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Early Music America concerts display talents of young, emerging artists

5/29/2018

 
By Peter Jacobi H-T Reviewer | pjacobi@heraldt.com

Early Music America’s contribution to this year’s Bloomington Early Music Festival came to an end with three concerts on Saturday, two in the afternoon fulfilling the promise of introducing collegiate ensembles purveying the best in early music performance, one in the evening featuring remarkably gifted artists invading today’s concert halls to exhibit their talents.

In the afternoon

Case Western Reserve University’s Baroque Chamber Ensemble — a collective of seven instrumentalists and three singers keenly directed by Julie Andrijeski — continued the festival’s focus on French music, offering two works of space and substance: Francois Couperin’s “La Piemontoise” from “Les Nations” and “Pyrame et Thisbe,” a cantata by Michel Pignolet de Monteclair.

The Couperin is a chamber work for four (here, violinists Alan Choo and Guillermo Salas Suarez, cellist Eva Lymenstull and harpsichordist Michael Quinn) that received, as needed, a muscular and energetic reading which might be described as historically attuned jam session. Any sleepy listener would have been aroused.

The cantata retells the mythological tale of Pyramus and Thisbe, lovers doomed in life to be misguided into suicides but, thanks to relenting gods, reunited in death as embracing parts of nature. The lovers, in the Pignolet score, are given their measures of arias and duets, accomplished nicely by soprano Sarah Coffman and tenor Nathan Dougherty. The most extensive role, however, was that of the narrator who weaves the story; it was powerfully performed by bass Daniel Fridley, he of a thrillingly deep and beefy voice and dramatic bent. Ensemble members Alice Culin-Ellison (violin), Sophie Benn (cello), and Peter Bennett (harpsichord) furnished the instrumental backdrop in supportive fashion.

Program number two on Saturday afternoon brought a visit from the University of Southern California Collegium Workshop and its director, Adam Knight Gilbert. They offered “O virgo splendens: Devotional Music of Iberia,” music from the 13th, 14th and early 17th centuries of mostly a devotional nature. The program was intended to emphasize the continuity of this music and did.
One heard music of highly emotional quality, passionate in expression whether dolorous or exuberant, full-bodied vocally or whining, concerned with mortality and the hereafter or matters romantic. Over an hour or more, the music cast a hypnotic spell that carried the listener along embroiled in a whirlwind of song.

The collegium’s singers were superb: three women who could switch their instrumens from pure to coarse (Maria Hernandez, Rachelle Romero and Marylin Winkle) and countertenor Jae Hwan Kim. Several of the singers doubled as instrumentalists, but there were full-timers engaged with non-vocal aspects of these Spanish songs: Jason Yoshida, vihuela and percussion; Erin Young, baroque guitar and lute, and collegium director Gilbert, recorder and percussion.

In the evening

The day ended with a final Emerging Artists Showcase, once more divided into three parts: for violinist, soprano/harpsichord duo and piano trio.

Violinist Rachell Ellen Wong, an IU Jacobs School alum, contributed a half hour of virtuosity as she focused on 18th-century Italian violinist and composer Giuseppe Tartini and two musicians who were indebted to him, Italian violinist/composer Bartolomeo Campagnoli as student and German violinist/pianist/composer Friedrich Wilhelm Rust as one influenced. All of her recital was for violin solo, no accompaniment, either because the composer wrote the music so or the performer changed it.

Campagnoli’s Larghetto and Fugue, Opus 10, No. 5, gave soloist Wong a chance to reveal both the warmth and then brilliance of her playing. The Rust Sonata No. 1 also proved a showcase for her technical strengths. As a windup, Wong turned to two movements from Tartini’s famous/back then “infamous” Violin Sonata in G Minor, the “Devil’s Trill.” She was quite wonderful in all she played from it but also remarkable negotiating that “trill’ section in the concluding Allegro assai. Wong is an accomplished artist, in every way an EMA “emerging artist” to watch and seek out.

Soprano Adriana Ruiz, in collaboration with harpsichordist Benjamin Katz, next on the program, apparently for reason of time, cut down their set of songs by the 17th-century female composer Barbara Strozzi; the pace of the music made recognizing the cuts difficult.

