MAGIC VALLEY SYMPHONY
2015-16 SEASON
FAMILY MATTERS
S U N D A Y • O C T O B E R 1 1 , 2 0 1 5 • 4 : 0 0 p. m .
FIVE METRIC DANCES
by Randy Earles (1952 - )
The initial inspiration for Five Metric Dances came while attending a Baroque
Festival at Idaho State University a few years ago. Suites of dances were very
popular in the Baroque era (1600-1750). I started thinking about how to write a
modern suite of symphonic dances that would have the variety of meters and tempi
found in a Baroque suite, but without trying to write specific dances. After all, how
many people nowadays know how to dance an allemande or a courante?
Meters in music are notated by time signatures that indicate how many beats
are in each measure. Many suites begin with a prelude, so I chose to write a prelude
with a quick tempo that would feel like one beat in each measure, hence the title
“Prelude in One”. The next three dances successively have two, three, and four beats
to a measure. Musicians call these duple, triple, and quadruple meters.
The “Slow Dance in Triple Meter” is the closest to an actual dance, since I used
some characteristics of the Baroque sarabande in the melody. Since most popular
music is written in quadruple meter, I intentionally used a 12/8 time signature instead
of the more common 4/4 for the fourth dance, in order to avoid sounding too much
like a pop song. I also wrote a fugue section for the middle, which is not found in
pop music! The finale uses quintuple meter, which is not common in dances. It gave
me an opportunity to write a festive dance with a Latin tinge to close the set.
—Randy Earles
Like a favorite uncle, RANDY EARLES– active as a composer, arranger,
teacher, and performer– has become MVS extended family. During Maestro Hadley’s
tenure, Dr. Earles has capably judged the Youth Soloist auditions, favored us with his
Oklahoma Elegy in 2007, and once even filled an emergency vacancy in the trumpet
section.
Prior to this year’s work for the Magic Valley Symphony, he had been
commissioned to write original compositions for organizations like the Idaho
International Choral Festival, the Idaho Department of Education, and the Twin Falls
Municipal Band. His works have been performed by Army and Navy bands, and
concert bands around the world.
As a trumpet player he has performed a wide variety of music, with shows
ranging from Roy Clark to the Houston Symphony Orchestra. In musical theatre he
has been an actor/singer on stage, a trumpet player in the pit orchestra, an orchestra
conductor, and a music arranger. His musical activities have taken him to 48 states
and several Canadian provinces. Dr. Earles has been the Associate Dean for Fine
Arts & Humanities at Idaho State University since 2010. Previously, he served as
the Chair of the ISU Music Department for nine years. He holds a doctoral degree
in music composition from the University of Oklahoma, and holds undergraduate and
graduate degrees in music composition from the University of Houston.
THE ALCOTTS
by Charles Ives (1874 - 1954)
As in some family relationships, music is not always sweetly harmonious.
Consider the works of Charles Ives. As the son of a town bandmaster given to
experimentation in polytonality and acoustics, Ives’ musical sensibilities were
stretched early and often. His talent as a musician soon became apparent, and by age
14 he had become the youngest salaried church organist in Connecticut.
At the same time, Ives’ compositions were exploiting the limits of known
music with the same determination today’s teenager explores the limits of his iPhone- defying musical conventions, celebrating dissonance, even composing works in
two or more simultaneous keys or meters. While he retained a fondness for the
vernacular, the traditional hymns, the camp meetings, the sentimental songs and
familiar marches of his youth, Ives relished the opportunity to improvise take-offs.
The theme and variation was his standard operating procedure. His church was his
stage. His talent was enormous: Yankee ingenuity meets rebellious youth.
Committing the music to notes on paper stifled development and was to be avoided.
Lasting success and renown might have been possible if Ives had just not kept his
audiences constantly on the ragged edges of musical comfort. His father’s counsel
that “every dissonance doesn’t have to resolve, if it doesn’t happen to feel like it, any
more than every horse should have to have its tail bobbed just because it’s the
prevailing fashion” persisted as a musical legacy. Ives came to call his unaccepting
audience, “sissy ears.”
“The Alcotts,” a reference to the family of author Louisa May Alcott, appeared
first as one of four movements in what is now known as his Piano Sonata No. 2 (the
“Concord Sonata”). It was to be, as described by Ives, an "impression of the spirit of
transcendentalism that is associated in the minds of many with Concord,
Massachusetts of over a half century ago. This is undertaken in impressionistic
pictures of Emerson and Thoreau, a sketch of the Alcotts, and a scherzo supposed to
reflect a lighter quality which is often found in the fantastic side of Hawthorne." In
the Alcott homage to domestic life– where family harmony may not be as tranquil as
it appears to others– Ives indulges his tendency to quote from familiar works; the
listener can imagine the Alcotts enjoying Beethoven. The musicians on stage may be
less joyful, grappling with unusual harmonies, arbitrary barlines, and time signatures
such as 4½ over 4.
