Philharmonic Concert

upcoming fine arts events

carthage music department presents

Percussion Ensemble Concert Tuesday, December 6 7:30 p.m.

A. F. Siebert Chapel Music Theatre Techniques Showcase 1.0 Tuesday, December 6 7:30 p.m.

Campbell Student Union Auditorium (CSU) In the Moment Dance Performance Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, December 8-10 7:30 p.m.

Wartburg Theatre in the David A. Straz Center for the Natural and Social Sciences

Philharmonic Concert

*Tickets Required. Visit www.carthage.edu/tickets for ticket information

Kenosha Pops Saturday, December 10 7:30 p.m.

A. F. Siebert Chapel

Jörg Bierhance guest conductor

Fine Arts at Carthage acknowledges that the land on which our building stands is part of the traditional Potawatomi, Sioux, Peoria, Kickapoo, and Miami peoples past, present and future. These homelands reside along the southwest shores of Michigami, North America’s largest system of freshwater lakes. We honor with gratitude the land itself, and the people who have stewarded it throughout the generations. Many Indigenous peoples thrive in this place––alive and strong, and this calls us to commit to continuing to learn how to be better stewards of the land we inhabit as well. connect with us carthage.edu/finearts 262-551-5859 facebook.com/carthagefinearts instagram.com/carthagefinearts

Dr. Etsushi Edward Kawakami conductor

tickets required Get tickets 24/7 at carthage.edu/ tickets 262-551-6661 noon to 5p.m. Tuesday – Friday

Sunday, Nov. 6, 2022 | 1:00 p.m.

A. F. Siebert Chapel

upcoming fine arts events

program The Voyage I. II. III. IV.

The Rough, Open Sea The English Channel The Nine Muses The Lion’s Spring Dance

Concerto grosso I. II. III.

Prelude Dirge Fugue

Antiche danze ed arie per liuto, Suite No. 3 I. II. III. IV.

Italiana Arie di Corte Siciliana Passacaglia

Reena Exmail (b. 1983)

New Play Initiative: Memento Mori Thursday, Friday and Saturday, November 10-12 ∙ 7:30 p.m.

Wartburg Theatre in the David A. Straz Center for the Natural and Social Sciences *Tickets Required. Visit www.carthage.edu/tickets for ticket information

Ernest Bloch (1880–1959)

HAIR Saturday and Sunday, November 12-13 ∙ 3:00 p.m.

Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, Nov. 17-19 ∙ 7:30 p.m.

A. F. Siebert Chapel *Tickets Required. Visit www.carthage.edu/tickets for ticket information

Ottorino Respighi (1879–1936)

program notes The Voyage: Reena Esmail (b.1983) Originally conceived as a trio in 2020, Indian-American composer Reena Esmail wrote “The Voyage” for a young violinist, Julia St. John and her professional musician mother and father to perform together. The full string orchestra version followed shortly thereafter in 2021, but kept the title and the movement names, all chosen by the young daughter. Using both Hindustani and Western motifs and techniques, Julia’s titles are an evocative launching point for the listener’s imagination.

Opera Workshop Sunday, November 20 6:00 p.m.

H. F. Johnson Recital Hall 148th Annual Christmas Festival: Share in the Wonder Friday and Saturday, December 2-3 ∙ 7:30 p.m.

Sunday, December 4 ∙ 4:00 p.m.

A. F. Siebert Chapel *Tickets Required. Visit www.carthage.edu/tickets for ticket information

Student Recital: Katian Nelson Monday, December 5 7:30 p.m.

