For the convenience of concertgoers

the Garden Cafe remains open until 6:oo pm.

The use of cameras or recording equipment during the

performance is not allowed. Please be sure that cell phones,

pagers, and other electronic devices are turned off.

Please note that late entry or reentry of

the West Building after 6:30 pm is not permitted.

Music Department

National Gallery of Art

Sixth Street and Constitution Avenue nw

Washington, DC

Mailing address

2000b South Club Drive

Landover, md 20785

ivuw.nga.gov

The Sixty-fifth Season of

The William Nelson Cromwell and F. Lammot Belin

Concerts

National Gallery of Art

2,609th Concert

Davidson Fine Arts Chorale

James Dunaway, conductor

Paul Hennessy, pianist

March 18, 2007

Sunday Evening, 6:30 pm

West Building, West Garden Court

Admissionfree
Program

Part I

Tomas Luis de Victoria (1548-1611)

Ecce nunc benedicite Dominum

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791)

Regina coeli

Gioacchino Rossini (1792-1868)

Cantemus Domino

Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)

Unsere Vater

Part 11

Sir John Tavener (b. 1944)

Songfor Athene

Vytautas Miskinis (b. 1954)

Diffusa est gratia

Samuel Barber (1910-1981)

Agnus Dei

Norman Dello Joio (b. 1913)

OfCrows and Clusters

Eric Whitacre (b. 1970)

Leonardo Dreams ofHis Flying Machine
INTERMISSION

Part hi

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)

Largo

Arranged for mixed chorus by Ward Swingle

John Lennon (1940-1980) and Paul McCartney (b. 1942)

Ticket to Ride

Arranged for mixed chorus by Alexander L’Estrange

Johnny Mercer (1909-1976)

Autumn Leaves

Arranged for mixed chorus by Malin Stromdahl

Lennon and McCartney

Drive My Car

Arranged for mixed chorus by Simon Leslie

Part iv

Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908)

Flight ofthe Bumblebee

Arranged for mixed chorus by Ward Swingle

Undine Smith Moore (1904-1989)

Daniel, Servant ofthe Lord

The Musicians

Located in Augusta, Georgia, the Davidson Fine Arts School was founded

in 1981. It has consistently been named the number one public school in

academic achievement in the state of Georgia based on students’ high SAT

scores, and it has earned repeated praise for their artistic achievements

as well. In 2004 the Grammy Foundation named the school the National

Grammy Signature School, as home to the top high school music department in the nation. In 2005 the foundation designated the Davidson Fine

Arts School a Grammy Gold Signature School.

The Davidson Fine Arts Chorale is composed of advanced vocal students

from grades nine through twelve. The group performs regularly at prestigious events in Georgia and across the nation. It has sung in the National

Cathedral, the National Shrine ofthe Immaculate Conception, and the 

Temple Square Concert Series in Salt Lake City. It has recently performed at

conventions ofthe Georgia Music Teachers Association and the American 

Choral Directors Association. Last year the chorale was featured in the Dunwoody United Methodist Church Concert Series in Atlanta, and in February'

2007 it was showcased at the Music Educators National Conference, Southern Division, in Charleston, South Carolina.

Renowned for the scope ofits repertoire, the ensemble performs major

choral works, including operas and works for double chorus. Recent repertoire choices include Johann Sebastian Bach’s Singet dem Herm and Lobet

den Herm, Johannes Brahms’ Nanie, Howard Hanson’s Song ofDemocracy,

Joseph Haydn’s Little Organ Mass, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Missa Brevis

in F Major, Giovanni Palestrina’s Stabat Mater, Henry Purcell’s Dido and

Aeneas, John Rutter’s Gloria, and Eric Whitacre’s When David Heard.

5
James Dunaway has been the director ofthe choral program at the

Davidson Fine Arts School since 1996. His teaching career spans positions

in the public schools in Cedar City, Utah; at McMurry University in Abilene,

Texas; and at McNeese State University in Lake Charles, Louisiana. He holds 

a doctor of philosophy degree from the University of Utah and has guestconducted and presented clinics in several states.

Pianist Paul Hennessy, a graduate ofThe Catholic University of America,

also came to Davidson in 1996. He has concertized in Switzerland, Italy,

and the United States. In addition to his duties as instructor of piano at

Davidson, he is also the choir director at Saint Thomas Aquinas School in

Augusta, Georgia.

6

Program Notes

Tomas Luis de Victoria was born in Spain, studied and worked in Rome,

and spent his final years in his homeland. His style is often described as

Palestrinian, but it is marked by a certain mysticism— akin to that found 

in the art of his contemporary El Greco—that sets him apart from other 

Renaissance composers. Victoria wrote Ecce nunc benedicite Dominum near

the end of his life, when his style was evolving. This work bears the principal 

hallmarks ofthe Venetian baroque polychoral style, which primarily consists 

of dialogue and echo.

While working for the archbishop of Salzburg, Mozart wrote a significant body ofsacred music. The archbishop was never very supportive of

Mozart and often registered criticism ofthe young composer’s offerings.

In the case of Regina coeli, he maintained that Mozart borrowed much ofit

directly from opera and deemed frivolous the brief quotations of Handel’s

Hallelujah Chorus, an example of Mozart’s irrepressible sense of humor.

