2023-24 MSO Program

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Symphony Pages

Rohan Smith Celebrates 20 years ..8-9

Sponsors and Grants .........................11

About the Orchestra..........................13

Message from Our Conductor .........15

Special Thanks ...................................19

Board of Directors and Staff .............21

New Executive Director ....................23

Contributors .................................24-25

Orchestra Personnel ..........................27

Friends of MSO ..................................31

More with Midcoast Free Events .....32

Judith Elser Concerto Competition...33

Conductor’s Biography ................36-37

Concert 1.............................................41

Concert 1 Program Notes ...........42-44

Anastasia Antonacos, Pianist ..........45

Concert 2.............................................49

Concert 2 Program Notes ...........50-52

Philip Lima, Baritone ........................53

Concert 3.............................................57

Concert 3 Program Notes ...........58-60

Emily Isaacson, Guest Conductor ....61

Concert 4.............................................65

Concert 4 Program Notes ...........66-68

Soloists Kenlan & Britto ...................69

Rohan Smith Re ects on 20 Years with the MSO

(Interview with Michael Levine, MSO’s Executive Director)

What do you remember about your rst year with the MSO in 2003?

I remember that first year so very well! The first thing is that I was extraordinarily honored and surprised to win a real conducting job because this was something I always dreamed about. Then, what really amazed me about the orchestra was its community spirit and pride: this was a group of individuals from all walks of life, covering all imaginable professions—I guess that’s a microcosm of Maine—who were brought together by their common desire to make music. These people got on so well, were motivated, and very well organized. I remember our first rehearsals just being such a joy. The joy in the pleasure of making music together was something amazing.

What do you think has been a key to MSO’s success under your tenure?

Well, it was really interesting because John Teller [MSO’s first Executive Director] was basically the guy who made the machinery work. And of course there was the board. I would say the board in some ways has never changed in the sense that it’s always been a very effective group of people with good business savvy and an understanding of management and the importance of audience building.

There’s always been a real sense of financial responsibility. We are an allvolunteer orchestra with a model for ticket pricing, marketing, and audience building that have worked spectacularly well. This orchestra has always been in the black financially at a time when the prophets of gloom about orchestral music are always raising their heads saying “Oh, classical music is dying, the sky is falling, it’s all over.” This is said all the time, but never happens. The proof of the pudding is that people love and have a need to hear and play orchestral music.

embracing the classical canon of the great orchestral works is central to that. But we have musicians whose tastes in music range from preferences for early music to music that has been composed post-1913, when the Rite of Spring [by Igor Stravinsky] was composed. So we try to embrace the widest possible range of styles.

In what ways has the MSO changed over the last 20 years?

There’s been consistent growth in the playing level of the players in the orchestra. It still looks like the same orchestra, but of course it’s constantly changing. We have all grown together year by year and evolved in skill and stylistic understanding. I remember in the first years when we did certain pieces, there would be some treacherous moments. There’d be some things that would go off the rails, nothing terrible, but that almost never happens now. So we’re better.

These moments of progress happen without you really noticing it. At certain points you’ll do a landmark piece that is a step up in aspiration and musical difficulty. Examples of this might be the first time we did a Mahler symphony or the Verdi Requiem—music we couldn’t have done five years previously. A lot of the work goes on under the surface. You chip away at things a little bit at a time, like a painter does when working on the canvas, as you’re refining things. It’s a very granular process, and that’s actually one of the great pleasures of rehearsal.

Any nal thoughts about this milestone in your professional career?

Conductors are perceived to have shelf lives beyond which they wear out. Then sometimes you have a relationship that really works because the conductor and orchestra grow in parallel, and that is what we have here. The conductor learns from the orchestra, and the orchestra learns from the conductor. Both grow and discover things together.

Another reason for the orchestra’s success is that the players are motivated to play because of their intense interest in performing and studying orchestral music from many different time periods, cultures, and genres. Of course, 9

Sponsoring Organizations and Grants

Underwriters

Season Sponsors

Single Concert Sponsors

More with Midcoast Sponsor Media Sponsors

Advertising Sponsors Artist Lodging Sponsors

Foundations and Grants

Alfred M. Senter Fund Trust

Camden Rotary Foundation

Davenport Trust Fund

Harold W. and Mary Louise Shaw Foundation

Nathaniel Davis Fund

Van Winkle Family Charitable Fund

Special Thanks:

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SThe Midcoast Symphony is a community orchestra founded in 1990. Started as a chamber orchestra, we now have over 80 members on our roster. We continue to grow under the baton of Rohan Smith, bringing top-notch performances to the Orion Center in Topsham and the Franco Center in Lewiston. Our members are volunteer players: we are teachers, doctors, homemakers, business people, retired people, professional musicians, and a variety of other occupations. We hail from the midcoast, Lewiston-Auburn, and Portland regions, and we are excited to connect further with audiences and talented players from our state. Our repertoire ranges from Mozart and Haydn to recently written music.

In addition to our regular concerts, we have “More with Midcoast,” education and community engagement programs that support our goal to contribute significantly to the cultural life of midcoast and central Maine.

The orchestra welcomes membership inquiries from talented musicians and also community residents who want to join our orchestra auxiliary group, FRIENDS of MSO. Please contact info@MidcoastSymphony.org or (207) 315-1712.

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A Message from Our Conductor

Rohan Smith, Conductor and Music Director

In my 20th season conducting the Midcoast Symphony, we are revisiting music I previously conducted with MSO that resonates with special meaning and significance. We will also perform masterpieces that we have not yet undertaken, along with music by less recognized and fresh voices from the past and present.

We open with “Aspiration” from Symphony No. 1 by William Grant Still, considered the Dean of African-American composers. Still’s optimistic statement will dramatically contrast with Shostakovich’s tragically ironic Fifth Symphony, written in 1937, a coded document of suffering and defiance under the regime of Joseph Stalin.

Our exciting second program presents music by Latin American composers Moncayo, Piazzolla, and Ginastera, along with some of Europe and America’s great song and dance composers, Leonard Bernstein, Gustav Mahler, and Johann Strauss. This is a wonderful juxtaposition of music that is fairly new from the Americas and music that is from the old world.

Edward Elgar’s Enigma Variations, to be conducted on our third program by Maine conductor Emily Isaacson, is an exceptionally virtuosic piece and a test for any orchestra. Jessie Montgomery, a young African-American composer, has made her mark as an incredibly fresh and original voice in American orchestral music and will be represented by “Hymn for Everyone.” I am glad that Midcoast is consciously programming diverse voices from the present and the past, widening the musical experience for all of us.

At our final concert, we will perform Debussy’s La Mer for the first time. This is one of the pivotal orchestral works of the twentieth century and is another opportunity for the orchestra to shine colorfully and brilliantly. Finally, we return to Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony. The Beethoven symphonies are musical touchstones that we go back to again and again to revisit, relearn, and rediscover, and they never fail to deliver new emotional and expressive insights.

In addition, we are privileged to welcome piano soloist Anastasia Antonacos performing Beethoven and baritone soloist Philip Lima singing Copland and Mahler.

I hope you will be inspired and enriched by this season’s concerts of the Midcoast Symphony!

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Our Special Thanks

MSO proudly and sincerely thanks the following:

Orion Performing Arts Center

Judy Lloyd, Auditorium Coordinator

Franco Center

Penny Drumm, Administrator; Denise Scammon, Marketing and Development Director; Jake Hodgkin, Production Manager

Mt. Ararat Middle School

Megan Hayes-Teague, Principal; Kaili Phillips, Assistant Principal; Renovia Marro-Day and Josh Hyssong, Music Teachers

Friends of MSO

Our support group who volunteer for orchestra activities and are advocates for audience development

Program Notes Author

Mary Hunter

Program Editor

Carol Preston

Stage Crew

Mike Adair, Ara Dedekian, Chris Hall, Moira Walden, and Holly Whitehead

Recording Technician

Trevor Peterson

Radio Interviews

Denise Shannon

Art Director

Whitney Campbell who happily volunteers many hours on MSO projects.

