No Clapping Between Movements?
Join hosts Lena and Alexandra for the No Clapping Between Movements Podcast?, where they dive into the world of symphonic music, featuring insightful interviews with musicians, conductors, and artists from all corners of the globe.
Each episode explores the rich landscape of classical music, offering an in-depth look at the Olympia Symphony’s concert season, while uncovering how music connects and shapes our lives.
Lena, a self-proclaimed music neophyte, shares her passion for the arts and education - though she's left her childhood violin in the past to avoid tormenting the neighbors. Alexandra, an international conductor and musician, brings a wealth of experience and knowledge.
No Clapping Between Movements?
Episode 6 - Move with Elizabeth Landis
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In this episode, Alexandra and Lena are joined by Elizabeth Landis, harpist and soloist for the Olympia Symphony Orchestra's April concert.
They discuss Liz's passion for pushing the harp’s boundaries, the stunning Ginastera concerto’s complex pedal techniques, to the hidden stories of censorship and resilience in Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 5.
Most people don’t realize how intricate and technically daring the harp can be—until they hear Elizabeth Landis. She breaks down her journey from a tiny three-year-old entranced by a giant instrument to becoming principal harpist of Symphony Tacoma.
Doing the actual rehearsals, doing the actual performances, it's so rewarding. Like I just can't think of anything else that would satisfy my soul like this. There's something about the collaborative efforts of being in an orchestra that just it transcends each individual person.
SPEAKER_00Where we discuss symphonic music and interview artists and experts from around the world. I'm Lina Mandiola, and I am Alexander Riechov. Let's get started. Hi, Alex. Hello, Lena. Welcome to April. Oh my god, it's already April.
SPEAKER_02I know. Flowers are blooming. So we are talking about our April 19th concert titled Move.
SPEAKER_00Yes, our season finale, unfortunately.
SPEAKER_02Oh, that is so sad.
SPEAKER_00Sad, isn't it? I wish we had two more.
SPEAKER_02Only two, not like five.
SPEAKER_00Well, yes, in the season. Yes, but you know, two more, like May, June, and then summer.
SPEAKER_02And summer. We're gonna need we're gonna need a lot more donors for two or five. So if you're listening to this and you'd like to donate to the Olympia Symphony, please go to our website. Okay, so we have today our soloist, Elizabeth Landis. And before we ask her to talk about herself, I'm gonna talk about her. I pulled her bio off of her website. Liz, I'm sorry if I butchered it ahead of time. You'll be able to fix it in the follow-up. Elizabeth Landis is a harpist, educator, and travel enthusiast. Most days you can find her behind the harp performing in weddings and concerts, arranging music for the harp, or next to a harp guiding others in their harp journeys. At just three years old, she saw a harp up close for the first time and knew it was her life's path. She played her first wedding at 12, first large ensemble concert at 13, and taught her first student at 16. She spent her last year of high school attending the Interlokan Arts Academy and went on to study with the legendary teachers at University of Toronto, Temple University, and the University of Cincinnati's College Conservatory of Music. As a concert harpist, she serves as a principal harpist of Symphony Tacoma and Northwest Sinfonietta, and she has played with many, many orchestras, too many to list on this podcast, but I encourage everybody to go check out her bio. The most important, she's going to be playing with the Olympia Symphony. So welcome, Liz. Thank you. Thank you for having me. I know I read your bio, but I want to learn more about why you chose Harp, about your background and all of that.
SPEAKER_01Sure. So we were visiting my grandma up in Orlando, Florida, and she was a church organist at the time, so we went to go see her do that, and there happened to be a harpist that day, and I was all three years old. The only thing I remember is how big the harp was. I was just entranced by this gigantic thing in front of me, and I was like, that is my life's calling. And my parents were like, uh-huh, sure. And so my parents are both musicians. Um, my dad was a violist in the Florida Orchestra, and my mom taught all ages, all sorts of music, and ended up doing like AP music theory at an arts high school. We had a plethora of instruments at home. We had uh, you know, different kinds of violins and violas and flutes and a piano and even one of those like pump organs where you use your feet to use them. So uh yeah, they were like, why don't you do one of those? You should do one of those instead. We have one of these at home. Like, are you sure we we have a bunch of these instruments? I was like, no, it's the harp or nothing. And so they made a bargain with me because I don't remember this, but apparently I was a big pest about it. So they said, you have to learn how to read music on the piano first, because it's the same class we got the trouble of having the bass left. They were like, you have to get proficient at that first, and then when you turn eight, we'll get you a harp. And so I held up my side of the bargain. My eighth birthday rolls around, and I'm like, Where's my harp? And they were like, Oh, oh no. So they ended up getting me a lever harp to start, and then within a few years, I had both a growth spurt and also like I was just kind of advancing at the harp at a decent rate, and so my teachers sat them done, they were like, You need to get a repel harp, and they were like, Oh no. So being in Florida, like a lot of people had boats. This wasn't uncommon, but uh, so we had a boat, and then all of a sudden we didn't have a boat and we had a harp. Oh my god, wonderful parents, super supportive, they've been awesome.
SPEAKER_02While we're talking about the harp and growing up, um, when you first started, is the harp kind of like the violin? Do you get different sizes, or is it just big size?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, they come in different sizes. Um, so the first one I had was about four feet tall. It's basically like a concert harp, but on a smaller scale. And instead of having pedals, it's got levers, so you have to reach up and manually change the pitch by lowering or raising uh the lever, which changes the tension, thus changing the pitch. So the lever harp is a little limited in how many keys you can get to, just because it's like it's a set tuning, and then you can only get to a couple different keys from there. But with the pedal harp, you have access to all of them. So that was the big step up. It was being able to do more advanced things with like chromaticism or getting between keys really fluidly.
SPEAKER_00There are so many things about the harp that we we are not aware of. That's incredible.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and I just kept on picturing baby Liz standing next to this ginormous harp. And I was like, how does that even work?
SPEAKER_01It's my earliest memory. I just remember just how big it was, and that's it.
SPEAKER_02How about education? Like, what at what point did you start to take it really seriously? Like it's not just this is cool, but this is my life.
SPEAKER_01Sure. Uh it was kind of always there. I always kind of knew deep down that this was what I was gonna do with my life. I don't think I ever really entertained any other career options. I was just kind of this is it. Yeah, I took my um harp education very seriously. Like by the time I was 12, I was already doing weddings because my parents did weddings on the side. And actually, they were super smart about it. They were like, okay, we're you we know you're 12. 12-year-olds don't do well with money, so what we're gonna do is like start a bank account for you and we're gonna start saving up for when you're gonna need it. And actually, because of that, I was able to fund a lot of my interlock intuition because it was the the full year um versus the summer camps. So like going to the academy was very expensive. I had a work scholarship and also had to pay out a little bit, and so it was the money that I saved up from weddings and stuff that ended up helping to pay for that.
