Whirlwind Fall: Grammy Submissions and Global Music Awards

from Berkeley

Ensemble for These Times

Dear ever-patient readers in the Blogosphere,

It's been (and continues to be) a whirlwind fall! Just to catch everyone up a wee bit,  Ensemble for These Times' debut CD of music by David Garner, "Surviving: Women's Words" won a Silver Medal in the Global Music Awards, received two nice reviews (one at American Record Guide, calling the CD, "fascinating," and "compelling" and the other at Gapplegate Classical-Modern Music Reviews, calling it "extremely well done" and "Recommended."), and has been submitted for the 59th Grammy Awards--oh, my; I've been in California and Washington; and E4TT is preparing for the first of our Call for Scores concerts, 56x54 #1.

What's a 56x54 #1, you might ask?  Google's latest algorithm, perhaps? Well, this past December-January, we had our first-ever Call for Scores, as you patient reader-folks might remember.  We were honored (and overwhelmed) to receive 275 scores from 200 talented composers. In the end, we chose 56 fabulous works of varying lengths to perform over the next two seasons (Read more here and here) and we're excited to be performing the first set this week, along with one of David's song cycles from the CD and the world premiere of Bruce Nalezny's "Toccata," dedicated to our fab pianist, Dale Tsang.

So, for a teensy plug (Wait, isn't today's blogpost all a plug, you might also ask? Well, although I didn't mean it as such, just trying to catch up is making it go that way.  Thanks again for your. already praised and much-vaunted patience.), the concert will be on Sunday, Oct. 30 at 3 p.m. at the Berkeley Piano Club. Tickets ($20/15) are available at the door or from info@E4TT.org.

Ensemble for These Times

And who is that woman in the green dress in E4TT's new photos above? That, everyone, is the wonderful--not to mention beautiful--cellist Anne Lerner-Wright. Anne played with us last May and June, and we're thrilled to have her with us this season!

As you can imagine, I've been living and breathing E4TT--mostly, as there's lots else going on in my life, all of it good, for which I'm immensely grateful. More over the next weeks and months as time permits.

What I'm reading: The Alphabet and the Goddess and Mercedes Lackey's Elite
What I'm listening to: Scads and scads of fabulous CDs submitted for the 59th Grammys.
What I'm working on: 56x54 #1 plus music by David Garner!

Live Streaming!

David Garner

...from San Francisco

This week's post is late--mea culpa! But the good outcome of my tardiness is that I can give you the live streaming link for Monday's concert if you can't be there in person, as I just received it...That link and the instructions are at the bottom of this post.

The concert? Ensemble for These Times' composer David Garner's Faculty Artist Series program on APRIL 4, at 8:00 p.m., Caroline Hume Hall at the SF Conservatory of Music. You can also read Stephen Smoliar's article in the SF Examiner about the concert here. Admission is free, but it's open seating, so David recommends folks get there early.This is a bit of a plug post--surprised?--but keep reading for interesting info about civil rights figure, Mary Pleasant.

Monday's concert features four works, all by David Garner:
First half:
* Vilna Poems (2014), with texts by Avram Sutzkever, sung by soprano Krista Wigle, and played by cellist Evan Kahn, along with members of the SF Conservatory Faculty.
* Mein blaues Klavier (My Blue Piano, 2015), with texts by Else Lasker-Schueler, performed by Ensemble for These Times, i.e., me, pianist Dale Tsang and cellist Laura Gaynon. This is on our new JMPP CD, Surviving: Women's Words, which will be for sale at the concert and is being officially released on April 8 on Centaur Records (Centaur CRC 3490), already available from the group or online for pre-release sales.
*Judith Masur Songs (2016), written for mezzo-soprano Crystal Philippi, to texts by Berkeley poet Judith Masur.

Second half: excerpts from Mary Pleasant at Land's End (2015),  his fabulous, brand-new opera, Semi-staged by Jimmy Featherstone Marcheso, and performed by  mezzo-soprano Crystal Philippi, soprano Julie Adams, tenor Michael Jankosky, and bass-baritone  Philip Skinner with pianist Kevin Korth.

Here's what David writes:
"Mary Pleasant --one of the most complex, mysterious figures in the history of the nation--comes to life in Mary Pleasant at Land's End...with libretto by Mark Hernandez.  The opera traces much of Pleasant's astonishing life, beginning with her days as a shepherd for the Underground Railroad.  Arriving in San Francisco, she becomes a beloved leader in the young city. Eventually, this daughter of slaves stands as one of the richest and most influential individuals of the time. Her championing of people and causes, however, brings her into conflict with a familiar face of wealth and power, and the ensuing struggle plays out in a notorious courtroom drama that mesmerizes the public. Sensationalist press coverage demonizes Pleasant, playing on attitudes towards her race and gender. An essential figure in the founding of San Francisco, and indeed the state of Californi, she is forgotten even as the city bursts into world prominence..." More info at David's website.

