With works by Copland, Thompson, Bernstein, Kern, Sondheim and more...

"If you have never heard this group, you have missed out on a rare, wondrous musical treat."

Hubert Herring, NY Times, Hastings Enterprise

The Program

The Peaceable Kingdom  - “The wolf shall also dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them.” This text from the book of Isaiah is the inspiration for Quaker artist Edward Hicks’ famous paintings titled, “The Peaceable Kingdom” which in turn inspired Randall Thompson (1899-1984) to compose his beloved work of the same name. Commissioned in 1935 by the League of Composers to create a work for a joint concert of the Harvard Glee Club and Radcliffe Choral Societies, Thompson happened to view the painting that summer, proceeded to study the biblical text and choose the passages that appealed, and composed the work that now stands as a benchmark in American a cappella choral literature. The colorful, expressive text painting and broad emotional scope of the music captures the contrast between blessings bestowed on the righteous and woes inflicted on the wicked. Discordant harmonies reflect harsh punishment meted out in Old Testament fashion. Likewise Hicks’ painting conveys similar conflicts. A strong preacher, his beliefs espoused simplicity, self-discipline and spirituality. They also included ancient concepts of animal symbolism with their references to human personality, and are reflected in the faces of the animals: for example melancholy and reserve on the wolf, and willfulness in the lion. During his life the Quakers experienced great strife as some became worldlier and less spiritually guided. His signature subject (there are many versions of the painting) evolved over his life and reflects that strife. While details vary greatly, the paintings are attempts to portray the delicate balance between difficult, unresolved issues of justice and purity against lust, ego, greed and perhaps the most dangerous of all, pride. In the end his hope was to show the Inner Light, in which he believed so deeply, emanating from all living beings and the world. And, as Thompson does in his music, Hicks also offers hope for temporal peace and resolution. Randall Thompson believed that “a composer’s first responsibility is, and always will be, to write music that will reach and move the hearts of his listeners in his own day.” The desire for a Peaceable Kingdom has a timelessness that is sure to reach our hearts today.

Aaron Copland (1900-1990) needs little introduction to most American audiences. Best known for his ballet and movie scores such as The Red Pony, Billy the Kid, Our Town and his enduring favorite, Appalachian Spring, his 1947 motet In the Beginning for soloist and unaccompanied chorus dates from his ‘populist’ period. His distinctive style and musical personality is very much in evidence in this concisely written work. Based on the biblical text from the book of Genesis, the piece contains rhythms and harmonies we have come to recognize as his unique voice. A product of two milieus, Paris and the United States, he studied with the great pedagogue Nadia Boulanger in Paris, whose particular gift was recognizing and encouraging the individuality of her students. Copland grew up with, as Leonard Bernstein observed, the idioms of jazz and American pop in his ear. Jazz would be a strong influence all through his life. His style blends the internalized energy and visual landscape of his New York home with European Boulanger’s sensitivity to clarity, elegance and formal continuity - ‘la grande ligne.’ He created music which is spare and restrained, direct and not overly intellectual. He didn’t care for romantic excess, preferring straight-forward playing with little or no vibrato and without excessive sentiment. That is not to say emotionless – to him “music is largely the product of emotions.” He considered composition an act of self-expression and self-discovery. In explaining why he worked at night he said “I can’t get emotional early in the day.” He utilized a three-movement design of slow-fast-slow for almost all his work, as he does here in the motet; musical passages often alternate between great delicacy and brash percussiveness, much like, said Bernstein, Copland’s own piano playing. The incorporation of folk idioms reflected his desire to make music accessible to more people and he embraced many national styles, not just American. Today, Copland’s home in Peekskill, NY, offers musicians a place of inspiration and creativity and the non-profit Copland Fund for Music supports contemporary music and young composers.