SPEAKER_00I believe that that's one of the things that having parents who not only are supported but come from the same industry, they understand what you're gonna be spending money. Because for my parents it was a little bit difficult because they didn't come from that world. So it was like to tell them like I have this tuition and I have this and I have that, like that was uh a little bit difficult for them to understand. Of course, they supported, but there was no um how can I say there was no saving for that, just in case.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I gotcha. And it's it's hard to kind of anticipate what a musician is gonna need in terms of education or uh like teachers, materials, just in terms of like music or like for string players, it's like having a budget for the strings. It's just kind of a wild ride to go on if you don't know exactly what is involved in it.
SPEAKER_02So could you play in school, like regular K through 12, or did you have to take classes privately?
SPEAKER_01I started privately, um, and that was when I was on the lever harp. And soon it came to a point where I needed more advanced instruction, and actually at the time the Florida Orchestra didn't have a regular harpist until I was about 16 years old. Um and then Anna Kate Mackel joined the Florida Orchestra, and so I was finally able to like ask really in-depth orchestra questions, get some more insights into more technical aspects that um beforehand it was like there was a ton of great information, but it was like, okay, but how do I accomplish this like very specific thing in say the Berilios, the Symphony Fantastic, or how do I accomplish this in this Wagner piece? At the same time, I also went to an Arts Magnet High School, uh Gibbs High, and uh it was called Pennell's County City for the Arts. So I was doing orchestra through them. They actually bought a harp so that I could participate, and they still have the harp down there. So I was getting orchestral experience. I was in the U.S. orchestras, I was doing as much as I could, but it really started to take off when I finally got to study with Anna Kate. And she was the one who started kind of getting the bug in my head to be like, you need to go take lessons with teachers, you're getting ready for the age where you need to like think seriously about college and you need to do these auditions, so it might be good to start figuring out what teachers you want to possibly pursue a degree with. And so my parents were really great about that. Okay, so I went up to Oberlin and took a lesson with Yolana Konanassis, and she saw in my technique that I was struggling a little bit with tension. So she said, um, you got another year left before you really need to start doing uh auditions for college. So she suggested taking a lesson with Joan Holland over at Interlocken. She said, This was my teacher before I went off and did everything for me. So go study with my previous teacher and then come audition for me. So that's what I did. I somehow got into Interlocken, but I studied with Joan Holland for a year, and she basically took me to bare bones. She was like, we gotta relearn how to do this stuff without all this tension. So we were doing like very basic exercises, just making sure that I could come to the harp without any gripping from any of my muscles, trying to use as much um non-extraneous force as possible. And so from there we got ready for undergrad auditions. I'm trying to remember all the places. Okay, Oberlin, CIM, Curtis, which was quite the adventure because I didn't think I had any shot at Curtis, but I decided to do it anyway just to see what would happen to it. It was a terrible audition. It was absolutely awful. But Judy Loman, who was still there at the time, she was like, you know, I can't take you here at Curtis, but the application deadlines are still open for University of Toronto, where she also taught. Apply there and I'll take you. I have no idea what she saw in me, but I'm so grateful for her to take that chance on me. Because it was truly bad audition.
SPEAKER_02Oh no.
SPEAKER_00But she thought she saw something, yeah. Yeah. But that's great. You see, that I think that that's a great example that sometimes when we we'd get out of auditions or something that we think that to eat was not okay, it was actually okay. We are worse critic critics.
SPEAKER_01Oh, thanks. Although I remember I've like forgotten notes halfway through it, and I was just like fumbling around for a bit. So, but she saw something, so there was that.
SPEAKER_02So you went from Florida to Michigan, and then Michigan to Toronto. And then one other question from what you just said. So when you referenced tension, it was tension in your body as you're playing and not tension on the instrument.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so specifically my arms. So, and as a teacher, I've noticed this a lot while I'm teaching, and this is something I'm big about just because I have gone through the process of getting all that tension out of me. People tend to lock up in their forearms. They want to kind of control the amount of motion that they have, but in doing so, it really limits the ability to travel up and down the harp and be able to close the fingers in a way that lets them be fluid enough to be musical and also just get around for all the notes that they need achieved. So the biggest thing I've had to learn is to give up control to gain control. That has involved a lot of very strategic work in terms of trying to be as loose as possible on the harp. And so basically, I'm trying to be as fundamentally lazy as I can be. What's the bare minimum amount of effort I have to put in to get a good sound and achieve technique?
SPEAKER_02That makes sense because when you watch a harpist, your hands just kind of glide, or your hands from the strings, and that's one of the beautiful parts of watching someone play a harp.
SPEAKER_00When we look at the orchestral repertoire, we see lots of uh cello concerto, piano concerto, violin concerto, rarely a harp concerto. When you're going to study uh that instrument, I know that for instance uh for piano, you have like so many possibilities. You can go to uh chamber music, you can go to be an accompanist or collaborator, you can be a soloist. Strings I know, especially in Julia, that they even make a difference between with the teacher that you go, like if you go to certain teachers, you're gonna you're definitely gonna be a soloist. Sure. If you go to other teachers, you're definitely gonna be an orchestral player. Is that something like that in the harp world?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, there are some people who are more on the solo side and some who are on the orchestral side, and I would say actually Judy Lohman kind of bridges all the gaps. She can do it all. She not only was a soloist and like a prolific soloist, um, she also was in the Toronto Symphony for a very long time. But then there's people like Heidi Leewalder, who also did the symphony side of things, but her main thing was doing solos and concertos. And I would say like Yolanda Kananassis is like very much on the solo side. Um and Elizabeth Hainen, who I studied with the Temple, is like on the orchestral side. Not that they don't do solos or chamber music or um or concerity, but it seems like more chances to do stuff just because of their careers. Like if you're putting in an orchestra full-time, obviously that's gonna be your main thing. So yeah, there's a little bit of um like specialization in that sense.
SPEAKER_00But it doesn't mean, like, for instance, if you choose to become a principal in an orchestra, it doesn't mean necessarily that you're not gonna be playing concerto.
SPEAKER_01Right. So um, although I do know that a lot of times when people join orchestras, that like periodically people in the orchestra will get features as soloists. So, like Valerie Mussolini just did uh a brand new concerto. What was that back in January of this year? Or last year?
SPEAKER_00It was last year, it was piano and harp, wasn't it?
SPEAKER_01Yes, yes, yes.
SPEAKER_00And I remember you played that concert.
SPEAKER_01I wasn't expecting to do as much as I did.
SPEAKER_00It was beautiful.
SPEAKER_01Oh, thank you.
SPEAKER_00It was when we went there with Laurel.
SPEAKER_02Oh, that's right, because I remember you pointed up there, you're like, I think that's Elizabeth. And then didn't you text her?
SPEAKER_00I did text you. I said, like, how are you there?