MSO Musician Volunteers

The many musician volunteers who work behind the scenes,

Board of Directors 2023-2024

P.O. Box 86, Brunswick, ME 04011

info@midcoastsymphony.org • midcoastsymphony.org (207) 315-1712

Timothy Kenlan, President

Denise Shannon, Secretary Carol Preston, Treasurer

Quinn Gormley Kathryn Krott

Rachel Stettler Ted Walworth

Michael Levine, ex officio

Music Director: Rohan Smith

Executive Director: Michael R. Levine mlevine@midcoastsymphony.org

Orchestra Manager: Ray Libby info@midcoastsymphony.org

Box O ice Manager: John O’Connor boxo ice@midcoastsymphony.org or (207) 481-0790

Librarian: Beth Almquist

Bookkeeper: Cynthia Fabbricatore

Friends of MSO: info@midcoastsymphony.org or (207) 315-1712

us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/midcoastsymphony

Instagram: @midcoastsymphony

MSO's New Executive Director

Michael Levine

MSO welcomes Michael Levine as its new executive director. He came on board in the summer of 2023 ready to jump into a new season of music-making. Levine hails from Hollis and has a background in theater, working in management of theater companies dating back to the New Repertory Theater in Newton, MA, from 1987. Since then, he has been involved with the Portland Stage Company as its general manager, the LARK Society for Chamber Music as executive director, the St. Lawrence Arts Parish Hall Theater Renovations as co-project manager, and Acorn Productions in Portland as founding producing director (among many other positions).

In addition to his interest in theater and the arts, he has been a high school English teacher for many years, most recently at Windham High School. He brings a wealth of fundraising and outreach experience and a track record of setting high goals and achieving them. The orchestra looks forward to his work with the board and musicians, building upon the work of Carol Preston, who retired after five years in the role (but who continues playing violin in MSO), and the work she built upon done by John Teller before her.

Contributors

MSO would like to thank those who made our concerts possible with their generous contributions. The list below acknowledges donations received by October 1, 2023. Donations received after that date will be acknowledged on an insert in the January 2024 program. While every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of this list, please contact our office should you find any errors or omissions.

BENEFACTORS

Anonymous

Donald Christie, Jr.

Robert Frank

PATRONS

Anonymous

Sally F. Clifford

Mary Hunter

Donald & Carolyn Kanicki

Janice & Edwin Kieschnick

Timothy M. Kenlan

Gerry Orem

James Parakilas

Ann Slocum

DONORS

Michael Adair

Patsy Dickinson & Greg Anderson

Dr. & Mrs. Richard A. Anderson

Androscoggin County Medical Assoc.

Warren P. Armstrong

Jean C. Barker

Frederick S. Bartlett

Thomas Baumgarte

Richard Belcher

Rev. Robert Beringer

Blais Flowers & Garden Center

David Blocher

Greg Boardman

Rachel Boddie

Eleanor Cappon Bowman

Billie Jo Brito

Linda Brunner

Brunswick Downtown Association

Andrea Butler

Philip Carlsen

David & Caroline Cornish

Ara & Marcia Dedekian

Scott & Sharon Dow

SPONSORS

Anonymous

Margaret & Robert Abbott

Cynthia Harkleroad

Meg Lewis

Abigail Manny

Judy & George Metcalf

Irene & George Minich

Denise Shannon & Richard Papetti

Carol Redelsheimer

Mr. & Mrs. Paul Stanridge

Martha & Hollis McBride

Laura Zitske

Rebecca Dreher

Susan & David Duncan

Douglas Ertman

Jeff Ertman

Judith Falconer

Gerry Flanagan

David Fluharty

Johanna Frissel

Pamela Gormley

Kate & Bill Gray

Paul Greenstone

Susan Groshong

Frank Gross

Reginald & Pauline Hannaford

David Fluharty & Linda Hjortland

Lester & Sidney Hodgdon

Bruce Erwin Johnson

Donna Johnstone

Karen Jung

Eric Kawamoto

Janet Kieschnick

Jane Kresser

Eleanor & Peter Kuniholm

Ray & Sue Lagueux

Ed & Nancy Langbein

Daniel Levine

Ray & Jean Libby

Darren R. Linkin

David Linkin

Heather Linkin

Chris & Susan Livesay

Benjamin & Barbara Lounsbury

Nancy & Robert Morrell

Frank Morrison

Gary Haggard & Sally Morrison

Margaret & Martin Naas

Sandra & Richard Neiman

Julie O’Brien-Merrill

Aaron Park

David & Julia Pease

Trevor Peterson

FRIENDS

Beth Aldenberg

David S. Andrew

Anonymous

Anonymous, In Honor of Daniel Levine

Glenn Bangs

Lois Battersby

Gary & Rosie Bensen

Art Boulay

Eleanor Cappon

Mr. & Mrs. Stephen Chandler

Roland & Marie Christensen

Judith Clarke

Marie Clarke

Robert Clifford

Peter Cook

Robert Dent

Richard DeVito

Pamela & Garth Duff

Robin Glassman

Hubbard & Katherine Goodrich

Marjorie Hart

Ann Hartzler

Melanie & Gary Hatfield

Gretchen Kamilewicz

Richard Kauff

Mary Kenney

Dick & Rita King

Carol A. Pope

Emily Reese

Lynn Reese

Marjorie Roberson

Kate & Stephen Rosenfield

Norman & Alicia Scott

Rick Seeley

Richard Sipe

Mitchell & Martha Stein

David & Rachel F. Stettler

Marjorie & John Sunderland

Mary Swain

Elizabeth Volckening

Moira M. Walden

Lisa & Joe Walker

Edward Walworth

Jane Coryell & Irma J. Wilhelm

Joan Knight

June Leahey

Edward & Barbara Lovely

Lara Lupien

Chris & Carson Lutes

Daniel & Trynje Mahoney

Ursula McAllister

Shelia McGarr

Susan Mendenhall

Susan Mikesell

Charles Morrison

Anne & Michael Olivo

Susan Peaslee

Robert J. Perry

Elizabeth Pettigrew

Beth Preston

Carol Preston

Barbara Rondeau

Laurel K. Sisson

Margaret Spinne

Frederick Stafford

Susan & Elwood Trask

Elizabeth Warren-White

Kevin Werthiem

Patricia West

Marjorie A. Whipple

Sarah Woolf-Wade

Dawn Zimba

Orchestra Personnel

(listed alphabetically)

Violin I

Carol Preston, Concertmaster

Jessie Boardman

Jeanne DiFranco

Wesley Gillis

Kate Gray*

Mary Hunter*

Eric Kawamoto*

Sally Morrison*

Julia O’Brien-Merrill*

Trevor Peterson*

Emily Roy*

Tyler Sherwin*

Rick Seeley*

Violin II

Caroline Cornish,* Principal

Phoebe Blume

Jayden Brown

Ara Dedekian

Robert Frank*

Bev Hochberg

Janice Kieschnick*

Julie Pease*

Kate Rosenfeld*

Denise Shannon*

Moira Walden*

Viola

Heather Linkin,* Principal

Taylor Clark

Rebecca Dreher*

Meg Estapa

Meg Lewis*

Aaron Park*

Jeanie Wester

Cello

Patsy Dickinson,* Co-principal

Karen Jung,*Co-principal

Ben Bridges

Cello

Philip Carlsen*

Daniel Levine

Jen Reeber*

Martha Stein*

Rachel Stettler*

Lisa Walker*

Holly Whitehead

Alex Wong

Laura Zitske

Double Bass

Paul Greenstone,* Principal

Michael Adair*

Thomas Baumgarte

Sally Johnstone

Anne Nanovic*

Flute/Piccolo

Eileen Bonine, Principal

Sally Gundersen*

Alicia Scott*

Oboe/English Horn

Billie Jo Brito,* Principal

Sarah Dow-Shedlarski

Clarinet

Carol Furman, Co-principal

Rachel Boddie,* Co-principal

Ray Libby*

Bassoon

Frank Gross,* Principal

Lara Bailey*

Chris Falcone

Michael Powell

Ted Walworth* (Contrabassoon)

