Extreme Merdle and Haggard

Merdle: You know, it’s been a long time since we’ve been to a new music concert. I’m feeling a little guilty for not supporting the arts. Plus, I have a hankering for something not associated with Toy Story 3.

Haggard: Me too. I could go for something that doesn’t pander to the lowest common denominator.

Want some coffee?

M: Sure. Thanks.

H: [pours coffee] We should check the listings—see if we can find something worthwhile.

M: Mmm. Did you grab the paper?

H: Yeah. It’s on the counter, behind you.

M: Oh. I didn't see it there. It’s early--not quite awake yet.

H: That’s what coffee is for.

M: You said it. [sips] Hmm. [fumbles through paper] Arts section...NY/ Region…Ah! Here’s something. Ooh! It’s about the Caramoor Music Festival.

H: We haven’t been to Caramoor in years. What are they up to?

M: Well… “CHAMBER music has been a key part of the Caramoor International Music Festival in Katonah for most of its 64 years. But rarely has the festival presented as wide a spectrum of chamber offerings as it will in its 65th season, which opens this month.”

H: I didn’t know they’ve been around that long! Good for them.

Would you like your eggs scrambled or sunny-side up?

M: Sunny-side up, please.

H: So, a rare, wide spectrum of chamber music? [goes to refrigerator, grabs butter, eggs, bacon, and jelly] Sounds good. What else does it say?

M: “Along with established and emerging artists serving up standard chamber fare, an audacious group of new-music exponents will be on hand — bending the chamber format and…”

H: How does one bend the chamber format?

M: Maybe it’ll be played in a large arena.

H: Or maybe there’ll be just enough players so that you can’t quite call it chamber, but few enough that you can’t quite call it an orchestra.

M: Meh. “’We’re still pushing the envelope, for Caramoor, and trying to reach a broader part of the community,’ said Michael Barrett, the chief executive and general director of the Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts.”

H: The qualification of “pushing the envelope” doesn’t instill much chamber-format-bending confidence.

M: That and "trying to reach a broader community" kinda smells funny, don't you think? I mean, it sounds like a good thing, but for whom?

H: Not gonna tell you. It's just so good.

M: Mmm-hmm. “The new-music aesthetic being presented this year departs somewhat from that of academically oriented composers like Roger Sessions and Elliott Carter.”

H: Again with the qualifiers! I’m not sure what to make of these messages: first there was "wide spectrum"; then "format bending"; followed by pushing the envelope “for Caramoor”…

M: Don't forget departing “somewhat.” Yeah. They’re toeing a line, for sure. But the bigger issue is the seeming way almost all new music is being marketed.

H: Do you mean how they want to distance themselves from thinking and academia?

M: Totally. What’s wrong with thinking?

H: You got me. Not for nothing, I seem to think we've been through this whole "we want an art that appeals more to the senses than to reason" thing before.

Anyway, want to think about how you want your bacon to appeal to you?

M: Charred, baby.

H: That’s why I love you.

M: “While Caramoor’s performers maintain a uniformly high level of musicianship, they embrace elements of popular culture…”

H: Doesn't "while," as a conjunction here, connote a contrast? What's that supposed to mean?!

M: Hold on. “…producing what the festival’s marketers call extreme chamber music.”

I guess it means that nobody knows how to market that which is unmarketable.

H: But they know how to market popular culture! It’s like calling a sports drink extreme, because it actually contains water, instead of processed, liquid-like crap.

M: Do you ever get the feeling that arts advertising is, like, ten years behind current doublespeak practice?

H: Ha! You said sunny-side up, right?

M: Yep. “Reflecting their training at Oberlin and Juilliard, the members of 2 Foot Yard, a violin-cello-guitar trio that will appear on July 2, bring a certain phrasing and detail of tone to their interpretations, said Carla Kihlstedt, the group’s violinist.”

H: [cracks an egg]

M: “Yet, she said, the group works in forms that have more in common with folk or pop music than with traditional classical composition.”

H: …Because phrasing and details can't exist in folk and pop forms, don't you know? What?!

M: Maybe there’s something to this whole anti-academic distancing. Schools are obviously not doing their jobs well.

