Thursday, June 1, 2017 8:00 p.m Ian Hosack Graduate Recital DePaul Concert Hall 800 West Belden Avenue Chicago
Thursday, June 1, 2017 8:00 p.m. DePaul Concert Hall PROGRAM Ian Hosack, baritone Graduate Recital Laura Adkins, oboe Erica Jacob-Perkins, violin Hannah Cartwright, violin Aleksa Kuzma, viola David Sands, cello Jason Moy, organ Dr. Nicholas Hutchinson, piano Johann S. Bach (1685-1750) Ich habe genug, BWV 82 (1727) Aria: Ich habe genug... Recitative: Ich habe genug. Mein Trost ist nur allein... Aria: Schlummert ein, uhr maten Augen Recitative: Mein Gott! Wenn kömmt das schöne: Nun!.. Aria: Ich freue mich auf meinen Tod... Laura Adkins, oboe Erica Jacob-Perkins, violin Hannah Cartwright, violin Aleksa Kuzma, viola David Sands, cello Jason Moy, organ Franz Schubert (1797-1828) Drei Gesänge, D. 902 (1827) L incanto degli occhio Il traditor deluso Il modo prender Dr. Nicholas Hutchinson, piano
Ian Hosack June 1, 2017 Program Samuel Barber (1910-1981) Dover Beach (1931) Laura Adkins, oboe Erica Jacob-Perkins, violin Hannah Cartwright, violin Aleksa Kuzma, viola David Sands, cello Maurice Ravel (1874-1937) Don Quichotte à Dulcinée (1932) Chanson romanesque Chanson épique Chanson à boire Dr. Nicholas Hutchinson, piano Ian Hosack is from the studio of David Alt. This recital is presented in partial fulfillment of the degree Master of Music. As a courtesy to those around you, please silence all cell phones and other electronic devices. Flash photography is not permitted. Thank you.
Ian Hosack June 1, 2017 PROGRAM NOTES Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) Ich habe genug, BWV 82 (1727) Duration: 22 minutes It seems incomprehensible to us now when we learn that in his own lifetime, the genius of Bach s compositions was not widely appreciated. Even his fame as an organist did not impress the committee at the Thomaskirche of Leipzig where, though he obtained a post as cantor, he was hardly the favored candidate. The technical proficiency with which Bach built music is thoughtful and symmetrical, and imbued with an equal and complementary sense of art. In listening to Bach s music, there is an honesty deriving from a love for his work not fueled by something as artificial as fame. Bach sought to master and perfectly sharpen the tools available to him, focusing little on the (then rather new) sonata form, and viewing opera as a social frivolity. We can hear in Cantata BWV 82 the humanity his text setting can bring to light. Bach finds the yearning that can come with resolution, and gives voice to just how various and seemingly contradictory those yearnings can be. The verses from the gospel of Luke clearly reference an end to life, which seems out of place for the feast of the purification of the Virgin Mary. This feast day is to celebrate Mary taking her newborn son to the temple for the purification ceremony, where Jesus was to be blessed by the holy man Simeon so as to fulfill the law. In the account in the gospel of Luke, Simeon has been visited by the Holy Spirit and told that he would not die until he had blessed the Emmanuel, or Messiah. Using Martin Luther s translation of the bible, Bach creates an emotionally evocative performance that highlights the ecstasy in the promise of death after a life that has fulfilled its destiny. Franz Schubert (1797-1828) Drei Gesänge, D. 902 (1827) Duration: 10 minutes Of all the canonic Viennese composers, Schubert is the only true native of Vienna, and rightfully a gatekeeper of style for what was and would be the Viennese sound. I programmed this set of songs just because I love them and they make me happy, and through that love I discovered a great deal of who Schubert was as a composer of song. Written for the Italian bass Luigi Lablache, who received fame for his interpretation of comic opera roles, each song is a harkening back to the traditional
