Deborah Voigt is the featured soloist in two songs by Mahler and a major work for Soprano, chorus and organ by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy. Music Director Judith Clurman, has programmed a concert of sublime beauty and one that explores the ways three Jewish composers reconcile assimilation with their musical patrimony.
Felix Mendelssohn father, Abraham Mendelssohn, converted the family to Lutheranism when Felix was a boy. Abraham Mendelssohn changed the family to Bartholdy. Although he grew up a Christian, and remained a Christian, Felix Bartholdy took back the name of his paternal grandfather Moses Mendelssohn the famous philosopher and scholar.
The concert will feature a Mendelssohn Bartholdy piano trio and several choral works culminating in the magnificent Hear my Prayer for Soprano, eight-part choir and organ. Mendelssohn wrote two well known oratorios, Elijah and St. Paul, but he also wrote a great deal of music for liturgical use, most of it is little known but it represents a significant part of his total body of work. Hear my Prayer and Ave Maria represent the most well know works of the genre.
Ms. Voigt also sings two of Mahler's songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn (“The Boy's Magic Horn“), taken from a volume of German folk songs collected in the eighteenth century.
The first song is “Das irdische Leben” (The Earthly Life) a chilling song about the slow death of a staving child whose mother is not prepared to give the child the bread he cries for until the harvest cycle is finished and the grain tuned into bread.
“Das himmlische Leben” (The Heavenly Life) is the naive childlike view of Heaven, where the Saints do all sorts of menial tasks so we can have endless food and drink. The song preoccupied Mahler for years propelling the composition of his Third and eventually his Forth Symphony, Mahler finally made the orchestrated version of the song the last movement of the Forth Symphony. Here the two songs are in the original Wunderhorn form of voice accompanied by piano.
It was around the time of the Third Symphony that Mahler left Judaism and converted to Catholicism. Of the many forces that drove and tortured Mahler, the question of why Mahler converted has never been successfully answered, was it a matter of professional advancement, or a spiritual decision?
Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco was an important composer and performer in Italy during the twenties and thirties, who identified with his heritage and country. Early in the 1930's Castelnuovo-Tedesco understood the deteriorating situation of the Jews in Italy; in 1938, after being blacklisted by the Fascist Government, Castelnuovo-Tedesco appealed to Toscanini for sponsorship so that he and his family could immigrate to the US. With Toscanini's assistance Castelnuovo-Tedesco arrived in New York City in 1939, and soon like other European composers in exile, went to California to write music for Hollywood. In addition to his importance as a composer of film scores, Castelnuovo-Tedesco is recognized as one of the most important composition teachers of his generation, influencing leading film music composers of the 50's and 60's, including Andre Previn, John Williams, and Henry Mancini.
Castelnuovo-Tedesco has a large and broad output, including a violin concerto commissioned by Heifetz, orchestral works, chamber music, he is particularly associated with music for the guitar. Castelnuovo-Tedesco composed a large number of choral settings, solo songs, and other vocal pieces. A preponderance of his works have either Jewish references or thematic material.
One of the works on the program, Preludi per organo sopra un tema di Bruto Senigaglia for Organ, is based on thematic material that was originally composed by Castelnuovo-Tedesco's grandfather. Found many years after the grandfather's death, the themes and their significance changed the young Castelnuovo-Tedesco reenforcing his desire to promote his heritage
Grappling with their Heritage: Music of Mendelssohn, Mahler and Castelnuovo-Tedesco
Deborah Voigt, Soprano • Brian Zeger, Piano
The Claremont Trio:
Emily Bruskin, Violin • Julia Bruskin, Cello
Donna Kwong, Piano
Festival Singers, Judith Clurman, Conductor
Colin Fowler, Organ
Martin Bookspan, Concert Commentator
Works by Castelnuovo-Tedesco:
Preludi per organo sopra un tema di Bruto Senigaglia for Organ
Piano Trio No. 2 in G
Baruch Haba B'Sheim Adonai, for Chorus
Works by Gustav Mahler:
Das irdische Leben
Das himmlische Leben
Works by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy:
Zum Abendsegen
Jauchzet dem Herrn, alle Welt, Opus 60, Nr. 2
Hear My Prayer, for Soprano, Chorus and Organ
Piano Trio in d minor, Opus 49
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