H. F. Johnson Recital Hall

connect with us carthage.edu/finearts 262-551-5859 facebook.com/carthagefinearts instagram.com/carthagefinearts

tickets required Get tickets 24/7 at carthage.edu/ tickets 262-551-6661 noon to 5p.m. Tuesday – Friday

philharmonic personnel Violin 1 Lee Fulkerson, Concertmaster Emma Conran Julia Rieckmann Claire Guenther Violin 2 Katrina Briselden* Jenna Meola Riley Conway Edelmar Morales-Rivera Viola Carissa Keihl* Genevieve Zauhar Megan Baumeister Quentin Zeller Meghan Keiffer-Zagar Kaylee Smith Daniel Dadivas Olivia Carson Cello Grace Hill* Brian Dean Zoey Kurka Abigail Roushia Bass Sydney Edwards* Piano Katiann Nelson * * Principal

program notes Concerto Grosso No. 1: Ernest Bloch (1880-1959) When I recently asked a student who’s playing on this piece what she thought of the work, she paused for a second, cocked her head to the side and cautiously ventured that she, “didn’t really get it,” and was…unused to the harmonic language of this piece. I agree - it can feel discordant and unsettling (though, at the time I referred to the tonal language as, “crunchy and metallic”). The work is edgy, brittle, discomfiting, and even offensive - but it also reflects the era in which it was composed. When this was written in 1925, the world was in a transitional period. This was a time of relative peace, falling between the world wars, but was just several years away from the Great Depression. And on the music front, techtonic changes were happening in classical music composition setting the stage for the battle between 12-Tone serial composition and “old-fashioned” tonality. In fact, Bloch wrote this piece in response to his composition students’ challenge that tonality and classical form were dead ends.

Bloch responded by working within the constraints of tonality and also utilized the concerto grosso form, a compositional structure that had not been in vogue for over a century and half. The result is a work that capitalizes on every combination of the string orchestra plus piano obligato - soloists, pianists, and ensemble all work together and at odds to explore various timbre combinations. Bloch may have used “oldfashioned” notes, but he also incorporated Romantic era polytonality, timbres of the Impressionists, and the angular rhythms of the 20th century, all the while suffusing the work with his Jewish identity that his compositions were known for.

The 4th movement in particular, contains many parallels to the last work on the program, the Respighi. Both composers were active in the 20th century and these compositions hearken back to a bygone era while still “living” in the first half of the 20th century. The 4th movement of the Bloch, the Fugue, is a direct descendant of Bach, even venturing to sound like a Baroque or Renaissance work for a moment. But as it is of the 20th century, Bloch’s Bach is a hulking, muscular fugue, replete with aggressive accents that are placed in locations that normally wouldn’t be emphasized and is ever dynamically restless…just like the 20th century.

program notes Ancient Airs and Dances, Suite No. 3: Ottorino Respighi (1879-1936) Respighi was not only a notable 20th century/Romantic era composer, he was also a musicologist with a deep interest in early Italian music from the 16th to 18th centuries. We hear his interests intersect in the three suites of the Ancient Airs and Dances - while he was composing works requiring massive orchestras (such as The Pines of Rome), Respighi was also transcribing 16th-18th century lute works for modest sized chamber orchestras. Although the borrowed thematic material for the three suites are clearly Renaissance and Baroque in style, we hear Respighi’s 20th century sensibilities realized in his transcriptions.

Unlike the first two suites, the third suite tends toward a more introspective nature, vacillating from tender to somber (even verging into outright melancholy) to frustration and anger.

The third movement is much more romantic in character, beginning tenderly but reaching an ardent peak halfway through. Respighi ends the movement as he began it, intimately and quietly.

The first movement begins the suite with tenderness and is reminiscent of a gentle lullaby:

The last movement begins with statements of a theme that are much more pointed than the others, somewhat reminiscent of a Romanticized Bach violin sonata. The tempo quickens in the next few sections and ends as the movement becomes more and more deliberate and dramatic, ending in an exciting, tutti flourish.

The second movement begins soberly with a duet between the violas and cellos but veers rapidly in a series of joyful, playful vignettes, only to be interrupted by a calming interlude. The interlude settles into what we are led to believe is the final cadence, evoking the image of settling down a mischievous child for bedtime. As young children are apt to do, their plans do not align with those of their parents, and a rapid, tiptoeing pizzicato passage with intermittent explosions of sound take us into another series of playful motifs. The movement ends as it began, gently and after a swell from the orchestra, with duet between the violas and cellos.