The Main Street Sessions

For a long time,

I’ve thought that the classical music world needs to embrace other kinds of

music. Why? At first the idea might not make sense to some people. We don’t ask

reggae stars to acknowledge country music; we’d be surprised if

class=SpellE>Wynton Marsalis went on TV with Bjork.

So why should classical musicians (and classical music institutions) reach out

to any other musical style?

Well, there are many

reasons. (And as I’m writing this, I’m playing the hot new Bruce Springsteen

album. He sings Pete Seeger songs live, with a large

crew of musicians joining him, completely unrehearsed. Hot!) The classical

music world is trying to figure out its relationship to the rest of the world.

The rest of the world listens to pop (and jazz, and country, and

class=SpellE>hiphop, and dance music, and world music, and Latin music,

and lots more). We live, as far as they’re all concerned, in a closed little

box. We need to show them we’re human, too, and that we live in the same world

they do. And that many of us listen to their music, which—because we live in

the same world—is our music, too.

There’s more. We’re

publicly funded. What’s our relationship to the community that funds us? Are we

good neighbors? Do we respect what other kinds of musicians do? Or do we stand

apart with our noses in the air, waiting for the chance to educate people to

appreciate our superior art?

And then think of

orchestra musicians who play nonclassical music (the

Philadelphia Orchestra principal trombonist who plays in a Latin band, as shown

in the film Music from the Inside Out; the

players in the Metropolitan Opera orchestra who, I’ve heard, have a punk band

and play at CBGB; so many more). Why should this be cut off from their

orchestra life? Why can’t their orchestras—into which they pour so much of

their hearts—nurture everything they do musically?

So,

fine. The principle is

clear. (At least to me.) But how do we put it into

practice? I thought of one way when Aretha Franklin started singing opera

arias. She stepped in for Pavarotti one year at the Grammys,

singing “Nessun dorma” when

he abruptly dropped out. She was sensational, though of course in her own

style, not Puccini’s. (You can hear it—and see her, too—right

href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9v9Zpd4ulQ&search=aretha%20franklin">here,

thanks to YouTube. Forgive her Italian, and stay to

the end, when the really great stuff comes.) Later on, she sang “

class=SpellE>Vissi d’arte” and “Un

class=SpellE>bel di.” (I heard her do “

class=SpellE>Vissi d’arte” with the Detroit

Symphony; you can read my happy review.)

So when she did

that, I thought that opera companies should have congratulated her. “Aretha,”

the Met could have said, “welcome to our music. Of course we don’t do it the

way you do, but the way you do it makes us really happy. Come do a concert on

our stage!”

But beyond that,

what? How about some ideas we could try every day? So here’s one from Jennifer

Foster, the broadcaster from WDAV, a classical public radio station at

w:st="on">Davidson College

in North Carolina,

whose musical mashups I

href="http://www.artsjournal.com/sandow/2006/03/_not_so_passive.html">wrote

about here before. Jennifer produces a show called The Main Street Sessions, which features many kinds of musicians,

all from the station’s area.

Let Jennifer tell

the story (as she wrote it in an e-mail to me, which

I’m quoting with her permission):

Within the series I record and produce, Carolina Live: The Main Street Sessions

(our station is on Main Street),

I’ve wandered outside of classical boundaries several times. I have aired

progressive jazz, jazz standards, Brazilian folk, Celtic, barbershop quartet,

world percussion, singer/songwriter, and "new grass" material. I

fully expected hate mail, irate phone calls, angry

emails. We received none. In fact, words like “refreshing” and “innovative”

came up in a smattering of emails, letters and conversations.

The context of the program and some sensitive editing on my

part may have helped. I was able to humanize each musician or group of

musicians using interview material that was presented along with (and sometimes

layered over) the music we recorded in the performance studio.

style='mso-spacerun:yes'>

I discovered (for me) it’s hard to discriminate against music

when the humans making it are right in front of you. I put that affection to

work on the air as best I could in the way I scripted, edited, framed and

presented each segment.

I also deeply believe I can’t be the only person on earth who

loves all kinds of music; that an ear that revels in classical music is also attracted

to other kinds of music that are emotionally or texturally rich, complex or

thrilling.

style='mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;mso-bidi-font-family:"Book Antiqua"'>But

there’s more:

We organized a live concert, calling on musicians who’d

performed for the show to perform at the concert, held in an Episcopal church

in uptown Charlotte.

It was a remarkable array of performers — all ages, all types of music — and

people loved it. All three hours of it! There was old music, early music, new

music (Rzewski’s Winnsboro Cotton Mill Blues was a real

w:st="on">high point), Latin music, and a barbershop

quartet performed between numbers (the crowd loved them).

To top it off, a

twenty-five-year-old Charlotte

composer, Nathan Wright Shirley, wrote a piece that

brought all of these diverse musicians together for a grand finale. He even

wrote in a part toward the end for me (I’d been emcee al evening) to sing. It

was a bit rough at the beginning — those early music folks were having a tough

time with pitch — but once it gets into full swing, it isn’t half bad. You can

hear it at:

href="http://www.wdav.org/nav1024.cfm?cat=2&subcat=124&subsub=308">http://www.wdav.org/nav1024.cfm?cat=2&subcat=124&subsub=308

(look for the "listen" button). Rough as it was, it brought the

audience to their feet. What fun!

style='mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;mso-bidi-font-family:"Book Antiqua"'>And what

a great idea! And what a terrific way to make classical music part of the

community, by making the community part of what a classical music institution

does.

style='mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;mso-bidi-font-family:"Book Antiqua"'>Another

North Carolina example (which I’ve mentioned here before)—pianist Gregory

McCallum taking his piano around the state, playing recitals, giving

class=SpellE>masterclasses, and organizing concerts everywhere he

stopped, where local pianists of all ages and all musical persuasions could

play. Greg wanted to take that to every county in the state, but unfortunately

had to stop because of illness.

style='mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;mso-bidi-font-family:"Book Antiqua"'>Many

thanks to Jennifer, for doing all this, telling me about it, and letting me

quote her. Check out The

style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>Main Street Sessions

href="http://www.wdav.org/nav1024.cfm?cat=2&subcat=124&subsub=234">web

page, on the station’s site. Sample concert program

(scroll down on that page to see it):

style='mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;mso-bidi-font-family:"Book Antiqua"'>•

Original songs by Mike Orlando, mandolin, banjo and guitar, and sister

class=SpellE>Larina Orlando   

href="http://www.michaelorlando.com" target="_new">www.michaelorlando.com

• Barbara Blaker-Krumdiek, baroque cello with

viola da gamba/bass

player/cellist, Robbie Link   

href="http://www.robbielink.com" target="_new">www.robbielink.com

• Kate Minogue, wooden flute, guitar, &

vocals

• Billy Jones, the singer/songwriter whose homemade “Townie” T-shirt and

musical connections launched the idea for the show.

• Henry Lebedinsky

href="http://www.gostalbans.org/musicatstalbans.htm" target="_new">www.gostalbans.org/musicatstalbans.htm

, musician of all trades & guest fiddler, Michael Albert from

w:st="on">Boston 

style='mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;mso-bidi-font-family:"Book Antiqua"'>Which

reminds me of one last—and best—reason to do all these kinds of music together:

Because they sound good together, and because people in the audience (who might

not draw such hard and fast musical boundaries as we do) might like to hear

them.