TSO season opening concert features works by Copland, Gershwin, Rodrigo

The Tacoma Symphony Orchestra opens the 2010-2011 season with a globetrotting musical adventure that includes works 

evoking Paris, Spain, and the American West.  Music Director Harvey Felder opens his 17th season with Chabrier’s España 

and Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez. Joining him for the second piece will be Croatian guitarist Ana Vidovic, whose playing 

was called “nuanced and intensely personal” by The Washington Post.  Copland’s Billy the Kid and Gershwin’s An American in Paris 

will round out the second half of the program.  The concert will be held at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, October 23 in the Pantages Theater, 

at the Broadway Center for the Performing Arts in downtown Tacoma.  For tickets, $24 to $77, call (253) 591-5894 or (800) 291-7593 

or visit www.tacomasymphony.org.  The program is sponsored by Gordon Thomas Honeywell, Odom Corporation, and Marine Floats.

Ana Vidovic last appeared regionally as a recitalist at the 2006 Northwest Guitar Festival in Bellingham in 2006, but her concert with 

the TSO marks her orchestral solo debut both in Washington and the Pacific Northwest. Her extensive 2010-2011 tour also includes 

performances in Japan, the Netherlands, France, Poland, Scotland, and throughout the U.S.  The young musician is developing a 

growing reputation for captivating audiences with “an unmatched phrasing ability and an understanding of the soul of music” 

(Knoxville News Sentinel).  Ms. Vidovic’s appearance with the TSO is underwritten by the Gottfried and Mary Fuchs Foundation.

            

Concierto de Aranjuez, the first work ever written for guitar and orchestra, represented a daring leap in instrumentation – posing the 

relatively quiet classical guitar against the full force of a symphony orchestra.  The work stemmed from a 1939 meeting between the 

composer and Spanish guitarist Regino Sainz de la Maza in Paris. Its 1940 premiere in Barcelona was an instant sensation; the work’s 

resulting popularity gave Rodrigo the financial security that had hitherto eluded him.  Its prominence came to overshadow his other work 

(similar to Ravel’s experience with his Bolero) and left him with ambivalent feelings about the piece.  Nevertheless, it remains seminal in 

the repertory of Spanish music, artfully capturing the “fragrance of magnolias, the singing of birds, and the gushing of fountains" 

in the gardens of Aranjuez.  

Aaron Copland’s music, more than any other composer’s, is reflective of wide-open landscapes and the fierceness and opportunity of 

the American frontier. He once said his mission was to express “the deepest reactions of the American consciousness to the American scene.” 

That dedication has made him the most beloved and popular of classical American composers.  Billy the Kid, the first major orchestral work Copland 

wrote in the style that came to define him, captures the spirit of the Wild West through its distinctive use of actual cowboy and folk tunes.  The open 

chordal spacing and use of simple, direct harmonies spoke to audiences immediately – as it still does today.  These techniques contributed to 

the development of a distinctly American style of music.

Taking a step back in time to the latter half of the 1800s, the popular showpiece España marked a turning point in the career of French Romantic 

composer Emmanuel Chabrier.  The work’s immediate appeal prompted various transcriptions and arrangements, earning Chabrier sufficient clout 

to compose his grander scale works.  Though his body of work is limited, it was highly influential on early 20th century composers such as Debussy 

and Ravel.

An American in Paris was the third in a series of orchestral works by George Gershwin that began with Rhapsody in Blue and continued with 

Piano Concerto in F.  Rather than focusing on the piano in the manner of the first two pieces, An American in Paris is a lush and colorful tone poem 

for orchestra that illustrates the experience of an American tourist visiting Paris.  In order to evoke the bustling streets of Paris, with its endless braying 

taxis, the score calls for the use of four car horns.  While visiting Paris in 1928 just prior to the work’s composition, Gershwin had a now-legendary 

meeting with composer Igor Stravinsky, during which he asked the famous Russian for composition lessons.  Stravinsky asked Gershwin about his 

level of income, to which Gershwin replied, “About $100,000 a year.” Stravinsky paused, and then remarked, “In that case, I should study with you.”