H: You’re just saying that to get under my skin, aren’t you? Besides, you mean conservatories; they're hardly schools.

M: But you’re cute, when you’re mad. [sips coffee]

H: Seriously, just read. Meanwhile I’ll cook your breakfast, without help…all by myself.

M: “None of its tunes run more than six minutes.”

H: Selling point for short attention spans, no doubt.

M: No doubt. Or broader audiences. Heh. “In pieces like ‘On Waking,’ which it may play at Caramoor, the band employs extensive harmonics and extended improvisations punctuated only by a recurring four-note vocal line — Ms. Kihlstedt and the cellist double on vocals.”

H: I’m glad they may decide to use more than just sine tones. Grisey would be happy. [removes several strips of bacon from the skillet] Also, don't you think it's kinda a stretch to call a six-minute improvisation "extended"? A happening might be extended, but not a six-minute improv.

M: Or, it's like...

H: I know. Sex joke.

M: Mmm. “This, she said…”

H: What does “this” refer to?

M: Dunno. The "four-note vocal line"?

H: Dah-dah-dah dum!

M: “This, she said, results in a kind of abstraction that owes as much to the ethos of alternative rock as to the culture of the academy.

‘I find that audiences are getting much better at connecting the dots between different kinds of music,’ she said.”

H: Wait. Are we or aren’t we going to this festival?

M: Connect the dots.

H: Would you like toast, my abstract cryptographer?

M: Two pieces, please.

I dunno. I've liked Caramoor events in the past. Maybe the wonky description is coloring my preferences; but I think I'd still like to go.

H: We have nothing better to do, I suppose.

M: Either way, let’s find out what else is said about the state of arts advertising.

H: Good call.

M: “Connecting with audiences is a primary goal of Ethel, a quartet with two violins, a viola and a cello…”

H: Wait. Who wrote this, again?

M: Phillip Lutz, with two Ps, two Is, three Ls, an H, a U, a T, and a Z.

H: I suppose he has two eyes, four limbs, a torso, and a head, too.

M: You're funny. Not!

H: Nice. Nobody's used that reference since 1990!

M: Actually, 1992, chef-slave. Or 1993, if you want to count the sequel; but I don't know anyone who thinks that should count. [sips coffee]

“…the group adopts a ‘pedal to the metal’ attitude that plays down ‘the pursuit of perfection in classical performance,’ said Mary Rowell, one of the group’s violinists and a Juilliard graduate.”

H: That’s an odd thing to say.

M: You mean invoking a “pedal to the metal” attitude in order to downplay something?

H: Yeah, that. The idea is provocative, though.

M: ...if not logically problematic. “While the group’s playing hardly lacks precision […] the precision is never achieved at the expense of passion, Ms. Rowell said.

‘If we’re going to alienate audiences, it’s just not going to work,’ she said.”

H: More coffee?

M: Please. [ponders, sips] Do you think she’s implying that pursuing perfection alienates audiences? Or pursuing an antiquated ideal alienates them? Or is perfection unattainable? Or...

H: I think you’d be better off by asking what she means by “work.”

M: True. Or maybe I'll just send a letter of complaint to Julliard's office of academic standards.

H: Ha! [plates the last of the food, carries it over to table]

Alright, hun. Time to cry uncle. Breakfast is ready. Plus, this ham-fisted puffery is ruining my morning.

M: But you’ll miss my favorite part.

H: Yeah? What’s that? [sits at table beside Merdle]

M: Get this: “And the clarinetist Anthony McGill, who said that the pivotal works of his Caramoor debut would be by Debussy and Stravinsky…”

...

...

Wait for it.

...

H: Come on. My eggs are getting cold.

M: “...Debussy and Stravinsky — arguably new-music practitioners of their day…”

H: Did I read somewhere that Heidegger once argued this proposition and lost?

M: Shut up, chef-slave, and pass the Tabasco.
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It's been a long concert season...very long.

Summer is right around the corner and it's beautiful outside. You've been going to concerts every weekend for nearly 7 months now...season opening spectaculars, patriotic tributes, that obligatory performance of the Nutcracker, the unfortunate pops concert when Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels played with the orchestra. I know you're tired and that writing a concert review is the last thing you want to be doing right now. I understand.

