A STORYTELLING `FAMILY CONCERT'
Arrive early for free pre-concert talk about the music
The Ukiah Symphony will present a “Family Concert” under the baton of music director Phillip Lenberg on Saturday and Sunday, Feb. 18 and 19, at the Center Theatre on the Mendocino College campus.
The program begins with two works by French composers — Fauré's “Pelléas et Mélisande,” and Bizet's “Suite No. 1” from “Carmen” — and closes with “The Composer is Dead,” featuring music by American composer Nathaniel Stookey and text by Lemony Snicket. Each of the three works on the program employ music to tell a story, and the third piece also features a text narrated by a special guest, Ukiah's own Roseanne Wetzel.
Gabriel Fauré was born in 1844 and composed in a late romantic
style that soon gave way to Impressionist composers like Ravel and Debussy. His incidental music for the play “Pelléas and Mélisande,” written by Belgian Nobel laureate Maurice Maeterlinck, premiered with the play in London in 1898, and it tells the story of the doomed fate of a husband, a wife, and her lover who are all hopelessly entangled in a tragic love triangle.
Hardcore fans of the Ukiah Symphony may remember that the last time the orchestra performed a piece by a French composer (Debussy's “Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun”), it was recorded with a pared down ensemble and streamed to accommodate Covid restrictions on live performances. But now, the audience will get to hear, live and in person, the full orchestra perform the lush, colorful, and harmonically rich music that French composers are known for.
“Carmen,” an opera in four acts, was composed by Georges Bizet and it is based on a novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée. Bizet was a contemporary of Fauré but his career was cut short at the age of 37 by a heart attack during the initial run of the opera and he was never to know that his composition would become one of the most frequently performed works in the classical canon. The comic opera tells the story of a naïve Spanish soldier who is seduced by the charms of the fiery gypsy Carmen, only to lose her to another. Maestro Lenberg will lead the orchestra in a medley of themes from the opera that has become known as “Suite No. 1.”
Finally, “The Composer is Dead,” by the hugely popular children's author Lemony Snicket, comes to life on stage with the music composed by American composer Nathaniel Stookey and a live narration of the text. Originally commissioned by the San Francisco Symphony for a 2006 premier, in 2009 the book was released
with a CD insert which can now (or very soon) be found in the Ukiah library.
Appropriately enough, for this production, Ukiah librarian Roseanne Wetzel will narrate the accompanying text. Inspired by Prokofiev's “Peter and the Wolf,” and similar in purpose to Benjamin Britten's “A Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra,” it introduces young audiences to the instruments of the orchestra. Director Lenberg says, “While the music and story are designed to appeal to young audiences, they contain a humor and sophistication that will captivate audiences of all ages.”
You can purchase tickets for this concert, become a season subscriber, or even a sponsor by visiting www. ukiahsymphony.org. Concerts begin at 7:30 p.m. Saturday and at 2 p.m. on Sunday. Music Director Phillip Lenberg offers free pre-concert talks one hour before each performance. Ukiah Symphony concerts are recorded and posted on the above-mentioned website two weeks after the performance.