Music is the medium for Sept.
11 messages
San Jose Concert Challenges
Assumptions About 9/11 Tragedy's
Role In Our Lives
By Colin Seymour
Mercury News
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT (publ.
09/13/06)
An article about the Mission Chamber
Orchestra and the San Jose Symphonic
Choir misidentified the musical director
of the choir. He is Leroy Kromm.
September 12, 2006 -
Of all the Sept. 11 observances
at our churches in recent days, the
most effective may have been the
one Saturday night at Cathedral Basilica
of St. Joseph in San Jose. The Mission
Chamber Orchestra and the San Jose
Symphonic Choir presented a ''9/11
Memorial Concert'' that featured
Mozart's Requiem.
Aside from the concert's solid demonstration
of our depth of local talent by groups
that sometimes fly under the radar,
it was a vivid demonstration of insight
by Emily Ray, the orchestra's unsung
director. Ray's agenda included Terry
Vosbein's ''Prayer for Peace,'' written
Sept. 11, 2001, when the composer
from New Orleans was in England;
''Songs of Loss,'' by Craig Bohmler,
who lived in Los Gatos when he composed
it in 1997; the Requiem; and even
''America the Beautiful,'' which
those of us at St. Joseph's sang
en masse.
The performances were polished,
notably the ones by mezzo-soprano
Sherri Phelps on the Bohmler songs
and in the Requiem's solo quartet,
where she was joined ably by soprano
Nancy Wait Kromm, tenor Brian Staufenbiel
and baritone William O'Neill. The
execution by Ray's orchestra, Larry
Kromm's chorus, and orchestras from
San Jose's Lincoln and Piedmont Hills
high schools was virtually faultless.
And where better to evoke echoes
of the past and present than the
iconic basilica?
But Ray, above all, is to be congratulated
for the vision that gave meaning
to an event that could have been
trite. Without losing sight of artistic
success, she used a penchant for
revision to challenge several assumptions
about the tragedy's role in the last
five years of our lives.
It was a sermon that addressed our
initial reactions to the tragedy
via Vosbein's mournful ''Prayer,''
a response that was far less saccharine
than most in 2001 with its subtle
conjunct themes, conveying a sadness
that went even beyond conspicuous
flows of tears.
Then Ray's revisionist bent kicked
in. Bohmler's four songs excerpting
poems by Wordsworth, Tennyson, Blake
and Poe have been joined by a fifth
-- a scherzo -- which now is permissible
and which fits in. It's his longtime
lyrical collaborator Marion Adler's
clever lament to misplaced keys,
a malady that seems to beset more
of us as each block of five years
passes.
Bohmler's music ranges from brilliant
color, but with a dark voice, on
Wordsworth's ''Ode to Intimations
of Immortality' '; to an ethereal
dirge by Tennyson that dwells on
the starkness of mankind's
losses (aided by standout solos by
Sarah Lloyd on piccolo and Mihail
Iliev on bassoon); to a controlled
howling from Blake's ''Mad Song'';
to the anthemic ''Parting Song''
by Poe.
Phelps, more an alto than a mezzo,
could have used miking because of
the cathedral's cavernous acoustics,
but she was effective nonetheless,
especially when the dirge called
for extra drama to convey the mournful
tone.
But it's a hopeful work. As Ray
told the audience beforehand (the
mike helped), the Poe poem ends Bohmler's
work with hope that separation isn't
eternal.
The unanimity of knee-jerk patriotism
hasn't proved eternal either, as
''freedom fries'' have come and gone.
While some still claim dissenters
''hate America,'' darned if ''America
the Beautiful'' doesn't have a line
in the second stanza -- ''God mend
thine every flaw'' -- that seems
to say otherwise.
It probably was the Requiem, which
as Ray pointed out has a ''note of
hope, comfort and solace,'' that
triggered her revisionist theme,
though. As fans of ''Amadeus'' are
well aware, Mozart died before the
work was completed, but despite the
play/movie's conceit, the finish
originally was applied by Mozart's
student Franz Sussmyer. From among
many other revisions, Ray spotlighted
Franz Beyer's version from 1972.
The performances were good, but
in a rather unobtrusive way that
let one focus on the music (and text
provided) -- and focus on the perfect
time and place for taking it in.
Contact Colin Seymour at cseymour@mercurynew
s.com.
