Back Home in Texas

It was in the 50s when I left London and 101 degrees when I landed in Waco at 5:30 p.m.  Welcome back to Texas!

It’s been quite an adventure!  Nine operas, two academic symposia, two study days, one wedding, five abbeys, at least twelve museums, and numerous afternoon hikes later, I now am home.  Thanks dear friends and family for your encouragement and support. 

Daniel greets me with good news and bad.  The bad news:  While Daniel was visiting me in England, his car was so badly damaged by hail it probably will have to be totaled (along with 12,000 others).

The good news:  We’ve paid off our mortgage!  What a great welcome home and wedding anniversary present!

Laurel & Daniel at the Crites-Barrett wedding

I have more stories to tell, so even though I am back in Texas I plan to write more posts.  Thanks again for your encouragement.  I feel so blessed to have had this opportunity.  

                                                                                                                         June 21, 2011

Good-bye to Lewes

Good-Bye to Lewes  -- June 14, 2011

Castle on my last evening in Lewes

After I packed up this evening, I decided to take one last hike on the Downs.   The air was clear and the breeze not too sharp. 

As I entered the wildlife protection area, I was greeted by nine rabbits, who then promptly scurried away.  I hiked for over an hour in the evening cool.  As I crested what I had decided would be my last hill, a mother rabbit and her baby were on the path and a hot air balloon was suspended over the dale. 

It felt like one last unexpected gift.

Symposium a Success!

Just a short post to let you know that the symposium Time, Realism, and Convention in Recent Opera was a success –- a small crowd but very meaningful to the folks that were there.  Scholars, composers, and opera directors from England, Wales, Portugal, Germany, Greece, Serbia, and the Netherlands attended.  As you can imagine, we had some good discussions and I am pleased that my opening remarks managed to connect the various papers together.  Now after a celebratory drink at the university’s pub, I am in dire need of dinner!  

Symposium

I haven’t written much for the blog lately because I’ve been busy preparing for the symposium below.  It promises to be a thought-provoking day!  The complete program and abstracts are on the website:  

Symposium: Time, Realism and Convention in Recent Opera

Time, Realism and Convention in Recent Opera 

A Symposium Organised by the Centre for Research in Opera and Music Theatre at the University of Sussex 

David Osmond Smith Room, Falmer House 120, University of Sussex, 8 June 2011

http://www.sussex.ac.uk/cromt/1-3-14.html

This is new territory for me, so I feel a bit intimidated.  Wish me luck!  I’m sure I’ll learn a lot.  

Margaret and Nathaniel's Wedding

Well, there is a lot to write about -- a windy hike to Seven Sisters, a foggy one from Ditchling Beacon, a visit to Anne of Cleves home, attempts to learn some British jive, and seeing Die Meistersinger at Glyndebourne.   However, a couple of you have asked about Margaret Crites and Nathaniel Barrett’s wedding, so I will start with that.

Here’s the happy couple on their wedding day!

There was so much love, joy, and gratitude in them and surrounding them, it truly was a blessing to take part in the celebrations. 

As you would expect from these two, the wedding ceremony was thoughtful, a true worship service.  I wish all of you could have heard the evocative, unaccompanied duet that Margaret composed for the occasion.  The service took place in a simple eighteenth-century church in the small town of Fuhrberg, near Hannover, Germany.   

Many of the buildings there, like this one, have prayers, proverbs or family histories written over the door. 

Both the wedding and the reception combined German and American traditions, which sparked some fun and revealing cross-cultural conversations.  Actually there were two receptions -- one immediately after the service and another one that night.  

Bridesmaid Katie Thompson at the first reception

Lindenhof 

Stefan Baral and Groomsmen Jamie Yarborough, Jared Henderson and Ethan Barrett

The evening meal progressed through various courses – aperitif, soup, salad, fish with vegetables, veal, and dessert – with ample time for toasts, stories, and conversation in between each one. 

Dancing preceded dessert, after which more dancing ensued, and then still yet another course!  The multi-tiered wedding cake was unveiled to the strains of the Bridal March.  (Margaret had walked down the aisle to a much more introspective song.)  People danced swing, waltz, disco, and salsa into the early morning.

