Minority Rites
July 11, 2009
One of the happiest developments for those of us with interests that inhabit what are called niches is that no niche-interest is too small to get its full due through new media. There seems to be a blog for everything, and communication between people involved with the rarest pursuit can find fellow-enthusiasts somewhere in the world to gratify and stoke that zeal. Marketing has come to see the power of this phenomenon under the label of the “long tail” — out of which fortunes are being made on what would once have been deemed unprofitable minority concerns.
Some of these niches, of course, predate digital media but nevertheless profit from them and the communication they forward. Those interested, for example, in the history of the design, technology, manufacture, preservation, and restoration of pipe organs have long merited their reputation as a particularly hardy lot. The Organ Historical Society was founded in 1956, largely under the influence of the doyenne of organ historians, Barbara Owen, for whom that adjective hardy would constitute a laughable understatement. At the time when the Society was founded, the keenest interest among historians and amateurs was focused on the mechanical-action pipe organs that had predated the innovations involving pneumatic and electrical means, starting in the late 19th century. Their interest was far from being all abstract, for valuable monuments to artistic creativity and technological genius were being destroyed constantly in those days, simply for want of an appreciation for their irreplaceable value — a value often obscured by poor maintenance or the redundancy or altered purpose of the venues that housed them.
Such ardent concentration on one type of instrument, mostly those of greatest antiquity, led to an unfortunate corollary: the instruments that had gradually succeeded the old mechanical-action (also called tracker-action) organs in dominance began themselves to be replaced — often thoughtlessly — by new instruments that sought to imitate the virtues (and technology) of the older style. Many of these new organs were of the highest quality, but many were not up to the standards of the instruments that they replaced — the best of which suffered from merely having become temporarily unfashionable. (It is true that some of the musical concerns that led to their falling out of favor had real validity in their aim to compensate for the relative neglect of certain musical values for a time.)
As we know, fashions can be cyclical. But the wheels don’t necessarily revolve on their own. There usually arise prophets who prepare the way for the new or the return of a proper appreciation for the old. In the case of the electro-pneumatic organs of “symphonic” character, a leading harbinger was Nelson Barden. In a certain approach to aristocratic quality of workmanship, he has no rivals. Though he might have persisted in crying in the wilderness, fueled by his ardor for these instruments — then considered decadent by much of the musical intelligentsia — his fervor fortunately was able to light fires in others as well. Some of these, happily, were not lacking in means to further his work in preserving and extending the use of what was left of a great tradition — one in which, by the way, a number of American builders had long kept the Patent Office busy and were stars of the recurrent “industrial exhibitions” that were such an item for the Victorians and Edwardians.
The occasion for my briefly (and thus insufficiently) commemorating his great accomplishments here was a celebration of Nelson Barden’s 75th birthday last Sunday in Boston. A grand banquet was held in the vast space that houses the Boston University Symphonic Organ, a creation of Mr. Barden out of surviving components deserving of a new home (the nucleus coming from the Aeolian house organs, once so common in the mansions of American magnates, belonging to benefactors of the University).
The after-dinner program included a wonderful silent movie, accompanied by anything but silence from the great organ, improvised with consummate skill and imagination by Peter Krasinski. Then came more masterly music-making on the Symphonic Organ, both from historic performances that were immortalized on paper rolls (the contents of which Mr. Barden has now digitalized, providing another valuable service to historic preservation) and — at least as notably — live performances by Harry Huff, one of the leading virtuosos of the symphonic manner on the pipe organ.
Then we heard a brilliant re-creation by two exponents of Nelson Barden’s shop, now leading practitioners in their own right, of what they credibly claim was the stock lecture Nelson Barden gave around 650 times to visitors to the Boston University Symphonic Organ. It managed to be hilarious and moving at the same time. One of those entertainers was Jonathan Ambrosino, who was the instigator of the event and, with other distinguished partisans of the cause, sponsored the grand affair (such large attendance being the more amazing when the annual convention of the Organ Historical Society was getting underway in Cleveland).
