Buzzing Reed- Classical Music & Clarinet Culture

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Last week I was invited to play a few solo pieces with the choir of First Community church in Columbus. The music minister, Ronald Jenkins, is also the chorus master for the Columbus Symphony chorus, one of the best all volunteer choruses in the country.

The two pieces I played were written for 4 part choir, organ and clarinet obbligato. They were The Lord is My Light and My Salvation by John Rutter, and Be Filled with the Spirit by Craig Courtney.

Here is my recording of the Rutter with the First Community Church choir.

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I have always liked John Rutter’s music for orchestra and chorus, and I have played much of it with Ron Jenkins, who hires a full orchestra several times a year to do such repertoire.

Rutter writes well for the clarinet. The soaring lines and hushed pianissimos of The Lord is My Light and My Salvation lay well on the clarinet, and the scherzo middle section shows off the clarinet’s ability in perky staccato.

When playing with such a strong singing group as this one, I had to use a full orchestral tone to project, especially since Rutter writes much of the clarinet part in the middle range of the instrument.

The Courtney piece is also well written, with a similar tessitura and style; soaring melismatic lines, appropriate for the clarinet with its legato tone. I’ll see if I can get a recording to post here.

Both these pieces are appropriate for good amateur clarinetists to play. If your church has a decent choir, ask your music director about performing them.

There’s good and bad pops music. Good is well written and arranged, with idiomatic orchestration. Bad is not, especially when individual parts are awkward. Difficult is okay, but poorly written becomes awkward and difficult to pull off.

We have played three out of the four total Columbus Symphony Holiday Pops concerts this weekend. An extra concert was added Saturday afternoon due to popular demand. If you still want to attend, there is one more concert this afternoon (Sunday Dec. 6) at 3PM.

(If you know someone in the CSO, you can get a promo card for free downloads of several tunes from our website, http://columbussymphony.com)

I don’t have very difficult parts, (maybe that’s why I like them!) so I used these performances to practice my Alexander Technique, breathing ideas, voicing, and general relaxed concentration; skills I often forget to monitor during more difficult programs.

Ronald Jenkins has created a dedicated following in Columbus with his careful mix of light classical, traditional and new pops works for the Holiday Season. It’s always a feast of the artistic senses; with singers, dancers, children, stories, sing alongs, humor, and a visit from a “special guest from the North Pole.” Something for everyone. And it works.

This program featured some new and some old music. Ron usually includes a few classical works on the first half. This weekend, he added two movements from Handel’s Judas Maccabeus Oratorio, an inclusion of some music in honor of the Jewish holiday tradition of Hanukkah. He also likes to feature concertmaster Chas Wetherbee whenever he can. This program had two movements from Vivaldi’s Winter concerto from the Four Seasons.

Craig Courtney, who resides in Columbus, wrote what has become our traditional Holiday Pops Overture, a delightful and well arranged selection of several Christmas carols. We’ve done a few other works by Craig, and they are always fun (often really funny, too, especially his 12 Days of Christmas satire) and well written.

This program featured two works from Wonder Tidings by Stephen Main from San Francisco. Evocative instrumentation set the mood for the first piece, In the Bleak of Mid-Winter, oboe solo (Steve Secan), Harp (Jude Mollenhauer) and soprano (one of three wonderful singers from the chorus), with strings and some full chorus. The second featured a strikingly appropriate jubilant orchestration for Alleluja, A New Work is Come on Hand.

The CSO Chorus was radiantly featured in A. Randolf Stroope’s acapella (unaccompanied chorus) All My Heart This Night Rejoices. Two Ballet Met dancers created a lovely, romantic vignette to this sweet music.

The first half ended with an arrangement of Deck the Halls, to hint at the lighter second half.

The second half is always more folksy and traditional in style. This year it’s 3 Christmas carols in a sing along for the audience, followed by two works for the wonderful Children “New World Singers” honed to high quality by Sandra Mathias. One of my beginning clarinet students sings in this choir. I’m very proud of him.

Then a Mel Tormé classic tune, Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire, followed by Leroy Anderson’s quintessential classic Sleigh Ride (conducted by a child member of the audience).

Then we played Ronald Alan Bass The Night Before Christmas, with the story/poem told by Linda Dorf and acted by several Ballet Met children dancers. I particularly like this piece, which is deliciously composed, and which reminds me of the brilliant music of John Williams.

A few more Christmas tunes and a visit from Santa and Mrs. Claus and we were done.

Often, during these long hauls of ultra-light saccharine music, musicians will poke fun by adding a word or two to a title. Some previous musician had changed the name of one of the last tunes we played from “We need a Little Christmas” to “We need a Little Less Christmas”. As much as I enjoyed the music, I think I’ve had enough to last me until next year.

But I’m glad the audience enjoys it. A happy audience is our goal.

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The CSO chorus humbles me as a musician. They are so disciplined and full of musical and technical vigor that it embarrasses me that they do it for free.

This weekend’s concerts featured Chas Wetherbee playing the ethereal Lark Ascending of Vaughn Williams, with Ronald Jenkins conducting, and four excellent solo singers. But the real star of the show was the chorus.

I didn’t play the Hadyn Lord Nelson Mass, so I heard it from back stage. I could barely hear the orchestra, but the chorus came through loud and clear through the shell. (The chorus is packed up against the back of the stage, so they were closest to me backstage)

Throughout the piece, the CSO Chorus stayed at the front end of the beat, leading the rhythm forward, as they should. Their energy never ceased, their dynamics were always rich and varied. I’ve always known they were good, but I wanted to note it here for the record.

Of course, any mention of the chorus’s quality cannot be complete without mention of Ronald Jenkins, who for years has maintained and developed this world class group. In this concert, Ron was chorus master and conductor, and he succeeded in both commendably.

Although the Haydn would have been plenty of singing to satisfy anyone, the program included three other gorgeous works with chorus: Britten’s The Building of the House, Vaughn Williams’ Serenade to Music and as an encore, Copland’s The Promise Land. Their focus never let down. The music making was full of passion to the last note!

Thank you CSO Chorus, for your years of high quality and spirited music making. You keep my ego in check!