Music News
Rome Prize to Kurt Rohde
Updated April 15, 2008
Kurt Rohde — San Francisco composer, prominent violist with numerous Bay Area orchestras and chamber-music groups, founder-director of the Left Coast Chamber Orchestra, and music professor at the University of California at Davis — has just received a 2008-2009 Rome Prize, one of the most prestigious awards in the arts and humanities. It was established more than a century ago, and chartered by an act of Congress in 1905.
Kurt Rhode
Photo by Frank Doering
The Rome Prize for musicians that Rohde is receiving has been named for the composer Elliot Carter. It enables “independent artistic pursuit” at the American Academy in Rome for 11 months. (The “Rome Prize” supporting such composers as Berlioz and Debussy is another, older award program.)
While Rohde is on leave, Left Coast will have Anna Presler as acting artistic director, the position she also held while Rohde was away from 2002-2003 for a Berlin Prize residency. He has also received a Charles Ives Fellowship, a Hinrichsen Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, a Guggenheim Fellowship; and commission awards from the Koussevitzky Foundation of the Library of Congress, the Fromm Foundation of Harvard University, the Barlow Endowment for Music Composition, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Hanson Institute for American Music.
The composer has been featured in Classical Voice since the beginning of this publication, in scores of reviews and news items. See the latest review by Jeff Dunn of Rohde’s string quartet Gravities, and the response to the performance at Yerba Buena Center. His extensive biography is available online.
Rohde’s response Tuesday afternoon to the news of the Rome Prize:
I am tempted to say something like I had been a finalist so many times in the past that if I did not receive it this time, I was going to ask for a T-shirt that read “I was a finalist for the Rome Prize three times and all I got was this lousy T-shirt.” Actually, I did say that to the people at the front desk before my last finalist interview. They loved the idea and thought that they could get that phrase onto some coffee mugs and baseball caps. But I got the fellowship this time, and the waiting spell is over.
What I would actually say is that this is a much better time for me to have this opportunity than had I received it in the past. I don’t think I am rationalizing this, but I actually feel ready to undertake these large-scale projects I have been wanting to do for years, but have not felt ready to approach them or have had the uninterrupted time to give them the serious attention they need. The past four to five years have been transformative for me, and I finally feel like I can compose what I want to compose, be involved and engaged while doing it, and make some meaningful contribution to the experience people will come away with when they hear my music.
It only took half my life to feel this way. I know how lucky I am and I am always aware of the good fortune I have had. I am never without gratitude, and very conscious about giving back what has been shared with me.
Other Sources of Music: Film, Dance
Sure, concert halls and opera houses are the obvious places to go for classical music, but — as this column has been insisting for a decade now — look beyond those and you may be well rewarded.
The upcoming San Francisco International Film Festival, for example, celebrates music — of all kinds, including classical — during its run, April 24 – May 8. Here are just three notable examples:
- Mark Kidel’s Journey With Peter Sellars features aspects about the opera director that even his (many) detractors appreciate about him — his intelligence and passion as a speaker. (No wonder he was a keynote speaker at last year’s film festival.) The documentary shows Sellars rehearsing Osvaldo Golijov’s Ainadamar at the Santa Fe Opera and John Adams’ A Flowering Tree in Vienna, and follows his career from the wunderkind years in his 20s, through the many prominent and controversial projects in the years that followed. Journey will be screened in the renamed, restructured, and mighty-fine Sundance Kabuki Theaters on May 3, 4, and 5.)
- Carlos Saura, whose exceptional music films have covered everything from Carmen to El amor brujo to all about flamenco, has now turned his attention to the fado, Portugal’s national music genre, characterized by mournful tunes and lyrics, often about the sea or the life of the poor. Saura’s Fados includes the greatest masters of the musical form: Mariza, Camané, Carlos do Carmo, and Chico Buarque, and adds world-renown singers from other countries, such as Caetano Veloso, Lila Downs, and Cesaria Evora. Fados will be shown in the Castro on April 26, and in the Kabuki on April 28 and 29.
- Scott Hicks’ Glass: A Portrait of Philip in Twelve Parts is a documentary of the composer’s life and work, through 12 “mosaics” over several continents of his activities and performances. The film also traces the 70-year-old Glass’ life from his native Baltimore, as well as the beginning of his career in New York City. Screenings begin April 26, in the Pacific Film Archive and the Kabuki; an additional showing is on April 30, in the Kabuki.