Ives had graduated Yale in 1898 with a poor academic record, an appetite for
even more radical experimentation in music, and enough common sense to seek
paying work. In time he became so successful in the insurance industry that he is
called the “father of estate planning.” He continued to compose, refusing to copyright
his work and customarily giving it away. He sought no recognition for his work and
turned his back on the established world of music, a favor returned then and since.
F R I D A Y • N O V E M B E R 2 0, 2 0 1 5 • 7 : 3 0 p. m.
JOHN and MARGE COLEMAN married in 1953, sharing among other things
a love of music. Marge had participated in school music programs and John had been
raised by a classically trained soprano mother who performed throughout her life.
They settled in Twin Falls, where John built a highly-respected law practice. By and
by, Sue (Miller) was born, then Kathy (Harris), John, Diane (Peterson), and lastly
David.
Kathy recalls that the first piano arrived when Sue was only 6 and Marge
started with Teala Bellini what became a lifetime of piano lessons. As a young
mother, she would practice late into the night after the children’s bedtime. She taught
Sue to play “Chopsticks” and “Peter, Peter, Pumpkin Eater,” but when Sue took to
playing them endlessly, piano lessons for Sue were arranged so that she could learn
to play something else. Sue thanked the family with great enthusiasm and a habit of
practicing at 6 a.m. About then, John started to leave early for the office.
When Kathy was just 5, Julienne Slaughter suggested an experimental group
of Suzuki Method violin lessons, new to the U.S. back then. Thus began the Coleman
family violin tradition with Sue starting violin in the school orchestra, and Diane at
age 4. Continues Kathy, “Practicing was a given at our house. It was part of the daily
chores. At age 10 I practiced piano before school and violin after school. One
morning I told Mom I wanted to quit piano lessons because I was tired of practicing.
Mom’s reply: ‘Well, you can quit lessons, but you will still need to get up early and
you can clean house instead.’ I decided I would rather practice than clean bathrooms.”
And, there were rewards. Diane remembers Baskin-Robbins treats coming home from
lessons.
The Coleman family thrived on music. Marge taught piano for over 40 years
until her death in December of 2012, numbering among her many students 18
grandchildren. Family and friends were treated to impromptu recitals, and there were
the Sunday evening programs for Dad, family reunion concerts, Christmas Eve
programs, and a family string orchestra at Marge’s funeral. John, the silent but
indispensable partner in the music enterprise, faithfully attended concerts and recitals
and generously funded years of lessons, music camps, and quality instruments. David
and son John, who chose to discontinue lessons, have been willing cheerleaders,
and have encouraged music in their own homes.
Today, among the five children and 26 living grandchildren of John and Marge
Coleman, one finds 10 music teachers, 23 pianists, 11 violinists, 1 violist, 2 cellists,
1 bassist, 3 drummers, 2 organists, 2 electric bass players, 2 trumpet players, 1 French
horn player, 5 trained vocalists, and all love to sing. Three grandchildren present solo
appearances tonight. And Kathy? She performed with Magic Valley Symphony
through high school and for about the last fifteen years in addition to managing the
Magic Valley Youth Orchestra for the last nine years.
AARON MILLER, with double bass experience in jazz and classical,
contemporary and popular, chamber and solo-- performs with an energy and
enthusiasm that is palpable. Starting in 2007, he joined the faculty of Brigham Young
University-Idaho where he directs the double bass studio and the jazz combos
program, and has devoted the past 3 years to completing his doctoral degree from
Northwestern University where he studied with Andrew Raciti. As an advocate for
new music, Miller recently commissioned and premiered four new works for the
double bass that feature improvisation as an essential element, and presents for our
audience the Concerto for Double Bass & String Orchestra, Movement 3, of the
internationally acclaimed contemporary Serbian composer Živojin Glišic.
ANGELA MILLER began playing the viola in the public school music
program in Twin Falls and continued at Brigham Young University, earning her
Bachelors degree in viola performance in 2010, highlighted by a residency at the
Paris Conservatory of Music. She then relocated to Santa Barbara, California to
pursue graduate studies with world famous viola soloist Helen Callus, receiving her
Masters in Music from UC Santa Barbara in 2014, and continuing doctorate studies.
