UMS Concert Program, Wednesday Nov. 09 To 20: University Musical Society: Fall 2011 - Wednesday Nov. 09 To 20 --

Season: Fall 2011
Hill Auditorium

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Fall 2011 Season
133rd Annual Season
General Information
On-site ticket offices at performance venues open 90 minutes before each performance.
Children of all ages are welcome at UMS Family and Youth Performances. Children under the age of three will not be admitted to regular, full-length UMS performances. All children must be able to sit quietly in their own seats without disturbing other patrons. Children unable to do so. along with the adult accompanying them, will be asked by an usher to leave the auditorium. Please use discretion in choosing to bring a child.
Remember, everyone must have a ticket, regardless of age.
While in the Auditorium
Starting Time Every attempt is made to begin concerts on time. Latecomers are asked to wait in the lobby until seated by ushers at a predetermined time in the program.
Cameras and recording equipment
are prohibited in the auditorium.
If you have a question, ask your usher. They are here to help.
Please turn off your cellular phones and other digital devices so that everyone may enjoy this UMS event disturbance-free.
In the interests of saving both dollars and the environment, please either retain this program book and return with it when you attend other UMS performances included in this edition or return it to your usher when leaving the venue.
Event Program Book
Wednesday, November 9 through Sunday, November 20, 2011
AnDa Union 5
Wednesday, November 9, 7:30 pm Michigan Theater
A Night in Treme: The Musical Majesty of New Orleans 13
Friday, November 11, 8:00 pm Hill Auditorium
St. Lawrence String Quartet 17
Saturday, November 12, 8:00 pm Rackham Auditorium
Beijing Guitar Duo with 23
Manuel Barrueco
Sunday, November 20, 4:00 pm Rackham Auditorium
ums University Musical Society
Fall 2011
September
! An Evening with Ahmad Jamal
i Emerson String Quartet 23--24 i Mark Morris Dance Group
25 i Dan Zanes & Friends
October
John Malkovich and Musica Angelica Baroque Orchestra: 77ie Infernal Comedy: Confessions of a Serial Killer
9 9
13 15
Yuja Wang, piano
National Theatre Live: One Man, Two
Guvnors
State Symphony Capella of Russia
Goran Bregovic and His Wedding and
Funeral Orchestra 21-22 I Cloud Gate Dance Theatre of Taiwan:
! Water Stains on the Wall 27 j Schola Cantorum de Venezuela 27-29! Gate Theatre Dublin: Beckett's Endgame and Watt
30
National Theatre Live: The Kitchen
November
Apollo's Fire with Philippe Jaroussky, countertenor
! Audra McDonald
; Diego El Cigala 9 AnDa Union
]' A Night in Treme: The Musical Majesty
of New Orleans 12; St. Lawrence String Quartet 20 i Beijing Guitar Duo with Manuel Barrueco 27 Canadian Brass
December
3-4 i Handel's Messiah
i London Philharmonic Orchestra with i Janine Jansen, violin
i Stile Antico
inter 2012
January
8 National Theatre Live: The Collaborators 20-22 : Einstein on the Beach
23 i Denis Matsuev, piano
i Les Violons du Roy with Maurice Steger, i recorder
I Hamburg Symphony Orchestra with
Francesco Tristano, piano: Messiaen's From the Canyons to the Stars
February
4 : Sabine Meyer and the Trio di Clarone 10 Chamber Ensemble of the Shanghai
I Chinese Orchestra 12 i Michigan Chamber Players
I The Tallis Scholars
Sweet Honey In The Rock
; Wayne McGregor I Random Dance: FAR
! FELA! (at Music Hall, Detroit) 19 National Theatre Live: Title TBA
@@@@! Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis
I Hagen Quartet
March
9 ] Chicago Symphony Orchestra with i Pinchas Zukerman, violin
Max Raabe & Palast Orchester Ex Machina: The Andersen Project National Theatre Live: 77ie Comedy of Errors San Francisco Symphony with Michael Tilson Thomas, conductor: American Mavericks
April
12 Zakir Hussain and Masters of Percussion
! CheikhLo
Charles Lloyd New Quartet 18 Pavel Haas Quartet
19-21 I Ballet Preljocaj: Snow White 22 i Ford Honors Program: Academy of St. Martin in the Fields with Joshua Bell, violin
I ]
May
Breakin' Curfew
UMS Educational and Community Events
All UMS educational activities are free, open to the public, and take place in Ann Arbor unless otherwise noted. For complete details and updates, please visit www.ums.org or contact the UMS Education Department at 734.615.4077 or umsed@umich.edu. b
Why Renegade
Monday, November 14, 7-9:00 pm
Ann Arbor District Library Downtown Branch,
Multipurpose Room, 343 S. Fifth Avenue
Renegade: a rebel, someone who breaks with customs--and the idea behind UMS's 10-week, 10-performance Winter Season series focusing on innovation and experimentation in the performing arts. UMS Programming Director Michael Kondziolka and a panel of guests will lead a conversation about UMS's "Renegade" series and the significance of artistic renegades.
A collaboration with the Ann Arbor District Library and the U-M Institute for the Humanities.
visit www.ums.org for more information 0
urns
presents
AnDa Union
Biligbaatar
Chinggel
Hadanbaatar
Monkhjayaa
Nars
Otgonbayar
Saikhannakhaa
Tsetsegmaa
Uni
Urgen
Program
Wednesday Evening, November 9, 2011 at 7:30 Michigan Theater Ann Arbor
This evening's program will be selected from the following pieces and will be performed with intermission:
Altargana
Boomboi.i
Derlcha
Galloping Horses
Genghis Khan
Give You a Rose
Heemor
Holy Mountain
Hometown
Hoorai
Mother
Ordos Drinking Song
Sumaro
The Girl Who Stole Horses
The Legend of the Swan Brothers
Wan Li
AII arrangements by AnDa Union, except Heemor composed by llata and Galloping Horses composed by Chi Bulag.
20th Performance of the 133rd Annual Season
Asia Series
The photographing or sound and video recording of this performance or possession of any device for such recording is prohibited.
This evening's performance is sponsored by the Confucius Institute of the University of Michigan.
Funded in part by Arts Midwest's Performing Arts Fund, a program of Arts Midwest, funded by the National Endowment for the Arts, with additional contributions from Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs, General Mills Foundation, and Land 0' Lakes Foundation.
The 2011 national tour of AnDa Union is part of a major, multi-year cultural exchange with Minneapolis-based Arts Midwest, the Chinese Ministry of Culture, and the US Major University Presenter's consortium. Support for the tour has been provided by the Ministry of Culture, People's Republic of China.
AnDa Union appears by arrangement with 2Luck Concepts. For further information, please visit www.andaunion.com.
Large print programs are available upon request.
Notes on the Program
Altargana
Altargana is based on a famous Buriat folksong. The Buriats live in the northeast of Inner Mongolia in Hulun Buir, close to the Russian Border. Altar?gana is a type of special small grass that grows in Hulun Buir in Inner Mongolia. It has very deep roots and is very difficult to pull up. This song tells how the parents are like Altargana grasses, strongly rooted and looking after their children.
Boomborai
Boomborai is based on a folk song from the Horchin Grasslands. It comes from ancient
Mongolian Shaman traditions and tells how one of the shaman dance rituals, Andaii, was born. If women were depressed because of prob?lems in love and marriage, their families would in?vite the local shaman to dance the Andai to keep away disease and misfortune. It is said that once upon a time, there lived a father and his daughter on the Horchin Grassland. One day, the daugh?ter, suddenly stricken by an unknown disease, lost her mind and began to behave strangely. She re?mained ill for a long time without any signs of re?covery. One day, the father, burning with anxiety, carried his daughter on a herdsman's wooden cart to a faraway place to see a doctor.
However, when they arrived at the town of Ku-lun, the axle of the cart broke. At the same time, the girl's condition worsened and her life was in danger. The anxious father had no idea what to do except to wander around the cart, singing a song to express his sorrow. The wailing song drew some people from nearby villages. They couldn't help but shed tears at this sight and joined the old man in swinging their arms and wailing around the cart.
To everyone's surprise, the daughter quietly rose, got off the cart, and followed the people, swinging her arms and stamping her feet with them. When people saw her, she was sweating all over, and her disease had been miraculously cured. The good news spread, and from then on, people began to follow suit and treat young wom?en who suffered from similar diseases by dancing around them in the same manner. The dance be?came known as "Andai."
