Mélomanie Starts the New Year with World Premiere

By Christine Facciolo
Mélomanie returned to The Delaware Contemporary on Sunday, January 14, 2018 with a concert that included a World Premiere, selections from the French baroque and a contemporary tribute to an early French composer.

Mélomanie performs with guest soprano, Clara Rottsolk. 

The first half of the program featured early music, opening with a performance of the Suite 1 in C Major from Pieces en trio 1692 by Marin Marais. Marais’s Pieces en trio have taken second place behind his solo viol works, but these trios are exquisitely crafted miniatures requiring the same care and stylistic sensitivity as his solo virtuosic repertory. Mélomanie’s performance showed mastery of the idiom, as it relished Marais’s rich harmonic language while making the most of its musical rhetoric.

Guest soloist Clara Rottsolk then joined the ensemble for a performance of the cantata Leandre et Hero by Louis-Nicolas Clerambault (1676-1749), the master of the genre in France. The instrumentalists introduced the work with sensitivity and style, after which Rottsolk entered with a quiet Recit. Rottsolk’s diction was impeccable. Her soprano soared with clarity and control, although at times her high notes were somewhat jarring. But her capacity for dramatic expression was superb, and she held the audience in rapt attention until the story concluded with the joyful reunion of the young lovers.

Contemporary works filled the second half of the program beginning with — appropriately enough — Tombeau de Marin Marais, a tribute to the Baroque French composer by 20th Century French composer Max Pinchard (1928-2009). Gambist Donna Fournier took the lead with a compelling yet delicate performance. Flutist Kimberly Reighley and violinist Christof Richter provided contrasting color with modern instruments.

The concert concluded with the World Premiere of the cantata Lenten is Comen/Worldes Blis by Thomas Whitman. Whitman, chair of the department of music and dance at Swarthmore College, and his colleague Craig Williamson, gave a lively and informative introduction to the piece with a discussion on the language and spirit of the two poems that form the basis of the composition. (Williamson also participated in a post-concert Q&A session, gave a primer on his years of linguistic research with some interesting examples for members of the audience who stayed on.)

Rottsolk was accompanied by members of Mélomanie on baroque instruments as well as guest Naomi Gray on baroque cello. Rottsolk captured the contrasting moods of the text — the exuberance of spring, the melancholy of a loveless life — with the nuances of her voice. Whitman’s music was melodic and mysterious, joyful and foreboding punctuated with some interesting harmonies for the instrumentalists. The second poem was sung unadorned in its original setting. The audience was left with thoughts of the coming spring on this frigid January day “in bleak midwinter.”

See www.melomanie.org. 

DDOA Announces 2018 Individual Artist Fellowships

This post content courtesy of a press release from Delaware Division of the Arts...

Seventeen Delaware artists are being recognized by the Division for the high quality of their artwork. Work samples from 124 Delaware choreographers, composers, musicians, writers, folk and visual artists were reviewed by out-of-state arts professionals, considering demonstrated creativity and skill in their art form. The 17 selected fellows reside throughout Delaware including Lewes, Newark, Rehoboth Beach and Wilmington.

Awards are given in three categories — $10,000 for the Masters Award, $6,000 for the Established Professional Award, and $3,000 for the Emerging Professional Award — and Fellows are required to offer at least one exhibit or performance during the upcoming year, providing an opportunity for the public to experience their work. The work of the Fellows will be featured in a group exhibition, Award Winners XVIII, at the Biggs Museum this summer.

“Individual Artist Fellowship grants provide the recognition and exposure that artists need to successfully promote their work,” said Paul Weagraff, director of Delaware Division of the Arts. “The financial award allows them to pursue advanced training, purchase equipment and materials, or fulfill other needs to advance their careers.”

The Masters Fellowship is open to differing artistic disciplines each year. In Fiscal Year 2018, Masters Fellowship applications were accepted in Dance, Jazz or Music from artists who had previously received an Established Professional Fellowship. In addition to exemplifying high artistic quality, Masters Fellowship applicants must demonstrate their involvement and commitment to the arts in Delaware. Listed below are the Delaware Division of the Arts 2018 Individual Artist Fellows and four Honorable Mentions.

Musician and educator Lloyd Shorter has been awarded this year’s Masters Fellowship in Music: Solo Recital. Shorter plays English horn, oboe, and oboe d’amore. This season marks Shorter’s 45th season with the Delaware Symphony Orchestra. He is also a performer and Co-Artistic Director of the Relâche Ensemble, an eight-member contemporary music ensemble based in Philadelphia. With Relâche he has recorded or performed new works, toured nationally and internationally, and collaborated with numerous composers including Philip Glass. At the University of Delaware, Shorter spent 34 years as Assistant Professor of Oboe, and was the Director for the Governor’s School Music Program and a member of the Del Arte Woodwind Quintet. He continues to teach privately and explore new music with a special interest in technology.

