Concert Announcement: AVE The Song of Songs, Feb 13-15

First off, yes! I have lately been negligent about blogging. Can't make any promises about when I'll be back on line, but if you keep reading this entry, you will get some of my personal insights on this upcoming event...

Artists’ Vocal Ensemble, Jonathan Dimmock – Artistic Director
The Song of Songs: Music as the Food of Love
With guest artists
-Congregation Sherith Israel Cantor Rita Glassman (Sat. only)
-Acalanes High School Choir, Bruce Lengacher, Director (Sun. only)
-Stephen Myers, Reader


Three performances
Friday February 13, 2009, 8:00 P.M.
St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, 2300 Bancroft Way , Berkeley CA 94704
Saturday February 14, 2009, 8:00 P.M.
Congregation Sherith Israel , 2266 California St. , San Francisco , CA 94115 (
Sunday February 15, 2009, 4:00 P.M.
Lafayette Orinda Presbyterian Church, 49 Knox Drive Lafayette , CA 94549

Admission: $20 general admission, $10 for seniors and students. Tickets are available online, or can be purchased at the door 30 minutes in advance of each concert.

San Francisco ’s highly acclaimed professional choral ensemble, AVE (Artists’ Vocal Ensemble), directed by Jonathan Dimmock, announces its third concert series of the 2008-2009 season: “The Song of Songs: Music as the Food of Love”. AVE will look at how music and love have interwoven throughout Western history. This program features works from the Renaissance to today, featuring Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina’s delightful and elegant settings of the Song of Songs (Canticum Canticorum), as well as additional works by Sebastian de Vivanco, Francisco Guerrero, and contemporary composers Bob Chilcott, Stephen Paulus and Heinryk Gorecki. These concerts will feature as guest artists the Acalanes High School Choir (Bruce Lengacher, Director), Congregation Sherith Israel Cantor Rita Glassman, as well as readings of Shakespeare sonnets by actor Stephen Myers.

These concerts will be co-presented by the Breast Cancer Emergency Fund - a San Francisco-based organization- which provides local assistance to victims of breast cancer. http://www.BreastCancerEmergencyFund.org

Celeste's thoughts...
These concerts are a real treat for me, as well as a Renaissance polyphony homecoming, of sorts. I first encountered many of these beautiful works with my group, Vox Populi, which was active between 1998-2006. We dedicated most of one concert set to selections from Palestrina's Canticum Canticorum, and in fact, declared his setting of "Vox dilecti mei" the group's theme song. ("voooox.. VOX!" can you hear it?) as our theme song. I hold Palestrina personally responsible for nurturing my love of small-ensemble singing.

Repeated personal favorites include, as well as "Vox dilecti", "Surge amica mea","Pulchra es amica mea", "Veni dilecti mei"... and Clemens non Papa's glorious, embracing 7-voice setting of "Ego flos campi". I am quite fond of the latter. F-major is the home key, and when the basses first come in hitting those low-F's, the sensation is akin to diving into a big, warm bath. (Might I mention that AVE has THE BEST BASS SECTION IN TOWN this time around?)

For the Palestrina, our director has assigned most of the pieces to reduced groups (10 singers instead of 16), which, in his words, creates a more intimate, inviting experience for the audience. I am fond of this choice because it allows me to better revisit the playfulness of ensemble first experienced with these pieces in Vox Populi- much harder to do with 16 voices. I also like getting a vocal break here and there in the program!

We are also performing three modern pieces; Bob Chilcott's 'Arise my love' and Stephen Paulus's "Love" (maybe I've transposed the titles)... two beautiful 20th c. Anglican pieces. We close the program with Heinryk Gorecki's "Amen" - a massive symphonic piece hearkening the Slavonic Church choral tradition. I am a little afraid that our 16 voices will not do it justice, but on Sunday, we will be joined by the award-winning Acalanes High School Chamber Choir (another 25 voices), which should beef things up nicely.

I am excited about performing at Congregation Sherith Israel. This will be my first concert in a synagogue. We will be collaborating with Cantor Rita Glassman on one piece at this venue, in part, to help bridge the program. While most of our program was composed for Christian liturgies, the texts are all from the Old Testament, and are as important and cherished to those of the Jewish faith as they are to those of the Christian faith. In fact, judaism celebrates a more direct interpretation of these highly sensual texts, and does not have to apologetically "re-cast" this hot'n'heavy poetry as the metaphor for the marriage between Church and Christ. (I mean, come on... "your two breasts are like fawns" (SoS 4:5) "Come into my garden" (SoS 5:1))

I hope that you can make it to these (sexy, underneath the upright verneer of sacred choral music) concerts... let me know if you would like a discounted ticket.