The Santa Barbara music community has come to know her as an educator and
freelance artist, and she is currently recording her first album of contemporary solo
viola music including her own compositions based on hymn and folk tunes. Her Flos
Campi (Latin for “flowers of the field”) fits that aesthetic. The six-movement suite
for viola and wordless choir recalls much more, according to a program note written
by composer Ralph Vaughan Williams, than “buttercups and daisies.”
JENETE ST. CLAIR graduated with a Bachelors degree in Voice and Cello
Performance from Utah State University, where she studied with Anne Francis of the
Fry Street Quartet. After moving to Maryland in 2008 she became a member of the
Prince George’s Philharmonic, the DC Temple Orchestra, and is currently the cellist
for the Southern Maryland String Quartet. She has enjoyed performing with the Jenny
Oaks Baker Orchestra, the Pink Floyd Symphonic Orchestra, and the Mormon Choir
of Washington D.C. at the Strathmore. Jenete is active with the local community
theater Port Tobacco Players, performing as Cinderella in “Into the Woods,” Maria
in “Sound of Music,” and Polly in “Crazy for You.” Currently she has a private cello
and voice studio in Maryland where she enjoys teaching, gardening, and spending
time with her family. The contemporary arias from Broadway are favorites that come
alive through her classical training, as in her performance of “Voi che sapete” from
Mozart’s opera buffa The Marriage of Figaro, where Cherubino (an adolescent boy
whose part is traditionally sung by a female) professes his love for Susanna, singing
“You Know What Love Is.”
SYMPHONY NO. 3 IN C MINOR, WITH ORGAN AND TWO PIANOS
by Camille Saint-Saëns (1835 - 1921)
Some would have happily written off the young Camille Saint-Saëns as not
quite part of the musical family. He had earned respect as a prodigy at the piano, and
Franz Liszt had pronounced him “the world’s greatest organist.” But as a composer
he revered
“art for art’s sake,” disdaining the emotionalism of the fashionable Romantic style in
favor of a quintessentially French elegance, style, and wit. He was outspoken and
brash and perennially at odds with the moving forces in the lively world of
19th century French music.
As Saint-Saëns approached the sixth decade of his life and contemplated the
showpiece for organ his third symphony could be,
had he mellowed and settled into the musical mainstream? For starters, the organ
would be neither the “one-man orchestra” nor even the featured soloist as in the
highly regarded organ symphonies of his contemporaries. It would be something as
revolutionary and outspoken as his youthful opinions. It would have the four
movements needed to qualify as a traditional symphony; but . . wait: maybe it should
sound like just two. And, would it be OK to plunge into that maudlin emotionalism
everyone confuses with art, or just take a 4-note ascending motif and see how many
forms it can take in the cyclic technique he learned from Liszt? Imagine the audience
of the 1886 Paris premiere under the baton of the composer. What kind of “organ
symphony” must they have expected from the world’s greatest organist, this
unorthodox composer?
Adagio - Allegro moderato. Awaiting the entry of the powerful organ. Why
such a mysterious C minor introduction? Still, how charming that the violins
are dancing and laughing and spinning such enchanting melodies and themes.
But where is the organ?
Poco adagio - Will this be the Big Entrance for the organ? A lush and lyrical
melody in the strings extends the suspense, making the wait almost
worthwhile. But enough of that thematic transformation of those four notes,
here comes the organ– finally– and the orchestra can relax in the comfort of
those sustained low notes, in an awesome if understated serenity.
Allegro moderato - Presto. Suddenly animated strings break the spell and the
orchestra busies itself in more thematic evolution à la scherzo without the
organ. Is that it? Sparkling pianistics fill the void, rekindling organ
expectancy. The entire orchestra is in motion. Surely the organ will join in.
Suspense builds, then dwindles. The quiet itself is intense.
Maestoso - Allegro. So now it explodes. All the forces quietly brewing unleash
a majestic impact, the themes so long in development effervesce suddenly in
a rich and full-bodied and technicolor sonority, an entire orchestra straining to
keep up with the mighty organ in a romp that brings the audience, breathless,
to a triumphant C major finale.
Saint-Saëns may have surprised even himself with this work lauded as one of
the most important French orchestral works from the 19th century. The composer
explained only that he had “given everything I was able to give.”
F R I D A Y • F E B R U A R Y 2 6, 2 0 1 6 • 7 : 3 0 p. m.
