The day before ...

Greetings from a *cold* Harleysville, PA!

(I think all this time in NM, California, etc., has made my blood too thin for this).

I'm back at the "Ditlow Homestead" and have loved catching up with grandparents, brothers, sisters, parents, and my musical community to which I had such strong ties for the early part of my career. What is so exciting is that these ties have continued, and somehow even deepened, as we've all developed our lives and careers. A recent personnel change (due to weather) caused me to have to contact some people who I haven't seen or written to for a while, and I was moved by their immediate, warm responses and their willingness to help. (Problem solved, by the way!).

I've solved the epidemic problem of "Harleysville being on the edge of civilization" (meaning no Starbucks!) by taking matters into my own hands and bringing a milk frother, stovetop espresso maker, and Lavazza espresso with me. 

Tomorrow is "Bach by Candlelight" - and I couldn't resist making this "meme" ...

On this concert, I am the only person on it who gets the distinction of playing every piece - and really to play all "three" keyboard instruments. Within these works, I am charged with playing: 

1). 'orchestral' parts - multiple lines, covering for instruments we don't have ...

2). virtuoso solo music in the triple concerto (we're doing it on piano) - and the prelude and fugue isn't easy, either ... 

3). improvised and realized keyboard figured bass (but more than half of the music isn't figured) ... so essentially I'm making up the keyboard part in the right hand ... 

I found this quote from Bach which perfectly describes the magic of playing continuo:

"Like all music, the figured bass should have no other end and aim than the glory of God and recreation fo the soul; where this is not kept in mind there is no true music, but only an infernal clamor and ranting." 

I listened to rehearsal footage last night so that I can practice better today ... 

But there is also every genre possible in Bach's music - both looking back to Renaissance polyphony, and even the "rules" from plainchant or melodic construction - and - jazz, bebop, and ... heavy metal ... (there is a passage in the Bach d minor double violin concerto which makes me smile every time - it's Guns N' Roses, 260 years too early) .... 

Score-Marking

Today was a great day - more harpsichord playing, more working on the instrument in preparation for Saturday's concert. I helped my sound technician vacuum out the harpsichord, in case dust was disturbing the action inside.

I also discovered another amazing thing about my iPad Pro, and its indispensable app for a musician, ForScore. There are a whole bank of common musical symbols, and some less common ones.

I was in search of something that I would never need for another thing, and I found it ... 

It is ... wait for it ...

My mark to turn my page (wirelessly) through Bluetooth pedal.

Ah, the bliss of being a 21-st century musician. My forefathers would have surely approved of, and used this, had it been around in Vienna, Leipzig, or Bayreuth ...

And we are counting down until Saturday's event! Non vedo l'ora!

This sign is outside St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Elkins Park, PA. Please join us!

{I'm at the midway-point through the program of OperaWorks. This is my first time on faculty here and it's a joy to be here for four weeks. 

 

The curriculum here is very much based on the joy of creation. Thus, it contains a lot of improvisation and play.}

It’s now mid-August, or about a month after I began this post. I returned home on July 25th and have been home for now a period of three weeks. I know that I’ve taken the “best” of what that program has to offer, and in doing so, am closer to answering some long-time questions that I have. 

The questions were,

”Why record a solo CD?” 

“Who will buy it or listen to it?"

“What value do these add to my market?"

“Are these my own voice?" 

 

 

My siblings have been after me for a long time about “solo material,” knowing that I mostly earn my living playing with, or for, others. 

The project:

Bach, Well-Tempered Clavier, Volume II (on harpsichord)

Shostakovich, Preludes and Fugues, Opus 87 (on piano) 

And:

Some improvisations - my own “voice” tying the pieces together. 

Here’s the first one, recorded casually in one take (on my iPhone) - 

 

Please return to read more about the process ...

 

PHOTO: a "Bach" in Colorado (March, 2015)

Magnificat

This past Sunday, I got to make music in a way that I really "believed.” During the course of times that have been far too crammed, this came (strangely) as a huge blessing and gift.   

I have known the Bach Magnificat perhaps since undergraduate, when I played some of the solo arias in lessons for friends and colleagues. 

At Westminster Choir College, Dr. Andrew Megill led the Westminster Kantorei in a rehearsal and performance process that was life-changing.

Several other performances have followed.

When I was asked to take over (some) choral duties at UNM for this academic year, I bartered for the top auditioned choir. This year has been an amazing journey for me with them, as I have learned some things as a choral conductor “from scratch” (warm-ups, administration). Other things I feel have been a very natural extension of me (rehearsing a cappella, further development of ears, honing in on rhythm, controlling more lines of polyphony, further work on musicianship). 

The only thing I REALLY wanted to do, all year, was this piece. 

Thirty minutes of unadulterated joy. It’s also one of the most perfect pieces of music ever written. It’s the best of Bach (and that is saying a *lot*). Imagine my surprise when my colleagues delightedly volunteered to play in the orchestra. They were able to recommend graduate students to fill out the ranks.

One of my best students (a good undergraduate singer) said,

“The thirty minutes we shared on stage might be one of the best memories of my life. Doing anything."

Thank you.

As Bach said, "Soli Dei Gloria." 

Count-down

I forever love the quote from a book I read about the Guarneri String Quartet. They (jokingly) make light of the fact that there is rarely any money in chamber music, and when there is any money, it certainly isn’t much. I am determined to solve this problem. 

The arts don’t sustain themselves financially. In the days when Bach would have been alive, he was essentially writing “pop music,” much in the vein of how a praise band would write a chart for a contemporary worship service. Back in those days, we didn’t have “early musicians,” rock musicians,” “pop musicians,” or “classical musicians.” 

We had musicians.

