ABOUT ARTIS WODEHOUSE'S PERFORMANCE OF 65 CELEBRATIONS
Artis Wodehouse performed 65 Celebrations on her restored 1887 Mason & Hamlin Liszt organ in a world premiere performance at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation at Montclair, NJ, on May 17th, 2009. 65 Celebrations was written for either piano or organ and Wodehouse played Schonthal's music on both the modern piano and the antique reed organ. She used both instruments since certain pieces in the work are more suitable for one rather than the other. She alternated between the piano and the Liszt organ, sitting in the center between them.
The Liszt organ is considered to be one of the finest examples of American reed organ- building from the 19th century. It was named after the famous Hungarian pianist and composer, Franz Liszt, who had close professional and personal contacts with the Mason & Hamlin Company. Wodehouse recently had her Liszt organ restored and tuned to modern concert pitch. The organ has a uniquely expressive capability that works very effectively with Schonthal's music.
A brief spoken poetic meditation, integral to the music and evocative of the spiritual themes around which the music is organized, was read by Mary Tiebout to guide the listeners into each of the major musical sections. Tiebout, a Unitarian Universalist minister who often elevates music in the services she leads, created the narrative passages, choosing poetry of Rilke and Machado and writing her own poems to subtly illuminate her experience of the music. Performance time for the entire piece is approximately 1 hour.
ABOUT 65 CELEBRATIONS BY RUTH SCHONTHAL
Schonthal's cycle, 65 Celebrations, is a musical meditation of 14 sets each of which focuses on a particular theme or observance in the Christian yearly cycle. Each of the 14 is comprised of a very brief prelude, postlude and two to four musical interludes that form a single unique experience. At the same time, the sets progress from one to the next in such a way that the listener senses a musical analogy to the way the year unfolds through time. The cycle isn't religious in a strict sense, but rather, combines elements of Christian, Jewish and earlier pagan traditions. In the words of Ruth Schonthal herself:
"65 Celebrations are a series of musical sermons without words representing the spiritual without the specifics. Almost each prelude or interlude undergoes transformation in mood or message. The music is tonal, bitonal, consonant and dissonant, embodying joy, harmony, conflict, sorrow, despair, and in the postlude, solace." – Ruth Schonthal
EXCERPTS FROM THE WODEHOUSE/TIEBOUT PERFORMANCE OF 65 CELEBRATIONS:
• PASSION
My life is not this steeply sloping hour,
in which you see me hurrying.
Much stands behind me; I stand before it like a tree;
I am only one of my many mouths,
and at that, the one that will be still the soonest.
I am the rest between two notes,
which are somehow always in discord
because Death's note wants to climb over –
but in the dark interval, reconciled,
they stay there trembling.
And the song goes on, beautiful.
– Rainer Maria Rilke, translation by Robert Bly
• ST. JOHN'S DAY - SUMMER SOLSTICE
Surely the light will fade, even the joy,
but for now, while light remains,
we gather blossoms
from the garden
that we planted
in our faithful winter dreams.
– Mary Tiebout
• TRINITY
To praise is the whole thing! A man who can praise
comes toward us like ore out of the silences
of rock. His heart, that dies, presses out
for others a wine that is fresh forever.
When the god's energy takes hold of him
his voice never collapses in the dust.
Everything turns to vineyards, everything turns to grapes,
in the ripening south breeze of his longing.
The mold in the catacomb of the king
does not suggest that his praising is lies, nor
that the gods cast shadows.
He is one of the servants who does not go away,
who holds through the doors
of the tomb trays of shining fruit.
– Rainer Maria Rilke, translation by Robert Bly