Peter Sellars in Journey
From Saura’s Fados
Yuan Yuan Tan and Ruben Martin rehearse Stan Welch’s Naked
Photo by Erik Tomasson
Another rich vein of music is opening at the San Francisco Ballet’s New Works Festival, April 22 – May 6, marking the company’s 75th anniversary with 10 premieres. From the Kronos Quartet’s presentation of Graham Fitkin’s commissioned work for Yuri Possokhov, to the Dvořák Piano Quintet No. 2 for Val Caniparoli, to Rodney Sharman’s variations on César Franck’s music for James Kudelka’s new ballet, the music to be heard at the festival has a tremendous range:
- Program A: Paul Taylor’s Changes, to music by John Phillips, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and John Hartford; Christopher Wheeldon’s Within the Golden Hour, to music by Ezio Bosso; and Yuri Possokhov’s Fusion, to music by Graham Fitkin and Rahul Dev Burman (April 22, 25, 27; May 1 and 4).
- Program B: Stanton Welch’s Naked, to music by Poulenc; Julia Adam’s A rose by any other name, to music by Bach; James Kudelka’s The Ruins Proclaim the Building Was Beautiful, to music by Rodney Sharman; and Mark Morris’ Joyride, to commissioned music by John Adams (April 23, 26, 29; May 2, 3, 4).
- Program C: Margaret Jenkins’ Thread, to music by Paul Dresher; Val Caniparoli’s Ibsen’s House, to music by Dvořák; Jorma Elo’s Double Evil, to music by Philip Glass and Vladimir Martinov (April 24, 26, 30; May 3 and 6).
Lorena Feijoo rehearsing the Caniparoli premiere
Photo by Erik Tomasson
The Selling of … Opera?
In my report last week about a brief opera tour in Germany, I mentioned, with a sense of relief, the lack of EuroTrash. Not so fast: here’s a report about a Masked Ball production in Erfurt, featuring “… director Johann Kresnik’s staging [with] naked pensioners wearing Mickey Mouse masks, wandering around the ruins of New York’s World Trade Center.” There is much more to this — all of it distracting from the music and anything the opera is about.
What I don’t understand: Why involve Verdi at all in this tiresome juvenile-to-gross buffoonery? Kresnik’s justification is that his production helps “sell” opera: “You have to introduce new elements, otherwise it is difficult to attract new theatergoers.” If this is truly the way to bring in new audiences, I suspect those alleged operatic neophytes may be missing altogether the point of what’s so great about opera. It’s certainly not mixing Mickey Mouse and 9/11.
Then there is Hans Neuenfels’ Nabucco at Deutsche Oper Berlin, where the Hebrews’ chorus is replaced by a swarm of bees — so help me. So help us all.
From the Erfurt Ballo
Musing on opera’s production dilemma, especially of new works, Fiona Maddocks writes in The Evening Standard:
Despite every effort, mainstream opera companies have never successfully solved the problem — partly perception, partly practicalities — of what to do about new opera. You could fill a decade of seasons with mainstream repertoire and satisfy audiences without playing anything written after 1950. Even Berg’s Wozzeck, premiered in 1925, scares the crowds and is habitually sold with reduced price tickets.
Yet no one working in opera can stomach the idea that their art form is moribund, just kept alive with ever more grotesque directorial facelifts performed on old favorites: a Brokeback Mountain-style gay cowboy staging of Eugene Onegin currently showing in Munich, with the ball scene set in a transvestite disco, shows the danger.
How has a once wildly popular art form, the pastime for all social classes, lost its way so badly? Composers historically wrote for the theaters of their day, to commission, with performances and audiences guaranteed, and few competing distractions. They knew exactly what was required, and their entire training and musical apprenticeship prepared them.
If a composer today gets the call from the Royal Opera House, the likelihood is that they’ve never written a full-scale theater work and have no idea about the technical or dramatic requirements. Few would spend the long hours required writing a work no one has asked for. Through inexperience they choose overwordy librettos and misjudge pacing and scale. If they prefer to write a small ensemble piece, perhaps on a domestic subject more in the style of modern theater, the 2,000-seat auditorium is hopelessly unsuited.
Boys Turn 60
Founded by Gaetano Merola and Madi Bacon 60 years ago, the San Francisco Boys Chorus is celebrating this important anniversary with a gala concert in the War Memorial Opera House on Sunday, June 15. To be conducted by Music Director Ian Robertson, the concert will feature two premieres by alumni composers, and an unusual program of Léo Delibes’ rarely heard Messe Breve and Franz Schubert’s youthful Mass in C Major.
