The 2011 Brucknerathon: A Report
Neil Schore brought offical greetings to the Brucknerathon from the West Coast "Brucknerthon," and presented me with a copy of their playlist. Local flooding in the region caused some last minute changes and I was up after midnight preparing new driving instructions to Ken Jacobson's house in Simsbury that would avoid the closed and flooded roads. New directions were slipped under the attendees doors at the hotel after midnight. The listening session began officially at 8:30AM. A light breakfast was provided for those who were driving in locally. At the suggestion of Ben Korstvedt, we shuffled the playing of the symphonies and started with the Symphony No. 6. I had arranged a partial theme for the session by featuring performances by German "Kapellmeisters," namely conductors who stayed out of the media spotlight but were accomplished musical craftsmen. These included Heinz Bongartz, Vaclav Neumann, Franz Konwitschny, Dean Dixon, and Hans Zender. William Carragan gave a report and a MIDI presentation of his new two-piano arrangement of the 1874 Bruckner Symphony No. 4 and Benjamin Korstvedt reported on his latest findings as he continues his extensive research on the Fourth Symphony. (see the playlist below.) William Carragan also provided timed analysis sheets for people to learn exactly what was happening at any given moment in a symphony. These timed analysis sheets can be found at https://www.abruckner.com/articles/articlesEnglish/carragantimed/ We were also fortunate to have David Aldeborgh from Poukeepsie, New York among our ranks. David is a recent recipient of the Kilenyi Medal of Honor of the Bruckner Society of America. A new logo for 2011 was commissioned by German graphic artist, Matthias Richter and the logo followed us around on a big sign for most of the weekend. Tee shirts with the new logo were available for sale at the event. Also for sale were Bruckner CDs and assorted pins, keychains and bottle openers. See collectibles in my webstore. All attendees received free CDs and DVDs of the excellent Dominican Republic choral concert. These items were made available courtesy of Massimiliano Wax of Santo Domingo. Our luncheon treat was a six foot grinder stuffed with turkey, roast beef and Italian meats. Tuna wraps and several salads were offered as well. My son, Matthew had amusing stories to tell as he was in charge of transporting ("very carefully") the monster grinder from Windsor to Simsbury. Plenty of beer, wine and soda were available. Due to the two presentations, we pushed ahead with our listening sessions as lunch was consumed. Listening continued through the afternoon as attendees made good use of Ken and Ruth Jacobson's marvelous listening room and outdoor deck. For dinner, Chicken Marsala was offered along with more beer and wine. The traditional "Brucknerathon" cake was delivered by my wife, Marjory. During the dinner hour, there was a quick group photo session and then we resumed with the video portion of our presentation making use of Ken's drop-down screen and overhead projector. The listening session ended at 11:03PM and everything was packed up by 11:30. All attendees were given detailed driving instructions back to the hotel in Windsor. On Sunday morning, a few of us (me, William Carragan, Daniel Pennell from PA, Chuck Benson from Texas and Neil Schore from CA met for breakfast and final goodbyes. All told, it was an exhausting weekend but a great event. See below for photos and more details. |
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Photo Gallery | |||
| Sol Siegel's Report on the Brucknerathon | ||||
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The 2011 Brucknerathon Logo | |||
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The 2011 Playlist | |||
