Rarely-heard music, Evgeny Sudbin ... and HM The Queen!

Have you ever heard of Joseph Jongen? No, neither had we, but our first hour will feature his Piano Quartet Op.23 on this week's Vivace. 

At 7 o'clock, we have a well-known trio by Mozart to enchant you.  Then, after selections by Lumbye and Ponchielli, we'll feature a work by CPE Bach played on a rarely-heard instrument, the tangent piano. And just before 8 o'clock, we have a super-special royal birthday to celebrate.

During the 8 o'clock hour, we'll start a few days of celebration to mark the visit to Charlottesville next week of the great Russian-born pianist, Yevgeny Sudbin, whose concert on Tuesday, April 29 at the University of Virginia will be the season finale for the Tuesday Evening Concert Series. He will join us on Vivace to play one of Beethoven's great piano concertos.

As ever, I hope you'll join us for Vivace, three hours of entertaining and interesting music, this Friday, 6-9 am, right here on WTJU-Charlottesville.

PS.  If you also tune in Sunday morning at about 8 am, Mr. Sudbin will be interviewed by Deborah Murray on Classical Sunrise.  In fact, why not start your Sunday on a gentle note by tuning in from 6-9 am.

"Fathers and Sons of the Bach Family"

Father’s Day is this Sunday, 17 June. To mark the occasion, on Classical Sunrise that morning (6 to 9 AM), I’ll be doing a show titled “Fathers and Sons of the Bach Family.” 

Of course you can expect to hear music of Johann Sebastian Bach and his sons, but I will also be featuring works from other lesser-known members of this extraordinary family. The Bach line of professional musicians spans over six generations. 

According to the family chronicles, Veit Bach, a baker by trade (d. ca. 1576), was the forefather of this dynasty and the first to show musical proclivities. His son Hans (d. 1626) was the first known professional musician, and his three sons in turn established different branches of the Bach family of musicians. 

Among other samplings, we’ll hear music of Heinrich Bach (1615-1692), son of Hans and founder of the Arnstadt line, and that of his son Johann Michael Bach (1648-1694). We’ll explore the music of Johann Bach (1604-1673), also the son of Hans, and the founder of the Erfurt line of the family, and listen to music of Johann’s great grandson, Johann Ernst Bach (1722-1777). 

In my mind, no day is complete without the music of JS Bach, and with 20 children to his name (10 of which survived to adulthood), JS Bach is perhaps the musical epitome of Fathers and Sons. 

So tune in to Classical Sunrise this Sunday, 17 June 2012, on WTJU Charlottesville, 91.1 FM, and streaming live on www.wtju.net, to celebrate the music of the most important family in the history of Western music.

And if you missed the program, you can hear it again on-demand anytime over the next two weeks at our Virtual Tape Vault.

Airing Britten's War Requiem

Wednesday, 30 May 2012, marks the 50th anniversary of the first performance of Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem at the newly built Coventry Cathedral. The cathedral was built adjacent to the ruins of the Gothic cathedral, which was devastated during the bombing of the City of Coventry by the Luftwaffe the night of 14 November 1940. The decision was immediately announced the next morning to rebuild the cathedral. The new cathedral was consecrated on 25 May 1962, and the War Requiem, commissioned for the occasion, was premiered there on 30 May 1962.
The War Requiem combines the Latin text of the Requiem mass with the searing poetry of Wilfred Owen, who was killed in the trenches in WWI only days before the cease fire. This monumental work has not lost any of its power or intensity today.

Britten was a pacifist, and his world view of peace and reconciliation was reflected in his selection of the soloists for the performance from among three of the major nations in conflict in both world wars: Peter Pears (English), Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (German), and Galina Vishnevskaya (Russian). The Soviets, however, refused permission for Vishnevskaya to appear. With less than two weeks before the premier, Britten was without a soprano (despite having the programs printed up with Vishnevskaya’s name in it). Britten turned to Heather Harper, who, with perfect pitch, was known for her ability to learn a part very quickly. 

Benjamin Britten made a recording of the War Requiem in 1963, featuring Pears, Fischer-Dieskau, and Vishnevskaya, the soloist originally intended for the part. This Decca recording is now legendary, and it sold 200,000 copies in the first 12 months. Not surprisingly, it remains the definitive interpretation of this powerful work.



