One of the core tenants of Cedar Valley Chamber Music is to utilize the size of our ensembles to take music off the traditional concert stage and out into the community. Maybe no other season demonstrates this concept better than the one presented to you this summer. I say this because, while you will hear a few works originally written for chamber ensemble, the majority of this season’s programs use chamber ensembles as a vehicle to transport the essence of a work to a completely different format. The initial motivations behind the creation of these arrangements were often times commercial in nature. It is easiest to think of them as the equivalent of today’s audio recordings. For a price, you could buy chamber ensemble editions of symphonies, overtures, concertos, or other larger works and, along with your friends, perform the symphonies of Haydn, Mozart, or Beethoven from the comfort of your own home. From the performer’s standpoint, this is a wonderful challenge. Not only is it chamber music, but the reduction of the original symphonic forces to a chamber ensemble requires the musician to be aware of the composer’s original intent for orchestration. For example, a violinist or pianist in the arrangement must transform themselves at any given moment and imitate an oboe, french horn, harp, or any other variety of orchestral instruments that were used in the original works. The other challenge, particularly with later works like Strauss or Stravinsky, is that musicians also are required to play a significant amount of notes! There is no way around that when one takes a piece for 100 players and reduces it down to only 5! As Artistic Director, I love the idea of this season’s theme because it makes impossible artistic ideas possible. Beethoven Symphony no. 6 at Covenant Medical Center (July 18), a Strauss Tone Poem inside Sunnyside Country Club (July 20), and bringing the Rite of spring to life in the Grand Lobby of the GBPAC (July 24) are just a few examples of this contradiction made real. Of course the reverse is also true. When it comes to Mussorgsky’s “Pictures at an Exhibition” (July 24) or Ravel’s “Mother Goose Suite” (July 17/18), works originally conceived for piano get a little larger. Most know Ravel’s large orchestration of both of these works, but I think you will find that these “intermediate-sized” ensemble transcriptions bring their own unique ideas and expressions to each work. One of my favorite lines from “Alice in Wonderland” is when Alice says to the White Queen, “…”There’s no use trying," she said; "one can't believe impossible things.” And the Queen replies, "I daresay you haven't had much practice.…When I was younger, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast!” So bring along your imagination this season and enjoy these “impossible” performances transformed “Through the LookingGlass”.
Hunter Capoccioni, Artistic Director
Concert #1: Symphonic Metamorphosis
“Down the Rabbit Hole” Our 2016 Summer Outreach Series
July 15, 7:00pm Trinity United Methodist Church, Charles City
Sponsored by the Max and Helen Guernsey Foundation All events are free and open to the public
July 16, 7:00pm First Presbyterian Church, Cedar Falls
Community Concerts by The Exorior Duo
Michelle Cheramy, flute Courtney Miller, oboe Kirsten Yon, violin Tara Lynn Ramsey, violin Julia Bullard, viola Yvonne Smith, viola Nathan Cook, cello Stefan Kartman, cello Jeannie Yu, piano
July 13, 10:30am: Landmark Commons, Waterloo
July 14, 10:00am: Windhaven Communities, Cedar falls
July 19, 10:00am: Friendship Village, Waterloo
Jul 20, 10:00am: The Western Home Chapel, Cedar Falls
Concert for Families: Ravel’s Mother Goose with Animation
Symphony No. 6 in F major “The Pastoral” (1808) arr. Michael Gotthard Fischer (1810)
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 - 1827)
I.
Allegro ma non troppo: Erwachen heiterer Empfindungen bey der Ankunft auf der Laude. Andante con moto: Scene am Bach.
July 16, 2:00pm: The Hearst Center for the Arts, Cedar Falls
II.
July 17, 2:00pm: The Waterloo Center for the Arts, Town Hall, Waterloo
III. Allegro: Lustiges Zusammensein der Landleute. IV. Allegro: Donner Sturm.
Other Community Concerts “Beethoven Goes to the Hospital”
Seven Metamorphoses sur la “Pastorale” (1983)
Covenant Medical Center Visitor Lobby July 18, 2:00pm
Two Rhapsodies for Flute, Viola, and Piano (1901)
Guest Artist Recital: The Florestan Duo A concert to honor 40 years of the UN I Suzuki School July 18, 7:00pm The Hearst Center for the Arts
CVCM Solo night At The Cellar Wine and Martini Bar
I. “L’ Étang” (The Pond) II. “La Cornemuse” (The Bagpipe)
Jan Novak
(1921 - 1984) C. M. Loeffler (1861-1935)
Symphony No. 104 in D major “London” (1795)
