Category Archives: Musical Performance

Opera Night’s 7th Anniversary!

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Like any modern day music historian, I talk about music during our generation in the 21st century. I also like to examine the role of classical music in today’s society. Although classical music is not on the top 10 list of popular genres, it is still used to educate and help young musicians, school children and professionals further their performance skills.

 Northport – a New York City suburb on Long Island – is one such artistic community where classical musicians and music teachers dedicate their time to building new talent. My former classical piano teacher, Isabella Eredita-Johnson has not only developed young artists as a teacher, but she has also created an organization called Opera Night.

Since its beginning, the series grew 

Since its first gathering at Café Portofino in Northport village on Friday, July 1st, 2004; Isabella and her sister, Maddalena Harris, have been inviting singers to perform arias and vocal duets on a monthly basis. They both named this gathering, Opera Night. As the series grew and began attracting larger audiences, the little café with the bistro charm couldn’t accommodate crowds.

Two years later, Opera Night relocated to St. Paul’s United Methodist Church across the street. Along with more seating space, the church provided an upright Steinway piano to accompany the singers and greater performance space. While moving to St. Paul’s greatly benefited audiences and singers, Isabella, also faced challenges. Some of them involved focusing on professional singing and musicianship while accommodating local audiences. I personally talked to Isabella about how Opera Night evolved from a monthly gathering to an actual venue, and the challenges that arose.

Opera Night is still as fresh and exciting as when it started

Isabella explained, “The caliber of the audience has grown and the presentation is now more formal than from Opera Night’s beginnings in 2004. The one thing that hasn’t changed is the spontaneity.” The performance program is determined by which singers show up that night. Isabella claims, “we do this to keep the performances fresh and exciting. After a performance, people come up to me and say, “this was the most exciting Opera Night to date!” If I had a dollar for every time I heard that, I would be very rich.”

 This spontaneity helps Opera Night stand out amongst the competing performance venues that heavily rely on structure in their programming.

Another aspect of Opera Night that hasn’t changed is the immediate delivery of famous arias and duets. Isabella started Opera Night to bring the most exciting and popular parts of great operas to opera lovers instead of performing full operatic works. Some musicians might find this hodgepodge of music overwhelming, but for Isabella, it comes naturally. Isabella claims, “For me, it’s easy because good, finely trained singers have come to me. The nature of inviting 20 different singers is they will most likely sing 20 different songs.”

Opera Night now focuses on furthering singers’ performing repertoire and skills

Focusing on the singers is fairly new general goal at Opera Night. Isabella explained, “The reasons a singer would want to sing at Opera Night are: they sing in front of a large audience; they get a free accompanist provided by Opera Night; and they increase the quality of their performances.” These benefits naturally encourage singers to spread the word about Opera Night to opera lovers and potential future Opera Night performers.  

If a free accompanist and a full house is not enough to attract singers to Opera Night, the success story of some regular performers will perhaps change prospective singers’ minds.

Bringing professionals back to the music and putting their voices in films

Bruce Solomon initially had a successful singing career. However; supporting a family while performing as a concert artist was challenging. So he went into sales.

Years later, he heard about Opera Night, which helped satisfy his passion for singing and helped make up for the years he was out of the musical scene. Thanks to Opera Night, Solomon can now easily step back into singing.

In the beginning years, Frances Fascetti was an Opera Night regular. Chris Garvey, an audience member, taped and recorded all of Fascetti’s performances and distributed them on a digital music platform.

One faithful day, independent film director, David Campfield, found Fascetti’s recording of “Ave Maria.” Isabella was thrilled to hear Campfield wanted to use Fascetti’s recording in his upcoming film, Cesar & Otto’s Summer Camp Massacre. Fascetti was doubly excited to learn that out of all the “Ave Maria” tracks available for download on the worldwide web, Campfield chose hers.

Opera lovers are all around and they are coming out to Opera Night

Aside from helping young professionals develop their skill and performance repertoire, Opera Night reinforces the communities love for one of the most classical performing arts.

Isabella says, “Opera lovers are out there and they’re coming out of the woodwork. We see the audience turn out, and it is growing. You meet these people who love Opera and want to know if there is anywhere they can listen to it… and you tell them about Opera Night.”

The minute Isabella meets an Opera lover looking for a good performance; she puts them on the email list and sends them reminders about upcoming performances.

Opera Night also reinforces Isabella’s life-long drive and passion for opera and classical performing arts.