Ruiz proved, however, that she has the natural and trained soprano voice to focus on Strozzi’s heart-gripping songs. And she joined, with impact, the chorus of musicians seeking to prove that Strozzi, though now increasingly recognized, is still not sufficiently regarded as a composer of importance. Strozzi’s songs about love endured, love longed for, love betrayed and love glorified are potently expressed in songs that echo the sentiments embedded in their ardent words. Soprano Ruiz proved herself an equally ardent disciple.

The program concluded with the Costanoan Trio, musicians who hail from the San Francisco area and decided a year ago they were meant to play together. Of that, they gave ample proof on Saturday evening. Cynthia Black is the ensemble’s soulful violinist, Frederic Rosselet its resonant tone-producing cellist and Derek Tam its fortepianist of the beguiling fingers. Late 18th-century music for piano trio was the object of their preference.

That meant impressive forays into the Piano Trio in C Major of Anton Reicha and Sonata in D Major of Luigi Boccherini, both contemporaries of the dominating figure of the era, Beethoven. That meant, then, happy to say, endearing attention to Beethoven’s Piano Trio in G Major, Opus 1, No. 2, a graceful, richly lyric and notes-laden piece, all joy and subdued spectacle.
The trio exhibited artistic personality and musical excellence; there can be little doubt about its path to success.

An amazing array of talent devoted to early music in Friday BLEMF performances

5/29/2018

 

By Peter Jacobi | H-T Reviewer | pjacobi@heraldt.com May 27, 2018
Early Music America, visiting partner in the programming offered by the Bloomington Early Music Festival, continued to have a significant impact on what audiences saw and heard on Friday.

​Pledged to promote the study of and the performance opportunities in early music, often now called historical performance, EMA made BLEMF its 2018 site of preference: the event at which to stage its annual Young Performers Festival and Emerging Artists Showcase.

In the afternoon, at Trinity Episcopal Church, another collegiate ensemble was featured, on this occasion the Peabody Conservatory’s B’More Bach Ensemble. In the evening, for the showcase, the headliners were a recorder-viola da gamba duo called Rumore Terribile, harpsichordist Melisande McNabney and a Juilliard School-originated ensemble, Voyage Sonique.

All proved there’s an amazing array of talent around devoted to early music; what one heard was impressive. However, in the evening, each also proved to be a rule breaker. Reportedly, the musicians were told to hold their portion of that concert to 20 minutes. Instead, each portion exceeded 40. In sum, and without official breaks, that was more than a number of audience members could take. There were departures, a shame for those who performed late.
Still, the musical values exhibited on Friday could not be doubted.

The afternoon

Peabody’s B’More Bach Ensemble consists of seven musicians, all graduate students at the institute. They spent the afternoon focused on Bach, of course, but also his important contemporary, Georg Philipp Telemann.

The Telemann pieces, Paris Quartet No. 2 in A Minor and Trietto No. 1 in G Major, were happy, gentle items, typical of the composer’s chamber music. Sets of four played them with clarity and a fine sense of line. The flute was each work’s featured instrument, one for the Paris Quartet, two for the Trietto. Sara Lynn tackled both with remarkable agility and lungs capable of the long haul. JT Mitchell served as her partner in the Trietto and totally held his own.

The four Bach selections included three vocal, which cast soprano Katelyn Aungst and baritone William Marshall into starring roles. From BWV 21 “Ich hatte viel Bekummernis” (“I Had Much Affliction”), the two joined for a duet expressing dependency on Jesus (“Come, my Jesus, and restore and delight with your glance”). Their voices vividly took on the emotion. From BWV 51 “Jauchzet Gott in allen Landen” (“Exult in God in Every Land”), soprano Aungst sang “Highest, renew your goodness every morning from now on.” Again, her voice captured the pleading, tearful nature of the aria’s message. The two then combined to unleash the fear and trembling addressed in “Crack open, heaven; tremble, world. Descend into my lament,” from the “St. John Passion.”

