NYFOS Celebrates 100th Birthday of Bernstein

Exonians and faculty alike stared in wonder as two singers, including Joshua Jeremiah, performed “Arias and Barcarolles,” Leonard Bernstein’s final major piece. The voices tripped over each other in 12 tone harmony, creating a creepy yet lively atmosphere in the Bowld. The piece is palpably autobiographical and allegedly came from a remark that President Eisenhower made while Bernstein was performing at the White House. “You know, I liked that last piece you played. It’s got a theme. I like music with a theme, not all of them arias and barcarolles,” Eisenhower said.2018 marks the 100th birthday of composer, conductor, pianist, educator and humanitarian Leonard Bernstein and the 30th anniversary of the New York Festival of Song of which Bernstein was the founding advisor. To celebrate the double anniversary that the NYFOS has planned for over the past two years, the singers have been performing Bernstein concerts in and outside New York City for the past two seasons. This past Friday, Sept. 21, NYFOS had its debut in Exeter in the Forrestal-Bowld Music Building. The concert was open to the public, free of charge and starred Loeb as the mezzo-soprano, Jeremiah as the baritone and Steven Blier and Michael Barrett on the piano, both of whom had won Grammy awards for their piano arrangements.Barrett, protégé of Leonard Bernstein, described how the NYFOS was created. “We were frustrated with the vocal recital as it was being presented 33 years ago. We just thought it was so boring, so predictable, everyone singing the same songs over and over. We knew there was a huge amount of song out there: art songs, theater songs, pop songs, even the Beatles. We started this recital series and all of our concerts are thematic and about something. We started making them interesting, like ‘songs of the afterlife,’ one of our first themes.”When asked what he hopes the Exeter community gains from this concert experience, Blier said “I hope the community rediscovers the true Bernstein experience.”Leonard Bernstein was born on Aug. 25, 1918 in Lawrence, Massachusetts. His early works date back to as early as the 1940s during World War II and as to late as the 1970s anti-war movements. During this era, Bernstein portrayed the voice of urban America into his songs. Best known for his score, “West Side Story,” Bernstein composed songs for anywhere from small ensembles to philharmonic orchestras to Broadway. He also spent many years conducting many groups around the globe such as the London Symphony Orchestra and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra.However, according to senior Hanna Pak, who composed her HIS430 final paper about Bernstein, the composer had a rough personal history behind the international acclaims he received. “There were also a lot of rumors, and some of them may have been confirmed, that he was a closeted gay, so there was that inner tension going on. And I’ve heard of allusion to doing drugs and cheating. He doesn’t have the most steady moral compass out there, but he is a great composer,” she said. On top of this inner tension, Bernstein constantly rebelled against his father who escaped Ukraine to avoid mandatory service in the military and came to the U.S. with an American dream. The conflict originated as Bernstein’s Jewish father wanted Bernstein to take the path of a religious career such as being a rabbi, while Bernstein wished to follow pursue music.A day before the main concert, on Thursday, Sept. 21, NYFOS held a master class for four PEA students: Pak, upper Lhamo Dixey, senior Paula Coraspe and senior Madeleine Potter. These students were selected by each of the four vocal teachers at PEA. During the master class, the students performed various scores written by Bernstein and received detailed feedback from the members of the NYFOS crew.“Everything he (Bernstein) did was explosive, revolutionary, and I think at one point in my essay I compared him to Icarus—he flew too close to the sun,” Pak said. Even though she was told only one week in advance that she’d be performing for the NYFOS crew, Pak employed her experience playing Bernstein’s scores at the summer camp she attended recently to deliver a fabulous vocal performance for the audience.“His beautiful melodies are exclusively American,” Barrett said. “His music is full of emotion and love. It’s smart and lasting. It speaks to us as human beings.” Just as Barrett had predicted, Friday’s concert definitely spoke to the Exeter community. Exonians crowded the wings of The Bowld in an attempt to absorb as much music as possible before running for check in. Lower Christina Xiao enjoyed this way to start off this year’s concerts. “One of my favorite pieces they performed was [Mr. and Mrs. Webb Say Goodnight] because I loved how the pianists sang in it. I personally hadn’t listened to music like that in a while.”