T H E A T L A N T A E A R L Y M U S I C A L L I A N C E BROADSIDE Volume IX, #3 November, 2003 Get Ready for the January Workshop! by Jorg Voss The Atlanta chapter of the American Recorder Society The workshop will finish with a Student performance will join AEMA in sponsoring a Workshop with Early Saturday afternoon, 4PM, and our membership and Music, January 23rd and 24th, 2004 friends are invited to attend. The place will be announced later. AEMA MISSION Last Spring the Education Committee of AEMA It is the mission of the Atlanta conducted a survey of AEMA members and received We invite you to participate. Even if you do not Early Music Alliance to foster excellent feedback. The overwhelming number of plan to play at this workshop, there are other ways to enjoyment and awareness of respondents asked us to provide workshop help make this event successful: the historically informed per- opportunities to learn more about Early Music and its We welcome donations to defray the cost of the formance of music, with spe- performance. cial emphasis on music writ- event, for the facility, for faculty stipends, for ten before 1800. Its mission Our first Workshop, this time mainly for players of scholarships and for sheet music. will be accomplished through Early Instruments, primarily of Recorders and Viols, We also appeal to our members to open their dissemination and coordi- but also open to other instrumentalists, will be held in homes to participants from out-of-town for Friday, nation of information, educa- Atlanta January 23rd and 24th, 2004, under the very January 23rd and Saturday, January 24th, 2004. tion and financial support. capable leadership of Martha Bishop, Patricia Petersen and Ann Stierli. Please contact Jorg Voss at 770-998-3575 or e-mail [email protected] for questions and offers to contribute. The Atlanta Chapter of the American Recorder Society In this issue: (ARS) is very actively participating in co-sponsoring Your Education and Planning Committee, this event. Mickey Gilmor, Jane McLendon, Susan Patterson, Atlanta Baroque A brochure for the workshop and a registration form Kurt Alexander Zeller, and Jorg Voss Orchestra Guest are included in this mailing of “Broadside”. Conductor Series Continues Southern Lad Returns to Lead ABO - page 2 Stephen Smith will lead the Atlanta Baroque Register for the Orchestra, Atlanta Choral Artists, and soloists January Leila Lazenby, soprano; John Wright, tenor; James Workshop Weaver, bass, on Saturday, November 22, 2003 at - pages 3-4 8 p.m. in the main sanctuary of Peachtree United Methodist Church, 3180 Peachtree Road, N. E., Atlanta. Admission is $25. Mr. Smith is artistic Martha Bishop’s director of the Ensemble Corund in Lucerne, new series: Switzerland, founded in 1993 as a vocal ensemble. Rhetoric in Music The brilliance, clarity and color of the precious - page 5 stones in the corundum family (ruby, sapphire) characterize the sound they strive for. In 2000, a Calendar Baroque orchestra was added to the ensemble. A Reminder for the visit to http://www.corund.ch/ will prove Holiday Season enlightening. - page 7 The Broadside recently interviewed this personable dual U.S./Swiss citizen, with roots in the South, on his musical life and especially Messiah. The following page reproduces this dialogue. 2 B R O A D S I D E November 2003 Editor: What are some of the highlights of your life experiences historical performance practice and all possess THE ATLANTA with this popular work? EARLY MUSIC ALLIANCE outstanding musicianship and presence. Considering the orchestra’s and chorus’s reputation for quality Four important “life experiences” with Messiah come BOARD OF DIRECTORS music-making, I think one can count on a Messiah to mind, each separated by approximately a decade. that “gets under the skin”, as they would say here in Eckhart Richter, President As a child I lived in Baltimore, MD. The men at the Predrag Gosta, Vice Switzerland. President Naval Academy in Annapolis MD got together each Jonathan DeLoach, year with Hood College, a women’s college in Frederick, Editor: In this Messiah performance , as always, there will be Secretary to perform the Messiah. Attendance at those annual three performing forces: the orchestra, the soloists, and the chorus. Jorg Voss, Treasurer performances, with piano score in hand, became one One often hears performances in which one of these elements is Johnette Crum, Membership of my family’s rituals. That was my first encounter with less excellent than the others. What do you see as your David Buice the work and left a lasting impression. Later, beginning responsibilities and challenges in coordinating these so that they Nancy Buss in 1973 as a music student at Furman University in work together to produce a compelling performance, with Sylvia Chandler Greenville, SC, I sang with the Furman