Dancing Dan with Margaret's Mother Nancy

The celebrations continued the next day with a Texas-style brunch.  As we returned to England Daniel quipped, “We’re not jet-lagged, we’re party-lagged!”  British immigration let us in anyway.  

Daniel has arrived & Lewes Castle

Daniel has arrived!

This afternoon we toured Lewes castle.  In quintessential Daniel fashion, we climbed to the highest point first and then slowly worked our way back down.

Here are two views of Lewes and the surrounding area taken from the castle’s western tower.

The castle's Barbican House:

A view down one of Lewes' medieval twittens (streets) taken from the Barbican:

Twitten & House from the 1300s

Portions of the castle and the barbican date from c1100.  It's first owner, William de Warrenne, was the Bill Gates of his time -- in other words, enormously wealthy and influential.

Daniel striking a GQ pose and looking like the distinguished gentleman that he is:

Laurel looking like a disheveled American tourist:  

As Winnie the Pooh would say, it was a blustery, blustery day – one of the windiest I’ve experienced here so far.

Daniel with blustery hair, chalk cliff in background

Daniel may have better photos or wish to write more, but he is asleep.  In the meantime, here is what the castle looks like from Paddock lane near my house.

More at some point about a Pre-Raphaelite Church and the Farmers Markets.

Christopher Maltman Lieder Recital

May 19, 2011

I am lost to the world

On which I squandered so much time . . .

I am dead to the world’s commotion,

And rest in a quiet realm!

I live alone in my own heaven,

In my love, in my song.

                     Friedrich Rückert, set to music by Gustav Mahler

Another great performance at the Brighton Festival – a song recital by British baritone Christopher Maltman and pianist Joseph Middleton.   [For musicians, the complete program is below.]  Songs about or written in Venice serves as the theme of the first half.  Maltman’s singing during the first two songs of Fauré’s Cinq mélodies ‘de Venise’  lacks a sense of line, but the rest of the set shows both artists to advantage.  Middleton’s playing is exquisite.

The hall is very dark and after the first set the woman beside me laments “It’s a pity it’s so dark.  You can’t read the translations.” 

Maltman returns and addresses the audience.  “It’s a great honor and pleasure to be singing in my home town, but it’s also bloody nerve-wracking!”  Everyone laughs.  “One of the side benefits, though, is being able to take the No. 7 bus to work.”  More laughter.  He asks for the houselights to be raised so that we can read the poetry.

The first half closes with Reynoldo Hahn’s Venezia.  Maltman describes the composer as a “terribly dapper little fellow” who thought his job was to be “the footlights that illuminate the text.”

After the interval, Maltman announces “Sorry to disturb your evening by talking,” but a couple of days ago he and Middleton decided to rearrange the program:  “The three songs by Schubert to Metastasio texts are rather

                                                                                    Low,” he explains           

and the set after (more Schubert) rather high.   

                                                

But I suspect it’s also a matter of poetic tone.  The concert closes with Mahler’s Rückert Lieder, whose final song ends:

I am lost to the world

On which I squandered so much time . . .

I am dead to the world’s commotion,

And rest in a quiet realm!

I live alone in my own heaven,

In my love, in my song.

There is a long silence before applause breaks out, punctuated by shouts of “Bravo!”

Maltman and Middleton do perform an encore, but they make us earn it:  we call them back on stage at least four times.  The song they choose, “Mattinata,” disrupts the spell.  It’s one of those tunes that sticks in your head once you’ve heard it.  I can hear several people humming it as we leave. 

(I had blackberry ice cream at intermission, by the way!)

Complete Program

Christopher Maltman baritone 
Joseph Middleton piano



Fauré Cinq Mélodies de Venise Op. 58


Schumann Two Venetian songs from Myrthen Op. 25


Schubert Gondelfahrer D809


Mendelssohn Venetianisches Gondellied Op. 57 No. 5


Hahn Venezia - Six chansons en dialecte vénitien


Schubert Three Rückert Lieder


Schubert Drei Lieder (Metastasio) D902


Mahler Rückert Lieder

Apocrifu Dance-Theatre Performance at the Brighton Festival

Apocrifu  (Apocrypha) 

Dance-Theatre Performance at the Brighton Festival

Hurling books,

Walking on books,

Blinded by books,

Battered by books.

  

The divisive power of words  -- that is the message of Apocrifu, a dance-theatre piece by Belgian choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui.