And we need to go back to that. There is just as much to learn from Jimi Hendrix’s “Star Spangled Banner” improvisation and Billy Joel’s amazing piano lick in “Scenes from an Italian Restaurant” (the one in G Major, right before the “Oh-oh’s,” and before the great re-transition to F Major) as we can from studying the cadenza to … basically any instrumental concerto in the canon.

I have long worked on the precision and cleanliness in my playing, and it has come along way. Any musician who plays classical music needs to then swing the pendulum in the other direction, as to call upon the spirit and presence of the original. As if to say, “Bach is in the room. Let’s groove it.”  

 

 

PHOTO: Lukens Trio and Friends, from “Bach by Candlelight 2014"

Or another way to think of it is to “transcend” the instrument. Beethoven, in speaking to Schuppanzigh, said, 

“Do you think I worry about your lousy fiddle when the spirit speaks to me?” 

(this was after Schuppanzigh complained about the difficulties that he encountered when playing one of the quartets).

My goal in playing the d minor Bach concerto coming up will be to (of course) play accurately … 

but even much more than that ...

to make the listeners feel like we have taken a time machine back to Leipzig, and we are listening to some of the greatest music ever written and enjoying the thrill of the idea that it “could” have been created on the spot.

If you would like to attend our concert on 12/19/15, please consider reserving your space in advance. You might even consider a CD! You can click here (Lukens Trio Kickstarter) to learn more about that. Thank you! 

Continuo

"In order to be faithful to the written music, one must be prepared to alter the written notes." (from ON EARLY MUSIC)

What? 

I think it is easier for a classical musician to understand this as "one must know everything so well, and be so free, that one can transcend the score." 

In playing anything in public, but specifically an unrealized continuo part, one must call upon skill sets closer to what jazz musicians use. You have to be at home with form, harmony, sequences, riffs, licks, and gestures. You play as if to say, "Yes, and ..." 

I am an especially lucky girl these days. I have been able to borrow and practice on the collection of harpsichords which UNM has (they have *six* good instruments under lock-and-key in the basement!). 

These instruments tell stories in a way that a modern piano can't. Their uniqueness, and what the instrument will-or-won't hold, regarding tuning. 

I purchased a tuner for my iPhone (on encouragement from my historical performance teacher at Eastman, Paul O'Dette), which will help you tune an instrument within any "meister" or "comma" imaginable. When I do the Bach and Shostakovich project recordings, I will take advantage of this. 

Late November and all of December are two parties for baroque playing for me. Last weekend was another performance at Chatter (same great institution, just a different location) ...

(PHOTO: from my GoPro, playing some wild Biber pieces)

... and December 3-4 will be an off-shoot of "Movable Sol"'s concert series, "Barokk Werke Verzeichniss." (A play on BWV). On that docket are several preludes and fugues from WTC I (I have been doing more WTC II these days, but the WTC I is always wonderful to revisit), a Boccherini gamba sonata, and some works for unaccompanied 'cello.

December 19th will bring a blissful reunion with my wonderful trio back on the East Coast. I will get to perform again Bach's great Harpsichord Concerto in d minor (I last performed this in the winter of 2004. This performance has brought about new practice techniques, much more work and training since then on my technique and on harpsichord, and new scores and editions have come out since I last performed it). 

Here's to continuo until the end of the semester ... 

What's all the "Chatter" about?

Yesterday was an important “debut” for me in Albuquerque. There is a unique, 50-weeks-per-year series in town, which has a tremendous following and is an institution of the highest creativity (with a little bit of “crunchiness”). 

It’s called “ChatterABQ." You can view the website here.

The organization and events which it sponsored used to be called “Church of Beethoven.” It is a one-hour event, every Sunday morning at 10:30AM. Tickets are sold on-line and also at the door (though a special guest, who I had invited yesterday, said he got the last ticket!). Performers are booked months in advance and the repertoire ranges from Bach Cantatas to Pärt or Schnittke or world-premieres. For the price of a ticket, you are treated to about an hour of music, some poetry, and two minutes of silence. The venue which hosts this, the Kosmos Art Gallery in Albuquerque, is an old warehouse which has been re-purposed as a performance venue and artists’ loft. 

The ticket also includes some pretty fantastic coffee and biscotti-pastries-croissants, of your choice. You just have to get there early to get your “free” coffee and get a good seat!

Joel Becktell, cellist and baroque cellist, had invited me to participate in a concert with him back in August, when I came to another event at Chatter. After this event, we came up with the program in the parking lot of the gallery. The past weeks have been spent working through the Schnittke First Sonata (1978) and the Bach Third Gamba Sonata, in g minor. 

I have long loved the process of analyzing music, either for the first time, or examining something again under close lens when it has been “put away” for a while. I most recently performed the g minor Gamba Sonata with Wendy Richman (a long-time friend from Oberlin, Eastman, and who is now on the faculty of University of Alabama). It was wonderful to take out the old Bärenreiter part and re-work it, thinking about different possibilities of cross-phrasing, hemiolas, tendency tones, and evaded cadences. Ah, J.S. Bach, how you continue to make me swoon ...

The Schnittke was another matter, as yesterday was its first performance for me. The piece is a bit of a “bête noire” - as Joel puts it. There are pacing decisions, texture challenges, not to mention the technical demands put upon both players. 

The audience responded in exactly the way I hoped they would. Ears have to get acclimated to the relative quiet sounds of a five-string baroque cello with a harpsichord. They were “with” us in the Bach in that way! I could especially tell during the arioso slow movement. The Schnittke brought about an entirely different reaction, including audible real-time gasps at the shocking climax of the middle movement.

I am so grateful to this institution for what it does in promoting live music, poetry, and a community who relishes both in such an “espresso” way.

PHOTOS: Aziza Murray from ChatterABQ, 2/8/15.