45th Parallel and Alex Ross collaborate on unique show with his words and great music

Talk about putting pressure on yourself and your colleagues! The musicians of 45th Parallel Universe invited America’s foremost music critic, Alex Ross, to do a program of his reading selections from his writings and paired that with members of the 45th Parallel collective playing for him. It all went impressively well in front of a very full house at The Patricia Reser Center for the Performing Arts on January 26th.

Ross is the classical music critic of the New Yorker, author of three acclaimed books, and recipient of a MacArthur genius awards. (He is also a member of the Music Critics Association of North America of which I am also a member.) His writings about music are eloquent and insightful, and they worked smoothly and effectively in the show, which was conceived and produced by violinist Ron Blessinger, who was the Executive Director of 45th Parallelers until recently when that role was handed off to Lisa Lipton

Sitting on the stage in a comfy-looking chair, Ross introduced each piece on the program a thoughtful selection from his writings. I got to the event late and missed his initial musings about György Ligeti from “The Rest is Noise.” That was followed by an ensemble (flutist Martha Long, oboist Karen Wagner, hornist Joseph Berger, bassoonist Steve Vacchi, and clarinetist James Shields) performing Ligeti’s quirky “Six Bagatelles for Wind Quintet.”

Ross read a descriptive and slyly humorous fragment from “The Arctic Sound of John Luther Adams” in which Adams stated about his music that “it’s got something, or, at least, ‘It’s not nothing.” That was followed by the jagged and icy music from Luther’s “Maclaren Summit,” which is the second movement from his “Wind in High Places.” Played by violinists Blessinger and Greg Ewer, violist Charles Noble, and cellist Marilyn de Oliveira, the piece vividly conveyed a frozen and treacherous landscape.

A few years ago, Florence Price’s music was rediscovered in an abandoned house near Chicago, and that has led to a renewed interest in her music. In Ross’s essay from the New Yorker magazine, Ross captured the significance of finding one of America’s treasures that no one knew or cared much about. The mousai REMIX (violinists Shin-young Kwon and Emily Cole, violist Kayla Cabrera, and cellist Oliveira) delivered a soul-searching account of three movements from Price’s “Five Folksongs in Counterpoint.”

Touching on sophisticated popular music, Ross talked about the middle-class background of the members of the English band Radiohead and the group’s exploratory music. Percussionist Sergio Carreno created an arrangement of Radiohead’s “Pyramid song, Creep, and Treefinger” that generated lots of good vibes, featuring vocalist and keyboardist Bora Yoon, Oliveira on electric cello, percussionists Michael Roberts and Stephen Kehner, and Carreno on drums

In his book on the impact of Richard Wagner and his music, (“Wagnerism: Art and Politics in the Shadow of Music”) Ross drew on the connections between characters in a Willa Cather novel and the Wagner’s Ring Cycle, focusing on the lament and scolding of Fricka that she leveled against Wotan for his crazy schemes, which broke a lot of rules. Mezzo soprano Hannah Penn, accompanied by pianist Maria Garcia, did Fricka proud, commanding the stage with an imperious demeanor while singing with conviction and stellar diction.

The show wrapped up with Ross’s insight into Aaron Copland’s music from “The Rest is Noise” and a totally committed performance by the 45th Parallel Chamber Orchestra of “Appalachian Spring” (suite for thirteen instruments). The ensemble delivered the piece with grace and a bit of elan, capping off a wonderful evening of great music to accompany words by the nation’s greatest writer on classical music.