Arts & Entertainment

Kathy Mattea

She has never had a movie made about her. No Sissy Spacek to portray her. But, like Loretta Lynn who has, Kathy Mattea has a familial heritage that stretches back to America’s coal-mining regions. And a musical heritage and style that, like Lynn, includes country and gospel, but woven in with folk and bluegrass.

Suzy Bogguss, Alison Krauss, Jackson Browne and Crosby, Stills and Nash are just a few of the artists with whom Kathy has collaborated. In her 28 years on the music scene, she has recorded 30 hit singles and 17 albums, including Goin’ Gone, Come From the Heart, 18 Wheels and A Dozen Roses, Burnin’ Old Memories, and Where’ve You Been.

And winning two Grammys for her efforts, the first in 1990 for Best Female Country Vocal (Where’ve You Been), the second in 1993 for the gospel-oriented Christmas album Good News.

On the way to becoming a star, Kathy joined a West Virginia University bluegrass band, dropped out of WVU, moved to Nashville, worked as a tour guide at the Country Music Hall of Fame, backed-up Bobby Goldsboro on vocals, and sang demos for songwriters and publishers.

She is no stranger to hard work; it’s in her genes.

Raised near Charleston, West Virginia, Kathy’s mining heritage is thick: both her grandfathers were miners, both her parents grew up in coal camps, and her mother worked for the local miner’s union. Her father was saved from the mines by an uncle who paid his way through college.

Oddly, she wasn’t exposed to much traditional mountain music. But when she was 19 years old she heard Dark as a Dungeon and began quietly cataloging mining and mountain songs she would someday record.

When Kathy was about nine, 78 miners were killed in The Farmington Disaster, near Fairmont, West Virginia. In 2006 the Sago Mine Disaster killed 12 West Virginia miners. “I thought, ‘Now is the time to do these songs’,” Kathy remembers.” The Sago disaster propelled Kathy back in her memory to what she had felt at that moment in her life, and she thought, “‘I need to do something with this emotion, and maybe this album is the place to channel it’. And so I knew the time was right.”

The album was COAL.

It was a life-altering decision, one that would forever change the way Kathy thought about music and singing. “This record reached out and took me. It called to me to be made,” Kathy states. “If you go through your life and you try to be open, you try to think how can you be of service, how can your gifts best be used in the world…if you ask that question everyday, you find yourself at the answer. And it’s not always what you thought it would be when you asked.”

She found herself discovering a part of herself she had never known before. “I had to unlearn a lot about singing. These songs are about getting out of the way; it’s about being with the song, opening a space and letting the song come through you.”

“I wanted some labor songs, some songs that articulated the lifestyle, the bigger struggles, and I wanted a wide variety musically,” Kathy notes. “Most of all, I wanted it to speak to the sense of place and the sense of attachment people have to each other and to the land.” She chose songs by such celebrated songwriters as Jean Ritchie, Billy Edd Wheeler, Hazel Dickens, Si Kahn, Utah Phillips, Merle Travis, and Darrell Scott.

Kathy says she’s had good luck picking songs because she goes with her gut. “I’ve found so much of my voice through interpreting other people’s songs, it’s like a marriage,” Kathy remarks. “I’m breathing something into the song, collaborating with the writers on bringing something forth.”

Kathy has played with guitarist Bill Cooley for 20 years and calls him “my silent partner, my unspoken collaborator on everything I do… I have been orbiting around him, musically, for a long time.”

Kirk Albrecht at minor7th.com describes Cooley as “… a guitarists guitarist, like Vince Gill, who seems to be at home in most any style.”

Versatility, the hallmark of any busy sideman, has been the stock in trade of a career that has seen Bill touring and recording with the likes of country icon Merle Haggard, country-pop diva Reba McEntire, traditionalist Alan Jackson and rockin’ singer-songwriter Hal Ketchum, as well as the eclectic, genre-crossing Mattea.

A native of Santa Barbara, CA, Bill moved to Nashville in 1985. A dozen years later he was called “one of Nashville’s most respected sidemen” by Guitar Player Magazine.

