Grammy Report

The 53rd Annual Grammy Awards were quite a weekend: three ceremonies, including the televised extravaganza, plus two huge parties, all in the space of about 30 hours. The sheer number of awards is kind of staggering: there are 109 different categories, including Best Norteño Album (what's that?), Best Banda Album, Record of the Year and Album of the Year (huh?), Best Surround Sound Album (are people still doing that?), seven different categories in Gospel music (classical music gets twelve!), plus a separate set of awards for technical and lifetime achievement in various areas.

The Grammys are primarily about celebrity and secondarily about music, and once one accepts that, it's possible to have a great deal of fun watching all the famous people do their thing -- and we did! I even thought some of the pop awards were well deserved: Esperanza Spalding is a fantastic musician, whom we got to hear at the Sunday afternoon awards ceremony in a terrific number with Bobby McFerrin. Not sure what to make of Lady Gaga, but she certainly knows how to make a spectacle of herself -- though I found her leather get-up much more interesting than the big egg. And what a hoot to see Mick Jagger prancing around like he's still in his 30s!

We didn't win but were pleased to see the opera award for "L'amour de loin" be accepted by Daniel Belcher, a former HGO studio artist who is doing wonderful work these days, both in Houston and elsewhere. Sixto put together a slideshow that includes pics of three of the four Ars Lyrica nominees: myself (as conductor), Keith Weber (producer) and Ava Pine (soprano), but without Jamie Barton (mezzo-soprano), who was singing in San Diego that day instead.

Notes for "Musical Resolutions" -- New Year's Eve 2010

For those who like to read these in advance, here are my notes for "Musical Resolutions," Ars Lyrica's New Year's Eve 2010 program. Looking forward to seeing many of you this coming Friday night at the Hobby Center, to ring in the new year!

Tonight’s program offers “musical resolutions” of various sorts: the integration of various national styles in the Bach and Telemann works, plus the firmly resolved (though famously frustrated) love of Apollo for Daphne. The latter work also continues our current season’s exploration of the Baroque teatro mundi, with a gorgeous if sobering mythological drama.

Italian cantatas like Apollo e Dafne allowed music-loving Romans of Handel’s day to have their cake and eat it, too—by conjuring the gods, goddesses and sound world of Baroque opera but on a smaller scale and without the distractions of (and papal prohibitions against) the opera house. Such works mine the theater of our interior imagination, as they seduce, distract, and entertain us with the ravishing sounds of voices and instruments. In contrast, the Bach and Telemann selections deliver less explicit stories but equally alluring soundscapes.

Bach’s so-called “Orchestral Suites” are in fact suites for a fairly small ensemble, consisting perhaps of just single or a few players per part. Long assumed to have been written during Bach’s service at the court of Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen, certain movements may predate his time there (1717-1723) while others may reflect the larger instrumental resources available to him in Leipzig after 1723. In any case, these four works, among the most familiar in Bach’s output, reflect the widespread popularity of French dance movements during his lifetime and likely represent just the tip of the iceberg: Bach surely composed other such Ouvertures (as he called them) that are lost to posterity. Among the cleverest assimilations of the two dominant instrumental genres of Bach’s day, these works resolve the inherent tension between binary-form dances and ritornello-based concerto writing in movements that incorporate soloistic display within the predictable formal schemes of Baroque dance movements.

The German ensemble suite typically begins with its most imposing movement: an overture modeled on those of Jean-Baptiste Lully, with a majestic opening section and a faster, imitative second section. The dances that follow mimic the flow of a classic divertissement in French Baroque opera. In the C-major Suite, Bach includes a number of paired dances whose unconventional scoring creates some surprising effects: note the odd inversion of the violin’s typical lead role in the second gavotte, for example.