Ian Hosack June 1, 2017 Program Notes forms of Opera Seria. While Schubert is known for the unique talent he developed for delivering German poetry, there is no doubt his classical sensibilities and text setting began with his study with the Italian master composer Antonio Salieri. The three songs, set to Italian texts, vary in mood and purpose, as the sources are three different works by Metastasio, though the third piece is possibly from a different poet. Written in the style of Italian arias, these pieces bridge Schubert s stylistic sensibilities from his past with Salieri to his present experience setting poetry in lieder. Composed in remarkable proximity to Winterreise D. 911, these three Italianate gems represent the more jovial and lively Schubert. During this period of time, Schubert began to suffer from long bouts of headaches and other symptoms related to his illness, syphilis. While Winterreise has the reputation of being the work that brought Schubert to the end of his life, these three Italian songs, composed within the same period, brightly contrast the dour mood of the more famous cycle. I hope you enjoy this venture from lovesickness, to anxiety, to blissfully ignorant sexism to conclude the first portion of my program. Samuel Barber (1910-1981) Dover Beach (1931) Duration: 9 minutes Even with music originating within our own borders, it can be easy to feel removed from the people who created it. I remember distinctly when I came to the realization that music was, and is, written by real people who exist in the same universe as the rest of us. In 2007, I was invited to sit in on my friend Carlton Ford s lesson with Richard Stilwell. Carlton brought me into the studio space that overlooked Lake Michigan and the sleeping Buckingham fountain. When Professor Stilwell arrived, he sadly announced that Gian-Carlo Menotti had passed. Menotti, in addition to being a prolific and famed composer in his own right, was also, as most music undergraduates know well, Samuel Barber s long-time lover. It was as Professor Stilwell took time to mourn his mentor and friend that these figures became very real people to me, and their presence in my own musical lineage was felt very closely. Dover Beach was originally composed for Barber s own voice, described as a naturally beautiful voice after his first sung performance of the piece. He takes Matthew Arnold s words, which express concern for his generation inheriting the world in the state it was in after the Great War, with people divided throughout
Ian Hosack June 1, 2017 Program Notes Europe and beyond. That divide is represented in the text by the waters separating Arnold s home country of England from the neighboring France. This sentiment of separation in close proximity is deeply felt in our community today, where we see such coarse exchanges happening in opinion and politics, in art and thought and ideology. In Dover Beach, as Arnold looks over the moving waters, he is reminded of Sophocles pondering the turbid ebb and flow of human misery, the human condition, which is shared by everyone in this room. Maurice Ravel (1874-1937) Don Quichotte à Dulcinée (1932) Duration: 7 minutes Commissioned in 1931 by G. W. Pabst to accompany a cinematic telling of the Don Quixote story, Ravel began to work on what would be his final composition. Plagued by Pick s Disease, a neurological condition that periodically and with increasing severity robbed Ravel of his fine motor control and memory, he would eventually be released from the contract, which was taken over by Jacques Ibert. This is perhaps a fitting real-life scenario to accompany the trials of the delusional Don Quixote, in which the humor inherent in the tale plays second fiddle to Don Quixote s humanity. Ravel s work is based on the 1605 Spanish story by Miguel de Cervantes, The history of the valorous and wittie Knight-Errant Don-Quixote of the Mancha, which chronicles the activities of an elderly man who, after reading too many chivalric tales of knights, delusionally believes himself to be one. In Ravel s setting, each of the three songs are told from the point of view of Don Quichotte, with only mentions of his squire [Sancho] Pança and love Dulcinée. Don Quichotte views the world in a distorted way, and in the full story Pança and Dulcinée are there to remind the reader of reality, but Ravel only chooses to speak from the titular character s perspective. The world as Don Quichotte sees it is very real and very true from where he sits, and each song is told with an earnest quality, treating him with care and respect, possibly inspired by Ravel s own mental impairment. Notes by Ian Hosack.
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