Horn

Carolyn Kanicki,* Principal

Beth Almquist*

Cynthia Harkleroad*

Sarah Rodgers*

Trumpet

Timothy Kenlan,* Principal

Gerry Flanagan*

Martin Naas*

Trombone

Bruce Theriault, Principal

Jeff Ertman*

Chris Hall

Tuba

Douglas Ertman

Percussion

Quinn Gormley,* Principal

John Maillet

Rusty Quinn

Timpani

Durell Bissinger

Harp

Suki Flanagan*

Piano

Jim Parakilas*

*This musician is sponsored by one or more persons or organizations through a “Chair Sponsorship” fundraising effort.

“ Working with Rohan over the last eight years I’ve been with the orchestra has been amazing! For me as a musician, as a Board Member, and now as President, Rohan has been a driving force in helping the orchestra grow to new heights. He has a vision for programming, and through that, he continues to push the orchestra to new heights of success and brilliance every season. Thank you, Rohan, and congratulations on 20 years!’’

– Tim Kenlan, MSO President and Trumpet

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“ I was the board president during the MSO’s search for a new music director, and though I wasn’t on the search committee, I observed the thrilling process excitedly. When Rohan auditioned by conducting the orchestra as a finalist, he electrified us by communicating his musical ideas with passion and generosity. In the two decades since, wearing a groove in the highway between Exeter and Topsham on Wednesday nights, he has helped the orchestra grow into a vital community arts asset through his skills as a conductor, by creating connections with the audience, and by linking us with extraordinary soloists, not least of whom is his wife, violinist Eva Gruesser. Rohan’s spirited love of music is now indelibly etched into the MSO’s performances.’’

– Barbara Burt, MSO Past-President and French Horn

30

Friends of MSO

We Need You!

The “MSO Friends” is a group of community members who directly support the orchestra’s activities by helping with important tasks such as fundraising, ushering, tickets, and mailings. They are valuable advocates for the orchestra within the community and have been responsible for bringing many new audience members to these performances.

If you would like to join in this effort or learn more about their activities, please speak to one of the “Friends,” call the orchestra office at (207) 315-1712, or email info@ midcoastsymphony.org.

The following are MSO Friends who provided invaluable support to the orchestra during the 2022-23 season, volunteering at concerts and helping with special projects:

Sally Adair

Jane Almeira

Roger Bogart

Steve Bonine

Dirk Brunner

Linda Brunner

Andrea Butler

Dana Cary

Marcia Clayton

Shanna Cox

Margaret Craven

Jan Crosson

Peg deBruyn

Tony deBruyn

Elizabeth Detwiler

Sarah Dow

Kate Fellows

Ryan Fellows

Judy Fiterman

David Forkey

Heather Hall

Joy Hayes

Simon Hayes

Candi Hine

Linda Hornig

Sarah Irish

Donna Johnstone

Sally Johnstone

Katie Krott

Jane Kresser

Meg Lewis

Peggy Mason

Ashley McMahon

Jeannie McMahon

Fred Nehring

Joyce Paradis

Dan Pelletier

Carolyn Perkins

Beth Preston

Judy Preston

Lynn Reese

Jan Roberson

Don Robitaille

Deston Rogers

Devon Rogers

Barbara Rondeau

Brian Shedlarski

Marc Solobello

John Strong

Robert Swerdlow

John Teller

Nan White

31

with

Our Education and Community Engagement Events

Free Pre-concert Events, Sundays at Orion Performing Arts Center:

Meet the Soloist ~ October 29 • 1:30 - 2:00 PM

Get to know pianist Anastasia Antonacos, USM piano faculty, as she chats with MSO violinist Caroline Cornish, former television news anchor and reporter.

Meet the Instruments ~ January 21 • 1:30 - 2:00 PM

Wannabe musicians of all ages are invited to toot, strum, and squawk on variety of orchestral instruments with MSO musicians.

Meet the Next Gen

March 24 • 1:30 - 2:00 PM

Enjoy a performance as the next generation of musicians from our community steps into the spotlight. Performers to be announced.

Meet the Music, Meet the Musicians ~ May 19 • 1:30 - 2:00 PM

You’ll enjoy today’s music even more after an introduction by our program notes author, Mary Hunter, Bowdoin College Professor of Music Emerita. She will also chat with MSO musicians Tim Kenlan and Billie Jo Brito, today’s soloists.

Concert Saturdays at Franco Center

October 28, 2023, January 20, March 23, May 18, 2024

Enjoy the sound of local youth music groups during intermission.

Judith Elser Concerto Competition

May 22, 2024 • 7:00 p.m.

Franco Center, Lewiston

Five talented finalists, all music majors currently attending a Maine college or university, will perform for judges and community members in a competition to become the guest soloist with Midcoast Symphony Orchestra (MSO) during the 2024-25 season. The winner and runner-up will be announced that evening, and the winner will be awarded $1,000 from the Judith Elser Fund. The event is free and open to the public.

More information is available on the MSO website.

The Judith Elser Concerto Competition honors the memory of Judy Elser (19402015), a long-time music teacher who played cello in the MSO for many years, served on the Board, and left a generous bequest to the orchestra when she died. We are grateful for all she gave to the orchestra and know that she would be thrilled to witness the personal growth and success her gift has made possible for our young entrants and winners.

Rohan Smith

Conductor and Music Director

Conductor and violinist Rohan Smith has been Music Director of the Midcoast Symphony Orchestra since 2003. He has led the MSO to critical acclaim in performances of the major symphonic repertoire from all eras. In recent seasons, Smith and MSO have performed Mahler’s First and Fourth Symphonies; Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra; Beethoven’s Eroica, Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Symphonies; Brahms’s First and Second Symphonies; Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique; Debussy’s Nocturnes; Stravinsky’s Petrouchka, and Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloe Suite No. 2.

In May 2006, MSO under Smith was one of only 65 orchestras across America to perform the newly commissioned “Made in America” by Joan Tower. In May 2015, Smith led the Midcoast Symphony, the Oratorio Chorale, and Vox Nova in two memorable performances of the Verdi Requiem

Rohan Smith is Director of Orchestras and Chamber Music at Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, where he conducts the Symphony Orchestra and the Chamber Orchestra. Smith has conducted the PEA Chamber Orchestra on cultural exchange, service, and outreach tours to Vietnam, Hong Kong, Quebec, England, New York, and the Coachella Valley, California, performing there for children of immigrant farm workers.

Smith performed with the Austro-Hungarian Haydn Orchestra under Adam Fischer for many years, including frequent performances at Haydn’s summer residence at the Esterhazy palace near Eisenstadt, and in festivals throughout Europe, Japan, and Taiwan. In 1991 and 1995, he participated in the Mahler Festspiel in Kassel, Germany, with members of the Vienna Philharmonic, Berlin Philharmonic, and Concertgebouw orchestras under the batons of Adam Fischer and Manfred Honeck. Smith performs regularly with members of America’s leading orchestras in the“Music for Life”benefit concerts at Carnegie Hall, to bring attention to the humanitarian needs of refugees in Syria, Darfur, and HIV-infected children in Africa.