American Jerome Kern (1885-1945) learned to play piano from his mother. He plugged songs and did time as a rehearsal pianist on Broadway before getting his own songs produced, primarily in England. By 1914, he had over 100 songs used in 30 shows. Musicals of his day often were nothing more than a vehicle for a particular star. Using an intimate style of production which sharply contrasted with the current large-scale operettas that were in vogue, he developed a new style of musical in which the characters were more realistic, and the stories and songs were more closely integrated. His most important work, Show Boat, written with lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II, was the first ‘musical’ to enter the opera repertoire, and many of its songs including Ol’ Man River and Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man have become standards. The songs featured in our program include 1942’s I’m Old Fashioned from the film You Were Never Lovelier, The Song Is You, from 1932’s Music in the Air, a Hammerstein collaboration (both songs arranged by James Bassi) and the 1939 All the Things You Are from Kern’s last Broadway musical Very Warm for May.

Stephen Sondheim (1930 - ) was inspired to create his 1984 Pulitzer prize-winning musical, Sunday in the Park with George by the painting titled, “A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte” by 19^th century pointillist Georges Seurat. In the play, Georges stands in front of an empty canvas, his task to bring order to a gathering in the park which includes his frustrated model and mistress Dot. Immersed in his work and the attempt to portray his subjects in a world of symmetry, balance and perfection, he is so captivated that his long-suffering mistress, decides to leave him for a baker who will support her. Eventually she and Louis run away to America, but not before Dot tells Georges she is carrying his child. The song Sunday closes the first act of the musical, with actors depicting the bucolic scene that Georges has at last frozen into a harmonious whole. Sondheim’s musical style shows a fondness for the harmonies of Debussy and Ravel, and densely literate lyrics. His creative philosophy is best expressed in his song title, “I Never Do Anything Twice.” The musical is a reflection on the difficulties of creating art in a commercial environment.

The critically acclaimed 1956 operetta Candide by Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) has never been a commercial success, owing perhaps to the difficulties of bringing to life Voltaire’s satirical novel in the musical idiom, a project that took Bernstein and librettist Lillian Hellmann several years to accomplish. It has, however, memorable music including the sparkling, often-heard overture and witty lyrics. Candide’s story, absurdly told by Voltaire, is of a young man who is determined to follow his tutor’s philosophy that everything that happens must be for the best. Even after experiencing an endless series of disasters, including the supposed death of the woman he loves, he clings to this belief. Voltaire used exaggerated and senseless events to show the reader the irrational nature of the world. At the novel’s end, Candide and his friends find that the old tutor, once given up for dead, has abandoned his original philosophy for the ethic of work. Candide and company settle on a farm, determined to cultivate a good, honest life as expressed in the song, Make Our Garden Grow. The change to practicality from idealism reflects Candide’s realization that the world is indeed an imperfect place full of needless and irrational suffering that happens even to good people.

                                                                                                                                                                ~ Sally Evans

The Performers

Mezzo soprano Liz Norman’s passion is for recital and chamber music. She has appeared at Weill Recital Hall/Carnegie Hall, Ascension Music, Trinity Church, St. Bartholomew’s and many other local and regional recital venues. Winner of the Artist’s International Competition, she has toured nationally with the New York City Opera, the Venus Trio and the Gregg Smith Singers. Ms. Norman has appeared on PBS' Live from Lincoln Center, WNYC radio, has recorded for Delos and Vox, and can be heard in the film Dead Man Walking. Recent oratorio performances have included Mozart's Requiem,  Bach’s Magnificat and Handel’s Dixit Dominus with the New York Collegium at St. Thomas Church, Resphighi’s Lauda per la Nativita del Signore with the Central City Chorus and Handel’s  Messiah at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. Opera credits include Cherubino in Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro at the Harlem School of the Arts, Carmen for the New York City Opera Education Department, and the Sorceress in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas.  In 1994, Ms. Norman followed another passion, one for arts education, by becoming a teaching artist for the newly established New York City Opera High School Partnership Program. In collaboration with teachers at Martin Luther King, Jr. High School, Ms. Norman has helped to build an arts-integration workshop model that has won financial support and industry recognition from major institutions including the Annenberg Foundation/Center for Arts Education, and NYSCA Empire State Partnerships. She has designed staff development programs for clients including the American Social History Project, Lincoln Center Institute, New York City Opera, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, and the United Federation of Teachers.  In 2002-2003, she was Project Arts Staff Developer and Instructional Specialist with the NYC Department of Education, Manhattan High School Superintendent’s Office. Ms. Norman has been a presenter at the Face to Face conference, NYSCA Empire State Partnerships, and RESEO (Association of European Opera Company Education Departments), an arts education panelist for The League of American Theaters and Producers, and is a Peer Advisory Panelist for the 2004-2006 Center for Arts Education Partnership Grant Program. Ms. Norman is currently Education Consultant for the Gotham Chamber Opera and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s. She is a teaching artist for the Lincoln Center Institute, the New York City Opera, and maintains a broad range of independent relationships with schools across the tri-state area. 

