dollar

I must admit that when I heard about plans for the BlackCreek Festival, I was skeptical. Who would want to pay high prices – $52-$135 for most concerts and a top price of $280 for Domingo – to sit outside on a tennis court listening to amplified classical music?

The Rexall Centre at York University was built to accommodate professional tennis tournaments and physically, it serves that purpose well; situated right under the flight path for landings at Pearson International Airport, however, the location surely cannot be considered ideal for tennis. If less than ideal for tennis, it should be disastrous for classical music performances. At the concert we attended, a plane whirred overhead every 3-4 minutes during one 20-minute period; fortunately, there were more quiet times than noisy during this concert. Clearly, the management of the BlackCreek Festival operates at the mercy of God and the air traffic controllers.

To be fair, however, summer concerts in the great outdoors cannot really be judged by indoor standards. The Ravinia Festival in Chicago has been thriving for decades in spite of the trains that pass by with annoying frequency. As a matter of fact, festival directors there recently made a virtue out of imperfect conditions by commissioning a series of new train-related compositions for the festival.

So…while one might wish the planes to be seen and not heard, does the Rexall Centre have some offsetting advantages?

Opening night at BlackCreek was apparently utter chaos due to the traffic congestion, whereas at the concert I attended, there was no trouble at all; that is, if you don’t mind paying $20 to park, then boarding a school bus to the venue itself. And did I mention that if it rains, ticket-buyers are just out of luck – no rain checks are given and no umbrellas are allowed in the facility.

What about that bane of music-lovers’ existence these days – miked singers and musicians? Amplifier technology has taken over Broadway to the point where genuine singing ability is almost irrelevant and ear-splitting volume is the norm. With 11,000 seats in the Rexall Centre, no shell to assist in the production of high-quality natural sound, and the aforementioned sky traffic, Drabinsky and Co. really had no choice; it was truly amplified sound or nothing.

I am happy to report that the BlackCreek Festival has achieved the impossible: amplified orchestral sound that gives us a reasonable facsimile of the real thing. To be sure, the harp and celesta in excerpts from Prokofiev’s “Romeo and Juliet” were too loud, but otherwise there was warmth, nuance and depth in the string sound and timbral accuracy in the winds and brass. The volume was robust but never excessive.

Even more impressive, perfect for a concert in a venue such as this, was the imaginative use of video. On the big screen overhanging the stage we saw useful facial and profile shots of Maazel and of the vocal soloists positioned with the chorus behind the orchestra and all but invisible to the audience. Most importantly, we had close-ups of Dame Helen Mirren and Jeremy Irons (photo: right) as they played a dozen different characters from Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Without the video, the audience would have missed completely Irons’ vast range of facial expressions and the subtle interplay with Mirren.

Nor was this “basic video” to spice up the proceedings. Clearly, the video team had taken a great deal of time and trouble to match their shots to the words and the music. This was excellent work that would greatly enhance concert hall performances of similar repertoire.

Orchestra of Maazel’s Making

The Castleton Festival Orchestra had been virtually hand-picked by Maestro Maazel and had been working with him for several weeks. If it did not rise to the level of the New York Philharmonic, his most recent orchestra, it was nonetheless a fine body of players.

Maazel has long been known as a superior technician. His stick technique is clear and decisive and his knowledge of a vast repertoire is legendary. As Maazel ages, he seems less concerned with dazzling effects and more with beauty and expression. Watching him on the podium I am reminded of Fritz Reiner – not that I am old enough to have ever seen Reiner “live” – whose technique and demeanor, on DVDs and by reputation, was similar. Reiner never “acted out” the music and his face was virtually immobile. His expression was severe, to say the least, as Maazel’s, for the most part, is today. Such demeanor often elicits greater discipline and closer attention – even fear – on the part of the musicians, especially the young and impressionable.

Maazel like Reiner and all the best conductors, works out the thousands of details of phrasing, articulation and colour in rehearsal. When it comes to the performance what is needed most on the podium is accuracy, reliability and inspiration. Professional players can be depended upon to remember the details and execute them as agreed in rehearsal.