As an orchestral violinist in New York, Rohan Smith performed regularly with the American Symphony Orchestra, the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, the American Composers Orchestra, theNewOrchestraofWestchester,andon Broadway. He has performed under conductors James Levine, Kurt Masur, Andrew Davis, Kyrill Kondrashin, Dennis Russell Davies, Mark Elder, Kurt Sanderling, and Charles Mackerras. As an orchestral violinist he has been privileged to perform with many distinguished artists such as Jessye Norman, Itzhak Perlman, Thomas Hampson, Marilyn Horne, Pinchas Zuckerman, Midori, Kathleen Battle, Andre Watts, Garrick Ohlson, Billy Taylor, and Frank Sinatra.

As a chamber musician, Smith has performed at the Kowmung Music Festival in Australia, the Cervantino Festival in Mexico, the Toronto International Chamber Music Festival, and Klangfrühling Schlaining in Austria. Smith was a member of the contemporary music group Terra Australis from 1986 to 1989 and performed with them as soloist at the 1988 Aspen Music Festival in Andrew Ford’s Chamber Concerto No. 3: In Constant Flight. He recorded several of Ford’s works on the CD Icarus, which was named one of the best 10 CDs by The Sydney Morning Herald in 2001.

37

The Kowmung Music Festival with the audience in the background and the artists performing on a dance platform erected by goldminers in 1880. Photo by Stephen Fearnley.

“ I was pleased to be on the orchestra’s search committee when Rohan was hired. So many things about the orchestra changed when he came on board. The orchestra quickly mushroomed in size. In 2000, when I joined the Midcoast Chamber Orchestra, there were maybe 45 musicians, and now we are twice the size—a full symphony orchestra. Rohan is responsible for much of that growth as well as our musical growth. Musicians don’t stick around in a volunteer orchestra unless they are having a great time.’’

– Carol

Preston, MSO Past-Executive Director and Concertmaster

Soulful Expressions

Saturday, October 28, 2023

7:00 p.m.

Franco Center, Lewiston

Sunday, October 29, 2023 2:30 p.m.

Orion Performing Arts Center, Topsham

Aspiration

William Grant Still (from Symphony No. 1, “Afro-American Symphony”) (1895–1978)

Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827)

Allegro con brio

Largo

Rondo

Anastasia Antonacos, Pianist

Intermission

Symphony No. 5 in D Minor, Op. 47Dmitri Shostakovich (1906–1975)

Moderato

Allegretto

Largo

Allegro non troppo

Aspiration by William Grant Still and Symphony No. 5 by Dimitri Shostakovich presented under license from G. Schirmer Inc. and Associated Music Publishers, copyright owners.

Soulful Expressions

Aspiration (from Symphony No. 1, “Afro-American Symphony”)

by William Grant Still

William Grant Still was the most immediately successful African-American classical composer in the first half of the twentieth century. He wrote five symphonies, eight operas, several ballets, and many symphonic poems and suites, plus chamber music and choral works. He studied with modernist composer Edward Varèse, had a Guggenheim fellowship in 1934, won commissions from major American orchestras, and conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 1936. He also had great success as a commercial arranger for such musicians as Artie Shaw and Paul Whiteman, and for film music.

His largely conservative and highly approachable concert music was less favored in the high-modernist period of the 1950s and ‘60s, but has been increasingly widely played since then. He was not the loudest of civil-rights activists, but all of his symphonies and much of his other music explicitly draw on and refer to African-American musical traditions and experiences. His symphonies all have titles; the First Symphony, from which this movement is drawn, is the “Afro-American Symphony,” and the four movements are, in order, “Longing,” “Sorrow,” “Humor,” and “Aspiration.” Each movement also has an epigraph from the poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar. The one in this movement is:

“Be proud, my Race, in mind and soul, Thy name is writ on Glory’s scroll

In characters of fire.

High ’mid the clouds of Fame’s bright sky, Thy banner’s blazoned folds now fly, And truth shall lift them higher”

The music, alternating as it does between darker and more joyful moods, shows the power of hope even as it acknowledges the depths from which it might arise.

Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37

by Ludwig van Beethoven

When Beethoven arrived in Vienna in 1792, aged nearly 22, he became known as a pianist, and particularly as an improviser, before his reputation as a composer was secured. He often performed at the houses of the local aristocracy, but his first appearance for the larger public was as a pianist at a charity concert in 1795, where he played either the first or the second concerto. This third concerto was written—also for his own performance—around 1803, after Beethoven had

realized his deafness and fallen into a period of despair, but also as he had become firmly established in Vienna as a creative force.

The concerto’s key—C minor—is often thought of as particularly characteristic of Beethoven and often as especially suitable for stormy music (e.g., the Fifth Symphony and the “Pathétique” Sonata). In the eighteenth century, when all keys were thought to have particular characters, C minor was described as “plaintive” and “melancholy.” This concerto is neither particularly stormy nor melancholic. Moreover, in contrast to the massive and ground-breaking Eroica Symphony, which was written around the same time, this piece is relatively conservative.

Like almost all concertos preceding it (unlike Beethoven’s fourth and fifth piano concertos) it begins with a long orchestral introduction that offers essentially all the main material for the first movement, from the opening stern march to lyrical melodies. One interesting feature of this movement is how much the piano plays the same material in unison in both hands, making it sound more like an orchestral instrument than the normal chord-playing piano.

The remaining two movements begin with the piano, in a kind of balance against the first movement. The slow movement features one of those heavenly, almost “out of time” Beethoven tunes, wreathed around with ornamentation; in the last movement the minor key adds intensity and urgency to virtuosity. The cadenzas (the places where the piano plays alone in the middle of movements) were all written by Beethoven himself but give a sense of how his improvisations might have shown off both his piano playing (last movement) and his skills at chopping up and reorganizing musical material (first movement).

Symphony No. 5 in D Minor, Op. 47

by Dmitri Shostakovich

Written and first performed in 1937, this was a landmark work for Shostakovich. A year earlier, he had fallen from grace with Stalin, his opera Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk having been condemned by the regime in the newspaper Pravda as “muddle instead of music.” The Soviet Composers’ Union, which had the power to grant or deny composers commissions and posts in educational institutions— in a word, to make or break composers’ career—marched other composers to the lectern in their meetings to denounce Shostakovich for “formalism”: that is, music insufficiently dedicated to mass appeal and a heroic manner. In response, Shostakovich entitled this symphony “A Soviet Artist’s Response to Just Criticism” and it was received absolutely rapturously at its premiere. The

43

Soulful Expressions continued

audience wept during the third movement, applauded for half an hour at the end, and other composers wrote encomiums like the following: “A work of such philosophical depth and emotional force could only be created here in the Soviet Union.”

The work is indeed heroic in proportions (it’s 45 minutes long) and manner; it moves from the austerity of the opening movement to the major-mode triumphalism of the last, thus following a similar pattern to that of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. In his official writings about it, Shostakovich likened it to the development of a personality (himself, thinly disguised), moving from uncertainty to a place in the sun. He wrote that it embodied “all that he had thought and felt” since the devastating criticism in Pravda, a sentence that was clearly meant to be read on the surface as an acknowledgment of the rightness of the Stalinist criticism. But even during Soviet times, music critics and others read a different and more resistant “program” into the work—one in which, as Richard Taruskin writes, they wept, then “stood up and cheered, grateful for the pain.” The music, in other words, allowed them access to a range of feelings and attitudes that they could not express in daily life.