Like Bach, Telemann assimilated Italian and French styles in his music but on a scale that dwarfed his now more famous contemporary. This most prolific composer of the late Baroque (and perhaps of all time) produced dozens of concertos in the Italian style, including several that feature multiple wind soloists. Better perhaps than anyone else, Telemann grasped the peculiarities of Baroque wind color and how to write for such instruments. His E-minor Concerto cleverly pits the old (the archaic recorder) against the new (the fashionable transverse flute), in four movements whose joyful thumping and tender expressiveness make it one of his most popular works.

Apollo e Dafne is one of the richest sources of Handelian compositional “leftovers”: he re-used all but one of its arias and duets in later operas or oratorios, some multiple times. Its poignant lesson—of the inevitable choice between love and duty, passion and reason—has always been popular with opera composers: in addition to the well-known setting by Richard Strauss, both Jacopo Peri and Heinrich Schütz wrote Daphne operas in the 17th century. Handel began his cantata in 1706 or 1707 and finished it several years later, perhaps after his departure from Italy. Long admired for its creative orchestration, the work is a masterpiece of well-calibrated emotional expression: from Apollo’s proud vanity in the opening scene to his plaintive final promise, or from Daphne’s initial childlike innocence to her ultimate embrace of destiny.

The story, in brief, goes as follows. As described in Ovid, Cupid has decreed that the god Apollo shall fall for the beautiful nymph Daphne, but his love cannot be returned since she is bound by her devotion to the goddess Diana and can love no man. When Apollo’s attempts at seduction backfire, Daphne escapes by returning to nature: Mother Earth turns her into a tree. Fashioning a fragrant wreath from its laurel leaves, Apollo consoles himself and vows never to forget her. © Matthew Dirst

A Grammy Nomination!

Woke up yesterday morning to a wonderful surprise: a Grammy nomination for Ars Lyrica's recent recording of Hasse's "Marc Antonio e Cleopatra" on the Dorian-Sono Luminus label. Congratulations to all involved in this project, especially soprano Ava Pine, mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton, and producer Keith Weber. The Grammy nominees for best opera (category 99) includes some serious competition, from all over the world, with ours the sole American recording so honored. If you're a voting member of the Recording Academy, thanks for your vote!!

1610 Vespers Reviews

The buzz on our Monteverdi Vespers has been great. If you haven't yet seen the reviews, check out the Dallas Morning News and the Houston Chronicle plus a really nice blog post. Many thanks to all who came and enjoyed the program!

Stay put, you'll be glad you did!

Leaving before the last act is sometimes all too tempting. Kings and queens did it regularly, and presidents still do. Well, they're busy folk, and who among us hasn't taken the opportunity to duck out of something you felt obliged to attend but for which you couldn't muster any enthusiasm in the first hour? But are such things the inevitable result of bad art or evidence of our ever-shorter attention spans?

Or are we willing patrons of the arts only when we get what we know?

Case in point: Houston Grand Opera's current production of Peter Grimes. At last night's performance there were more empty seats after each intermission. Sadly, those who left missed some of the most amazing moments in a truly magical work, including the heartbreaking Act II quartet and Grimes' searing final soliloquy, sung with astonishing intensity by Anthony Dean Griffey.

Those who perform unconventional repertoire greatly appreciate listeners who like to be challenged occasionally. What can we do to motivate others to give unfamiliar music a chance?

Organ-mania in Houston!

Who'd have thought it possible? New organs at St Philip Presbyterian and the Co-Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Houston have drawn capacity crowds to dedicatory recitals and other events this year, and people are coming back in droves for more! Last night's crowd at the Co-Cathedral, for a recital by Philippe Lefebvre from Paris, was nearly as big as that for David Higg's program a few weeks ago, and the recent Concert for Peace at St Philip had its largest crowd ever this fall, too.

Remembering back to the thirteen (or was it more?) times that Clyde Holloway had to play the opening recital on the big Fisk/Rosales at Rice, I guess there is considerable interest here in the organ. It just takes an amazing new instrument to bring people out of the woodwork. Churches and music schools take note: this is an excellent way to get people excited about your programs!