Under less than ideal concert conditions at the Rexall Centre, Maazel and the Castleton Festival Orchestra made music on a gratifyingly high level. The Prokofiev excerpts were powerful and exciting. Tchaikovsky’s “Romeo and Juliet” Fantasy Overture was even better. Maazel had added some dynamics of his own to Tchaikovsky’s score, but they always made musical sense. Rhythms were crisp and the love music was as passionate as one could hope for. Maazel’s articulation of the final chords was unusual but compelling. The timpani crescendo at the end was brilliant.

There are no cheap effects in Mendelssohn’s “Incidental Music for A Midsummer Night’s Dream” and any conductor who attempts to add them is looking for trouble. Maazel obviously loves this music and played it as Mendelssohn surely intended it to be played. His tempi for the Overture and the Scherzo were far slower than those chosen by many conductors who should know better, and to my ears, perfect. With slower tempi, there is time for accurate execution of the rhythms and accents, as well as time for expressive phrasing. Maazel brought out the beauty of the music without wallowing in romanticism.

Special mention should be made of Ottawa-born Joyce El-Khoury, (photo: right) one of Maazel’s favourite sopranos, who recently scored a major success as Mimi in his new production of “La Bohème” at Castleton. El-Khoury’s brief solos in the Mendelssohn had a youthful tone that was a joy to hear.

Mirren and Irons recounted the “Midsummer Night’s Dream” plot line for us and spoke some of its most memorable lines as they played the various characters. This play is magical in its exploration of young love and the interplay of human and supernatural forces. Irons amazed the audience with his command of accents and voices, and Mirren lived up to her reputation as one of the most skilled and versatile actresses of our time.

It was a glorious concert, with the music, poetry, actors and musicians all combining magnificently to overcome the risks of performing in an open air venue.

But did the people come? I would guess that there were fewer than 2,000 people in attendance on this night in a facility that holds 11,000, a much smaller audience than had shown up for Domingo on opening night.

I suspect that while we had the crème de la crème in Maazel, Mirren, Irons et. al., only the pop stars and classical superstars like Domingo will be able to fill a place as big as the Rexall, and at such inflated prices.

Something has got to give; either Drabinsky gives up trying to present classical music in such a venue or he drastically reduces the prices for such events.

Maazel in for More than a Midsummer’s Night at BlackCreek

As suggested earlier in this piece, the two festivals covered here are a study in contrasts but they also intersect in interesting ways.

Castleton is one artist’s vision of how to develop young talent. Maazel economizes by using his own property and a lot of his own money but the scope of the vision requires more resources in the long run. Maazel is thinking long-term. I note that on the Staff List for the BlackCreek Festival, Maazel is listed as “Artistic Advisor, Classical Programming.”

This is where Castleton and BlackCreek come together. Maazel wants the exposure that BlackCreek can give his young performers but he also needs the income. Fees from appearances such as this, beyond Castleton, surely help to subsidize the basic programme back home. On the basis of his reputation and contacts, Maazel has been able to set up similar arrangements in California (Berkeley), Maryland (Bethesda), Virginia (Manassas), and China (Beijing).

After all, it makes no economic sense to be mounting full-scale opera productions and concerts in Castleton with a large orchestra in a facility seating 400; only by repeating them elsewhere can the costs be recouped.

Castleton and BlackCreek are both exciting, new ventures, albeit it with very different goals. Time will tell whether their visionary founders have understood their markets and accurately crunched their numbers.

Paul E. Robinson is the author of “Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar,” and ”Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music.” NEW for friends: The Art of the Conductor podcast, “Classical Airs.”

Not even the greatest of composers has left the world a portfolio of only masterpieces – a case in point being Franz Liszt (1811- 1886), undoubtedly one of the most famous composers who ever lived.

The Austin Symphony recently celebrated the Liszt bicentennial by programming the composer’s Piano Concerto No. 1 and “Totentanz” for piano and orchestra; the former remains solidly in the standard repertoire, while the latter barely qualifies for even an occasional performance.