According to the program Cherkaoui “thinks of himself as a choreographer of religious dances.  For him the word ‘religious’ implies community, the idea of ‘joining together’.” “Words and ideologies may divide us, but ‘there is one language that we have in common, and that is rhythm.’”

Cross-cultural collaborations figure in most of his works.   Tonight’s choreography combines modern and kathak dance, and Noh puppet theatre, with touches of flamenco, hip hop, and ballet. 

The three male dancers are accompanied by an all-male Corsican vocal ensemble.  The chamber choir assumes various positions on stage – singing from a platform above the dancers, the rear of the stage, and the sides.  Their unaccompanied polyphony melds extensive drones and north African rhythms and vocal timbres with Italianate harmonies.  It hints of medieval organum. 

At the end books turn into swords. 

The choreographer carries a martyred comrade up a steep staircase and leaps Tosca-like into the dark.

May 18, 2011

The Feast of St. Pancras Festivities

May 14, 2011

St. Pancras  Festivities -- Lewes

I had a productive morning writing, so I decided to attend the Feast of St. Pancras festivities.   Quaker-me had to look up who St. Pancras was, of course!  Pancras was martyred c300 CE and is an important saint in England; some of his bones made their way here.  He is also one of the “Ice Saints.”  His Feast Day in May usually coincides with the final spring frost.

The festivities took place at the priory ruins in Lewes.  Established in 1078, the monastery remained an active community into the 1530s, until Henry VII and parliament dissolved all monasteries so that the crown could control the land (among other reasons!).  Thomas Cromwell brought an engineer over from Italy to literally blow up their church.  The remains of the buildings have been recently restored thanks to the national lottery. 

The historical foundation that maintains the priory and a local bonfire society co-sponsored the event.  It’s a quirky partnership – a group that is trying to preserve a former Catholic monastery and a group that celebrates the suppression of a Catholic rebellion led by Guy Fawkes.  The bonfire society’s motto is:

I see no reason

Why gun powder treason

Should ever be forgot

The festivities included a procession of drummers dressed in faux medieval garb accompanied by two puppeteers dressed as Druid giants,

Procession of drummers seen through an old window

crafts demonstrations, storytelling, and “Hands on History” events, such as trying on medieval armor. 

You could also lock someone up in the stocks and throw wet sponges at them (I was not a victim!) and try your hand at rolling the “swede” (a large rutabaga).  

Immediately outside the priory grounds, another British activity:  Cricket.

Cricket field immediately outside the priory.  In the background, you can see one of the area's many chalk cliffs. 

St. Pancras is also known as an “ice saint” because his feast day often prompts a cool spell.  And he did – at least in Sussex!   

Favorite Quotes: Glyndebourne Study Day on Wagner’s Die Meistersinger

Favorite Quotes:  Glyndebourne Study Day on Wagner’s Die Meistersinger

FYI:  Wagner’s Die Meistersinger is set in the 1500s in Nuremberg, Germany and incorporates some actual historical figures from that time.  Some of the characters represent different crafts and professions (cobbler, goldsmith, baker, furrier, etc.).  The music is very complicated, especially the large crowd scene at the end of Act 2.

In Wagner, when boy meets girl it’s always complicated.

Real people, real time, real place – that’s kind of unusual for Wagner!

An illustrated Book of Trades from 1568 ranks 114 trades and professions in descending order of importance.  1 = Pope, 26 = Goldsmiths, 78 = Bow Makers, and so on.  Musicians are ranked dead last, together with “slow-witted fools.”

The first act of the opera is about setting the rules for a song contest:  Only Wagner would set a committee meeting to music.

Conductor Vladimir Jurowski to the audience:  I promise I won’t wave my arms too much.

Tristan and Meistersinger are two sides of the same coin.  They’re a “Buy one, take two” deal.

By now you’ve heard this motive about 75 times – trust me, you’ll hear it a few more.

On the big crowd scene that closes Act 2:  You would need 24 ears to perceive all that is happening.

Bayreuth, the operahouse that Wagner designed, has a very deep, covered orchestra pit that creates a blended, burnished sound.  Glyndebourne is a smaller auditorium with a more live pit that fosters a brighter, louder sound.  The conductor on the challenges of performing Wagner in this space:  Bayreuth, you know, has a very veiled sound.  If we get the balances right in the orchestra and in the voices, I think you’ll hear 75% more than you do in most performances.