I. II. III. IV.
Franz Joesph Haydn (1732- 1809)
Adagio — Allegro Andante Menuetto: Allegro Finale: Spiritoso
A fundraiser for the Boys and Girls Club of the Cedar Valley July 21, 7:00 pm
Also Sponsored by The Virginia Zastrow Smith Performing
Symphony No. 6 in F Major “Pastorale” Most concert goers know Beethoven’s famous Symphony No. 6, in whole or at least in part. Its 1808 premiere in Vienna was one of the most infamously long concerts in history (it also featured Beethoven’s Symphony No.5, Piano Concerto No. 4, and selections from his Mass in C!) Though the “Pastoral” Symphony was originally panned by critics, it seems to have greatly inspired the organist/composer Michael Gottfried Fischer of Erfurt. History indicates that Fischer never actually met Beethoven, but he might simply be considered a big fan who was passionate about having great music accessible to the public through arrangement. Fischer also arranged piano scores of three different operas including Mozart’s entire “Magic Flute” for publication. The purpose of such arrangements were to make works with large casts accessible to a small group of performers and consequently to bring awareness of the masterpiece to a larger group of interested people. Fischer wasn’t the only Beethoven aficionado to arrange his symphonies either. The virtuoso pianist and composer Johann Nepomuk Hummel made various arrangements of Beethoven Symphonies Nos. 4 - 8, a piano trio version of Symphony No. 2, and a four-hand piano edition of the Grosse Fugue. Hummel chose instrumentations similar to what you will hear in Salomon’s arrangements of Haydn’s symphonies (July 24) with flute, strings, and piano in various configurations. However, Fischer went a different and unusual direction with the use of a string sextet. While popular in the late-Romantic period, this ensemble type was almost non-existent in the first decade of the nineteenth century. Mozart, and Beethoven both wrote string trios, quartet, and quintets, but no sextets. The only six-part music they wrote were for woodwind quintet and piano. Indeed, one of the few sextets that come from the same period as this work is the Grande Sestetto Concertante KV 364 (1808) which Cedar Valley Chamber Music will perform on our final concert of this season.
7 Métamorphoses on Symphonie “Pastorale” Jan Novak (1921-1984) is this season’s “composer that deserves more recognition.” He is the perfect example of a handful of composers whose love for their homeland (in this case Czechoslovakia) outweighed the political and social problems that faced Europe in the early twentieth century. After the end of World War II, Novak received government funding to travel to the U.S. From 1947-48 Novak worked with composers including Aaron Copland and Boleslav Martinů. Still, even though Czechoslovakia underwent a communist takeover in 1948, Novak chose to return to his hometown of Brno, where he stayed for several years. Disillusionment finally set in for Novak as his more liberal political views placed him at odds with the communist government of that period and he eventually did move with his family to other European countries including Denmark and Italy. The other reason for Novak’s relative obscurity may be linked to his musical style. In tonight’s work, you will hear harmonic tonality, polytonality, and rhythmic influences from Czech folk music and American jazz. Martinů, Milhaud, Poulenc, and Copland are all present in this music but, for the generation following World War II, this style of composition was considered conservative and “out dated.” Three decades after his death, Novak’s use of instrumental color, rhythmic and textural variety, as well as a dark humor show him to be a composer of the highest levels of artistic abilities and imagination.
Deux Rhapsodies Charles Martin Loeffler (1861-1935) was a violinist, composer, and scholar who had a varied and interesting life on both sides of the Atlantic. Born in Germany, he began his pursuit to master the violin at a young age, studying with several of the great performers/teachers of the late nineteenth century (Joachim, Massart, Lèonard). Moving the the US to find new musical opportunities he eventually became a concertmaster of the Boston Symphony, a position he held for twenty-one years (1882 - 1903). (continued on next page_)
During that time, Loeffler gave the American premieres of the Bruch, Saint-Saens, and Lalo violin concerti. Loeffler was a well)read artist with a preference for French literature. His particular love of poetry often inspired his musical composition and this can been seen in his Two Rhapsodies on tonight’s program. Both movements are influenced by the symbolist poetry of Maurice Rollinat (1846-1903). The symbolist style is often described as “indirect” and “dream-like” in quality with the goal being to explore spiritual concepts lying behind nature rather than nature itself. The Rhapsodies exemplify this concept musically using suggestive movement titles (“Pond” and “Bagpipes”). The pastoral titles bring images to mind but, unlike Beethoven who describes scenes for each movement of his symphony, Loeffler's single words are vague and referential to each individual. The Pool Full of old fish, stricken blind long ago, the pool, under a near sky rumbling with thunder, bares the splashing horror of its gloom between centuriesold rushes. Over yonder, goblins light up more than one marsh that is black, sinister, unbearable; but the pool is revealed in this lonely place only by the croakings of consumptive frogs. Now the moon, piercing at this very moment, seems to look here at herself fantastically; as though, one might say, to see her spectral face, her flat nose, the strange vacuity of her teeth – a death's-head lighted from within, about to peer into a dull mirror. The Bagpipe His bagpipe groaned in the woods as the wind; and never has stag at bay, nor willow, nor oar, wept as that voice wept. Those sounds of flute and oboe seemed like the death rattle of a woman. Oh! his bagpipe, near the cross-roads of the crucifix! He is dead. But under cold skies, as soon as night weaves her mesh, down deep in my soul, there is the nook of old fears, I always hear his bagpipe groaning as of yore.
