Another organ concert and tho’ I’ve rhapsodized about others, I have to adjust my grading curve. Today’s organist, a woman named Jillian Gardner who is studying for an Artist Diploma (something like a PhD for musicians) at Baylor University, was off the chart. She had an uncanny resemblance to Lucy Comerford, so maybe that influenced me too:-) At one point, she was playing the bass line with her feet and playing different tunes on two of the manuals — and changing stops along the way. Incredible. She wore a pair of ruby shoes which caught my fancy as well.
There was just enough time for breakfast/lunch after that concert (Eli’s Table) and a walk through the festival’s art venue before our next one.
Our afternoon concert was the Sounds of Charleston which took us on a musical journey of the city’s history. This report is probably more than you want to know about Charleston or the music….but I thought the whole experience was worth memorializing. I don’t have any pictures except for the venue.
Now! More (than you ever wanted to know) about the concert!! In the 1600’s Charleston was the crown jewel of the English colonies and after the American Revolution it was the richest city in North America — something like 7 of the richest 10 people in America lived here. Its rich citizens formed the St. Cecelia Society which held an annual concert with the finest musicians in the world. So our concert started with a a terrific bass (Ryan Allen) singing Mozart and Handel. Of course, these riches were built largely on the backs of slaves. More about that later.
Civil War years were highlighted with songs that might have been sung around a campfire by homesick soldiers — north or south. Bill Schlitt played the guitar and Bart Saylor played the mandolin, lute and mountain dulcimer as they sang these spirited, yet sad songs.
The interlocator for the concert (who was also the guitarist) was an enthusiastic and sincere man who didn’t skip over the horror and shame of slavery, noting that probably half of all the slaves in America came through the harbor at Charleston. He also talked about the mass murder in the Bible study group at Emanuel Church three years ago almost to the day — just three blocks from where we were sitting. He admitted to being dumbfounded and awed by the ability of the relatives of the victims to forgive the killer. Spirituals were the appropriate music and a professor from the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Carl Bright, his wife (Guinevere) and daughter (Genesis) were the performers. He played the piano and they sang — and boy, did they. Their voices blasted the first song, Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, through the room. Electrifying — no microphones required. And what would singing spirituals be like without group participation? So most of the audience joined in on Wade in the Water — Genesis was louder than all 160 of us!
To round things out, the pianist for the Charleston symphony (Ghadi Shayban) along with Maida Libkin (she is the wife of Bill Schlitt) played Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. The Charleston connection here is that Gershwin spent many weeks in Charleston working with DuBose Heyward, a Charleston insurance agent, who wrote the book Porgy on which Gershwin’s Porgy & Bess was based.
It all wrapped up with a sing-along Amazing Grace.
Speaking of wrapping up…..
Dinner tonight at S.N.O.B. If you’re following along you know what it stands for…..if not Slightly North of Broad.