Isabella’s performance experience during college encouraged her to take on Opera endeavors

 Isabella’s mother and father were the first opera lovers she ever knew. Their love of music fostered Isabella’s talent for classical piano, and soon, her years of dedication and performing eventually resulted in a degree from the Manhattan School of Music. Her greatest inspiration for opera however, was a “fine” bass/ baritone singer and enthusiastic voice teacher named Peter Maravell.

Isabella became Maravell’s piano accompanist at his studios. What Isabella thought would be a summer job that paid more than what her peers were making at McDonalds, turned into an assistantship and apprenticeship under a great singer. Maravell taught Isabella the music from the operas by some of the greats – Mozart and Puccini.

Maravell helped give Isabella a job that enhanced her experience as a concert pianist. Working under Maravell also expanded her musical world.

Isabella’s performance experience outside of academia encouraged her to teach music and take on projects and musical endeavors that would attract large audiences. For her, these projects and endeavors would revolve around opera.

Isabella encourages communities to help keep opera afloat

As Isabella continues in her musical endeavors and projects, she is constantly reminded of the hard economic times currently affecting many opera companies – even large ones in the neighboring metropolis, New York City. Isabella has taken the initiative in promoting New York City Opera’s Chairman Challenge, a fundraiser that will help City Opera continue producing full operas. More importantly; this challenge will help New York City Opera improve their opera education and professional development programs. This is why Isabella encourages community members to take an active interest in keeping opera afloat by attending a performance; spreading the word about a company; or donating.

Tonight is Opera Night’s 7th Year Anniversary!

Tonight’s celebration of Opera Night’s 7th year in Northport will remind community members of how much people love Opera. People want to have it and need to have it. “And for a good reason too,” Isabella says, “it is just wonderful!”

The Shepherd of the Messiah Sing-In

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Handel’s Messiah Sing-In is an event where audience members, for one night, become Avery Fisher Hall’s largest concert choir of the year. This transformation begins when the conductor faces the audience in the orchestra section- the section in front of the stage- and leads them in singing The Messiah by Georg Frideric Handel.

What if you are not a singer? Do you experience the same sensation as the other 1,000 members who brought a copy of The Messiah? You will have an amazing experience but it will be very different from the singers’.

The night I attended, this past December 21st at Avery Fisher Hall, I had a throat cold and my score money went to tickets. Therefore, I became an observer from inside the performance rather than a participating singer. Being an observer however, enabled me to see just how important the conductor’s leadership and presence is for the deliverance of a great concert.

Gary Thor Wedow is very well known for conducting large choirs at Carnegie Hall and was selected to lead the first choral performance. He divided the orchestra section of the audience in two sections he called “New York” and “New Jersey,” for the heterophonic piece, “And The Glory of the Lord.”

While Wedow may have given these sections corny names, he did set a positive mood for the singers. Contrary to Wedown, the next conductor, Vincent Rufino, displayed more interest in his appearance than in Handel’s music.

During the run of “He Shall Be Purified,” Rufino’s enthusiasm was relevant in his bounce of the heels and raised posture of his shoulders. Prior to beginning the song, Rufino received frantic shrieking and cheers of praise from adults who were alumni of his high school choir. The only thing missing from his reception was flying panties.

One of the only conductors who exhibited a more professional and interpersonal presence was Gail Archer, the choir conductor from Barnard College and Columbia University. She stepped to the podium to tell the audience a little about Handel’s history as a composer in the royal courts in England and Italy. Following her brief history lesson, she proceeded to conduct the song, “And We Like Sheep Have Gone Astray.”

Like a conductor with years of experience in leading large ensembles, Archer expressed the massiveness of the performance by swaying her hands and forearms gracefully: counting the meter with her right hand while signaling dynamics, rests and accents with her left. With the rest of her body planted to the stand and a great balance in her torso, Archer’s motion was like that of a classical Hindu dancer: it told a story about this piece of music.

I felt the audience delivered the most spirited performance during Archer’s performance. I feel she, like a shepherd, led all the sheep home. If Archer should be in next year’s, 44th annual Sing- In, I would definitely consider attending.

Edgar Allen Poe’s Holiday Song

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When I first heard about giving a Christmas recital with the Huntington Women’s Choir, these ideas for songs crossed my mind: “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer,” “Jingle Bells,” and “The Little Drummer Boy.” Thankfully, the Women’s choir would not sing any of these selections. Instead, we were handed a copy of “Hear the Sledges with the Bells.”