Music director Peter Bay was hedging his bets in honouring Liszt. He gave us two Liszt works for piano and orchestra with Italian pianist Benedetto Lupo, but devoted the rest of the concert to works by Mozart and contemporary composer Mark Edward Wilson.

In my opinion, Bay could have created a more interesting Liszt celebration with the addition of symphonic poems such as “Orpheus” or “Mazeppa,” or by going for broke with “A Faust Symphony.”

Liszt’s “sometime” assistant Joachim Raff used to run around claiming that it was he who orchestrated all of Liszt’s works at Liszt’s request. There is, however, strong evidence to the contrary. The truth notwithstanding, Liszt was only intermittently successful as a composer of orchestral music; his supreme achievements were in the realm of piano literature, written to show off the master’s prowess as a travelling virtuoso. Much of this repertoire is clever and entertaining; even more of it is shallow and silly.

Lupo’s Liszt Exciting but One-Dimensional

The Piano Concerto No. 1 is showy music, but it is redeemed by tight construction and heartfelt lyricism. Benedetto Lupo (photo: right) tossed off the fireworks with great aplomb, without really getting much below the surface of the music.

On the other hand, he had no such challenge in “Totentanz” since the piece has no depth whatsoever. It is 15 minutes of variations on the four-note sequence from the Thirteenth Century chant known as “Dies Irae.” Used in this way, this four note sequence wears out its welcome as quickly as Liszt runs out of interesting ideas. But then, the point of performing the “Totentanz” – if there is one – may be to allow the soloist to impress audiences with the number of notes he/she can play in the shortest possible time; it is, as it was in this instance, a crowd pleaser! From my perspective, “Totentanz” may ultimately be of more value to the Guinness Book of Records than to serious musical literature.

One might describe Liszt’s treatment as  “all icing and no cake, “ whereas Berlioz’s use of the same  sequence in the final part of his “Symphonie Fantastique” suits very well the story he is telling in music. More recently, Rachmaninov used the same sequence with great imagination in his “Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini” and “Symphonic Dances.”

So that was it for our Liszt celebration, and after “Totentanz,” not a moment too soon.

Wilson’s Phoenix Does Not Rise to the Occasion!

Unfortunately, it was followed by a recent work called “The Phoenix” by University of Maryland composer Mark Edwards Wilson (photo: right). By way of introduction in the programme notes, Mr. Wilson gave us a great deal of high-minded nonsense about birds in American Indian, Hindu, Chinese and Egyptian cultures. Apparently “the piece journeys through a series of strongly defined tonal centers, yet it does so using methods that liberate it from the traditional tonic/dominant hierarchy. Similarly, I have felt liberated from the strictures of writing in a conventional academic style, whether those strictures are tonal or atonal in nature.” Huh? I guess it loses something in the translation.

After a promising opening melody in cellos and basses, Mr. Wilson’s music settles into workmanlike sequences, which the members of the Austin Symphony duly played with workmanlike competence.

Stylish Mozart Steals the Show

And what about the Mozart? What can one say about the great G minor symphony, except that it nearly always outclasses any other piece that appears on the same programme. Peter Bay had lavished exceptional care on its preparation for this concert and the ASO players responded accordingly. Tempos sounded just right for all four movements and the “Mozart style” was ideal, at least as Bruno Walter understood it. That said, purist Nikolaus Harnoncourt may not nave agreed.

Paul E. Robinson is the author of “Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar,” and ”Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music.” NEW for friends: The Art of the Conductor podcast, “Classical Airs.”

Photo of Maestro Peter Bay by Marita

by Paul E. Robinson

It was just over a year ago that Austin music lovers last heard Anne Akiko Meyers (photo: above) in an imaginative and brilliantly played recital at the Butler School of Music at the University of Texas.

Meyers had recently been appointed to the faculty at the school and – with a baby on the way – she and her husband had decided to move to Austin. What a coup for the school, its students and Austinites!

We all looked forward to hearing Meyers on a regular basis; unfortunately, even the most carefully planned relationships don’t always work out. Meyers and the Butler School of Music couldn’t find a way to live with each other.

Butler’s Big Bad Blunder!