If you can't come on 4/4x8 (i.e., April 4, at 8:00 p.m.),  you can watch the livestream. Streaming will start about 5 minutes before the concert. When it begins, you'll see "Live now" below the name, Caroline H. Hume Hall. Select it to automatically see the video with the live stream...at least in theory.

What I'm reading: M.T. Anderson's Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and the Seige of Leningrad; Elizabeth George's A Banquet of Consequences; Terry Pratchett's final Tiffany Aching novel, The Shepherd's Crown.

What I'm listening to: Mozart's Jupiter Symphony and Beethoven's First.  Also the many, many (did I say many? We received 275!) scores from E4TT's call for scores. Winners to be announced June 1.

What I'm working on: Mein blaues Klavier, of course, along with songs by Winterberg, Sharaf and Garner for April and May.

What is it about the ancient Greeks?

...from Berkeley

Singing Elisa

I continue to almost-but-not-quite* binge-read my way through Deborah Crombie's marvelous Duncan Kincaid/Gemma James mystery novels.  Over the weekend, while performing my debut as Elisa in The Handel Opera Project's chamber performance of Handel's rarely performed but ravishing score of Tolomeo, I also finished the fifth in Crombie's series, Dreaming of the Bones.  I found the denouement surprisingly moving--surprisingly, because being moved isn't what one always finds in British murder mystery novels.

To avoid any spoilers, let me just say that vengeance not-quite-a-la-Elektra rears its retributive head in Crombie's #5. Crombie refers to Elektra several times in her tale, including at the very end, which got me contemplating vengeance, as my Handelian character, Elisa, has her own, much, much milder attack of a different kind of vengeance. (A princess who is spurned by the man she loves--who turns out to be a prince in disguise who loves another--Elisa luckily lets her better self comes to the fore before she poisons said unlucky lover, whom she, instead, lets live and love. She doesn't quite get as far as loving the one she's with, but hey, she's a Handelian princess, right?)

All this brought me back, yet again, to that other "E" character, Elektra--especially as I just performed in a house concert of Strauss' Elektra again this past summer--and to her primal cry for vengeance, vengeance driven by the will of the Greek gods externally manifesting the internal needs of the human psyche. Which all goes to show that in such a deeply Jungian, collective-consciousness sense, in their plays, mythology, and all-too-human gods, the ancient Greeks got it right, mining key human emotions--vengeance,  retribution, and expiation all being at the core of so much tragedy, right down to this very day.

Perhaps the most moving of all for Elektra and Crombie #5 is the single voice crying aloud against evil that was once committed, and for it to be made right.Who'd a thunk that a mystery novel could generate such disturbing, philosophical thoughts? And yet the best ones do.

What I'm reading: Deborah Crombie's #6, Kissed a Sad Goodbye

What I'm listening to: Can't get Tolomeo out of my head, nor, for that matter, the Poulenc, Delage, and Tailleferre from last week.

What I'm working on: songs by John Harbison and David Garner, for concerts later this spring and our tour to Krakow this summer.


*Oh and why almost-but-not-quite binge reading?  Well, beyond my first time singing as Elisa over the weekend, I also performed some lovely French music in concert on Tuesday with Ensemble for These Times and on Wed. as well. It's hard to binge-read at full throttle when you're performing, as adequate sleep and concentration are prerequisites for singing well and staying healthy.  But I have to admit that the Duncan-Gemma duo created quite a temptation, taking all my professional will power to put them down.

Two Shout-Outs and a Third Vinaccesi

Vinaccesi Ensemble in Santa Rosa at CAS on June 2

Today's post is a quick one, two, three, four...two shout-outs for friends and colleagues who are performing in the Bay Area over the the next week plus a third Vinaccesi concert and yet another shout-out.

First, pianist John Boyajy will be playing Debussy, Chopin, Bach, and Callaway at Old First Concerts on Friday June 7 at 8 p.m. (that's tomorrow, folks, and today by time you read this post, in all likelihood!).  Ticket link: www.oldfirstconcerts.org/performances/530.

Second, on Thursday, June 13, at 7 p.m., mezzo-soprano Kindra Scharich--who is in the Vinaccesi Ensemble with me--will be joined by violist Paul Yarborough (of the Alexander String Quartet) and pianist John Parr for "Songs of Voice and Viola," Lieder Alive's season closer, in a Liederabend of Brahms, Marx, Loeffler and more.  At Salle Pianos (1632C Market) in SF.  Three marvelous musicians performing seldom-heard gems. Ticket link: http://liederalivevoiceandviola.eventbrite.com/

And sandwiched between those two concerts, the Vinaccesi Ensemble returns to San Francisco on Tuesday, June 11 at 12:30, at Noontime Concerts (Old St. Mary's, 660 California St.), for the third our "Voices of Venice" series, this time a lunchtime version. Music by Vivaldi, Vinaccesi, Strozzi, Rossi, and Monteverdi. Read more about it in Classical Sonoma and see the program here.

