Narrow Room, Wide Music
Classical music in America has been getting grayer and grayer. Although my wife and I are in our 50’s we sometimes feel like the youth brigade at traditional classical concerts in Greater Boston. Audiences are moving away to retirement destinations, or just plain dying off and the old composers are not attracting enough young listeners.
The Boston Chamber Music Society, which we’ve subscribed to for many years, was recently forced to end its Friday evening concerts at Jordan Hall and fall back on a single Sunday evening concert at the Sanders Theater. A few years ago, sensing their decline, the BCMS issued a questionnaire to their subscribers asking for advice. My wife and I suggested expanding their program material to include more modern and living composers and composers from broader cultural traditions.
Apparently we were out-voted because the program didn’t change. In the years we’ve attended their concerts we’ve heard every major piece written by Brahms, Dvořák, Beethoven, et al. Many times. The BCMS ensemble is second-to-none in their skill and command of this repertoire, and the music is beautiful, but really, enough is enough.
And yet . . . and yet, even as old listeners are dying off, young people are being drawn to the richness and subtlety of this music and are redrawing the map of the music to include the whole world. The New England Conservatory and NPR produce a weekly radio program, From The Top, featuring jaw-dropping talent from teenagers across the US performing both traditional and contemporary classical music. The host of the show, Christopher O’Riley, also gives solo piano concerts, and we attended one in West Palm Beach recently where he interspersed 19th century classical works with his own arrangements of songs by RadioHead.
And around the world small ensembles are gaining audiences and acclaim by widening the box. One of our favorites is the Boston trio, Triple Helix who gave a marvelous concert recently in Groton featuring works by Shostakovich, Bright Sheng, and Piazzolla.
Last night we attended a concert by the Chameleon Arts Ensemble at the Goethe Institut in Boston. The building is in a residential neighborhood on Beacon Street and the auditorium there is a long narrow hall apparently carved out of several living rooms or dining rooms in a row. It features intricate rococo plaster reliefs on all the walls and ceilings, and the floor is flat so only the front rows have a good view.
And it was sweatingly hot. But the reason why it was hot was because it was packed. The seats were filled and more people were seated or standing on the sides or in the doorways. And for the first time in years of classical concerts, my wife and I were among the older people in the room. I never thought it would feel so good to feel old!
The concert was excellent and eclectic. Starting with Schumann’s opus 73 fantasy, it included Pärt’s Spiegel im Spiegel, the world premiere of Zhikr: Songs of Longing by Shirish Korde, (featuring soprano Elizabeth Keusch), Takemitsu’s Rain Spell, and Faure’s opus 45 piano quartet.
In terms of sheer technical virtuosity Chameleon is very good but not quite on the same plane as the BCMS. But they make up for this by not being on the same plain as BCMS either - the program and their performance of it was fresh, exciting and courageous. On Spiegel im Spiegel, which has become a minor hit recently in the classical world, the instruments are left naked and exposed, especially the clarinet, so they have to be perfect. Were they? No, but somehow it didn’t matter and I was completely absorbed by the music.
The hit of the evening was the Korde, and the composer was there to receive the warm, enthusiastic response from the audience. The piece uses 7 instrumentalists and a singer, and features extensive percussion plus a harp. It’s a fresh and engaging work with African, Indian, and western flavors reflecting Korde’s own personal background. When I got home I tried to find him on Rhapsody; I failed but any composer who makes me want to hear more has succeeded at something.
So classical music has a future after all, and I’ve found it in a long, hot, narrow room in Boston.