In the spring of 2001, Rudolf Kämper organized two concerts in Baltimore. He billed the second one under the name of “ANALOG music ensemble“. After moving to Omaha, he resurrected the name (with the ‘arts’ substitution) and the ensemble began its new life as a collective.
‘Tets
April 15, 2001
Baltimore, MD
PROGRAM
Paul Hindemith, Septet for Wind Instruments
Igor Stravinsky, Octet for Wind Instruments
PERSONNEL
Benjamin Loeb, Conductor
Marcia McHugh, Flute
Emily Hay, Oboe
Samuel Kaestner, Clarinet
Mary Lynn Freyer, Bass Clarinet
Joyce Besch, Bassoon
Alex Staherski, Bassoon
Rudolf Kämper, Trumpet
Tom Hill, Trumpet
David Goldklang, Horn
Shawn Johnson, Trombone
Jeff Koonce, Bass Trombone
ANALOG Abroad
May 6, 2001
St. James Church, outside of Baltimore, MD
This concert was a collaboration with Joe Drew, who was living in New York and running the Juilliard Pre-College Division’s orchestral program. They performed as a brass quintet at a tiny stone church deep in the Maryland countryside.
PROGRAM
Karlheinz Stockhausen, Michael’s Farewell
Elliott Carter, Fantasy about Purcell’s “Fantasia Upon One Note”
Elliott Carter, Birthday Flourish
Johann Sebastian Bach, Contrapunctus IX
Witold Lutoslawski, Mini Overture
Jason Taylor, Model Airplane*
Jason Taylor, Supermodel Glue
Franz Schubert, Der Doppelgänger (arr. Kämper)
Ottorino Respighi, Nebbie (arr. Drew)
Joaquin Turina, Miniatures (arr. Bange)
Peter Maxwell Davies, March: The Pole Star
Paul Hindemith, Five Pieces, op. 44 (arr. Kämper)
I. Slowly
II. Slowly-Fast
Thomas Morley, Fyer, Fyer! (arr. Kämper)
PROGRAM NOTES
Darren Bange, trombone
Armen Dohanian, tuba
Joe Drew, trumpet
David Goldklang, horn
Rudolf Kämper, trumpet
make up the ANALOGmusic ensemble, a newly formed group interested in bringing
all types of music to audiences in a new way that is fresh and inventive. The members include graduates and current students of Peabody Institute in Baltimore as well as from the Yale University School of Music. Members have experience performing throughout the United States as well as Germany and Italy. Honors in the ensemble include a Concert Guild competition finalist and a new member of the President’s Own Marine Band.
Our theme for this afternoon’s recital is to present several short works at a relatively fast pace. The music is meant to be a diverse assortment of works that attempt to play around the listener’s attention span and taste. Please feel free to enjoy this afternoon as you would a plate of appetizers, take what you like and enjoy whatever strikes you.
KARLHEINZ STOCKHAUSEN was born near Cologne in 1928. He is most easily recognized with the Darmstadt Summer Institute of the 1950’s. Here he associated with composers who would shape modern music for the following generation. Stockhausen’s early career involved him in works of electronic music and totally serialized music. Today Stockhausen is constantly exploring extravagant use of instrumentation and event. He has written for an audience to be surrounded by four orchestras, or a string quartet playing in helicopters which broadcast over a small town. Michael’s Farewell was originally intended to postlude an opera. The patrons leaving the opera house would experience five trumpet players dressed as statues sounding from neighboring rooftops.
Here are two pieces that display a surprisingly flexible vocabulary from ELLIOTT CARTER, a composer with a reputation for particularly ascetic music. An American composer, born in New York in 1908, Carter had the opportunity to meet Charles Ives who is critically regarded as this country’s most influential and original composer. True to his melting-pot culture, he typically draws from every possible musical material and exploits it in every possible way. For instance in both of the works this afternoon, Carter allows us to view two recognizable melodies through a prism of his sonic mastery. Purcell’s Fantasia is a charming melismatic and contrapuntal work typical of the renaissance or baroque era. Carter draws our attention to music Purcell may have never intended or expected but is fascinating nonetheless. Likewise at the end of the Flourish the careful listener will recognize the tilting melody which Carter has prepared and accompanied with interesting affect. The New York Times has called Mr. Carter America’s greatest living composer and he earns this title with astoundingly inventive works.
JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH hardly needs an introduction to music lovers of all backgrounds. Born in 1685 and died 1750, Bach’s life essentially defines the Baroque period in music. Legend has it that the Art of the Fugue (of which this Contrapunctus is a small part) was his greatest and final work. It was conceived of one theme which continually restates and transforms throughout the larger work to consist of simple fugues, counter-fugues, double and triple fugures, interpolated canons and culminating in a mirror fugue. Today it is unclear to what the original size of the piece amounted, in surviving printgs only what we believe were the opening three sections are extant. Bach did not notate what instruments should play the parts. Today brass is often used, especially for this particular example.
WITOLD LUTOSLAWSKI was born in Warsaw in 1913 and died in 1994. He is perhaps most recognized for his large orchestral works, such as Concerto for Orchestra or Venetian Games. This Mini Overture for brass quintet is an elegant example of form. The quickly moving notes form a framework around small explosions of color. Asymmetric rhythms, large leaps in the melody and jagged texture allows this work to achieve a homogeneous style that can easily be described as angular.
JASON TAYLOR wrote both Model Airplane and Supermodel Glue for the ANALOGmusic ensemble and this afternoon is the set’s world premiere. A young and productive composer, (Taylor was born in Pennsylvania in 1975) he is currently having two more works premiered this month at the Baltimore Composer’s Forum downtown. Model Airplane and Supermodel Glue attack two of the best qualities possible in brass music. Model Airplane lends itself to the colorist capabilities of brass. Long streaming sounds delight the listener as melodies imperceptibly glide in and out of plain view. Exploiting the percussive sound of brass is a favorite among composers but in Supermodel Glue Taylor treats this tastefully with interesting rhythms and robust melodic lines.
The Miniatures (originally for piano) by JOAQUIN TURINA were a fitting find for Mr. Bange to make. Their post-impressionist and Spanish flavor makes a lovely addition to the collection of works this afternoon. As is so often the case, Turina’s parents hoped he would have a career in medicine, but with his artist-father’s consent he began his musical studies with the piano. Born in Seville in 1882, the composer had the opportunity to meet the immortal Spaniards d’Indy, de Falla, and Albeniz. Turina was eventually considered a national hero for his composition. He conducted at teh Ballets Russes, and was appointed professor of composition at the Madrid Conservatory in 1930. The republicans during the Spanish Civil War apparently persecuted teh composer but after the war he was recognized as the commissioner of the Ministry of Education of 1941. He died after a long and painful illness eight years later in 1949.
The Pole Star March is a small example of the obvious skill of the composer, PETER MAXWELL DAVIES (born in Manchester, 1934) who was included along with Birtwistle, Goehr and Ogdon in the Manchester Group. Crucial to Davies’s style and conception involves the fact that he served as music director at the Cirencester Grammar School. While serving at this post as a teacher of children his music took on a simpler style, he arranged works of other composer to allow performances in the school, adn he developed a teaching style closely involved with the performance of music. While not written during his service at the grammar school, The Pole Star is an example of effectiveness through simplicity. It is essentially a march much like Sousa would have written. There are short beats punctuating the obligatory strides of a march along with more lyrical melodies floating over the top. In Davies’s case; however, the chords comprising the pulsing quality are slightly askew while lyrical melodies are almost of a Broadway character.
PAUL HINDEMITH (born near Frankfurt 1895, died 1963) wrote Five Pieces (or Fünf Stücke) for a string orchestra. Hindemith is an important icon in the historical menagerie of 20th century musicians. He was clearly a great and diversified composer, as well as music theorist, violist, teacher, and conductor. here again this piece exhibits the grace of the composer and his ability to write beautiful music in a simple vocabulary. This music was part of a series of works intended to help young string players study ensemble playing. We are playing directly off of string parts this afternoon and the music lends itself easily to a brass ensemble.
Finally we present a quick and lighthearted rendition of a 16th century English madrigal by THOMAS MORLEY (born in Norwich 1557 or 58, died 1602) complete with Elizabethan pinings of love and jovial fa la la’s.
— notes by Rudolf Kämper