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Classical music offerings are a little sparse in the city during the summertime, but a sparkling exception to that rule is Summerfest, the excellent chamber music series that brings some of Kansas City’s most talented instrumentalists to the stage for four weekends of traditional and contemporary music each July.

Each weekend’s concert is given twice, on Saturday evening at 7:00 p.m. at White Recital Hall in the James C. Olson Performing Arts Center, 4949 Cherry Street on the UMKC campus, and on the following Sunday afternoon at 5:00 p.m. at historic Old Mary’s Episcopal Church at 13th and Holmes in downtown Kansas City, Missouri, just east of the Missouri State Office Building.

This year’s lineup of concerts indicates that, as usual, Summerfest will have a number of delights in store:

July 9 and 10.  Summerfest brings Liguria by Elizabeth Brown, which was named after an arts center located on the Italian Riviera in the village of Bogliasco, just a few miles south of Genoa. Written in 1999, the piece is one of “lyrical melancholy,” according to the composer, which was inspired by “steep narrow walkways twisted through ancient olive groves and between walled houses and small farms, with the Mediterranean spread below.”

Also on the first weekend’s programs are Lester Trimble’s Four Fragments from The Canterbury Tales, two Baroque love songs by English composer Henry Purcell from the plays Sweeter Than Roses and Music for a While, and Mozart’s Piano Quartet in G Minor.

The Trimble piece, probably unfamiliar to most Kansas City audiences, is based upon stories from Chaucer’s famous medieval Canterbury Tales and according to program annotator Andrew Granade the composer wished to explore the “deep relationships with the medieval world that could inform music, so he careful imbedded several anachronisms throughout the score, from the use of the harpsichord as the work’s primary instrument to the adoption of Chaucer’s original Middle English text.” Some of the Chaucer text will be sung by soprano soloist Gwen Coleman Detwiler.

July 16 and 17.  The second Summerfest weekend focuses mostly on Italian Baroque music, with Domenico Scarlatti’s Sonata No. 2 and five other sonatas transcribed for chamber orchestra in 1975 by composer Jean Francaix.  Also included is Vivaldi’s Bassoon Concerto.

The lone non-Baroque piece of music on the program is Thirteen Ways by contemporary Virginia-based composer Thomas Albert, inspired by the poem inspired by “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” by Wallace Stevens. Commissioned by eighth blackbird, it has become his most popular piece, and according to Gramophone Magazine it “mirrors the sentiments of the poems in touching and gently humorous terms.”

July 23 and 24.  Summerfest’s third concert is the most geographically diverse. It begins with Haydn’s charming String Quartet Op. 9, No. 3, continues with the Trio for Flute, Violin and Harp by Mexican conductor and composer Carlos Chavez, and also features American composer Lowell Lieberman’s Fantasy on a Fugue by J.S. Bach, Op. 27, and a work from the former Czechoslovakia, the Musique de chambre, No. 1 by Bohuslav Martinů. 

The work of Chavez deserves a broader hearing.  His six symphonies are considered among the finest 20^th-century works in that genre, and his chamber music and piano concertos are also much prized by connoisseurs.  Summerfest’s performance of his trio will mark an unusual performance of his works in Kansas City.

Lowell Lieberman is one of today’s leading composers, and his take on the music of Bach offers an interesting contrast between contemporary compositions and the Baroque master works of the great Bach. Martinů, one of the giants of 20^th-century Czech music, along with Leos Janáček, composed much of his music in France during his student days and in the United States after fleeing his native country during the war years. His music remains distinctly Czech in character, however, and his chamber works as well as his symphonies have been landmarks of the last century’s music.

 July 30 and 31.  The final Summerfest weekend features two composers familiar to all students of piano music, along with two contemporary composers whose works are perhaps less familiar.

Muzio Clementi, a Mozart contemporary and the author of so many familiar piano pieces, was also an outstanding composer of chamber music, and his Trio for Piano, Violin and Cello in D Major will open the fourth Summerfest program. The other familiar composer on the program is Brahms, who will be represented by his sensuous Serenade No. 1 in D Major, which so typifies the German master’s mastery of broad-stroked melody.

For the more modern pieces on the program, Summerfest will bring us the work of modern American composer Joan Tower and the contemporary Canadian-American maestro Karim Al-Zand.  Tower, perhaps best known for her Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman (a counterpoint to Aaron Copland’s famous World War II-era Fanfare for the Common Man), is represented by Petroushskates (1980), a piece influenced by both Stravinsky’s ballet score for Petroushka and the “curving, twirling and jumping figure” of an Olympic ice skater, according to the composer.  The Al-Zand composition which concludes the season is the light-hearted Three Character Pieces for Bassoon and Viola written in 2006.

Summerfest’s outstanding collection of musicians includes Mary Grant, Anne-Marie Brown, Tony DeMarco, and Kristin Velicer, violin;  Sean Brumble and Jessica Nance, viola; Alexander East and Susie Yang, cello; Edward Paulsen, bass; Shannon Finney, flute; Barbara Bishop and Kristina Goettler, oboe; Jane Carl, clarinet; Joshua Hood, bassoon; Tod Bowermaster and Kelly Cornell, horn; Melissa Rose and Dan Velicer, piano; Matthew Zell, percussion; Marie Rubis Bauer, harpsichord; Yumiko Endo Schlaffer and Nuiko Wadden, harp, and Gwen Coleman Detwiler, soprano.

Tickets to Summerfest are available online at www.summerfestkc.org, from the Central Ticket Office, 816-235-6222 and http://www.umkc.edu/cto

Top Photo: Summerfest musicians Shannon Finney, flute; Joshua Hood, bassoon, Jane Carl, clarinet; Alexander East, cello; Mary Grant, violin

By Don Dagenais

City Classics Music and Dance Columnist; Classical Contributor

A lifelong classical music fan, Don Dagenais is a frequent preview speaker for the Lyric Opera of Kansas City and has taught classical music and opera courses at several Kansas City venues. He has served on the boards of directors of a number of performing arts organizations including the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, the Lyric Opera Guild, UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance, Opera Volunteers International, the Civic Opera Theater of Kansas City, Inspiration Point Fine Arts Colony, Octarium, and the Friends of the Symphony.  He has been the past president of most of these organizations and is current the president of the Friends of the Symphony. 

Dagenais co-authored a history of the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, published on the occasion of its 50th anniversary (2007) and has written books on the histories of both the Lyric Opera Guild and Opera Volunteers International, as well as an introductory book for opera novices (Your Passport to the Opera).  He has received several local and national awards for outstanding volunteer work for the arts, including a lifetime achievement award from The Coterie Theatre in 2000, the Kansas City Musical Club's annual award in 2001, a Partners in Excellence Award from Opera Volunteers International in 2002, a Bravo Award from Opera Volunteers International in 2004 and a community service award from the Daughter of the American Revolution in 2008 honoring him for his community service to the arts.

In addition to his music interests, Don is president of the board of directors for the Metropolitan Ensemble Theater and has served on the boards of The Coterie Theatre and the Heart of America Shakespeare Festival, serving as president of each organization.  He publishes newsletters for seven arts organizations.  When not involved in the performing arts, Don is a senior real estate attorney with Lathrop & Gage LLP in Kansas City, Missouri, where he has practiced law since 1976 after graduating from the Cornell Law School.

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