A native of Nashville, David Spicher is the son of session fiddle king Buddy Spicher. He has performed with Crystal Gayle, Pam Tillis, the Jerry Douglas Band, Carolina Rain, Jim Lauderdale, Nickel Creek, polka queen Lynn Marie, the Nashville Symphony, John England & the Western Swingers, and his family’s own Nashville Swing Band.

Eamonn O’Rourke (fiddle, mandolin, vocals) was born in County Donegal, Ireland. In 1993, Eamonn moved to New York. Working with a wide variety of artists throughout the United States and Canada, he was blessed with the chance to study with the great Mark O’Connor and cultivated a successful career as a session musician.

On Friday, May 4 and Saturday, May 5 at 8pm in the Schuster Center, the Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra will present Kathy Mattea: From the Heart, the final concert in this season’s SuperPops series, featuring Kathy, Bill, David, and Eamonn.

And quite a few other musicians on vocals.

“I think there’s a mystery there,“ Kathy says, “that somewhere in me, in my DNA, there’s my great grandmother singing, and my grandmother, and my people, singing through me, with me.”

DPO presents Spotlight: DPO Quartet and Principals

DPO's "Supergroup"

Look. Up in the sky. It’s a bird. It’s a plane. It’ a…bird and a plane.

Darn!

Ever since I was a kid, I have looked forward to seeing, and yet never actually have seen, a Super Hero. The flying kind or otherwise. I have seen a Super Chief (actually, I’ve ridden on one out of L.A.), a Super Bowl game, and a Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious movie. But not one Super Hero.

I have, however, seen and heard in person several Super Musicians. Dizzy Gillespie, Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, Jim Croce, Rachel Barton Pine, and Emerson, Lake, and Palmer. All are, or were, big stars at the top of their craft. None had to sneak into a telephone booth and change clothes to let people know they had big-time musical game. Pass them on the street, and you’d have no way of knowing they were extremely special, talented people.

Until you heard them play.

And we have in our midst some musical super heroes of our own. If you have attended a Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra (DPO) concert, you have heard these heroes play before. You may not have noticed them specifically, because they most likely were performing as members of the larger group.

Unlike Reed Richards, Susan Storm, Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm, they haven’t gone on any scientific missions to outer space during which – after exposure to cosmic rays – they gained superpowers and became Mister Fantastic, Invisible Woman, Human Torch, or The Thing.

The DPO’s musical super heroes had their power all along. And there are six of them. I like to think of them as the Supergroup.

Like any super hero, our six had to undergo a severe trial to prove their worth. Nothing that involves fire, explosives, metallic weapons, or death rays, but something much more challenging for a classical musician.

A blind audition.

Prospective members of the DPO and prospective Principal (read: first chair) musicians receive 10 excerpted musical selections each out of which they’ll play three or four in the first blind audition round (5-7 minutes) of music for a particular instrument.

And they must perform it for judges who can only hear the musician play; they cannot see the musician, so as not to be swayed by any factor other than the musician’s sheer ability both to correctly read and perform the music.

It requires perfect knowledge of the music and steely control of one’s nerves and emotions to win an audition.

Each blind audition round per instrument starts with 10 applicants in a group; the judges pick one musician from each group.

In the second blind round all surviving first-round applicants are in the same group from which judges select the three best. In the third and final blind round judges select the one musician who is the best of the final three.

It takes on the average 12 to 20 auditions for an applicant before landing the average DPO musician’s job.

A professional musician for over 20 years at the time, Bill Slusser, DPO second violin/librarian practiced for two years before auditioning for the DPO. Two years and 22 auditions later, Bill landed his current position.

On Thursdday, April 26 at 6:30 pm in the Renaissance Auditorium of the Dayton Art Institute, the DPO will present Spotlight: DPO Quartet and Principals, the final Special Event of the season. And the Supergroup will perform works by a super grouping – Mozart, Britten, and BRAHMS.

Q: Who, exactly, are the Supergroup?