Derlcha
Derlcha is an ancient Mongolian singing competi?tion. Originally it was kings and princes of banners (regions) that took part but today it has become a popular art. It is often part of a festival or Nadaam, two people battle against each other, each singing a verse which the other has to reply to. The battle can go on for days until one of the singers cannot think of anything to sing but is made speechless. The winner then ridicules the loser in front of the crowd before a new challenger takes on the winner and so the competition goes until one singer is left and declared the winner. The winners of these com?petitions became very skilled in remembering verses and developing their wits to overcome their oppo?nents. Mongolian children have practiced Derlcha battles with their friends as a game for centuries.
Nars, himself, used to participate in Derlcha battles with his friends when he was growing up in the Horchin Grasslands and AnDa Union's version is based on verses used in the ancient Derlcha battles.
Galloping Horses
Galloping Horses is undoubtedly the most famous piece of music composed for the morin huur. It was written by the master Chi Bulag who created the piece after watching a fierce horse race, in which the winning horse staggered over the finish?ing line, collapsed and died of exhaustion. Chi Bu?lag has been central to the evolution of the morin huur taking the ancient chuur huur and develop?ing it into what we know as the morin huur today.
Genghis Khan
This a song that is sung at auspicious Mongolian ceremonies such as weddings and is often used as a piece of music to start the proceedings. It brings good luck as Genghis Khan is revered by the Mon?golians as the founder of Mongolian culture, and many Mongolians make the pilgrimage to the Genghis Khan Mausoleum in Ordos. Responsible for the unity of the Mongolian tribes, he is also the Mongolian father figure who is credited with the creation of their written language. Although he didn't unify China, it was Genghis Khan's grandson, the Kublai Khan, who founded the Yuan Dynasty.
Give You a Rose
This song is based on a very popular Uyghur folk song from Xinjang.
Heemor (The Wind Horse) The wind horse is an allegory for the human soul in the shamanistic tradition of Central Asia which has been integrated into Mongolian and Tibetan Buddhism. Heemor is a symbol of the idea of well-being or good fortune. As the wind horse rises, things go well, and as it falls, fortune falls. Heemor takes our prayers to Tengar, the sky god. This beautiful piece of music inspired by Heemor was composed by Yalalt who lives and works in Hohhot, Inner Mongolia.
Holy Mountain
Moadin chur playing is always inspired by the sounds of the mountains and waters. This song is dedicated to Holy Mountain. Before Ghengis Khan became mighty he hid in the holy moun?tain several times to escape from dangers and find strength. Traditionally the elders always went there to prayer and find solace. The moadin chur is an ancient Mongolian reed flute, the reeds for the flute are now mostly found in the Altai Mountains in Xinjiang and it is here that most moadin chur music is played today.
Hometown
This song is inspired by the steady destruction of the Grasslands as farming and mining continue to eroded in combination with the effects of global climate change. The lyrics of this composition were written by Urgen, who left his home in the Grasslands when he was 13 years old to train at music school in the city. Although he has never returned, his heart remains in the Grasslands, as do the hearts of Anda Union's. But the Grasslands are no longer the Grasslands of their childhoods. This song appeals for the Grasslands to be saved and preserved.
Mother (Chagan Tokhoy Notuk) This is a song about mothers from Chagan Tokhoy, which is a mythical place in the Ujim Chin Grass?lands. It consists of two long songs combined into one song. Biligbaatar sings about how much they miss their mother when they are far away, "Grey-haired old mother, every moment, every second we miss you, our lovely mother." Tsetsegmaa sings a Buriat song that a mother sings to her daughter when she is getting married. The Mongolian no?madic way of life is based on moving pastures four times a year so as to ensure that the grass is not over grazed. It also means that each herder will
live far away from the next, also to stop overgraz?ing. It is very common for a Buriat mother to sing this song to her daughter, as often the daughter will move far away to live with her husband's family. "After you get married, if you find a clean spring you can drink the water, if the daughter marries far from home that happens often."
Ordos Drinking Song
Drink--especially milk wine--is very important to Mongolians at festive times and occasions like weddings. They drink to inspire themselves and raise their spirits and then sing drinking songs and enjoy themselves. There are many drinking songs but this one is in the Ordos tradition.
When the milk wine is in the bottle,
Just like small sheep in the pen,
When you drink the milk wine,
It is just like a tiger out of the pen.
We toast everything goes well for me and you!
Sumaro
A young girl, Sumaro is in love with boy called Sanjay Mam. But this is no ordinary love and they are desperate to be together every day. When San?jay Mam is not there, Sumaro climbs to the top of the shrine so that she can see far over the Mon?golian plains to wait all day for her lover to return. Sanjay Mam, desperate to see his love, rides his horse so fast that the dust billows behind him like the spray that rises from the lake as a goose lands on the water.
The Girl Who Stole Horses
This piece is based on a famous Horchin folk song. A girl dresses as a boy in order to steal 33 horses from the rich and then gives them to the poor. This makes her famous and a popular heroine.
The Legend of the Swan Brothers
Based on a Mongolian folk song, this piece tells the story of a very poor Mongolian man similar in nature to Robin Hood: he steals from the rich and gives to the poor.
Wan Li
Based on a very famous Horchin folk song, this piece describes a very beautiful girl in the Horchin Grasslands. Everyone who sees the girl falls in love with her. They wrote a song about the beautiful girl, named Wan Li.
A
nda means a blood brother or sister. For Mongolians an "Anda" is more important than a birth brother as you choose a per?son to become an Anda, a lifelong blood brother. AnOa Union is a brotherhood of Andas.
The members of AnDa Union all took up mu?sic from an early age with a passion for traditional Mongolian music, most of them coming from mu?sical families. They are part of a musical movement that is finding inspiration in old and forgotten songs, drawing on a repertoire of magical music that had all but disappeared during China's recent tumultuous past. As a group they hold on to the essence of Mongolian music while creating a form of music that is new. Traditionally music would be played in the Mongol Ger (Yurt) or in the Grass?lands and would be informal, with the styles and instruments varying across the vast Inner Mongo?lian plains. AnDa Union combines a wide range of this diverse music into a unique feast of accessible Mongolian music.
Mongols have a strong musical tradition that is passed from generation to generation. The morin huur, or horse-head fiddle, pays homage to the most
important animal in the Mongol culture; almost all houses have a morin huur hanging in the hallway.
As the youngest of his seven siblings, Otgon-bayar's father showed him old ways of playing and carved a horse-head fiddle for him to practice. Nars's grandfather, a nomadic herder and virtuoso musician, was his inspiration and his first teacher. At the music academy in Chifeng where many members of the group studied, they stood out for their musical dedication and annoyed fellow stu?dents with their obsessive morin huur practice. In the capital city of Hohhot they became part of the Inner Mongolia National Song and Dance Troupe and there they discovered other young Mongols who shared the same musical passion and ideals. In 2001, AnDa Union was formed and a unique styled of Mongolian music was born.
Nars, the group's leader, says, "Our music draws from all the Mongol tribes that Genghis Khan [more properly known as Chinggis Khan], unified. We all have different ethnic backgrounds and we bring these influences into our music. There is a wealth of folk music for us to learn, so far our repertoire of songs is like a drop in the ocean."
The group describes themselves as music gath?erers, digging deep into Mongol traditions and un?earthing forgotten music. They are on a mission to stimulate their culture and re-engage young Mon?gols, many of whom no longer speak their own language. Saikhannakhaa is fighting to reverse this trend by opening a bar in the capital Hohhot, where she will promote music, "I found an old golden wheel with half its spokes broken in an old dusty shop. It looks like a wheel that once turned the warrior carts of the great Mongol armies. I will hang this wheel in my bar as a warning to Mongolian people that our culture is broken and needs to be mended." Hadanbaatar, the drummer adds, "young Mongolians like us now understand how important our culture is but maybe the next generation won't care and we have to prevent this from happening."
AnDa Union are fluent in singing and play many instruments including the morin huur, the maodun chaoer (a three-holed flute), as well as Mongolian versions of the lute, and mouth harp. Although Mongolians are a race of musicians, the pseudo-folk music promoted in nationally run the-
aters and auditoriums in Inner Mongolia is far from the long song and horse-head fiddle coming from the Grasslands. AnDa Union is bound by a mission to promote the essence of this music to the worid. "Most of the band members have been playing to?gether since childhood," remarks Nars. "As adults, we studied professional vocals and instruments to?gether. We are like a family. Ten years ago, AnDa Union was forged and we haven't looked back."
