If you are an adventurous music aficionado, Evanston is a great place to live. We have everything! Major artists from multiple genres put our town on their touring schedules due to the presence of magnificent performance venues (SPACE, Pick-Staiger Concert Hall, Cahn Auditorium, etc.).
We have a large population of outstanding local musicians (both vocational and avocational) who entertain at smaller dedicated music spaces, churches, bars and restaurants.
Northwestern’s Bienen School of Music is a major contributor to this rich mix, and the university’s concert planners have scheduled some unique performances in the coming weeks. As is often the case at the Bienen School, the ticket prices for these world-class performances are quite affordable. Here are two upcoming Bienen events that have gotten me excited.
Proving Up, 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 13, 14 and 15; 3 p.m. on Nov. 16 at Ryan Opera Theater, Bienen School of Music, 70 Arts Circle Drive. This Bienen production will be the Chicago premier of Proving Up, an opera composed in 2016 by Missy Mazzolli, a celebrated modern composer who was the Mead Composer-in-Residence at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra from July 2018 until April 2021. This opera is based on Northwestern alumna Karen Russell’s short story about the Zegners, a 19th-century family struggling to meet the requirements of the Homestead Act to receive title to a 160-acre parcel in Nebraska. Russell wrote the story in 2013, and Mazzolli thought that the narrative resonated in the 21st century when people are examining and reevaluating the achievability of the American Dream. The Zegners are a family that does everything “right” and are still undermined by forces beyond their control. Mazzolli worked with librettist Royce Vavrek on this opera. Vavrek’s libretto preceded Mazzolli’s composition. It was originally commissioned by the Washington National Opera, Opera Omaha and the Miller Theatre in New York. Proving Up was scheduled to run at Lyric Opera of Chicago in 2022 but was cancelled due to a COVID surge. This opera is in English, and the music is haunting and surreal. In addition to a conventional chamber ensemble, the score for this opera includes unconventional instruments, including scrap metal percussion, seven acoustic guitars, eight harmonicas and a harpsichord.
Mazzolli has an impressive resume as a contemporary classical music composer and a television and film soundtrack composer. She is also a fine pianist. The Bienen production will be directed by Joachim Schamberger, Director of Opera and Artist in Residence at NU’s Bienen School of Music. Schamberger is an internationally-acclaimed stage director and video designer. The music will be provided by NU’s Contemporary Music Ensemble. The conductor for this production is Bienen faculty member Alan Pierson. Pierson has received great press; he was called “a dynamic conductor and musical visionary” by The New York Times. $18/$8 students.
Ursula Oppens, Jerome Lowenthal and 30 students from the Bienen School of Music piano studio, 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 5, Galvin Recital Hall, Northwestern University, 70 Arts Circle Drive. This gang of pianists will collaborate to perform Frederic Rzewski’s exceptionally great and enduring work, The People United Will Never Be Defeated! Rzewski based this work on El pueblo unido jamás será vencido, a revolutionary anthem with lyrics by the Chilean folk music group Quilapayún and music by famed Chilean songwriter and playwright Sergio Ortega. Rzewski wrote this music in 1975 as a tribute to the struggle of the Chilean people against the repressive regime of Augusto Pinochet. The piece was written for pianist Oppens who is a featured performer for this concert. Oppens is a true virtuoso who has performed all over the world for decades. She premiered The People United Will Never Be Defeated! in 1976 at the Kennedy Center when she was 32 years old. The piece starts with a rendition of the folk song’s musical theme and progresses through 36 variations, a cadenza, and a restatement of the theme. The variations range from lyrical and serene to bombastic and dissonant. This is a very difficult piece to play, and is comparable to Bach’s Goldberg Variations and Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations in the challenge it presents to pianists. Rzewski’s masterpiece is becoming a major part of the repertoire of world-class pianists; there are at least 20 recordings of the piece. Given its origin, The People United Will Never Be Defeated tends to be performed more regularly when authoritarianism is spreading. It is experiencing a surge in performances now.
Oppens spoke to the RoundTable about the show and the People United Will Never Be Defeated. “The first twelve variations are on the circle of fifths. The next six variations are a kind of D minor blues.” She explained that the variations in the piece change to reflect the composer’s reactions to the political struggle in Chile. “It is a complex piece, but it is also tightly organized, which makes it very interesting for audiences.” Rzewski’s masterpiece is technically difficult, but Oppens said, “Performers like works that require virtuosity. We like to do things to show off a little bit.” Oppens has been performing The People United Will Never Be Defeated throughout her career since she premiered the piece in 1976, but this performance will be unusual. Oppens will team up with her partner, pianist Lowenthal, and several Bienen School piano students to tackle the piece. Two pianos will be on stage, which will allow quicker transitions between variations as the players step in to take their sections of Rzewski’s masterpiece.
Oppens has a long history with Northwestern’s Bienen School of Music. She was the John Evans Distinguished Professor of Music at the Bienen School from 1994 until 2008. “I just loved the school. I loved being at a school where there were serious musicians who were also interested in intellectual studies,” she told the RoundTable. Oppens also appreciated Northwestern’s location on Lake Michigan. “My parents came to visit and they said, ‘This looks like a resort!’” Oppens said that the only drawback was her commute to Evanston from New York.
Oppens is a musical omnivore. She has commissioned works from a broad variety of composers, including modern classical composers such as Christian Wolff and Conlon Nancarrow. Oppens also has commissioned works from great jazz composers such as Carla Bley, Anthony Braxton and Anthony Davis. Oppens said, “Their music is at that edge between tonality and atonality, which is a very favorite place of mine.”
The program on Dec. 5 will open with Michael Brown’s Twelve Blocks for one piano, four hands. Oppens and Lowenthal will sit together to play this piece. Lowenthal is another amazing artist. He made his debut as a solo pianist at the age of 13 with the Philadelphia Orchestra. He has had a celebrated career as a concert pianist and a professor at the Julliard School. Now 93 years old, Lowenthal continues to perform and teach. Oppens and Lowenthal met many years ago. They had a strong musical connection and became friends and colleagues. Lowenthal was married to another pianist, Ronit Amir, and Oppens was the partner of the great jazz musician Julius Hemphill. Amir died in 1990, Hemphill in 1995. Lowenthal and Oppens came together in their shared grief. During the pandemic lockdown, Oppens and Lowenthal played together since all performance venues were shut down. The young pianist and composer Michael Brown wrote Twelve Blocks for them. Its title comes from the fact that Oppens and Lowenthal lived 12 blocks away from each other in Manhattan and visited each other daily during the lockdown. In addition the intense music, Twelve Blocks includes poetry recitations.
This will be a rare chance to hear these two great pianists demonstrate the truth of that old saying, “age ain’t nothing but a number.” Oppens is enthused about the upcoming concert. “It should be enormous fun!” $10/$5 students.