Nelson Barden had declared that he wouldn’t utter a word by way of speechifying. Thanks, however, to the sway of the fruit of the vine, he gave an account of his life and work in perhaps twenty minutes that could have passed for a painstakingly-composed major address.
Here follow a few photos of the organ taken on the happy occasion (just with my iPhone), when over a hundred grateful diners renewed bonds with each other, with the honoree, and with an art that is not now lost, partly because of Nelson Barden.
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Yankee Doodle Diva
July 6, 2009
We have appreciated Joyce DiDonato here before, and the American mezzo-soprano daily extends the artistic celebrity that she deservedly enjoys round the world. But, on her country’s Independence Day, she demonstrated for British audiences physical bravery and performance-heroism that recall Greg Louganis’s return from injury to triumph in the 1988 Olympics.
Joyce DiDonato has provided her own account of the evening here, with followups here.
UPDATES FROM OTHER SOURCES:
Intermezzo
Financial Times
The Telegraph
Live Journal
Prima la Musica
The Independent
Parterre Box
Jacksonian Democracy
June 29, 2009
What we like to call, with disdain, the media circus surrounding the death of Michael Jackson was predictable. I’m finding, though, that the reactions of people I know are not so much so.
There has been an intermittently stimulating discussion of the list-serv of the American Musicological Society that appropriately asks the question of how fitting the toolbox of the scholarly musicologist is to the artistic legacy of Michael Jackson. Since modern musicology is conversant with the language of reception of art and the influences, upon it and by it, that are not altogether musical, the subject need not be an embarrassment to dispassionate research. But passionate research is what many will enter into when it comes to a figure whose effect on masses of humanity is not yet completely understood.
One blogger has taken up the task of aggregating serious writing on Michael Jackson — a worthy and particularly 21st-century-media thing to do. It will be interesting to watch how it develops. It can be expected to produce a mixture of scientific content wrapped in a commonplace wrapper and commonplace content disguised by scientific lingo (and I certainly know which I prefer).
I Feel Compelled to Point Out
June 22, 2009
The young woman, Neda, who died from gunshot wounds while unarmed and unaggressive on the street in Tehran, died in the arms of her music teacher.
I can’t be the only musician who is moved by this.
Music Criticism vs. Fantasy Life
June 17, 2009
It is a perennial accusation made against worshipers that they make their gods in their own image. I’m on record below as being a big fan of Le Poisson Rouge, but in today’s New York Times we are told
So you can imagine how gratified the composer [Arnold Schoenberg] would have been to hear this fresh, keenly dramatic account of “Pierrot Lunaire” presented at an informal club for an eager and receptive audience.
Whoa there.
Schoenberg famously put on his ideal concerts for years in Vienna. These were notoriously ernst affairs. Would the man who didn’t even allow applause take to the easy-going Poisson Rouge atmosphere? I think not. Not the man who said, “If it is art, it is not popular. And if it is popular, it is not art.”
Another thing that the chief critic of the Times may be forgetting is that, if Schoenberg had had his way, said critic might not even have been allowed at the Poisson Rouge performance, since Schoenberg customarily posted a sign at the door saying, Kritikern ist der Eintritt verboten (”Critics are forbidden entry”).
Is It Still Serious Music If the Violist Smiles?
June 15, 2009
Le Poisson Rouge has been cited here before for its presentations and means of presentation. I’ve now been there for five very different occasions, and last night brought the best of those. In a program also flagged here recently, Alarm Will Sound gave a Derek Bermel evening.
While the music was consistently fine and the performances were of the highest virtuosity, the main point I want to make is one of attitude. I remember, years ago in the New Yorker, the estimable Andrew Porter’s expression of astonishment and pleasure when a chamber musician showed by a smile that he was pleased with a happy turn of phrase that he had just executed. We are not surprised when a member of an early-music group does this, and rock musicians of course have such facial demonstrations as an indispensable part of their stock-in-trade. But conventional “classical” instrumental musicians who aspire to be taken seriously (say, the player in most of your major string quartets or — goodness knows — the white-tie-sporting symphonic musician who dreams of a career in the Berlin Philharmonic) knows that the poker-face is part of the uniform. He’d no more laugh at a humorous phrase in Haydn than he’d wear flip-flops with his tails.