How can we hear this socially-embedded work today? Is the last movement truly triumphal or so over the top that it’s a parody of triumphalism? Is any listening necessarily bound to politics? The easy answer is that great art transcends its circumstances to speak to all people in all ages, and it is certainly possible to listen to this work as an abstract story of struggle and triumph. One can also hear a masterly collage of musical references: listen for the stern, Bach-like counterpoint in the first movement, a grotesque waltz in the second, the resonant chords of Orthodox sacred music in the third, and the final movements of Beethoven’s Fifth and Ninth symphonies in the last—so much for “only in the Soviet Union”! Or one can relate the whole thing to Beethoven, noting how the simplest materials pervade and unify the work, the main examples being the two three-note rhythms short-short-long (“Kit-chen SINK”) and long-short-short (“LI-bra-ry”).

The fascination of this symphony is that all these messages and meanings are equally true. The last movement is a triumph (and a relief) after the pain of the third movement; we do recognize “universal” psychological archetypes in the music evenas these attach to the demands of a particular appalling political agenda. The grotesque waltz (a Shostakovich specialty) is funny and terrifying at the same time. So a respectful way to listen to this work might be in a spirit of selfexamination, if not self-criticism—what are my reactions, and why?

© Mary Hunter

Anastasia Antonacos

Anastasia Antonacos has given notable performances around the world as a solo recitalist and chamber musician. She has played at venues such as the Salle Cortot, Casa Orfeo, Holland’s Alkmaar Conservatory, and Alice Tully Hall. She has also played in Greece, Russia, France, and Belgium, as well as various places in the U.S., including Washington, D.C., where she testified for funding for the National Endowment for the Arts. Her solo CD, Colour Is the Keyboard, was recorded and produced by Grammy winner Bob Ludwig of Gateway Mastering Studios.

She won First Place at the International Young Artist Music Competition in Bulgaria, and she holds prizes from the Capdepera International Piano Competition in Mallorca and the Indianapolis Matinee Musicale Competition. In 2004, the Greek Women’s University Club of Chicago awarded her the Kanellos Award. She attended the Holland Music Sessions, the Bowdoin Summer Music Festival, and the Wilhelm Kempff Beethoven Course in Positano, Italy, where she was one of eight pianists selected for an intensive study of Beethoven led by John O’Conor.

A former member of the full-time piano faculty at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Antonacos holds a master’s and doctorate in piano performance from Indiana University in Bloomington and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Southern Maine School of Music. She is a USM School of Music faculty member and a founding director of 240 Strings. She performs regularly around New England as a member of the Portland Piano Trio, which has been chosen for multiple residencies at Avaloch Farm Institute.

Antonacos has made solo appearances with the Northshore Philharmonic Orchestra, the Midcoast Symphony Orchestra, the Portland Symphony Orchestra, and the Bangor Symphony Orchestra. She has collaborated with violinist Joseph Silverstein and members of the Vermeer, Cassatt, DaPonte, and Barkada Quartets. Committed to new music, she has premiered works by Daniel Sonenberg, Richard Nelson, and David Martynuik.

She lives with her husband and daughter in Portland, where she was named one of the 100 Most Influential People of Portland by the Phoenix. She is the Artistic Director of Fox Islands Concerts.

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Song & Dance Music from Around the World

Saturday, January 20, 2024

7:00 p.m.

Franco Center, Lewiston

Sunday, January 21, 2024

2:30 p.m.

Orion Performing Arts Center, Topsham

Danza nal (Malambo) from Danza EstanciaAlberto Ginastera (1916–1983)

Libertango Astor Piazzolla (1921–1992)

Huapango José Pablo Moncayo (1912–1958)

Old American Songs Aaron Copland

Boatmen’s Dance, The Dodger, Simple Gifts, I Bought Me a Cat, (1900–1990)

Zion’s Walls, The Golden Willow Tree, Ching-a-ring Chaw, At the River

Philip Lima, Baritone

Intermission

Thunder and Lightning Polka Johann Strauss, Jr. (1825–1899)

Three Songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn Gustav Mahler (The Boy’s Magic Horn) (1860–1911)

Rheinlegendchen (“A Little Rhine Story”)

Tambourgesell (“Drummer Boy”)

Lob des hohen Verstandes (“In Praise of High Intellect”)

Philip Lima, Baritone

Symphonic Dances from West Side Story Leonard Bernstein (1918–1990)

Concert 2, Song and Dance Music: Libertango by Astor Piazzolla presented under license from G. Schirmer Inc. and Associated Music Publishers, copyright owners. Danza Estancia by Alberto Ginastera; Old American Songs by Aaron Copeland; Symphonic Dances by Leonard Bernstein presented under license from Boosey & Hawkes Publishers, copyright owners.

Song & Dance Music from Around the World

Danza nal (Malambo) from Danza Estancia, by Alberto Ginastera

Huapango, by Jose Pablo Moncayo

Libertango, by Astor Piazzolla

Western classical training has been part of Central and Latin American culture since the nineteenth century, and, in the twentieth century especially, many composers emerged thoroughly steeped in the music of European and North American classical styles. Ginastera, an Argentinian, was among the most prominent of these. However, much Latin American music, and certainly the works now most played worldwide, incorporate or rely on material—especially dance rhythms—from local folk or popular traditions.

Argentinian composer Alberto Ginastera wrote his ballet Estancia (Ranch) in 1934; its final movement is based on the rhythms of the malambo, a virtuosic folk dance typically done by (male) gauchos. Astor Piazzolla was also Argentinian and a famous performer on the bandoneon (similar to an accordion); his works are almost all based on the tango, often called Argentina’s national dance. They have achieved enormous popularity and have been arranged for every conceivable ensemble, including full orchestra. Jose Pablo Moncayo was Mexican and wrote a vast diversity of works. Today’s “Huapango” is based on the Mexican dance of the same name, which is a couples dance often involving rhythmic stamping as well as complex turns and spins.

A rhythmic feature common to all these dances is the “hemiola,” which is the alternating (and sometimes simultaneous, in different instruments) dividing of six fast notes into either two groups of three or three groups of two (123 456 or 12 34 56). This combination gives the music an irresistible tugging feeling. The song “America” in Bernstein’s West Side Story is the most familiar example; we’ll hear that later in the concert.

Old American Songs

by Aaron Copland

The mid-twentieth-century interest in paying homage to and incorporating local musical material into orchestral scores was not confined to Latin America. Indeed, the idea of “national style” is as old as classical music itself. And, in the nineteenth century, German music became the yardstick by which almost all concert music

was judged. Composers from “the peripheries” started to assert their own national identities while also working within the basic aesthetic framework of Germanic music. Antonin Dvo ák was among the most successful at this, inspiring many American composers in the early part of the twentieth century.

Aaron Copland, who studied in France as a young man, was as keen as anyone to assert his “serious (i.e., European) composer” bona fides. However, on his return to the US, and in line with both FDR’s Depression-era promotion of American public art and the contemporary left-wing interest in celebrating the cultures of rural and working-class Americans, he developed an accessible, assertively “American” style. The Old American Songs that we’ll hear today are an example of that. The songs themselves—words and tunes—are from various US sources, including hymn tunes and folk songs. Copland’s contribution is his lively orchestral accompaniments.

Thunder and Lightning Polka, by Johann Strauss, Jr.

Three Songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Boy's Magic Horn), by Gustav Mahler

Johann Strauss was one of the most popular composers in the late nineteenth century, writing over 500 social dances (especially waltzes and polkas) and a variety of other music. Whereas waltzes are in triple time, polkas are in double time and can sound much like marches. This one has a particularly active percussion section, illustrating the exciting weather of its title.

Strauss worked within, but was not primarily concerned with projecting, a self-consciously “Germanic” style. However, Achim von Arnim and Clemens Brentano’s poetry collection Des Knaben Wunderhorn (1805-08), from which Mahler chose his texts, was part of a Romantic move to celebrate ancient German culture through its legends and verses. The poems are actually old, but von Arnim and Brentano edited them. They are typically short and often project a kind of pastoral innocence that can also include grief and humor, often with an undertow of irony.