THE MAGIC VALLEY SYMPHONY salutes the College of Southern Idaho
for their fifty fruitful years of academic and vocational education. Without CSI, the
Magic Valley area would be a hard-to- imagine pale shadow of its present self.
Throughout its entire history, our CSI family has played an essential role in the
success of the Symphony, strong evidence of the commitment of CSI to arts and
culture. We are grateful beyond words for the comfortable rehearsal space, the
functional library facility, the post-concert reception area, and the instrument sharing
generously provided at no charge by CSI, and then there is our modern and spacious
performance venue: the Fine Arts Auditorium.
In gratitude, the Symphony welcomes this concert opportunity to feature the
CSI Music Department faculty, and remind our audience that they are so much more
than capable educators: they perform, they compose, they innovate, and they create
a rich environment for the enjoyment of all kinds of music here in Twin Falls.
This concert is sponsored by STEPHAN, KVANVIG, STONE & TRAINOR,
a full-service lawfirm serving the good people of the Magic Valley area for over 100
years with quality legal services and a commitment to community involvement
exemplified by the present service of partner, Laird B. Stone, on the CSI Board of
Trustees.
EAGLE CELEBRATION OVERTURE
by George Halsell (1956 - )
The Eagle Celebration Overture was commissioned by the Magic Valley
Symphony, and written to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the founding of the
College of Southern Idaho. The work opens with a rousing statement in the horns,
setting a festive tone, before the orchestra settles into an unexpectedly quiet
celebration as a solo flute offers a gentle melody accompanied by the strings. The
clarinet soon picks up this theme, then leads the listener into an interlude in which
more and more sections of the orchestra join, adding piquant dissonances that crackle
with anticipation. This tension is released when the theme returns in an exciting,
exultant statement.
The celebration soon gives way to a lyrical woodwind melody over a moving
string accompaniment. This theme is then handed over to the violins, who are soon
after joined by other sections of the orchestra, as they work the melody out among
themselves. The orchestra eventually agrees on a conclusion for this lyrical theme,
but after a brief quote of our opening idea, dissension soon arises, as the first violins
steal the first interlude's accompaniment and turn it into the opening of a fugue. The
violas, cellos and basses snatch this theme away in turn, then the woodwinds, and
later the brass, join in the fray. Tension and excitement begin to build once again as
each new line clashes with the others. Ultimately the opening themes return to assert
themselves, put the arguments to rest once and for all, and unite the orchestra in
celebration. If one listens very carefully, hints of the CSI Fight Song can even be
heard as well, weaving in and out of the final festivities, as the piece rushes to a
joyous finish.
–George Halsell
DR. GEORGE K. HALSELL, a native of Bryan, Texas, earned his
undergraduate degree in bass trombone performance from the Peabody Conservatory
of the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, and his Masters and
Doctorate of Musical Arts degrees, also in trombone performance, from The
University of Texas at Austin. He also attended graduate school at the University of
Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. He has performed with ensembles
ranging from the Baltimore Symphony and the Baltimore Opera Orchestra to bands
for Diana Ross, the Temptations, and the Ringling Brothers, Barnum and Bailey
Circus.
As a composer, Dr. Halsell first distinguished himself by composing a work
that was premiered by the Baltimore Chamber Orchestra in 1988. After joining the
College of Southern Idaho music faculty in 1974, he composed several marches for
the CSI Symphonic Band and the Twin Falls Municipal Band, and the acclaimed
Symphony in Five Episodes, commissioned by the Magic Valley Symphony in
celebration of our 50th anniversary.
In 2010 Dr. Halsell was honored with the Governor’s Award for Excellence in
the Arts. He continues a full-time schedule of teaching, conducts the CSI Symphonic
Band, and regularly performs with Twin Falls Municipal Band and the Symphony.
LINCOLN PORTRAIT
by Aaron Copland (1900 - 1990)
What genius brings a Brooklyn-born son of Lithuanian/Polish Jewish
immigrants to compose music that embraces the expanse of American lands and the
diversity of the American people? Aaron Copland, schooled in the nationalism of late
19th century music, endeavored to define an “American sound” as indigenous and
recognizable to us as Mussorgsky and Stravinsky are Russian. That Copland did it
with such austerity of notation and untried harmonies only begins to describe that
genius. But, without an audience clamoring for another great symphony, he was
forced to find other media. Eight film scores, two operas, six ballets, countless
special occasions, one Oscar, one Pulitzer Prize, one Medal of Freedom, and a long
list of prestigious honors later, we had our American sound.
