Actually, it’s Sunday night the 3rd of April as I type these words,  and I can’t promise that this will be one of my more eloquent blog entries.  Heck,  I’m not sure it will even be all that coherent, thanks to the utter (though happy) exhaustion I’m feeling right now after a week absolutely drenched with music, music-making, and music-teaching.  Come to think of it,  most of my weeks are full of music,  but this week I tasted such an amazing array of emotions tied up with it all… from bitter frustration to radiant joy and just about everything in between.

As an AUDIENCE MEMBER. . .  I had the tremendous pleasure of sitting in the audience for two astonishing student recitals at Carthage.  One featured am exceptionally gifted soprano named Jillian Swanson,  who has always had a spectacular voice but has struggled (like almost all singers with large voices) to bring it under solid technical control and to wed it to firm musical skills.  Her senior recital Friday night was a clear demonstration of how far she has come and of the splendid things which are very likely in her future.  (And she saved the best for last – her absolutely spectacular singing of the final lines of Dvorak’s famous Song to the Moon.  The singing she served up in those few measures would not have been out of place on the stage of any major opera house.  If she is ever able to summon up that kind of singing on a regular basis, look out world!)   The other recital, Saturday night, featured two brilliantly talented clarinetists-  Sammy Whalen and Nathan Larsen – who are both from Kenosha and two of the brightest lights in an amazing group of instrumentalists lighting up the Carthage music department.   They each did great work in their respective solo performances,  but the towering high point of the evening, in my opinion, was when they joined together in a delightful clarinet duet by Mendelssohn that in certain moments sounded for all the world like the kind of bel canto duet that might be sung by the likes of Joan Sutherland and Marilyn Horne.  As I sat there drinking in that gorgeous music and marveled at their sublime playing, it was as though every care of real life had winked completely out of existence.    (And a special bravo to my colleague, office neighbor and friend Dimitri Shapovalov, who was the impeccable pianist for both of these recitals.)

As a JURIST. . .  Just as great music (especially when performed well) can make our troubles seem to vanish, once in a while music stirs up a few troubles as well. This past Wednesday,  most of the full-time music faculty spent most of the afternoon listening to sixteen of Carthage’s finest musicians auditioning for a spot in this year’s Honor’s Recital.  It’s always an exercise in both delight and frustration…. delight that we have so many talented and committed musicians on hand – but frustration at having to choose between them.   Although we were in remarkable agreement when it came to the top finishers as well as the bottom finishers,  we were rife with contrasting opinions about the musicians in the middle,  and moreover it was clear that we had come to the judge’s table with widely divergent ideas and expectations about the honors recital itself and what criteria should matter most to us.  Compounding my frustration was that one of my own voice students was in this competition and right in the middle of the pack, where things were most contentious. . . and he ultimately finished just out of the running, despite having sung quite well.   It was a valuable reminder for him -and for me- that music always has been and always will be a very subjective sort of artistic expression,  about which it is impossible to make hard and fast predictions about who or what will ultimately win out in a competitive field.  In the end, one can only do the very best you can and let the rest take care of itself.  Fortunately, my student was far more philosophical about this disappointment than I was. . . and he ended up comforting me rather than the other way around!   And also fortunately,  discussion is already under way on how we can make this annual competition more meaningful and more fair for all concerned.   In the meantime,  we still managed to choose a spectacular lineup of musicians for this year’s honors recital, as you can hear for yourself on May 15th.

As a CHOIR DIRECTOR . . . Someone in my senior choir was really surprised when they read a facebook post of mine that referred to the frustration and disappointment I was feeling that Wednesday afternoon.  This person was surprised because that same evening I led choir practice at church and appeared not to have a care in the world.   Almost more than the pleasure of being an audience member at a great recital or concert,  I think the excitement of leading a choir rehearsal does even more to chase the blues away and to replace them with the sweet smiles of satisfaction.  Certainly I was feeling that Wednesday night and feeling especially grateful that rather than sitting around, stewing in my juices of disappointment,  I was making music with people I love.

As a TEACHER . . . There were some neat moments in my private lessons this week,  including a gratifying breakthrough with one of my basses,  and a couple of instances when I actually managed to talk tough with students who need to work a bit harder to learn their music without waiting for me to laboriously spoon-feed it to them. That felt extraordinarily good.   But my very favorite teaching moment this past week came not in my voice studio but rather in my opera history class,  as we turned from the era of bel canto – Rossini, Donizetti, Bellini – to the operas of the transcendentally great Giuseppe Verdi.  For once,  I resisted the urge to do all the talking (SOOOO hard with a topic I love as much as this one)  and managed to lead what I think turned out to be a really fruitful discussion about the peculiar excesses of the bel canto and how they left opera fans open to a new kind of opera which would be a little less about pretty singing and much more about telling powerful and moving stories.  It’s not that this particular topic is so thrilling in and of itself (at least to your typical man or woman on the street)  but what really was thrilling was seeing the students managing to make sense of this critical juncture in opera history pretty much on their own. I was not the oracle with all the information-  I was just the cheerleader, the facilitator – and it felt SO good!  Now if I can just remember to shut up, once in awhile!