After hearing Meyers again last month, on this occasion performing Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 1 with the Austin Symphony, I have to think that the school has greatly diminished itself by letting this superb artist get away.

Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No.1 is a masterpiece by any standard. I often think of it as the violin concerto Debussy would have written – had he been Russian. From the opening bars, it weaves an impressionistic aura of ever-changing colours, combining the solo violin with various winds; so it ends too, while in between we have a wider range of tempi and moods. I last heard this piece in concert with Midori, who spun the long lines with great beauty and delicacy but altogether missed the passion.

It was Meyers who reminded me that, to really get inside this piece, the soloist can’t be afraid to dig into the strings of her instrument, even at the expense of some of the tonal beauty.

Great Artist and Stradivarius Sublime Combo

Meyers is a forceful personality on stage and, when necessary, plays with intensity and abandon. No doubt her instrument – the “Ex-Napoleon/Molitor Stradivarius” – factors into what we hear, but it takes a great artist to get the best out of even the finest instruments. Meyers’ intonation was a little shaky in the beginning, but she soon settled down and proceeded to give us a virtual master class in bowing technique – not to mention the pizzicati that resounded like rifle shots out in the hall.

Meyers was very attentively accompanied by conductor Peter Bay and the Austin Symphony. The orchestra is often in the background in this concerto, but what it has to say is always important and often difficult to play. This was an impressive performance by all concerned, with Meyers consummately authoritative in the solo part.

Meyers rewarded the enthusiastic audience with an encore: an unaccompanied, improvisatory version of Gershwin’s “Summertime.”

Haydn and Stravinsky Well Programmed

While Meyers stole the show on this night, the rest of the concert was also very fine. As I don’t recall having previously heard any Haydn from Peter Bay and the Austin Symphony, it was a pleasure to see his Symphony No. 93 on the evening’s programme.

Bay made no attempt at period performance style – apart from using solo strings to start the slow movement – but, nonetheless, crafted an excellent performance. The execution of this symphony, to my taste, could have been a little more earthy and robust, but to render so much detail accurately in this repertoire is no small achievement. Bay even managed to deftly elicit some appropriate audience laughter from the rude noise in the slow movement.

Bay chose his tempi well, and balances were very good; I do wish, however, that trumpets and timpani had managed to get their triplets together more consistently in the Trio of the Menuetto.

If Haydn symphonies are rarely played in Austin, I would guess that Stravinsky’s “Petrouchka,” a virtuoso challenge for any orchestra and conductor, turns up just as infrequently. Fortunately, Bay and most of his players have the technical chops to handle this piece with ease, and much of it sounded first-rate; that said, there was some pretty messy brass playing as well.

Next Time a Multi-Media Petrouchka?

At their last concert, the Austin Symphony (ASO) had presented a multi-media version of Dvorak’s “New World Symphony,” a piece that scarcely needed the multi-media treatment, whereas, to my mind, audience appreciation of “Petrouchka” (ballet music) would have been greatly enhanced with some projections indicating what was being depicted in each of the four scenes played.

Last season, the ASO presented Strauss’ “Don Quixote” with surtitles for each of the episodes of the tone poem, and something similar with surtitles and pictures would have been very helpful on this occasion. As a ballet score “Petrouchka” is wonderful, but in concert it is apt to sound episodic and unsatisfying. The ending works perfectly for the ballet but is odd and inconclusive in a concert setting.

For Those Wanting More…

Anne Akiko Meyers may have parted company with the University of Texas, but she still lives in Austin. She now has a 7-month old daughter (Natalie) with whom she travels widely. Meyers has recorded the Prokofiev Violin Concerto No. 1 and produces several new albums every year. For more about Meyers and to follow her blogging, visit her website.

Paul E. Robinson is the author of “Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar,” and ”Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music.” NEW for friends: The Art of the Conductor podcast, “Classical Airs.”

I doubt that Gioachino Rossini had airplanes and hot-air balloons in mind when he wrote his comic opera “L’Italiana in Algeri” in 1813 – but why not? There is so much craziness in the opera as written,  that a little more just adds to the fun. And there was plenty of fun in the Austin Lyric Opera (ALO) production that took to the stage at the Long Center last week.