Heather Harper, however, made the War Requiem her own, singing it hundreds of times in performances. (According to the BBC Music Magazine, her last performance of it was in 1995.) She is featured on a superb 1991 Chandos recording of the War Requiem conducted by Richard Hickox, and her performance is impeccable. (The recording was a 1992 Gramophone award winner.)

To mark this occasion (and the recent death of Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau), I will be playing a complete recording of the War Requiem on Classical Sunrise on WTJU Charlottesville, 91.1 FM, or wtju.net, on Sunday 27 May 2012, between 6 and 9 AM EDT.

Happy 327th Birthday, Johann Sebastian Bach (21 March 2012) (1685-1750)

Bach's final unfinished fugue.

Over the next three Sunday mornings on my show Classical Sunrise (6 to 9 AM EDT), I will be featuring J.S. Bach’s monumental works: Die Kunst der Fuge, BWV 1080 (The Art of Fugue); the Mass in B minor, BWV 232; and the St. Matthew Passion, BWV 244; three of the greatest classical works of all time.

Bach was the undisputed master of fugal writing, and the Art of Fugue is the culmination of his skill and artistry. The work consists of 14 fugues and four canons. The inventiveness and genius of the piece is breathtaking. It was his last major composition; Bach died before he could complete it. The abrupt ending in the middle of the last fugue, and the profound silence thereafter, speaks to my soul in a way that no other single piece of music can match.

Bach’s Mass in B Minor, BWV 232, is in some ways the vocal equivalent of the Art of Fugue: the Mass was his last choral composition, representing the crowning achievement in this genre. He completed it in 1749, the year before he died, although parts of it were composed decades earlier.

Bach’s setting of the Passion According to St. Matthew, BWV 244, was composed for Good Friday 1727 in Leipzig. Every year at St. Thomas Church in Leipzig, a Passion traditionally was performed on Good Friday. It was the high point in the church calendar, particularly coming as it did after Lent during which no music was performed in the church. Bach, as a cantor at St. Thomas church, had earlier composed the St. John Passion, BWV 245, but it lacked the unity that Bach achieved in the St. Matthew Passion. Only these two Passions survive of the five passions that were mentioned in his obituary. The St. Matthew Passion, known as the “Great Passion,” in Bach’s family, according to Christoph Wolff, surpassed all that Bach had previously composed in sacred music.

Bach’s compositions were all intended for the glory of God. Perhaps nowhere is Bach’s intention more evident than in these three grand-scale pieces.

Adolphus Hailstork

Adolphus Hailstork. I admit to being fascinated by the name before I became aware of his music. Dr. Hailstork, born in 1941, received his doctorate in composition from Michigan State University; before that, he studied at the Manhattan School of Music and also with Nadia Boulanger, among others. He is Professor of Music and Eminent Scholar at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia.

Dr. Hailstork is a versatile composer, having written numerous works for piano, organ, chamber ensembles, orchestra, band, solo voice and chorus. On my Sunday morning classical show, Classical Sunrise (6 to 9 AM) on 26 February 2012, I will be featuring a sampling of his works as part of WTJU’s Black History Week celebration.

One piece that I will play I find particularly appealing (including the title). It’s called “Ignis Fatuus,” a piano work that he composed in 1976, from a CD of the same name featuring the piano music of Dr. Hailstork.

In the liner notes, the composer informs us that the title means “foolish or mysterious fires” and that it refers to “the spontaneous ignition of gas over swampland.” Dr. Hailstork says that he is a fan of Ravel’s piano music, and the piece is certainly reminiscent of the evanescent quality of some of Ravel’s pieces, such as Miroirs. Dr. Hailstork describes the character of the piece more poetically: “These fire lights seem to flicker on and off, dancing and swirling in the dark of night, like ghostly presences.”

Robert Moran's Trinity Requiem for 9/11

Trinity Requiem: 
The Choral Music of Robert Moran
Trinity Youth Chorus; The Esoterics; 
Musica Sacra
Innova 224

To mark the tenth anniversary of 11 September 2001, the Trinity Church Wall Street (Ground Zero) commissioned Philadelphia-based composer Robert Moran to compose a requiem for the Trinity youth choir. The Trinity Requiem is a marvelous and moving work; the piece is scored for harps, cellos, and organ, and the youth chorus is joined by only a few adult members of the Trinity Choir.