Delaware Division of the Arts 2018 Individual Artist Fellows

Masters Award ($10,000)

• Lloyd Shorter, Wilmington — Music: Solo Recital

Established Professional Award ($6,000)

• Dennis Beach, Wilmington — Visual Arts: Sculpture
• Jack Clemons, Lewes — Literature: Fiction
• Thomas Del Porte, Wilmington — Visual Arts: Painting
• Ellen Durkan, Wilmington — Visual Arts: Sculpture
• Maribeth Fischer, Lewes — Literature: Creative Nonfiction
• David P. Kozinski, Wilmington — Literature: Poetry
• Lawrence Stomberg, Wilmington — Music: Solo Recital
• Joan Warburton-Phibbs, Wilmington — Dance: Choreography

Emerging Professional Award ($3,000)

• Leah Beach, Rehoboth Beach — Visual Arts: Photography
• Kevin Bielicki, Newark — Visual Arts: Sculpture
• Joyce Chen, Wilmington — Music: Solo Recital
• Jen Epler, Wilmington — Literature: Fiction
• Gemelle John, Wilmington — Literature: Poetry
• Lauren E. Peters, Wilmington — Visual Arts: Painting
• Robert Waters, Lewes — Media Arts: Video/Film
• Shannon Connor Winward, Newark — Literature: Fiction

Honorable Mention

• Teresa Clifton, Milford — Literature: Fiction
• Charles Guerin, Dover — Visual Arts: Works on Paper
• Isai Jess Muñoz, Hockessin — Music: Solo Recital
• Terence Roberts, Wilmington — Visual Arts: Photography

To contact an individual artist, contact Roxanne Stanulis, Program Officer, Artist Programs and Services.  The next deadline for Individual Artist Fellowship applications will be Tuesday, August 1, 2018 by 4:30pm.

The Delaware Division of the Arts is an agency of the State of Delaware. Together with its advisory body, the Delaware State Arts Council, the Division administers grants and programs that support arts programming, educate the public, increase awareness of the arts, and integrate the arts into all facets of Delaware life. Funding for Division programs is provided by annual appropriations from the Delaware General Assembly and grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency. For more information about the Delaware Division of the Arts, visit arts.delaware.gov

Experiencing Piffaro's Holiday Musical Renaissance

By Christine Facciolo
For those seeking “off-the-beaten-track” holiday music, the Immanuel Church in Wilmington’s Highlands neighborhood was the place to be on Sunday, December 17, as Piffaro, the Renaissance Band, presented Es Ist Ein Ros, a German Renaissance Christmas.

Piffaro’s Christmas program this season followed Welcome the People, the ensemble’s homage to the 500th anniversary of the Reformation and featured a host of beloved carols that serve as an integral part of Protestant worship to this day.

If there’s one thing that emerged from this concert, it’s that Martin Luther loved Christmas and he loved music. While the Reformation was wringing out the ritual excesses of the late medieval church, Luther was working to integrate the simple unison plainsong and complex polyphony of the Catholic Church into his new Protestant liturgy. Luther also brought significant change by giving the congregation an active, musical role in church services through the singing of vernacular psalms, hymns and carols.

The beautifully curated program featured the refined Christmas music of Michael Praetorius (1571-1621) as well as compositions by Luther himself, including Veni, Redemptor gentium and Von Himmel hoch, which he wrote for his family’s Christmas Eve devotions.

The concert also included works by among others, Johann Rosenmuller, Johann Walter, Johann Eccard, Hans Leo Hassler, Christoph Bernhard, Leon Paminger and Adam Gumpelzhaimer, all grappling with different ways of incorporating Italian musical forms into a Protestant liturgical design.

There was sheer pleasure in the graceful melodies and interesting harmonies. The alternation of Latin and German texts and sophisticated and common musical forms engaged listeners on a variety of levels.

The performance was everything you would expect from the musicians of one of the world’s greatest interpreters of Renaissance music. Intonation was flawless, the blend superb and the phrasing eminently convincing.

Guest soloist Jessica Beebe contributed a soprano that was tonally pure throughout its range, applying it with the assurance of an artist fully cognizant of the demands of the music.

See www.piffaro.org.