Symphony No. 104 “London” In today’s modern lingo, what Franz Joesph Haydn was subjected to in 1790 might be referred to as “corporate restructuring.” It was during this year that Haydn’s longtime employer, Nicolaus von Esterhzy, died and left the continuance of the estate to his son Anton. Sadly, Anton was not as enthusiastic as his father and regarded the performing arts less interesting than hunting. With that, the great Esterhazy orchestra of Europe was disbanded. However, as Alexander Bell once so famously said, “When one door closes another opens…”, and in walked Johann Peter Salomon. You may have never heard of Salomon, but his connections to classical music are many and significant. For one, he was born in Bonn in the exact same house that would later bear a composer named Beethoven. He is the supposed author that coined the term “Jupiter” for Mozart’s last symphony and was well respected enough to be buried inside Westminster Abbey upon his death. He was a highly skilled violinist who not only lead the commissioning of twelve symphonies from Haydn, but would also concertmaster each performance in London. It was his ingenuity, combined with an impeccable sense of timing, that brought Haydn to London. From Haydn’s perspective it was close to having Publisher’s Clearinghouse arrive at your door. The amount of money that Salomon was able to offer Haydn to write two sets of six symphonies each was more than Haydn had ever seen living at the Esterhzy estate. Having purchased the rights to these symphonies, and with Haydn being immensely popular, Salomon was well positioned to sell the orchestral score and parts to the large publishing houses of Europe and recoup some money in the process. Interestingly, he choose instead to make his own arrangements of these works for home performance (Hausmusik in German). He labeled them “Grand Quintets,” as the piano part itself was seen as optional for performance. Either way Salomon’s instrumentation truly captures the grandiose nature of Haydn’s twelve symphonies. Many other composers would have simply arranged each work for piano four-hands or for a piano trio (as Clementi actually did). Salomon’s ensemble however allows for more surprise and variation in the dynamics and color which Haydn’s music requires, particularly for Symphony No. 104.
Concert #3: Small Sacrifices
Concert #2: Extreme Makeover… Strauss Edition
July 23, 3:00pm Elkader Opera House
July 20, 7:00pm Sunnyside Country Club
July 24, 3:00pm Gallagher Bluedorn Performing Arts Center
Michelle Cheramy, flute Daniel Friberg, clarinet Benjamin Coelho, Bassoon Yu-Ting Su, Horn Tara Lynn Ramsey, violin Katherine Wolfe, violin Kirsten Yon, violin Julia Bullard, viola Yvonne Smith, viola Nathan Cook, cello Stefan Kartman, cello Hunter Capoccioni, double bass Jeannie Yu, piano
Till eulenspiegel einmal anders !, Op. 28 Distilled by Franz Hasenöhrl Metamorphosen (1945)
Richard Strauss
(1864- 1949)
Richard Strauss
Benjamin Klemme, conductor Michelle Cheramy, flute Courtney Miller, oboe Daniel Friberg, clarinet Benjamin Coelho Bassoon Yu-Ting Su, Horn Deborah Klemme, violin Tara Lynn Ramsey, violin Kirsten Yon, violin Julia Bullard, viola Yvonne Smith, viola Nathan Cook, cello Hunter Capoccioni, double bass
Realization by Rudolf Leopold (1996)
Piano Quartet in C minor, Op. 13 (1884) I. II. III. IV.
Richard Strauss
Grand Sestetto Concertante KV 364 (1779)
Anonymously arranged 1808 I. Allegro II. Andante III. Finale: Presto
Igor Stravinsky
Arranged by Wolfgang Renz (2006) I. Promenade II. The Gnome III. The Old Castle IV. Tuileries V. Cattle VI. The Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks in their Shells VII. Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuyle VIII. The Market at Limoges IX. Catacombs X. The Hut on Fowl’s Legs XI. The Great Gates of Kiev
Modest Mussorgsky (1839 - 1881)
Le Sacre du Printemps (1913)
Allegro Scherzo: Presto Andante Finale: Vivace
Arranged for the Imani Winds by Jonathan Russell (2010) I. II.
Kaiser-waltzer, Op. 437 (1889)
Arranged by Arnold Schoenberg (1925)
Sponsored by Dr. Kent and
Johann Strauss II (1825-1899)
(1882 - 1971)
L’Adoration de la Terre (Adoration of the Earth) Le Sacrifice (The Sacrifice)
Pictures at an Exhibition (1874)
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756 - 1791)
Till Eulenspiegel – einmal anders! (Till Eulenspiegel – differently, for once!) The character of Till Eulenspiegel epitomizes the common man’s desire to challenge the establishment. The fourteenth century Germanic folk hero uses prank and mischief to get back at society, particularly the clergy and nobility. To set the tone for Till’s general demure, Strauss opens with the laughing, mischievous Eulenspiegel depicted by the French horn. This melody returns throughout the piece as the main character pesters the townspeople. Unfortunately for our hero, one of his pranks goes terribly wrong, and after a review by a panel of judges, Eulenspiegel is sentenced to death. Strauss musically illustrates both the seriousness of the judges, interspersed with joking and pleading by Eulenspiegel, as well as the mâcabre moment he is hung from the gallows. First performed in 1954, the version of Eulenspiegel you are hearing tonight is best categorized as a “deconstruction” of Strauss’ original work. The arranger, Franz Hasenöhrl (1885-1970), taught composition at Vienna’s University of Music. This is his only known published work which is a surprise as Hasenöhrl accomplished an amazing feat. This arrangement boils down an enormous, fully orchestrated piece to just five instruments (the original score calls for a full string section plus three flutes, piccolo, three oboes, English horn, two Bb clarinets, clarinet in D, bass clarinet, three bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns plus four more ad lib., three trumpets plus three more ad lib., three trombones, bass tuba, timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, and ratchet). He also greatly reduced the length of the original work (cheated?) from around twenty minutes to around eight minutes. With large sections of the work missing this work could be thought of as a parody of a joke…or a musical joke of a musical joke.