The Austin Lyric Opera is a regional company with a modest budget, struggling every month to keep its head above water; yet it consistently manages to mount one imaginative and entertaining production after another.

General Director Kevin Patterson sure knows how to pick them. The company, which celebrates its 25^th anniversary next season, fully deserves not only the support of the local community, but in my opinion, national recognition as well.

I have been attending ALO performances for about six years now, and I have come to know that when I see Richard Buckley in the pit, the music is in good hands. That was certainly the case with this production. A few more stands of violins from the Austin Symphony might have given him a fuller sound, but throughout the evening the playing was audibly bubbly and charming. Piccolo player Beverly Frittelli deserves a purple heart for her bravery ‘under fire.’

The delightful “set” for this production of “L’Italiana in Algeri,” which the ALO borrowed from the Sante Fe Opera, was designed by Robert Innes Hopkins. It resembles a child’s pop-up book, which is closed as the opera opens, and opens over the course of the opera, on different scenes.

As the opera opens – or one ‘turns the page’- up pops a building, part of the palace of the Bey (Turkish for “sultan, lord or ruler”) of Algiers, a scene onto which the various characters in the opera enter the picture in 3D fashion. When the book is closed, it becomes a desert landscape with a starry sky, on which we have a wonderful 1920s biplane in which Isabella arrives from Italy (Act 1), and a hot-air balloon (Act 2) in which she takes her leave at the end of the opera.

All the sets, as well as the costumes (designed by David C. Woolard) are ‘fairy tale’ bright and colourful.

The stars in this production are undoubtedly Sandra Piques Eddy as Isabella (photo: right) and Paolo Pecchioli as the Bey Mustafà; both are gifted singers and accomplished comic actors, and under stage director Herbert Kellner, they rarely missed an opportunity to elicit a laugh.

Eddy delighted Austin audiences several years ago in Rossini’s “La Cenerentola”, and she has returned in even richer voice. She is now vastly experienced – having made numerous appearances at the Met – and is very much at ease with the demands of bel canto.

Pecchioli made a dashing and appropriately foolish Mustafà in his Austin debut, and handled his difficult music with aplomb.

Tenor Javier Abreu sang with an appealing lyric voice, but lacked both ringing high notes and volume.

It goes without saying, that one shouldn’t attempt Rossini without first-rate performers but even with an excellent cast, the operas can become tiresome without a resourceful director. The action, for example, is frequently interrupted as lead singers stand and deliver ‘show-off’ arias.

Kellner is a director who not only has a seemingly endless bag of comic tricks up his sleeve, but he has a sophisticated sense of how to invent bits of business that perfectly match the character of the music. There were times when reactions from the chorus threatened to upstage singers in mid-aria but more often than not these antics added to the fun and kept things moving.

The Act I finale is a brilliant tour-de-force of ensemble noise-making and singing, and on opening night, Buckley’s prestissimo tempo had singers and players alike hanging on for dear life. It was not as tight as it probably will be in later performances but who cares – the sheer joy of the music-making made that a moot point.

For Those Wanting More…

Rossini was only 21 when he wrote “L’Italiana in Algeri,” and it was hugely popular. Italian audiences of the day were reportedly doubled up with laughter watching Algerians and Italians alike behaving like fools.

The content of the opera, however, was actually a satirical treatment of a very serious matter. At the time, Algeria was part of the Ottoman Empire and feared as the home base of the notorious Barbary pirates (painting:right). These pirates controlled the seas and ranged widely even outside the Mediterranean. Their main business was kidnapping European Christians and selling them into slavery.

Europeans unfortunate enough to be shipwrecked on the Barbary coast of North Africa could expect the same fate, just as Lindoro, Isabella and Taddeo did in Rossini’s opera. Indeed, in this period, wealthy Muslim men kept many wives and concubines as Bey Mustafà aspired to do in the opera.

Nor was this simply an Italian problem. In the early 1800s, there were over 200,000 Americans enslaved in Algiers and the United States fought several wars to try to free them. The terrible era of the Barbary pirates only came to an end when France conquered Algiers in 1830.