The "Introit" begins the piece with two long chords that, to me, appear as a summons or calling forth to witness the tragic events of our time. The youth chorus then begins with the Kyrie, reminding me very much of the purity of one of my favorite choral pieces, the Faure Requiem, but with something more modern added, an other-worldly sense that I hear in the music of Arvo Part. The offertory in the middle of the Requiem consists of a beautiful, yet somewhat melancholy, interlude that allows more space for reflection than does the music set to text.

On the recording, a siren is heard passing the church at the beginning of the offertory. This was not planned, of course, and Mr. Moran explains in the liner notes that they decided that the "alarm" was worth preserving as a reminder that the World Trade Center had been just behind Trinity Church ten years ago. The simplicity of the "In Paradisium" section, which closes the piece, while tinged with melancholy, also leaves one with a sense of serenity and peace.

I'll be playing the Trinity Requiem some time during my show, Classical Sunrise (6 AM to 9 AM) on WTJU 91.1 FM, Sunday, 11 September, as part of my own effort to commemorate this tenth anniversary of 9/11. Please tune in. I think that you'll be moved by what you hear.

NOTE: This program is available in the WTJU Tape Vault through September 25, 2011 if you miss the live broadcast.

Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (c. 1525 - 1594)

Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina -- quite a mouthful. Actually, the composer was born in the town of Palestrina (not far from Rome); hence, "da" or from Palestrina. In his home town, he would have been known as Giovanni Pierluigi, but to the rest of the world, he was simply Palestrina.

He was arguably the most outstanding composer of his time and the leading musician of the Counter-Reformation. He composed about 104 masses, more than anyone else in the history of music, and almost half of which were published in his lifetime.

He also composed more than 300 motets, as well as numerous hymns and several settings of the Magnificat and the Lamentations of Jeremiah. His first book of masses was published in 1554 and was dedicated to Pope Julius III, who rewarded Palestrina by appointing him to the Sistine Chapel, the Pope's personal chapel. Famously, Palestrina composed the Missa Papae Marcelli to commemorate the reign of another pope, Pope Marcellus II, who, however, reigned for only 3 weeks in April 1555.

I played the Missa Papae Marcelli performed by the Tallis Scholars on my regular show on Sunday morning, Classical Sunrise (6 to 9 AM).

Today, I'll be hosting "Portrait of the Artist" from 5 to 7 PM, with Palestrina as the featured artist.

To whet your appetite, here's the Gloria from that work, performed by the Oxford Camerata, directed by Jeremy Summerly.

2011 "Proms" on WTJU

The BBC “Proms,” the well-beloved and preeminent British summer musical festival, started the 2011 season on 15 July and will run through 10 September. This season features 85 concerts, covering a wide variety of works, from the longest symphony ever written (Havergal Brian’s Gothic Symphony) to masterpieces of Renaissance composer Tomas Luis de Victoria.

The Proms, more formally known as the Henry Wood Promenade Concerts, began in 1895 and were initially held in the Queen’s Hall in London. The festival quickly became a venerated British institution. Henry Wood (knighted in 1911) conducted the concerts from the inception of the festival in 1895 until his death in 1944 (only three weeks earlier he had conducted Beethoven's Seventh Symphony at the Proms). After the Queen’s Hall was destroyed in 1941, the Proms were moved to its present location at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

Throughout the festival, I will be featuring selected works performed at the 2011 Proms during my regular show on WTJU, Classical Sunrise. So tune in Sunday mornings, from 6 am to 9 am, to WTJU 91.1 FM, or on the web at wtju.net.

Happy Birthday Arvo Part!

Arvo Part turned 75 on 11 September 2010, and the music world received the gift of the release of Mr. Part’s Symphony No. 4 (“Los Angeles”), composed in 2008. The symphony was commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic and conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen, and premiered at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in L.A. on 9 January 2009. Since then, it has been performed in New York and, most recently, at the Proms in London, to rave reviews.

The symphony comes 38 years after Mr. Part’s Third Symphony and is dedicated to Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who has been imprisoned in Siberia, presumably on political grounds, since 2003. The liner notes to the CD contain the quote “il perdono e le grazie sono necessarie in proporzione dell’ assurdita delle leggi e dell’ atrocita delle condanne.” Cesare Beccaria. (pardon and grace are necessary in proportion to the absurdity of the laws and the atrocity of the sentences). Mr. Part states that “the tragic tone of the symphony is not a lament for Khodorkovsky, but a bow to the great power of the human spirit and dignity.”