Moderator [jovially]:  I think you’ve just said it’s going to sound better here than in Bayreuth! 

Director David McVicar:  There’s a dictatorial aspect to all of Wagner’s art.  We must resist him!

His goal as a director:  That quiet place, that spiritual place where great art takes us, that makes us question the life that surrounds us.

During the Q & A:

Woman in the audience:  Many of us when we play or hear music see colors.  When you knew you were going to conduct and direct this opera what colors did you see?

Study Day on Wagner at Glyndebourne

Glyndebourne Theatre as Viewed from the Lawn (The round building is the performance space)

May 15, 2011

Thanks to the festival’s education director, I got to attend another study day at Glyndebourne.  This one focused on Richard Wagner’s opera Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (The Master Singers of Nuremberg).  Again, it was a real treat and very informative.  I heard presentations by a cultural historian, one of the world’s leading Wagner scholars, the conductor, and the director of the new production.  The conductor chose to have the understudies illustrate his talk with live musical examples.  How bland this music sounds with just the piano!

There were definitely some Wagnerites there, armed with libretti.  Some even had scores.

Tidbit for the day:  Perhaps some of you know this, but I didn’t.  Several famous portraits of Wagner show him wearing a beret.   The beret is a political statement; it was the favorite headgear of the “New Old Germans,” who were campaigning for a united Germany and a return to traditional German culture.  Why a beret?  Partly because they were worn by certain craftsmen and artists like Han Sachs and Albert Dürer during the Renaissance.   

Elaborate picnics are the tradition at Glyndebourne.  There was another event going on in another theatre so quite a few people were eating in the gardens during the lunch break.  

My picnic was tasty but rather simple, I’m afraid.  As I walked around I could hear champagne corks popping from various directions. 

In just a week’s time, humongous poppies had started to bloom in Glyndebourne’s garden. 

They also had the organ room open for us to enjoy. 

I’ll see the opera itself on May 25.  I am so excited!!! 

Reactions to the opera Clemency

Reactions to the opera Clemency:  Mixed frankly.  As I wrote in the previous post, I am still pondering over it.  (Perhaps that’s the point?) 

The opera’s production updates the story to the twentieth century and gives it a vaguely Balkan setting.  The score and libretto also contain allusions to Islamic terrorists and the Sept. 11^th attacks (references to the “twin towns,” taped airplane noise, vocal lines and orchestral ornaments that mimic Islamic calls to prayer).  In the book of Genesis, the three visitors go onto destroy Sodom and Gomorrah.  Abraham argues for clemency, hence the opera’s title.   

The opening is very effective.  The opera commences in silence.  Abraham arrives home from work.  Sarah cooks in the kitchen.   A plane passes overhead.  Then Abraham launches into an extended unaccompanied prayer.  It’s beautiful writing for the solo voice. 

The orchestra does not enter until several minutes later.  The Britten Sinfonia plays MacMillan’s sparse polyphonic music with clarity and conviction.  It’s a stellar performance.

A famous icon of this Biblical account inspired its creators, so the set is framed like an altarpiece in a medieval church. Its triptych echoes the 3-in-1 music for the angelic visitors.  They mostly sing homorhythmically in close harmony.  Occasionally their utterances are polyphonic and I wish that technique would be employed more.  And I think the staging and gestures should either heighten the icon-like quality of the set or ignore it.  Instead they choose to do a little of both. 

MacMillan and Symmons Roberts claim that the opera is about vengeance, mercy and “the idea of hospitality and what happens in its absence.”  But its music and text seem to indict Islamic culture, not the Christianized west.  How hospitable is that?   Are we supposed to see Abraham and Sarah as good, but ineffectual Muslims? 

On the other hand, the “twin towns” are about to be punished for not helping the poor.  When Abraham invites the three strangers in, they are dressed as day laborers.  He and Sarah are hospitable, and Christians, Muslims, and Jews all claim Abraham as an ancestor. 

Can you tell I’m still thinking?