SPEAKER_02Surprise I'm everywhere. So, what is life like for a concert harvest? Right? Because a harp's not like a piccolo, you don't just stick it in your your handbag and go. Because you've traveled around the country, you've traveled all over Washington. My own curiosity, how does that work?
SPEAKER_01The process of moving a harp around is always interesting. I've gotten really used to it, but you've got to have at least an SUV at your disposal to move a harp around. So everybody asked me, how do you get a harp in an SUV anyway? So you have to um basically tilt it on its side and then shove it in. Uh so obviously my seats are perpetually down. I've got all this padding and this material to make sure it like actually can glide in smoothly. But then doing the actual rehearsals, doing the actual performances, it's so rewarding. Like, I just can't think of anything else that would satisfy my soul like this. There's something about the collaborative efforts of being in an orchestra that just it transcends each individual person. Like, you're more than the sum of your parts. And being able to get together with all these like-minded people, make music at this high level, this high scale. Like, how many people is it? It's like 80 people in some of these like orchestra settings. It's like that's a lot of people to coordinate and get to cooperate in such a very diligent, like, okay, here's the beat. We're all together, we're all doing this thing. It's just so incredible when it all happens. So, and to be like a little sliver of that, it's and usually the harp's the magical moments. Every once in a while, like, say like bar talk, concerto for orchestra. If you're playing second harp, you get to use spoons, or in my case, it was recently the backs of like plastic forks to make this like strumming, like kind of nasal strumming effect. So every once in a while we get to do some extended techniques, but usually it's like just kind of this floating ethereal moment over the orchestra.
SPEAKER_02So, most harp pieces are you playing a lot of the time with the orchestra or some of the time where you just have to sit there and kind of count the count the measures and wait for your entrance?
SPEAKER_01It depends on the piece. Uh so let's see, what's the one I have to sit around most for? Uh sometimes Wagner will be like, oh, you rest for a thousand measures, and then in the score it'll just be tacit, and then all of a sudden you just have to know the cue and it's been 30 minutes, you're like, I don't know. So that's always fun when you're just trying to guess at where the entrances are if you don't know the piece that well. But um, but I would say for the most part, I would like wait maximum, like 50 measures to play something.
SPEAKER_00I was looking at my score. Whenever I first mark the score, when whenever there is an instrument that's coming that's waiting for too long, I a big mark and I say first entrance. And for a harp, there were lots of like first entrance, do not be. So the possibility to miss that entrance is huge.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah. Actually, I got a funny story. So the last time I played Shastakovich 5, I had gotten COVID, and I told the personnel manager, I was like, I am so sick, like you need to find somebody else. And they tapped this was when I was still in Jacksonville, Florida. So they tapped everybody in the region, people in Georgia, people in like the Carolina Stephen, they were tapping everybody, and nobody was available for this concert. And so they were like, Okay, if you just wear a mask, because like I was on the tail end of it, but I was still testing positive, and they were like, if you wear a mask and we just keep you like a million feet away from everybody else, can you constantly? I was like, I don't think you want that. Like, I had bad COVID brain fog too after that, and they were like, please, we have nobody else, and I was like, Okay, fine, and then I could not count for the life of me. I'd be like, five, two, three, four, six, two, three, four, six, two, three, four, six, two, three, and then I was just out to lunch.
SPEAKER_00Oh no. Oh my god.
SPEAKER_01Well, the concert was fine, but that first rehearsal, I was like, what has happened to my brain? It is absolute mush.
SPEAKER_02So before we get to the music, how did you end up in the Pacific Northwest?
SPEAKER_01So my husband, he used to be in the Navy and uh in the Navy band, so he plays trumpet, and actually he's out doing stuff P today. So yeah, we were stationed in Jacksonville first, and then we got the orders to come out to here in Bremerton, and then we were kind of looking at our situation um as he was getting toward the reenlistment stage, and then just had like all the things that were happening for us here musically. We were like, we think this is like a good place to just be. So that's how we ended up in this area, and it has been just absolutely incredible for both of us as musicians. Nice.
SPEAKER_02That's great. And now you guys are Pacific Northwesterners. I love it. Um, okay, one more question that I have been dying to ask you. Sure. Is how in the world do you teach your cats how to use the talking buttons?
SPEAKER_01So my cat Freya, she was just over here a second ago. She's super poofy. Um, I love her to death. So she's the one that does the talking buttons primarily. We taught all three of our cats. Unfortunately, one of them passed from cancer, but um they they originally learned how to high-five for treats. No way. Yeah. So they'll just reach up, you know, do a little tap on the hand, and then give them a treat. And so when we got the talking buttons, we hadn't learned how to transfer that skill. So we'd hold up the talking button, they had to learn how to press the button, or at least touch it, and then we'd load her onto the floor, and eventually they figured out, oh, it's the button you have to press. But that it took a while for them to also figure out you have to compress the button. So sometimes we'd have to, you know, grab their paw and like push down. And so that they finally got it. They all figured it out eventually. But Freya was the one that took to it, and I think it's because we introduced it to her when she was a kitten. And so she is super chatty, and I'm surprised she's not on the buttons right now because she's been like, wait, you're in the area where we play. I actually found this um from an account. There was uh somebody on YouTube, Billy Speaks was the account. And so I saw the woman there, she trained her cat how to do the talking buttons, and I was like, oh, I wonder if I can do that with ours. And so ordered the little kit, and you program in your voice so you can get um like you get just like these buttons, and then it's like, what do you want them to be able to say? So it's like treats, water, food. I've also got one for Mad, which is one of Freya's favorites, so that they can kind of communicate what they want to do. And we've got ones for different uh toys that they like to play with, so it's like if they want to play, which one do they want to play with? Yeah, they just step on the buttons, primarily Freya, but step on the buttons that they want to talk to you for. So usually it's what they want to play uh with, or it'll be they'll remind us when it's time for their wet food for the night. And then if I don't respond in time, Freya likes to go arc in on the mad button. So you just hear me mad, mad, mad.
SPEAKER_02Oh my gosh, how long did it take me to teach them how to do that?
SPEAKER_01It's so funny. Uh, how long did it take for Freya? She was pretty quick about it. Um, I want to say it took her maybe three months to really figure it out.
SPEAKER_02No, that's it. Yeah, this is amazing. I know, Alex, you have to watch them on Instagram so they come on my feed sometimes, and you just see cats or dogs just going and pressing these buttons, you know. Treats. I want out, I want codes, I'm mad, I'm angry. I am mad. What's cat?
SPEAKER_00That's the thing, you know. I I am a cat person.
SPEAKER_02And see, I'm a dog person. I just assume cats are always mad.