Concert Announcement: AVE Twelfth Night, Dec 12-14

The San Francisco Early Music Society presents

ARTISTS' VOCAL ENSEMBLE

Directed by Jonathan Dimmock
Twelfth Night
Choral Music from Christmas to Epiphany

The Saints' Days that lie between Christmas and Epiphany are at the heart of the religious calendar of Europe. In this program of both sacred and secular music, the relationship will be explored between the religious holidays and the winter solstice/New Year, as found in the great tradition of Renaissance choral music.

Friday, December 12, First Lutheran Church, Palo Alto, 8:00
Saturday, December 13, First Congregational Church, Berkeley, 7:30
Sunday, December 14, St. Mark's Lutheran Church, 1111 O'Farrell Street, San Francisco, 4:00

Single tickets are $25 each, or $22 for SFEMS members and seniors, and $10 for students.
They can be ordered in advance through SFEMS by calling 510-528-1725 or submitting the following webform on the SFEMS website.

Now, for my own words...

Once again, AVE toys with numerology. We presented "666" on June 6, 2006 - a concert of apocryphal settings of texts from Revelations. Since then, we did an all-Isaac and Josquin concert titled "1508" celebrating the 500th anniversary of the reign of Maximillian I of the Holy Roman Empire (which covered modern Austria and Germany), and last June, performed Monteverdi's 1610 Vespers.

The program description sounds pretty academic. Indeed, we are offering exactly one Gregorian chant, motet, and English medieval carol for most of the feast days that fall between Christmas Eve and Epiphany. But, we have been working hard to present something more seamless. There will be lots of solos and sub-groupings of the voices, and hopefully, spirited renditions of everything! Plus, finger cymbals and AVE's trademark use of the Shruti box for chant drones!

Our motets span the gamut of late-medieval (a reprise of Perotin's "Sederunt", this time with solo male voices) to the freshly composed (Fredrik Sixten's setting of O magnum mysterium). We performed Sixten last concert, and I wasn't the biggest fan of his "neoRomantic" style at the time. It evoked for me too much of a lush overly Technicolored pastiche - the Hollywood-stylized AVE MARIA at the end of Fantasia. While "O magnum" is even more over the top than the "Ave Verum" we sang in October, I can really get into it. It's more neo-Expressionist than neo-Romantic, and makes me feel like I am in the middle of a dramatic dance number in a late 50's MGM Grand musical. Maybe I am better loving my inner Syd Charise / cabaret singer this time around. The piece that we are performing was dedicated to Swedish choral conductor Ragnar Bohlin, who recently began his tenure as Choir Director of the SF Symphony.

I also like the daring of programming something so lush and melodramatic at an early music gathering. It will shake the cobwebs out of the carpet, for sure!

But, despair not - we are singing some great "oldies", and nary a chestnut (save the "authentic" medieval setting of the Coventry Carol, and the plainchant setting of "Hodie Christus natus est" "Puer natus est nobis"). Look forward to Perotin, Sheppard, Sweelinck, Ockeghem, Porta, and others.

Not so happy day

Revered oceanographer, excellent wine-maker, proprietor of Rancho El Mogor, artist and family friend, Dr. Antoine Badan, passed away last night. He taught me calligraphy, and could oversee the making of a mean paella.

His passing urges me to spread the word about the fantastic wine country in the Guadelupe Valley east of Ensenada, Baja California, Mexico. This New York Times article features Antoine and his fellow vintners. His Cabernet-Merlot blend, Mogor Badan, was considered the most elegant wine tasted by the article's author during his journey to the region.

Oh, happy day!

San Francisco Classical Voice has just published a review of our French Baroque concert. Our supportive reviewer was incredibly positive. Her enthusiasm is deeply appreciated. We had a small crowd on both nights, but we still seemed to get good smiles and reaction from the audience.

Here is a link to the review, Divine Delights (link fixed), by Anna Carol Dudley. This is the third time that I have been mentioned by name in a review, the second time that the mentions have been thoroughly positive, and the first time that multiple things were said. Also, the first time that my head-shot was featured. This reminds me, its time to get a real head-shot. That photo was impromptu, taken in the garden at the Musée Rodin in Paris two summers ago. No make-up or styling. I was sick, and my left lower eyelid was swollen. Regardless, the genius photographer made lemonade from those lemons.