Flutist Lynn was joined by violinist Stephanie Zimmerman, cellist Matt Gabriel and harpsichordist Paula Maust for a carefully balanced and lyrically toned reading of Bach’s Trio Sonata in G Major, BWV 1038.

The evening

“Rumore Terribile,” a duo of two years standing, brings together the gifts of Martin Bernstein on recorders and Salome Gasselin on viola da gamba. Bernstein adds acting occasionally to his bag of tricks. It looked as if he can on Friday, but speaking without microphone and often diminishing his interpretation to near whispers, much of what he uttered was lost to this listener. It’s a complaint I frequently share after listening to musicians (and others) talk from the Auer stage.
​
The two performed a program of French and British music, 17th- and early 18th-century works by Louis and Francois Couperin, Jean-Marie Leclair, Marin Marais, Humphrey Salter, and Matthew Locke. The Italian composer and lutenist Andrea Falconieri snuck into the list with a soft, soothing melody of his. Bernstein and Gasselin make for a compelling duo. Their technical mastery of the instruments is first rate; they work in comfortable unison, and they seem to believe strongly in the music they play.

Harpsichordist Melisande McNabney delivered an all-French program of exquisite delicacy and elegance, some of it consisting of works she has transcribed. One heard music of Jean-Henri d’Anglebert, Jean-Philippe Rameau, Jean-Baptiste Lully and Antoine Forqueray. Her keyboard technique is formidable. Her taste is appropriately refined. Her sense of period is assured. Her conception of the music is on point. She well should be an artist on the rise.
​
Leclair, Francois Couperin and Marin Marais — more French fare — provided the substance for Voyage Sonique’s concert-closing segment. This group — violinists Augusta McKay Lodge and Jeffrey Girton, cellist Keiran Campbell and harpsichordist Robert Warner — played mostly as full ensemble. Its usual theorbo player had to miss the festival and was replaced by the eminent locally based Dusan Balarin, who fit right in.

In the ensemble’s playing, one could hear strong interpretive inclinations: a more formal yet intimate Sunday concert feel for Leclair’s Trio Sonata No. 1 in D Minor; a dreamy nature in Couperin’s “Le Parnasse ou L’apothetique de Corelli”; a haunting quality in Marais’ Chaconne from “Semele” and subtleties of presentation in Couperin’s Les Concerts Royaux No. 4. All were performed superbly; the musicians really appeared to belong.

CELEBRATING BLOOMINGTON’S BICENTENNIAL WITH OLD-TIME MUSIC AND DANCE

5/2/2018

 
PictureThe Hogwire String Band
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 4, 2018


In honor of the City of Bloomington’s bicentennial, the Bloomington Early Music Festival will bring together leading instrumentalists, singers, dancers and speakers in a concert, May 20, to celebrate old-time, rural-style folk music and dance traditions in the community. In addition, the festival will offer a workshop and presentation of local old-time music field recordings on May 19.

The three events are part of the upcoming Bloomington Early Music Festival, which runs from May 18-27 in multiple performance locations, in multiple Bloomington locations. For information on the complete festival of 20 events (all free to the public), visit http://blemf.org.

THE CONCERT

Old-Time Music and Dance in Bloomington: Past & Present
When: Sunday, May 20 at 7pm
Where: Unitarian Universalist Church, Bloomington
2120 N Fee Ln, Bloomington, IN 47408


Featured bands from the Bloomington area will be Brad Leftwich and the Hogwire Stringband (with Sam Bartlett, Abby Ladin and Linda Higginbotham), The Nailbenders (Grey Larsen, Mark Feddersen and Cindy Kallet) and Jamie Gans & Friends (with Brad Leftwich, Sam Bartlett and Grey Larsen). Special guest Dillon Bustin will perform traditional old-time folk songs of Bloomington and the region. Tamara Loewenthal will call and demonstrate a contra/square dance with selected dancers. Abby Ladin, Tamara Loewenthal and Malke Rosenfeld will add their percussive dancing talents to the program.

