Toledo Symphony prepares 'Kaleidoscope' Sunday
By SALLY VALLONGO
SPECIAL TO THE BLADE
The Toledo Symphony has dubbed its third Blade Chamber Series concert “Kaleidoscope,” and the name certainly fits.
At 7 p.m. Sunday in the Toledo Club, select players from the orchestra will indulge lovers of small ensemble music with one of the best programs offered in recent history.
Classical, Romantic, and Modern styles will be featured in works by Vincent Persichetti, Beethoven — a composer who needs no first name — and Edward Elgar.
The big finale will be the Elgar, one of his masterworks: Piano Quintet in A Minor. Pianist Frances Renzi will join the TSO’s A-list quartet comprising Kirk Toth and Naomi Guy, violins; Valentin Ragusitu, viola, and Martha Reikow, cello. All are principal players with endowed chairs.
As World War I painfully wound down on the continent in 1918, the English composer, who had been so powerfully affected by the four-year conflict, sought peace of his own in the Sussex countryside. There he wrote the quintet, one of three major chamber works.
“It is big chamber music, with at times an almost orchestral sonority to it,” wrote a critic in Gramophone magazine, after the work received its premiere in 1919.
In total stylistic contrast — and revealing the sophisticated flair of Merwin Siu, who shepherds chamber programs from musician’s suggestions to finished programs — the work immediately preceding the Elgar will set two of the symphony’s most rarely recognized players in a dialogue.
A little wildlife-inspired piece that might just be perfect for the Toledo Club’s traditional Wild Game Dinner, it’s a droll trio for contrabassoon, piccolo, and narrator. “The Bear and the Nightingale,” by Umberto Bertoni, pits the highest and lowest pitched instruments in the orchestra against each other.
Brought to the table by Nora Schankin, the TSO’s longtime contrabassoonist (and third chair bassoon), it also will involve veteran piccoloist Mary Scudder, whose high-flying runs and trills can trump the combined forces of 100 other players.
Cellist Robert Clemens, who has found a second calling as narrator for many symphony works as well as a witty poet himself, will read the tale as the two women play.
“ ‘Scherzo per ottavino e controfagotto con voce recitante’ was written by Umberto Bertoni in Rome in 1910,” says Schankin.
“It is subtitled ‘Brief dialogue between the Bear and the Nightingale,’ and based on a fable by U. Garavini. The first public performance was on March 7, 1974 in Firenze (Florence).”
The piece is rarely performed, notes Schankin, who has bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Michigan School of Music.
“I know of one other performance, a college recital, in 1981. Other than that, there is very little information.
“I’m just glad Mary and I get to play it. It’s fun to have us, from the back, as it were, come forward for a few moments,” adds Schankin.
The Sunday program will open with the Vincent Persichetti Serenade No. 10 for Flute and Harp, with assistant principal flutist Amy Heritage and principal harpist Nancy Lendrim in the spotlight.
Following will come a beloved Beethoven string quartet, Op. 18, No. 4 in C Minor, performed by violinists Jillienne Bowers and Cheryl Trace, that hard-working violist Ragusitu, and cellist Renee Goubeaux.
The setting is, of course, the most intimate stage used by the symphony for any of its series, the barrel-vaulted main dining room with its popular side balcony — the only one permitting refreshments in the hall.
Tickets are $25 to $35 at www.toledosymphony.com or 419-246-8000.
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