Atlas

carthage music department presents

Atlas Student Recital by Norris Jones Featuring Ryan Boren, piano

Wednesday, April 20, 2022 | 7:30 p.m. | Recital Hall

program Michelangelo Lieder Wohl denk ich oft Fühlt meine seele Chansons de Don Quichotte Chanson du Depart Chanson du Duc Chanson de la Mort

Hugo Wolf (1860-1903)

Jacques Ibert (1890-1962)

War Scenes An Incident Specimen Case Inauguration Ball The Real War

Ned Rorem (b. 1923)

program notes Michelangelo Lieder The Michelangelo Lieder was composed by Hugo Wolf, an Austrian composer who was famous for his art songs, or Lieder. Towards the end of his life, Wolf contracted an illness that slowly ate away at his sanity. The Michelangelo Lieder is one of the last song cycles he composed.

This song cycle is set to text by the titular Michelangelo, who also experienced great fame and a striking sense of loneliness that resonated with the ailing Wolf. This work is not as well known as his other pieces.

Wohl denk ich oft I often recall my past life, As it was before I loved you; No one then paid heed to me, Each day for me was a loss; I thought to live for song alone, And flee the thronging crowd.

Today my name is praised and censured, And the entire world knows that I exist!

Fühlt meine seele Does my soul feel the longed-for light Of God who created it? Is it the ray Of some other beauty from this vale of tears That storms my heart, awakening memories?

Is it a sound, a vision in a dream That suddenly fills my eyes and heart With inconceivable, searing pain, Reducing me to tears? I do not know.

What I long for, what I feel, what guides me Is not in me: tell me how to achieve it!

Only another’s favour is likely to reveal it.

This has absorbed me, since seeing you.

I am torn between yes and no, bitterness and sweetness – Your eyes, my lady, are the cause!

program notes Chansons de Don Quichotte This song cycle was composed by Jacques Ibert for the production of a movie about Don Quixote. This role of Don Quixote was played by Feodor Chaliapin, an incredible operatic bass.

Unbeknownst to Ibert, the producers had recruited several people to write music for the movie.

In the end, Ibert’s song cycle was chosen. Each piece highlights a significant moment in Don Quixote’s story: setting off on a journey as a chivalrous knight; boasting about heroic deeds he’ll achieve and saving a damsel; and his eventual capture and burning of his story books, which shattered the delusion of knighthood he’d been using to escape his normal unfulfilling life.

This final moment is so shocking that Don Quixote dies, but he hopes he’ll find immortality through the retelling of his story.

Chanson du Depart This new castle, this new edifice, Enriched with marble and porphyry, That love built for his empire, And to which all heaven lent its skill.

It is a rampart, a fortress against vice, In which the virtuous maiden takes refuge, Whom the eye beholds and the spirit admires, Forcing hearts to do her service.

It is a castle, built in such a way That none can approach its gate Unless he has saved his people from tyrantsVictorious, valiant, and amorous.

No knight, however bold, Without such traits, can enter this place.

Chanson du Duc I want to sing now of the lady of my dreams, Who lifts me above this century of squalor.

Her heart of diamond is untainted by deceit, The rose fades beside her cheek.

For her I have undertaken high adventures: My arm to deliver the princess from servitude, I have vanquished enchanters, confounded perjurers And compelled the universe to pay her homage.

Lady, for whom I go alone across the earth, Who is not prisoner of false appearances, I defend against any temerarious knight Your unparalleled brilliance and your preeminence.

Chanson de la Mort Do not weep Sancho, Do not weep, my friend.

Your master is not yet dead.

He is not far from you, He lives on a happy isle, Where all is pure and without deceit, On the isle finally found, Where you will come one day.

On the isle you’ve hoped for, O my friend Sancho.

The books are burnt And make a heap of ashes.

If all the books have led to my death,

program notes It suffices that through one I will live; A phantom in life And real in death— Such is the strange fate Of poor Don Quixote War Scenes War Scenes is a modern song cycle by Ned Rorem, set to the journals and texts of Walt Whitman during his time as a volunteer travel nurse during the Civil War. Whitman is a prolific American poet, widely celebrated for his works about love, friendship, nature, and democracy. During the war, he would attend to injured soldiers, help them write letters to loved ones or recount experiences, and console them as they passed away. Ned Rorem used these stunning and sometimes graphic texts and set them to intense and atonal music. This is an incredibly challenging set where both the pianist and vocalist have to tackle complex rhythms and melodies.

Why Atlas?

When trying to find a common theme between these sets, I found that all of these amazing people had their own crushing issues: Michelangelo and his loneliness and search for inspiration. Wolf with his depression, illness, and slow descent into insanity. Quixote with his delusions and desperate hope to escape and find a purpose in life. Whitman reliving the tragic and gruesome scenes of war, while reconciling those memories with the normalcy of everyday life. Rorem with discrimination as well as his values of peace throughout World War 2 and following wars. Atlas was a Titan from Greek mythology. In a battle against the new Olympian’s, he served as the war general, and he was recognized as a brilliant tactician and the embodiment of strength. As punishment for losing the war, Atlas was sentenced to hold up the sky for the rest of eternity. I think Atlas’ story shows a man struggling with an enormous burden, and enduring. He is often depicted as a kneeling man carrying planet Earth on his shoulders, buckling but never falling. All of us go through difficult times in our lives. For these artists and characters, music, art, and poetry were essential in helping them get through it. All of them had their own personal “Atlas,” a seemingly insurmountable weight they carried, but with the help of music and the community of people around them, they endured. I hope that everyone is able to find a passion that can carry them through hard times, and friends or family for support when that’s not enough. Unlike Atlas, none of us are ever truly alone.

thanks I’d like to thank my family and friends. I’d also like to thank Kurt Link for all the support and helping me learn how to sing over the last four years. I’d also like to thank Ryan Boren for playing piano for me and collaborating with me on different music for the last few years. Lastly, I’d like to thank all the other faculty and staff that supported me over the years! *** 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.

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