The three songs we’ll do today illustrate that mix. “Rheinlegendchen” (“A Little Rhine Story”) is narrated by a spurned lover who imagines throwing his ring into the river, a fish eating the ring, a king eating the fish and finding the ring, and the sweetheart (who apparently works for the king) recognizing it and rushing back to the lover. “Tambourgesell” (“Drummer Boy”) is narrated by a young man who is about to be executed, who regrets not still being in his station

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Song & Dance Music continued

as a drummer, and who bids the world farewell. “Lob des hohen Verstandes” (“In Praise of High Intellect”) describes a song competition between a cuckoo and a nightingale, judged by a donkey, whose large ears are supposed to help him hear. The cuckoo wins.

Symphonic Dances from West Side Story

by Leonard Bernstein

Leonard Bernstein was among the twentieth century’s most multi-talented and celebrated musicians. As a pianist, conductor, composer, and educator, he straddled the divide between European and American classical music, bringing them closer. His 1957 musical, West Side Story, whose lyrics were by Stephen Sondheim and initial choreography by Jerome Robbins, has become an enduring classic of the American stage and screen, not to mention the source of some of the most popular songs in the “Great American Songbook.”

This orchestral suite is extracted from the original film version; it includes the music from both dances and songs in the original and follows the musical’s narrative arc. Many arrangers, in addition to Bernstein, had a hand in putting this together. Still, Bernstein’s compositional vision of incorporating jazz and Latin American elements into an orchestral context remains. This combination is distinctively American and closes the stylistic circle of today’s concert.

© Mary Hunter

Philip Lima

Baritone Philip Lima has regularly garnered critical acclaim for his performances on both concert and operatic stages: “His singing was glorious” (The Boston Globe) “vibrant baritone and a commanding presence” (Cleveland The Plain Dealer)—“keen musicianship along with total dramatic intention.” (Opera News Online)

He has sung leading operatic roles in Germany and for regional American opera companies in repertoire ranging from traditional favorites by Handel, Mozart, Puccini, and Verdi to important works of twentiethcentury masters such as Samuel Barber, Benjamin Britten, and Viktor Ullmann to the comic masterworks of Gilbert and Sullivan. Of particular note have been his featured roles in the world premieres of operas by jazz greats Leslie Burrs, Nathan Davis, and Mary Watkins and by award-winning composer Larry Bell.

Lima has appeared as soloist with the Boston Pops and over 70 orchestras, choral societies, and concert series across the United States, and in Korea and Ukraine in beloved choral works of Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Fauré, Handel, Mendelssohn, Orff, and Vaughan Williams, as well as works by Bernstein ( Arias and Barcarolles and major excerpts from Mass), Dave Brubeck (The Light in the Wilderness), Mahler (Kindertotenlieder), Ravel (Don Quichotte à Dulcinée), and Lee Hoiby (his setting of the “I Have a Dream” speech of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.).

Lima is featured on the recording of pioneering African-American composer Florence Price’s Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight, which won the 2020 American Prize for the Performance of American Music.

The Assistant Chair of Berklee College of Music’s Voice Department, Lima is a frequent recitalist whose performance of Schubert’s Winterreise with pianist Beverly Orlove was cited by The Boston Phoenix in an annual summary of Boston’s “Unforgettable Classical Events.”

More information about Mr. Lima is available at philiplima.com and on his YouTube channel, PhilipLimaSings

“

It has been magical observing the Midcoast Symphony rise in virtuosity under Rohan’s leadership from my seat in the viola section. He has a great respect and interest in the inquiries, needs, and personal development of his orchestra members. I’m grateful for Rohan’s insight, wisdom, experience, humor, personal stories, and humble manner in which he has shared two decades of his talent with us. It is a true gift unlike any other I’ve ever received!’’

– Heather Linkin, MSO Past President and Viola

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A New Artistic Mélange

Emily Isaacson, Guest Conductor

Saturday, March 23, 2024

7:00 p.m.

Franco Center, Lewiston

Sunday, March 24, 2024

2:30 p.m.

Orion Performing Arts Center, Topsham

Hymn for Everyone Jessie Montgomery (b. 1981)

Symphony No. 38 Wolfgang Amades Mozart in D Major, K.504, (“Prague”) (1756-1791)

Adagio - Allegro Andante

Finale (Presto) Intermission

Enigma Variations, Op. 36 Edward Elgar (1857-1934)

Theme (Enigma: Andante)

Variation I (L’istesso tempo) “C.A.E.”

Variation II (Allegro) “H.D.S-P.”

Variation III (Allegretto) “R.B.T.”

Variation IV (Allegro di molto) “W.M.B.”

Variation V (Moderato) “R.P.A.”

Variation VI (Andantino) “Ysobel”

Variation VII (Presto) “Troyte”

Variation VIII (Allegretto) “W.N.”

Variation IX (Adagio) “Nimrod”

Variation X (Intermezzo: Allegretto) “Dorabella”

Variation XI (Allegro di molto) “G.R.S.”

Variation XII (Andante) “B.G.N.”

Variation XIII (Romanza: Moderato) “ * * * ”

Variation XIV (Finale: Allegro) “E.D.U.”

A New Artistic Mélange

Hymn for Everyone

by Jessie Montgomery

Jessie Montgomery, whose “Banner” MSO played in 2021, wrote “Hymn for Everyone” in 2022. In a YouTube interview, she notes that it is both a response to the lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and a reflection on hymns in general, which have, through history, offered a sense of both community and individual solace. She imagined the orchestra as a collection of choirs and the tune, repeated in different guises throughout the work. It resembles many hymns in a straightforward rhythm and feels very singable. Although there are no dramatic contrasts in this 11-minute piece, the music combines a sense of interior contemplation with more public outcry.

Symphony No. 38 in D Major, K.504, (“Prague”)

by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

The “Prague” symphony is so-named (but not by Mozart) because it premiered in that city in early 1787. It followed on the heels of the first Prague performances of The Marriage of Figaro, whichwerea huge success, and the premiereof Don Giovanni, which was commissioned by the theater there. This symphony was probably played by the theater orchestra, which had three or four first violins, three or four seconds, and a couple each of violas, cellos, and basses. There was a single player of each wind, brass, and percussion part, plus a harpsichord playing the bass line and chords, to a total of about 26 souls on stage. Overall, that is smaller than most modern orchestras, but with so few string players, even oneon-a-part winds would have been proportionately louder. It’s worth keeping that in mind because the wind and brass parts in this work are quite remarkable and wonderfully varied—sometimes they are the main event, sometimes they double the string parts, sometimes they provide a counterpoint, and sometimes they serve as punctuation, marking the joins and separations between musical “sentences.”

Today, we are used to a four-movement model of the Classical symphony—usually arranged in the fast, slow, minuet, fast pattern. The Prague Symphony has no minuet, which may seem like an anomaly, but historically, it is not that unusual. And Mozart makes up in the richness and complexity of his writing anything that one might feel missing because of the more compact form of the whole.

The first movement begins with a slow introduction, by turns martial and more lyrical. It passes into a much longer fast section that opens with a reminiscence of the more melodic, sometimes mysterious music in the introduction but quickly introduces several more cheerful ideas. The movement is striking because of the complexity of its sound. There is a lot of counterpoint (two or more equally interesting things happening simultaneously), and it is worth paying attention to how many different things you can hear at the same moment. The slow second movement opens quite placidly and never becomes overtly stormy, but the mood changes subtly at remarkably short intervals. Along with the placidity, we hear some moments of tension and instability that may remind us of a tragic opera. The last movement is predictably fast and cheerful, but juxtaposed with apparent simplicity is more counterpoint, often sounding a bit like a round (where everyone sings the same tune but starting one after the other) and some slightly anxioussounding syncopations (offbeat rhythms) that may remind us of the opening of the fast section of the first movement.