Metamorphosen 80th
Not long before his birthday, Richard Strauss got word of the destruction of Dresden (where many of his works had their premieres), then the bombing of Munich and Vienna---in which the great opera houses of both cities were destroyed. Heartbroken, Strauss tinkered with a septet for strings, possibly inspired by the string sextet he uses to open his opera Capriccio which was written during the same year, but with the addition on the double bass. At first bore the title “Mourning for Munich.” When Paul Sacher, the conductor of a chamber orchestral in Basel, Switzerland, commissioned a new work from Strauss, the septet was rebranded as Metamorphosen [Metamorphoses] and was expanded from seven solo parts to twenty-three. The work was composed between March-April, 1945 during the terrible final weeks of the war and was premiered on 25th January, 1946. Tonight you will be hearing a reconstruction of the original string septet by cellist Rudolf Leopold who researched the early sketches of the work in 1990s and published it in 1995 with Boosey and Hawkes. Metamorphosen unfolds through a seamless and continuous contrapuntal tapestry. The textures shift smoothly from lower to higher instrumental sonorities and from transparent simplicity to some of the richest seven-part writing ever conceived. The layers of this tapestry are composed of themes: a solemn processional that opens in the lower strings, an insist theme with four repeated notes at its start, and a lyrical theme that gently swells in the violins. Within these themes are the seeds of the funeral march from Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony. The way Strauss works with this idea is anything but "thematic." Most works introduce a theme and deconstruct it over the course of the work. Metamorphosen is exactly the opposite. The essence of Beethoven is veiled and scattered over the course of the work and only truly reveals itself at the very end. Underneath the ending Strauss writes the words “In Memoriam!” What that means is subject to interpretation, but in the large sense the eighty year old Strauss, a man who lived through a dizzying succession of emperors, kings, and prime ministers was saying farewell to an entire culture. A culture that was in large part shaped by the Napoleon of Beethoven’s period (Eroica) and stretched to the destruction that defined the rule of Hitler’s regime.
Piano Quartet in C Minor, Op. 13 From a work that Strauss composed at 80 years of age, we turn to a a piece written when he was a mere 20. This piece won Strauss the first prize of 300 marks at a Berlin Composers’ Society competition and seems to have been a source of personal pride for the composer as is indicated by the fact that he was still performing it on his 1921 American concert tour. The piano quartet would also prove to be the last work of chamber music he composed before he turned his focus to larger orchestra forces. The piece itself is reflective of a young composer well acquainted, if not enamored, with Johannes Brahms along with the kernels of what would blossom into Strauss’s trademark lyricism. The quartet is laid out in four spacious movements. The opening Allegro is the farthest-ranging in terms of mood and the most direct in its relationship to Brahms with its variety of rhythmic and harmonic shifts . The Andante is as expressive an instrumental movement as we might expect from the great composer of songs Strauss proved to be, and the extended scherzo clearly signals the eventual arrival of the merrily joking Till Eulenspiegel ten years later. The final movement is filled with a different kind of vitality and symbolism, coming to rest, after a stunning little fugato that is more intimate than showy, in a confident gesture that seems to declare the completion of Strauss's engagement with the genre of chamber music for his expressive purposes.
Kaiser-Waltzer, Op. 437 In 1918 Schoenberg and some of his students established a Society for Private Performances. Its purpose was to mix together academic study and musical performance together in an intimate environment. The members were to grant center stage to the music at all times and there was to be neither applause nor expressions of dissatisfaction. All music was also to be given the appropriate room and respect so that listeners might focus their critical faculties. Not only new music, but also arrangements of well-known classics, were performed at these concerts. The society was discontinued in 1921 and the Kaiserwalzer arrangement is dated 1925, but while it was never part of the Society for Private Performance's repertoire, it may be supposed that it was used for a similar course of Schoenberg's own teaching. Though quite a different animal from Strauss's Metamorphosen, some Schoenberg historians also point to this arrangement as being Schoenberg's musical farewell to Viennese culture and the whole of his life to that point as he left Vienna that year to accept a post in Berlin to teach theory and composition. Strauss deconstructing Beethoven and Schoenberg arranging thee Viennese waltz. All in all, this arrangement of the Emperor Waltz isn’t too far outside the original intent of the composer. At its height, Johan Strauss and his dance band were only thirty musicians. Before this, Strauss began with a similar sized ensemble. Perhaps two violins, a viola, double bass, and maybe a piano. Johann Strauss worked his way up by performing in cafes, restaurants, and small parties around Vienna. It was over many years of fame and the rise of the waltz in Viennese society that his ensemble grew to the larger size. In some ways the Vienna Philharmonic performances of Strauss on New Years Eve are just as much an arrangement of the original intent of these waltzes as the one you are hearing this evening. Written to celebrate the 40th anniversary of of the Austrian Emperor’s rule. It consists of an introduction, four waltzes, and a lengthy coda.