Dr. Gregory Youtz will lead a pre-concert talk about the music being performed beginning at 6:30 p.m. in the hall.  Patrons are invited to come early 

to enhance their appreciation and enjoyment of the concert.  They are also encouraged to bring a non-perishable food item with them.  

The TSO is collaborating with the Emergency Food Network to provide collection bins at every concert this season for distribution to the area needy.

Tacoma Concert Band + Harp

The Tacoma Concert Band is an icon in community music.  Not only is it one of the best bands in Tacoma, but it is an award winning, nationally recognized wind band.  Robert Musser is the founder and conductor of this great ensemble.  You can hear their next performance this weekend in the Pantages theater this Saturday (10/8) at 7:30 pm.

The program includes two works that feature a guest soloist, Elizabeth Blakeslee on harp.  Blakeslee is the solo harpist from the National Symphony Orchestra, in Washington D.C.

The program also includes the Barnes Fantasy Variations on a Theme of Paganini.  This is a virtuosic work often performed by the U.S. Marine Band.  It uses a familiar melody in 20 variations, many of which feature soloists within the band.  It is a wonderfully crafted composition, and a fantastic showpiece for bands.

For more information and tickets:  http://www.tacomaconcertband.org/

Here is the entire program:

Dunedin March…………………….Kenneth Alford

Fantasia in G Major…………………….J. S. Bach

Fantasy Variations on a Theme of Paganini…………..James Barnes

Fantasia for Harp and Concert Band……………..James Bingham

The Golden Age of Broadway……………………..Richard Rodgers

Greensleeves: A Fantasia for Band……………….Robert Smith

Nocturn for Harp………………….Clare Grundman

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice……………..Paul Dukas

Washington Grays March…………………Claudio Grafula

Music of Israel, here in Tacoma

Second City Chamber Series is offering a really interesting program of Israeli music.  I really think this organization is a gem in our community.  They have been offering chamber music concerts in our community for 34 years!  Besides great music and musicians, many of their concerts are held in the Annie Wright School's Great Hall.  It is a neat location for chamber music.  Big enough to let the music breathe, but small enough to feel intimate and like the audience is a part of the performance.  For more information go to:  http://www.scchamberseries.org

NW Sinfonietta Celebrates 20 Years

The Northwest Sinfonietta is a premiere chamber orchestra in the Northwest.  Conducted by Christophe Chagnard, this ensemble has become know for it's detailed and exciting performances.  NW Sinfonietta has a devoted following, and in recent years has expanded its concert series to include performances in Seattle and other northern communities.

This year is the 20th Anniversary for NWS, and they have an outstanding season of classic and contemporary works.  The first Tacoma performance is this Saturday (10/2) in the Rialto theater in downtown Tacoma.  For ticket information :  http://www.nwsinfonietta.org/season.html

Wonderful Variety on One Recital

This looks like a really cool program of chamber and solo recital music - featuring horn, clarinet, and piano.  Additionally, Gina Gillie (horn) is also singing on the recital.  Wow!  What fantastic variety and talent.  This PLU Faculty Concert also features Craig Rine (clarinet), and Amy Grinsteiner (piano).

Tickets: $8, $5, $3

This program has a lot of variety: in music styles, in instrumentation, in musical form.  Check out the program:

Romatic Sonata for Clarinet, Horn and Piano,  Gunther Schuller (b. 1925)

I. Adagietto II. Adagio III. Vivace, jauntily

Quartet for the End of Time,  Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992)

III. Abyss of Birds

En Fôret,  Eugène Bozza (1905-1991)

Etude-Tableau in C minor, Op. 33, No. 3,  Sergei Rachmaninov (1873-1943)

Trio in B flat, Op. 274,  Carl Reinecke (1824-1910)

I. Allegro II. Andante – A Tale III. Allegro – Scherzo IV. Allegro – Finale

Der Hirt auf dem Felsen,  Franz Schubert (1797-1828)

Here are the program notes and artist information:

The versatile Gunther Schuller is well-known as a composer of both jazz and classical music, as a conductor, and also as a horn player. It comes as no surprise then that the writing for horn in his Romantic Sonata for Clarinet, Horn and Piano is effective and idiomatic. The current revision of this piece was completed in 1983, but the composition was originally written in 1941 when Schuller was only 16 years old. Even as a young man, he was skilled at creative rhythmic and instrumental combinations, and this early piece also shows the influence of jazz on his compositions.