Isn't the Bay Area great?!  Sooo many things to do, places to see, music to hear, people to be with...

What I'm reading: the second Andrea Camilleri book, The Terra-Cotta Dog, which arrived from the library last week. (The Berkeley Public Library is a jewel in the crown of the public library system.  I am a frequent visitor, a regular patron--and very grateful to my local librarians!)

What I'm listening to: Rossi, Vinaccesi, and more Italian Baroque music...can't shut off my internal sound track of these fabulous tunes.

What I'm working on: spurious Vivaldi, Rossi, Strozzi, and Hugo Wolf.

And...as a P.S., almost forgot about yet another colleague's concert(s) this weekend. The Vinaccesi Ensemble's own Adam Cockerham has a duo, Jarring Sounds.  You can hear them this weekend in Berkeley (Garden Gate Center at 8 on the 8th) and SF (Church of the Advent of Christ the King at 3 on the 9th).  Check out how they named their ensemble...

Two wonderful musicians: George Mesterhazy and Zheng Cao

In the universe of my very occasional blog, here's a very much belated post about a colleague and marvelous jazz pianist, plus a slightly less belated post about another wonderful musician and talented mezzo-soprano.

I met George Mesterhazy through a Mensa-musician friend, a trombone player named Herb Roselle who thought we'd enjoy knowing each other and talking music, and connected us.  Herb was right...and I had the pleasure and privilege of hearing George play live in San Francisco a couple of years ago.  Such a special player, arranger, and composer!

George passed away in his sleep in April 12, 2012 (yes, over a year ago: I'm embarrassingly delinquent in this post, with my apologies to all), and Herb has given me permission to post this clip of a soulful, lyrical Tennessee Waltz that he recorded when George let him put a digital recorder inside George's piano as he played.

Enjoy...

Another inspiring, generous, and fabulous musician passed away this year on Feb. 12 after a long battle with cancer: mezzo-soprano Zheng Cao. Formerly an Adler Fellow and long associated with SF Opera, Zheng premiered Bonesetter's Daughter (operatic setting of the wonderful Amy Tan novel) and was beloved among audiences and colleagues for her passionate performances and warm, rich mezzo-soprano voice.  There's an open Facebook group as a memorial to her, Zheng Cao celebration, and a public memorial is planned on June 24 at 3 p.m.  Hear her warm, rich portrayal of "You'll never walk alone" in 2011.

Two beautiful stars in the musical firmament for us all to keep alive in our hearts.

What I'm listening to: Salamone Rossi's madrigals and canzonettas; Barbara Strozzi duets, especially "Begl' occhi"; Elena Ruehr, David Garner, and Laura Schwendinger, Ruth Lomon.

What I'm studying: Ruth Lomon, Viteslzava Kapralova, Gabriela Lena Frank,  Edwin Geist and David garner for the  upcoming JMPP concert (May 19, San Jose).

What I'm reading: Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children; Job by Joseph Roth, The Time Keeper by Mitch Alboum, and Stoner by John Williams.

Vinaccesi Ensemble at the Legion of Honor

It's been an amazing 2013 thus far, with a plethora of fabulous musical events every weekend, so many of them performed by my wonderful colleagues.  So much good music, so little time...at the risk of sounding too   wide-eyed and "gee whiz" about things, the Bay Area is such a wonderful place!

Today's post is a last-minute shameless--or should I say shameful?--plug for this Sunday's concert that my Baroque chamber group, the Vinaccesi Ensemble, will be performing: March 17 at noon at the Legion of Honor in San Francisco.  It's part of the La Belle Vie 2013 series at the Legion of Honor, co-produced by the San Francisco Friends of Chamber Music and accompanies the Legion's exhibit, the Royal Treasures from the Louvre: Louis XIV to Marie Antoinette, which has just been extended to March 31.

For this concert, Vinaccesi Ensemble (me, mezzo-soprano Kindra Scharich, tenor Jonathan Smucker, Hallie Pridham, Baroque cello and gamba, and Susie Fong, harpsichord; our bass Kirk Eichelberger will be on the road and unable to join us) will feature music performed in Paris during the lifetimes of the Sun King and Marie Antoinette, that is, between 1630 and 1790, which will include pieces by Marais, Couperin, Rameau, Handel, de la Barre, Gluck, the young Mozart, and the ever popular Monsieur Anonyme, as well as a melody by the royal Sun King's father, Louis XIII. 