2016 Artists Julia Bullard is professor of viola and Associate Director of the School of Music at the University of Northern Iowa. She is an active solo, chamber and orchestral performer both in the US and abroad. Recent solo and chamber engagements include performances in Russia, Central and South America, France, and across the US. In November of 2015 she performed as soloist with the Bogotá Chamber Orchestra. She is the violist of Trio 826, a string trio, which has just released their first CD recording entitled “Mosaic” on the Blue Griffin label. Julia received her Bachelor and Master’s degrees from Temple University in Philadelphia and the DMA degree from the University of Georgia. Her teachers included Joseph dePasquale, Emanuel Vardi, Sidney Curtiss, Mark Cedel, and Levon Ambartsumian. Prior to joining the UNI faculty she taught at the University of Georgia's Pre-College Program, Settlement Music School (Philadelphia), and Temple University’s Music Preparatory Division. She has performed with various orchestras, including the Greenville (SC), Trenton (NJ), South Jersey, Macon (GA), Schenectady (NY), and Utica (NY) symphonies, as well as at several summer festivals including the Madeline Island Music Camp, Luzerne Music Center, Ash Lawn-Highland Opera Festival, and the Virginia Waterfront International Arts Festival. A native of Waterloo, Hunter Capoccioni received his Bachelor and Masters of Music from Rice University where he studied under Prof. Paul Ellison. Dr. Capoccioni has held professional positions as Associate Principal Double Bassist of Norrlands Opera Orchestra of Sweden and the Principal Double Bassist of the Norwegian Opera Company, where he served until 2006. From 2007 - 2014 Dr. Capoccioni served as Instructor of Double Bass at the University of Northern Iowa. During this period he also held the position of Principal Bass with the Waterloo Cedar Falls Symphony and performed regularly with the Des Moines Symphony. Dr. Capoccioni completed with Doctorate of Musical Arts Degree in 2014 from the University of Illinois Champaign/Urbana where he studied under Prof. Michael Cameron. Dr. Capoccioni is the founder and Artistic Director of the Cedar Valley Chamber Music Festival. He currently lives in Houston, Texas and works at the Shepherd School of Music as the Chamber Music Coordinator. He performs regularly with the Houston Grand Opera and Houston Ballet. With playing described as a “...fine blend of artistry and bravura” (Edmonton Journal), flutist Michelle Cheramy is an artist recognized for the beauty of her sound, the fluidity of her playing and her interpretive skills in repertoire from the 18th to the 21st centuries. One of the few flutists in Canada to hold a full-time university appointment, Michelle is currently associate professor of music at Memorial University in St. John’s, Newfoundland. From her maritime base she has appeared in recital, as soloist with orchestra, and as teacher/clinician throughout Canada, the United States and in Russia. She has also been featured in numerous radio broadcasts nationally on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. While her performance work now focuses primarily on solo and chamber projects, past orchestral appointments include positions with the Thunder Bay and Augusta Symphony orchestras. A rare combination of outstanding scholar and performer, Cheramy is past winner of the Canadian Concerto Competition, prize-winner in the Montreal Symphony competition, and winner of the National Flute Association’s annual research competition for her dissertation on the late work of André Jolivet. She holds degrees from the University of British Columbia (B.Mus.), Indiana University (M.M) and Rice University (D.M.A.) where she was a student of Camille Churchfield, Peter Lloyd and Leone Buyse respectively. Benjamin Coelho, Professor of Bassoon, has been at The University of Iowa since 1998. A native from Tatuí, Brazil, Ben started the bassoon at the age of ten at the local Conservatory. In the early 1980’s he came to the U.S. to study at Purchase College Conservatory of Music, where he received his BFA. He received his Master of Music degree from Manhattan School of Music. His bassoon teachers included Clóvis Franco, Donald MacCourt, Arthur Weisberg, and Kim Walker. He has appeared as soloist, chamber musician, orchestral musician, teacher and clinician in many countries in four continents. As a recording artist, Ben has released seven critically acclaimed CD recordings. Ben has played as principal bassoon with several orchestras in Brazil and the USA. Currently, he is the principal bassoon with the Quad City Symphony Orchestra. Ben lives in Iowa City, Iowa with his wife Karen and their wonderful daughters Liliana and Julia.
Cellist Nathan Cook is critically recognized for his "authoritative yet relaxed" playing and his "sweet and pliant" sound (Houston Chronicle). His solo and chamber performances have been heard regionally and nationally in Canada on CBC Radio, and regionally in the United States on NPR stations in New York, Texas, and Iowa. Nathan has performed and taught throughout the Americas at festivals in New York, Chile, Brazil, Honduras, and, of course, CVCM. Nathan is a founding member of both the Exorior Duo (www.exoriorduo.com) and Trinitas Chamber Ensemble (www.trinitasmusic.com). The former is named from the Latin verb for “to spring up” or “to appear” and has commissioned and premiered works by Karim Al-Zand, Andrew Staniland, and Clifford Crawley. Trinitas, named from the Latin word for “three,” is a newly-formed trio comprising Michelle, Nathan, and pianist Phil Roberts that generally aims to inject its energetic programs with light-hearted humor. Nathan hails from Appleton, Wisconsin and holds degrees in cello performance from the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University in Houston, Texas where he studied with Norman Fischer. Nathan’s other teachers have included Terry King with whom he studied at Grinnell College. He currently is Associate Professor of Music at Memorial University of Newfoundland in Canada where he serves as Coordinator of Chamber Music.
Daniel Friberg has served as second and e-flat clarinetist of the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Symphony since 2011. Based in Minnesota, he is a freelance teacher and performer, and co-manager of the combined printed music departments of Groth and Eble Music Companies. Past orchestral engagements include the Minnesota Orchestra, New World Symphony, and Duluth-Superior Symphony. He was featured on the JOYA! chamber music series in 2014 and 2015, and has been a guest soloist for clarinet events at Simpson College, Wartburg College, the University of Northern Iowa, Central College, Iowa State University, and the University of Memphis. During the spring semester of 2015 he was visiting instructor of clarinet at Winona State University. Dr. Friberg earned his Bachelor of Arts and Master of Music degrees at Yale University (studying with David Shifrin), and his Doctor of Musical Arts degree at the University of Minnesota (studying with Burt Hara). From 2009 to 2010 he was a fellow of the Belgian American Education Foundation, studying at the Royal Ghent Conservatory of Music in Belgium with Eddy Vanoosthuyse. While there he took lessons on a 10-key classical boxwood clarinet with early clarinet specialist Vincenzo Casale, and historical performance is an interest he continues to develop.