UMS welcomes AnDa Union, who makes its UMS debut this evening.
Artist Biographies
Nars grew up in a village two hours from Ar Horqin, a town 880 kilometers northeast of the capital Hohhot. His family was traditional herders and he grew up living with his grandparents and spent summers on the Grasslands living in a yurt. His grandfather is a musician, who plays multiple instruments including the accordion, morin huur, and other three-stringed fiddles, and became his teacher and mentor from an early age. He went to primary school with Urgen who lived in a nearby village. At age 12, he boarded at music college in the city of Chifeng where he shared a room with Chinggel, and met Monkhjayaa and Uni. After graduating, all five of them went to Hohhot and joined the Inner Mongolia Music and Dance Troupe where they met Saikhannakhaa, Otgonbayar, and Bataar. In 2001, they formed AnDa Union. Today, Nars runs a music school teaching morin huur, tobshuur, and hoomei to young people. A visit to his house is greeted with over 20 students practicing the morin huur. His parents have now moved to Hohhot to help him run the school and they all live together in a house filled with students, beds, and instruments.
Urgen grew up in a village two hours from Ar Horqin, close to Nars. He lived with his parents and two brothers in a traditional herders' lifestyle. When Urgen was 10, his older brother, Bagana, who was a musician, was killed by a drunk driver. Urgen was already a budding musician but this tragic loss inspired him to become a top performer, striving to fulfill his brother's dream. He went to school in Ar Horqin with Nars where he met Uni, then went onto Chifeng Music College and onto
Hohhot to join the Inner Mongolia Music and Dance Troupe. He is married to Toya, who is a children's TV presenter for Mongol TV, and they have a baby girl. They live in a flat in Hohhot in the same complex as Monkhjayaa.
Otgonbayar grew up in the Grasslands an hour from the town of Ujim Qin. He is the youngest of seven children, all of whom are incredibly musical. As a little boy, his father made a morin huur for him to play and taught him the old ways of playing the horse-head fiddle. His father was his inspiration to become a musician. Otgonbayar's father died while he was still a boy and his oldest brother became his father figure. They were a nomadic family, herding sheep and horses until 10 years ago, when laws were passed to divide up the Grassland and restrict herder's movements and livestock. Otgonbayar went to school in Ujim Qin. He now lives in Hohhot with his wife who is a long-song singer.
Uni was raised around Ar Horqin and met Nars and Urgen at comprehensive school. He learned music from a young age. His father was a counselor in the local communist government. He studied music at Chifeng Music College with Nars, Urgen, Chinggel, and Monkhjayaa. He went to Hohhot to work with Inner Mongolia Music and Dance Troupe and was a founder of AnDa Union. He lives in Hohhot with his wife who is a dancer.
Chinggel grew up in Ongniud Qi, in the same region as Monkhjayaa. His family are herders. He went to Music College in Chifeng where he studied morin huur, but now mainly performs on the flute. He is one of only four musicians in Inner Mongolia who can play the moadin chor. Today, his passion for the moadin chor has led him to start making the reed flutes as well as Mongolian metal flutes. He loves to drive his large Yamaha motorbike through the streets of Hohhot. He has an older sister who is a dancer.
Saikhannakhaa is from Tongliao and spent holidays on the Grasslands with her grandparents, close to Tongliao in eastern Inner Mongolia. She learned music from a young age from her paternal grandparents. She won a prize as the most talented female morin huur player and was invited to join the Inner Mongolia Song and Dance Troupe where she became the first professional
female musician. Today she runs a very successful Mongolian bar in Hohhot with her mother, father, and uncle. She has a younger brother who is also a musician. Her father once managed the art school and is a painter. Her mother trained as a dancer and actress. She has recently married a dancer from the Inner Mongolia Music and Dance Troupe.
Monkhjayaa grew up in Ongniud Qi in the same region as Chinggel with his parents and sister, following the traditional herding lifestyle. Monkhjayaa is a very accomplished horse rider. He studied music in Chifeng where he met Nars, Uni and Urgen, and Chinggel. He joined the Inner Mongolia Music and Dance Troupe and helped found AnDa Union. He lives in Hohhot with his wife and baby daughter in the same apartment complex as Urgen. He and his wife own a beauty salon in Hohhot.
Hadanbaatar is the drummer of the ensemble. He grew up near Ordos City in the Grasslands, where his parents were nomadic herders. The Ordos people are a large ethnic group within the Mongol population. He joined the Inner Mongolia Music and Dance Troupe where he met the rest of AnDa Union. He lives in Hohhot with his wife who is a singer. He has recently started a small business with a friend making traditional handmade Mongolian drums.
Tsetsegmaa is a long-song singer and tours with AnDa Union. A Buriat, she grew up near Hulun Buir in the northwest of Inner Mongolia near the border of Russia and Outer Mongolia. Hulun Buir is one of the most remote areas of the region and home to both Ewenke and Buriat people. She works within the Inner Mongolia Music and Dance Troupe as a solo long-song singer. She has won many prizes and awards for her astounding musicianship and has written a number of Buriat songs which she perfoms with AnDa Union. She resides in Hohhot and has one sister.
Biligbaatar is a long-song singer and tours regularly with AnDa Union. He grew up in Hexigten. His mother, younger brother, brother's wife, and daughter, all live in the Grasslands and herd the family livestock. Biligbaatar is an expert horseman. A long-song gold medalist, his talent was developed in the beauty of the Grasslands. He resides in Hohhot with his wife who is also a singer.
J
ohn Luckacovic spent 19 years with Columbia Artists Management Inc., becoming a vice president and member of CAMI's Board of Directors. Eleanor Oldham joined the ICM Artists European office in London, where, as second in command of that office, she signed and managed the careers of conductors and instrumentalists. After relocating to New York in 1997, she began to develop new projects and attractions, and in 2001, Mr. Luckacovic and Ms. Oldham formed 2Luck Concepts to enable them to continue to seek out, develop, and produce unique and engaging projects from around the world. In just 10 years, among their many projects, they managed the inaugural North American tours of George Piper DancesBallet Boyz; Akram Khan's Kaash, MA, Sacred Monsters (featuring Akram Khan and Sylvie Guillem), and In-I (featuring Akram and Juliette Binoche); they produced and managed the first-ever North American tours of London's Shakespeare's Globe Original Practice productions of Twelfth Night and Measure for Measure, followed by Love's Labour's Lost in 2009 and The Merry Wives of Windsor in 2010; the first North
American tour of Stan Won't Dance in Sinner, the first US touring of New York contemporary ballet company Cedar Lake; and a 12-week50-city tour of Moscow's Helikon Opera.
Last fall, 2Luck produced the 60th anniversary tour of Poland's national ensemble MAZOWSZE. This season's projects include Akram Khan's Gnosis and Vertical Road; a fifth Globe production (The Comedy of Errors), Mnozil Brass from Austria; Francesca Gagnon--The Voice of Alegria with Symphony Orchestra, celebrating the music of Cirque du Soleil; and AnDa Union.
Management
Tim Pearce and Sophie Lascelles
Education Assistant Pascal Pearce
Translator
Zhang, Tiancang (Jane)
Special thanks to David Fraher, Kat Duvic, Sanj Altan, Tim Wilson, Ken Carlson, Richard Lewis, and our friends and families in Inner Mongolia.
urns
presents
A Night in Treme
The Musical Majesty of New Orleans
Rebirth Brass Band
Keith Frazier, Bass Drum Phil Frazier, Sousaphone Stafford Agee, Trombone Derrick Tabb, Snare Drum
Derek Shezbie, Trumpet Vincent Broussard, Tenor Saxophone Chaderick Honore, Trumpet Glen Andrews, Trumpet
with
Donald Harrison, Jr.
Musical Director, Alto Saxophone, and Vocals
Cyril Neville
Vocals and Percussion
Dr. Michael White
Clarinet
James Andrews
Trumpet and Vocals
Glen David Andrews
Trombone and Vocals
Program
Friday Evening, November 11, 2011 at 8:00 Hill Auditorium Ann Arbor
Tonight's program will be announced by the artists from the stage and will be performed with one intermission.
21st Performance of the 133rd Annual Season
18th Annual Jazz Series
The photographing or sound and video recording of this concert or possession of any device for such recording is prohibited.
This evening's performance is co-sponsored by Anne and Paul Glendon and Comerica Bank.
Media partnership is provided by WEMU 89.1 FM, Metro Times, The Michigan Chronicle, and Ann Arbor's 107one.