SPEAKER_01They are not, they're lovely. And I think she's not quite associated it with like being happy. I think she just wants me to go into the room where she gets pet most. Because we have this routine where we'll go into the bedroom and then she makes biscuits on the comforter, and then I just pet her. And so I think she's trying to tell me I want to do happy things. But we have a button for pets too, so she'll say pets, and then sometimes otherwise she'll just be like happy, and I'm like, I don't know what you're trying to tell me, but okay.
SPEAKER_00I'm such an old-fashioned cat person, I didn't even know about it.
SPEAKER_02So let's talk about the music. We're gonna talk about the Ginisteras Harp Concerto first. So, Liz, I do a real deep dive into research on these pieces every time. I Google it and I look at Wikipedia. That is the extent of my knowledge base. So a little bit, Alberto Ginistera. He was born April 11, 1916, and died June 25th, 1983. Oh, I was alive when he was alive. Or I am alive when he was alive. I'm still here. Umposer of classical music. He's considered to be one of the most important 20th century composers of the Americas. He was born in Buenos Aires to a Spanish-Catalan father and an Italian mother. He studied at the Williams Conservatory in Buenos Aires, graduating in 1938 as a young professor. He taught around the country, and he, after visiting the United States in 1945 through 47, Tanglewood, he returned to Argentina, where he held a number of teaching posts. So he moved back in 1968 to the United States, and in 1970 to Europe, where he died in Geneva, Switzerland, at the age of 67. And what I thought was really interesting about it is it says he groups his music into three periods: Objective Nationalism, which was 1934 to 1948, subjective nationalism from 1948 to 1958, and neo-expressionism from 1958 to 1983. And this piece is 1956, so that falls within the subjective nationalism. And I'm guessing the nationalism is where his work was inspired by the by the gagaucho of Argentina, right? So not fully inspired, but sort of subjectively inspired. So let's talk about it.
SPEAKER_01Ooh, where do I start with this one? This is an exciting concerto just from start to finish. The whole thing is imbued with a sense of drive, I would say, and a lot of energy. It's like the most high octane uh concerto that we have in the repertoire for sure. It is also a very percussive piece. It has a lot of elements of heart attacks. For the harp, it's we're so used to rolling our chords, very soft entrances. You kind of like help guide the orchestra into its new phrase. And then here it's just like on the beat. Everything is very articulated. It's very um like on the tips of the fingers almost for us, which is an area for us where it is a little more of a brittle sound. Not in the sense of like like falling apart, but it's like it's got more of an edge to it, versus like where we get more finger into the strings where it produces that really warm, lush sound that everybody's used to. Another thing that makes it really percussive is there's actually tapping on the soundboard during this piece, knocking and tapping on it with kind of the bonier parts of the fingers. At the same time, the percussion is kind of going hams, so it's just adding to a little bit of that percussive element right there. Not to say there aren't moments of respite in this piece. The second movement is definitely one of I would say introspection. It's written in a way where you don't usually hear the harp where it's just straight chords. So usually we end up rolling them a little bit, we'll crack the chord as we say. But this one is just straight all the way through. It says don't arpeggiate any of it. And that's not a typical feature for harp concerity, but it kind of makes for a ghostly ethereal effect. You just have the tones and then they just die out naturally from decay. Nobody really writes like that even today, but it's super gorgeous in that moment, and then of course you get through kind of the cadenza moment where it gets a little bit more involved, and then you're back to this kind of ghostly effect. And then the cadenza is really interesting. It's one of the longer cadenzas that we've got. I think it is the actually the longest one. It's about three or four minutes. Yeah, it's a long one. The cadenza is this really interesting mix of tonalities. It actually opens with the notes as you would tune a guitar with. You start, what is it, E, A, D? Is it yeah. I gotta remember my notes now. E A D uh G B E. So those are the tuning notes for guitar. It's got an element of like, ooh, we're kind of invoking other instruments here. And then the second time that that motive comes back in the cadenza, it's a fifth up, but it's down by the soundboard, which is called Pre de la Tab. It's just close to the soundboard, but it kind of gets that guitar effect. It's got this nasal quality to it. It's it's just like it's not resonating the full string in the way that you would associate a harp. Like you're still getting a great tone out of it, but it sounds like a guitar, so it's kind of invoking instruments that he was very familiar with. The whole thing also draws on some extended techniques. So it was during the time where Salzedo, one of the most prolific harp composers that we've got, he had established this amazing teaching tradition and kind of this like technique tradition that still is employed by a lot of harpists today. He also kind of pioneered all these extended techniques, so drumming on the soundboard, uh, the thunder crash, which is where you get the bottom of the strings, the wire strings to smash together, and you get this kind of thunder effect, which is used in this piece. Playing Cradle de Tab a lot, there was always that from before, but like he really employs it in this one. Like using the backs of your nails to do the strumming instead of with the fingertips. That tradition was pretty much getting established around the time that this piece was getting written. So he uh Gina Sarah actually uses a lot of those techniques in this piece, and but he kind of sat on this piece for a while. Like he started it and then everybody was really excited about it. They were like, Oh, we're finally getting a new concerto, it's gonna be really fun. But it was uh, if I remember right from Heidi Leewalder, it was like seven or eight years before it actually got finished, and it was actually um a very famous concert harpist named Zabaletta who was like, Hey, can you give this to us? Like, we want you to finish this, like we want to perform this. So Zabaletta finally got him to finish this piece and actually um worked with him pretty closely because the edition that we have is edited by Zabaletta. I have the a copy of the Urtex with me, and there are some changes just because some of the technical things are a little tricky to navigate as written. So Zabaletta did a little bit of editing that makes it more idiomatic for the harp, and that's the edition that we ended up with today.
SPEAKER_00Hmm. No, it's interesting because the part that I have have different things on uh in certain parts. So I was wondering if there were different editions. My curiosity also is that wasn't it that she had commissioned the concerto and then he took him while she was still uh a harpist at Philadelphia, if I'm not mistaken, and then it took that long that she was retired by the end. So, who was the one that was uh that he was writing the concerto for?
SPEAKER_01Oh, um I'm so bad name.
SPEAKER_00And I remember reading about that it took so long that she retired. Edna Phillips. Yes, there we are. You got it. Wikipedia. So we were writing the subject.
SPEAKER_02Lina, now that you have the source there, wasn't it that that story that she had uh that it took too long that she ended up retiring from the it says Phillips Phillips had retired by the time the work was ready to be premiered, so the solo part was played by the Spanish harpist Nicanor Zabaleta with the Philadelphia Orchestra.
SPEAKER_01Zabaleta was everywhere though. He also got um two Rodrigo concertos off the off the ground, too. The concerto de Arnuez, he arranged for the harp, and so sometimes you'll hear it on the harp, and then the concerto serenada was properly a harp concerto, so Zabaleto was kind of making things happen for a long time.