Another Trip to the Opera and More Morris Dancers

I travelled to London to see poet Michael Symmons Roberts and composer James MacMillan’s new chamber opera Clemency, a work that I am still mulling over.   The opera sets the Biblical story sometimes referred to as “The Hospitality of Abraham.”  Three mysterious strangers visit Abraham and Sarah;  Sarah laughs when they prophesy that she will bear a child.  

On the way to the theatre I had a laugh of my own.   I approached a traditional-looking British pub that had a sign reading “No Football Zone” over the door.  (It’s the playoff season here.)  And lo and behold – Morris Dancers! 

They told me that had been dancing all day and were having some pints to ease their sore feet.  They agreed to pose for a photo

but insisted I do so as well.

[If you want to read more about the opera, see the next post.]

Two Springs

I am having the luxury of experiencing spring twice –- first in Texas and now in England.

Everything is in bloom here: 

lilacs, wisteria,

columbine and clematis,

bluebells and golden chain.

Trevor Pinnock and Friends in Brighton

Trevor Pinnock is one of Europe’s most respected performers of Baroque music.  I purchased one of the few remaining tickets for this performance before I left Texas in April.

The concert is in an old church two blocks from the sea – again, I can’t resist going down to the water.

One of the "banjos" on Brighton's beach

I have an unreserved seat in the gallery that was advertised as having practically no view of the performers, but I arrive early and the usher tells me, “Actually, the view’s quite good if you sit on the front row.”  He is right!

“Trevor Pinnock and Friends” opens with Airs and Dances from Purcell’s The Fairy Queen and then moves onto J. S. Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 5.  I teach the flashy first movement every semester, so it’s a great treat to hear it live.  Bach wrote it to show off his employer’s new harpsichord and himself.  Pinnock plays it with spritely ease.  It’s also wonderful to hear and see the communication amongst the performers, especially during the more delicate and introspective second movement and the ebullient third. 

The organizers allow audience members to come up during the intermission and look at the harpsichord.  I feel sorry for the poor tuner, but he doesn’t seem to mind.

The second half emphasizes that the concert truly is Trevor Pinnock and Friends.  It begins with Harpsichord Concerto in D minor (with that great unison opening!) and closes with the Suite No. 2 in B minor, both by Bach. The flautist, not Pinnock, takes the spotlight during the encore.  She plays a haunting melody I recognize but can’t place (one of the Bach flute sonatas?) while the rest of the ensemble plays pizzicato accompaniment to bring the evening to a graceful, gentle close. 

Digital Opera Symposium and York Cathedral

I spent May 9 at a symposium about digital opera at the University of York.  I’m still not sure what digital opera is, but neither is anybody else it seems.  Are we talking about digital media in opera composition, performance, or distribution? All or none of the above?  Should we use the term digital or digitized? And what exactly is an opera anyway? The composers, directors, and musicologists in attendance all have different views.

After a day of mind-bending academic talk and some nifty music,  I walked over to York’s medieval cathedral and found it bathed in golden light. 

Close-up of the heart window

I gladly spent the next morning in its soothing splendor.  York’s minster (an old Anglo Saxon word for church) has been a place of worship since 627 CE.  The current building was started in 1220 and took over 250 years to complete. 

I took a guided tour that focused on the minster’s stunning windows.  Some of the stained glass dates back to the 1200s. 








The window below dates from 1260 and has over 100, 000 pieces.  (You're seeing about a third of it.)

Some panels in other windows are being restored.

Pharoh's daughter rescues Moses

When a woman asked if the church was bombed during WWII, our guide told the follow story: 

A number of years ago, I was leading a tour and the same question came up.  A man in the crowd said, “I think I can answer that.”  He had been a German bomber pilot.  “We would follow the river up to York and see the church.  So beautiful, so huge.  Why would we want to bomb it?  It was a fixed point for navigation.” 

Other fun sights and facts:

The east arm of the building is not quite in line with the rest of the nave.  I did not notice this until the guide pointed it out.  

Constantine was crowned Emperor in York in 306 CE.

In the crypt, you can see how the current building was built on top of a Norman church (c1080), which was built on top of a chapel (c700), which was built on top of a Roman fortress (c71 CE). 

Mechanical Clock

One sight at the University of York at the end of a long, word-filled day struck me as very funny:  the soap dispensers in the restroom.

Just in case you forget where you are, I suppose? Or in order to get a deal on corridor signs you had to order the soap dispensers too?