Brendan Kinsella, pianist

Summer is Over

Thu, 4 Aug 2011 11:17:08 -0500

Well, summer never really ends in Texas, which is one of the reasons why I love living here. In any case, my concerts for the summer are finished, and I’m left with a month or so of juicy inactivity before school and concerts start up again.

A fun time was had in the past two months. The UMKC Composition festival is growing and attracted stellar students from all around (including a handful from Thailand) who dug my Rzewski program. Rzewski’s music was what put me on this insane path long ago, and I hope that I was able to inspire the students to delve deeper into a truly great body of contemporary repertoire. Right on the heels of that performance was the first of several gigs with Daniel Saenz which featured some brand new stuff as well as two standards for the concurrent UMKC Cello Clinic. The piece that was most memorable for me was B.P. Herrington’s southern Gothic “That Blood’s Too Red”, written for the occasion. Recording to follow shortly.

My European trip started out in the Netherlands with a concert on the Monument House series in Utrecht, hosted by Anne Ku and Robert Bekkers (http://concertblog.wordpress.com/). Anne knows how to run things, plain and simple. She’s a pianist, composer, teacher, economist, energy consultant, and all-around polymath, and it shows in the diverse following that she has cultivated in Utrecht. Nathanael May and I presented concerts on consecutive nights, both well-attended and catered with delicious Andalusian and Vietnamese cuisine (respectively).

As always, SoundSCAPE was a blast - when you combine ten days of awesome new music with a zany, talented, and very social group of people and hold it in one of the most beautiful parts of Italy, you can’t miss (although the weather was slightly uncooperative this year - it’s never a good sign when it’s raining so hard that you can’t see the Alps). Danny and I repeated our KC program with a few substitutions and had an amazing time onstage. The vibe from the audience was perfect. It’s a fantastic experience to play new music in a setting so devoted to its creation and understanding.

Following a CelloNoir cameo at Schlern and narrowly making it through the worst day of travel in my life sans sleep (six hours on the train, seven hours waiting in an airport for a delay, a two-hour connection, sleeping in Heathrow, an eight-hour transatlantic flight, a four hour connection that was delayed and rerouted, and a four-hour drive...sad face), I finally made it home almost a month later. It’s never felt so good.

Now, onto Liszt.

Summer is Here

Sat, 21 May 2011 15:11:19 -0500

Well, almost. In any case, I can feel the horrible gaze of the gigantic stack of music that I have to learn every waking moment. Within the span of a few weeks, I’m off to KC for two concerts on the Conservatory’s Summer Composition Festival (an all-Rzewski program and a reunion with Danny Saenz, of CelloNoir fame), then back home for a solo recital at UTPA with some new and newly-discovered rep, and then off to Europe for a concert in Utrecht, followed by twelve days of soundSCAPE goodness in northern Italy. Whew.

Speaking of reunions, a blast was had in St. Louis a few weeks ago by KGB at our New Music Circle debut. Despite the original sobbing fits induced by the thought of putting together Nick Omiccioli brand new trio in two rehearsals, the concert was a resounding success and it was by far the best that we have performed together as an ensemble. It’s rare to find good chamber music partners; people who can play and listen sympathetically, cue reliably, and who know each other’s parts as well as they know their own are perennially few. I was amazed that a work as intricate as Falling Through Infinity came together so smoothly after only two rehearsals (and not playing together for year!).

This got me thinking. Is the current conservatory model of training young musicians realistic compared to what’s expected in the “professional” world? I remember one of my teachers telling me in undergrad that his chamber music and collaborative concerts always outweighed the number of solo recitals and concerti that he played, and that it was extremely important to be known as a reliable collaborator (to his credit, he played a remarkable number of concerti and solo recitals, many on short notice). Hell-bent on winning competitions and being a rockstar, I scoffed, but I now see the truth of his words.

Most undergraduate curricula for BM performance degrees require memorized junior and senior recitals of 50-60 minutes in length, with the option of doing non-required freshman and sophomore recitals. How about requiring a collaborative/chamber music recital every semester on top of that? Yes, it’s tough, but learning the standard chamber canon (or at least specializing in one instrument or voice type) boosts our marketability and gives the average piano grad far more playing opportunities. It can be difficult for fresh piano grads, many who might only have a few recital programs and instrumental sonatas under their belts, to cope with the reality that professional musicians often have a very limited time to put a gig together and that we have to nail it the first time. Knowing the basics of chamber music, its repertoire, and being able to reliably deliver on next-day notice can make sure that the phone keeps ringing.

Now back to visiting with Oscar...

The Liszt Year is Upon Us

Sat, 29 Jan 2011 10:57:34 -0600

...and it's going to be a doozy.

I've got two programs ready to go that include significant works and transcriptions by the old Abbé. It's unlikely that I'll survive either.

Program I:

Beethoven-Liszt: Symphony #5 in c minor, op. 67

-intermission-

Liszt: Sonata in b minor

Program II:

Liszt: Selections from Annees de Pelerinage, book III
Rzewski: Selections from The Road, Book VII
Poulenc: Aubade (in its solo transcription by the author)

-intermission-

Beethoven-Liszt: Symphony #5 in c minor, op. 67

Thankfully, the symphony isn't THAT bad until the last movement. At that point, I usually break down into tears.

If you’re looking for something to do on a Saturday morning, saunter on over to the Hall of Shame for two new choice clips. There’s a leftover bonbon from the Chopin year and something to get the ball rolling for 2011.

Celebrating Chopin

Wed, 10 Nov 2010 22:20:37 -0600

...the best way I know how. Direct yourself to the Hall of Shame for a unique take on the first movement of the Third Sonata that gives Schumann’s remark “Hats off, gentlemen, a genius!” a deeper meaning.

Thank You, Todd-Davis Germaine

Tue, 2 Nov 2010 22:24:35 -0500

Well, my Carnegie debut is officially done. Sunflower Sutra went very well and was surrounded by some wonderful playing by the other TDG Fellows featured on the program (lots of great transcriptions and rarely-performed Romantic works). Nice crowd, too.
YET...
...I wouldn’t be telling the truth if I said that it was a stress-free weekend. In classic Kinsella style, I mistakenly left my messenger bag containing the score in my cab on the way to my brother Jonathan’s apartment from LaGuardia. Shoko, as always, saved the day by bringing another copy I had at home with her when she arrived on Saturday night. With only 30 minutes to try the piano, no score until the night before, and scant practice time, I can’t say that it was the most comfortable I’ve felt before stepping onstage. Yet, in spite of my ongoing efforts to derail myself, my anxiety evaporated when I sat down at the piano. There was something about doing this piece in its original environment that drew me into the piece and made me forget about the circumstances leading up to the performance. It was hands down the most fun I’ve ever had onstage.
Onward and upward. This weekend is a lecture recital on music for speaking pianist and a spot on SUNY Fredonia’s Chopin/Schumann/Liszt bicentennial concert (with a spooky cameo by Crumb). After that, we’re back in gear for Messiaen in Chicago and St. Louis in September and piano trios in KC in January. Next semester it’s looking like lots of chamber music all over the place as well as some solo gigs for the beginning of the Liszt year. Oh, and copious beach time in between each concert. Have I mentioned that I love living in the Valley?