In the opening of the adagietto first movement, the horn plays the exact same ascending four-note pattern six times, while the added sonorities of the clarinet and piano develop the theme into different and interesting textures. The remainder of the movement embodies a slow and dramatic Neo-Romantic character. The second movement contains a precariously high, haunting melody first presented by the clarinet, then the horn, then the horn and clarinet in a unison which has an ethereal and beautiful quality. Agitation and tempest stir the middle section before the music relaxes back into a restatement of the original melody. The last movement begins with a march- like tune in the horn and punctuated jazzy chords in the piano. A brooding tone overtakes a short middle section, and the light-hearted march returns to round everything off.

In 1940, composer Olivier Messiaen, a Roman Catholic and spiritual mystic, was captured and held as a prisoner of war in a German war camp. It was there that he wrote his Quartet for the End of Time. Himself a pianist, he found among the other prisoners a clarinetist, a violinist, and a cellist. On January 15, 1941, Messiaen’s group of musicians debuted his quartet for about 400 fellow prisoners. The music is based on chapter 10 from the Book of Revelation in which the seventh angel descends to announce that there will be time no longer. Messiaen musically builds on this idea by doing away with the standard time signatures of Western classical music and instead developing a varied and flexible rhythmic system, based in part on ancient Hindu rhythms. In a preface to the score, he describes the third movement for solo clarinet in this way: “Abyss of the birds. Clarinet alone. The abyss is Time with its sadness, its weariness. The birds are the opposite to Time; they are our desire for light, for stars, for rainbows, and for jubilant songs.”

En Fôret was written in 1941 as a final exam piece for Paris Conservatory graduate students by composer, conductor and violinist, Eugène Bozza. Exam pieces, by design, contained a variety of playing styles and effects to test the competency of the students. Such exams provided composers like Bozza with a unique outlet for the creation of virtuosic and ingenious showpieces for solo instruments. In En Fôret, Bozza borrows from Ottorino Respighi’s Feste Romane and incorporates quotations from St. Hubert’s hunting call as well as the Gregorian chant “Victimae paschali laudes.” Along with these melodic themes he includes many technical aspects of horn playing such as trills, glissandi, muted and stopped passages. The title means “in the forest,” and the music provides the listener with a vivid journey through a wooded setting in which one comes upon various scenes and characters ranging from hunters to monks.

The great Russian musician Sergei Rachmaninov, masterful and lush composer for the piano, frequently performed his own works, the recordings of which give modern performers valuable insight into the interpretation of his own works. His Etude-Tableau in C minor, Op. 33, No. 3 is one of two piano solos that was written in 1911 to be a “picture piece” or a musical manifestation of visual stimuli. The writing of these etudes is rather advanced and less predictable than some of his earlier preludes, while Rachmaninoff biographer Max Harrison calls the études-tableaux "studies in composition" that "investigate the transformation of rather specific climates of feeling via piano textures and sonorities.” Although Rachmaninoff wrote nine pieces for Op. 33, he only published six in 1914. No. 3 is one that was published posthumously but is often inserted, along with No. 5, among the first six.

Carl Reinecke was a celebrated concert pianist, conductor, director of the Leipzig Conservatory and composer whose many works were frequently performed during his lifetime. An impressive list of his students includes Edvard Grieg, Christian Sinding, Leoš Janáček, Isaac Albéniz, Johan Svendsen, Richard Franck, Felix Weingartner, and Max Bruch. For his accomplishments, it is surprising that his fame has faded in modern society. His Trio in B flat, Op. 274, composed in 1905, is written in a style similar to Brahms’ Horn Trio. The piano writing is thick and lushly Romantic while the horn and clarinet frequently trade off statements of the melodies and sometimes play in unison to create a unique texture.