Dr. Stefan Kartman currently serves as Professor of Cello and Chamber Music at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee where he teaches cello and chairs the string area. Dr. Kartman also serves on the faculty of The String Academy of Wisconsin, the state’s premier pre-college string training program, and is currently Principal Cello in the Festival City Symphony. In addition to solo performance, he has performed to critical acclaim as cellist of Trio Antigo, the Kneisel Trio and the Florestan Duo, giving performances and masterclasses in conservatories of music and institutions of higher education worldwide including the Cleveland Institute of Music, the China Conservatory of Music and the Xiamen Conservatory of Music, and the D’Albaco Conservatory of Music, among many others. An avid chamber music enthusiast, Dr. Kartman has served on the faculties of the Vianden Chamber Music Festival in Luxembourgh, the Madeline Island Chamber Music Camp, the MidAmerica Chamber Music Festival, the Green Mountain Chamber Music Festival, and was artistic director of the Milwaukee Chamber Music Festival. His early training in chamber music was with his father, Myron Kartman of the Antioch String Quartet and during his formal training as a chamber musician, he studied with members of the Guarneri and Juilliard String Quartets and the Beaux Arts Trio. Stefan Kartman received degrees from Northwestern University, The Juilliard School of Music, and his Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Rutgers University. He has been teaching assistant to Harvey Shapiro and Zara Nelsova of the Juilliard School and proudly acknowledges the pedagogical heritage of his teachers Shapiro, Nelsova, Bernard Greenhouse, Alan Harris, and Anthony Cooke. Violinist Deborah Coltvet Klemme is Acting Principal Second Violin of the Quad City Symphony Orchestra and Substitute Violinist with the Minnesota Orchestra. She began studying the violin at age three with her mother in Alberta, Canada. She graduated summa cum laude with a Bachelor of Music from the University of Northern Iowa, and received a Master of Music from the Cleveland Institute of Music as a student of Stephen Rose. For the past eight years, she has toured the world, recorded numerous albums and DVDs, and performed on many of the world’s greatest stages as Music Supervisor and Solo Violinist in a band led by Irish musicians Keith and Kristyn Getty. Ms. Klemme is married to QCSO Associate Conductor Benjamin Klemme, and together they have two young sons.
2016 Artists (continued) Dedicated to engaging audiences and performers of all ages with the transforming power of orchestral music, Benjamin Klemme leads an active career as a conductor and educator. As Associate Conductor of the Quad City Symphony Orchestra, he conducts pops and family concerts, and designs educational initiatives to inspire listeners and performers of all ages. He also serves as Music Director of the Quad City Symphony Youth Ensembles. In addition to his work in the Quad Cities, Klemme serves the Greater Twin Cities Youth Symphonies as Concert Orchestra Conductor. Previously, he has held conducting posts at the National Repertory and Cleveland Pops Orchestras, University of Minnesota, Santa Fe Youth Symphony Association, New Mexico School for the Arts, and MacPhail Center for Music. Klemme earned the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in conducting from the University of Minnesota, Master of Music degree in orchestral conducting from the Cleveland Institute of Music, and Bachelor of Music Education degree from the University of Northern Iowa. His principal conducting teachers include Mark Russell Smith, Carl Topilow, Louis Lane, Rebecca Burkhardt and Ronald Johnson. Klemme lives in Davenport, Iowa with his wife, violinist Deborah Coltvet Klemme, and sons Simon and Winston. Dr. Courtney Miller is currently Assistant Professor of Oboe at the University of Iowa where she gives private instruction, master classes and reed classes. Prior to her position at the University of Iowa, Dr. Miller taught oboe at Boston College and was faculty in the New England Conservatory’s Preparatory Department. She has also served on the faculty at Ashland University (OH), Baldwin Wallace Conservatory Outreach Department, and Cleveland Institute of Music Preparatory Department. Dr. Courtney Miller made her solo debut with the Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra at age 17, and continues to be a devoted performer traveling throughout the United States and abroad as a solo, chamber, and orchestral musician. She has performed in many prestigious halls, such as Boston’s Symphony Hall and Cleveland’s Severance Hall. In addition to her solo endeavors, Dr. Miller is a core member of the prestigious international chamber ensemble, VirtuosoSoloists. As an orchestral musician, Dr. Miller currently serves as the English hornist with the Quad City Symphony. Dr. Miller has performed frequently with numerous orchestras including the Portland Symphony (ME), the Jacksonville Symphony (FL), the Atlantic Symphony (MA), the Akron Symphony (OH), the Canton Symphony (OH), the Toledo Symphony (OH), the Erie Philharmonic (PA), the Cleveland Opera (OH), the Cleveland Pops (OH), the Wheeling Symphony (WV), the Youngstown Symphony (OH), and the Tallahassee Symphony (FL). Dr. Miller’s primary teachers are renowned oboists and pedagogues John Ferrillo, John Mack, Eric Ohlsson and Eric Olson. Violinist Tara Lynn Ramsey is a Fellow and co-concertmaster of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago. Originally from Cedar Falls, Iowa, she began her studies at the UNI Suzuki School, later attended the Interlochen Arts Academy, and holds degrees from Northwestern University and the Cleveland Institute of Music. A passionate performer of contemporary music, she has worked extensively with composers and given premieres of new works in Chicago, Cleveland, Miami, and New York City. In the fall of 2015, she performed with musicians of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on the CSO’s new music series, MusicNOW; was a soloist in Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 with the Civic Orchestra; and performed at the