The evening will include The Nailbenders’ tribute to Joe Dawson (1928-2012), a Bloomington fiddler who for decades passed along his traditional Monroe/Brown County old-time musical legacy to members of the community.
​

Several speakers, including Dillon Bustin, Teri Klassen and Alan Burdette, will shed light upon local old-time music traditions, resources, and tradition-bearers such as fiddlers Lotus Dickey (namesake of the Lotus World Music and Arts Festival) and Strawberry McCloud.

The evening is supported in part by the Bloomington Old Time Music and Dance Group. 

PictureCindy Kallet and Grey Larsen
THE WORKSHOP

       
Old-Time Music – The Legacy of Joe Dawson
            led by Grey Larsen, Cindy Kallet, and Mark Feddersen
        When: Saturday, May 19, from 10am-12pm
        Where: Monroe County History Museum 
        ​     202 E 6th St, Bloomington, IN 47408

Bloomington fiddler Joe Dawson (1928-2012) carried and shared a treasured repertoire of traditional Monroe and Brown County old-time music. He learned these fiddle tunes from his grandfather, as well as other family members and neighbors, while living on the Elkinsville-area family farm, which is now beneath the waters of Lake Monroe. The workshop leaders will explore his legacy, introduce his music, and teach some of his tunes to all who would like to learn them. Bring your musical instrument. Audio recording is welcome, for personal use only (no posting online please).

For more on Joe Dawson, see https://greylarsen.com/resources/joe-dawson/.



PictureJoe Dawson
FIELD RECORDING PRESENTATION

        The Legacy of Fiddler Joe Dawson
           presented by Alan Burdette (director, Archives of Traditional Music) and Grey Larsen
        When: Saturday, May 19, 1pm
        Where: Hoagy Carmichael Room, IU Archives of Traditional Music
        ​    Morrison Hall, Indiana University

The presenters will describe and play samples from the large collection of Joe Dawson field recordings that Larsen made, curated and donated to the Archives. The collection also includes photos, video and other documents, and represents one of the most important collections of local traditional music in the Archives’ holdings. 

For more on Joe Dawson, see https://greylarsen.com/resources/joe-dawson/.


Postlude: We are excited to also announce that, in the fall of 2018, Grey Larsen and Cindy Kallet will be partnering with young violinists within the Monroe County Public Schools and pedagogues from the Bloomington area to teach Joe Dawson’s local traditional fiddle music.

About the 2018 Bloomington Early Music Festival

Marking its 25th year, the Bloomington Early Music Festival is grateful to a number of key partners, including the Historical Performance Institute (HPI) at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music and Early Music America, which brings to town its innovative series of performances by emerging artists and college ensembles across the United States and Canada. This year’s festival overlaps with the third annual conference on Historical Performance: Theory, Practice, and Interdisciplinarity, presented by the HPI, under the guidance of its director, Dana Marsh. For more information, please visit http://blemf.org. Sponsors for the festival include WFIU Public Radio, the City of Bloomington, and the IU Arts and Humanities Council.
Information about performances and activities surrounding the Festival this year can be found online via blemf.org and on social media. For more information, please contact the festival organizers at office@blemf.org.

FESTIVAL PARTNERS

  • Bloomington Early Music supports, encourages, and produces historically informed performance arts in Bloomington and South Central Indiana.
  • Early Music America serves and strengthens the early music community in North America through grants, scholarships, and resources that help everyone in the field at any level to explore, engage, and connect with early music and one another.
  • IU Historical Performance Institute at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music offers students the highest standard of instrumental and vocal training along with a thorough grounding in the academic reference tools of the profession – comprehensive theoretical, critical, historiographical and practical skills: to study, interpret, and perform period-specific music of the past millennium through to the early twentieth century.
  • WFIU Public Radio serves south-central Indiana with cultural programming and NPR News. WFIU also extends the educational mission of Indiana University across America and beyond as the producer and distributor of programs including Harmonia. For more than two decades, Harmonia has been a chief destination for early music on dozens of U.S. broadcast outlets, and online at harmoniaearlymusic.org.

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CONTACT THE BLEM TEAM 
Bloomington Early Music 
P.O. Box 734 
Bloomington, IN 47402
Email: office@blemf.org
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Bloomington Early Music is a 501(c)(3)
not-for-profit organization.