SPEAKER_00Coming back to to Ginaster, it's interesting because I do have a very, you know, even though I'm not from Argentina, I'm from Brazil, but I do have a big connection with Argentina because I was born in um the south of Brazil, which is the same gaucha culture. We do share the same culture down there, like when in the south of Brazil, uh part of Argentina, Uruguay, and part of Chile as well, which is the gaucha culture. Actually, in Brazil, I call um people will call me gaucha because the state I grew up and the the heavy accents, believe it or not, I have an accent in Portuguese as well. But it's it's interesting when you refer to the gaucho culture, it's something much more rural, and you can you you actually can hear the pastoral operation that he takes um from the culture in this in this concerto, especially in the in the second movement. The most, I would say, most advanced harmonic changes and very um I'm not gonna say avant-garde, but uh a modern intake, uh modern approach compared to the first and last and last movement of the re reference to the guitar is uh clear for us that grew up in the in the Gaucha culture because that's our instrument. And but also the the the beginning and in the end the rhythm, the the rhythm part that's something that's crystal clear for uh for me when I hear it's it's typical rhythms from that part of of Latin America that we also call the cone sul. If you look at South America, it looks like a cone in the end, right? That's that's middle part, uh that's the cone sul, that would mean the south of Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina, and Chile. For me, this is clear, like it's very familiar. Uh when I hear those sounds, for me, it's it's really reminds me of childhood. Oh, awesome.
SPEAKER_02This harp concerto has three movements, like you were both talking about. And as I was reading the names of the three movements and listening to the piece, they fit perfectly.
SPEAKER_00As Elise was saying, there is this like massive interlude in the middle, like which is the harp solo, which almost for me to like a solo part in in between. In my opinion, it should be fourth movement. The solo part, and then the third.
SPEAKER_02Is the solo part in movement two?
SPEAKER_01The beginning of movement three, which is not a typical place to put a cadenza, so it just starts off a movement.
SPEAKER_00Yep. That's why it feels like a totally separated part.
SPEAKER_01Pretty much, just a single gliss to get into it.
SPEAKER_02So this earlier you said tapping on the soundboard. What is that? Where's the soundboard on a harp?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so the harp um has this uh wide base where all the strings end up going through it, and it's just this wide, flat plane, and that's the soundboard. So that's where all of the sound is traveling out from. It's an amplifier and a resonator, so most of the sound is coming out of the soundboard, hence the name. This flat wood surface is perfect for us to kind of drum on. So it'll be a combination of I try to use the flats of my knuckles, so like not on the knuckle itself, but like the flat parts in between to do some of the bigger, like more articulated taps. And then I'll use the first joint on the like fleshy side of the finger for some of the more like duller taps.
SPEAKER_02Do we listen to that through all three movements?
SPEAKER_01The tapping's actually only in the first movement. That's the only place that it shows up, yeah. And at the same time, the orchestra is kind of having a moment. Um the percussion is also going uh pretty much in sync with the harp. It feels like a bigger ensemble moment after all this, like, okay, here's the harp, here's the harp, here's the harp, and now it's back to bigger ensemble.
SPEAKER_02So, what made you choose this piece? Alex, did you choose it or Liz, did you choose it?
SPEAKER_00I did. I did. Um, I'm not only a big fan of uh Ginaster. I think this is one of the best concerti ever written, not only for Harp, it's just so great, you know, the way that he features the instrument, the music material and how he develops and how he explores the instrument in a way that nobody else explored. Like it's fascinating because when you think in modern composers or I would say composers from his era or from his time that wrote for violin or for piano or for clarinet, or they did not expand the or did they didn't use as much of the the techniques that Kinastar is using for the harp. So it really like uh much ahead of his time, not only for like I mean for the harp, yes, for the instrument, yes, but also for all every single instrument. You know, it was really, really um how can I say not challenging but risky to put that out there, you know. But yet it's really uh avant-garde and uh and uh uh experimentalist in a way, yet it's so good and cool on the ears. It's really beautiful, it has beautiful moments and it's fun and it's exciting. So it's a piece of music that for me in the repertoire of especially of the uh the 20th century is on the top repertoire. It's just because we talked in the beginning of the the our conversation, you know, that there are not many harp concertos are out there. It's not because it's one of the few, but I think that among other instruments it's also like magnificent and it should be out there. And I think it was the time uh the time for our audience to get to know, you know, this piece, like to feature Liz, which is a phenomenal, phenomenal harpist. Like her sound travels the whole like beautifully. I couldn't wait to feature her as a as a soloist. She was my muse to start with, and then I was like, Oh, she will be perfect for for Hino Stara. And then I text her, Do you play the Hinoastera? Would you be interested? I remember that text I showed it to my husband, and I was like, Am I gonna get to play this piece? Coincidentally, because that's the thing, sometimes I do things and I don't realize I do things, it shows the intuition, right? Because in season we had the um Carlos Simon was um student of Gabriela Lena Franc, and you have you with Heidi, and Heidi 30 years ago performed the same concerto with us, but it was 30 years ago, 1996. That's like a coincidence that uh I was not expecting. But tell me a little bit about the story because I remember you said that was the last time she performed.
SPEAKER_01It was here in Olympia or the last time she did um uh He Zero with Olympia. She performed it one other time. I think she said with Everett, but don't quote me on that one. Um yeah, she was basically winding up her performance of the concerto at that time. It's very exciting because um I actually, what was it, three days ago we played this for her? Um and she just has these incredible insights into this because she's done this with so many orchestras. Um and she was like, okay, like make sure that you know the orchestra part here because there's a chance like sometimes they just kind of run away, they get really excited, and you just kind of have to find them again. It's not that bad. It's easier for the heart to catch up than for like the orchestra to do anything different. So, yeah, she's got like all these insights. That's that's like where her insider knowledge really comes handy.
SPEAKER_00How many times have you performed this?
SPEAKER_01This will be the second time. I did it for a competition back when I was studying at CCM, and then that was like the last time I've done it, actually. It's really fun because I think I've definitely advanced a lot, and a lot of that actually has to do with Heidi. It was during the pandemic where I was kind of twiddling my thumbs, and I might as well try to fix up all these technique things that have kind of been plaguing me for the last few years that I really haven't had time to deal with. I was just at the stage where I was like, I don't know how to like get through some of this stuff, I don't know how to like fix it. And a friend of mine was like, hey, I studied with her, she really helped me out. Like, why don't you go take some virtual lessons? And so she actually had me do some of these theory because that's like one of her really well-known pieces that in content fantasy. And she was she's the kind of person that can just diagnose something and like not have to think too hard about it. So she was like, What are you doing with your wrists every time I would do arpeggios up and down the hearth? And I was like, What do you mean? And she's like, Yeah, your wrists are like, you know, they're changing and it's changing your hand position. And I was like, That was my problem the whole time. It was that simple a fix. And she just like clues into it so easily. She's the one who's trying to get me to finally lower my shoulders because I play a little bit like with my uh shoulders up in my ears sometimes. Uh very much about using the gravity of your arms to get into the strings. So it's like I thought like I had done all the work to get as loose as I could. No, there was more to do, and I wanted to kind of be like, you don't need to use basically any of your muscles to get into the strings, just let the surface tension of your fingers hold on.