Kennedy Center Honors Gala alongside Yo-Yo Ma. In 2016, her string quartet, the Laydeez Quartet, in which she plays viola, won the inaugural Dover Quartet Competition at Northwestern University and was subsequently featured on WMFT, Chicago’s classical radio station. Ms. Ramsey lives in Chicago with her husband, pianist Andrew Rosenblum, and their shih tzu Latifah. Originally from Ames, Iowa, Yvonne Smith performs as modern and baroque violist as soloist and in ensembles throughout the United States and Canada. Yvonne has been a soloist-in-residence with Dubuque Strings, a prizewinner of the U.S. Army Young Artists Competition and a semifinalist in the Sphinx and Fischoff Competitions. She has received fellowships at the Grant Park, Aspen, and Tanglewood Music Festivals. Yvonne began piano lessons with her mother at the age of three and, and at age nine, she began studying the viola at her elementary school in upstate New York. Yvonne went on to earn her Master of Music and Bachelor of Music degrees from the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University under the tutelage of Joan DerHovsepian and James Dunham. She makes her home in Houston where she is a member of Mercury: The Orchestra Redefined and performs regularly with the Houston Grand Opera Orchestra. In addition to making her debut with Cedar Valley Chamber Music this summer, Yvonne will be performing with the Berwick Academy (Eugene, OR) and American Bach Soloists Academy (San Francisco, CA) on baroque viola.
A native of Taiwan, Tina Su is Associate Professor of Horn at the University of Northern Iowa. From 2000-2006, she was the third horn with the Taipei Symphony Orchestra. She has performed extensively in the United States, Europe, Asia and Russia. An active chamber musician, she is a co-founder of the Wonder Horns, a horn quartet based in Taiwan. She has performed with the Miró String Quartet and Boston Brass, and has appeared at the Taiwan Connection Music Festival and the Cedar Valley Chamber Music Festival. Since joining the faculty of University of Northern Iowa, she has frequently performed with the Northwind Quintet and the Northern Brass Quintet. Su earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Music Performance from the Eastman School of Music where she was awarded a Performer’s Certificate. She received a Master’s Degree in Music Performance from the Juilliard School, and her Doctoral of Musical Arts degree from the State University of New York at Stony Brook. Her principal teachers include Si-Yuan Zuang, Verne Reynolds, Peter Kurau, and William Purvis. She has studied chamber music with the New York Woodwind Quintet and the American Brass Quintet. Her first solo album Watercolors:Art Songs for Horn and Piano was released in 2014 and is available through CD baby and iTunes. Violinist Kirsten Yon is Associate Professor of Violin at the University of Houston. Dr. Yon attended the University of Michigan and the Cleveland Institute of Music before completing her Doctor of Musical Arts degree at the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University. Major teachers included Stephen Shipps, William Preucil, David Updegraff, and Kathleen Winkler. The winner of multiple competitions, Ms. Yon has performed with numerous professional orchestras across the United States and South America, including principal positions with the Ann Arbor Symphony and section performances with the New World Symphony, and the Houston Symphony Orchestra. A frequent violin clinician, Yon has given masterclasses worldwide. Dedicated to musical outreach , Yon is founder/ faculty advisor of Cuerdas de Enlace, a pedagogical outreach program with ties to Tegucigalpa, Honduras. Ms. Yon has presented masterclasses and seminars in Honduras, Brazil, South Korea, Norway, England, and at universities and schools throughout the United States. Previously on faculty at the Interlochen Center for the Arts and the Texas Tech University Orchestra Camp, Yon taught at the International Music Academy in Pilsen, Czech Republic from 2009-2011 and the Nathan Schwartzman String Festival in Uberlândia, Brazil, for the past six years. From 2012 onwards she has joined the esteemed faculties of both the Cambridge International String Academy and the Texas Music Festival. Kirsten Yon's debut recording was recently released by Centaur Records, featuring the Ravel and Kodály Duos with cellist Jeffrey Lastrapes. Jeannie Yu was awarded first prize in the Frinna Awerbuch Piano Competition in New York, the Flint Symphony International Concerto Competition, the Portland Symphony International Concerto Competition, and the Kingsville Piano Competition in Texas. She also earned the prestigious Gina Bachauer Memorial Scholarship Award, a full scholarship for the master’s degree program at The Juilliard School of Music where she also received the Bachelor’s Degree. Subsequently she was awarded an accompanist fellowship at the Peabody Conservatory of Music where she received her Doctor of Musical Arts Degree. Ms. Yu has performed as soloist with the Flint Symphony, Portland Symphony, Marina del Rey-Westchester Symphony, Des Moines Symphony, Des Moines Brandenburg Symphony, the Xiamen Symphony Orchestra in China, Sheboygan Symphony Orchestra, the Milwaukee Ballet Orchestra, the Milwaukee Youth Symphony Orchestra, and the Festival City Symphony Orchestra. She has been in great demand as a soloist and collaborative artist in live performances on WQXR in New York, WOI, in Iowa, WFMT in Chicago, and chamber music series such as the Northwestern University Winter Chamber Music Series, the Rembrandt Chamber Players Series in Chicago, and Chamber Music North in Michigan, Midsummers Music in Door County, Frankly Music Series in Milwaukee in addition to her schedule of performances as a member of the Florestan Duo and the Trio Antigo. Recently she has been asked to join the Rembrandt Chamber Players as an associate member. Ms. Yu has also participated as faculty in the Alfred University Summer Chamber Music Institute, the Ohio Wesleyan Summer Chamber Music Festival, the Milwaukee Chamber Music Festival, the Troy Youth Chamber Music Institute, and the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music.