Susie Fong will perform on a newly-completed harpsichord based on a 1707 Nicholas Dumont instrument by renowned Berkeley harpsichord maker John Phillips, who will discuss the instrument during intermission and after the concert.

AND...equally exciting, the Vinaccesi Ensemble's new CD--due to be released on Centaur Records on April 1, no fooling!--has shipped and is available for purchase from the ensemble and at the concert.  Benedetto Vinaccesi: the Solo Cantatas has all 8 extant solo cantatas by the group's inventive and stylish Venetian namesake. (More on this in a future post perhaps?)

As a quick side note, the 28th Jewish Music Festival in Berkeley produced the world premiere of David Garner's Vilna Poems, with texts by renowned Yiddish poet Avrom Sutzkever, to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising.  Garner's compositions are always moving and ever-lyrical, and this song cycle--beautifully performed by Lisa Delan, soprano, Kristin Pankonin, piano, David Krakauer, clarinet, and Matt Haimowitz, cello--is no exception.  You can hear Garner's radio interview with Sarah Cahill on KALW in which he talks about about this and others of his pieces (including the song cycle of his I'll be premiering in April, "Phoenix"--but more about that on a future post).  The second half of the program centered on a breathtaking performance of Messiaen's  ethereal--and timeless--Quartet for the End of Time, by Krakauer, Haimowitz, Kay Stern and Kathleen Tagg.

As a second quick side note, I have several more belated and overdue topics for my always-occasional and ever-delinquent blog.  Perhaps the month of March will be a good one for slightly more timely posting, or at least catching up?  Time will tell... but as we're enjoying an early, lovely spring here in Berkeley, hope--at least in this blogger's heart--springs eternal.

And as a third and final side note, March 14 was my birthday (as well as that of my niece and my stepsister--three Pi day birthdays shared with Albert Einstein in one fabulous family ;)) and I wanted to thank all my  wonderful friends who wished me a happy birthday today!

The regular disclaimer: I'm talking about friends and acquaintances in this post...

What I'm listening to: Strauss, Wolf, Garner, Geist, Handel, Gluck, Mozart, Lomon, Ruehr, Golijov, Gabriela Lena Frank, and much, much more. This is a busy month!

What I'm working on: all of the above.

What I'm reading: Martin Walker's Black Diamond (the third in his excellent Inspector Bruno series); Cinda Williams Chima's Seven Realm series, and more....

Chanson für Morgen (premiere): music by Bay Area composers Garner, Getty, Conte, Bilotta, Adams

After an embarassingly long absence from posting on my blog--can blogs whither and die from loneliness? If so, mine should have--I've got a short and shameful plug for my upcoming concert. In all fairness, it's got some pretty cool music, all by Bay Area composers, including a great new piece by David Garner that the amazing Kristin Pankonin and I will be premiering.

So, disclaimer done, here's the plug and the promo blurb--and

I do hope to see you there!

.......

Don't miss the premiere of David Garner's new song cycle, Chanson für Morgen this Saturday, April 2, in Berkeley, at Trinity Chamber Concerts (2320 Dana), 8 p.m.

Soprano Nanette McGuinness and pianist Kristin Pankonin will be performing a program of music by Bay Area composers, including John Adams, John Bilotta, David Conte, Gordon Getty, and--of course-- David Garner.

The concert features the premiere of Garner's new song cycle, Chanson für Morgen, with texts by the witty and evocative German/ Polish Jewish poet, Mascha Kaleko (1907-1975). Written for McGuinness and Pankonin, Chanson für Morgen is supported by the East Bay Community Foundation and also by your very generous donations to the EBFA's challenge commissioning grant last fall. The concert is also produced in association with the 26th Annual Jewish Music Festival.

Concert information:

When: April 2, 2011, 8 p.m.

Where: Trinity Chamber Concerts, 2320 Dana St., Berkeley

Tickets:Trinity Chamber Concerts

(510-549-3864)

$15/10

About Mascha Kaleko: A member of the so-called "los

t-generation," Kaleko is part the Jewish diaspora whose futures were destroyed during the Holocaust—despite their being fortunate enough to escape with their lives. After her family immigrated to Germany, Kaleko g

rew up to become a member of the pre-war artistic intelligentsia in Berlin. Her first publications of satiric verses were banned by the Nazis in the mid-1930s, and she left Germany for the U.S. shortly before World War II. She remainoed in exile for the rest of her life, first in the U.S. and then in Israel. Her story—as an eternal emigrant and exile, a Jew, a woman, and a mother—and her poetry both still resonate today.