Thus, when the tacit violist in the front row right away reflected in the movement of his body that he was artistically involved in someone else’s playing, it not only increased my own involvement with the performance but it felt a little transgressive, too. But only for a moment. These folks are offering challenging “classical” music as though it’s something to be enjoyed. The fact that they aren’t ashamed to show their own enjoyment in their countenances and body-language gives us permission to imitate their involvement and share in their resulting satisfaction.
May their tribe increase, I say.
Two hundred years ago today, Mozart’s Requiem was sung for Haydn (who had died on the last day of May) in Vienna’s Schottenkirche.
One Fine Insight from 1973
June 10, 2009
A memorable part of Leonard Bernstein’s Norton Lectures at Harvard, in which he gave a masterly elucidation of Mozart’s 40th Symphony, came when he recomposed the first movement as Mozart would have done had he been merely a master of musical materials and not a genius. Everything was perfectly thought-out, symmetrical — but without that spark of life that genius lends.
Ever since that revelation, I have now and then been struck by the same principle being displayed by a great variety of the best composers (whether or not to Mozart’s degree is another question) . To take an example that revealed itself to me a few days ago: Puccini’s “Un bel dì” from Madama Butterfly. It would be difficult to come up with a composer more distant from Mozart in many ways. But in the aspect of creativity that Bernstein was dealing with, they are blood-brothers. Here is a take-home assignment: look at or listen to “Un bel dì” and rethink it as perfectly well-behaved, very regular, tune. My efforts produced a perfectly charming tune for a popular song — which simply revealed why people are so enchanted with the much less predictable tune that Puccini came up with.
To take one example that occurs right off the bat: the mediocre composer (maybe me) might have ended the first phrase, “Un bel dì, vedremo” with “-mo” held for three beats and followed it by a perfectly balanced consequent phrase. But the conflicted Butterfly gets to sing something far more interesting. Just as she utters her “-mo,” the orchestra continues the melody immediately, to be joined by the unhappy geisha two beats later. There are so many intricate things going on here that reward close examination. But for now, I just want to register my delight at this general way of thinking, which I was led to years go by Bernstein’s infectious and intelligent love for Mozart’s great edifice in G Minor.
The song is “Unstoppable” by Santigold.
As noted here before (and by Anne Midgette elsewhere), the Thirteenth Van Cliburn International Competition has taken a fresh approach to its presentation of contemporary works. In the event, many of the competitors have told interviewers that they chose a work from the four possibilities based on what they thought they could learn in time. And who can blame them? John Musto’s difficult “Improvisation and Fugue” thus was played by only one of the semi-finalists, Nobuyuki Tsujii. But that twenty-year-old not only took a gold medal but won the large cash award for the best performance of a contemporary piece for his crystalline interpretation of the Musto work. That he learned it in a short time and played it with confidence is a great tribute to him, and his winning shows the good judgment of the jury. He had been a clear audience favorite throughout.
The young Japanese pianist did not choose the Musto as his only challenging work by any means. He played hours of major works (including, among many other things, the Hammerklavier Sonata, a Schumann quintet, and concertos by Chopin and Rachmaninoff). He has been blind from birth.
The new work, which was commissioned by the Stecher and Horowitz Foundation for their own Fourth New York International Piano Competition held last summer, where it enjoyed some brilliant performances, can be heard in Nobuyuki Tsujii’s prize-winning version on Cliburn TV (at Semifinal Archive for May 31), and played by the winner of the Stecher and Horowtiz competition, Allen Yueh, here. You will want to compare the two quite distinct interpretations.
UPDATE: Nobu’s performance is now also on YouTube.