Thank you to the 2015-2016 Cedar Valley Chamber MusicBoard of Directors Serving you since 1939
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Grand Sestetto Concertante (after Sinfonia Concertante in E-flat, K. 364)
Pictures at an Exhibition
The sinfonia concertante upon which this sextet is based was a genre extremely popular in France during Mozart’s life time. This kind of piece calls for solo instruments to have important parts, playing both separately and together. Sadly, little is known about the origins of either the arrangement, which was published after Mozart’s lifetime, or the original Sinfonia. Scholars place the original’s composition date around 1779. This would have been about six months after Mozart returned from Salzburg on a trip through both France and Germany, however the Sinfonia Concertante is not mentioned in any of Mozart’s correspondences or in any other known record.
If you have ever been to an art gallery, the concept of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition is an accurate representation of the experience one can have with the visual arts. For many it is a meditative experience where a moment is captured simultaneously inside a work of art and inside the viewer's mind. It is easy to see landscapes and portraits as both in and out of time. Places where the scenes and the people in them have lives outside the picture frame. Mussorgsky's ability to capture this idea in music was quite a novelty for the time period. Folktales and other literature were often depicted in nineteenth century music but Pictures is quite a different idea that might be more comparable to works such as Smetana's Ma Vlast. In these type of works, music serves to illustrate objects rather than stories. Castles, catacombs, gates, rivers are the "characters" in this music and through it comes a sense of nationalistic pride that is both timeless and sincere.
This work follows four years after Mozart’s five violin concerti of 1775. Most consider the Sinfonia to be a noticeably more mature and expressive work. Alfred Einstein noted, “Every trace of galanterie has disappeared” replaced by the “revelation of the deepest feelings.” The scholar Eric Blom says of this work that “It is a beautiful, dark-colored work in which a passion not at all suited to an archiepiscopal court, and perhaps disclosing an active revolt against it seems to smolder under a perfectly decorous style and exquisite propositions.” In 1808 an anonymous transcriber refitted the Sinfonia Concertante to the sextet of string on tonight’s program. The parts, without a score, were issued by Chemische Druckerei of Vienna in that year as the Grande Sestetto Concertante. Tonight’s performance uses a modern edition edited by the late Mozart scholar Christopher Hogwood.
Le Sacre du Pritemps (The Rite of Spring) Composer and clarinetist Jonathan Russell tackled the immense challenge of arranging Igor Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring when he was commissioned by the San Francisco Symphony’s Keeping Score educational outreach program for performance in their workshops about the Rite. The SF Symphony’s idea was to take Stravinsky’s thirty-five minute work for orchestra and condense it into a ten to twelve minute piece for woodwind quintet, capturing the essence of the work and highlighting the ingenious ways in which Stravinsky uses woodwind instruments. Following the successful reception of this educational outreach project, the Imani Winds, a professional woodwind quintet, commissioned Russell to expand the arrangement by another eight minutes to use on their frequent tour programs. We don’t have many works this summer where the arranger is still living and able to discuss the process. Of this arrangement Russell says that, “It was a thrilling opportunity to delve into this monumental piece, to figure out how it works, and how I could condense and re-imagine it without losing its fundamental qualities.” From the vantage point of the Imani Winds, they perform the work frequently and find that it brings a fresh perspective to the work. As their oboist Toyin Spellman-Diaz states on their website, “There is something novel hearing this work in it’s entirety. Often times there is so much of it that is usually covered up by loud percussion and obnoxious brass.” (we sincerely apologize to all percussionists and brass musicians for that statement)
This is the one work on this season’s program that actually changes size in the opposite direction. Mussorgsky’s original version of Pictures is a suite for solo piano. For our last concert we are blowing the original up slightly by a factor of ten. Not as large as Ravel’s orchestration, not as small as Mussorgsky’s original. The result is a colorful orchestration with an intimate expression. One recent reviewer noted that, by his count, 422 arrangements of Mussorgsky’s original work are in existence (albeit, not all of them treat the complete work). How accurate this number actually is can be questioned, but if anything it may be a little low. Oboist Wolfgang Renz arranged this work for Ensemble Berlin, a select group of colleagues from the Berlin Philharmonic who wanted to create music “at a high level and in a relaxed atmosphere.” The group's website discusses their relationship with Renz saying, "These arrangements, which have been expressly set down for the ‘Ensemble’, offer both listeners and interpretive performers hitherto unknown varieties in sound and, - over and above this, open up completely new aspects of current interpretations of repertoire.” Similar to Johnathan Russell's adaptation of Stravinsky, the result of Renz's arrangement is a setting of Mussorgsky's masterpiece that diminishes the bombastic and grandiose aspects of Ravel's larger orchestration and places more emphasis on aspects of lightness and spirituality found throughout the work.
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