Special thanks to Honigman Miller Schwartz and Cohn LLP for sponsoring this evening's leadership donor reception.
Special thanks to the Detroit Party Marching Band for their support of and participation in events surrounding tonight's concert.
Produced by Danny Melnick for Absolutely Live Entertainment in association with Wendell Pierce.
A Night in Treme: The Musical Majesty of New Orleans appears by arrangement with Ted Kurland Associates.
Large print programs are available upon request.
Home Is In Your Heart
The heavens opened and the storm wafers surged and the bowl began to fill, and our favorite street paraders, and piano ticklers, and rhythm-and-blues singers, and funkateers, and trumpeteers were scattered to the winds.
They wondered whether they would ever go home or would want to. For some it was a test of faith. Do you rebuild Can you afford to Can you afford not to Will the future be friendly Others saw it as an opportunity to reaffirm their trust in the infinite wisdom of the universe.
They are more than musicians. They are healers, and from the Diaspora of musical genius they have come together to heal themselves.
Some of them are here tonight.
Their stories are told on Treme, the HBO drama that follows a group of locals as they pick up the pieces in the months after the levees failed in 2005. 7reme is about people who found the grace to return to their silent streets and look beyond the desolation, and believed that their lives were turned upside down for some divine reason.
Tonight, the gathered ones have come to play, for family and friends, for the displaced and the forgotten, for their elders and ancestors in the Spirit World.
"If you don't return to the roots of a tree, it won't be there anymore," Donald Harrison, Jr., the saxophonist and cultural anthropologist who is also tonight's music director, says. "From these roots, the fruit grows all over the world."
Tonight we can smell the fragrance of sweet jasmine and gardenias instead of the mold and mud. Tonight we celebrate how these musical healers have worked through their rage and fear and frustration and heartbreak and heartache-their defiance and devotion and the vulnerability.
Slowly, these musicians have rebuilt the Old Neighborhood, even if it isn't there anymore, exactly. Tonight in Treme, the music prevails.
--Leo Sacks
Leo Sacks is directing a feature documentary about the New Orleans gospel sensation Raymond Myles (www. raymondmylesmovie.com). After Katrina, he created The New Orleans Social Club and produced the group's acclaimed Sing Me Back Home. He recently produced Take A Look: Aretha Franklin Complete on Columbia, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of her first pop recording.
R
ebirth Brass Band was the natural choice to serve as the house band for A Night in Treme. With roots firmly planted in centuries of Afro-Caribbean rhythms, no one pumps the Crescent City's musical lifeblood quite like Rebirth. Just as The Dirty Dozen played at The Glass House, a now vanished club where the Dozens fomented a new generation of funk-loving brass bands every Thursday night, the heart of Tuesday night in New Orleans belongs to Rebirth at the Maple Leaf Bar. The sound is equal parts bebop cutting session and hard-grooving dance party as rabid 'birthers soak up soaring trumpet runs that boomerang off the pressed-tin ceiling and bass drum and tuba solos that rumble into the street. The band's new CD, Rebirth of New Orleans, commingles second-line swing, hip-hop-influenced funk and all the kinetic energy of a daylong parade. It's classic Rebirth, constructed on one unruly groove at a time: tenor saxophonist Vincent Broussard and trombonist Corey Henry hold up the mid-range while Derrick Shezbie carries the melody on trumpet as snare drummer Derrick Tabb supplies the syncopated thrust. Add the matchless Frazier brothers--Phil on sousaphone, and Keith on bass drum--to the mix and Rebirth are conversing in an ancient language from southern Africa. Their mantra since 1983 has been "Lord, You Sure Been Good to Me," and never more so than after Katrina. "Rebirth has reshuffled the cards," Donald Harrison says. "They've revitalized our tradition in ways that are fresh and new."
@@@@T
here are chiefs, and there are Big Chiefs. Donald Harrison, Jr. embodies the best of both. Composer, educator, historian, producer, saxophonist, and patriarch of the Congo Nation Indian tribe, Mr. Harrison is a true ambassador of New Orleans music. "New Orleans music is like the river," he says. "Ideas come from other places. You bring something, and take
something back. It's give and take, like the human spirit. It's indestructible." Mr. Harrison can move from hard bop to a second-line Mardi Gras beat faster than Mama makes her roux; his playing is laced with pride and fired with defiance, acceptance, and hope. His sensibility
Donald Harrison, Jr.
as a modernist and traditionalist with a highly personal style has produced satisfying collaborations with Clark Terry, Lena Home, Roy Haynes, Jack McDuff, Terence Blanchard, Don Pullen, Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, and the reformed Headhunters. Mr. Harrison has also nurtured many "young lions," including Mark Whitfield, Cyrus Chestnut, Christian McBride, and, most recently, his nephew Christian Scott. Mr. Harrison was particularly proud of mentoring Christopher Wallace years before Wallace became the rap legend Biggie Smalls, aka the Notorious B.I.G. Mr. Harrison learned the culture and traditions of the Mardi Gras Indians firsthand from his father, Big Chief Donald Harrison, Sr., the spiritual leader of the Guardians of the Flame. Scripture says that a tree is judged by the fruit it bears--consider that Mr. Harrison walks in his own light today as Big Chief of the Congo Nation. Guardian of the Flame, a new feature short directed by Brian Harrison Nelson that made its world premiere this spring at the 8th annual New Orleans International Human Rights Film Festival, is inspired by the Harrisons' intricate family tapestry. "We've come to celebrate community tonight," he says, "the most joyful part of New Orleans." His new album is titled Quantum Leap.
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ocial protest songs and Cyril Neville are like sausage in the gumbo when he performs with his older brothers Art, Charles, and Aaron in The Neville Brothers. The siblings have been inseparable from New Orleans R&B and
pop since the 50s and the 60s, when Art Neville was brewing a brand of funk with the Meters of which Cyril Neville joined in the 70s. On his own with the Endangered Species Band, the Uptown All-Stars, and Tribe 13, Mr. Neville has been slinging terse songs about social justice and heritage like flaming arrows. These collaborations have produced a rich recorded legacy, including The Fire
FAis Time, Soulo, New Orleans Cookin', For the Funk Of It, The Healing Dance, and Brand New Blues. The Essential Cyril Neville 1994-2007 is a powerful primer of American musical styles from the original Uptown Ruler. He has appeared on recordings by Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, Robbie Robertson, and Dr. John, while his recent work with the Voice of the Wetlands All-Stars has drawn awareness to the fragile ecosystem in southern Louisiana. Six weeks after Katrina, Mr. Neville joined the powerful collective The New Orleans Social Club and delivered a searing version of "This Is My Country"--one of Curtis Mayfield's most important songs about social justice--on Sing Me Back Home. Mr. Neville's message for all of the slow-moving powers in Washington, DC and New Orleans encapsulated what everyone was feeling after Katrina: shock, heartbreak, anger, vulnerability, defiance. "I've paid 300 years or more...of slave-driving sweat and welts on my back," he sang. "Unfortunately, those words could have been written yesterday," Mr. Neville says. With countless lives still in storm-tossed transition, he will not allow us to forget that cruel reality known as "Katrina fatigue." "There's still a lot of misery," says the fiery poet-philosopher, whose home with Queen Gaynielle Neville in the Gentilly district was destroyed when the levees failed. "Enjoy the music of New Orleans, but remember to take a good look around."
PhOlO KKk Oliver
T
he more he learns about New Orleans and the music of the American South, the more he pushes himself and his band mates in different directions, the more Dr. Michael White demonstrates that everything old is new. Whether he's exploring the music of Jelly Roll Morton, King Oliver, or Sidney Bechet, the good doctor shows us that traditions are supposed to be challenged while they're being celebrated. Holder of the Rosa and Charles Keller Endowed Chair in the Humanities of New Orleans Music and Culture at Xavier University, Dr. White has brought his toe-tapping brand of New Orleans jazz and blues clarinet around the world. His sound can be wry and bluesy or playful and swaggering; he always has a story to tell. He can be historically authentic when he collaborates with the Original Liberty Jazz Band of New Orleans or the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, or he can paint with popular colors in a joyous set with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band. That facility--that remarkable grace--makes him such a distinguished cultural anthropologist. Dr. White was a major catalyst on Wynton Marsalis's acclaimed 1989 release, The Majesty of The Blues. His most recent project is Blue Crescent, which was recorded with longtime members of his Original Liberty Jazz Band. It also features sparkling trumpet from another standard-bearer, New Orleans' own Nicholas Payton. "I can only hope that Katrina strengthens New Orleans music, and what the nature of improvisation truly means."
