Orpheus - New Brandenburgs

Orpheus Chamber Orchestra at Studio 535
Photo: Larry Fink

Everything Old is New Again:
Orpheus and the
New Brandenburg Project

Orpheus Chamber Orchestra was founded by a group of New York musicians with a bold idea. Rather than follow a conductor, as tradition would have it, they envisioned a new kind of orchestra that would operate on principles of collaboration and shared leadership. It seemed anarchical and was, at first, chaotic. Who leads rehearsals? Who plans programs? Who determines the interpretation for a piece of music?

By the time I became a member in 2002, the group had developed the Orpheus Process™, a system of artistic democracy and mutual respect in which musicians share the responsibilities of leadership, onstage and off. Playing with Orpheus, the difference is palpable. There is a heightened sense of collaboration, of personal commitment to each phrase and gesture. We strive to create vibrant, compelling performances in which the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. We hope this exuberance is contagious among listeners at Carnegie Hall and around the world.

In 2006, Orpheus began the New Brandenburg Project, an effort to commission six new works inspired by Bach’s original Brandenburg Concertos. These superb pieces, so rich in invention, form a perfect set. Bach gave us an alpha and omega of instrumental composition and orchestrational mastery, not just for the high Baroque period but for all time. As Bach biographer Karl Geiringer writes, “There is an exuberance and abundance of inspiration in this music which only a genius, aware of his newly achieved full mastery, could call forth.” No wonder musicians and audiences continue to return to these tuneful, joyous works.

Through the New Brandenburg Project, we hoped to pay tribute to this set and contribute to a living repertoire for chamber orchestra. Additionally, we wanted to unearth a variety of new perspectives on the Brandenburg Concertos and a familiar framework in which listeners could relate to new music. To reflect the artistic debate and experimentation that is the spirit of Orpheus, we commissioned six diverse composers in succession, each of whom was asked to use one of the Brandenburgs as a departure point.

Bach provided both the inspiration for and a beguiling link between our distinguished composers, despite their highly distinctive voices. Stephen Hartke reacted to the palatial residences of Bach’s dedicatee, the Margrave of Brandenburg-Schwedt. A fourth movement of his A Brandenburg Autumn will have its world premiere tonight. Paul Moravec was moved by the world-altering events of 1989, as the Brandenburg Gate was thrown open and the Berlin Wall torn down. Both he and Melinda Wagner made use of the B-A-C-H (German notation for B-flat, A, C, B natural) theme, introduced by Bach himself in the monumental Art of Fugue. Wagner offered a whimsical take on No. 4, while Christopher Theofanidis and Aaron Jay Kernis took on the all-string Brandenburgs. In his title, Muse, Theofanidis referenced Bach’s role in this project and for musicians at large. Kernis slyly parted ways with the original orchestration of No. 6 by introducing winds in the second movement of his work. The venerable Sir Peter Maxwell Davies capped off our project just last February with his take on the early keyboard concerto format of No. 5, juxtaposed with reflections on a poem by Orcadian poet George Mackay.

Five years in the making, we are thrilled and honored to present the New Brandenburg Project in its entirety for the first time at the inaugural Spring for Music Festival. It marks the culmination of an unforgettable journey for Orpheus and, we hope, an exhilarating experience for listeners.

-Alan Kay, Orpheus Artistic Director/Clarinetist

Spring for Music

Spring for Music is a festival of seven concerts by North American orchestras and chamber orchestras in Isaac Stern Auditorium at Carnegie Hall, performing creative, stimulating, and adventurous programs. Tickets will be priced at $25 throughout the hall (with a limited number of tickets at $15), assuring lively and engaged audiences. All the box office receipts for the seven concerts will be divided equally among the participating orchestras, net of credit card and box office charges, at the end of the festival. Eligible orchestras apply for participation by proposing programs reflective their artistic beliefs and consistent with Spring for Music‘s artistic philosophy.

For more information about Spring for Music visit www.springformusic.org

Friday, May 6, 2011 at 7:30PM - Carnegie Hall, Stern Auditorium \| Perelman Stage Carnegie Hall box office: 57th and 7th Avenue CarnegieCharge: 212-247-7800 Online: www.carnegiehall.org
In 2006, Orpheus began the New Brandenburg Project, a series of six original commissions inspired by Bach's Brandenburg Concertos. This season, May 6 at Carnegie Hall, Orpheus will perform the complete New Brandenburgs for the first time, at the inaugural Spring for Music Festival. Learn more about this historic event and the artists behind it.
Stephen Hartke		A BRANDENBURG AUTUMN inspired by Bach's Brandenburg No. 1
		While this work borrows Bach’s instrumentation from Brandenburg Concerto No. 1, it departs into a wholly separate sound world. As in many of his works, a sense of the local landscape factors heavily in this piece’s unique musical language.


Paul Moravec		BRANDENBURG GATE inspired by Bach's Brandenburg No. 2
		The title, Brandenburg Gate, suggests a portal through which we enter Bach's world of exuberant invention. It also refers to the actual monument in Berlin, which I personally associate primarily with the astonishing images of the opening of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989.


Christopher Theofanidis		MUSE inspired by Bach's Brandenburg No. 3
		Much of Theofanidis’ music does in fact reference early music and liturgy, so in a sense he and Bach have dipped from the same wellspring. With an instrumentation based on the Brandenburg Concerto No. 3, Muse further subdivides the triplicate string parts and grants the harpsichord an independent and prominent role.


Melinda Wagner		LITTLE MOONHEAD inspired by Bach's Brandenburg No. 4
		Wagner’s New Brandenburg plays with the translation of the name Bach, meaning brook or stream. Subtitled Three Tributaries, the work unfolds in flowing movements organized in a typical fast-slow-fast pattern.


Sir Peter Maxwell Davies		SEA ORPHEUS inspired by Bach's Brandenburg No. 5
		Sea Orpheus takes its inspiration from a poem by George Mackay Brown, the Orcadian poet. There are three movements, played without a break are based on a Gregorian chant, ‘Tantum Ergo Sacramentum,’ which is subject to constant transformation processes, and is present throughout in some form.


Aaron Jay Kernis		CONCERTO WITH ECHOES inspired by Bach's Brandenburg No. 6
		The essential element in Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 6 that inspired this work comes from its opening passage, where two spiraling solo violas, like identical twins, follow each other breathlessly through a hall of imitative mirrors. Like the Bach it begins with only violas, cellos and basses, but gradually adds reeds and horns later.