SPEAKER_02It's almost like she was telling you just to you gotta simplify it a little bit.
SPEAKER_01Exactly, exactly. You can take it easy through some of this, like you don't need as much effort as you think you do, and that's just kind of open things up. Oh, hi.
SPEAKER_02That's pretty soon we're gonna hear the mad button.
SPEAKER_00We might actually. Yeah, treat. And uh so she's aware that you're performing with us.
SPEAKER_01Yes, yes. I think she's uh doing master classes down in California, so I don't think she's around, but she was very excited to hear about this. She's like, oh well, that was like the thing I did. I did it with Olympia, and it's been so long, and it's such an exciting thing for me. She's like, Oh, and we're just carrying on the legacy, and she was very excited about it. I'm so excited. It's a great piece.
SPEAKER_02So, I mean, this episode's gonna turn into five hours if we keep going on, but we we're gonna cover all of the topics. Liz, is there anything else before we move on to Shastkovich um that you want to kind of tell us about? Because you it seems like you are very passionate about teaching the next generation of harp players. And and I know for me growing up, I didn't I didn't even know harp was a thing that I could play. Because it was, you know, it's kind of this thing in the peripheral, you see it occasionally, you see it on cartoons, you see it, whatever, but it's not one of those like violin, clarinet, flute, guitar, piano. It's something a little bit more abstract.
SPEAKER_00It's a good point because even though So everybody loves the heart, you know, everybody like it's it's a sound that uh you know we we hear everywhere at least at least growing up in Brazil, like it was not really available, you know. You know, it was not something that was um um mainstream, so to speak. It was uh I only I I think I first saw a harp in person, like physically like I was able to to touch a harp was when I was 16 years old.
SPEAKER_02Not to mention that when you look at it, it looks intimidating as hell. It looks beautiful, it's definitely beautiful, but you look at and you're like, how do you even play that? There's like five billion strings on there.
SPEAKER_01Sometimes I don't even know.
SPEAKER_00But it's funny because I did once uh a couple of years ago, uh, in another worker show, we had a um tour, so to speak, for the sort for some kids. Like the parents came and brought the kids because they they thought the kids were interested in the percussion because uh that that concert had lots of percussion instruments, and uh all of a sudden, like you know, the the percussionists were showing, oh, and this is a marimba, and this is blah blah blah, and then all the kids were not looking at the marimba, they were looking at the harp. Finally, one of the kids said, What about the harp?
SPEAKER_01Nice, okay.
SPEAKER_00We can go and and see the harp as well. I mean, we are here for the percussion, and oh my god, it was so lovely because they it was fascinated. Which what okay, so I'm sure that people are that now here uh listen to it, they are probably asking themselves, What are the paddles for?
SPEAKER_01Oh, sure. So the paddles are for changing the pitches. Um, so the modern harp is what we call a double action harp, and that means that there are two notches that we can go into that raise the pitch or lower the pitch by a half step. So the strings are arranged like the white notes on the keyboard, so C D E F G A B C blah blah blah. And the petals, there's a pedal for each of those seven notes. So if you're in the middle position with all the petals, that's your natural position. So that means there's one level of tension. There's uh you go from flats to naturals to sharps so that we have access to all of the keys. But then um, if we need accidentals, then say like we're in the key of D major that's got two sharps, and suddenly we need to modulate to A major, which has three sharps, then we just press the G pedal down into the sharp position, and suddenly brand new key. So that does have some limitations in the sense like piano, you can access all 12 notes at once, they're just physically right there at your disposal. The harp doesn't have that same level of chromaticism, like we'll never be able to do a chromatic scale without having to change a million petals and probably make a mess of it. But it does make for some really interesting effects in that we can do what's called enharmonics. So you can spell notes differently. Um so let's say C natural, another way you could get to a C natural is by B sharp. Those are the same tones, actually. There's just different spellings, and because of the petals, I can have a C natural and a B sharp at the same time, which means if I set my petals a certain way, we can get these beautiful um pentatonic glissandi, which and this is the only instrument that can do that, that's why the harp is such a magical thing. We can get these doublings of notes in uh very strategic places. So if you hear those glisses and it just sounds really magical and ethereal, probably the pedals are set to some wild configuration, like it would be like sharp, natural, flat, flat, natural, natural, sharp. So well, it's very fun. With the harp, especially in the Genus Stera, there's a lot of pedal changes. There are so many pedal changes. There's at least 200 as far as I've counted, and I haven't thought it that hard.
SPEAKER_02So wow.
SPEAKER_01It's a lot of pedals, and really what it's doing is kind of delving into chromaticism with the harp. So that's another thing that makes this piece super interesting, whereas other composers kind of approach it like not in a conservative sense, but it's like they've got the like here's how you set up your pedal charts, here's how you get to different keys with the pedal charts, and you kind of don't wander off that script very much. But Zenistero was like, here we go, we're just gonna write a piece and we'll figure this out, and it ends up working. It's a lot of pedals, there are some unharmonic moments in there, also, but interesting modalities that you usually wouldn't get to on a harp just because so many people have followed that very like almost like romantic or impressionistic script where it's the tonal centers are very clear, um, and they don't kind of go as much into oh, here's a really chromatic moment. And it's like it's crunchy for a moment, and then you'll suddenly get another period of tonality in this piece, which is awesome. It kind of goes back and forth between like, oh, here's something that's like definitely in this key. Now we're kind of out in the wilds, now we're in a key again, now we're in the wilds, and you just don't get that in harp and charity very often.
SPEAKER_02I'm still stuck at the 200 changes on a pedal.
SPEAKER_01There's one measure that's like, I think, what is it, seven petals and just a single measure. My gold. Yeah. I've had to practice that a lot, and then I'll get to the end of the day, and I'm like, why are my hips sore?
SPEAKER_02Alright. I guess we gotta move on to shostacope. I'm I guess we gotta move on to shastocope.
SPEAKER_00Like in fact, the score calls for two harps, but but we'll only have one.
SPEAKER_01That's pretty typical.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, every time I've done it, it's one.
SPEAKER_01I think it's for budgetary reasons usually, because it's like it's the same part doubled in both harps.
SPEAKER_00So yeah, so what would be the because I'm asking you as a a conductor who never who always have seen with one harp. So what as a harpist, what will be the difference?
