Out West Arts: Performance at the end of the world

What a wonderful end to the Los Angels Master Chorale 16/17 season. The program was almost entirely familiar works, but nothing could have said more about who this group is and where they stand in the musical world. None of the pieces on the program dated to before 1997 and all of them were from composers affiliated with the Chorale – most with strong connections to Los Angeles itself. The occasion was the 20th anniversary of the world premiere of Morten Lauridsen’s Lux Aeterna, a piece completed for the Chorale during his tenure as their composer-in-residence and arguably the work that the LAMC is most identified with. That kind of familiarity with a work gives an ensemble like the LAMC a unique perspective and this past week’s performances of these five a cappella motets were rich, warm, and holy as anything you can think of. Lux Aeterna is both profound and welcoming, and Artistic Director Grant Gershon leads the chorale to really penetrating heights with this piece.

The LAMC was wise to use Lux Aeterna as the starting point for programming for the first half of the evening which included works largely commissioned by or for the Chorale with locally affiliated composers, including Billy Childs, Moira Smiley, Shawn Kirchner, Esa-Pekka Salonen and Eric Whitacre. All of the works touched on the same themes of light, gratitude, and time in different ways  representing a great cross-section of musical styles. Perhaps the most pointed and poignant contrast to Lauridsen’s masterpiece was the opening Iri da iri, a setting of the concluding stanza of Dante’s Paradiso, which the choristers of the LAMC commissioned directly from Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Conductor Laureate Esa-Pekka Salonen. It was as haunting now as it was at its 2014 premiere. Salonen’s mystery of the spheres is as equally full of mystery as Lauridsen’s, but where Lux Aeterna is bright and inviting, Iri da iri is dark and foreboding. It’s a universe that is awe-inspiring but may not always be a friendly one even with salvation possible in its vast folds. Perhaps the other breath-taking moment of the night stood immediately half-way in between these works. Eric Whitacre’s I Fall received its West Coast Premiere with the LAMC’s Artist-in-residence conducting his own work. The piece is just a snippet of a larger work Whitacre is developing with his long-time collaborator, poet Charles Anthony Silvestri. In this instance the darkness and light of salvation take a far more personal and immediate turn. Silvestri has set the most personal and cutting of subjects in this excerpt – the moment of his wife’s passing nearly a decade ago from cancer. It’s one of those moments that feels beyond any sort of analysis or reproach given the depth and extreme intimacy of its subject matter. But to be certain, this collaboration was a stunner. A moment where gratitude and loss and failure all meld into one dizzying mix. Whitacre is a choral superstar for a reason, and his masterly work, which slides up and down in tone almost imperceptibly at times was a winning moment. It couldn’t have been a better show for looking back and taking in what’s gone before.

Labels: LA Master Chorale 16/17

Composer birthday celebrations are an unavoidable trope of concert programming. Even when the composer is a living one, the urge to revisit works in an anniversary is an irresistible temptation for too many arts organizations. But when the composer is John Adams, celebrating his 70th year, and the ensemble is the Los Angeles Master Chorale, objections fade in the wake of some great music performed under optimal circumstances. LAMC Artistic Director Grant Gershon and his vocal artists are no strangers to Adams’ music and have a working relationship reaching back for decades. In fact, later this year Gershon will lead the world premiere of Adams’ latest opera, Girls of the Golden West for San Francisco Opera. So a program honoring Adams last Sunday may be expected but this evening had a decided twist.

The first half of the night was devoted to choruses from Adams’ operas and oratorios. The beauty and complexity of these choruses is perhaps the best kept open secret of Adams’ oeuvre. Not to LAMC listeners, though, who have heard the four profound and richly textured ensembles from The Death of Klinghoffer in prior concerts here. They were again beautifully rendered in new piano transcriptions that Gershon had prepared for Adams’ publisher, which he noted should be out later this year. Joining the Klinghoffer sections were choruses from The Gospel According to the Other Mary, A Flowering Tree, and Doctor Atomic. Perhaps most ecstatic of these performances, though, was the toast chorus from Nixon in China. Close on the heels of the masterful LA Philharmonic performances of this opera last month, this closer for the first part of the evening left no doubt about Adams’ enduring musical legacy regardless of what yet lays ahead.

