Studzinski Recital Hall, Bowdoin College
Christopher Hyde - Portland Press Herald
Elliott Schwartz's Chamber Concerto VI: Mr. Jefferson received a fitting world premiere Saturday at Bowdoin College's Studzinski Recital Hall, which was filled for the occasion.
The solo part was performed by noted British violinist Peter Sheppard Skaerved, who suggested Thomas Jefferson the violinist as a subject to the composer.
The Portland Chamber Orchestra, under Robert Lehmann, was in good form for the difficult, densely written score.
The work will be recorded in the fall as part of a complete set of the Schwartz Chamber Concertos, which will be a good thing, since it is difficult to grasp all of its musical and historical allusions in one sitting.
The main themes, however, based on the letters of Jefferson's name, and the four-note "magician" motif of "Uranus" in Gustav Holst's "The Planets," are easier to follow and unify the work on a musical as well as an intellectual level.
The five-movement concerto, played without a pause, describes five aspects of Jefferson's life: The Inventor, The Violin, Garden, The Letter and The Portrait
.
These are arranged symmetrically around the center garden, like Jefferson's architecture.
The most striking, to me, was the Letter section, referring to Jefferson's "Head vs. Heart" letter to his good friend during his sojourn in Paris, Mariah Cosway, as much a Renaissance personality as our third president.
It has a fascinating change of idiom at its center, where the Jefferson theme becomes transformed into a Wagnerian liebestod. Some of Cosway's own compositions -- she played harp and flute to Jefferson's violin -- are also quoted.
The Portrait movement recapitulates what has gone before and ends with the Holst motif, which Schwartz uses as an epitaph.
The portrait itself is the one by Gilbert Stuart in the Bowdoin College Museum of Art.
The rest of the concert, including the Bach Orchestral Suite No. 2 in B minor, the Haydn Sinfonia Concertante in B-flat Major, and the Saint-Saens "Carnival of the Animals," with Ogden Nash's verses read by violinist Yasmin Craig Vitalius, was also thoroughly enjoyable.
The fine performance of the Bach Suite began with something I have heard all too often, in both live and recorded performances -- a sort of bewilderment in the first few bars, as if no one quite knows where the music is going. Is it because Bach likes to start in medias res?
The Haydn provided an opportunity for the solo violin, cello, oboe and bassoon to shine.
The Saint-Saens was a tour de force of technical brilliance in the service of musical humor and parody.
Everyone was in rare form, but the two-piano work of Anastasia Antonacos and Chiharu Naruse and Thomas Parchman's mocking clarinet cuckoo were quite incredible.
February 23 2007
Portland’s newest premier ensemble, Portland Chamber Orchestra, made its debut under Music Director, Robert Lehmann. Ellen Chickering was the featured soloist in Berlioz’s “Les Nuits d’Ete.” The program also includes Richard Strauss’ “Duet Concertino” for clarinet and bassoon featuring Ardith Keef, and Wagner’s “Siegfried Idyll.”
Portland Press Herald
Maine Sunday Telegram
February 25, 2007
“Intriguing choices give orchestra strong start”
by Christopher Hyde
The first concert of the Portland Chamber Orchestra Friday night at the University of Southern Maine’s Corthell Hall in Gorham bodes well for the future of the new group.
The program selected by music director Robert Lehmann was unusual, highlighting the richness of the literature available for small orchestra, while the soloists were outstanding.
… The first work on the program, the Berlioz “Nuits d’Ete” with soprano Ellen Chickering…is either disappointing or incomparable. This performance was the latter. Chickering was marvelous…
Another form of love…was portrayed in Wagner’s “Siegfried Idyll”, originally written for chamber orchestra to be played for the composer’s wife’s birthday…The orchestra came together well in this more familiar piece.
The final Duett Concertino of Richard Strauss is a very late work…Both soloists, Kristen Finkbeiner, clarinet, and Ardith Keef, bassoon were excellent.
All in all, an auspicious beginning. The next concert, May 4, promises to be just as intriguing.
Portland Press Herald
Maine Sunday Telegram
January 21, 2007
Everything’s coming up classical in an area already renowned for its summer festivals, a surge in ‘off-season’ activity is generating new buzz.
By Bob Keyes
Portland a mecca for classical-music artists? Indeed, some recognizable names are calling the area home, including tenor John McVeigh, and soprano Lisa Safford. Robert Lehmann, string studies director at USM, recently formed the Portland Chamber Orchestra.
Portland Press Herald
Maine Sunday Telegram
January 21, 2007
“As if Lehmann wasn't busy enough…”
by Christopher Hyde
It is not very often that any region witnesses the birth of a new professional orchestra, but we will be hearing the premiere performance of the Portland Chamber Orchestra, under the direction of Robert Lehmann, on Friday, Feb. 23.
The Portland Chamber Orchestra is Lehmann’s brainchild and has been planning for about two years, he said. “The cycle of Brandenburg Concertos that we played last year was the catalyst that brought the whole thing together, but what was really encouraging was the response of professional musicians, here in Maine (including Bangor) and Boston, to the idea. Virtually everyone was immediately enthusiastic, in spite of busy schedules.
Lehmann is no stranger to busy schedules himself. In addition to being assistant professor and director of strings and orchestras at USM, he is also on the artist faculty as a player of violin and viola. He recently came off a grueling schedule of conducting all of the Portland Symphony Orchestra’s Magic of Christmas concerts, and when I caught up with him he was about to go to northern and Down East Maine for four workshops and a concert performance of the Mozart Sinfonia Concertante for violin and viola, with his wife Kimberly.
“The idea behind the Portland Chamber Orchestra was to create a group flexible and virtuosic enough to perform some of the most challenging works,” Lehmann said. “It had been simmering in my mind for a while and came to fruition while performing last year’s Brandenburg concerti. As music director, I am keenly interested in performing the wonderful music written for the instrumental forces that exist between the string quartet and the symphonic orchestra with artists capable of embodying the triple role of soloist, chamber musician and orchestral player that this repertory requires…There’s a tremendous literature for chamber orchestra, which has remained almost untouched in Maine,” Lehmann said. “We occupy the middle ground between a string quartet and a full orchestra, and are flexible enough to expand or contract. I also think there’s an audience for this wonderful music.”
As an example he cites the first program, which will include the Berlioz, “Nuits D’ete”, sung by soprano Ellen Chickering; Richard Strauss’ Duett Concertino for clarinet, bassoon, harp and strings, and the Wagner “Siegfried Idyll,” which, although it is often performed by full orchestra, was originally conceived as an intimate work.
At present, the Portland Chmaber Orchestra consists of nine strings and five to six woodwinds, many of whom are principals with the PSO. Jennifer Elowitch, co-founder of the Portland Chamber Music Festival, will be guest concertmaster for the premiere.
The May concert also has audience appeal, with the pianist Martin Perry performing the Mozart Piano Concerto No. 14 in E-flat (K. 499), and the Bloch Concerto Grosso No. 1 for strings and piano obbligato. It will conclude with the Hovhaness “Talin” Concerto Opus 93, for viola and strings, with Kimberly Lehmann.
In case anyone is wondering, Lehmann says he was not one of the candidates for the position of music director of the Portland Symphony Orchestra, although he would be happy to help out if asked. He maintains that he “thoroughly enjoyed” the Magic of Christmas stint, and is glad that his ideas about the series were well-received.
