Rose Ensemble once again enchants local audience with devotional pieces
BY SAMUEL BLACK, FOR THE NEWS TRIBUNE
Duluth News Tribune - 10/21/2006
A certain magic exists between the Rose Ensemble and its Duluth audience. What else can define the enthusiastic applause for music from 13th- and 15th-century Spain and Portugal?
Friday night at Weber Music Hall on the UMD campus, the Rose Ensemble shared its first concert of its second decade. This concert featured music written to celebrate the Virgin Mary, although the audience was definitely composed of Christians, Jews and nonbelievers. Fifteen musical selections appearing on their newest CD made up the program, titled "Rosa das Rosas," or Most Wonderful Rose Among Roses.
The music began off-stage. A hymn to King Ferdinand and the Virgin Mary celebrated a victory over the various Muslim opponents they encountered in those ancient days. Then Kristine Kautzman and Heather Cogswell sang an emotional duet to Holy Mary, the star light that guides all believers.
Part of the delight the Rose Ensemble brings is its message that this program is aimed at everyone in the house. Tim O'Brien narrated a story about a spider in the sacred chalice, drunk by the priest, and later emerging from the priest's fingernail. By this time, the audience was spellbound. The women of the ensemble sang a long story about the blessedness of the Virgin, praising her ability to solve simple human problems.
Several instrumental pieces punctuated the evening. Ginna Watson wove a tantalizing web with her vielle, rebec, harp, and psaltery throughout the evening. Each of these stringed instruments takes the listener to distant worlds. Various members of the Ensemble share by adding percussion to her tunes.
This music exists in various manuscripts and is not immediately ready to sing. Part of the beauty of the group is the manner in which director Jordan Sramek and his colleagues create performable music from these ancient texts.
The most beautiful selection of the evening was a hymn called "Or Piangiamo," Let us now weep. The sopranos and altos sang this tune, with Eric Betthauser lyrically wrapping the audience with his lofty version of the first verse about Mary and the cross. Kathy Lee emotionally sang the second verse about the anguish experienced by a mother who loses a son. The recurring refrain makes clear that this day, for Mary, was sadder than any other. This was heavenly music, sung meaningfully by a handful of treble voices.
Kathy Lee told a story about a sacred candle saved from severe melting by a swarm of bees. Kim Sueoka narrated a tale about a painter who was saved by the Virgin Mary after he angered the devil by painting him disparagingly. Then Mark Dietrich told a rich tale about the loving power of the Virgin herself, exquisite rose, standing far above all other flowers.
With an encore about Abraham, the ensemble celebrated Jewish, Christian and Muslim spirituality as a way of promoting genuine peace around the world. The evening celebrated the conjoining of all religious sympathies. With beautiful music and immediate audience rapport, the Rose Ensemble will find a responsive audience in Duluth whenever they visit. One can only hope it will be often.
Samuel Black is a musician/ writer who reviews classical music programs for the News Tribune.