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Doors Open!
Festival Concert 6
August 24, 2021
Tuesday
One-hour concert at Lincoln Theater
4:00 pm – Socially distanced seating with limited capacity; masks required. Tickets must be purchased in advance.
7:30 pm - General admission / open seating; masks required. Tickets available in advance or at the door.
PROGRAM
Johann Sebastian Bach Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565, trans. Kibbey
Benjamin Britten Suite for Harp, Op. 83
Gabriel Fauré Une châtelaine en sa tour, Op. 110
Isaac Albéniz Granada
Paquito D’Rivera Bandoneon
Samuel Torres Taken
Bridget Kibbey, harp
Artists
Bridget Kibbey, harp
Please note: All ticket sales are nonexchangeable and nonrefundable.
Bridget Kibbey’s performance is sponsored by Ben Harris & Rebecca Mitchell.
This concert is sponsored by Bath Savings Institute.
This concert is dedicated to the memory of Geoff and Betsy Gattis.
PROGRAM NOTES
Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D minor is a work of bold gestures and a rapid succession of ideas unified by a restless, probing mood. The term “toccata” implies “touch” and came to be associated with an opening section of a work where a performer modulated through keys as though in the act of checking intonation—but unlike a prelude, which typically has a unifying pattern, a toccata employs the stylus phantasticus, a capricious changeability that builds up to dramatic holds and silences followed up by starkly contrasting shifts. In the process, the very action of striking the keys (or, on the harp, strings) becomes theatrical, drawing attention to the “touch” that gives the piece its name. Transcriptions of this work have abounded over the past near-century; indeed, the Toccata and Fugue gained its place in the repertoire, famously, through a transcription for orchestra as the opening number of the film Fantasia, which proceeded immediately after a silhouette of the conductor Stokowski shook hands with Mickey Mouse. The fugue subject is uncharacteristically lengthy for Bach, with oscillations between an upper “pedal” note and a melodic descending line. Once the fugue reaches a natural climax, the tempestuous improvisatory spirit takes hold again. In this arrangement for harp, the piece is largely reimagined for a sonic palette which, unlike the mighty organ, is created via a single, resonant piece of wood, colored by fingers and strings instead of multiple sets of pipes.
Une châtelaine en sa tour by Fauré is a fantasie for solo harp published in 1918. The title comes from the second line of a poem by Paul Verlaine (a poem which Fauré had set to music in its entirety some years before). Verlaine was a contemporary of Fauré’s and one of the leading symbolist poets whose work was primarily suggestive, featuring chains of images, and above all paid attention to the music of words, prioritizing the sounds above their overt sense. Another feature of Verlain’s poetry is a vague archaism, evocations of a misty past that persists beneath present encounters. The title itself, “A mistress in her tower,” conjures images of a storybook medieval world of knights and spinning wheels and crusades, a world in which troubadours composed love songs as odes to impossibly distant, high-born ladies, and who sang these songs to the accompaniment of, it comes as no surprise, their own playing on a harp. Fauré’s fantasie is one of the first great works for solo harp, demanding virtuoso skill in the service of a deeply felt but partly repressed feeling. Touches of modality are evocative of past musical practices, and it’s possible that some of the busy figuration is meant to depict the activity of the spinning wheel as the mistress in her tower passes her time in loneliness and longing for her impossible beloved.
Born in Campodrón, Spain in 1860 (making him a contemporary of Mahler and Debussy), Isaac Albéniz was a remarkably gifted pianist who was sent to Madrid Conservatory before he was 10 years old. Apparently, conservatory life did not suit young Albéniz; legend has it that he ran away from home and lived several years as a wanderer, sustaining his existence through his piano playing in such distant places as Buenos Aires and San Francisco, eventually landing in London, and then resuming his musical studies in Leipzig. As a composer, Albéniz, like other nationalist composers of his time, began to publish piano music inspired by the diverse folk music of his homeland, including many works with evocative place names such as Catalonia, Navarra, Sevilla, and Cádiz. Albéniz composed the piece Granada in 1886 during a stay in the town, intrigued by the mixture of native and Moorish (Islamic/Arabic) cultures, writing to a friend:
I live and write a Serenata, romantic to the point of paroxysm and sad to the point of despair, among the aroma of the flowers, the shade of the cypresses, and the snow of the Sierra. I seek now...above all, the heartbreaking lament out of tune. … I want the Arabic Granada, that which is all art, which is all that seems to me beauty and emotion, and which can say to Catalonia: Be my sister and my equal in beauty.
Paquito D’Rivera was born in Cuba in 1948 and by the age of 10 was performing as a featured artist with major ensembles. He has collaborated with a galaxy of musicians from Dizzy Gillespie to Yo-Yo Ma across a range of styles that defies summary, but at its center is fusion of Afro-Cuban-folk-jazz. Bandoneon is named for the accordion-like instrument at the core of the tango music of Argentina and Uruguay. It was originally composed as a part of a suite for clarinet and piano, The Cape Cod Files, which he subsequently orchestrated to become the Cape Cod Concerto. Bandoneon has since been performed as a separate work by D’Rivera’s sextet. This arrangement for harp marvelously conveys the harmonic changes and the essential bass rhythm while the lead voice lithely saunters throughout a wide compass.
Celebrated Latin Grammy Award-winning percussionist, composer, and arranger, Samuel Torres was born in Bogotá, Colombia into a family lineage of impressive musicians. As the heir apparent to some of the initial pioneers of the emerging Latin-jazz tradition, Torres had early access to a wealth of Colombian music genres, from the infectious rhythms of the cumbia and vallenato to styles which reflect a range of African, Indigenous, and European influences. By the age of 12, Torres was performing jazz, pop, and salsa with various ensembles in Bogotá. As collaborators, Torres and Kibbey have toured together with the program Bach to Brazil that traces the fertile mixture of traditions of the early colonial period to the present day. Taken was composed for Kibbey and in it, Torres astutely incorporates the resonances of the harp into the composition, as though it were a massive guitar. The title refers to the insecure status of those residing in a country who may, at any moment, be snatched away. The anxiety can be heard in the agitated central section of the piece.
Benjamin Britten was a composer whose interest was frequently piqued by performers that he came to know personally. For example, his works for cello were written for Mstislav Rostropovich, and his many works and opera roles for tenor were conceived for his partner, Peter Pears. In the case of the Suite for Harp (1969), the inspiration was Welsh harpist Osian Ellis, whose heritage receives a nod in the final movement, a theme and variations on the Welsh hymn tune known as “Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise.” The work is structured in five contrasting movements, much like a baroque suite, which Britten described thus:
1) A classical Overture with dotted rhythms and trumpet chords. 2) Toccata, a rondo busy with quavers and semiquavers, with much crossing of parts. 3) Nocturne, a clear tune with increasing ornamentation over a low, chordal ground. 4) Fugue, a brief scherzo, in three voices. 5) Hymn (St. Denio), a Welsh tune, a compliment to the dedicatee, with five variants.
Britten’s Suite for Harp has come to be recognized as one of the essential works for solo harp of the 20th century.
—By Mark Mandarano