Jessica Hung

A: Jessica Hung, Kirstin Greenlaw, Sheridan Currie, Andra Padrichelli, Eileen Whalen, and John Kurokawa.

Violinist Jessica Hung of Chicago is Concertmaster of the Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra. Jessica also serves as Concertmaster of the Annapolis Symphony Orchestra and previously held the same position in the Chicago Civic, Northwestern University, CIM, and Ashland Symphony Orchestras, as well as the post of Assistant Concertmaster with the Akron Symphony Orchestra.

After winning selection by audition, Jessica performed with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at the Tanglewood Music Center. Her orchestral endeavors have brought her to such venues as Carnegie Hall in New York and the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam.

Kirstin Greenlaw, Principal Second Violin of the Dayton Philharmonic, maintains an active performing and teaching schedule in the Dayton and Cincinnati areas. Between performances with the Duveneck String Quartet in Cincinnati and the Dayton Principals quartet, she is active in the SPARK program through the Dayton Philharmonic.

Kristin Greenlaw

She has served on the faculty of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and as concertmaster and soloist with the Greensboro Symphony Orchestra. Now in her seventh year on the faculty of the Opera Theatre and Music Festival of Lucca, she is acting chamber music coordinator for the Festival. She is also a grand prize winner of the Carmel Chamber Music Competition and graduate of the Interlochen Arts Academy

Sheridan Kamberger Currie is the Principal Violist of the Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra. She has performed as chamber musician throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe and has performed as soloist with numerous orchestras since her concerto debut in 1997. In 1998 Ms. Currie was the Time Warner String Fellow at the Aspen Music Festival and the winner of the Nakamichi Viola Concerto Competition there. Other competition awards include first prize in the 1998 Geraldine B. Gee International Viola Competition, where she also won second prize in 1995 and 1997.

Andra Lunde Padrichelli, Principal Cellist of the Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra, has played in the Fort Worth Symphony as Assistant Principal and has played in the Cincinnati Symphony. She has received many awards, including First Prize in the New York ASTA competition in 1997.

Her tenure with the Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra has given her opportunities to collaborate with artists such as Yo-Yo Ma and Emanuel Ax as well as performing chamber music and extensive orchestral solos.

Eileen Whalen

Eileen Whalen, the Principal Oboist of the Dayton Philharmonic, has served as the Principal Oboist of the Honolulu Symphony and the Northeastern Pennsylvania Philharmonic and has performed with the New Jersey, Colorado, and Jacksonville Symphonies, among others.

In addition, Ms. Whalen is the Principal Oboist of the Glimmerglass Opera Orchestra, with whom she has performed on an Emmy-nominated PBS Great Performance broadcast, has recorded for Chandos records, and has been heard regularly on NPR’s World of Opera.

John Kurokawa is the Principal Clarinetist of the Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra, a position he has held since 1995. A former student of Edward Marks and Ronald de Kant, he holds degrees in woodwind performance from Bowling Green State University (specializing in clarinet, flute, and saxophone) and clarinet performance from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music.

John Kurokawa

Kurokawa has been a featured soloist with the Dayton Philharmonic, performing the concertos of John Adams and Mozart. He has performed with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and participated in the orchestra’s recording of Mahler’s Symphony No. 9. He is also the Principal Clarinetist of the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra and spends the latter part of his summers performing in the Lakeside Symphony Orchestra.

See the extremely tested, tried, and talented Supergroup with the DPO on April 26 in Spotlight: DPO Quartet and Principals.

Just don’t expect to see a bat signal in the spotlight….

DPO presents Sons of Russia and Tchaikovsky’s Final Statement

In 1994, Kevin Bacon stated that he had worked with everybody in Hollywood or someone who had worked with them. That spawned a trivia game known as Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. Pioneering scientific research has suggested that all human civilization is a small-world type of network typified by short path lengths. Six Degrees is based on the small-world phenomenon and presumes that you can link any movie actor through his/her film roles to actor Kevin Bacon within six steps.

What gets to me is the assumption that this type of game is new and surfaced as the feedback to Bacon’s quote.

