By Lyn Bronson
Although stormy weather was predicted for January 14, the good Lord provided us with a balmy rainless evening (until after the event mercifully) as the Carmel Music Society presented the third event in its 1997-98 season. Actually the Sturm und Drang occurred inside Sunset Center as we heard on this occasion Canadian tenor Ben Heppner in recital at Sunset Center in Carmel. The pianist assisting him for the event was Craig Rutenberg. As it turned out, January 14 happened to be Mr. Heppner’s birthday, and accordingly the President of the Carmel Music Society, Keith Anderson, invited the audience to a birthday reception for Mr. Heppner in Carpenter Hall following the concert.
Heppner has a mighty voice that can either storm the heavens or project subtle pianissimos that tickle the spine. This is not to imply that there is nothing in between, for quite the opposite is true. Heppner constantly displayed an extraordinary range of dynamics and expression. His diction is so magnificent that when he spoke to the audience, even those of us in the rear of hall heard him with absolute clarity-in spite of the much-maligned Sunset Center acoustics.
The evening’s program began with Beethoven’s cycle of six songs, An die ferne Geliebte which received a solid and sensitive performance. Heppner with his acting skills derived from his opera experience projected an impressive range of emotions in this work. The following set was a group of four songs by Schumann: Widmung, Die Lotosblume, Talismane and Du bist wie eine Blume. These four lovely songs received four lovely performances.
However, it was the Richard Strauss group which followed that was the high point of the evening. Here the magnificent pianism of Craig Rutenberg really came into play. Talk about a range of dynamics, Rutenberg would sometimes play softly, then more softly, and finally at just the barest whisper, yet his tone always projected beautifully and enhanced the vocal line. Heppner was at his absolute best in these songs and created such a magic spell that we wanted them never to end.
After intermission, Heppner and Rutenberg treated us to a novelty, the Tre Sonetti di Petrarca, the three Liszt songs more familiar to audiences in Liszt’s piano transcriptions. The first two, Pace non trovo and Benedetto sia ‘l giorno unfortunately make a much better effect in the later piano versions. However, the No. 123, I vidi in terra angelici costumi was pure magic. Heppner achieved a lovely tenderness, and Rutenberg’s beginning and ending solos contained expressive felicities that boggled the mind. The pianissimo ending of No. 123 in the wrong hands seems endless in its repetitions of the final cadence, but Rutenberg managed one of the most skillful prolonged decrescendo’s I have ever heard. It was breathtaking!
The program ended with a series of Bonbons in English, which Heppner explained to the audience, was going to be his “Mario Lanza” phase of the program. Three songs by Ernest Charles, “My lady walks in Loveliness, The House on the Hill,” and “Let my Song fill your Heart” were tossed off with elan, as were “Homing” by Teresa del Riego and “Sylvia” by Oley Speaks. As an encore to an appreciative audience Heppner and Rutenberg treated us to an aria from André Chenier and lastly a lovely heartfelt rendition of “Danny Boy.”
A curious aspect of the printed program for the evening’s concert was its inclusion of three long pages (approximately 2000 words) of background information about Mr. Heppner. It seemed to include every detail of his long singing career, and although it mercifully omitted any description of prepubescent singing engagements at Boy Scout jamborees, it included just about everything else. This information comes as hype from Mr. Heppner’s management and is designed to convince a presentor to engage Mr. Heppner’s services. Presumably an audience that has already purchased season or single tickets is already pre-sold and doesn’t need the hype, merely a well-written paragraph about the artist.
Furthermore, no information was given to us about the assisting pianist Craig Rutenberg. Mr. Rutenberg is a world-class pianist, and his magnificent playing added immeasurably to the artistic success of the evening’s concert. Gone are the days when the pianist was known as the “accompanist” (in fact, in artistic circles, today, the “A” word is as much of an embarrassment as the “F” word). And also gone are the days when the piano lid on stage was totally closed and the pianist played sotto voce in the background while the singer bellowed at the top of his lungs with the veins standing out on his forehead. What we heard in this program was vocal chamber music of the highest order, and this great pianist, Craig Rutenberg, needs more recognition than just having his name printed once on the program page (his name was omitted from the cover of the booklet).
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, apparently not a fan of the vocal arts, once wickedly said, “Swans sing before they die -’twere no bad thing did certain persons die before they sing.” Well, the only swan song in this concert was that of the Steinway concert grand owned by the Carmel Music Society. This instrument acquired in 1948 is being replaced by a recently-purchased new Hamburg Steinway concert grand arriving by air freight from Europe around the first of February, hopefully to be in place for the Carmel Music Society’s next event, cellist Matt Haimovitz’s concert on February 10. The Society’s custom over the years has been to ask each artist to sign the piano at the end of a concert. On the gilded cast iron plate can be found the signatures of some of the century’s greatest artists: Horowitz, Rubinstein, Heifetz, Milstein, Gieseking, Ashkenazy, de Larrocha, Novaes, Stravinsky, Poulenc and many, many others. In this sense this piano is an historic instrument and could have been restored for $25,000. Instead the Society has purchased the mystique of the “Hamburg” Steinway at the cost of $100,000. The future will decide the wisdom of this course of action.
