Love, Sweet Love

What the world needs now is love, sweet love.  It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of.  What the world needs now is love, sweet love.  No, not just for some, but for everyone.  Lord, we don’t need another mountain. There are mountains and hillsides enough to climb. There are oceans and rivers enough to cross. Enough to last to until the end of time.  What the world needs now is love, sweet love!                                                 

In the wake of the terrible shooting that occurred several months ago in Orlando, Florida at a gay nightclub,  an amazing array of notable stars from Broadway came together to record a special video to commemorate the tragedy and raise funds.  Bernadette Peters,  Audra McDonald,  Nathan Lane, Sutton Foster,  Chita Rivera, Joel Grey and all kinds of other luminaries came together to sing a song from way back in 1965 ….  “What the world needs now is love, sweet love!”  I suspect that a few eyebrows were raised at the song choice (when was the last time anyone had given this song a thought?)   but the sentiment of its lyrics could not be more timely.   And as I watched the video and listened to these singers pour their collective heart and soul into the song,  it got me thinking about what America was like in 1965, the year that this Burt Bacharach song first hit the airwaves.   Our country was confronting some very painful and difficult racial issues – and people listening to this song back then had no way of knowing just how turbulent their world would soon become.   Half century later, here we are – newly confronting those same divisions and some others as well.    It’s not that we are where we were fifty years ago.  Far from it.  But I think of a lot of us have had a very rude awakening as to where in fact we are as a nation… and as a world.

I didn’t expect such weighty thoughts to be on my mind and on the minds of the people coming to my concert yesterday at First United Methodist Church,  a concert titled “So in Love:  A Celebration of Love Songs Through History.”  (It was part of their outstanding Fine Arts at First series.)   When I first conceived the program a few months back, I imagined it would be a light-hearted, pleasant romp.   But by the time the actual concert rolled around,  it seemed like it needed to be more than that: it also needed to be a reminder of how essential love is to our well-being as people …. as a community …. as a nation … and as a world.   I can’t say that we managed to do all of that,  but I hope that the people who came found themselves nourished and uplifted somehow.

For sure, people were inspired by the wonderful performances delivered by the “Friends” who joined me in the program.   First of all,  I invited several of my Carthage voice students who either live in Kenosha or Racine or close enough that they could be there without too much trouble.  (Carthage is on Thanksgiving break right now,  so all of my students are back home.)   It was certainly fortunate for me that such a group includes MeriKatherine Bock, Austin Merschdorf,  Matt Burton and Chris Wojciechowicz – who all sang wonderfully.    I also asked two of my private high school students (both seniors) to join me,  and I could not have been prouder of Andrew Dorst and Noah Chartrand for their fine performances.  Last and certainly not least,  I was joined by Kathy and her best friend, Kate Potter Barrow.  I was thrilled to have all of the company … especially I was just getting over a fairly nasty cold and was not at 100% strength.  So it was nice to have other people there to supply the biggest musical thrills of the afternoon.   And speaking of thrills,  it was certainly a thrill for me to get to play the splendid Bösendorfer concert grand piano that graces the sanctuary of First United Methodist.  It’s one of the best pianos in southeastern Wisconsin and I am grateful for each and every opportunity I have to play it.

At the bottom of this blog are some photos of the guests in action.  (Matt, you seem to be missing.)

The concert featured love songs from the realms of both classical music and musical theater, in what I hope was a good balance of the two.    And I’m proud of the fact that the concert spanned almost 400 years of music,  from an Italian art song published in 1602 (“Amarilli mia bella”)  to a song from the 1979 show Sweeney Todd (“Not While I’m Around.)    Along the way,  we explored all kinds of facets of love,  from the playful giddiness of “Miracle of Miracles” (Fiddler on the Roof) to the aching darkness of “If I Can’t Love Her” (Beauty and the Beast) to the ardent passion of “Younger than Springtime” (South Pacific) to the sweet befuddlement of “I Remember it Well” (Gigi.)  We also gave them a little taste of opera with arias from The Marriage of Figaro and Gianni Schicchi and even a little James Taylor.  And through all of that, I only needed to use music for one piece: a really poignant Rodgers and Hart song called “My Romance” that Kate introduced me to and that she sings with such heart.   The lyrics talk about how the singer’s ideal of romance has nothing to do with cliches like moonlight –  but is only about being with the person you love. Great stuff.

Through the whole concert, only one thing went badly wrong- although I hope most of the audience didn’t know.  MeriKatherine Bock’s second piece was the luscious soprano aria “O mio babbino caro” and she sang it gorgeously.  Once the applause had died down,  I jokingly apologized to Kathy for having to follow such a fine performance with her one solo of the afternoon,  Cole Porter’s “So in Love.”  (She laughed.)   I don’t know what got me so distracted in the moment,  but when I sat down to play the introduction to the song,  I was playing it in g minor rather than e minor – a whole third too high!  (This is the key in which Amy Nichols and I sang this back in high school.)   Kathy gave me a bit of a stricken look about halfway through the first phrase, which is when I first realized my boo boo …. but for some reason, I didn’t want to stop – admit my error – and start over.  So I just forged ahead,  but spontaneously turned it into a duet in the hopes that I could maybe cover any moments that got too high for Kathy.   I’m glad to say that we managed to deliver a satisfactory performance,  and I couldn’t be more proud of my wife for scaling the heights so bravely.  And I made doubly sure to play “I Remember it Well” and “Til there was You,” which followed it,  in the proper keys!