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he Great Spirit has blessed the trumpeter and bandleader James Andrews with divinely inspired soul fire. He's just one of those New Orleans musicians who can play anything: rock, jazz, Latin, bossa, calypso, or biting funk. Coming up, Mr. Andrews loved the sound of the brass bands and social aid and pleasure clubs that paraded outside his front door in Treme. His grandfather was the much-loved local star Jesse Hill. Mr. Andrews idolized "Poops," who cut the New Orleans evergreen, "Ooh Poo Pah Doo," and Mr. Andrews and his baby brother, the dynamic Troy ("Trombone Shorty") Andrews, performed it on the first season of Treme. Andrews also felt a deep connection with the spirit of Louis Armstrong, so much that Mr. Andrews came up with his own handle: "Satchmo of The Ghetto." It became the title of his debut album in 1998. "That's what I always look for, that's what Pops gave me," Mr. Andrews says. "The flavor and the
feeling." Satchmo of The Ghetto was a savory slice of his soul that played like a New Orleans jukebox; he just released a new album, The Big Time Stuff, with guest turns from Cyril Neville, Big Chief Monk Boudreaux, and Brian J of the Brooklyn funk band The Pimps of Joytime. But little brother gets the last word: "James taught me everything I know," Shorty says.
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dazzling performer with a penchant for sequins and shades, Glen David Andrews encapsulates the best thing about New Orleans music: it has no borders or boundaries. A rugged trombone player and singer, he's deeply devoted to hip-hop and R&B. He also loves jazz, country, and the blues. But it is a gospel album called Walking Through Heaven's Gate (2009) that has brought Mr. Andrews into the national spotlight. He knows the meaning of faith and the comforts it can bring, singing old hymns like "I'll Fly Away" and "The Battle Hymn of The Republic" with a preacher's passion. "If you're ready for a blessing, say, 'Oh yeah!'" he proclaims. "But if you really want a blessing, say, 'Oh Lord!'" "The combination of his influences has made Mr. Andrews a breakout star on the small screen; he had a recurring role in the second season of Treme. But he also wants to make a difference in the lives of young people who grapple with everyday violence. Mr. Andrews has joined the nonprofit organization Trumpets Not Guns to help steer them away from the streets and into music. The group's goal is to refurbish and distribute 300 instruments in the coming year. "I'm involved because I'm mad as hell," Mr. Andrews says. "There's no reason why people should be scared of a second-line on a Sunday afternoon. We've got to get the guns out of our children's' hands."
UMS Archives
T
onight's concert marks Dr. Michael White's second performance under UMS auspices. Dr. White made his UMS debut with Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra Octet in January 1996 at Michigan Theater.
UMS welcomes the Rebirth Brass Band, Donald Harrison, Jr., Cyril Neville, James Andrews, and Glen David Andrews, who make their UMS debuts this evening.
urns
presents
St. Lawrence String Quartet
Geoff Nuttall, Violin Scott St. John, Violin Lesley Robertson, Viola Christopher Costanza, Cello
Program
Franz Josef Haydn
R. Murray Schafer
Osvaldo Golijov Haydn
Saturday Evening, November 12, 2011 at 8:00 Rackham Auditorium Ann Arbor
String Quartet in C Major, Op. 74, No. 1
Allegro moderato Andantino grazioso Menuetto (Allegro) Finale (Vivace)
String Quartet No. 3
Slowly, but with great passion Allegro energico Slow; calm; mystical
INTERMISSION Kohelet
String Quartet in d minor. Op. 76, No. 2
Allegro
Andante piu tosto Allegretto Menuetto (Allegro ma non troppo) Finale (Vivace)
22nd Performance of the 133rd Annual Season
49th Annual Chamber Arts Series
The photographing or sound and video recording of this concert or possession of any device for such recording is prohibited.
Media partnership is provided by WGTE 91.3 FM.
Kohelet was composed for the St. Lawrence String Quartet, and was co-commissioned by Carnegie Hall and Stanford Lively Arts Stanford University with the generous support of Kathryn Gould.
St. Lawrence String Quartet recordings can be heard on EMI Classics and ArtistShare. St. Lawrence String Quartet is Ensemble-in-Residence at Stanford University. St. Lawrence String Quartet appears by arrangement with David Rowe Artists. For further information on St. Lawrence String Quartet, please visit www.slsq.com.
Large print programs are available upon request.
Now that you're in your seat...
W
hen contemporary music and the classics are brought together on a single program, one is bound to see both in a new light. We become conscious of a part of music's essence that always remains the same, regardless of style: the desire to say something that cannot be put into words, and to create some kind of new order using musical sounds. We also become aware of that fact that, as a well-known radio commentator put it, "all music was once new," and that all music builds, in one way or another, on music that had existed before. When it comes to string quartets in particular, Haydn, the "father" of the genre, will always be in the center, even as his musical "great-great-grandchildren" are exploring entirely new possibilities of working with two violins, a viola, and a cello.
String Quartet in C Major, Op. 74, No. 1
(1793)
Franz Josef Haydn
Born March 31, 7 732 in Rohrau, Lower Austria Died May 31, 1809 in Vienna
Snapshot of History... In 1793:
King Louis XVI of France is guillotined. The Louvre, the former royal palace, becomes a museum
William Blake writes Songs of Innocence and of Experience
President George Washington lays the cornerstone for the United States Capitol
The second partition of Poland by Russia and Prussia
Beethoven writes his three piano trios, later published as Op. 1
Haydn wrote six new quartets to take with him on his second visit to London, 1794-95. Earlier in the 1790s, he had carefully observed the cosmopolitan London musical scene over two seasons. Now, the new quartets were clearly customized for a thriving London market. Violinist Johann Peter Salomon, the impresario who had invited the renowned Viennese composer to the British capital, introduced him to a musical life that differed from the insular court life at Esterhazy and differed, too, from the more formal, semi-private concerts that were given in the homes of Viennese aristocrats. Haydn noted how London's larger public concert rooms colored the music that was played there. (The Hanover Square Rooms, where tonight's quartet was first performed, was large; it accommodated 800). The London musicians were skilled, versatile freelancers who could speedily come to terms with new music and were flexible
in both orchestral and chamber music. Back in Vienna, musicians were usually servant-performers or aristocrat amateurs. Salomon himself was a virtuoso, one of the leading lights in London, with a fine reputation as a leader of both an orchestra and a string quartet. Salomon's London offered Haydn a burgeoning variety of public concerts in a busy commercial metropolis with a population that was nearly four times that of Vienna. London's sophisticated concert audiences craved novelty and were willing to pay handsomely for it--and the effect on Haydn's music was profound.
With his new collection, Haydn was, in effect, playing catch-up. His quartets were designed to compete with the more attention-grabbing, less subtle quartet music then current in the English capital. Leading London composers like Ignaz Pleyel and Adalbert Gyrowetz wrote quartets to showcase four soloists, often within a relatively loose musical structure. Single movements became favorites and were often played sandwiched between symphonies, concertos, and vocal selections. Haydn's quartets are the first he had written for performance in public venues. He wrote them on a much broader canvas, requiring an almost orchestral technique. He had left behind the more intimate, more intense, and inward-looking world of his Viennese quartets. The opening of tonight's C-Major quartet, Op. 74, No. 1, for example, is a bold and dramatic chord which would have had an immediate effect of calling a large audience to attention. (Five of the six quartets open this way, whereas none of his quartets had previously done so). Throughout the quartet, and particularly in the finale, the virtuoso first violin part was written with Salomon's agile fingers in mind. The first violin dominates the writing, but not to the exclusion of contrapuntal
writing between all four instruments--as in the recapitulation of the first movement, where the opening themes are re-visited. After an intense and sonorous slow movement, Haydn makes dynamic use of rhythm and introduces striking harmonic surprises in the minuet. The finale is exuberant and engaging, with vigorous corporate counterpoint and a recurring witty rustic passage over a cello drone--all designed to please an audience eager to experience the latest from an esteemed composer.
Program note O2011 by Keith Homer.
