Four Concerts and a Rehearsal (in one week)!

No, I didn't play four concerts, I just went to four concerts.

The first concert this week was Sunday afternoon. I only discovered this one, thanks to a nice article in the Sacramento Bee, on Friday. I went with one of my friends from harp circle. It was a nice trip to Grass Valley, and the concert included a nice pre-concert talk with the artist, harpist Bridget Kibbey. She's a pedal harpist, so unlike many concerts, I didn't feel that I needed to come home and practice til my hands fall off, because there's no chance of arriving at that level in this lifetime. But she was delightful to listen to for an afternoon. Here's the article that was in the Bee.


Tuesday's concert was Richard Goode, the final performer on the CSUS New Millenium series. I haven't been to a piano concert for a long time -- don't really know why, because I love piano music. But his was wonderful. He could make the piano sound like a bell and the soft passages made you just want to jump on the stage to really get into them. He played a program of Bach, Haydn, Brahms and Schumann. Edward Ortiz wrote a much better review than I can.

Wednesday afternoon John and I went to the regular Music at Noon series at Westminster Presbyterian Church. This week's group was Passamezzo Moderno, a group from the Bay Area who played Baroque music. They were fantastically good. I actually can't figure out why a group that plays that professionally will schlep all he way over to Sacramento to play a noon concert, but I'm glad they did. I think this is the second time they've been here.

The last concert I went to was the CSUS Symphony with my friend Chase, aka Charles Spruill IV, playing the Butterfly Concerto. This is a really interesting piece, which I've never even heard of, but which was written in the 50's. It is based on a Chinese folk tale of a more or less Romeo and Juliet story, girl pretends to be boy, then admits to the object of her affection that she's a girl, he returns her love. They want to marry, but both have had arranged marriages already planned. He kills himself rather than not share his life with her. On her wedding day, his grave opens up with great thunder, and she throws herself into it. The couple then fly out of the grave as a pair of butterflies. The music is an attempt to marry Chinese and western musical traditions. Chase did a fabulous job -- as he always does -- and it was such a pleasure to watch him in his final performance at CSUS. The piece has many duets between the solo violin and various instruments in the orchestra. You could see that Chase was enjoying the whole experience as well as the music.

On Sunday we got together to have a rehearsal for Baroque and Beyond -- our group that is putting on a concert on April 11 in Davis. It really went well. I'm feeling quite good about how that concert will go.