But the finish line is so close. Don't give up yet!

First up, the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra's season is coming to an end, and William R. Wineke is on the case for Channel 3000.

Review: WCO Ends 50th Season In Triumph

Johann Hummel's 1816 "Piano Concerto in A Minor" provided a thrilling end to a brilliant season.

Hummel did that? I'm pretty sure that nothing that Hummel did was "thrilling", but okay.

As always, the performance was enhanced by Norman Gilliland's "Grace Notes" commentary.

Yes, program notes can provide useful historical information and context for works far removed from modern day. What historical gems did Mr. Gilliland uncover about Hummel, an obscure-ish composer largely unknown to those who didn't play trumpet in high school?

Gilliland noted the composer was such a gifted artist that he was invited to live in Mozart when he was seven years old, went on to study with Haydn and Salieri and was a friend of Beethoven.

Who knew that Mozart was such a hospitable guy.

[F]ollowing the intermission, the WCO played Franz Schubert's "Symphony No. 9 in C Major," nicknamed the "Great" symphony, partially because it takes the better part of an hour to perform.

Well, not really. The moniker was meant to distinguish the work from his "Little C Major" Symphony...but you know, whatever.

So, how well did the WCO perform the "Great"?

It's a powerful symphony and was performed very ably by the very able WCO,...

I'm not going to lie, that's a very able description.

...but after the excitement of the Goodyear piece [the Hummel concerto, which is strangely being referenced by the soloist], it seemed almost anti-climactic.

The Hummel concerto made the "Great" Symphony seem anti-climatic?

It has been a very long concert season indeed.

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Down the road in Indiana, Ivy Farguheson, of the Star Press, thinks Orff is a musical genius (and Tchaikovsky too).

REVIEW: "Carmina Burana' was a live masterpiece to behold

Symphonies are meant to perform Carl Orff’s “Carmina Burana” and luckily the Muncie Symphony Orchestra met with their fate Saturday evening in Emens Auditorium.

Okay, a bit ridiculous, but it's actually a pretty clever opening sentence. Good start, Ivy.

figure orff: "What has C sharp minor got to do with fascism?"

Most musical productions are meant to be listened to in person. Rarely is a live performance worse than a studio-backed recording and Carl Orff’s epic work is no exception.

A clumsily written thought, but point well-taken. On to the review...

That’s not to say there aren’t recordings,...

No, no, you don't need to explain yourself. Live performances better than the recording...we're with you.

Just move on and don't waste time backtracking, or you might get into some convoluted explanation comparing Orff's Carmina Burara to some random recording artist...like, say, Prince. That would be bad.

That’s not to say there aren’t recordings, even live recordings, that transfer the various emotions from the masterpiece on the stage or in a recording studio into your living room with passion. There clearly are.

Great. I was wrong. We made it out the other side unscathed.

But in much the same way seeing Prince...

I thought we had an understanding?

...live in concert can change the way you understand the guitar,...

figure prince: Changing the way I understand the guitar.

...compared to that nice CD in your car, listening to Orff’s music can open your ears to things you’ve never heard before.

Where are you going with this?

That’s why in both cases, with Prince and Orff, you choose the live option over the recording. You want to be in the presence of genius.

We are very liberal with our use of 'genius', aren't we?

And you want to be exhausted when they’re finished gracing you with their presence.

I suppose.

figure exhausted: Just heard Carmina Burana performed live.

Because Prince is great live, CDs should never have been invented? I like your logic.

So, how about the actual concert?

With the help of the Ball State University Chamber Choir, Concert Choir and the University Choral Union, the orchestra began the production with the most popular piece from “Carmina,” “O, Fortuna.”

I think most "productions" of this piece start with that part, seeing that it comes first in the score.

There isn’t an American who has ever seen a television commercial or watched the NBA playoffs during the last 20 years who has not heard the beginning measures of “O, Fortuna.”

Americans do love the arts!


embeddence orff: Wait, they have Orff in Canada, too?

And, sadly, maybe people’s experience with “Carmina” ends there.