SPEAKER_01I think it is just um the amount of sound. Because the it is possible, especially with these modern harps, to get a lot of sound out of them. Um, like construction of these harps during Shastakovich's time, there was actually this kind of warring between like different brands of trying to come up with a harp that had more chromatic abilities. But yeah, with the modern harps, I like they're so good that they can really project out when they need to. And like the Shastakovich has enough sparsity in the writing, so when the harp is there, like you can pretty well hear it. So a doubling would just mean that you're just getting more sound.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, because that's that's another thing, you know. He writes so well, he's so meticulous with the orchestration. It's it's rare to find in the score something that I would say, like, oh, this is gonna be a problem with balance. It's always super clear, like he always managed that the for the delicate instruments that the space is there for the instrument.
SPEAKER_01I always wondered why there was a a double harp there. Yeah, and it comes down to budget too. It's like if you can get away with one harp and you don't have to pay for a double person, it's like it breaks my heart a little bit, but it's like I I understand it.
SPEAKER_02We should back up a little bit for our 500 trillion million listeners. Um, because we just started talking about it, but we never said that we're gonna talk about symphony number five. Shostakovich by Dmitry Shostakovich. So Dmitry Shostakovich, born September 1906, died August 9th, 1975, born in St. Petersburg, Russia. His father was an engineer who studied physics and mathematics. His mother, Sofia, immigrated from Siberia. He was a Soviet composer and pianist who became internationally known after the first premiere of his first symphony in 1926. Shostakovich displayed musical talent after beginning piano lessons with his mother at age nine. At age 13, Shostakovich was admitted to the Petrograd Conservatory and he studied piano and composition. And honestly, he's pretty prolific, and there's tons of books out on him, so I don't even think reading any sort of bio on him and his accomplishments will do us justice on this podcast. So we'll just encourage everybody to go read a book or Google him like I did. But let's talk about symphony number five.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, let me just point it out that he he broke the the Beethoven uh myth that every composer was afraid of the ninth symphony. Beethoven died after writing the ninth, and then uh Mahler did not complete the tenth, and uh, you know, so there was this this fear over the ninth symphony, and he ended up writing 15th. I think that there are so many things about this this symphony, you know, makes it incredible. Historically, it's a very I mean for Shostakovich, it's a very important piece because it was in a time of fear. Until then he was considered or he felt he was safe in the way he was writing, until he premiered his uh opera Um Madame Macbeth, which was not well received, because it was it said that it did not confirm with the norms or with the rules that the government expected. At that time for him or and for every single artist, it was basically like you either write the way or you conform to the norms or you are gonna disappear. You know, he had his uh family uh being threatened, and uh, you know, it was not easy, like we think that uh censorship is just write what you want, uh what we we want, and everything is gonna be fine. It's not, you know, it's really like it's basically living in fear because the only thing you you do and the only thing that you meant to do is to write music, and if you write one even without uh intention, if you write one thing you think that might be right and they think it's wrong, you know, you either gonna be put on jail or worse, or someone in your family is gonna be hurt. Or anyway, just this is just the scenario that he was writing.
SPEAKER_02Online it calls it the Great Purge that started in 1936 that you're talking about, where people just started being jailed and disappearing, being killed, like his artistic friends and family.
SPEAKER_00And it was sometimes it was not only because they thought differently, but because what they were writing was not what the government wanted to hear. He developed a sense of writing with subliminal messages, which is fascinating. I I highly recommend to come to the concert because I'm gonna do like a demonstration with the orchestra to show what the subliminal messages that he's uh using space-wise. So this piece is it has lots of those little hints of what he was leaving. It it's it became very personal. He was able to trick the governments, you know. They they believed that that was uh a fantastic way of uh representing the nation. He was little, like by little putting some of his fears and some of his uh ideas in the subliminal again message underneath all the the notes that he he was writing. It's a metaphor that uh music survived in resilience, you know. And um, how important it is to have freedom of speech, and how important it is to be able to express yourself, and but also like how powerful art is, because if it wasn't that powerful, why people fear so much?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, because he was denounced twice in his career, plus censured. It seems like he had to figure out ways around it to kind of not trick but like outsmart everybody on how to perform his music.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, the violin concerto also, I think it was the second piece that uh he was he was not allowed to to perform. Started with uh, if I'm not mistaken, uh it was after I mean before Symphony 5, and then the second time was the violin concerto. And the violin concerto is is is it's so icy, it's so like cold, it's devastating the sounds that he got from that uh instrument and uh harmonies. It's lonely, it's really lonely. Anyway, it's a it's a way of not only self-expression but expressing an entire nation, you know, and everybody that was living in that fear. And in one sense that relates to Ginaster, he never I'm not gonna say never because never is uh is a very strong word. He was like censored, but was not because of the music he was writing. It was a different type of uh of censorship, it's but it because it was more of his ideology. And he was actually um what was the is the word when you're banned from your country?
SPEAKER_02Exiled.
SPEAKER_00Exiled. And he was actually had to live in ex like in Europe, I think United States too, because of that. It's a very interesting way of of thinking about censorship because in this sense, like with Inasera, he was really going against what was happening. With Shostakovich, he was against, but they were also controlling his voice. They were not controlling what Hinacera was writing. They fired him, they did, you know, the other thing. For Shostakovich is beyond the ideology, it's also like making sure that he doesn't have a voice.
SPEAKER_01I just thought it it was always remarkable to me how Shostakovich knew that there were these kind of impositions on him. And he said, Okay, yeah, I can work with this, and also kind of like secretly thumb his nose at the government at the same time. So he was very clever. He was like, Oh, I've got all these rules, but like here, let me make a masterpiece out of this. Take that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think that that's what's remarkable about him is how clever and uh creative he was. You know, you gotta be creative, you know, in order to survive. Yeah. Symphony number five is has such sarcastic moments. You know, the second movement where he kind of like portrays the drunk person uh walking on the street, uh, you know, which which is supposed to be like a stereotype of the high people in the government leaving out parties and walking on streets that drunk and not caring about uh what's happening with those people, and then in the end, like with the with the this this massive ending, like that's uh you know, people think, oh, this is so patriotic, but he's being so sarcastic and so funny at the same time, you know, it it's incredible. And I will never forget the first time I put my hands on the score, it was for a masterclass with Kurt Mazur, and he actually worked with Shostakovich. And he was ex he was explaining the end of the the piece where the strings just keep keep the da-da-da-da-da-da-da. And then some and some of us would go so fast with that uh ending, like you know, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. And he said, No, no, no, this is him saying yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, which means in Russian, me, me, me, it's my voice, me, me. So you cannot go so fast on that ending, which we mistakenly go sometimes because it it feels natural. But basically, those are the subliminal messages that he's putting there, you know, that yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, me, me, me, my voice, you don't take my voice from that. Amazing.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we had this conversation before on this podcast that you really need to understand what the composer was going through, where they were in their life, what was the environment they were writing in, and what the intention was behind each piece. Because if you don't understand that, I mean it could still be a beautiful piece of music, like you don't have to know the intrinsicacies, but it just makes it that much more fascinating and that much more higher level of understanding of the symphony, right? Of the music that's being played.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah. For me, I like to see what's beyond the notes, you know. Even sometimes even if the the composer is not a romantic, so to speak, in a in a way of that's that's like to express their feelings on on their music, on her their art. There is also always like an a reason for it, you know, uh to put the notes on the on the paper. And I always like to know the reasons why.