Au contraire!

It has its roots in 1840 Russia, the year and the place in which the first of three of the most titanic, groundbreaking composers who ever lived first saw daylight. In order by date of birth they are Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, and Sergey Prokofiev. And the links that connected them all were their nationality and a school.

And a fantastic talent for musical composition.

Look at the thumbnail of each composer’s life, and see if you can connect the dots between them.

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Let’s start at the beginning with the composer whose works we immediately recognize when we hear them: Tchaikovsky.

The son of a mining engineer to whom he never truly warmed, Tchaikovsky grew up learning to play piano and speak different languages by both the family governess and his mother, whom he lost in his early teens to cholera. In 1862 Tchaikovsky was one of the first to enter the St. Petersburg Conservatory, the attitudes of many of the school’s faculty as conservative as its name. Then, as if fate were on his side and anti-faculty, the school hired him as a teacher of harmony. Harmony!

Some 15 years later, Tchaikovsky wed a young woman who had been a student of his, a marriage that lasted less than one month. So much for harmony.

He composed a massive body of work, compositions that remain to this day a beloved part of the Russian repertoire. Fantastic rumors and folk tales to the contrary, Tchaikovsky died in 1893 of the same disease that took his mother – cholera.

Next up: Rimsky-Korsakov.

Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov

Rimsky-Korsakov (born 1844) came from money and an old-line military family. For many years, he was in the Russian navy in one capacity or another – cadet, officer, and administrator. In that time had sailed, seen the world, and taken up composing as a hobby. He wanted to write music that would provide Russia a unique nationalistic musical identity.

Neither his administrative, nor his musical capabilities, went unnoticed. Barely a hand at composing, he nonetheless received appointment to the St. Petersburg Conservatory as a professor of – of all things – composition! A start-up operation at the time, the Conservatory needed funding in the worst way, and his family’s many wealthy connections doubtless played a larger part in his selection to the faculty than his composing skills.

But the old adage “those who can do; those who can’t teach” didn’t apply to Rimsky-Korsakov. He read and studied along with his students (probably both longer and harder than), becoming one of the most unique and innovative Russian composers.

BTW: Prokofiev was a student of his.

Sergey Prokofiev

Speaking of which, the music of Sergey Prokofiev (1891) has proven itself to be lasting in spite of the fact that it is some of the world’s most singularly demanding, conventional and in the same breath advanced, audacious, sarcastic, unsure, and outspoken ever written.

Intelligent beyond his years, Prokofiev studied at the St. Petersburg Conservatory and transformed what he had learned plus what he had already known into a career as a pianist and composer, a career that – in 1917 – was steamrolled by the immense socio-political weight of the Bolshevik (read: Communist) Revolution.

Reading the writing on the political wall, Prokofiev emigrated first to America then Europe, unable to please concertgoers with works some of which actually parodied them and just missing a chance to become a successful and socially chic pianist in exile. First mistake.

Tail between his legs, Prokofiev returned to what was in 1936 the Stalin-dominated U.S.S.R hopeful to wow the Communist leadership with his music. Second mistake.

The Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra is holding a three-concert homage to these three titans of Russian music.

Jessica Hung

On Thursday, April 12 and Saturday, April 14 at 8 pm in the Schuster Center, the DPO will present Sons of Russia, the seventh concert in this season’s Classical Series, featuring Rimsky-Korsakov’s Russian Easter Overture, Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2 with DPO concert master Jessica Hung as soloist, and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6, the Pathetique.

On Friday, April 13 at 8 pm in the Schuster Center, the DPO will present Tchaikovsky’s Final Statement, the fourth and final concert in this season’s Classical Connections Series, featuring Tchaikovsky’s Waltz of the Flowers from The Nutcracker ballet and Symphony No. 6, the Pathetique.

So, have you connected the dots yet? What things do all our composers have in common? They were all Russian. They all had to prove themselves musically. They all attended the St. Petersburg Conservatory.

Three degrees of separation. Not six. Okay; that’s the bad news. The good?

No Kevin Bacon….