I recently aired the new recording on my Sunday morning radio show, “Classical Sunrise,” and I have listened to the symphony several times both before and after. The piece is exceedingly beautiful and other-worldly, like much of Mr. Part’s music in recent decades. I am particularly a fan of his choral music, and the symphony has much the same spiritual and mystical dimension that I so admire in those works. And, like his choral music, the symphony is based on an underlying, albeit unspoken, text, the Orthodox Canon of the Guardian Angel. The liner notes tell us that even before Mr. Part began composing the symphony, he had been thinking about texts related to guardian angels. When he received the commission from the L.A. Philharmonic, whose namesake city means “the angels,” the choice of text was clear.

Symphony No. 4 is scored for strings, harp, and percussion. It opens in a slow shimmer of strings and reflects the meditative, minimalist style that Mr. Part developed and that he terms “tintinnabulation.” This aesthetic style stems from his study in the late 1960s and early 1970s of medieval music. The chimes throughout the work also evoke the characteristic ringing of church bells. The symphony has 3 movements: the first, marked “Con sublimita,” needs no explanation, as the entire work is sublime. The second movement, marked “Affannoso,” gave me some pause. This term in Italian could mean “labored” (i.e., as in breath) or, more figuratively, frantic. Which was it? It’s both. The slow, almost labored, pace of the strings in the second movement is punctuated with the insistent urging of percussion. Finally, the last movement is marked “Deciso,” i.e., decided, bold, or with decision. To me, music this ethereal somewhat belies the notion of “bold,” but towards the end of the movement the percussion decidedly underscores Mr. Part’s vision, until the percussion too fades away into the mist.

The 2010 ECM recording also includes fragments of Mr. Part’s “Kanon Pokajanen,” a 1997 composition performed by the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir, conducted by Tonu Kaljuste, to whom the work is dedicated.

 - Deborah Murray

War and Peace 4 June 2010

Today marks the 70th anniversary of the end of the evacuation of the Allied Forces from Dunkirk in World War II, after the Allies were defeated by Germany. Winston Churchill called the evacuation operation the "miracle of deliverance."

And Sunday, the 6th June, is the 66th anniversary of D-Day, the return and landing four years later of some 160,000 Allied troops in Normandy to liberate war-occupied Europe.

WWII anniversaries are always particularly poignant for me, perhaps because my father fought in the War in the South Pacific. And so to commemorate these anniversaries and Memorial Day this past week, I will be playing Benjamin Britten's War Requiem, op. 66, on Classical Sunrise on Sunday the 6th (from 6 am to 9 am).

I'll be playing a digital release of the original 1963 recording featuring the London Symphony Orchestra, with the composer conducting, and three soloists whom Britten specifically had in mind when he composed the piece: Peter Pears, Galina Vishievskaya, and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, representing threee of the nations deeply affected by the War (Great Britain, the then-Soviet Union, and Germany).

The recording remains unsurpassed.

Please join me on Sunday.
- Deborah Murray

JS Bach's 325th Birthday on Sunday, 21 March 2010

This Sunday, 21 March 2010 marks the 325th anniversary of the birth of Johann Sebastian Bach, who, in my opinion, is the greatest composer of all time. We will be celebrating this anniversary on Classical Sunrise on Sunday from 6 to 9 am with an all-Bach program.

Starting at 6 am (EDT), I will be playing the great Mass in B minor, which was completed in his last years, around 1748-1749. His plans regarding the mass started much earlier with the layout of the Kyrie-Gloria Mass of 1733, when he thought of composing a complete setting of the mass.

Many parts of the Mass in B minor are drawn from earlier works, including the Sanctus, which was orginally written for Christmas 1724; the Osanna, which was derived from a secular cantata movement from 1732; and the Agnus Dei, derived from a cantata movement from 1725. The B minor mass represents the pinnacle and summation of Bach's vocal works.

Among other works of Bach that we will hear on Sunday, I will also play the Cantata BWV 69, Lobe den Herrn, meine Seele (Praise the Lord, O my Soul), written for the election of a new Town Council in Leipzig. This work also borrowed in part from another cantata.

No Bach Cantatas during Lent

There were no cantatas performed in the Lutheran church in Leipzig during Lent in the time of JS Bach.

Don't despair, however, because we will listen to the only surviving cantata from Bach's Weimar years that was likely performed on the Third Sunday in Lent, 24 March 1715: BWV 54, Widerstehe doch der Sunde (Resist sin indeed). So tune in to Classical Sunrise during the 6 am hour on 7 March to hear this performed.



