Abigail Pack
horn
Ināra Zandmane
piano
with:
Robert Bracey, tenor
Monday, September 15, 2008
7:30 pm
Recital Hall, School of Music
Program
Alpha (1973) Jean-Michel Defaye
(b. 1932)
Concertino for horn, Op. 45 Lars-Erik Larsson
Allegro Moderato (1908-1986)
Lento Cantabile
Allegro Vivace
Intermission
Canticle III, Op. 55: Still Falls the Rain Benjamin Britten
(1913-1976)
Sonata No. 3 Alec Wilder
Moderately Fast (1907-1980)
Slowly
With a Solid Beat and a jazzy feeling
Tempo di Valse - Joyously
Program Notes
Jean-Michel Defaye (b. 1932) studied theory and piano at the Paris Conservatory, where he took
Nadia Boulangers accompanying class. In 1952 he won the Premier Second Grand Prix de
Rome, and a year later the second prize in composition for the Belgian Queen Elisabeth
competition. His work is mainly oriented towards instrumental music, particularly for brass. In
Alpha (1973), he explores the effect of subtle displacements of rhythmic figures against relatively
stable ostinato patterns in the left hand of the piano. The piece, framed in a lyrical un-measured,
improvisatory styled conversation between the horn and piano demonstrates jazz influence that
contrasts the intense energetic, and chromatic, middle section.
*****
Twentieth century Swedish composer, Lars-Erik Larsson (1908-1986) was a composer from
young age as well as an accomplished organist. He also was gainfully employed as a choral
master and guest conductor in Sweden from time to time. His compositional style is often
considered neo-classical with Larsson giving great detail and concern to harmonic structure and
strict counterpoint. This Concertino, Op. 45 written in 1955 while he was a professor of
composition at the Stockholm Conservatory belongs to a set of 12 solo instrumental works
composed with orchestral accompaniment. Larsson’s use of polytonality and ‘modern’
compositional style is highlighted well in this harmonically rich three-movement piece.
*****
“More than half the works of Benjamin Britten (1913-1976) are settings of words…the composer
had an innate feeling for the expressive power of words...Britten uses the word ‘canticle’ to signify
an extended setting of a single poem on a subject of spiritual significance.” “Canticle III, entitled
Still Falls the Rain, was completed in November 1954. Its text is from The Canticle of the Rose
by Edith Sitwell (1887-1964) and bears the subtitle ‘The Raids, 1940. Night and Dawn’.” (Timothy
Day)
A revolutionary poet who wrote in a brave and controversial fashion wrote this powerful poem,
which reflects the bombings in London by the Nazis during 1940. Britten has masterfully set this
poem to music. One hears the piece intensify in both the tenor textually, and the horn musically.
The tenor and horn trade movements (or stanzas) until the very last stanza where, for the only
moment in the entire work, they share passing tonal (major) harmonies preparing for the text that
reflects the voice of Christ in the first person and the Crucifixion, sounding as unison. Perhaps
the harmonically momentous foreshadowing of this is heard when the tenor sings of “us”,
humanity, when we implore mercy, no doubt as an expression by the poet of human culpability.
**poem text on reverse side**
*****
Alec Wilder (1907-1980), an American composer from Rochester, NY, studied at the Eastman
School of Music in the early 20th century and began his music career as a songwriter and
arranger in New York during the early 30’s. His songs were composed for, and performed by
many popular singers such as Mildred Bailey, Cab Calloway, and Bing Crosby, and later in the
1940’s his music was affiliated with, and conducted by Frank Sinatra. After this early career in
popular music and spending much time and energy composing songs incorporating popular
melodies and jazzy swing rhythms for his singing contemporaries, he turned to writing for
classical musicians including solo works, orchestral music and some opera attracting such
musicians as Stan Getz and classical tubist, Harvey Phillips. His writing style demonstrates long
flowing melodies, often in fugue with other voices, which in this Sonata No. 3 is between horn
and piano. This work, composed in 1970, is dedicated to friends John Barrows (horn) and his
wife Tait (piano), both former faculty members at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Still Falls the Rain – Edith Sitwell
Still falls the Rain---
Dark as the world of man, black as our loss---
Blind as the nineteen hundred and forty nails
Upon the Cross.
Still falls the Rain
With a sound like the pulse of the heart that is changed to the hammer-beat
In the Potter's Field, and the sound of the impious feet
On the Tomb:
Still falls the Rain
In the Field of Blood where the small hopes breed and the human brain
Nurtures its greed, that worm with the brow of Cain.
Still falls the Rain
At the feet of the Starved Man hung upon the Cross.
Christ that each day, each night, nails there, have mercy on us---
On Dives and on Lazarus:
Under the Rain the sore and the gold are as one.
Still falls the Rain---
Still falls the Blood from the Starved Man's wounded Side:
He bears in His Heart all wounds,---those of the light that died,
The last faint spark
In the self-murdered heart, the wounds of the sad uncomprehending dark,
The wounds of the baited bear---
The blind and weeping bear whom the keepers beat
On his helpless flesh... the tears of the hunted hare.
Still falls the Rain---
Then--- O Ile leape up to my God: who pulles me doune---
See, see where Christ's blood streames in the firmament:
It flows from the Brow we nailed upon the tree
Deep to the dying, to the thirsting heart
That holds the fires of the world,---dark-smirched with pain
As Caesar's laurel crown.
Then sounds the voice of One who like the heart of man
Was once a child who among beasts has lain---
"Still do I love, still shed my innocent light, my Blood, for thee."