Gioacchino Rossini, best known for his lively operas, wrote music that

is teeming with humor and wit. Indeed, some consider his Petite Messe solcnelle, which is neither small nor liturgical, to be a musical joke. This work

is one in a group of pieces Rossini wrote toward the end ofhis life that he 

called Les Peches de vieillesse (The Sins of Old Age). Another in this group is

Cantemus Domino, a double-chorus motet written in the style ofthe Renaissance masters. In a cadential formula commonly used during that period 

and used in this work, the outer voices sustain the final chord while one or

two inner voices sing moving notes. Rossini’s sense of humor intervenes

at the end ofthis beautiful and solemn piece, when the tenors sing a twelvenote flourish as the other voices sustain.

More than any other composer represented in this program, Johannes 

Brahms turned to forms and styles ofthe nineteenth century to enrich

his neoclassic works. Unsere Vater (Our Fathers) is essentially a Venetian

polychoral motet with Brahmsian harmonic textures.

7
The contemporary English composer Sir John Tavener is sometimes

confused with the English Renaissance composer John Taverner (c. 1490-

1545). Since 1999, the year in which Tavener’s Songfor Athene was included 

in the funeral service of Princess Diana and his Acclamationfor the Millennium was played at the opening ofthe Millennium Dome in Greenwich,

England, he has been described as Britain’s most prominent and popular 

living composer. His minimalist approach in Songfor Athene shows that 

the simplest materials can produce profound expression.

A prolific composer, Vytautas Miskinis is also renowned as a conductor and an international choral adjudicator. He is the artistic director ofthe 

Azuoliukas Boys’ and Men’s Chorus, a professor of choral conducting at the

Lithuanian Academy of Music, and the president ofthe Lithuanian Choral

Union. His groups have performed throughout the world and have garnered

the highest honors in international competitions.

The 1938 premiere of Samuel Barber’s Adagiofor Strings by the nbc

Orchestra under Arturo Toscanini catapulted the composer to fame. This

now instantly recognizable piece was originally the slow movement of

a string quartet Barber had written as a student, which Toscanini suggested 

he rearrange for string orchestra. Nearly thirty years later, in 1967, the

composer again reworked the Adagio, this time for unaccompanied mixed

chorus, using the Agnus Dei from the Latin mass as the text.

Norman Dello Joio won the 1957 Pulitzer Prize for Music for his Meditations on Ecclesiastes, which was first performed at The Juilliard School

on April 20, 1956. Another of his famous works is Scenesfrom the Louvre,

based on his Emmy Award-winning documentary, The Louvre. His Variations, Chaconne, and Finale won the New York Critics Circle Award in 1948.

Having written more than forty-five works for chorus over a span of almost 

seventy-five years, Dello Joio continues to compose.

Eric Whitacre rapidly emerged onto the American choral scene in the 

mid-1990s with dramatic compositions that explore searing dissonances

and demonstrate the composer’s uncanny knack for expressing text. After

graduating from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Whitacre attended The 

Juilliard School, where he studied with John Corigliano and David Diamond.

A recording of his choral works by the Brigham Young University Chorale

was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2003. Leonardo Dreams ofHis Flying

Machine is both a tribute to the Renaissance and a wild fantasy that explores

Da Vinci’s curiosity and torment.

Known for his innovative vocal arrangements that blur the lines between 

jazz, pop, and classical music, Ward Swingle is equally renowned for his 

vocal octet, the Swingle Singers, who have made dozens ofrecordings—five

ofwhich won Grammys—and toured the world. Between his arrangements,

which suggest a conviction that the voice can do anything that an instrument can do, and the ensemble’s performances ofthem, Swingle has raised 

the bar for vocal virtuosity among choral singers. In fact, many choir directors rank his artistry with that of J. S. Bach and Ralph Vaughan Williams.

Although Swingle is now officially retired, the Swingle Singers continue

today in England, with input from the founder.

The Swingle Singers’ first experiments in the early 1960s were focused

on J. S. Bach’s music, because it was already familiar to many listeners.

In Swingle’s arrangement of Bach’s Largo, the chorus becomes a baroque 

string orchestra as the soloist ornaments the melody in the manner of a jazz

instrumentalist. In a similar vein, Alexander L’Estrange’s arrangement of

John Lennon and Paul McCartney’s Ticket to Ride takes advantage of contemporary audiences’ familiarity with the music ofThe Beatles. L’Estrange

has written many arrangements for the Swingle Singers and played double

bass for their fortieth anniversary tour in 2003. Simon Leslie, a friend ofthe 

Swingle Singers’, arranged Drive My Car specifically for the group. Malin

Stromdahl, the arranger ofAutumn Leaves, is not affiliated with the Swingle

Singers but without question has been influenced by the ensemble. She

sings with the Swedish vocal group Bara Vox.

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Undine Smith Moore, often referred to as the “Dean of Black women

composers,” began composing while at Fisk University. Although she wrote

works for piano and instrumental groups, Moore is best known for her choral works, many ofwhich draw inspiration from African American sources.

Scenesfrom the Life ofa Martyr, based on writings of Dr. Martin Luther King

Jr., was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. In her 1981 keynote address to the

First National Congress on Women in Music, Moore noted that she considered herself a “teacher who composes, rather than a composer who teaches.”

Program notes by James Dunaway

10

Next Week at the National Gallery ofArt

Thomas Mastroianni, pianist

Liszt, works from Annees de pelerinage deuxieme annee, Italie

Debussy, Preludes pour piano, Book 2

March 25, 2007

Sunday Evening, 6:30 pm

West Building, West Garden Court