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Organist Cameron Carpenter thrilled the audience at his performance in June 2010, and returns in this special addition to the 2010-11 ESO Season! Mr. Carpenter will perform works with the ESO by Cole Porter and Gershwin and the North American Premiere of his own work The Scandal in the first half, and then present a solo organ recital after intermission.
Ticket Information
$50 Dress Circle (A)
$40 Terrace (B)
$35 Orchestra (C)
$20 Orchestra Front (F)
Tickets subject to applicable service charges.
Program Info
Program
COLE PORTER
Anything Goes
PORTER
So In Love
PORTER
Let’s Misbehave
GEORGE GERSHWIN
Shall We Dance?
GERSHWIN
Fascinating Rhythm
CAMERON CARPENTER
The Scandal, Op. 3 (North American premiere)
INTERMISSION
Following intermission, Cameron Carpenter will present a solo organ recital of works of his own choosing.
Program subject to change.
Program Notes
The era of Cole Porter (1893-1964), George (1898-1937) & Ira (1896-1983) Gershwin, and others such as Harold Arlen and Irving Berlin was a true golden age in American songwriting. While the lyrics were often remarkably clever and insightful, and brought life to the music, the melodies of these songs are enough to establish their credentials as true standards. Cameron Carpenter begins tonight’s performance with five such songs, arranged for organ and orchestra by Dan Powers.
Anything Goes is the title song from Cole Porter’s 1934 Broadway musical, which ran for just under a year in its opening run. So In Love was from Kiss Me, Kate, Porter’s 1948 update of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew. Porter originally intended his song Let’s Misbehave for his 1927 musical Paris, but it was dropped close the show’s opening and replaced with Let’s Do It, Let’s Fall in Love (hardly a second-rate substitute!). It achieved a life of its own from recordings, and eventually showed up in a 1962 revival of Anything Goes.
George and Ira Gershwin had their early success in New York, but proved equally comfortable in the warm Hollywood sun. Shall We Dance? is the title song from the seventh movie uniting Fred Astaire with Ginger Rogers, and was made in 1937. Fascinating Rhythm was a song written by the Gershwins in 1924, and added into the musical Lady Be Good later that year.
Program note © 2011 by D.T. Baker
The Scandal, Op.3
Cameron Carpenter (b. 1981)
First performance: January 1, 2011 in Cologne
This is the ESO premiere of the piece
Cameron Carpenter composed The Scandal for the New Year’s concert in Cologne. At first sight the piece resembles a traditional solo concerto; there’s an orchestra tutti and single instrument, in this case the organ. The score even includes an organ cadenza. However, Cameron Carpenter prefers to refer to The Scandal as a “pseudo symphonic tone poem with organ”. It is not a mere showcase vehicle for the soloist but, as Cameron Carpenter puts it, “a musical illustration of the concept of the scandal. In the accelerated media age of the 21st century, scandals are one of our collective pastimes. If you want to be successful, you need a scandal. And my piece illustrates this phenomenon. After all, scandals evolve in distinctive repeating patterns and curves of arousal – just as music does. In this case, the organ symbolizes the protagonist of the scandal, the orchestra the enraged public.”
Like every proper scandal, the piece starts with a big bang. Organ, strings and winds run around like chickens with their heads cut off – “of high drama” reads the instruction in the score. The whistle of the police officer arresting our hero yells across the room. Soon, word of the scandal spreads: the bassoon can’t keep its mouth closed and tells the theme to the clarinet. A fugato evolves while the news spread around the orchestra. Of course, every instrument tells a different story…
In the meanwhile, the scandal grows. Already, yellow press journalists are lining up, eager to dig up nasty details to publish them in 12-inch headlines (according to the score, the xylophone is imitative of a newsroom teletype). Further aspects come into focus: lawyers get involved, rumors spread, people comment and deny. “But my piece also shows the private aspects of the scandal” says Cameron Carpenter, “the hero tries to protect his family from the public and somebody else sells everything he owns and moves to Morocco.”
A special moment arrives with a long and expressive cello solo, accompanied by the organ. The smoke clears, and a single voice becomes audible, sympathizing with the protagonist – probably the woman with whom our hero became entangled. Excitement turns to emotion: he may be married and she’s a prostitute, but they really love each other!
