Things don’t always turn out as you expect. I know that of course, but there is something willfully forgetful about my 60-is-the-new-40 brain. Certain events in the yearly calendar evade easy characterization. The annual Album for the Young Concert, which occurred on February 13 this year, is the most prominent among those things which ought to be familiar to me, but which astonish me anew every year. This year was the eighth year of the concerts and because it took place in Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, the venue certainly contributed a new context for A4TY, as it is fondly known around the school community.
The Bloomingdale Student New Music Project was the vision of gifted performer and teacher Katy Luo, who noticed that her young piano students were completely unfamiliar with composers and composing. The music they played was largely from Classical music history. Beethoven’s Für Elise, a student favorite, was written 203 years ago. Even Bartok’s Microcosmos, standard student repertoire, was written over 70 years ago. So Katy decided to ask students to create their own music and she arranged a concert for students to play music other students had written. She also asked professional composers to write music especially for students. An important part of the concert process was the interaction of student composers and performers and of professional composers with student performers.
I attended the first concert, which was held at our David Greer Recital Hall, and my very first impression was that it was a mess. Some of the compositions were under a minute long. Some of the performers had never performed in public before and barely knew how to hold their instrument. The number of stage set-ups was maddening and time consuming. By the end of the concert, however, I was a believer. Many of the pieces were hauntingly original. Some of the young composers had clearly been influenced by the music they were learning as student players, but some of them went off in completely different directions. The pieces eluded easy description. They represented the fits and starts of the creative process. Each new composition, regardless of its state of readiness, was afforded the dignity of its own finished performance. Some of the pieces were even performed by faculty members and that has always been a special part of the evening for me. Experienced performers find the artistry in these fledgling compositions.
The seriousness of these students’ first compositional expressions was brought home to me quite powerfully by the integrity everyone brought to the process of the concert from the very beginning. One of Bloomingdale School of Music’s core values states “There is music in everyone.” From the beginning of our A4TY concerts, as envisioned by Katy Luo and ably advanced by her successor and wonderful teaching artist Margalit Cantor, the current leader of the A4TY concerts, everyone who writes a piece gets that piece performed. What better way is there to prove your commitment that core value “there is music in everyone”?
Weill Hall was filled to capacity. It is a wonderful space and its history and traditions mean a lot to musicians and New Yorkers. As the most recent concert began and the first young pianist came out to play the first 30 second piece, my first thought was very familiar to me. “Having this concert here was a mistake.” The usual parade of unfamiliar pieces and performances followed, each meticulously set up by the professional staff at Weill Hall. As the concert progressed and I saw some very impressive performances of some very strong pieces, I realized that this was a completely appropriate spot to celebrate the power of human expression, at whatever level. I can’t honestly say that every piece was very good. It was not like Garrison Keillor's mythical hometown of Lake Wobegon, where all of the children are above average. I can say that it was a clear representation of our profound belief that there is music in everyone—and some of it is very good indeed. I have come to understand that there is a much larger continuum of musical expression than many people realize.
Lawrence Davis
