PRESENTING.....

...the first annual Brian L. Hughes awards for creative orchestra programming!

There are times, of course, that I have lamented living here in what some may deem to be a cultural backwater.  There is no opera (of course this is the U.S. where one of our largest companies--the Chicago Lyric--ranks only number 66 in the world); there is no chamber music and very little in the form of creative programming elsewhere.  Even though we have three liberal arts colleges, you wouldn't know anything of their music offerings either because a) the music programs don't communicate with their marketing offices, b) their marketing offices don't market, or c) the local paper doesn't deem such activities important enough to publicize.

Where I do have to count myself fortunate is that, even though we do not have a "world-class" orchestra nearby (although the Chicago Symphony is only approximately 200 miles away) there are four regional symphonies within 90 miles including the orchestras of Dubuque, Cedar Rapids, Waterloo-Cedar Falls, and the Quad Cities (Davenport, Bettendorf, Rock Island, and Moline).  The Madison Symphony is just a bit further outside that radius (and thus is not included in my "awards.")

The "Hughes awards" are totally arbitrary, based upon my own criteria which include possible thematic content, inclusion of both contemporary and American composers and overall creativity and originality.  The latter would imply programs that step out of the Overture - Concerto - Symphony box.  Also of important note is the presentation of works outside the standard repertory; i.e. why offer yet another performance of Dvorak 7 (or 8 or 9) or Shostakovich 5--regardless of my own love for those works--when there are hundreds of neglected works that may be favored by audiences (and surely the players).  Do we need yet another performance of Beethoven 5 instead of say, the Bizet Symphonie?  Or what about the Franck--long a staple of the repertoire that now seems to be rarely played?  I could make a long list of neglected works and that's just the works of the "masters."

Not part of the repertoire!

It is incumbent upon the modern day symphony to be a proponent of the music of our time BECAUSE that is the heritage of the medium.  It was not until the mid to late nineteenth century that works of the past started to form any kind of "repertory."  In the time of Mozart and Haydn, people were "discovering" the works of Bach and Handel as if they'd been composed in another millennium, rather than some one hundred years previous.  In Mozart's time (and Beethoven's and many other's) the music presented on a concert program had to be new.  There were no "interpreters" of the music of the past; most performers were led by the composers themselves.  But, somewhere along the way (the early twentieth century and the rise of serialism?) the audience became disconnected from the music of its time.  If we are to remain viable, we must espouse the changing milieu in which we live.

I have yet to come up with a plethora of categories, so there will be just one "grand prize" winner, with honorable mentions of individual programs from the aforementioned ensembles.  Thus, the winner of the first annual Brian L. Hughes award for creative orchestra programming (Eastern Iowa) is....

(drum roll, please....)

NO AWARD GIVEN.......


What, you say?  There is no orchestra in Eastern Iowa worthy of an award for overall creative orchestral programming?  Frankly, no.  There is no orchestra with I feel has dared to "push the envelope" in a way that is going to be both exciting while expanding the audiences' sphere of reference.   There are a limited number of bright spots, but most of the programs are limited to the tried and true, dyed in the wool, old models of orchestral programming.  For example, take this program from the Dubuque Symphony:

• Glinka: Russlan and Ludmilla Overture
• Tchaikovsky: Variations on a Rococo Theme 
• Rachmaninoff: Symphony No. 2

Or this example from the Quad-Cities:

• Dvorak: Carnival Overture
• Rachmaninoff: Piano Concerto No. 3
• Beethoven: Symphony No. 5

On the American music front (number of composers), here is the rundown:

• Dubuque: 3
• Orchestra Iowa, aka Cedar Rapids Symphony:  1
• Waterloo-Cedar Falls:  2 (one shared with Dubuque)
• Quad Cities:  3

In the "contemporary" vein, we do see:

• Two world premieres (of the same piece, by Iowa-born composer and Julliard-trained Michael Gilbertson.)
• A work by Peter Maxwell Davies, an often thorny composer but represented by his user-friendly Orkney Wedding with Sunrise.
• A work by Bartok!  (Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta)
• A work by Stravinsky!  (but really, the Rite celebrates its 100th birthday in two years:  does that still make it new?)
• Works by Samuel Coleridge Taylor and Louis Moreau Gottschalk (yea, Dubuque!)

I must present an award for the best in "pops" programming, although the outdoor concert by Orchestra Iowa is part of their masterworks series.  Here is an example of a listener-friendly concert that doesn't sell out:

• Elgar:  “Nimrod” from Enigma Variations 
• Walton:  Crown Imperial 
• Elgar:  Pomp and Circumstance (which one?)
• Holst:  “Jupiter” from The Planets 
• Parry:  Coronation Choral Anthems 
• Rozsa:  Parade of the Charioteers, from Ben Hur
• Respighi:  Pines of Rome

Many orchestras have also tossed their "Christmas" concerts on the trash heap of popular music, much to the chagrin of the players (in particular) and even many in the audience (so I'm told).  Not so, Orchestra Iowa:

• J.S. Bach:  Christmas Oratorio
• Corelli: Christmas Concerto
• Handel:  Messiah

Thus, this is the end of the first-ever Hughes awards.  There is interesting programming to be found on each of the orchestras' seasons, not just an entire season that dares to be radically different.  Take this for (one last) example:

• Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherazade 
• Rodrigo: Concierto de Aranjuez 
• Ravel: Bolero 

If there is any program that fails in EVERY WAY to push the audience in any way, it is this one.  Okay, count me as one who is not a fan of Bolero (I have conducted it, thank you...) and the Rodrigo, for all of its tunefulness and beauty, is vastly overplayed.  One would think that there exists only one concerto for guitar (even Rodrigo wrote more than that), and must yet another presentation of one of R-K's "big three" be heard?

Here are the web sites for the four orchestras:

• Dubuque Symphony:  www.dubuquesymphony.org
• Orchestra Iowa (CR Symphony):  www.orchestraiowa.org
• Waterloo-Cedar Falls Symphony:  www.wcfsymphony.org
• Quad City Symphony:  www.qcsynmphony.com