music

A celebration of Sonic Harvest’s 15th year

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Part of the joy of living in the Bay Area, aside from the expansively gorgeous weather even under the specter of drought and climate change, is the vast range of opportunities in the arts. This is especially true in music and in vocal music in particular. We have access to many of the top globally recognized singers – both operatic and popular – in splendid productions. And alongside them are the excellent musicians, who live locally, that support those events and make possible the Bay Area’s world-class level of music.

In their spare time, these musicians do their own thing.

And that own thing is wildly diverse, imaginative and beautifully realized. It occurs, for instance, in the work of Composers, Inc. and Cal Performances current program Berkeley RADICAL. It is both individually and institutionally supported. There are so many of these events that it’s hard to keep track of the many series and performances, much less attend them all.

Numbered among these numerous small and fleeting events is the Sonic Harvest, which celebrated its 15th anniversary this past October 18. The brainchild of composers Allen Shearer and Peter Josheff, this annual celebration of new vocal music began as the Harvest of Song, an opportunity to present, in intimate concert, mostly vocal composition by Shearer, Josheff and friends. It showcased some of the Bay Area’s best new music instrumentalists and vocalists.

Over the years the name, venue and personnel have shifted, but an intrinsic commitment to vocal music composition has remained intact. Today the contributing composers include Ann Callaway and Claudia Stevens. This year’s concert was held at the Northbrae Community Church in Berkeley.

The advantage of a series that lasts over time is that it provides a testing ground for new work that then is developed. Josheff, Callaway, Shearer and Stevens have all presented arias and scenes from longer works. In 2009 Shearer’s chamber opera The Dawn Makers, with libretto by Claudia Stevens, premiered at Herbst Theatre in a stylish production by Composers, Inc. The Dawn Makers, based on the myth of the dawn goddess Eos and the Trojan warrior Tithonos, was a finalist in the National Opera Association’s 2015 Dominick Argento Chamber Opera Competition.

At this year’s Sonic Harvest, Josheff presented his piece for piccolo, “Big Brother” (2014). Written for the Bay Area’s most wonderful flute player, Tod Brody, the piece emphasizes the lower register of instrument. No eardrum piercings here, rather a mind-boggling series of breathless runs. Hey, there’s a lack of rests, but Bach’s flute pieces are notable for the same. They require a virtuoso flutist.

Spanish loomed large with poetry by Lorca and Neruda set by Allan Crossman and Shearer. Crossman’s was in translation, and sung with delicate feeling by bass Richard Mix, accompanied by Kate Campbell who creates magic on the piano. Crossman’s two earlier pieces from the 1970s were combined with a 2014 setting of a poem by Louis Phillips in a neat set of short songs. Shearer sang his own tango-esque setting  (2015) for Neruda’s passionate “No estés lejos de mí” with Claudia Stevens accompanying on piano.

Later on Shearer presented a series of his 2015 settings from Mekeel Mcbride’s Stories Wind Told to Grass. Hauntingly sung with faultless diction by mezzo Christine Abraham, accompanied by Tod Brody, flute, Jean-Michel Fonteneau, cello and Jeffrey Sykes, piano. Perhaps in keeping with the season, the songs carried a whimsical and gothic air, a sensibility Shearer seems to delight in.

Stevens presented a set of witty piano pieces, each a tribute to one of her renowned piano teachers, including Aaron Copland (“I could do something with that”); Arie Vardi  (“Butterfly like a bulldozer”); Leon Fleisher (“Have the courage to wait”) and Leonard Shure (“Lead, don’t fall!”). She quoted not only the fragments from Beethoven and Chopin that are the piano student’s staple, but also the teacher’s comments, disguised as titles, shouting them out from the piano bench, while coursing through the language of the piano.

The program closed with performances by Voci, the East Bay women’s chorus directed by Anne Hege. The first of Henry Purcell, composer Ann Callaway’s setting of Gerard Manley Hopkins’ tribute to the English composer. Like Hopkins’ unique sprung rhythms, Callaway’s setting was complex and scintillating – beginning with a series of breaths that recalled wind, or inspiration, the metaphoric persona of inhalation.

Hege had reworked an earlier piece, “Like Roots”, into a choral piece that uses “tethers” and electronic music. The piece is from a larger work, The Body is NOT a Machine. While the larger group vocalized and intoned, two singers accompanied the chorus and themselves by moving their arms to stretch and loosen tethers. Each movement created a sound in response.

A fascinating and diverse showcase of work. They’ll be back next year. Be sure to catch them.


– Jaime Robles 

 

Photo: Allen Shearer