The America of 1942 was in crisis. Pearl Harbor had just been bombed, and the
public was unified in the war effort. Conductor André Kostelanetz mobilized his art
in the service of the public spirit, proposing a series of three musical portraits of
American heroes, and inviting the contribution of the creator of the American sound.
The assignment was to illustrate the “qualities of courage, dignity, strength,
simplicity, and humor, which are so characteristic of the American people.” For
Copland, they settled on Abraham Lincoln, a subject admittedly daunting, but in his
words, “inevitable . . . with the voice of Lincoln to help me I was ready to risk the
impossible.”
Copland explained his Lincoln Portrait in three parts. First, “I wanted to
suggest something of the mysterious sense of fatality that surrounds Lincoln's
personality. Also, near the end of that section, something of his gentleness and
simplicity of spirit.” The hauntingly beautiful Civil War song called “Springfield
Mountain” is introduced by the clarinet. Then the background of the times in which
Lincoln lived are sketched in the middle section. The familiar “Camptown Races”
of Stephen Foster is heard. In the climax, “Springfield Mountain” is powerfully
transformed as Copland’s music frames Lincoln’s words in a call to action, a
meditation on democracy, and a remembrance of those who died to protect it.
S A T U R D A Y • A P R I L 3 0 , 2 0 1 6 • 7 : 3 0 p. m.
REMEMBERING ROGER VINCENT
Twin Falls, Idaho, devoid of natural water out on the remote high desert, could
have been equally devoid of live music worth the listening– had it not been for the
efforts as early as the beginnings of the town, of some memorable individuals. Meet
Roger Vincent.
Roger grew up on the family homestead near Filer and remembered being
introduced to music performance with a few lessons by an itinerant violin teacher.
He learned clarinet in the school band so well that, when drafted into World War II,
he landed a post in an Army band. When he returned from the service he headed to
the University of Idaho choosing, as a matter of practicality, a major in agriculture.
There he also studied voice and soloed with the Vandaleers, but he was called home
to the family farm when his father fell ill. To his parents he was “the singing farmer,”
and Roger smiled.
While managing the family farm, Roger found time to also manage his popular
dance band and direct the Methodist Church choirs in Filer and Twin Falls. By and
by, when Marty Mead arrived, they entertained the community with regular duet
performances. Margaret Vincent, Roger’s faithful partner from the age of 17, was at
the piano. As Roger and Margaret’s family grew, so did the family commitment to
music. The children report falling asleep to “Chopin and Rachmaninoff and Dad and
Marty and Mom at the piano.” In time, there would be Laura, Jo, Janie, Carol, son
Roger, and Susie, all musicians in their own right.
Before long, Roger was sought out to sing the male lead in Carousel, and
signed on to Marty’s “crazy dream” to build a large community performance venue,
serving on the first committee to raise funds to build the Fine Arts Auditorium. (Thus
was born the Dilettantes of Twin Falls– and the Carousel pit orchestra became Magic
Valley Symphony). When the Twin Falls Music Club wanted to stage Handel’s
Messiah and it became apparent that the community really needed a full adult
chorale, Roger organized it and directed it for five years. With Margaret, he founded
the Northwest Opera.
But it didn’t stop there. While operating a 250-head dairy by day, Roger was
performing with the Boise Philharmonic and traveling 37 states through seven
Community Concert seasons with the Chicago “Serenaders.” For Margaret,
managing the six kids and 250 cows back home was a normal day’s work. For Roger,
lead roles with Dilettantes became frequent. Practice absorbed one to two hours of
every day. Daughter Janie remembers riding up the Bliss grade in the cattle truck
rehearsing lines with her Dad and adds, “He never sat and studied.” The neighbors
were amused to hear Roger outside singing to his crops and his cattle.
Margaret had taught all six children to play the piano. Then, when the children
were grown, Roger turned the tables and insisted that Margaret “finish” her musical
dream. For two years Margaret lived in Boise to complete her BSU degrees. Roger
would fly in for a lesson in the middle of the week and fend for himself on the farm
for the rest. Margaret retired from the CSI Department of Music faculty, having
carried the piano performance program and having created the piano pedagogy
program, after ten years. Her children describe her as a “teacher to the core,” taking
special satisfaction in mentoring other piano teachers.
Roger continued to sing even after suffering a stroke, and only very unwillingly
gave up his avocation. After he was gone, Margaret found in his desk, kept close, a
copy of this quote from Victor Hugo:
“Music expresses that which cannot be said
and on which it is impossible to be silent”
program notes by
Paula Brown Sinclair
©2015 Magic Valley Symphony Orchestra, Inc.