SPEAKER_02I think what you just said is a lovely phrase that we want to know what's beyond the notes. I mean, that's what we're doing today, right? We are going beyond the notes. Because in this piece, he's Russian, he lives in in Russia or whatever what it was called at that time. And also during World War II, he was being denounced, he was being censured, people were dying around him. Like, like you could easily go down this dark hole of giving up and not wanting to play music anymore and just giving in to the government or whatever it is, but just that he persevered and continued to do what he loved is just amazing.
SPEAKER_00And with humor, you know, then he goes to write six, seven. Well, seven is not really humoristic, but nine. The symphony number nine, it has a humor behind as well. You know, he goes smaller, everybody else, like you know, like I said, Beethoven, Ma, etc. They all go big on the nine because you know, probably it's gonna be your last symphony. It's kind of like, no, that's not gonna be my and like how many symphonies can we think of that are like so humorous?
SPEAKER_01It's like maybe the Haydn surprise symphony, but it's like Shotzukovich was a master of that.
SPEAKER_00That's your high yeah, Heidi, maybe Mozart has some things. Oh maybe Prokofiev. Maybe, but he also has the humor that's a little bit more sarcastic on the sarcastic side, the dry humor.
SPEAKER_01So it's like we got so many pieces of music that are so like, oh, here's like the basic emotions, like mad, sad, glad, afraid, shame, surprise, but then sarcasm is very nuanced.
SPEAKER_00That's true, and creepiness, moments in the symphony is so creepy. Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_02What does that mean?
SPEAKER_00Creepy to the point, like, for instance, like movie music composers, they will grab that type of atmosphere, orchestration, harmonic progressions, and put that in, for instance, I don't know, Rosemary's Baby. There is a moment in the oh gosh, the third movement that oh god, that it's it's Rosemary's Baby guys. Like it's really like it's we are in a horror movie here. It's so it's so bizarre. It's when the harp is playing comes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you know what I'm talking about? There is a big solo, yeah. It's a big solo, and then there is I think it's flute that I need to go back uh to but it's a flute solo, it's not the pickled one, and then the cellos come after.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, uh you remember, like it's uh it's one of my favorite parts actually, is this just like this like progression that keeps building up in the tension, and I always am like it's like a sense of dread, but then there's also a sense of release at the end, and you're just like, okay, like okay, she didn't die.
SPEAKER_00It's about to happen, it's about to happen, and then anyway, it's that type of feeling that was never put in music before, and then all of a sudden you have that tool, music composers grab that and use in scenes, and that that's why it gives it brings that me creepiness when I think because it may remind me horror movies.
SPEAKER_01I would say a lot of film composers have drawn from Shostakovich, like inspired by like not just his orchestration, but like some of his thematic ideas. He was a master of kind of like this driving energy, and I think that's like a good really compliment to the Genus Terra too. It's like this like driving force. It's like once you start, it's like you just have to see it to his natural conclusion. It's just like such a like great piece.
SPEAKER_00And you know what's it's so bizarre when you drew the parallel also with the metaphor with his life. He when you get his scores, he's very specific with the metronome marks, but almost nobody follows that. He fought so hard, none of the conductors follow the damn thing.
SPEAKER_01Oh my gosh, the amount of times I've heard seven go lickety split at the very end, or it's like like more of the tempo you would associate it with, but it's just like, oh, it's all kind of all over the map sometimes.
SPEAKER_00I need to find a recording that will have the metronome marks. I couldn't find one, like there will be recordings that will start with the right metronome mark that will and will end with a completely different one. So you have to kind of like do a Frankenstein of the the recordings that are out there to find one that has. Actually, the to follow the the tempo that he wanted. Poor guy. I feel so bad.
SPEAKER_01He's very clear.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, super clear. But I think it's because of the drive that you mentioned. That especially in the last moment, the last part of the symphony, people wanna run. And it's not what he wrote.
SPEAKER_02It sounds like he's probably rolling in his grave because I read that he was very particular about every aspect of his life.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_02So you better follow those pictures now, Mike.
SPEAKER_00Come to the concert. April 19th, 3 p.m.
SPEAKER_02Yes. First listen to the podcast, listen to us and all of our knowledge. More you guys and me, and then come to the concert for sure. That is a good leeway to wrapping this up. Liz, it's wonderful to speak with you today and learn more about the harp because I've got 10,000 other questions. But before we wrap up, is there any parting words or anything else that you would like to say?
SPEAKER_01I'd like to just say a couple things. First of all, thank you for having me on this. I think it's such an amazing project to be able to communicate with audiences, potential or established, and just get them kind of hyped up for this music, kind of get into the weeds a little bit to be like, why is this such an interesting piece? Like, who's heard the Genus Terra that much? So it's like giving people the opportunity to be like, oh, that sounds really interesting. It's such a great medium to have, and I appreciate y'all letting me ramble on about the harp and this concerto. I also want to speak a little bit about Olympia Symphony, because like this symphony is kind of special to my heart. It's such a great group of musicians. I've been talking with a bunch of my colleagues and friends there, and they're like so amped up for this concert. Some of them have performed the Genastero with Heidi, so they've been there for over 20 years. There are a lot of people that have stayed that long and it's out of passion, and it's just like such a great group of people. And I know that the community is really invested in the arts. I know there's a tax that helps with a lot of the arts funding in there too, which I think is just remarkable that people keep saying, yes, let's use our money to support these things. So it's like the whole culture of the area is bolstered by the people that live there, and I think that's just an incredible thing. It's like you don't necessarily get that all over the place, but the fact that so many people are like, yes, the arts matter, yes, I want my community to be this connected, yes, I want to know more about these uh interesting pieces of music. I just think it's a wonderful place. Wonderful musicians, wonderful conductor, wonderful people to chat with. So I'm just so honored to be a part of this.
SPEAKER_00Oh, and we are we are honored to have you. And I am I mean, I always say I'm lucky. I'm lucky to to be here, and I, you know, I love my babies.
SPEAKER_01Oh, we love you.
SPEAKER_02No. And we love Olympia and the Inspire Olympia fund because that in itself, you're right. It shows that this city supports the arts.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02And on that note, see you Sunday, April 19th at 3 p.m. for the Olympia Symphony concert, last of the season.
SPEAKER_00Thank you for listening to the no clapping between movements podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and leave a review.
SPEAKER_02If you have any questions for the hosts or topics you would like considered for future episodes, email at ncnpodcast at gmail.com. Until next time.