SUN, FEB 5th, 2023 at 7:30pm
CHAMBER MUSIC by CANDLELIGHT
Hybrid Concert, presented in-person and livestreamed on YouTube.
Livestream available here.
Venue: Second Presbyterian Church, 4200 Saint Paul St, Baltimore, MD 21218
Free concert with open seating. No tickets or reservations required.
PROGRAM
My Love of Light
Brian Prechtl (b. 1962)
Jonathan Carney, violin; Colin Sorgi, viola; Dariusz Skoraczewski, cello; Marcia McHugh, flute; Lura Johnson, piano; Brian Prechtl, percussion
Invocation, Mazurka, La Captive, and Romance for violin & piano
Amy Beach (1867-1944)
Greg Mulligan, violin; Lura Johnson, piano
"the light is the same”
Reena Esmail (b. 1983)
Christine Murphy, flute; Melissa Hooper, oboe; Harrison Miller, bassoon; Austin Larson, horn; Vitor Trindade, clarinet
String Quartet No. 13 in G Major, Op. 106
Antonin Dvorak (1841-1904)
Holly Jenkins, violin Greg Mulligan, violins; Karin Brown, viola; Bo Li, cello
My Love of Light
Brian Prechtl (b. 1962)
Jonathan Carney, violin; Colin Sorgi, viola; Dariusz Skoraczewski, cello; Marcia McHugh, flute; Lura Johnson, piano; Brian Prechtl, percussion
Invocation, Mazurka, La Captive, and Romance for violin & piano
Amy Beach (1867-1944)
Greg Mulligan, violin; Lura Johnson, piano
"the light is the same”
Reena Esmail (b. 1983)
Christine Murphy, flute; Melissa Hooper, oboe; Harrison Miller, bassoon; Austin Larson, horn; Vitor Trindade, clarinet
String Quartet No. 13 in G Major, Op. 106
Antonin Dvorak (1841-1904)
Holly Jenkins, violin Greg Mulligan, violins; Karin Brown, viola; Bo Li, cello
Notes on the Program
My Love of Light, a poem by Sri Chinmoy
My love of light is my spiritual will. Within it is the power infinite. I give fear no place in my life. My love of light is God's Smile of satisfaction. God's supreme Love manifests in me and through me to transform my human problems into my divine opportunities.
My animal human love is my unnatural experience and uncertain possibility. My divine human love is my natural experience and certain inevitability of my living in the eternal Now.
My love throbbingly says: "God is all Blessing."
God's Love smilingly says: "My child is all gratitude."
Love radiates the life of harmony, brightens the joy-consciousness and sharpens the sword of intuition.
Love is always ready to meet man's every soulful demand. Love conquers all that is unlike God. It is, indeed, supreme over all.
Love gives me my importance in the cosmic Vision of God. Nobody remembers me save my love. My sole treasure is love. Love's treasure is God's Heart.
Love is the undeniable truth of my identity as God's son, chosen son. Love is the unique combination of Heaven's freedom and earth's discipline. In Heaven's freedom is earth's emancipation. In earth's discipline is Heaven's manifestation.
No time-born desire can rend my love of light. My love of light flies beyond the widespread net of death. Mine is the love that has the birthless origin and the deathless end.
—Sri Chinmoy, from Songs of the Soul, 1971
Invocation, Op. 55; Mazurka & La Captive, Op. 40; and Romance, Op. 23 (Beach)
Born into a musically gifted family, Amy Beach began taking piano lessons from her mother when she was six years old. At the age of sixteen, she made her first concert debut and later went on to perform piano concertos with prominent orchestras such as the Boston Symphony Orchestra. When Beach married her husband, she became known as Mrs. H.H.A Beach, which were the initials of her husband. He made her promise that she would no longer teach piano, only perform two recitals a year and live according to his status as a doctor. When he died, she dropped the three initials and simply went by “Amy Beach.”
Beach dedicated her piece “Romance for Violin and Piano” to Maud Powell, who was a violin prodigy and a pioneer female performing violinist. The piece portrays a love story from beginning to end. Beach and Powell premiered the work in the year that it was composed at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago.
—Emily Ilyes
"the light is the same” (Composer's note written by Reena Esmail)
Like many people, I spent the last half of 2016 trying to make sense of what was happening in our country and in our world. In my search for texts for my oratorio, This Love Between Us, which I was writing concurrently, I came across these wise words from the 13th century Sufi mystic poet, Rumi.