String Quartet No. 3 (1981)
R. Murray Schafer
Born July 18, 1933 in Sarnia, Ontario, Canada
Snapshot of History... In 1981:
Ronald Reagan becomes President of the United States; the 52 Americans held hostage in Iran for 444 days are released
Elias Canetti receives the Nobel Prize for Literature
MiloS Forman directs the film Ragtime after the novel by E. L. Doctorow
IBM releases the first Personal Computer
Dr. Bruce Reitz performs the first successful heartlung transplant at Stanford Hospital
Mr. Schafer's 11 string quartets can be viewed as the most significant body of chamber music written by a Canadian composer. From String Quartet No. 1 of 1970 to Wo. 11 in the spring of 2007, they reveal many aspects of his restless, questioning musical mind. Although stylistically diverse, the quartets can still be viewed as a cycle. "All my quartets are somewhat related," Mr. Schafer says. At one level, the musical connections between the quartets increase as the cycle progresses. On another level, the physical relationship of the instruments is explored. The Second, for example, ends with solo cello on stage; the Third begins in the same manner. The Third Quartet ends--and the Fourth begins--with the first violin off-stage, in the distance. A melody is shared from the end of String Quartet No. 4 to the beginning of String Quartet No. 5. The Eighth begins its musical development where the Seventh ends.
Much of Mr. Schafer's music questions the very nature of performance itself. His 12-part Patria cycle, written over a three-decade period, presents a "theater of confluence, in which all the arts may meet, court, and make love." They do so all night
long, at five o'clock in the morning, over an 8-day period, in a forest, by a lake, in a science center, at a railway station, in a Northern bush camp. The quartets, however, are contained in traditional performance spaces. But even if the performance occurs within the "chamber" of the chamber music medium, the listener should be prepared for chamber music with one or two walls broken down. Schafer re-thinks traditional forms and structures. Musicians leave the stage (in Quartets Nos. 2, 3, 4, and 7); pre-recorded material is included (in Nos. 4 and 8); additional musicians are included (Nos. 4 and 7); a T'ai Chi dancer performs (Wo. 6); and percussion is included (Nos. 5 and 7).
String Quartet No. 3 was written in 1981 for the Orford Quartet, to a commission from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. It begins with an intense, exotic rhapsody, played by the solo cello, alone on stage. The other three players start from different points in the concert hall and, as they gradually converge, arguing violently and consciously avoiding gestures in harmony with one another, the movement ends. In the second movement, the four performers do play together as one quartet. But Mr. Schafer also instructs them to expand their instrumental gestures with shouted vocalizations. These are "like the vocal shouts of karate," Mr. Schafer says and they are not to be superimposed on the string music. Instead, the shouts grow out of the physical impulse that produces the string tone. The second movement is highly energetic. At one point, it settles momentarily into a slow waltz tempo. Elsewhere, it is the music of warring samurai or, perhaps, the urban jungle. "In the second movement, all hell breaks loose," wrote Alex Ross in The New Yorker. "The Lawrences reprise their notorious yelling act, screaming gibberish in tandem with fast-moving dissonant lines. It's a spellbinding spectacle, and it is also a hilarious send-up of the emotional infantilism of the ultramodern repertory."
In complete contrast, all is calm and peaceful in the haunting Finale. Here, Mr. Schafer says, the players must be in complete unison not only with the notes played, but also with all the physical gestures they go through--the bowing, breathing, body swaying, and so on. The music is a long, hypnotic unison melody. After some gentle humming from the players on stage, the first violin moves off into the distance. As he disappears, the music itself seems to float away.
Program note O2007 by Keith Homer.
Kohelet(2011)
Osvaldo Golijov
Bom December 5, 7960 in La Plata, Argentina
Snapshot of History... In 2011:
The Arab Spring: long-lime dictators are toppled in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya
Osama bin Laden is killed by a US military operation in Pakistan
77ie Help, a novel by Kathryn Stockett, tops the New York Times bestseller list; its movie version is also a major success
Painter Leonora Carrington, one of the last surviving members of the Surrealist movement, dies in Mexico City at the age of 94
Dominique Strauss-Kahn is forced to resign as Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund after being accused of sexual assault
String Quartet in d minor. Op. 76, No. 2
("Quinten") (Fifths) (1797) Haydn
Snapshot of History... In 1797:
Franz Schubert, Gaetano Donizetti, Heinrich Heine, and Mary Shelley are born
Jane Austen writes the first version of Pride and Prejudice under the title First Impressions
John Adams becomes the second President of the United States
The French revolutionary wars continue: France signs a peace treaty with Austria but is still at war with Great Britain
Friedrich Holderlin publishes the first volume of his novel Hyperion
In Germany, this quartet has the nickname Die Quinten (Fifths), referring to the two descending intervals of a fifth with which the piece opens. This falling interval and its inversion and different permutations recur throughout the first movement; it will provide a unifying element in the melodic material of the entire quartet. Haydn would have called this his "learned" (gelehrter) style. And it is a measure of his genius as a composer that we do not need to pick apart the technical sophistication of his musical language to enjoy its content. The craft in Haydn's music appealed to the younger Mozart and he learned much from it. With the d-minor tonality of this
quartet, however, we also find Haydn taking a leaf out of the book of a composer more than 20 years his junior. D minor was Mozart's "tragic" key--the key of the powerful Quartet K. 421 that Mozart had recently dedicated to Haydn. In his Op.76, No.2, Haydn returns the compliment with one of the most concentrated, rigorously constructed quartets he ever wrote.
The highly focused, impassioned mood of the first movement relaxes in the following "Andante." Here, the first violin serenades us, to alternating plucked and bowed accompaniment, in elegant music that is not without a hint of whimsy--the pleasing, relaxed theme has the unusual length of 15 measures. The minuet then brings complete contrast. Its severe style introduces a strict canon, first between the two violins, then between viola and cello. Its bleak and eerie minor mood, plus the tension Haydn develops within the music, have given the movement a nickname of its own: Hexenmenuett (Witches' Minuet). The tension between major and minor keys continues in the exuberant finale with its "Hungarian" off-beat inflections, frequent pauses to hold the listener's attention, and extreme leaps--with a surprise in store on the final leaps. The tension is only resolved towards the end when, suddenly, the music eases quietly into the major key and remains there right up to the jubilant final chords.
For the 18th-century English historian Charles Burney, Haydn's Op. 76 collection, written when the composer had already been writing quartets for a half century, was "full of invention, fire, good taste, and new effects and seem the production, not of a sublime genius, who has written so much and so well already, but of one of highly cultivated talents, who had expended none of his fire before." Haydn's music is concentrated and closely argued. It speaks out to an audience and ranges boldly through different keys. The music both sums up the great classical era of chamber music and looks ahead to the dawning age of romanticism.
Program notes O2011 by Keith Homer.
T
he St. Lawrence String Quartet (SLSQ) has established itself among the world-class chamber ensembles of its generation. Its mission: bring every piece of music to the audience in vivid color, with pronounced communication and teamwork, and great respect to the composer. Since winning both the Banff International String Quartet Competition and Young Concert Artists International Auditions in 1992, the quartet has delighted audiences with its spontaneous,
passionate, and dynamic performances. Alex Ross of The New Yorker magazine writes, "the St. Lawrence are remarkable not simply for the quality of their music making, exalted as it is, but for the joy they take in the act of connection."
Whether playing Haydn or premiering a new work, the SLSQ has a rare ability to bring audiences to rapt attention. They reveal surprising nuances in familiar repertoire and illuminate the works of some of today's most celebrated composers, often
ums University Musical Society
all in the course of one evening. John Adams was inspired to write works expressly for the quartet after hearing them in concert. The first of these was "String Quartet," which SLSQ premiered in 2009 to wide critical acclaim. In 2012, the quartet will join forces with the San Francisco Symphony to perform "Absolute Jest," another work Adams has composed with the SLSQ in mind. This work will premiere in San Francisco in March 2012, with additional performances in Chicago, Ann Arbor (Friday evening, March 23, 2012 at Hill Auditorium), and New York.
This past October saw SLSQ premiere a new work by Osvaldo Golijov, also composed for them. Kohelet (co-commissioned by Stanford Lively Arts and Carnegie Hall) is expected to build on the success of their previous collaboration, which culminated in the twice-Grammy-nominated SLSQ recording of the composer's Yiddishbbuk (EMI) in 2002.
SLSQ maintains a busy touring schedule. Some current season highlights include visits to Baltimore, Cincinnati, Ann Arbor, Toronto, Philadelphia, Montreal, Durham, and New Orleans, as well as a return to Australia in spring 2012. During the summer season, SLSQ is proud to continue its long association with the Spoleto Festival in Charleston, SC, and Bay Chamber Concerts in Rockport, Maine.