Performers
The School of Music is pleased to announce Abigail Pack has joined the School of Music as
associate professor of horn. Pack, a native of Roanoke, Virginia received her Bachelor of Music
degree in Music Education from East Carolina University in Greenville, N.C. in 1994 before
earning a Master of Arts degree in Horn Performance and Pedagogy in 1996 from The University
of Iowa in Iowa City, IA, where she was a teaching assistant and toured with the faculty brass
quintet. Ms. Pack most recently received her doctoral degree from The University of Wisconsin-
Madison in December of 2004. She completed her doctoral coursework there in May 2001. She
has held teaching positions at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, VA; Knox College in
Galesburg, IL; Western State College in Gunnison, CO; and in the Gunnison Watershed School
District in Gunnison, CO. She was awarded the Bolz Teaching Fellowship while in residence at
UW-Madison. Ms. Pack has held playing positions with the Barton Symphony Orchestra, Quad
Cities Symphony Orchestra, Des Moines Symphony Orchestra, Cedar Rapids Symphony
Orchestra, Green Bay Symphony Orchestra, and with the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra. She
currently performs regionally as a member of the Roanoke Symphony Orchestra, Opera
Roanoke, Southwest Chamber Orchestra, and with the Wintergreen Summer Music Festival.
Recent performance highlights include the University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa at
the International Horn Symposium, International Flute Conference, Washington D.C., The
International Midwest Band and Orchestra Conference, Chicago, Illinois, and most recently at The
Kennedy Center of the Performing Arts, Washington D.C. with the Montpelier Wind Quintet.
Born in the capital of Latvia, Riga, Ināra Zandmane started to play piano at the age of six. Ms.
Zandmane holds BM and MM from Latvian Academy of Music, MM in piano performance from
Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, and DMA in piano performance from the University of
Missouri at Kansas City. She has been the staff accompanist at the University of North Carolina
at Greensboro since 2003, performing up to fifty recitals per year. Ms. Zandmane is frequently
invited to serve as an official accompanist at national competitions and conferences, among them
the North American Saxophone Alliance conference and the MTNA National competition since
2004. Ms. Zandmane has been presented in solo recitals in St. Paul, Kansas City, Cleveland, St.
Louis, and New York, as well as in many Republics of former Soviet Union. In April 2000, she was
invited to perform at the Glenn Gould Studio in Toronto. Ms. Zandmane has appeared as a soloist
with the Latvian National Orchestra, Liepaja Symphony, Latvian Academy of Music Student
Orchestra, SIU Symphony, and UMKC Conservatory Symphony and Chamber orchestras. She
has performed with various chamber ensembles at the International Chamber Music Festivals in
Riga, Vilnius, Tallinn, Helsinki (Finland), and Norrtelje (Sweden). Ms. Zandmane has collaborated
with such musicians as Martin Storey, Paul Coletti, Branford Marsalis, Michel Debost, Kelly
Burke, Steven Stusek, and Susan Fancher. For the last few years, Ms. Zandmane has worked
together with Latvian composer Peteris Vasks. She has given Latvian premieres of his two latest
piano pieces, Landscapes of the Burnt-out Earth and The Spring Music, and recorded the first of
them on the Conifer Classics label. Solo recordings include the piano works by Maurice Ravel,
recorded together with her husband, Vincent van Gelder, and the complete Sonatas for piano by
Alexander Scriabin. She also can be heard on various chamber music CDs.
Robert Bracey, tenor, Associate Professor and Vocal Division Chair, holds a BM in Music
Education from Michigan State University, a MM and a DMA in Voice Performance from the
University of Michigan. He previously taught on the faculties at Bowling Green State University
and Michigan State University, where he served as the Chair of the Voice Area. He also taught on
the voice faculty of the Michigan All-State program at the Interlochen Arts Camp. Dr. Bracey was
awarded first place in the 2002 Oratorio Society of New York’s International Solo Competition at
Carnegie Hall. He returned to Carnegie Hall for performances of Handel: Messiah later that year.
He made his Detroit Symphony debut at Orchestra Hall and his Kennedy Center debut in
Washington, DC with the Choral Arts Society of Washington. A Regional Finalist in the New York
Metropolitan Opera Auditions, he also won first place in the NATS Regional Competition where
he received the Jessye Norman Award for the most outstanding soloist at the competition. Most
recent highlights include performances with the Telemann Chamber Orchestra in Tokyo and
Osaka, Japan, Oratorio Society of New York, Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, Syracuse
Symphony, Independence Messiah Festival, Grand Rapids Symphony, Flint Symphony, Elgin
Symphony, Boise Philharmonic, Illinois Symphony, Pacific Symphony, Orlando Philharmonic,
Dayton Philharmonic, Choral Arts Society of Washington, ProMusica Chamber Orchestra, Fort
Wayne Philharmonic, Wichita Symphony, Southwest Florida Symphony, North Carolina
Symphony, Duluth-Superior Symphony, Duke University Chapel Choir, Ann Arbor Symphony,
Greater Lansing Symphony, Choral Society of Greensboro, Kalamazoo Bach Festival, and the
Winter Park Bach Festival. Some engagements for the 2008-2009 season include appearances
with the East Texas Symphony, Midland Symphony, Grand Rapids Symphony, and the Wisconsin
Chamber Orchestra among others. Centaur Records released Dr. Bracey’s first solo compact disc
in 2006. The recording of English art songs also features UNCG faculty Andrew Harley, piano and
Scott Rawls, viola. It is available in markets worldwide.