Almost everything we sang on this concert were songs about romantic love which prompts the question of what that kind of love has to do with other kinds of love:  love of God (and God’s love for us) …  the love between parents and children …  and the love that for so many of us feels under siege at the moment:  love for our neighbor,  love for our community and nation,  and even love for our enemies.   The Greeks were wise enough to have four different words for these four kinds of love:  eros,  agape,  storge, and philia, which suggests that each is quite distinct from the others.  But we have just the one word – love – for all of them,  which suggests that maybe all of these feelings share something besides the word.  But what?  Believe it or not – and I’m as shocked as anyone to admit this –   the best answer I have found thus far comes from one of the Beatles, John Lennon:

There are two basic instincts motivating forces in our lives:  fear and love.  When we are afraid, we pull back from life.  When we are in love, we open to all that life has to offer with passion, excitement and acceptance. 

There it is.  Love is about being open.  It’s about walls coming down.  It’s about acceptance.   And it’s often about taking a chance, allowing yourself to be vulnerable, believing that someone else has the potential to enrich your life- and that you have the potential to do the same for them.   Maybe more than anything,  it’s about the belief that we are not meant to live this life alone, behind walls – even though those walls might make us feel safe, and stepping beyond those walls can sometimes mean getting hurt. In other words, love can be tremendously scary.  But love is when we manage to step beyond our hesitation.    And notice that for Mr. Lennon,  the opposite of love isn’t hate-  it’s fear.  And that suggests that the upturn in hate crimes and bigoted rhetoric in the last few weeks is maybe not so much about hatred as it is about fear.  And given a choice,  I would much rather confront Fear than Hatred.  Fear is something we all understand and have in common,  even if we differ in what we’re fearful of or how we express our fear. It was in the face of fear that the song “What the world needs now is love, sweet love” was written –  and it is in the face of fierce new fears that we embrace its simple message once again.

(Pictured at the top:   My family gave this card to Kathy and me for our 25th wedding anniversary back in September.  I love the saying.)

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Sunday’s program, in case you’re interested, was the following:

“Only Make Believe” “You are Love” and “Why Do I love you” (Showboat)    GB

“Amarilli, mia bella”  (Giulio Caccini)      GB

“Danza, danza”   (Francesco Durante)  Andrew Dorst

“Sento nel core”   (Alessandro Scarlatti)   Noah Chartrand

“Die Post”  (Franz Schubert/ Winterreise)   Matt Burton

“Non so piu”  (Mozart/ The Marriage of Figaro)   MeriKatherine Bock

“Ich liebe dich”   (Ludwig van Beethoven)   played on the flute by Christopher Wojciechowicz

“Widmung”  (Schumann/ Dichterliebe)         GB

“Lydia”    (Faure)       played on the piano by GB

“Chanson romanesque”   (Maurice Ravel)     Austin Merschdorf

“Go, Lovely Rose”   (Roger Quilter)      Roger Quilter

“Black is the Color of my true love’s hair”  (John Jacob Niles)    Matt Burton

(Offering)

“Some Enchanted Evening”  (Rodgers & Hammerstein/South Pacific)    GB

“Miracle of Miracles”   (Harnick-Bock/ Fiddler on the Roof)   Andrew Dorst

“Younger than Springtime” (Rodgers & Hammerstein/ South Pacific)   Noah Chartrand

“If I Can’t Love Her:  (Rice-Menken-Ashman/ Beauty and the Beast) Austin Merschdorf

“O mio babbino caro  (Puccini/Gianni Schicchi)  MeriKatherine Bock

“So in Love”  (Cole Porter/ Kiss Me, Kate)   Kathy Berg

“I Remember it Well”  (Lerner & Loewe/Gigi)   KB and GB

“Til there was You”  (Willson/ The Music Man)     KB and GB

“My Romance”   (Rodgers & Hart/ Dumbo)    Kate Potter Barrow

“Not While I’m Around  (Sondheim/ Sweeney Todd)   Caritas

“Shower the People with Love”  (James Taylor)    Caritas

“S’Wonderful” and “Our Love is Here to Stay” (Gershwin & Gershwin)    GB

<I should let you in on a little secret.  There was a printed program but there were all kinds of additions and alterations to it in the days leading up to the concert-  and right up to concert time I was still revising in my head just exactly what was going to happen and when.   And because I arrived at the church about a half hour later than I had hoped, I had essentially no time to just sit quietly and let my thoughts settle – and when we were all walking into the sanctuary to begin,  I literally did not know what I was going to sing to start the program.   “Amarilli, mia bella” was the first piece listed in the program, but I knew I needed to begin with something a little lighter and more inviting.   I am not a nervous performer at all,  but I must confess that my stomach was in a knot as we entered to the audience’s applause.   But then I looked out and saw Kathy’s dad in the third row and MeriKate’s parents a couple of rows behind him – and a lot of the people who attend my Adventures in Lifelong Learning lectures – and other friends –  and my fears just magically evaporated.  And as I walked up to the piano,  I decided to start things of  with music that I know to the depth of my soul …. three songs from Showboat, which I have been singing since my senior year in high school.   And in those three songs – Only Make Believe,   You are Love,  and Why Do I Love You? –  one could find three different ‘takes’ on love ….  playfully coy,  earnestly impassioned, and finally amused and even a bit bewildered.  And from there, we were off- with no looking back.

If one moment stays with me above all others,  it’s when Caritas sang “Not While I’m Around” from Stephen Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd.  The first words are:  “nothing’s going to harm you, not while I’m around.”   There are a whole lot of people in this country right now who do not feel safe – or valued – and this song was a response to that.  It was a reminder that there is nothing more fundamental about loving someone than wanting them to be safe and cared for.   I think many of us are seriously thinking about that for the very first time in our lives.>

Andrew Dorst (above)

Noah Chartrand (below)

MeriKatherine Bock (below)

Christopher Wojciechowicz (below)

Austin Merschdorf  (below)

Kate Potter Barrow, with me at the piano  (below)