Oh. You mean there's more to the piece than just the "O, Fortuna" part?

[snip]

So, the piece embodies the genius of Prince and the popularity of promo music for the NBA playoffs...what conclusions can we draw?

“Carmina Burana” is one of the most powerful musical pieces ever written and listening to it in any fashion will make you wonder why symphonies across the world don’t simply perform this production and maybe Tchaikovsky, another musical genius.

Carmina Burana is awesome and should be performed by every orchestra, "and maybe Tchaikovsky, another musical genius,"too.

This is quite possibly one of the greatest sentences I've ever read.

Listening to this epic live will make you wonder why musical recordings were ever created, period.

That's quite the side effect of attending this concert. Perhaps the surgeon general should slap a warning on this concert: May make you question why musical recordings were ever created.

And make you search for other live symphonic productions in another town near you.

Just a second...did you say that Prince can change the way I understand the guitar?

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It's been a very, very long concert season.

Titles for Sale

And without further ado, here’s the title in question found atop a recent piece by David Patrick Stearns:

Itzhak Perlman a winner at Resorts

Figure 1. Foreshadowing the premise that the house always has the advantage

There are several things we should keep in mind as we go along which will be helpful in order to assess the efficacy of today’s title:

1) The Resorts is a casino-hotel in Atlantic City (A classical casino concert?)
2) Itzhak Perlman wins something (What did he win?)
3) He wins it at Resorts (Presumably, as opposed to somewhere else)

Fantastic! Now we can look at the review, which is pretty okay, not that there aren’t issues.

Musically, he played a medium-weight program - Leclair, Beethoven, Stravinsky - little different from what you'd hear at the Kimmel Center.

No kidding! I took it upon myself to check out the program for the next Philadelphia Orchestra concert and, well, there’s certainly some similarity: Brahms D minor Piano Concerto; Franck D minor Symphony; and Claude Vivier Orion. I don’t know what this says about the integrity of the orchestra’s programming, since casinos are essentially scams. But, hell, someone is doing it right.

Preconcert Muzak was Brahms' Symphony No. 1.

Muzaked Brahms? Wonderful beyond description. Ugh.

The big leap for Atlantic City, however, wasn't pop vs. classical, but singer vs. instrumentalist. Headliners are almost always singers (even if the voice happens to belong to Joan Jett). Nobody could recall a purely instrumental artist headlining recently in Atlantic City.

Why bring Joan Jett into question? This seems more like an unnecessary value judgment, to me. Is she less of a singer somehow?

More pressing, however, what is the Resorts up to? Why bring in someone who doesn’t fit the previous model for success?

So who was there? As I learned from chatting up those around me, many were from the immediate area: a local music teacher who has loved Perlman for years...

Also known as: someone who has never stepped inside a casino before. (Just a guess, but local music teachers probably don’t have a large amount of disposable income).

...a small-business owner who had caught [Perlman] on PBS...

PBS watchers aren’t generally attracted to bright lights and shiny things, or are they?

...and people who applauded between movements, suggesting a crossover/fringe crowd, but one that was ultimately more attentive than your typical concert audience.

Newbies, diversity, and attention: Hooray! It’s a veritable melting pot of fresh money!

The idea, according to casino officials, was to attract a different clientele, and what arrived was people who probably would have been just as happy to hear Perlman at, say, the Glassboro Center for the Performing Arts.

How’d the Resorts lure them in, then?

The difference is that this fringe audience probably wouldn't have known about the Atlantic City event without Resorts' marketing - and all its billboards.

Okay. It’s not like our symphonies don’t spend a bigillion on advertising, right? This is the norm. However, the catch was:

The net had to be cast wide to fill a theater with listeners willing to pay up to $125 for any violinist, and indeed, I talked to those who had driven in from Montgomery County.

That’s an expensive meatball.

And rather than traveling through suburban byways, you simply had to navigate the dense thickets of King Kong Cash slot machines between the parking garage and the theater.

