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Thriving through 9/11 and recession too: Secrets of musical survival
Tempesta di Mare's survival formula
Tom Purdom
Tempesta di Mare completed its three-concert celebration of its tenth full season with a program devoted to suites and concertos for a full-sized Baroque orchestra. Like the week before, the program once again featured works with a "ten" in their labels, e.g. Scarlatti's Sinfonia X in A Minor and Handel's Concerto Grosso in D Minor, Opus 6, No. 10.
Tempesta's co-director, Gwyn Roberts, fulfilled her musical assignments with the relaxed air of a hostess presiding over an especially satisfying event. She and co-director Richard Stone have every reason to be pleased with their achievement. Tempesta di Mare has thrived in difficult times.
Roberts and Stone posted their first mailing on September 10, 2001. They made it through the recession that followed 9/11, and now they're surviving the current economic crunch as well.
The secret of their success is a magic formula known to a select few: Schedule imaginative quality programming, recruit good musicians and apply plenty of attention to backstage necessities like fund-raising, promotion and the design of attractive brochures.
Other music groups, like Dolce Suono and Lyric Fest, have benefited from the same arcane strategy over the past decade. Piffaro and Orchestra 2001 have applied it since the 1980s.
When composers were legion
As I noted in my review of the first two concerts, the fact that you can build a program around an arbitrary limitation like a "ten" in the title testifies to the sheer volume of music produced during the Baroque era. (To read that review, click here.)
We are talking about a time when composers seem to have been as common as pastry chefs, each churning out compositions by the dozens. Before cheap printing and high-speed communications, every self-respecting duke and count apparently employed a composer who was expected to produce new compositions for a full calendar of court concerts, as well as every wedding, birth or visit from a passing dignitary.
An arbitrary selection system can force the planners to consider works that might otherwise sit in file cases, unplayed, merely because no one had given them a good look. The Tempesta program didn't include any old friends, but the six selections were all winners.
Ngai's showstopper
Concertmaster Emlyn Ngai once again starred in Saturday's showstopper. The previous Sunday, Ngai ended the first half with a Vivaldi sonata that earned him an enthusiastic standing ovation. This time he ended the first half with a concerto by the founder of the French violin school, Jean-Marie Leclair, that evoked a similarly enthusiastic response.
Leclair was a master violinist, and his Concerto in E Minor demands a masterly display of skill and style. In the first movement allegro, Ngai's fingers traveled all over the fingerboard even when he was playing a high, ethereal passage. The third movement combined more high-speed work with an eminently hummable melody.
Hummable melodies
The program included an unusual number of movements that featured hummable melodies. Engaging melodies may not be the ultimate pleasure in music, but it's always a treat when one shows up.
The harpsichord presents special problems for composers who write concertos that mesh its quiet voice with a full orchestra. A successful harpsichord concerto requires a composer who fully understands the strengths and weaknesses of the solo instrument.
Harpsichord challenge
The English composer John Stanley (1712-1786) became a noted harpsichordist, organist and composer even though he was accidentally blinded as a child. When Stanley wrote his Opus 10, No. 2 harpsichord concerto, he knew better than to waste time writing passages in which the harpsichord plays with the orchestra, which would have drowned it out. Instead he alternated harpsichord solos with orchestral passages.
The jump from the orchestra to the soft jangle of the harpsichord sometimes struck me as jarring, even with an orchestra that had been reduced by half. But in other passages Adam Pearl's fingers created a bright stream that rippled between the mountains of sound created by the orchestra.
The evening ended, fittingly, with Gwyn Roberts playing the soprano recorder in a Telemann suite. Roberts concluded her tenth season as Tempesta's co-director with a performance marked by flowing melodies with every note in perfect balance— none too loud or too soft. As all amateur recorder players know, that can be more difficult than it looks.
Tempesta's co-director, Gwyn Roberts, fulfilled her musical assignments with the relaxed air of a hostess presiding over an especially satisfying event. She and co-director Richard Stone have every reason to be pleased with their achievement. Tempesta di Mare has thrived in difficult times.
Roberts and Stone posted their first mailing on September 10, 2001. They made it through the recession that followed 9/11, and now they're surviving the current economic crunch as well.
The secret of their success is a magic formula known to a select few: Schedule imaginative quality programming, recruit good musicians and apply plenty of attention to backstage necessities like fund-raising, promotion and the design of attractive brochures.
Other music groups, like Dolce Suono and Lyric Fest, have benefited from the same arcane strategy over the past decade. Piffaro and Orchestra 2001 have applied it since the 1980s.
When composers were legion
As I noted in my review of the first two concerts, the fact that you can build a program around an arbitrary limitation like a "ten" in the title testifies to the sheer volume of music produced during the Baroque era. (To read that review, click here.)
We are talking about a time when composers seem to have been as common as pastry chefs, each churning out compositions by the dozens. Before cheap printing and high-speed communications, every self-respecting duke and count apparently employed a composer who was expected to produce new compositions for a full calendar of court concerts, as well as every wedding, birth or visit from a passing dignitary.
An arbitrary selection system can force the planners to consider works that might otherwise sit in file cases, unplayed, merely because no one had given them a good look. The Tempesta program didn't include any old friends, but the six selections were all winners.
Ngai's showstopper
Concertmaster Emlyn Ngai once again starred in Saturday's showstopper. The previous Sunday, Ngai ended the first half with a Vivaldi sonata that earned him an enthusiastic standing ovation. This time he ended the first half with a concerto by the founder of the French violin school, Jean-Marie Leclair, that evoked a similarly enthusiastic response.
Leclair was a master violinist, and his Concerto in E Minor demands a masterly display of skill and style. In the first movement allegro, Ngai's fingers traveled all over the fingerboard even when he was playing a high, ethereal passage. The third movement combined more high-speed work with an eminently hummable melody.
Hummable melodies
The program included an unusual number of movements that featured hummable melodies. Engaging melodies may not be the ultimate pleasure in music, but it's always a treat when one shows up.
The harpsichord presents special problems for composers who write concertos that mesh its quiet voice with a full orchestra. A successful harpsichord concerto requires a composer who fully understands the strengths and weaknesses of the solo instrument.
Harpsichord challenge
The English composer John Stanley (1712-1786) became a noted harpsichordist, organist and composer even though he was accidentally blinded as a child. When Stanley wrote his Opus 10, No. 2 harpsichord concerto, he knew better than to waste time writing passages in which the harpsichord plays with the orchestra, which would have drowned it out. Instead he alternated harpsichord solos with orchestral passages.
The jump from the orchestra to the soft jangle of the harpsichord sometimes struck me as jarring, even with an orchestra that had been reduced by half. But in other passages Adam Pearl's fingers created a bright stream that rippled between the mountains of sound created by the orchestra.
The evening ended, fittingly, with Gwyn Roberts playing the soprano recorder in a Telemann suite. Roberts concluded her tenth season as Tempesta's co-director with a performance marked by flowing melodies with every note in perfect balance— none too loud or too soft. As all amateur recorder players know, that can be more difficult than it looks.
What, When, Where
Tempesta di Mare: Opus 10 Orchestra. Works by Scarlatti, Stanley, Leclair, Vivaldi, Handel, Telemann. Gwyn Roberts, recorders; Adam Pearl, harpsichord; Emlyn Ngai, violin. Gwyn Roberts and Richard Stone, artistic directors. May 19, 2012 at Arch Street Friends Meeting, Fourth and Arch Sts. (215) 755-8776 or www.tempestadimare.org.
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