And to that end, the next opportunity to hear the new Fritts organ at St Philip: Friday, Nov 19, with Prof. Martin Jean from Yale University at the console. Details: Music at St Philip

And the next recital on the new Pasi organ at the Co-Cathedral: my UH colleague Robert Bates on Dec 7. Details: Opus XIX

Monteverdi Vespers on Nov 13

Looking forward to a couple of performances of Claudio Monteverdi's magnificent 1610 Vespers very soon: on Nov 13 in Houston and Nov 14 in Dallas, with Ars Lyrica, the Orpheus Chamber Singers, and the Whole Noyse. Here are notes on that upcoming program, hot off the press.

NOTES ON THE VESPERS

Though published relatively early in his career, Monteverdi’s Vespro della Beata Vergine is his most spectacular sacred work. Part of a larger 1610 Venice publication (dedicated to the Virgin Mary) that begins with a Mass setting, the 1610 Vespers, as it has come to be known, comprises far more than one actually needs for Vespers, prompting all manner of speculation as to the composer’s intent and the origins of this collection. Its contents—big psalm settings, smaller-scale motets, a lavishly scored sacred concerto, and two differently scored settings of the Magnificat—certainly cover all the standard parts of the Vespers liturgy, but whether they were meant to be performed as a whole is doubtful.

Like Bach’s equally monumental Mass in B Minor, Monteverdi’s Mass and Vespers are less solitary works than compilations of various items. Their publication may have served as a kind of musical calling card: by 1610 Monteverdi was no longer satisfied with the terms of his employment in Mantua, and the publication of a Mass and Vespers in Venice may well have led to his eventual position at St. Mark’s Basilica in that city. In any case, the sheer range of musical styles in the Vespers, from grandiose psalm settings to intimate motets, is striking, as is Monteverdi’s practical ingenuity: in the print he provides directions for performing the various movements either with groups of string and wind instruments or with organ alone. Most modern performances (like ours) give the score its full due with a rich panoply of instrumental color.

The 1610 Mass and Vespers summarize the shifting sands of musical style in the early seventeenth century: the Mass is set contrapuntally, in the style of a Palestrina, while the Vespers combines mostly prima prattica psalms with more modern seconda prattica motets. Within the psalm settings one finds a variety of compositional techniques, from the venerable block chordal style of psalm recitation (falsobordone) in “Dixit Dominus,” to various contrapuntal treatments of a slow-moving cantus firmus in the “Magnificat a 7” and elsewhere, even variations on the Romanesca (a secular ground bass) in “Laetatus sum.” The motets are by no means impoverished by their leaner scoring; their reduced forces permit greater vocal display, from the delicate intertwining of two sopranos in “Pulchra es” to the exuberant flights of fancy for three tenors in “Duo seraphim.” These latter movements especially have much in common with the theatrical music of this era: Monteverdi’s own Orfeo, for example, whose ardent song is not so different from these love songs to the Virgin Mary.

Of all the great monuments of music literature, the 1610 Vespers is one of the least familiar, perhaps because of the exotic performing forces the “full dress” version requires. Once one locates the necessary cornetts, sackbuts, theorbos, agile tenors, low basses, and altos with seemingly endless lungs, there are still many issues to consider: Should the piece be given in a liturgical context? Should the “Lauda Jerusalem” and “Magnificat” movements be transposed downward by as much as a fourth? Should instruments double the vocal lines and, if so, where? How much embellishment should one apply to the individual parts? Did the composer intend a performance of the various movements in the published order of the partbooks? Attempting to steer a course somewhere between the latest musicological findings and practical reality, ours is a concert performance of the whole work (without interpolated plainsong antiphons) in the order of the 1610 partbooks, with transposed “Lauda” and “Magnificat” movements, and occasional doublings of the parts and embellished solo lines. ©Matthew Dirst