Singers for particular reference to the “historically informed” aspect you Kurt-Alexander Zeller about 5 years in a row in their annual Messiah referred to in your last message? Patricia DeWitt, Broadside performances. There I was able to learn the work from Editor the inside out, as it were. A third important encounter The fact that each of these three forces is made up of was a radio broadcast I heard by chance in the early professional musicians who have been recruited and 80’s one Christmas eve while visiting my parents in chosen with care already goes far to solving the PUBLICATION SCHEDULE Maryland. I was already living and studying in potential problems you mention. In preparation for Broadside is published the project I have maintained regular contact with the monthly September - May. Switzerland at the time, but was concentrating on the The copy deadline is the 20th organ literature and had had few encounters with director of the Atlanta Choral Artists, Rob Burlington of each month. orchestral historical performance practice. The and have discussed many technical, interpretive and performance-practice aspects of the work with him SUBMISSIONS recording was Christopher Hogwood’s with the We gladly welcome articles Academy of Ancient Music. I was riveted by the sound so that he can prepare his singers in such a way that and letters but reserve the right of the historical instruments and by the lean and will avoid surprises when we get together for the final to edit all submissions. E-mail rehearsals. The same has happened with the soloists submission is preferred. Each flexible choir and listened to the end till late into the submission must include the night that memorable Christmas eve. The fourth and and with the concert master, Karen Clarke. The result, author’s name, address and most personal experience was in 1995 when Dominik we hope, is that through this dialog and exchange of phone number. Letters must be ideas, we all have the same musical goals clearly defined signed. Send submissions to: Kiefer, the concert master of the baroque orchestra before us and while heading toward it from several PatriciaDeWitt, “Kammerensemble Luzern”, and I decided to put [email protected], or 19 together the first historically informed performance different directions, aim to meet in the middle in Rosewood Road, Rome, GA of Messiah that had ever taken place in Lucerne. November. We intend our Messiah to be historically 30165. Together with my Ensemble Corund we spent a informed, but must be aware that, while historically luxurious week filled to the brim with rehearsals and informed, it or any performance of early music today presented 3 highly acclaimed performances. Since that can never be historically accurate. One example in time I’ve continued exploring the work, preparing our case is that the soloists will not be singing in the performances every one to two years. choruses, contrary to Handel’s own practice. This is not a question of egos. All of our soloists have Editor: What will you bring to this performance that is new or extensive experience in ensemble and choral singing different for you? and none are above being choir members. The tenor soloist, John Wright, for example, was on a tour with I hope that each performances of Messiah is as new me last year in the States with 10 concerts of the B- and different to the audience as it feels to me. The minor Mass (using 1 to 2 singers to a part), in which work is historically very multi-faceted and took on he sang literally everything for tenor, all the choruses myriad guises even in Handel’s own performances. Our Assistance with and the soli. This is very much in the spirit of baroque performance in Atlanta will be modeled on Handel’s newsletter logistics is historical performance practice, particularly in the typical performances after 1750, when the work began provided as a service music of Bach. In the modern concert situation, project of the Zeta to “settle down” into a form that is still recognizable however, we have first the problem of general audience Epsilon chapterof Phi in many readings today. Since the Atlanta Baroque Mu Alpha Sinfonia, expectations concerning the quality and role of the Orchestra and Choral Artists and I are working National Music concert soloist and secondly the pure logistical together for the first time, the “new and different” Fraternity, at Shorter difficulty of providing the soloists enough opportunity College, Peter DeWitt, will first develop and be fully realized during our to rehearse the choruses with the entire group. These faculty advisor. encounter in rehearsals for the concerts. In general I and other problems force us to a compromise in which want to emphasize the dramatic and dramaturgical the soloists will only sing in the choruses in which all elements of the oratorium.