As a MENTOR. . .  I’m not sure which day it was that Kathy directed me to watch an online video clip of something I could not have cared less about . . .   the dramatic moment on  “Live with Regis and Kelly”  when his guest host, who is the co-host of “Dancing with the Stars’  was stunned by her boyfriend’s on-air proposal.  I’m intrigued by such surprises, but not so much when it’s someone I’ve never heard of, hosting a show that bores me to death.   It turns out that the reason Kathy was making me watch this was not because of the man proposing or the woman to whom he was proposing.  It was because one of the violinists who strode out on to that soundstage to play in the background while the proposal was made was Justin Smith, who grew up at Holy Communion Lutheran Church in little old Racine, WI.   He now lives in New York City and has achieved tremendous success as a violinist, in a career that has included playing in the pit for many of our most popular broadway musicals and taking on an amazing array of fascinating projects.  Justin is just not afraid of anything, musically,  and it makes me very proud to think that he learned at least a sliver of that artistic confidence and poise from all the times that he and I made music at Holy Communion completely off-the-cuff, trusting ourselves and each other (and the Holy Spirit) to make something good happen.

As a COMPOSER . . .  My Musici Amici group will be sharing a concert on April 16th . . . a program with a theme about Time . . . . but after a fruitless search for pieces on that topic (aside from the pop songs that weren’t at all right for the occasion)  I decided it would be easier to compose some pieces of my own.  Sounds crazy, I know.   So I found a website with interesting sayings about Time,  and ended up setting five of them to music. . . sayings such as “Calendars are for careful people-  not passionate ones”  or “Time does not change us; it only unfolds us.”   Collectively, I’m titling the pieces “Time Pieces”  and I hope the audience on the 16th will enjoy them as much as my singers seem to.  It sure felt good to see these pieces flowing from my pen to the paper after a couple of months of writing nothing at all.

As an ACCOMPANIST. . .  This week ended for me with the recital of two of our best trumpeters,  Greg Schroeder and Matt Maccari,  who – like the aforementioned Sammy and Nathan –  are also from Kenosha and are a treasured part of our department.  I was delighted and honored to play for their recital, until the moment I got to my office at Carthage and discovered that Matt’s music was sitting on my desk but Greg’s was missing. . .  and at 7:29, I had to run up to the recital hall green room and explain the problem to Matt and Greg.   I am not exaggerating when I say that if this had happened to just about any other young recitalists, they would been thrown a fit, started to cry, beat me up, or some combination of the three.  But even as I ran around like a headless chicken,  Matt and Greg remained incredibly calm and positive. . . even as the time reached 7:35 . . . 7:40 . . . 7:45.  Finally, the student we dispatched to the library (what a day to have the copy machine in the music office be on the fritz!)  to make xerox copies of the trumpet parts of the missing pieces came rushing back into the recital hall . . . and we were ready at last to take the stage and make the very best of it that we could, with me essentially reconstructing the accompaniments as best I could.     One thing I said to the audience as a brief explanation for the delay was that this recital was turning out to live up to its name . . . . “The Great Trumpet Adventure” . . . . in more ways than one!  And in the end,  they both played quite well  (as they always do) and demonstrated remarkable poise.   (By the way, under the heading of accompanist,  I should also mention the great fun I had in playing for a rehearsal for my wife’s choir concert at Schulte Elementary. In that case, there was not much in the way of drama. . . . just a great deal of fun, especially thanks to the exciting choreography they’re doing for the RTG’s Kara Ernst and the pleasure of watching my wife do her magic with elementary kids.)

As a COLLEAGUE. . .  Last but not least. . .   Monday I heard the news that Lee Hoiby,  one of our country’s most gifted and admired song composers had just passed away- and I immediately contacted my colleague Amy Haines because i knew she was a tremendous admirer of him and of his music (and had actually corresponded with him)  and I went so far as to suggest that Amy should sing something composed by Lee Hoiby for the next day’s departmental recital, as a means to share a few thoughts about him and about his legacy with our students. And she agreed to it,  with me at the piano,  and the Hoiby song she chose to sing could not have been more perfect- not just as a tribute but also as a theme for this amazing week and all it has had to offer:   (these words are by Hoiby himself.)

I want to be where the music comes from

Where the clock stops; where it’s now.

I want to be with the friends around me

who have found me, who show me how.

I want to sing to the early morning –

see the sunlight melt the snow.

And oh, I want to grow!

I want to wake to the living spirit

Here inside me where it lies

I want to listen till I can hear it –

Let it guide me and realize

that I can go with the flow unending

That is bleeding, that is real.

And oh, I want to feel!

I want to walk in the earthly garden

Far from cities – far from fear.

I want to talk to the growing garden

to the devas, to the deer

And to be one with the river flowing

Breezes blowing, sky above.

And oh, I want to love!

I will not soon forget how beautifully Amy sang – and spoke – as together we sought to pay tribute to this remarkable and important composer.  And in a week full of great musical moments,  this one might be my very favorite of all because it somehow crystallized so much of what makes music a precious gift and a vigorous force for good in our own lives and in the world.

pictured above:   music faculty listen to honors recital auditions