James Freeman, Alan Harler, and Margaret Garwood

The first time I attended an Orchestra 2001 concert, shortly after it was founded, Freeman presented me with my first encounter with the music of George Crumb. Red-shirted musicians moved from instrument to instrument on a darkened stage, like the crew in the engine room of a mythical starship. Special instruments created peculiar sounds. Marcantonio Barone turned away from his concert grand and played a passage on a tinkly toy piano. I didn’t know what I was watching, but I knew I liked the mood it created.

Fortunately, I did some reading and brought Crumb’s work into focus. I realized he did odd things, but he didn’t do them just to be different: His unique sounds created moods and worldviews I could respond to. I’ve been a Crumb fan ever since, and Orchestra 2001 has staged most of the performances of his work I’ve heard.

From the ridiculous to the sublime

But Freeman didn’t limit his programs to the obviously experimental. He also introduced me to the music of the great Catholic mystic Olivier Messiaen. I’m probably the only person you know who has heard two live performances of Messiaen’s Visions of the Amen for two pianos. Philadelphia is one of the few places in the U.S. where you can perform Visions of the Amen with locally available, first-class pianists. But it can only happen if someone like James Freeman makes it happen.

Freeman gave Orchestra 2001 a broad charter, decreeing it would play “the music of the 20th century.” It was one of his most creative acts. Orchestra 2001 can play the whole range of music composed in its chosen time period, from outré work like Crumb’s to more conventional pieces like the original chamber ensemble version of Copland's Appalachian Spring. It has presented more than 200 works by 135 American composers (80 from the Philadelphia area), but the new works are always firmly embedded in the classical tradition.

Orchestra 2001 has extended its brief to include the 21st century, but its concerts are still unpredictable and wide-ranging. Unlike many advocates of new art, Freeman doesn’t sneer at the audience for older works. He doesn’t rebel against tradition; he extends it.

Orchestra 2001 has maintained a relationship with the Moscow Conservatory through all the turbulence of the last quarter century. It has also played in Denmark, England, Austria, and Abu Dhabi. Though most Philadelphians don’t know Orchestra 2001 exists, audiences in foreign lands think of Philadelphia as a hotbed of musical creativity.

A long tradition, a modern take

Alan Harler took over Philadelphia’s oldest volunteer chorus, the Mendelssohn Club — 130 experienced choral singers who sing for the sheer joy of creating great works under the baton of a professional conductor. I was impressed, when I first heard Harler conduct, with the refinement he imposed on that big-chorus sound.

But Harler is also an advocate for new music and a champion of American composers. Like Freeman, he has programmed new works as extensions of a living tradition. Under his direction, the Mendelssohn Club has commissioned 55 new works and premiered them on a schedule that also includes traditional masterpieces like Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and Mendelssohn’s Elijah. My most treasured memories of Mendelssohn Club concerts include a moving Christmas performance of Benjamin Britten’s St. Nicolas Cantata and two recent multimedia stunners, Julia Wolfe’s Anthracite Fields (which just won the Pulitzer Prize) and David Lang’s Battle Hymns.

Harler may be retiring, but he hasn’t lost his creativity. The centerpiece of his final season was a reenactment of the event that sparked the Bach revival in the 19th century: Mendelssohn’s historic performances of Bach’s St. Matthew Passion. Mendelssohn adapted Bach to 19th-century tastes by using a large chorus and orchestra rather than the smaller forces common in Bach’s time. Harler conducted from Mendelssohn’s score, with Mendelssohn’s forces, and created a moving lesson in the way great music survives changes in fashion and religious belief.

Who’s next?

The vacancies at these two institutions have evoked national interest among potential successors. Orchestra 2001 has narrowed the competition to five applicants and announced that each finalist will conduct a concert next season, making its 2015-16 season a series of auditions. The Mendelssohn Club has concluded a national search by selecting Dr. Paul Rardin, the director of choral activities at Temple University. Alan Harler occupied a similar position at Temple for most of his career, so the appointment continues a connection with both Temple and the Philadelphia community.

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On a sadder note, on May 3 we lost one of Philadelphia’s leading composers when Margaret Garwood died at 88, still working at a career she began when she was 35. She’s best known for her operas, Rappacini’s Daughter and The Scarlet Letter, but for me she’s associated with a more personal memory. She composed the first premiere I reviewed: a three-part choral work that ended with a setting of Edna St. Vincent Millay’s poem Dirge Without Music.

I had just started writing a review column and I felt I was facing a moral test, because I hate writing bad reviews. I understand the labor that goes into creative work like composing and writing, but I also feel I must honor the ethics of the critical vocation and give my readers honest assessments.

The premiere was an emotional experience for me partly because I discovered I could praise Margaret Garwood’s music (tears of relief). But I was mostly moved by the way her setting enhanced the stark power of Millay’s words.

Dirge Without Music is an outcry against death and the destruction of “the beautiful, the tender, the kind. . .the intelligent, the witty, the brave.” It ends, uncompromisingly, “I do not approve. And I am not resigned.” It’s one of my favorite poems by one of my favorite poets, and I can’t think of it without remembering the composer who decided that it might, after all, be a suitable text for a musical setting, in spite of the poet’s title.

Above right: Alan Harler (photo via mcchorus.org)

Above left: Margaret Garwood (photo via hildegard.com)