The piece opens with an octave statement from the horn which serves as the thematic material for the rest of the first movement. A slow second movement allows the listener’s ear to take in the rich harmonies, while the third movement is a fast paced Scherzo and Trio written in 3/4 time. The final movement frequently displaces the beat using ties over the barlines which elongates the melody and delays its resolution. As a whole, the Romantic style of the trio make for pleasing melodic and harmonic listening.

Franz Schubert’s Der Hirt auf dem Felsen, which translates to The Shepherd on the Rock, was composed in 1828 during the last few months of the composer’s life. It was written for soprano Anna Milder-Hauptmann who wanted a work that expressed a wide range of emotions. While the piece is characterized as a lied, it can also be thought of as chamber music for a trio, the voice and the clarinet having equally challenging parts. The song is in three sections, each containing a contrasting mood echoing the sentiments of the text. The first section speaks of a lonely shepherd standing on a rock and singing down into the valley which echoes back to him. The solitude of the echoes cause him grief, and the music of the second section turns dark and mournful. But he does not remain in misery forever and is cheered by the idea of the coming of Spring which signifies new life and is characterized by rapidly ascending scales in the voice and clarinet.

-Notes by Gina Gillie

About the Performers

Dr. Gina Gillie is an Assistant Professor of Music at Pacific Lutheran University where she teaches horn and aural skills, conducts a horn choir, and performs frequently with faculty groups and in solo and chamber recitals. As an orchestral player, she is currently Assistant Principal with the Tacoma Symphony and has also played with the Northwest Sinfonietta, the LaCrosse Symphony Orchestra, the Central Wisconsin Symphony Orchestra and the Beloit-Janesville Symphony Orchestra. She is a member of two faculty chamber ensembles at PLU, the Camas Wind Quintet and the Lyric Brass Quintet. Dr. Gillie studied horn performance with Douglas Hill at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where she received her Masters degree in 2006 and her Doctorate of Musical Arts in 2009. She completed her Bachelors degree at Pacific Lutheran University in 2004 studying with Kathleen Vaught Farner. As a vocalist, Dr. Gillie has participated in many choirs including the Choir of the West at PLU and PLU’s Choral Union. She frequently incorporates vocal chamber music into her yearly horn recitals as an outlet for vocal performance.

Craig Rine is an Affiliate Artist and Lecturer at Pacific Lutheran University. Mr. Rine is currently principal clarinet of the Tacoma Symphony and the Northwest Sinfonietta. Since moving to the Pacific Northwest in 1988 he has worked extensively with the Seattle Symphony, Seattle Opera, Pacific Northwest Ballet, the Northwest Chamber Orchestra and the Auburn Symphony. In addition, Mr. Rine teaches band at Curtis Junior High School.

Amy Grinsteiner holds a Diploma of Postgraduate Performance and L.R.A.M. Teaching Certificate from the Royal Academy of Music in London, a Master of Music Degree in Piano Performance from the Eastman School of Music, and Bachelor of Music degree in Piano Performance from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Her primary teachers were Dennis Alexander, Angela Cheng, Nelita True and Christopher Elton, with additional studies with Paul Lewis. Ms. Grinsteiner is on the piano faculty at Pacific Lutheran University and performs regularly at PLU as an Affiliate Artist in addition to performances on the Second City Chamber Series and the Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp in Michigan. This past summer she served as the Faculty Program Coordinator for the first University of Washington Summer Piano Institute, and traveled to London on a Student-Faculty Wang Center Grant. The research grant project, "Music as a hub in the London community," involved studying audience development and the impact of community outreach work. Since 2007, Ms. Grinsteiner has also been Director of the Young Chamber Players, the educational arm of the Second City Chamber Series. She is currently a D.M.A. candidate at the University of Washington in Seattle where she studies with Dr. Robin McCabe.

Lots to do at U.P.S.