Celebrating the 20th anniversary of the quartet's founding in Canada, SLSQ in 2009 commissioned five Canadian composers and performed their work across the country. They also have active working relationships with other composers, including R. Murray Schafer, Christos Hatzis, Ezequiel Vinao, Jonathan Berger, Ka Nin Chan, Roberto Sierra, and Mark Applebaum.
Since 1998 the SLSQ has held the position of Ensemble-in-Residence at Stanford University. This residency includes working with music students as well as extensive collaborations with other faculty and departments using music to explore a myriad of topics. Recent collaborations have involved the School of Medicine, School of Education, and the Law School. In addition to their appointment at Stanford, the SLSQ are visiting artists at the University of Toronto. The foursome's passion for opening musical arenas to players and listeners alike is evident in their annual summer chamber music seminar at Stanford and their many forays into the depths of musical meaning with preeminent music educator Robert Kapilow.
Violist Lesley Robertson is a founding member of the group, and hails from Edmonton Alberta. Cellist Christopher Costanza is from Utica, NY, and joined the quartet in 2003. Violinists Geoff Nuttall and Scott St. John both grew up in London, Ontario; Geoff is a founding member and Scott joined in 2006. Depending on concert repertoire, the two alternate the role of first violin. All four members of the quartet live and teach at Stanford, in the Bay Area of California.
UMS Archives
T
his evening's concert marks the St. Lawrence String Quartet's second UMS appearance. The Quartet made its UMS debut in November 2009 at Rackham Auditorium. Its debut program included pieces by Haydn, Ravel, and John Adams. The Quartet will return to Ann Arbor this March as part of American Mavericks at Hill Auditorium in performance of John Adams's Absolute Jest with the San Francisco Symphony and Michael Tilson Thomas.
urns
presents
Beijing Guitar Duo
Meng Su, Guitar Yameng Wang, Guitar
with
Manuel Barrueco
Guitar
Program
Anton Diabelli
Federico Moreno Torroba
Tan Dun,
An. Manuel Barrueco
Sunday Afternoon, November 20, 2011 at 4:00 Rackham Auditorium Ann Arbor
Trio in F Major, Op. 62
Adagio--Allegro moderato
Minuetto
Rondo
Estampas
Bailando un Fandango Charro
Remanso
La Siega
Fiesta en el Pueblo
Amanecer
La Boda
Camino del Molino
Juegos Infantiles
Mr. Barrueco and the Beijing Guitar Duo
Eight Memories in Watercolor
Missing Moon Staccato Beans Herdboy's Song Blue Nun Red Wilderness Ancient Burial Floating Clouds Sunrain
Meng Su and Yameng Wang INTERMISSION
Francisco Tarrega
Joaquin Malats, Arr. Tarrega
Sergio Assad Astor Piazzolla
Capricho Arabe (Serenata)
Serenata Andaluza Serenata Espanola
Mr. Barrueco The Enchanted Island
L'Evasion Fuga y Misterio Revirado
Mr. Barrueco and the Beijing Guitar Duo
23rd Performance of the 133rd Annual Season
Asia Series
The photographing or sound and video recording of this concert or possession of any device for such recording is prohibited.
Manuel Barrueco and the Beijing Guitar Duo record exclusively for Tonar Music.
Manuel Barrueco and the Beijing Guitar Duo appear by arrangement with Arts Management Group, Inc.
Large print programs are available upon request.
Trio in F Major, Op. 62
Anton Diabelli
Born September 5, 1781 in Mattsee, near
Salzburg, Austria Died April 8, 1858 in Vienna
Anton Diabelli was better known as a pianist, composer, and publisher, and even though he dedicated some pieces of signal interest to the guitar, he never appeared as a concert guitarist himself. As a publisher, he is remembered for the fact that he brought to public attention some of the works of then little-known Franz Schubert. Diabelli lived in Vienna, one of the two great European capitals of guitar music in the mid-19th century. Vienna was in fact the city where the Italian Mauro Giuliani, perhaps the most important guitarist-composer of the century, lived for around 20 years.
Diabelli's Trio in F Major is a work which fits nicely into the style of music that blends the classical and the Biedermeier which was so popular in Vienna in the first half of the 19th century. The first movement is in two-part form, opening with an introductory "Adagio" which, after a brief cadenza for the first guitar, leads into the sonata-form "Allegro moderate" Both the breadth of the movement and its rich thematic elaboration are clear indications of its Viennese origins, reflecting a style in which masterly construction is always matched by unquestionable melodic charm. The following "Minuet" is similarly pleasant in its melodies, and is clearly reminiscent of Haydn's minuets with their wealth of popular accents. The final movement completes the work in a pleasantly relaxed atmosphere.
Estampas
Federico Moreno Torroba
Born March 3, 1891 in Madrid, Spain
Died September 12, 1982
Federico Moreno Torroba was a prolific composer of symphonic works and operas which conquered the Spanish public. His international fame can be atributed to his compositions for the guitar.
His first master was his father, the famous organist Jose Moreno Ballesteros who taught at the Madrid Conservatory. Moreno Torroba's earliest compositions were orchestral pieces,
notably Cuadros castellanos. He then followed his predecessors in trying to create a true Spanish opera, producing La virgen del Mayo and Maria la tempranica. However, he had most success with his light and subtle zarzuelas, pieces wide in their appeal but retaining a purity of style. Moreno Torroba achieved similar prominence through his guitar works, and in fact, along with Manuel de Falla, was among the main architects of the rebirth of the classical guitar in the 20th century. After World War I, he met and became close friends with Andres Segovia, for whom he wrote many original works which have become classics of the guitar repertoire.
Eight Memories in Watercolor
Tan Dun
Born August 15, 1957 in Simaonae, Changsha, in the Hunan province, China
Tan Dun's sublime Eight Memories in Watercolor was originally written for piano but is offered here in an arrangement by Manuel Barrueco. The arrangement brings out the exquisitely beautiful colors of the guitar. Tan Dun has commented:
Eight Memories in Watercolor was written when I left Hunan to study at the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing. It was my opus one. The Cultural Revolution had just ended, China just opened its doors, I was immersed in studying Western classical and modern music, but I was also homesick. I longed for the folksongs and savored the memories of my childhood.
Program note by Risa Carlson.
Capricho Arabe (Serenata)
Francisco Tarrega
Born November 21, 1852 in Villarreal, Castelldn, Spain
Died December 15, 1909 in Barcelona
One of the reasons that Francisco Tarrega was able to transcribe the piano music of Albeniz, Malats, and others so effectively is that he was a trained and accomplished pianist himself. With the guitar in eclipse during the mid-1800s as both a domestic and a professional instrument, Tarrega's father
insisted that he master the keyboard instrument as a sort of musical insurance policy.
Born in the Valencian town of Villarreal, Tarrega went to Barcelona when he was 10 to study with the guitarist Julian Areas. After running away several times in his early teens to perform alone and with gypsies in Barcelona and Valencia, Tarrega eventually was able to enter the conservatory in Madrid, where the great zarzuela composer Emilio Arrieta persuaded him to concentrate on the guitar. In Sevilla, Tarrega had acquired a remarkable instrument by the master luthier Antonio Torres, whose visionary designs did as much to create the modern instrument as Tarrega's innovations did to forge its technique.
Tarrega's technique has been codified in the volumes of the Escuela Razonada published by his pupil Emilio Pujol, but it is also fully realized in his compositions and arrangements. Tarrega ranged widely over the 19th-century piano music he knew so well, transcribing Chopin preludes and movements of Beethoven sonatas among much else, in addition to the music of contemporaries such as Albeniz and Malats. He also arranged works by earlier composers such as Bach, Handel, Mozart, and Haydn, as well as popular excerpts from current operas by Verdi and Wagner.
Tarrega composed over 70 original works for the guitar, mostly preludes, etudes, and character pieces. These were for his own concert use--he performed widely throughout Western Europe--and many were unpublished. Although not academically inclined, Tarrega was knowledgeable and respectful of Spanish musical traditions, and one of his most famous pieces, Capricho krabe reflects the Moorish influence that was so powerful in southern Spain. Its modal melodies, however, are elaborated in the serenata style familiar from the Malats pieces, including the characteristic turn from minor mode to major for contrasting sections. It displays the extended range and timbral possibilities of the new Torres guitars, and the free right-hand technique that Tarrega pioneered.
Per invitation, in December 2009, Mr. Barrueco performed a concert in Villarreal, in commemoration of the centenary of Francisco Tarrega's death.