I'll comment more on my experience with the performance in a future post...

belt-challenged

I'm wiped out these days. I'm a total space cadet. This morning, I drove to work because I could not handle the crazy bike-bus-bike alternate. While sitting in my [parked] car, I noticed that my belt was twisted. I unbuckled, untwisted, and rebuckled. When I arrived at my destination, while getting out of the car, I was tethered... by the seat belt. Somehow, I had managed to loop my pants-belt through the seat-belt.

ohlordjesus the day better get hella more productive from here on out... (yes, blogging isn't helping)

You know that you have been singing way too much French Baroque music when...

You know that you have been singing way too much French Baroque Sacred music when you reach into your bag, pull out your box of mints, and mentally say to youself, "MAHNtos."

Follow-up to the "future" of classical radio

After hearing the soundtrack to "Back to the Future" on KDFC Classical 102.1 FM on Wednesday morning, this morning's offering of the soundtrack to the first "Pirates of the Carribean" was downright classy!

Concert announcement: Clerambault Miserere Nov 15-16

On Saturday November 15 and Sunday November 16, Pacific Collegium will present concerts of sacred French Baroque music for women's voices, featuring the North American premiere of Louis-Nicolas Clerambault's setting of psalm 51, Miserere mei, for three dessus (female voices).



Saturday November 15, 8:00 PM
St. Gregory of Nyssa Episcopal Church
500 DeHaro Street, San Francisco

Sunday November 16, 4:00 PM
St. Paul's Episcopal Church
114 Montecito Ave., Oakland

Tickets: $10-20, sold at the door prior to each concert

(Image- from Nouveax pricipes d'ecriture italienne avec des exemples suivant l'ordre de Madame de Maintenon pour les demoiselles de la Maison Royale de St. Louis a St. Cyr. Par la maitre a ecrice de Madame la Duchesse de Bourgogne, 1721)

I am the insitgator of this project. Almost three years ago, I randomly gave my mother a recording of motets by Clerambault for Christmas, recorded by Les Demoiselles de St. Cyr, led by Emmanuel Mandrin. Most of the selections on the recording were simple, sweet solos and duets for women's voices, composed during the early 18th c. by Clerambault while he was music master at the Royal Convent School of Saint Louis at St. Cyr, which was founded by King Louis XIV's second wife, Madame de Maintenon in 1683. The young women at this school received a well-rounded education, more progressive than the usual style of 'finishing school' education received by youg women of privilege at the time. Unlike at Vivaldi's ospedale, music, while important, played only a small part in the young women's education. As you can see in the image above, the young women were taught languages, mathematics, philosophy, etc... Accordingly, most of the music written for the school was simple. A wonderful collection, edited by University of North Colorado professor of musicology, Dr. Deborah Kauffman, can be found at the academic music library nearest you.

The Miserere mei performed on the recording is a radical departure from the other petits motets. Not only is it long (more than 20 minutes, with 7 choruses, 3 duets, and multiple solo recits and arias), it is written for three voices, and the writing is sophisticated. The opening is deceptively stark and simple, with the three voices reciting in homophony, "Miserere mei" in G-minor, as simply, yet as powerfully as the opening of Allegri's more famous setting of the same text. The opening chorus quickly moves into sharp dissonances echoing the pleadings of the text. It knocked my socks off upon a first listen.

That next year, I looked high and low for a score, only to find that neither a modern edition nor a facsimile of the manuscript are available at Berkeley. I found Dr. Kauffman's work, and contacted her, asking if she knew more about the piece. She kindly replied, and furnished me with an incomplete copy of the manuscript. It was very difficult to read. With help with the gamba player on the program, we managed to get not only the full copy of the manuscipt, but a bootleg modern edition straight from the the main library of the Centre de Musique Baroque a Versailles. Score! (pun fully intended). Dr, Kauffman is pretty sure that Clerambault composed the piece for the women at St. Cyr, but we cannot unearth details on its commissioning.

With manuscript in hand, last fall, I assembled the requisite missing forces; two high sopranos who would join me (the low soprano) in the "choir", plus a fabulous organist who is pursuing his PhD in musicology, along with our gamba player, at UC Berkeley.

We first thought of giving a liturgical performance of the piece during Holy Week this past season, but everyone was already too busy. Our friend, the director of Pacific Collegium, suggested that we build an entire program of French Baroque sacred music for women's voices that his group could present. Hence, the concerts announced above.