Paul E. Robinson is the author of “Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar,” and “Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music.” NEW for friends: The Art of the Conductor podcast, “Classical Airs.”

Craig Hella Johnson never ceases to amaze us. Just when you think his exceptional musical imagination has surely outdone itself, he comes up with something even more remarkable. His latest achievement was a festival given at St. Martin’s Lutheran Church in Austin, called “Renaissance & Response: Polyphony Then and Now.” Sound like an article in an academic journal? Perhaps, but that didn’t stop his many followers from selling out four concerts in one weekend and to judge by the concert I attended, enjoying every moment of it.

The basic concept of the festival was to combine music by several of the great Renaissance polyphonic composers – Josquin des Prez, Orlandus Lassus and Tomás Luis de Victoria – with contemporary pieces or responses composed by Robert Kyr. In spite of the umbrella title for the festival, the series went well beyond the Renaissance in its final concert devoted to the music of Bach, but again with a response by Kyr.

I attended only the Orlandus Lassus concert but there is no doubt that both the concept and the execution were exceptionally powerful. This concert had the added attraction of a pre-concert talk by Kyr.

Robert Kyr (photo: right) is a Professor of Music at the University of Oregon. He has composed a huge amount of music in many different genres – twelve symphonies and dozens of choral works, for example – and he has also studied and made performing editions of a great number of Renaissance pieces; in short, he was just the man for the commission Craig Hella Johnson had in mind for this series – someone with an in depth knowledge and love of Renaissance polyphony, who could compose new works, somehow inspired by this music written more than 400 years ago.

I have no doubt that Craig Hella Johnson was thrilled with what Robert Kyr gave him: music of our time of the highest quality, enriched by the polyphonic models, mysteriously bringing to life virtually the entire history of music. No mean feat.

What makes Conspirare’s concerts so impressive is that Johnson, the singular visionary, is also Johnson the gifted master of choral conducting. Conspirare’s nineteen-member Company of Voices is a hand-picked group of professional soloists melded into a vocal ensemble second to none. Craig Hella Johnson is the leader who makes it all work.

I must confess that I attend concerts of early music with a skeptical ‘chip’ on my shoulder. I am all too aware that the further back we go in the history of music, the fewer the facts at our disposal. When it comes to the performance of Renaissance music, in particular, what we know doesn’t take us very far.

In the cases of Josquin des Prez (1450-1521) and Orlandus Lassus (1532-1594), performers are often floundering on basic matters such as pitch, tempo, note values, dynamics and accidentals. We are still arguing about such things in Mozart and Haydn. Going back 500 years or so the questions are far greater in number.

Rather than emphasize what they don’t know, the best interpreters of early music concentrate on the challenges and the joy of opening up the door to the distant past even a crack. They are the archeologists of the music profession. They spend years immersing themselves in accumulated knowledge, then load up and head out into the field, full of excitement about the tiny glimpses into the human experience they might discover.

Orlandus Lassus (or Orlando di Lasso) is usually identified as a Franco-Flemish composer, although he spent most of his early life in Italy and his last 40 years in Munich. For his time, he was extraordinarily well-travelled and prolific. He composed over 2,000 works and set texts in Latin, French, Italian, Dutch and German. He wrote both sacred and secular music; only the former were represented in the Conspirare program.

For modern listeners who are apt to find Renaissance choral music somewhat austere and monotonous, we should keep in mind that behind that conservative persona endlessly praising God, there often lurked an earthier character fascinated by sex and drinking – in other words, an “all too human” composer. Orlandus Lassus was such a composer. In his secular works, he often dealt with both subjects.

In spite of Robert Kyr’s comment in the programme, that the evening’s concert exemplified “the scope and stylistic diversity of Orlandus Lassus’ output,” we were given a very limited exposure to the composer’s range. Instead, all we got we got were motets, a lament and two Mass movements.

Kyr’s “response” first took the form of a lament based on Lassus’ “Third Lamentation.” which we had just heard. Kyr began where Lassus left off, with free-flowing, harmonically limited polyphony, then gradually went further afield using texts from Psalm 69 and the Book of Jonah.