Serenata Andaluza Serenata Espanola
Joaquin Malats Born in 1872 in Spain Died in 1912
Joaquin Malats was another Catalan pianist, very much in the mold of his older friend Albeniz. Though much less widely travelled than Albeniz, Malats too studied in Paris. He was a truly formidable virtuoso, and it was his playing that inspired Albeniz to raise the difficulty bar to daunting heights in the later works of Iberia, Albeniz' four-volume magnum opus. "I am writing Iberia...essentially because of you and for you," the composer wrote in 1907.
Malats himself wrote comparatively little mu?sic, and it is almost exclusively guitarists who have kept it alive in transcriptions, beginning with Tarre-ga. The Serenata Andaluza --like its more popular sibling, the Serenata Espanola --is quintessential Spanish nationalism, with a seductive, liquid melo?dy gliding over insistent rhythmic figures.
The Enchanted Island
Sergio Assad
Born December 26, 1952 in Sao Paulo, Brazil
An unsuspecting visitor to Havana, Cuba, will be surprised to find the "Barrio Chino," one of the oldest Chinatowns in Latin America. The presence of Asians in the new world (if one ignores the first visitors crossing the Bering tens of thousands of years ago) began after what is known as the Ma?nila Galleon trade dating from the 16th century. Since that time, generations of Asians have immi?grated to Latin American and Caribbean countries bringing their culture and music.
The idea of Asian communities living in tropi?cal places like Havana and Sao Paulo inspired me to write the piece entitled The Enchanted Island for three guitars. This guitar trio was written for my dear friend and colleague Manuel Barrueco to be performed by him and the outstanding Bei?jing Guitar Duo. To represent the mixing of such different musical cultures as the Asian and the Latin American, I used the Asian hemitonic and anhemitonic pentatonic scales merged with Afro-Cuban rhythms. The piece has very well defined borders going from a vague and ambiguous hemi?tonic pentatonic introduction to a pulsating clave rhythm that uses the same thematic material that
served as introduction. Later, the clave rhythm changes into a syncopated rhythmic pattern that accompanies a still hemitonic pentatonic dialogue. Two slow sections follow: the first one is based on a strict Chinese anhemitonic scale and the second is based on the old Cuban dance known as Haba?nera. After a modified recap of section A, the piece ends with a "santeria" ritual. Santeria is a religion of common practice in Cuba that merges the wor?ship of the Yoruba deities with the veneration of Roman Catholic saints. The strong and hypnotic rhythmic pattern provides an exciting ending for this piece. The Enchanted Island is dedicated to Manuel Barrueco and the Beijing Guitar Duo.
--Sergio Assad
L'Evasion Fuga y Misterio Revirado
Astor Piazzolla
Born March 11, 1921 in Mar del Plata, Argentina
Died July 4, 1992 in Buenos Aires
Piazzolla was a prolific Argentine composer of "tango," an Argentine and Uruguayan urban pop?ular song and dance. At first, his stylized approach to the tango generated heated controversy in his native country. However, his music is internation?ally accepted and revered today as a new creative stage in tango development. In Piazzolla's words "the only way of changing the tango is to study music seriously. First you must listen to Bach, and then play all the tangos you want." Obviously, he was talking about artistic excellence--the path to follow in developing the universalization of his new tango, and the acceptance of this kind of mu?sic in the concert hall.
Program notes compiled byAsgerdur Sigurdardottir
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anuel Barrueco is internationally recognized as one of the most important guitarists of our time. His unique artistry has been continually described as that of a superb instrumentalist and a superior and elegant musician, possessing a seductive sound and uncommon lyrical gifts. His career has been dedicated to bringing the guitar to the main musical centers of the world.
During three decades of concertizing, he has performed across the US from the New World Symphony in Miami to the Seattle Symphony, and from the Hollywood Bowl with the Los Angeles Philharmonic to New York's Lincoln Center. He has appeared with such prestigious orchestras as the Philadelphia Orchestra and with the Boston Symphony under the direction of Seiji Ozawa, in the American premiere of Toru's Takemitsu's To the Edge of Dream.
His international tours have taken him to some of the most important musical centers in the world. Highlights include the Musikverein in Vienna, Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Royal Albert Hall in London, Philharmonie in Berlin, Teatro Real in Madrid, and Palau de la Musica in Barcelona. In Asia he has completed a dozen tours of Japan and made repeated appearances in Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, and Hong Kong. Barrueco's tours of Latin America have included performances in Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Panama, and Puerto Rico.
Mr. Barrueco's commitment to contemporary music and to the expansion of the guitar repertoire has led him to collaborations with many distinguished composers such as Steven Stucky, Michael Daugherty, Roberto Sierra, Arvo Part, Gabriela Lena Frank, Toru Takemitsu, and Dmitri Yanov-Yanovsky.
This current season includes solo recitals in the US, Canada, Germany, Spain, Mexico, Italy, and Iceland, and he will appear in trio with his proteges the Beijing Guitar Duo in Ann Arbor. Other scheduled performances include a tour with the Cuarteto Latinoamericano in Italy, and he will appear as an artist-in-residence for the Conservatory of Music in Puerto Rico.
Manuel Barrueco has appeared on a wide array of television programs including CBS Sunday Morning, A&E's Breakfast with the Arts, and Mister Rogers' Neighborhood on PBS. He was featured in a Lexus car commercial, and his work in music inspired Michael Lawrence's biographical documentary: Manuel Barrueco: A Gift and a Life which has been aired by PBS stations around the US. Mr. Barrueco's performances have been broadcast by television stations around the world such as NHK in Japan, Bayerische Rundfunk in Germany, and RTVE in Spain.
Mr. Barrueco's recording catalogue includes over a dozen recordings for the EMI label. His recording of Joaquin Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez with conductor and tenor Placido
Domingo and the Philharmonia Orchestra was cited as the best recording of that piece in Classic CD Magazine. His Koch Classics release, Concierto Barroco, with the Orquesta Sinfonica de Galicia and conductor Victor Pablo Perez, received a Latin Grammy nomination for "Best Classical Recording." His early recordings, available on VOX, have become classic amongst guitar recordings.
In 2007 Manuel Barrueco received a Grammy nomination for the "Best Instrumental Soloist Performance" for his Solo Piazzolla, which was the first recording to be released on the exclusive Manuel Barrueco Collection on Tonar Music. Tango Sensations and Sounds of the Americas were subsequently released in collaboration with the Cuarteto Latinoamericano, the latter receiving a Latin Grammy Award for Inca Dances by Gabriela Lena Frank for "Best Classical Contemporary Composition." Virtuoso Guitar Duos was released in 2009 and includes the most breathtaking guitar duos from the Spanish and Latin-American repertoire. In 2010 he released a solo recording, Tarrega!, which includes works and arrangements of the Spanish composer Francisco Tarrega.
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omprised of Meng Su and Yameng Wang, the Beijing Guitar Duo first met at the Central Conservatory in Beijing, China, where they both studied with the acclaimed professor Chen Zhi. The Beijing Guitar Duo was formally established at the encouragement of Manuel Barrueco, their teacher and mentor, while pursuing their advanced studies at the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore, Maryland.
The impressive individual talents
of Meng Su and Yameng Wang come together to create what has
become one of the most exciting guitar duos today. As recipients of the "Solomon H. Snyder Award," the Beijing Guitar Duo made its New York debut at Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall with critical acclaim. The current concert season takes them to guitar centers in countries such as Holland, Germany, Ireland, Finland, Croatia, China, and the US; in addition, they will perform in trio with Manuel Barrueco in Germany, Finland, and in the US.
Their first duo recording, Maracaipe, received a Latin Grammy Award nomination for the featured work Maracaipe, written and dedicated to them by composer Sergio Assad. Their second recording was released this past October and includes Scarlatti Sonatas, the Chaconne by Bach, Sonatina Canonica by Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Valses Poeticos by Granados, and the world-premiere recording of Tan Dun's Eight Memories in Watercolor in an arrangement for two guitars.
For more information on the Beijing Guitar Duo, please visit www.BeijingGuitarDuo.com.
UMS Archives
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his afternoon's concert marks Manuel Barrueco's fourth appearance under UMS auspices. Mr. Barrueco made his UMS debut in March 1996 as part of Guitar Summit II, a collaborative concert with fellow guitarists Kenny Burrell, Stanley Jordan, and Jorma Kaukonen at Rackham Auditorium. He most recently appeared under UMS auspices in a concert with Cuarteto Latinoamericano in November 2006 at Rackham Auditorium.
UMS welcomes the Beijing Guitar Duo who makes its UMS debut this afternoon.