Have you ever wondered during a concert what the composer was thinking and feeling while he or she wrote the piece you are listening to? Or what the composer’s home town was like? Or how political events of the day affected the audience’s reception of that work? If you attend Carmel Bach Festival’s “Aha! Beethoven” program, all your questions will be answered in a timely manner amid myriad musical excerpts performed by world-class musicians and singers.
Created five years ago by David Gordon, the director of the festival’s Adams Vocal Master Class, and Bruno Weil, the “Aha!” series has illuminated audiences on the minds, hearts, and times of Bach, Haydn, and other greats. This year, Beethoven’s life and work will be explored in a concert called “Aha! Beethoven: A Search for the Heart of Genius.” Led by Bruno Weil in his final season with the festival, the concert will include narration by Gordon on the topic of Beethoven’s life. When asked whether he has seen the use of such narrative, which includes reading excerpts of the composer’s journals, letters, and occasional anecdotes, change how an audience appreciates the music, Gordon replies: “We are taught to respect music, but Stravinsky said, ‘Don’t respect my music, just love my music.’ I see that one of the keys to understanding the music is to understand the human being who wrote it.”
He goes on to give an example: “People still talk about something we did in our Bach program in 2007. Music students know that Bach had 20 children, but many do not know that 10 of those children died. Only 10 lived to adulthood. One died mysteriously, one was mentally handicapped, some died at birth. And I read every one of those names. I read the roll call of the children who had died. Right after that, Sanford Sylvan sang “Schlummert Ein” from Cantata 82 and people remember that. I think it helped them say, ‘Wow! Bach had a hard life, and [yet] he kept writing this beautiful music.’”
In Beethoven’s case, Gordon is particularly interested in fleshing out the man beyond the intensely brooding, furrowed-brow bust sitting on myriad home pianos, while perhaps revealing to the audience Beethoven’s more loving, heartfelt side. “I’m trying to show other aspects of his personality, his persona, his self that go beyond the angry, Promethean Beethoven, pounding on the keyboard until the strings break.” He explains in his program notes:
Let us clear away the clichés, like cleaning the grime from an old oil painting. Should we be in awe of Beethoven, should we “respect” the greatness of his music? Two centuries ago the Austrian poet Franz Grillparzer had the answer: “Happy is he who encounters a greatness outside himself and through love makes it his own.’” The key word here is love. Not “respect,” which often serves only to objectify and distance us from the very art we desire to connect with. Grillparzer invites us to love the music, and that act enables us to meet Beethoven directly, using the language which more and more became his only means of expression.”
The Carmel Bach Festival concert will feature the Festival Orchestra, Chorale, Chorus, and soloists and will include the Septet in E-flat Major, Op. 20; Symphony No.1 in C Major, Op. 21 (Menuett); the “Moonlight” Sonata; and excerpts from Beethoven’s only opera, Fidelio, as well as from “Egmont” (incidental music composed for a play by Goethe of the same name). Featured soloists are soprano Kendra Colton, mezzo Sally-Anne Russell, tenor Thomas Cooley, and baritone Sanford Sylvan, plus tenor Alan Bennet. Instrumental soloists include concertmaster Elizabeth Wallfisch (see interview), who, like Weil, is departing after this season’s festival.
Speaking of the instrumentalists at the festival, Gordon says, “One of the things that we excel at is jumping from historical instruments to modern instruments. Every one of our string players brings at least two instruments to the festival so that on Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday evenings you’ll hear historical instruments, and on Tuesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, you’ll hear modern instruments, played in a very stylish way. We have musicians from Europe, North and South America, and the Middle and Far East, and it’s a very wonderfully mixed group of people — all of whom are hand picked to be in this ensemble.”
The Bay Area offers a plethora of high-quality Baroque ensembles, but the Carmel Bach Festival, which runs July 8-31, is unparalleled in terms of including variety (and great quantity) of lieder, symphonic works, chamber music, choral music, master classes, and preconcert talks featuring first-rate artists. As David Gordon puts it, “What happens at our festival is the kind of thing you would need to attend a concert series all year to experience. And you experience it with us in one week or, in the case of the Beethoven program, in one night: fortepiano, opera arias, solo songs, string quartet, symphonic repertoire, and a big opera finale in one of the most beautiful places on the West Coast.” Perhaps only Bachfest in Leipzig, Germany, squeezes as much music into such a short time — ah, but that ended June 20 and, besides, I’m pretty sure the beach is nicer in Carmel.