This week there are several events happening in the Tacoma area.  I highly recommend you attend some of these opportunities to experience classical music in our community:

Flute Recital and Master Class by Molly Barth - Tuesday, Sept. 21
Recital: 7-7:45 p.m., Master Class 8-9:30 p.m.
Schneebeck Concert Hall, University of Puget Sound
Free

Grammy Award-winning flutist Molly Barth is an active solo, chamber and orchestra musician, specializing in the music of today. Barth is assistant professor of flute at University of Oregon.  This is a great opportunity to hear a great performer in recital, and also hear instructions on being a better performer from her!  Masterclasses are like lessons, but in front of an audience.  They are common in university music programs, and offer music majors a chance to share their learning experience with their fellow students.  Ms. Barth's recital and masterclass are open to the public, and its free!

Friday, Sept. 24
Schneebeck Concert Hall, University of Puget Sound
Duane Hulbert, professor of piano at University of Puget Sound will present a program including Chopin’s 24 Preludes, Opus 28, and Sonata No. 3 in b minor, Opus 58.
Tickets: $12.50 general; $8.50 sr. citizens, students. Tickets available at Wheelock Information Center, 253.879.3419, or at the door.

In honor of the 200th anniversary of Frédéric Chopin’s birth, Duane Hulbert will present a solo piano recital of the composer’s works in the fall program of University of Puget Sound’s 2010–11 Jacobsen Series. The Chopin Bicentennial evening will begin at 7:30 p.m., Friday, Sept. 24 in Schneebeck Concert Hall on campus. The public is welcome to attend. Ticket information is below.
The concert will feature two of the Polish master’s greatest works: the complete set of 24 Preludes and the Piano Sonata No. 3 in b minor. The Preludes were written during Chopin’s stay on the island of Majorca, Spain, with the writer George Sand during the winter of 1838–39. The constant rain and Chopin’s illness set the backdrop for these marvelous miniatures, many of them reflecting the stormy conditions of that winter.

Chopin, born March 1, 1810, was one of many composers influenced by J. S. Bach’s own Preludes and Fugues in the Well-Tempered Clavier, writing the 24 short works in all of the major and minor keys. Chopin’s final Piano Sonata No. 3 in b minor was written in 1844, while he was living in Nohant, France. The four-movement work represents the culmination of the composer’s virtuoso writing, from the lyrical passion in the first movement to the unabated virtuosity of the brilliant finale. It is a recital not to be missed.  

Duane Hulbert, distinguished professor in the School of Music, is beginning his 25th year at University of Puget Sound. He has established himself as a frequent performer in many venues throughout the Pacific Northwest, and as a successful piano teacher both at the collegiate and high school level. His current and former students have won major competitions and hold prestigious positions in colleges and conservatories throughout the United States. His recording of piano works by Alexander Glazunov was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2002.  

The Jacobsen Series, named in honor of Leonard Jacobsen, former chair of the piano department at Puget Sound, has been running since 1984. The Jacobsen Series Scholarship Fund awards annual music scholarships to outstanding student performers and scholars. The fund is sustained entirely by season subscribers and ticket sales.

Admission is $12.50 for the general public; $8.50 for seniors (55+), non-Puget Sound students, and Puget Sound faculty and staff. It is free for current Puget Sound students. For tickets contact Wheelock Information Center, or order by credit card by calling 253.879.3419. Any remaining tickets will be available at the door.

For directions and a map of the campus: www.pugetsound.edu/directions.xml

String Quartet Concert

Here's a great opportunity for some wonderful string quartet repertoire.  This string quartet is made up of PLU music faculty.  It is a fantastic ensemble, and they're performing great music.  Don't miss this opportunity to support musicians and music education in our community.

Regency Concert Series: Regency String Quartet

September 14, 2010 at 8:00pm — 10:00pm

PLU's Regency String Quartet performs Bartok's String Quartet No. 1 and is joined by faculty bassist, Maurice Clubb, to perform Dvorak's Quintet for Strings in G Major.

Location: Mary Baker Russell Music Center Lagerquist Concert Hall

Contact Information

Music Department
253-535-7787
music@plu.edu

More Info

$8 General Admission, $5, Senior Citizens, $3 Alumni, Free 18 and under