After originating the role of André in the Broadway production of The Phantom of the Opera, Cris Groenendaal went on to play the Phantom for some 860 performances with three major companies: New York, Toronto, and the Canadian National Tour. Other Broadway credits include Anthony Hope in Sweeney Todd, the roles of George, the Soldier, and Louis the Baker in Sunday in the Park with George (both shows recreated for PBS), Major Rizzolli in Passion, and Miles Gloriosus in the 1996 revival of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. He originated the role of Father in the national tour of Ragtime, and played Jules in the 2002 Kennedy Center revival of Sunday in the Park with George. With the New York City, Cleveland, Portland, Tulsa, and Syracuse Opera Companies, he has played such roles as Danilo in The Merry Widow, the title role in Candide, Captain Corcoran in H.M.S. Pinafore, the Caliph in Kismet, and Ravenal in Show Boat. Mr. Groenendaal’s solo Broadway/Cabaret show has been featured in concert with the symphony orchestras of Phoenix, Arizona; Erie, Pennsylvania; Wheeling, West Virginia; Southwest Florida; and Rochester, Minnesota. The show has been performed in recital for voice and piano at the Performing Arts Center in Anchorage for the Fairbanks Light Opera of Alaska, and at the Hawaii Theatre Center. Other concert performances include a Carnegie Hall debut in 1994; a televised Boston Pops performance; and concerts with the Montreal Symphony, the Minnesota Orchestra, the Israel Philharmonic, the Moscow Radio and TV Orchestra, and the Russian Philharmonic. Mr. Groenendaal’s recordings include the role of Billy Crocker on EMI’s Anything Goes, RCA’s A Stephen Sondheim Evening, and Book-of-the-Month Records’ Songs of New York and Sondheim albums. Mr. Groenendaal and his wife Sue Anderson have produced two solo albums: Always and A Christmas Wish. In 1984 he won a National Institute for Music Theatre Career grant.

Sue Anderson's career has been full and varied, ranging from Broadway productions to films to recordings. As a conductor and musical director, Ms. Anderson has worked with the Broadway and national touring companies of Pirates of Penzance, Me and My Girl, and Cats. She has conducted orchestras around the country in Broadway concerts and recently conducted the London Philharmonia at Abbey Road Studios. An accomplished pianist, Ms. Anderson has performed as the featured on-stage pianist in Broadway's Jerry’s Girls. She also performs regularly at Carnegie Hall with the all-state choirs produced by Field Studies International. Some of the fun and unusual things Ms. Anderson has done are coaching Rex Harrison in the revival of My Fair Lady, teaching Peter O'Toole to play the piano, enjoying the finest chocolates with Katherine Hepburn, and being repeatedly kissed by Kevin Kline (sorry Cris). Sue is the proud mother of two children, Lucas and Emily.

Multi-talented pianist Robert Meffe was the associate conductor for Les Miserables on Broadway. Off-Broadway he has served as music director for The Prince and the Pauper; associate conductor and keyboard performer for Violet; and music director and arranger for Lightin’ Out. He has toured with The Phantom of the Opera as music director; with Les Miserables as associate conductor; and with Sunday in the Park with George as associate conductor. He has been music director for the Lyric Opera Cleveland productions of Candide and The Most Happy Fella. His recent appearances include the Craig Schulman Broadway Valentine concert tour of Taiwan and Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim on Broadway at the Palm Beach Pops. Mr. Meffe is an adjunct Professor of Music Theater at Pace University, has a BA in Pre-Medical Studies and Music from the University of Notre Dame, and a Masters of Music in choral conducting from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music.