This unaccompanied song for first and second soprano and alto is written by Hugh S. Roberton. And to everyone’s surprise, the song is adapted from a poem by Edgar Allen Poe titled, “The Bells.”

During the Huntington Women’s Choir holiday recital, the instructor, Judy, confidently claimed, “it was perhaps the only happy moment in Poe’s life.”

Naturally, listeners concurred with this thought as the singers recited, Hear the Sledges with the bells, silver bells… What a world of merriment their melody foretells… how they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, tinkle in the icy air of night… While the stars that over sprinkle, all the heavens seem to twinkle with a crystalline delight.[1] However, scholars and researchers argue the poem’s jubilent appearance.

Kenneth Silverman in his book, Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance, claims the ringing of the bells are symbolic of the changing seasons: the transition from spring into winter. Silverman claims Poe may have used the ringing of the bells as a metaphor for life itself.[2]

The Edgar Allen Poe Society of Baltimore offers an opposing view to Silverman’s interpretation. According to their historical records, Poe had no inspiration for this poem. He was staying at his cottage in Fordham, New York, and while with Marie Louise Shew- his wife’s nurse- in the same room; he listened to her comment on the bells ringing from afar.[3]

Whether or not Roberton interpreted “The Bells” as a dreary and grim rhyme, he certainly didn’t express it in his musical composition. Aside from the many interpretations and analysis created around this poem, Roberton wrote his song with a vivacious tempo and in the meter of 2/4, a meter used repeatedly for tunes within musicals. The key signature of D flat major, a key recognized by the tradition of romantic music as whimsical and dreamy, is another component that pulls the initial tone of the poem into a different direction.

“Hear the Sledges with the Bells” is a delightful song that invokes holiday cheer and joy without taking part in the fabricated repertoire fed to consumers Christmas after Christmas.

[1] Sir, Hugh Stevenson Roberton. “Hear The Sledges with the Bells.” (Bryn Mawr, PA: Theodore Presser Company, 1919).

[2, 3] Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. “The Bells,” (December 4, 2010), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bells (accessed December 12, 2010)

Hear; Don’t Listen

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One chilly Saturday afternoon, my BFF, Emily, was driving my sister, Gigi and my sister’s boyfriend, Sal and me around Huntington. We were listening to STAR 99.9 in the car, and on the program was a song I had not heard in ages- Susanne Vega’s “Tom’s Diner.”

This was Sal’s first time listening to the song. Of course he had heard it many times before on television commercials, but that Saturday in Emily’s car was the first time he ever listened to Vega sing, “I am sitting/ In the morning/ At the diner/ On the corner/ I am waiting/ At the counter/ For the man/ To pour the coffee…”*

“What?” Sal remarked, “Those are the words? I can’t believe I never noticed. She could have probably sang a song about using the toilet and I would have never noticed.”

Sal’s reaction to Suzanne Vega’s song is just one of the many common reactions I’ve observed in my family members and friends as they stumbled across a piece of minimalist music on the radio. They say, “this just repeats…”, or very appropriately, “that’s it?”

I had a similar reaction when I had revisited a piece by Satie. The piece is “The First Gymnopedie” (for Mademoiselle Jeanne de Bret, 1888). I replayed it for the first time when I was 19 years old and I said, “I can’t believe I practiced so intently [as a 15 year old piano student] just to master a piece so simple and lethargic.”

A few years past, and I played it again at 22, just for fun, and I understood why it was important to master. When I was learning this piece, I wasn’t mastering the technique because of the composition’s complexity or length; I was mastering the physical feeling of the Gymnopedie.

Tranquility in the wrists and fingers are vital, just like the decisive striking of the keys: all the notes of the chord must be played with the same volume and all voices have to sound as one. If the player diverges from the specifics of the piece, becoming too fast or some notes of the chord louder than others, you might deprive the song of its simple right of being.

Some of you may be wondering what this means. Imagine this, try listening to a virtuosic mezzo soprano sing the lyrics to “Tom’s Diner” while the rest of the song remains the way you and I have heard it all this time. Yes, the sound would be equivalent to that of a broken garage door falling on a car horn and in the process smashing the car.

So here is what “Tom’s Diner” and the “First Gymnopedie” have in common—they are songs for hearing and feeling, not for listening and analyzing. You might also argue this case to be true for many minimalist compositions and popular songs. So let me take the time to say, “Hear; don’t listen.”

*Lyrics were borrowed from this source, http://www.lyrics.com/toms-diner-lyrics-suzanne-vega.html