The mezzo-soprano Jan DeGaetani, who taught at the Eastman
School of Music and lived in Rochester for many years, died a quarter-century
ago. Her influence as a teacher, a proponent of new music, and simply as a
great vocal artist, is still strongly felt — or should be. The Rochester
Chamber Orchestra’s first concert of the 2014-15 season was a tribute to this
great artist.
DeGaetani was an amazingly versatile singer: her recordings
include everything from German medieval songs to Cole Porter and numerous 1970’s
and 1980’s premieres, with just about everything in between. In paying tribute
to her, there is a lot to choose from. The concert, on Sunday, October 12, at
Hochstein Performance Hall, also marked the debut of the RCO’s new artistic
director, Gerard Floriano. It was a strong debut: he programmed this concert
imaginatively, and directed it solidly.
The program began with Haydn’s Symphony No. 89, apparently
one of DeGaetani’s favorites — an interesting choice, as it is almost never
performed. In history, the piece was stuck between its brilliant predecessors,
the “Paris” Symphonies, and the even more brilliant “London” symphonies that followed.
But, being Haydn, No. 89 is a good-humored, superlatively crafted work well-worth
hearing, particularly in a performance as spirited and elegant as it received
from the RCO. Floriano gave a nice lift to the dance rhythms, and the small
ensemble ensured that every musical detail sounded clearly.
DeGaetani’s championing of women composers led to the choice
of two very different pieces from the past. Ruth Crawford Seeger (1901-1953) is
probably best-known for her work as a collector of American folk songs and as Pete
Seeger’s stepmother. In the 1920’s and 1930’s she was one of our leading
“modernist” composers, as well as a leading woman composer; from the
perspective of 2014, I would say she was a leading American composer, period.
Her music is atonal, but often has a yearning, tragic quality that reminds me
of Alban Berg’s work. It is also rigorously constructed and compact: a
two-minute song by Ruth Crawford Seeger is as full of varied emotion as an
opera, as this work proved.
DeGaetani recorded Crawford Seeger’s “Three Songs to Texts by
Carl Sandburg” on her “Songs of America” album, and Nancy Allen Lundy sang them
terrifically on Sunday. Her light, clear soprano is quite unlike DeGaetani’s
voice in timbre, but Lundy’s ability to communicate emotion in music — even
somewhat thorny music — is very much like DeGaetani. Lundy negotiated Crawford
Seeger’s constantly shifting moods and pitches with skill and a sense of
commitment (another quality Jan DeGaetani had in spades). The original piano
accompaniments were orchestrated with exquisite tact for strings and harp by
Chris A. Trotman. Possibly they soften Crawford Seeger’s edge a bit, but they
also bring out the delicacy and elusive melodic qualities of her music.
The composer Amy Beach (1867-1944)
was once invariably referred to as “Mrs. H.H.A. Beach.” But in the last few
decades, she has come into her own as one of the best American Romantic
composers; the RPO played her impressive “Gaelic” Symphony a couple of years
ago. Beach’s 1893 “Romance” for violin is one of her smaller-scaled works;
while her symphony is reminiscent of Brahms or Dvorak, this is a beautiful
little sugarplum in the manner of Fritz Kreisler. Its first audience demanded
an immediate encore, and I’m not surprised. RCO concertmaster David Brickman’s
playing was irresistibly sweet and refined, helped by another skillful
orchestration by Trotman.
Berlioz’s “Les Nuits d’Eté” appeared on DeGaetani’s last CD,
in a chamber reduction by her husband, Philip West. To conclude this concert,
Lundy sang four of the six songs in this cycle, one of the most beautiful works
in the vocal repertoire (and, I think, the very first orchestral songs, decades
before Mahler). I’m not sure that summer nights are ever mentioned in these
songs, but that title suits their relaxed, perfumed, romantic atmosphere
perfectly.
A heavier voice seems better suited to these songs, which
often lie rather low; in fact, Berlioz originally wrote them for several
different singers. But Lundy provided some beautiful singing and often
projected the text in the large Hochstein Performance Hall. (She also used a score,
which I found distracting — and she honestly didn’t seem to need it.) Floriano
proved that he’s a very experienced and sensitive conductor with vocalists,
providing just the right orchestral balance to set off Lundy’s voice.
Besides the performances, the evening also included excerpts
from DeGaetani’s famous recordings of songs by Rachmaninoff, Copland, and
Stephen Foster, and a live tape of a song from Paul Fetler’s “The Garden of
Love,” which she premiered with the RCO in 1985. These songs varied in sound
quality, and sitting at a concert audience listening to a recording was a bit
awkward. But, I suppose, the opportunity to listen to Jan DeGaetani sing even a
small corner of her vast repertoire is a welcome one.
This article appears in Oct 8-14, 2014.