We decided against giving an all-Clerambault concert. While the petits motets for 1- and 2- voices are charming and are historically interesting, they do not compare to the Miserere. Instead, we decided to program a smorgasborg of French music from the period. Come to the concert, and you will hear trios by Lully and Charpentier, duets by Couperin and Campra, and solo motets for soprano voice by Bernier and Campra, along with instrumental music for viol and organ. I personally had to look far and wide for music that fits my decidedly-non soprano voice. The Miserere works well for me, but as many of you mezzos out there know, the French Baroque took a shining to our lyric coloratura soprano friends. We didn't officially exist. So, we found a few trios and a duet, but my awesome soprano colleagues will be doing the heavy lifting on the solos and the duets. It also meant that I could not ask any of my wonderful mezzo friends to join in the project.

But, performing at "french baroque pitch", a=392 (a whole tone lower than modern pitch), helps me, too - the sopranos mostly like it, since it means that the endless measures of written high G's are not all that.

I am really excited about this concert. If you are in the area, and are free this weekend, I hope that you can make it to one of the concerts. It should be very special. Again, we have reason to believe that the Miserere has never been performed before outside of France (maybe Switzerland?). You will be in for a real treat.

The "future" of classical music radio?

My casual carpool driver was playing KDFC Classical 102.1 FM on the way into work. They played some "new" music - the theme to "Back to the Future".

Can't... even... editorialize... so stunned....

Concert announcement: Ground Round: November 8

I'll be joining Berkeley Baroque Band tomorrow evening at St. Albans Episcopal Church in Albany for a reprise of Ground Round, a program of rounds, chaconnes, and other works composed on repeating bass lines, from the 17th & 18th centuries. We first performed this concert in early September.

Saturday November 8, 8 PM
St. Albans Episcopal Church
1501 Washington Ave. Albany CA
Suggested donation: $15
All funds will go towards the organ refurbishment project at St. Albans.
--Concert website--

The announcement comes a bit late. I've been preoccupied with election crap and stuff. I hope that if this entry interests you, that you can make it.

I also pledge here to do more than cut&paste official promotional material about my upcoming concerts here in my blog. If you are a friend or direct associate of mine, and if you live in the Bay Area, I'm probably already spamming you with this information via e-mail, facebook, etc. Plus, so much of the blogosphere is clogged up with unoriginal re-posts. There are more keys on your keyboard than Ctrl^c Ctrl^v.

This concert is the brain-child of the same amazing musicians who put together German Chocolate last year. The organizers have a vast knowledge of baroque chamber music, so I could rest aside my fears that an all-Ground concert would consist of 90 minutes of Pachabel's canon. We aren't touching that piece with a 10-foot pole! Instead, we are performing the following varied program of instrumental and vocal works

Lully - Chaconne-Ouverture
Monteverdi - Zefiro torna
Biber - Passacaglia
Buxtehude - Herr, wenn ich nur Dich hab
Ortiz - Recercada primera; Recercada segunda
Anon - Italian Ground
Marini - Passacalio
Purcell - Evening Hymn; Chacony; Music for Awhile; A Ground in Gamut
J.C. Bach - Mein Freund is mein

I've highlighted my contributions in bold font. The Purcell and Monteverdi songs are standard repertoire for singers, but rather than find that boring, I am thrilled to finally have the opportunity to claim them as my own. It may surprise some of you to hear that I am singing Zefiro torna, which is traditionally performed by two sopranos or two tenors. Yes, I am singing quite a few high G's (although they may sound like F-sharps to your 21st. century ears). They aren't that bad, they pass quickly as the two singers repeatedly arpeggiate around each other in G-major.

I am having a harder time with the sustained high Fs in Mein Freund is mein, composed by Johann Christoph Bach, who was cousin once removed of Johann Sebastian Bach. I sang his beautiful arioso Ach, das ist Wassers genug hatte for the German Chocolate concert. Mein Freund... is written for soprano - it lends itself well to a darker, more-mezzo-ish tone, but it still gets up there, and I am still struggling to keep the air flowing and the tone from choking when I have to sing four straight measure above the C above middle C. I think that I am getting it, but you can be the judge... I'm heading toward lyric mezzo land, whether I like it or not. While I am still negotiating the high notes, I am much happier, when it comes to 17th century music, singing pieces that were intended for trebles, and not male altos.

I am amazed by the versatility of our little ensemble. We are 9 musicians (2 singers, 2 violins, 2 viols, 1 cello, 1 lute, 1 keyboard), and we can put together anything from a continuo song to an orchestral overture. So, while each piece on the program has its recurring, repeating theme in the bass line, this is definitely one of the more varied programs I have recently participated in. We also sound great!