The concert concluded with a more ambitious work by Kyr inspired, not by Lassus, but by a somewhat later composer, Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1641, photo: right). Kyr’s piece, called “Sante Fe Vespers 2010,” was inspired by Monteverdi’s “Vespers of 1610.”

This is where Kyr showed himself to be in total command of his art and his material. While quoting from Monteverdi, he went far beyond the early Seventeenth Century master to create intricate polyphony and sonorous climaxes only a modern composer could conceive.

“Renaissance & Response: Polyphony Then and Now” was a brilliant concert that gave the audience a way in to Renaissance music, and at the same time a way to relate its techniques and its contents to the music of our time.

Perhaps next time around, Craig Hella Johnson might enrich the experience even further by also showing us the secular side of the great Renaissance composers.

Paul E. Robinson is the author of “Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar,” and “Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music.” NEW for friends: The Art of the Conductor podcast, “Classical Airs.”

It is always a difficult business to “educate” the classical music audience without talking down to them on the one hand or talking over their heads on the other, and while some subscribers welcome non-musical elements in a concert, others hate them.

The Austin Symphony and conductor Peter Bay deserve full marks for making a valiant effort to both educate and entertain at their Long Center concert last week.

In the first half of the concert, we were given some background on the piece courtesy of the Chicago Symphony’s (CSO) “Beyond the Score” series, a multi-media production incorporating a giant screen over the orchestra, a narrator, two actors, a singer and a pianist. This innovative opening to the concert introduced us to Dvořák the man and the composer, and told us something about his approximately two-year stint (1892-95) in New York as head of the National Conservatory. More importantly, it explored all the elements that inspired Dvořák to create his most famous composition. In the second half, we had a complete performance of Dvořák’s Symphony No. 9 in E minor “From the New World.”

The Austin Symphony was in familiar territory with this programming, having participated in a symposium/festival called “New Worlds: Dvořák in Search of America,” a celebration of the Dvořák Centenary sponsored by the College of Fine Arts at the University of Texas in 2004. In that festival, the Austin Symphony also played the “New World Symphony” and there was much discussion about the American elements in the score and above all, about how Longfellow’s poem “The Song of Hiawatha” inspired the composer.

Beyond the Score Too Fond of the Familiar?

This installment of “Beyond the Score” was, presumably, written by the CSO’s creative director Gerard McBurney. (Not ‘Burney’ as listed in the Austin Symphony program book!) Visit the website for a full listing of past and future presentations.

What one notices right away is that nearly every piece given this multi-media treatment is already well-known to and beloved by symphony audiences everywhere. In other words, these are the very pieces least in need of elaborate and expensive extra-musical treatment in order to make them intelligible to contemporary listeners. That seems to me a basic problem with the concept.

For the record, there is one exception. “Beyond the Score” has also presented the Shostakovich Symphony No. 4 – exactly the sort of neglected and problematic repertoire that should be given special treatment. The San Francisco Symphony’s “Keeping Score” series is far more innovative in its choice of repertoire.

Beyond the Score More Fiction than Fact

In this “Beyond the Score” presentation of Dvořák’s “New World Symphony,” McBurney has concentrated on why it is called “From the New World” and made extensive use of Michael Beckerman’s entertaining but highly speculative book “New Worlds of Dvořák.”

The impression left by the “Beyond the Score” presentation is that the middle movements of the symphony are very closely related to the Hiawatha story as told in Longfellow’s poem. We are also left with the impression that Dvořák used actual African-American songs in the symphony. Neither impression is factual.

Let’s take the Hiawatha case first. All this Hiawatha business got started around the time of the eagerly anticipated premiere of the New World symphony in 1984. Music critic Henry Krehbiel attended rehearsals, interviewed Dvořák, and wrote about the piece at some length.

On good authority – Dvořák himself – Krehbiel stated that the slow movement was inspired by Longfellow’s account of Hiawatha’s wooing/courtship of Minnehaha. That claim opened the door to all sorts of research into what passage in the music corresponded to what passage in the poem. But Dvořák would say no more.