Enigma Variations, Op. 36

by Edward Elgar

The Enigma Variations—so-named by Elgar himself—were composed in 1899 when Elgar was 41. It was his first widely successful work and cemented his reputation. The work consists of an original theme and fourteen variations. All but the theme and Variation 13 have titles comprised of the initials (or nicknames) of friends and associates—nine men and four women—and purport to suggest something about each person. Elgar himself wrote in 1911:

This work, commenced in a spirit of humour & continued in deep seriousness, contains sketches of the composer’s friends. It may be understood that these personages comment or reflect on the original theme & each one attempts a solution of the Enigma, for so the theme is called. The sketches are not ‘portraits’ but each variation contains a distinct idea founded on some particular personality or perhaps on some incident known only to two people. This is the basis of the composition, but the work may be listened to as a ‘piece of music’ apart from any extraneous consideration.

Most of the friends were local amateur musicians and Elgar’s friends and neighbors who would be lost to history if not for their perpetuation in Elgar’s music, but several are worth noting. The first variation, “C.A.E.” is Caroline Alice

A New Artistic Mélange continued

Elgar, Edward’s wife. The ninth, “Nimrod,” often understood as the emotional heart of the work and certainly the most played as a stand-alone piece, refers to Augustus J. Jaeger, Elgar’s editor at the music publisher Novello and a stalwart supporter and encourager when his confidence failed or his cyclical depression was upon him. The grand finale, “E.D.U.,” refers to Elgar himself—evidently, his Alice affectionately called him Edu.

Elgar described the theme as an enigma, which has kept students of this piece searching for the “solution” since the work first appeared. Some have said that the up-and-down contours of the theme’s melody match the outline of the Malvern Hills close to Elgar’s house. Other statements by Elgar have suggested that a second, somehow meaningful tune is hidden in the theme, either in the tune’s notes or as a counterpoint. “Auld Lang Syne,” “Rule Britannia,” and the slow movement of Beethoven’s “Pathétique” sonata have all been suggested, but none of these has garnered universal agreement. Elgar noted that this tune was both well known and included “dark thoughts,” which seems to limit the choices beyond what musical detectives have been able to work out. Regardless, Elgar’s deeply felt and inventive writing, and the contrasts as well as the continuities among the variations, make sense of the work’s stellar reputation.

© Mary Hunter

Emily Isaacson

Dr. Emily Isaacson is a conductor and producer fiercelycommittedtoreimaginingclassical music for today’s audiences. She is the founder andartisticdirectorofClassicalUprising,a performing arts collective that believes classical music must rise up, challenge current norms, and re-envision where, how, and for whom we make music. Classical Uprising serves over 6,000 musicians and music lovers through its programs with Oratorio Chorale, a symphonic chorus and professional orchestra; Portland Bach Experience, an immersive music festival; and Horizon Voices, a youth choral program for singers K-12.

One of only a handful of female conductors (and moms) in the country, Isaacson was named the 2018 Maine Artist of the Year by the Maine Arts Commission, one of 50 Mainers Leading the State by Maine Magazine, and the 2022 winner of the American Prize. In 2008, Isaacson helped to launch Roomful of Teeth, a Grammy-winning new vocal music ensemble. She has taught at Clark University, Bowdoin College, and the University of Illinois. A St. Andrews Society Scholar, Isaacson holds a master’s degree in musicology from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland; a master’s degree in conducting from the University of Oregon; and a doctorate in conducting from the University of Illinois.

She lives in Portland, Maine, with her husband, daughter, and son. Isaacson belongs to Beyond Artists, a coalition of artists that donates a percentage of their concert fees to organizations they care about.She supports the Natural Resources Council of Maine and Alight Humanitarian Relief through her performances.

“ We have been so lucky to work with Rohan over the past twenty years! The first time (many years ago) he said, “The Berlin Philharmonic does it like this...” clearly expecting us to hop to and copy the best orchestra on the planet, I thought, “Yeah, right.” But that combination of optimism and ambition—plus first-hand experience with high-level professional music-making—has transformed the orchestra into an ensemble that manages really challenging music remarkably successfully, retains its players, and brings us and our audiences real joy. Thank you, Rohan!!’’

– Mary Hunter, MSO Past-President and Violin

Cityscape, Seascape, Soundscape

Saturday, May 18, 2024

7:00 p.m.

Franco Center, Lewiston

Sunday, May 19, 2024

2:30 p.m.

Orion Performing Arts Center, Topsham

Quiet City

Aaron Copland (1900–1990)

Tim Kenlan, Trumpeter

Billie Jo Brito, English Hornist

La Mer

De l’aube à midi sur la mer (“From Dawn to Midday on the Sea”)

Jeux de vagues (“The Play of Waves”)

Dialogue du vent et de la mer (“Dialogue Between the Wind and the Sea”)

Intermission

Claude Debussy (1862–1918)

Symphony No. 7, in A Major, Op. 92Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827)

Poco sostenuto – Vivace

Allegretto

Presto

Allegro con brio

Cityscape, Seascape, Soundscape

Quiet City

by Aaron Copland

“Quiet City” was originally written in 1939 as incidental music for the stage play of the same name by Irwin Shaw. That version was a chamber piece for alto saxophone, clarinet, trumpet, and piano. The play, involving the (bad) psychological effects on the protagonist of pretending not to be Jewish, was a flop. Copland took some of the themes from that and fashioned it into this miniconcerto for trumpet, English horn (an alto oboe), and strings. The composer remarked that this version took on a life of its own far beyond what would have happened if the play version had not been reworked. In the original play, the trumpet represents the bittersweet memory of the protagonist’s brother playing that instrument; in this version, the one-bit-after-another structure of the piece reminds us of its origins in incidental music, but the trumpet’s companionship with the English horn and the halo-like effect of much of the string writing, softens the melancholy of the original.

La Mer

by Claude Debussy

La Mer (1905) is the middle of Debussy’s three great orchestral trilogies, the others being Nocturnes of 1897-99 and Images of 1905-12. Although these works are all of symphonic length, and each is divided into three separate movements, Debussy specifically did not call them symphonies but rather gave them titles that connect them with extra-musical images and ideas. The three movements of La Mer are entitled “From Dawn to Midday on the Sea,” “The Play of Waves,” and “Dialogue Between the Wind and the Sea.” The titles by themselves may suggest visual images. Debussy is known especially to have admired the seascapes of British artist J. W. Turner for their “mystery” (Debussy’s word.) But Debussy himself, as well as early commentators on the work, were quite clear that La Mer was not intended to simply be a musical equivalent to a painting of the sea. Like many composers, he was suspicious of too-literal tone painting. He admired Beethoven’s “Pastoral” Symphony for the way Beethoven had captured the “invisible sentiments” of nature rather than just imitating the physical waving of trees in the wind or the rustle of a brook.

In a 1908 interview with Emily Frances Bauer for Harper’s Weekly, Debussy said, “I live in a world of imagination, which is set in motion by something suggested

by my intimate surroundings rather than by outside influences, which distract me and give me nothing.” La Mer, while it may evoke pictures of the sea in various states in our minds, is also about our own possible responses to the sea and (as several early commentators noted) the sea’s own sense of itself or its “voice.”

