The music of Ludwig Van Beethoven is “a force of nature,” according to Portland State Symphony Orchestra conductor Ken Selden.
Choral director Ethan Sperry calls the composer’s Symphony No. 9 in D minor “one of the most important pieces of music that’s ever been written,” adding that “it’s not something that would normally be handled by students.”
The music of Ludwig Van Beethoven is “a force of nature,” according to Portland State Symphony Orchestra conductor Ken Selden.
Choral director Ethan Sperry calls the composer’s Symphony No. 9 in D minor “one of the most important pieces of music that’s ever been written,” adding that “it’s not something that would normally be handled by students.”
Nevertheless, PSU’s Symphony Orchestra and Choral departments will be performing the formidable symphony tomorrow evening at the First United Methodist Church.
“We have 130 people singing who know what they’re doing and can handle it,” said alto soloist Eva Cummins. “A lot of professional groups around here, they’ll try to cut down the orchestra…but here we have the resources to be able to do it full-blown.”
The sheer numbers needed to do justice to the piece—in this case, 200 musicians, roughly 70 from the orchestra in addition to the 130 singers—make the piece a real challenge to perform. In fact, until this year, the university’s Music Department could not have marshaled the manpower to perform it.
“It’s a really big piece,” said concertmaster Nanao Yamada. “[But] this year I think the number [of musicians] has grown more than ever in terms of the string players, and that’s why [Selden] decided to do a big symphony.”
Cummins and fellow singers tenor soloist Carl Moe and soprano soloist Rachael Marsh are especially enthusiastic about the increase in numbers and talent in the choral program. They said that the Music Department has perhaps 100 more choir singers this year than last year and that Sperry’s aggressive recruitment is the reason their singing has improved so dramatically.
The students said that Sperry took them to 23 different high schools, sang to students and encouraged them to consider higher education and a musical career.
“He will blush, but it’s all because of Ethan. He hates hearing that but it’s true,” Cummins said.
Added Moe, “He went to more high schools, to just go and recruit, last year with the chamber choir than any—”
“—in the history of the Department of Music,” finished Cummins.
This rendition of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony is the biggest performance that Moe has been involved with at PSU. But although the number of performers involved is impressive, the technical demands of the piece are foremost in the singer’s mind.
“It’s one of the most performed works around the world, but it’s really, really hard, and the reason it’s hard is because Beethoven was an instrumental composer and didn’t understand how voices work,” he said. “He has the sopranos up on high A’s for the entire piece essentially, and then he has other people jumping around as if we were oboes or violins, and voices do not work that way.”
Moe said that his voice teacher, who has done this particular piece of music over 150 times as a baritone soloist, told him that the symphony is only about five minutes of work cumulatively but that it’s perhaps the hardest five minutes of music any singer will ever have to perform.
“There’s a lot of opportunity for train wrecks,” Marsh said.
Some members of the orchestra are somewhat apprehensive about the challenges of the piece.
Principal cellist Kris Duke said that the musicians received their music before winter break and have been practicing throughout winter term.
“Normally, an orchestra of our size and our level wouldn’t get to play something like this,” he said.
Sperry is philosophical about the performance, explaining that the piece’s fourth movement, the famous “Ode to Joy,” sets German writer/philosopher Friedrich Schiller’s poem of the same name to music. The poem espouses the notions of universal brotherhood and the accordance of the human spirit.
Significantly, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 was the first by a major composer to include a chorus. Sperry interprets this union of orchestra and choir as a formal manifestation of the poem’s spiritual message.
“The idea of this ‘Ode to Joy’ is bringing people together and, I think, literally bringing the chorus and the symphony together. Bringing together as many people as possible to have this shared artistic experience is that way of creating joy in the world, maybe even involving the audience,” Sperry said. “As far as bringing together as many PSU students as you’re going to see on stage together this year, it’s the right text and it’s the right message for doing so.”
In addition to Beethoven, the Chamber Choir and Sperry’s two new auditioned choirs, the Man Choir and the all-female Vox Femina, will perform Felix Mendelssohn’s “Heilig,” Johannes Brahms’ “Ave Maria,” Franz Schubert’s “Ständchen” and Anton Bruckner’s “Virga Jesse.”
“There’s a double choir piece, and then just the women, and then just the men and then everybody forms up together,” Sperry said. “It’s a nice little dramatic arc.”
The student’s attitude toward the Ninth was rather less spiritual.
“We have a personal relationship with Beethoven right at the moment, which is that he’s making our lives miserable,” Moe laughed.
“I have a theory, which is not just that he was crazy but that he was jilted by an alto,” Cummins said, smiling.
The venue has 800 seats and early ticket purchase is recommended.