In “New Worlds of Dvořák,” Beckerman explores the Hiawatha connections in great detail, and ultimately concludes that Dvořák meant what he said, that Hiawatha was “an inspiration” and only an inspiration, and that there is no detailed Hiawatha program to be uncovered in the symphony.

Beckerman also reminds us that when one of Dvořák’s American students went to stay with him for several months in Bohemia, for the primary purpose of discovering the meaning of the symphony, he came away empty-handed. The student, Harry Patterson Hopkins, went for long walks in the woods with Dvořák every day. In Beckerman’s words: “He found out nothing.”

And did Dvořák use “negro spirituals” in the symphony? It has often been stated that the famous tune that begins the Largo is such a tune. But as much as McBurney tries to throw dust in our eyes in “Beyond the Score,” this is more nonsense.

Dvořák became aware of “negro” music through a young man named Harry Burleigh. A student at the National Conservatory during Dvořák’s tenure there, his father had been a slave, and Harry had sung some spirituals and plantation songs for Dvořák. Burleigh made it very clear that while Dvořák was interested in this music, it is impossible to find any note for note quotations in the symphony.

Of course that didn’t stop the critics from claiming to find them. What did Dvořák have to say on this subject? In a letter written in 1900, he reflected his annoyance with the whole enterprise: “But forget that nonsense, the notion that I used Indian and American melodies, because it is a lie! I tried only to compose in the spirit of those national American melodies.”

There was more foolishness about Wagner being imitated in the brass chords which begin the Largo, and in the use of period film of a sea voyage to accompany the music in the first movement, suggesting that this music was inspired by Dvořák’s journey to America.

Mention was made by the narrator of a tuba, curiously used only in the Largo movement, yet no mention was made of an even stranger instrumental anomaly in the symphony – the piccolo – which is used for only 4 bars in the first movement, and nowhere else in the piece!

Taking Beyond the Score Beyond the Familiar

Whether serious or silly, all these stories and anecdotes are amusing and colorful and help to enliven multi-media presentations.

I spoke to several members of the audience after the presentation. They certainly enjoyed it. They felt they learned more about the composer and they embraced the use of visual media and live actors; upon close questioning, however, it also became apparent that they had embraced the still debated message McBurney conveyed, whether deliberately or inadvertently, as factual. i.e., that 1) the symphony quotes “negro” spirituals, and 2) the symphony tells the story of Hiawatha and Minnehaha.

So much for music education.

From my perspective, “Beyond the Score” presentations in this simplistic vein are both unnecessary and misleading, and do little to advance the cause of music education. That said, one can imagine insightful treatments of less popular pieces such as Liszt’s “A Faust Symphony,” Messiaen’s “Turangalîla,” Britten’s “Spring Symphony,” etc. that would benefit enormously from a “Beyond the Score” multi-media programming component.

In the End, The Sound, not the Story Stirs the Heart

After intermission, we experienced the music without the media, and it was a pleasure. In spite of the familiarity – over-familiarity? – of the piece, Peter Bay and the Austin Symphony gave it a fresh and committed performance.

The orchestra was without its regular concertmaster Jessica Mathaes. Former concertmaster Eugene Gratovich led with authority. All sections were in top form. Special kudos to the horn section, and to the double basses whose difficult four-part chords at the end of the Largo were perfectly in tune, and, of course, to the excellent English horn soloist who played the famous tune earlier in the same movement, with beautiful tone and phrasing.

For Those Wanting More…

Michael Beckerman’s book was published in 2003 by W.W. Norton. Another useful book edited by Beckerman is called “Dvořák and His World” (Princeton University Press., 1993). Dvořák the man is brought vividly to life by the Czech-Canadian novelist Josef Skvorecky in “Dvořák in Love,” first published in 1986.

Paul E. Robinson is the author of “Herbert von Karajan: the Maestro as Superstar,” and “Sir Georg Solti: His Life and Music.” NEW for friends: The Art of the Conductor podcast, “Classical Airs.”

Photo of Maestro Peter Bay by Marita