The commissioned premieres are Éric Marty’s C. elegans and Jeremy Faust’s Parvus sum (to text by opera librettist Philip Littell). Baritone Christopheren Nomura, the bell ringers, and training choruses will join SFBC for an evening of song and celebration.
The Boys at work
For all six decades of its existence, the Boys Chorus has been affiliated with San Francisco Opera, participating in 164 productions. Last season alone, SFBC choristers appeared in Tannhäuser, Macbeth, and The Magic Flute. Eleven boys are currently in rehearsals for The Little Prince. In recent years, the Choir has implemented the Willie L. Brown Jr. Music Scholarship for Boys, which provides tuition, uniforms, and transportation to over 25 young singers from underserved neighborhoods in San Francisco. This summer, singers from the 225-strong chorus will travel to southern France, on a concert tour that will include performances of works by Marc-Antoine Charpentier in Marseilles, Monaco, and Aix-en-Provence, July 8-18.
Robertson — San Francisco Opera’s chorus master — told Classical Voice about his history with SFBC:
In 1996, I was asked to take over the Boys Chorus. I agreed because I was interested in a new challenge in a field (children’s voices) where I had little experience, but one in which I had done a lot of listening in terms of Cathedral Choir music and performance. I was fascinated by the quality of sound that boys could produce and how that could be harnessed to the expression of music written for this medium. I agreed to be interim director until they sought a new leader. It’s 2008 and I’m still exploring the depths of this genre.
I have always enjoyed working with young people. Their minds are totally unconditioned by preconceptions and previous experiences. A youth group’s combined mental energy is a powerful thing, able to surmount what we oldies consider to be in some cases impossibly difficult music. Sometimes they can show you the way forward with their boundless energy and fresh viewpoint. That keeps me younger, too.
The Boys Chorus has toured domestically and internationally, singing in concert halls and cathedrals on four continents. Recent tours have included Hong Kong, Japan, China, Australia, Austria, Czechoslovakia, England, France, Greece, Hawaii, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, New Zealand, and Russia. Choristers have sung for U.S. presidents, the Pope, H.M. Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain, and the president of the Soviet Union. In addition to appearances with the San Francisco Opera, the Chorus has appeared with the San Francisco Symphony and San Francisco Ballet.
Ian Robertson conducts the Boys Chorus
And Music@Menlo Turns 6
For its sixth season in Atherton and Palo Alto this summer, Music@Menlo returns to the concept that gave rise to its first year — a musical journey through time. “The Unfolding of Music II” begins July 19, with a program titled “Towards Bach.” The visits: “Classical Bookends: Haydn and Schubert,” “The Romantic Generation,” “The Rise of Modernism.” The festival concludes, on Aug. 8, with “Music Now: Voices of Our Time.” The full schedule is now available.
As in previous seasons, the festival offers a wealth of free events, including “Prelude Performances,” master classes, conversations with musicians, an open house (all day on July 26), the Koret Young Performers Concerts, and others. The festival and the free programs are supported by grants from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, Koret Foundation Funds, and many individuals and organizations.
Conservatory on the Air
Concerts recorded by San Francisco Conservatory of Music faculty and students are now being broadcast by KALW, 91.7 FM, Monday evenings at 9 p.m.. Some of the highlights:
- April 14 — Jazz concert with Mario Guarneri, trumpet; Mary Fettig, saxophone; Mark Levine, piano; John Wiitala, bass; and Akira Tana, drums.
- April 21 — New Music Ensemble, Nicole Paiement, conductor; Benjamin Britten, Les illuminations, with Ambur Braid, soprano; Astor Piazolla, Cuatro estaciones portenas (The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires), with Cynthia Mei, violin and Charles Akert, cello.
- April 28 — Mahler’s Symphony No. 1, with the Conservatory Orchestra, Andrew Mogrelia, conductor.
Coast to Coast Chamber Music
The East Coast Chamber Orchestra — a 17-piece group that performs without a conductor — is up next at San Francisco State University’s Morrison Artists Series, at 3 p.m. on Sunday, April 20, at McKenna Theater. The program for the free concert includes Edvard Grieg’s Holberg Suite, Op. 40, Heinrich Ignaz Biber’s Battalia, Bartók’s Divertimento, BB. 118, and an Astor Piazzolla tango.
Janos Gereben (janosg@gmail.com) is a regular contributor to San Francisco Classical Voice.
©2008 By Janos Gereben, all rights reserved.