In the second half of the evening, Gershon and the Chorale diverged from the standard tribute show blueprint by instead presenting a work not composed by Adams but one of his own favorite composers. Starvinsky’s Les Noces was a perfect counterpoint and suggested much about what Adams has built his entire artistic career on. Les Noces continues to sound as bold now as it likely ever has, and the Chorale with soloists Elissa Johnston, Todd Strange, Nicholas Brownlee, and Niké St. Clair emphasized the rhythmic folk music elements of the piece tapping in to the dramatic and narrative elements of the work. Like everything else that night, it was jubilant and fittingly so for the composer who has been a friend to so many here in his native California.

Labels: LA Master Chorale 16/17, lame

The topic of how the arts should respond to political upheaval has unsurprisingly been in the news again. And given the events of last weekend, how could it not be? But regardless of what the arts can or should do, Los Angeles audiences were reminded this weekend of some of what they already have done for centuries in very pointed and dramatic ways – build community and provide a space to dream of a better world. Take the Los Angeles Master Chorale for instance. The performances of Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis this weekend had been scheduled for months and months. But here the large chorus, orchestra and Artistic Director Grant Gershon were playing grand music about the deepest questions mere feet from some of the largest protest crowds this city has ever seen streaming past their doors on Saturday afternoon. And if the challenges humanity presents weren’t enough food for thought, nature itself stepped in on Sunday night challenging everyone in attendance with one of the largest winter storms the region has seen in quite a while. The LAMC and the near capacity crowd responded superbly. Gershon addressed the audience from the stage noting the connection between recent events and Beethoven’s massive final meditation on the nature of the world to come and meeting suffering and tyranny with belief in something better. It was a gutsy and heartfelt performance that focused less on the very good soloists recruited for the evening (including a very welcomed local return of Rod Gilfry) and more on the chorus and ensemble as a whole. Gershon was looking for the universally human in this performance and while polish and finesse sometimes took a back seat, no one could argue with how heartfelt and sincere the evening was.

Meanwhile, across town, The Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra found itself in the midst of a major programming initiative for this season concerning similar themes. “Lift Every Voice” is a series of programs designed to encourage understanding and promote peace inspired by the lives of Rabbi Joachim Prinz, Kurt Weill and Martin Luther King, Jr. The concerts and lectures in the series have featured contributions from a number of guest performers including violinist David Hope who was on hand to perform Bruce Adolphe’s Violin Concerto “I Will Not Remain Silent” and arrangements of several Weill songs by Paul Bateman for violin and orchestra. These were paired on Saturday with Weill’s Seven Deadly Sins which were headed by vocalist Storm Large. Weill’s song cycle, like all of his work, bursts with theatricality and Ms. Large has made it her specialty in recent years. She‘s undoubtedly charismatic and versatile enough to make these songs sing with a weariness and trepidation that echo these current times so closely — they have an extra punch right now. The LACO musicians were no less dramatic with their taut performance of the score.

But perhaps the highlight of the evening was Jeffrey Kahane’s own comments from the stage at the start of the evening. He too noted how unexpectedly poignant this programming series had become in the wake of the disastrous scenario our country now faces. By tying in themes from Mozart’s operas he built an argument for these works that remind us of the good we are capable of making together, speaking out, and standing up to tyranny. He touched many in the audience including myself. Better yet is the fact that there are more performances for LACO next weekend when they will bring a staged performance of Weill’s Lost in the Stars to UCLA on Saturday and Sunday in collaboration with SITI Company and director Anne Bogart. It’s a rare opportunity to hear Weill’s late Broadway gem and is a must see for local audiences.

Labels: LA Master Chorale 16/17