Insofar as one can find it, this “voice” is not carried by any one instrument or instrument group or any single melodic idea. Rather, it is embodied in the continual appearance and disappearance of flashes of instrumental “color,” of incredibly brief shards of tunes that migrate from one instrument to another before you can catch them, and of complex accompaniments that may evoke both the mysterious or threatening depths of the ocean and the welling of notalways-wanted feelings. High winds, brass, and low strings are often given the most easily graspable ideas. The last movement feels climactic partly because Debussy deploys the whole orchestra playing together at greater length than in earlier movements and partly because he spins something like a tune out of the first identifiable motif of the entire work. He repeats this several times, at some length, so the listener feels that even though the wind and the waves may be endlessly at odds, together they constitute a magnificent and awe-inspiring natural phenomenon.

Symphony No. 7 in A major, Op. 92

by Ludwig van Beethoven

Beethoven’s Seventh and Eighth Symphonies were written essentially simultaneously in 1811-12. The Seventh was premiered first, in 1813, at the same concert as Beethoven’s anti-Napoleonic “Wellington’s Victory.” Beethoven biographer Maynard Solomon notes that for early listeners, this symphony was thus associated with hopes for peace after two occupations by Napoleon and years of the French-Austrian wars.

The immediate context aside, many early listeners to the symphony heard a festal character in it, some influenced by Wagner’s description of it as the “apotheosis of the dance.” The skipping rhythms of the first movement, the slow march character of the second movement, and the wild revelry of the last one all contribute to this reading. At the same time, there is a kind of obsessive character to all the movements that darkens and complicates the festivities and links it to the famously darker Fifth and Third Symphonies.

The first movement’s obsession is clearly the skipping rhythm: once the slow introduction is over, this rhythm is essentially never absent. There are several

Cityscape, Seascape, Soundscape continued

“teases” that lead us to think something more relaxed is going to occur, but other than a kind of becalmed passage close to the end, there is almost no relief from that basic rhythm.

The second movement was incredibly popular in the nineteenth century, being arranged for all kinds of ensembles, played alone without the other movements, and even inserted into some performances of the Eighth Symphony. It is just as obsessive as the first movement. The obvious fixation is the long-short-short rhythm of the opening, which pervades the movement. But there’s a more abstract fixation as well, which is the question of what counts as the tune. The opening idea seems like the main melody, even if it is a bit rudimentary. But when the violas play a longer-breathed lament simultaneously with the opening idea, this gets “demoted” to an accompaniment role. The question of precedence—that is, of foreground vs. background—persists throughout the movement.

The third movement, or Scherzo, alternates a frantic chase with a much calmer rhythm that may remind us of a slowed-down version of the opening skipping rhythm. The last movement does not insist on a rhythmic gesture quite the same way as the others, but it is obsessed with accents—especially whether they occur on the down or offbeat. That instability, combined with an often-repeated swirling gesture, creates a movement of almost terrifying intensity and fascination.

© Mary Hunter 2023

Tim Kenlan

Tim Kenlan has been with the MSO as its principal trumpet since 2015. During that time, he has performed with numerous chamber groups and as a solo musician and section member at many churches around Maine.

Kenlan attended the prestigious Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University in Bloomington, where he pursued a degree in trumpet performance. At Indiana University, he studied with Edmund Cord, former principal trumpet of the Israel Philharmonic, Utah Symphony Orchestra, and Santa Fe Opera.

Kenlan grew up outside Burlington, VT, and began playing trumpet at the age of 10. In high school, he studied primarily with Larry Solt in Burlington and with Charles Schlueter, former principal trumpet of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

He lives in Lewiston with his family. When he’s not playing music, he is a lawyer and shareholder with the law firm Berman & Simmons, P.A.

Billie Jo Brito

Billie Jo Brito, oboist and English hornist for the Midcoast Symphony Orchestra is celebrating her sixteenth season with MSO this year. She is a proud mom of three young men (including a set of twins), three stepdaughters, and six grandchildren.

Brito is a retired school teacher who spent 20 years at Lewiston Middle School. As a “retirement project,” she and her husband Dan bought Blais Flowers & Garden Center in Lewiston. When not surrounded by beautiful bouquets, she performs as time allows with the Maine State Music Theatre, the Bates College Orchestra, the Colby Symphony Orchestra, and chamber music wherever the opportunity presents itself. A graduate of the Juilliard School, she studied with John Ferrillo, Linda Stroman, and Ronald Roseman. She grew up in Toledo, Ohio.

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“ One of my first encounters with Rohan was a trip to show him the venue at Lewiston, which was new to all of us. He entered the building, looked around quickly, and clapped his hands to listen to the acoustics. It was immediately obvious that Rohan had vast musical experience and was the right choice as our new music director. (His comment was: “What a great place to play Haydn Symphonies. It reminds me of playing in Vienna.”) I feel strongly that his arrival marked the real turning point in the orchestra’s development. Anonymous comments soon went from “I didn’t know there was a local orchestra” to “I hear good things about the MSO,” and this has been reflected in increased financial support, audience attendance, and new members. It truly has been a very remarkable 20 years, and much of the credit belongs to Rohan.’’

– John Teller, MSO Past-Executive Director and Oboe

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EVENT SERIES 2023-24

Sept. 10 Midcoast Symphony Orchestra & Friends of the Franco Center Fundraiser

Sept. 16 Kendall Dean

Sept. 30 Davidson County Line Band

Oct. 7 Runnin’ Down a Dream: Tom Petty Tribute

Oct. 13 Sweet Baby James: America’s #1 James Taylor tribute artist Bill Griese

Oct. 15 Piano Series Duo Mundi George & Guli

Oct. 19, 20, 21 Fright Night Walk

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Oct. 29 Fiddle-icious

Nov. 3 The Women Who Risked Everything for Freedom concert

Nov. 9, 10, 11 Bricks & Bridges Comedy Fest

Nov. 17 Robert Washington: Elvis Tribute

Dec. 15, 16 Sights & Sounds of Christmas Show

Dec. 17 “Just Us” Entertainers Christmas Show

Jan. 26 Piano Men: The Music of Elton & Billy

Feb. 3 Welcome to Maine comedy show

Feb. 10 Imari & the Sahara Desert Dancers

Feb. 17 Josee Vachon

March 9 Magic Bus: The Who Tribute

April 3 Windham Chamber Singers

April 5: Studio Two: The Beatles Tribute

July 13: Heather Pierson Trio

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Check out all the FABULOUS events from local organizations!

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Saturday November 4 7:00 pm

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Oct 20 - 29 by Carey Crim

Imagine Steel Magnolias with modern day issues, as six women gather for a much needed girls night out. on t miss this hilarious and hear elt look at mothers and daughters and the way women support each other.

MY WITCH: THE MARGARET HAMILTON STORIES

Spend an evening with the beloved actress best known as “The Wicked Witch of the West” as she shares entertaining stories from her long career, including The Wizard of Oz

A CHRISTMAS CAROL

Dec 8 - 10 adapted by Christopher Schario

Si actors and a ddler perform the ickens out of this beloved holiday classic in a way you ve never imagined and will never forget. Children 18 and under only $15!

Jan 26 - Feb 4

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For tickets call 207-333-3386 or visit mainemusicsociety.org

Saturday, May 11 7:00 pm

Sunday, May 12 2:00 pm

When ris s husband is killed in a plane crash, she inherits a home in unenburg, ova Sco a that she never knew existed! Mystery, comedy, and romance follow, as she begins a laugh lled and poignant roadtripNorthtounravelthe mystery of her husband s secret life.

Get ready for heartwarming laughter and all the polyester you can handle! Whether you grew up Catholic, lived through the 1970s, or your family resembles the “fun” in dysfunc onal this nostalgic and hear elt new comedy is for you!

A married couple invents a game where they each confess an un a ering truth and promise to love one another regardless. But is being truthful the same thing as being true to oneself? Entertaining, humorous, poignant, and though ul, you ll be talking about this provoca ve new play all the way home.

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