The only other Bach cantata that would have been performed during Lent (depending on when Easter falls) would have been a cantata for the Feast of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, on 25 March. And, you can expect something special on Classical Sunrise (perhaps the B minor Mass) on Bach's birthday, Sunday 21 March.

JS Bach Cantata for Esto mihi Sunday (the Sunday before Lent)

This Sunday, 14 February 2010, on Classical Sunrise during the 6 am hour, I will be playing JS Bach's church cantata, BWV 22, Jesus nahm zu sich die Zwolfe (Jesus took the Twelve to Him). Esto mihi ("Be with me," after Psalm 31) Sunday or Quinquagesima is the Sunday before Lent.



This cantata dates from 1723, and along with Cantata 23, was composed for Bach's audition on 7 February 1723 for the post of Thomaskirche Cantor in Leipzig. A score of the cantata includes the inscription "Dies ist das Probestuck in Leipzig." (This is the Leipzig trial-piece.) Cantata 22 is tied to the Sunday Gospel, Luke 18, dealing with Jesus's journey with the twelve disciples to Jerusalem. Cantata 22 ends with a four-part chorale. And, as we know, Bach passed the audition.

During his years at Leipzig, and particularly in the first few years, Bach had to compose a new cantata each week (and then have it copied into parts, rehearsed, and ready to perform). The first Leipzig cycle of Bach church cantatas officially began with his installation as Cantor of St Thomas church on the first Sunday after Trinity 1723. The church cantata was sung after the Gospel and before the Lutheran creed. If the cantata were in two parts, the second part was performed after the sermon or during Communion.

JS Bach cantatas for Sunday, 7 February 2010

This Sunday, 7 February, on "Classical Sunrise" (6 am to 9 am EST), I'll be featuring two JS Bach church cantatas: BWV 144, Nimm was dein ist, und gehe hin (Take what is yours and go your way), and BWV 18, Gleichure der Regen und Schnee vom Himmel fallt (Just as the rain and snow fall from Heaven)(probably fairly apt given the predictions of snow for this weekend). The first is for Septuagesima, that is the Third Sunday before Lent, and was first performed on 6 February 1724, during Bach's first year in Leipzig. The latter dates most likely from 19 February 1713 during Bach's Weimar years. The text is by Erdmann Neumeister.



According to "The Cantatas of J.S. Bach," by Alfred Durr (translated by Richard DP Jones), Bach composed 5 cycles of cantatas for the liturgical calendar, but only 3 cycles survive almost intact, with a few other sacred cantatas. The earliest Bach cantata that is known dates from his Mulhausen period (roughly 1707). The year 1713, the year BWV 18 likely was composed, also coincides with the first secular cantata of JS Bach (as far as we know).

I hope you are enjoying this presentation of JS Bach sacred cantatas matched to the liturgical calendar. Deborah

Bach Cantatas on "Classical Sunrise"

This Sunday, 31 January, on "Classical Sunrise," I'll be featuring two JS Bach cantatas: Cantata for the 3rd Sunday after Epiphany, BWV 111, Was Mein Gott will, das gscheh allzeit, and Cantata for the 4th Sunday after Epiphany, BWV 81, Jesus schlaft, was soll ich hoffen.

BWV 111 was composed for 21 January 1725. The four-verse hymn on which it is based incorporates verses by Duke Albrecht of Prussia (1547, 1554). The anonymous librettist for BWV 81 takes the text from the Gospel of Matthew, 8:23-27 (Jesus, sleeping in the boat, is awakened and calms the storm). This cantata dates from Bach's first Leipzig cycle of cantatas, and was composed for 30 January 1724.

I'll be airing a recording featuring the Holland Boys Choir and the Netherlands Bach Collegium, conducted by Pieter Jan Leusink. The soloists for BWV 111 are Ruth Holton, soprano, Sytse Buwalda, alto, Nico van der Meel, tenor, and Bas Ramselaar, bass.

For BVW 81, the featured soloists are Sytse Buwalda, Knut Schoch, tenor, and Bas Ramselaar. This is a complete set of Bach sacred cantatas, on the Brilliant Classics label. This is the second year in which I am featuring Bach cantatas for the entire liturgical calendar on "Classical Sunrise."

 - Deborah Murray