Figure 2. “Twas Beast that bankrupted your future”

What David forgets to mention is that on byways you aren’t tempted to risk your kid’s college fund. He also doesn’t mention that the distance from the garage to the theater is roughly one-quarter of a mile—and the dense thickets of slot machines, which are designed to funnel you past places the casino wants you to pass, is akin to McDonald’s saying, “Yeah, the hamburgers are bad for you, but that’s why we have salads.”

So with the right marketing, most any fine classical artist,

Whoa there, partner: “most any fine classical artist”? Not terrible, just yuck.

So with the right marketing, most any fine classical artist, in theory, could work here. But I wonder if anyone else (perhaps cellist Yo-Yo Ma?) could truly fill the place.

I think that’s a good question, delving into issues about the relationship between marketing and the perceived quality of the product. But I thought this was a review?

Perlman's public identification level is unique among non-operatic classical figures. Though his visibility is nothing close to what it was, the name still has marketing power.

The violinist has long had a particular magnetism that makes audiences meet him more than halfway. Whether he's having a good night or a bad one - he's 64, an age when violinists are well into the winding-down phase - audiences listen to him more closely than they do other violinists, and thus take in more of the music at hand.

He’s still a moneymaker: check. He’s past his prime: check. He played a concert and I wrote a review about it: blank.

And Perlman had a very good night.

He...

He won a good night?! Though past his prime, he had a good night?! No senior moments? No medical scares? Please clear this up, David.

His playing has been through some bad patches in recent years, but technically speaking, he was secure and fluent.

Technically speaking, sure. But interpretive?

The first half pleasantly consisted of Leclair's Violin Sonata in D major and Beethoven's Violin Sonata No. 7 (Op. 30 No. 2), and though Perlman's cultivated musical responses didn't feel so fresh, the ever-engaged pianist Rohan De Silva kept your ears constantly pricked.

...but the pianist played well.

Later, Perlman recalled his own glory days in Stravinsky's Suite Italienne (from the composer's quasi-baroque ballet Pulcinella); his gleaming tone with the light sandpaper-ish tang was back in full during Stravinsky's most lyrical sections. His most inspired moments involved expressive fingerslides, usually the province of violinists from the old, old days. Good for him! Fine with me.

Meh. I don’t have any problems with the concert assessment, even though it received a disproportionate amount of space. But it’s the disproportionate amount of space that raises questions.

To me, this reads like a plain-faced plug (see Comedy of Errata), but worse. Recall the title: “Perlman a winner at Resorts.” Really? Was he a winner? Did the past-his-prime, old, old school violinist really emerge as triumphant winner from this endeavor?

Perlman left with his integrity intact.

He also left with a nice paycheck. But it’s not exactly glowing, is it? If anything, he won the right to leave with his integrity. That’s all. It’s printed right there in the review.

The audience left the near-full 1,300-seat Superstar Theater seemingly thrilled [...]

So, maybe the audience won, then?

Or did the Resorts come out the victor? They filled a large venue, probably made a nice little profit. But more than that, they got 1,300 local people into the casino, people who otherwise might not have been tempted to go, filtered them through the slots and other entertainments, and said, “Go!”.

Figure 3. Sure it pays out 35:1, but you have a 2.63% of hitting it, or 38:1 chance of making your money back

Ooh! I Like Music

I was reading today’s article, in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, by Pierre Ruhe about the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra’s concertmistress Cecylia Arzewski. She’s retiring, which is a bummer. However, towards the end, there’s a link—a double-underlined, green link with the word “music.” Ooh! I thought to myself. I like music. Let’s see where this link directs me.

Here’s the article. Now click on the link in the article, the one that says “music.”

That made me sad, which is why I’m writing about it. It's also why I'm linking this standard American expression of sadness. Did it make you sad, too?

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Addendum: I am sorry to report that the hilariously stupid link has been removed by an editor less than a day later. Someone actually cares.

If you missed it, you were supposed to click on "music" and it directed you to an advertisement for Intel. Stupid and sad, huh?

But I'm not so sad anymore.

Addendum II: I am happily sad again! For some reason, the funny link doesn't like it when it's linked from here. So, in order to witness this absurdity, simply click this then navigate to the article entitled, "Star violinist Arzewski bows out from ASO in style." It'll be happily sad.
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