Religions are many
But God is one
The lamps may be different
But the Light is the same
He states so beautifully that, even if our methods for searching for meaning and happiness look very different, the things we seek are so similar. This piece uses two Hindustani raags: Vachaspati and Yaman. The bhav, the aesthetic of these raags are so different: Vachaspati isdark, brooding, complex and dense. Yaman is light and innocent. And yet, practically speaking, only one note is different between them. The melodies they generate and the way they move makes them feel worlds apart, and yet their notes are almost exactly the same. The piece begins in Vachaspati, in desolate, spare melodic lines. Slowly, as Yaman peeks through the dense harmonies, thetwo raags begin to weave together into a seamless composite.
—Reena Esmail
String Quartet No. 13 in G Major, Op. 106 (Dvořák)
Dvořák endured three homesick years in New York as director of the National Conservatory of Music, with one blissful sojourn in his beloved Czechoslovakia for the summer of 1894. When he again returned home for the summer of 1895, nothing could persuade him to return to America, yet despite feeling “inexpressibly happy,” he was unable to compose anything new for several months. Then in a great rush in November and December he completed the G major Quartet, op. 106, followed by the A-flat major, op. 105. The Bohemian Quartet gave the first performance of Opus 106 in Prague on October 9, 1896. —Jerusalem Quartet
My love of light is my spiritual will. Within it is the power infinite. I give fear no place in my life. My love of light is God's Smile of satisfaction. God's supreme Love manifests in me and through me to transform my human problems into my divine opportunities.
My animal human love is my unnatural experience and uncertain possibility. My divine human love is my natural experience and certain inevitability of my living in the eternal Now.
My love throbbingly says: "God is all Blessing."
God's Love smilingly says: "My child is all gratitude."
Love radiates the life of harmony, brightens the joy-consciousness and sharpens the sword of intuition.
Love is always ready to meet man's every soulful demand. Love conquers all that is unlike God. It is, indeed, supreme over all.
Love gives me my importance in the cosmic Vision of God. Nobody remembers me save my love. My sole treasure is love. Love's treasure is God's Heart.
Love is the undeniable truth of my identity as God's son, chosen son. Love is the unique combination of Heaven's freedom and earth's discipline. In Heaven's freedom is earth's emancipation. In earth's discipline is Heaven's manifestation.
No time-born desire can rend my love of light. My love of light flies beyond the widespread net of death. Mine is the love that has the birthless origin and the deathless end.
—Sri Chinmoy, from Songs of the Soul, 1971
Invocation, Op. 55; Mazurka & La Captive, Op. 40; and Romance, Op. 23 (Beach)
Born into a musically gifted family, Amy Beach began taking piano lessons from her mother when she was six years old. At the age of sixteen, she made her first concert debut and later went on to perform piano concertos with prominent orchestras such as the Boston Symphony Orchestra. When Beach married her husband, she became known as Mrs. H.H.A Beach, which were the initials of her husband. He made her promise that she would no longer teach piano, only perform two recitals a year and live according to his status as a doctor. When he died, she dropped the three initials and simply went by “Amy Beach.”
Beach dedicated her piece “Romance for Violin and Piano” to Maud Powell, who was a violin prodigy and a pioneer female performing violinist. The piece portrays a love story from beginning to end. Beach and Powell premiered the work in the year that it was composed at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago.
—Emily Ilyes
"the light is the same” (Composer's note written by Reena Esmail)
Like many people, I spent the last half of 2016 trying to make sense of what was happening in our country and in our world. In my search for texts for my oratorio, This Love Between Us, which I was writing concurrently, I came across these wise words from the 13th century Sufi mystic poet, Rumi.
Religions are many
But God is one
The lamps may be different
But the Light is the same
He states so beautifully that, even if our methods for searching for meaning and happiness look very different, the things we seek are so similar. This piece uses two Hindustani raags: Vachaspati and Yaman. The bhav, the aesthetic of these raags are so different: Vachaspati isdark, brooding, complex and dense. Yaman is light and innocent. And yet, practically speaking, only one note is different between them. The melodies they generate and the way they move makes them feel worlds apart, and yet their notes are almost exactly the same. The piece begins in Vachaspati, in desolate, spare melodic lines. Slowly, as Yaman peeks through the dense harmonies, thetwo raags begin to weave together into a seamless composite.
—Reena Esmail
String Quartet No. 13 in G Major, Op. 106 (Dvořák)
Dvořák endured three homesick years in New York as director of the National Conservatory of Music, with one blissful sojourn in his beloved Czechoslovakia for the summer of 1894. When he again returned home for the summer of 1895, nothing could persuade him to return to America, yet despite feeling “inexpressibly happy,” he was unable to compose anything new for several months. Then in a great rush in November and December he completed the G major Quartet, op. 106, followed by the A-flat major, op. 105. The Bohemian Quartet gave the first performance of Opus 106 in Prague on October 9, 1896. —Jerusalem Quartet