September 16, 2007 2:00 pm
Davis Hall, GBPAC, Cedar Falls
with WCFSO members Anita Tucker, violin, Jonathan Chenoweth, cello & Sean Botkin, piano
An annual afternoon of chamber music event for which I perform on clarinet alongside colleagues from the WCFSO. For this year's special program I will share my family's amazing story of survival in Nazi camps during the Holocaust. The concert is also part of the University of Northern Iowa Holocaust Program.
Hindemith – Sonata For Clarinet and Piano
Haas – Suite for Piano
Messiaen – Quartet for the End of Time
Related concert – Know the Score LIVE! Holocaust Remembrance Day
Related post – Yom Hashoah
Performers capture Holocaust mood
By George F. Day
Waterloo-Cedar Falls Symphony
September 21, 2007
A large, receptive audience filled Davis Hall at the Gallagher-Bluedorn Performing Arts Center on September 16 to hear a chamber music concert, part of the University of Northern Iowa Holocaust Education and Remembrance Program. The four performers were Jason Weinberger, clarinet; Anita Tucker, violin; Jonathan Chenoweth, cello; and Sean Botkin, piano. All are members of the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Symphony.
The Holocaust theme was evident in the seriousness of the music and the lives and times of the three composers. Pavel Haas died in a Nazi concentration camp and Olivier Messiaen also was in a German prison camp. Hindemith was influenced by the musical tendencies of that period. Another connection was brought out by Weinberger in his excellent concert talk. His own grandparents, on both sides, were imprisoned in Nazi death camps but miraculously survived.
The first of the tree pieces was the Sonata for Clarinet and Piano by Hindemith. A wide variety of moods was expressed in the Sonata: From the dreamy, whispering first movement through the swift and mostly playful second movement, to the lively finale with its childlike skipping rhythms. The seamless playing of this meditative piece created a jewel of an introduction to the rest of the program.
Next we heard the Suite for Piano, Opus 13 by the Moravian composer Haas. Haas, not widely known in the United States, was influenced by folk music of his native land and jazz from abroad. Elements of both can be discerned in the suite, which was admirably played by Botkin. A work with quick rhythmic shifts, it creates moods ranging from gentle poignant to highly dramatic.
The grand showpiece was a performance of Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time.This work and performance were accurately described by a friend as the final notes sounded: ‘Monumental!’
Eight movements of a dazzling variety of instrumental combinations and styles, it was composed under the worst conditions imaginable. Messiaen was a prisoner in a Nazi work camp when he wrote the score, and it was first played before a group of prisoners and guards in 1941.
The power of Messiaen's score is in the complete absence of traditional forms. It is totally original and almost impossible to describe. Certainly it is more ‘avant’ than most musical works of the 20th century. The elusive nature of the Quartet is partly explained by the title. Messiaen, a deeply religious man, drew the central idea from the Book of Revelation where the angel utters the apocalyptic decree: ‘There shall be no more time.’
Such a concept forces one to see - through the music - time, life and death from a new, mystical perspective. The Quartet employs bird song [subtly evoked by the clarinet], hypnotic piano passages, melancholy glissando sounds from the cello, and a hear-breaking meditation by the violin [played with the purest of tones by Tucker].
The Quartet score is fearfully difficult but it was flawlessly interpreted by these fine musicians. Their triumph and Messiaen's clearly was apparent at the conclusion by the audience's clamorous, standing, shouting ovation.
Note: All reviews are edited for length and spelling.