Now, it’s the final showdown. The protagonist steps up and confesses – in this case, in form of a huge organ cadenza. “This is the most important moment of a scandal”, explains Cameron Carpenter, “the man publicly falls to his knees and confesses: yes, I did sleep with that woman. I fell in the mud - look, there is mud all over me. Will you forgive me? – And of course America likes nothing more than this noble and penintent man in the mud and instantly forgives him. Thus, The Scandal finally arrives at the heroic happy end.”
The image of the organ adds irony to the concept of the piece, says Cameron Carpenter: “Of course, the organ has this serious image. The organ is the elder statesman of all the instruments, just like Bill Clinton before the Lewinsky affair. And now it’s being pulled into this scandal. The organ’s entire existence is called into question.” Now if an instrument is to be involved in a scandal, it should be the organ! For centuries, the church was the single organization to interpret and enforce society’s moral rules. And how ironic: Now, the church instrument par excellence gets involved in a scandal – even better, by a composer who, by his own account, does not have any links to the church and perceives the organ as a totally secular instrument.
Artist Info
Cameron Carpenter, organ
From Franz Liszt to Vladimir Horowitz to Michael Jackson and David Bowie, the most enduring musicians emerge as revolutionaries in their field, but never stop evolving as their careers develop. Encompassing the organ in all its iterations - virtual, pipe, classical, and popular - Cameron Carpenter is following that pattern. With his 2010 Telarc album, Cameron Live!, Cameron Carpenter is a unique voice. The DVD was made on a large cinema organ using HD cameras and repertoire ranging from Bach to Schubert and Sousa. The CD is all major organ works of Bach - plus Carpenter, with a world premiere recording of Carpenter's Serenade and Fugue on B.A.C.H. (published by Edition Peters).
For playing Chopin's Études, Op.10 on the organ; for his design of organs, organ benches, Swarovski-encrusted performance wear and shoes; for his original works and improvisations; and for his expansion of the organ repertoire into music from film, animé, and popular culture, he is widely acclaimed. Amid the acclaim, though, it's worth noting that one of Mr. Carpenter's most vocal advocates comes from within the "old guard" of the organ community: Dr. John Weaver, formerly the head of the organ departments at both the Juilliard School and the Curtis Institute of Music. In his spoken introduction to Cameron Carpenter's first appearance at a national convention of the conservative American Guild of Organists, Dr. Weaver said: "This is truly one of the most amazing musical minds that I have ever encountered, a talent of Mozartean proportions, and a technique the likes of which I don't think has existed on this planet... because if it had, we would all know about it."
William Eddins, conductor
William Eddins is in his sixth season as Music Director of the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. During his tenure, he has made it a priority that he conduct performances in nearly every subscription series the orchestra has presented, as well as a wide variety of special concerts and galas.
Bill Eddins began playing the piano at age five, but was bitten by the conducting bug while in his sophomore year at the Eastman School of Music. In 1989, he decided to begin conducting studies with Daniel Lewis at the University of Southern California. Assistant Conductorships with both the Minnesota Orchestra and the Chicago Symphony (the latter under the leadership of Daniel Barenboim) honed his skills even further.
Mr. Eddins has many interests outside music. He is fond of biking, tennis, reading, pinball, and cooking. He recently completed building his own recording studio at his home in Minneapolis, where he lives with his wife Jen (a clarinetist), and their sons Raef and Riley. While conducting has been his principal pursuit, he continues to perform on piano in Edmonton and elsewhere. He accepts a limited number of guest appearances each year. In 2008, he conducted a rare full staging of Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess for Opéra de Lyon, which won him great acclaim, leading to a repeat engagement in Lyon in July and September 2010, as well as Edinburgh in August 2010, and in London in September 2010. During August 2009, Bill toured South Africa, conducting three gala concerts with soprano Renée Fleming and the kwaZulu-Natal Philharmonic Orchestra.
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Comments
Thanks for your inquiry - those sections are not open for this performance.
-Phil Reply | Reply with quote | Quote
Am I correct to assume that D & E would be open to sell if there is a sellout of ABC & F ? If so, it would behoove CC's fans to network with that goal in mind. Reply | Reply with quote | Quote
Yes, Mr. Carpenter will perform on the Davis concert organ. Reply | Reply with quote | Quote
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