By David Hennessee
The holiday season is upon us, and with that comes holiday music: from sacred music like Handel’s Messiah, to carols, both secular and sacred, to novelty songs (“Grandma got run over by a reindeer,” for example). A personal musical tradition of mine is tuning in to David Letterman every December 23rd to watch Darlene Love perform “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home).”
For many of us in the classical music community, performers as well as patrons, the holiday season means a concert by the Cuesta Master Chorale, often featuring something Christmas-y or sacred – a mass, requiem, magnificat, or what have you. This year’s concert is a little different: all well-known overtures, choruses and arias from best-loved operas. “Habanera” from Carmen, for example. Here’s a version with the legendary Maria Callas. Love the facial expressions! And the beehive!
Also we’re performing Dido’s Lament from Purcell’s opera “Dido and Aeneas.” I came across this version featuring the amazing Jessye Norman, and in addition to her passionate singing, she looks like a character from science fiction fantasy.
We’re also playing “Brindisi” from Verdi’s “La Traviata.” This is one you might not know by name, but once you hear it, you go, “oh yeah!” I found this great video of a Brindisi flash mob. In case you don’t know the term “flash mob,” it describes a recent phenomenon (dating from 2003) of groups of people assembling suddenly and unexpectedly in a public place, doing something unusual. For example, in 2006 at different stations in London’s Underground, about 4000 people wearing portable music devices danced in a flash mob “Silent Disco.” Flash mobs have become quite a trend in recent years; a quick YouTube search reveals all sorts of crazy, entertaining examples.
I think the flash mob is a fascinating phenomenon, perhaps showing our desire in modern society to break through the hum-drum, processed, commodified veneer of mass culture into random, unexpected, joyful moments of beauty and presence. Kind of a communal “random act of kindness” that erases distinctions between high culture and mass culture, the concert hall and the town square. My Marxist friends in the university often point out that in a capitalist society, art can become just another thing to buy sell, losing its edge and power of social criticism. Flash mobs, by contrast, exist in the realm of “art for art’s sake,” beautiful and effective for their very uselessness. Like Winnie the Pooh, they simply are.
The holiday season often sees performances of Handel’s Messiah. Of course, the Messiah is great and all, but I do have to say I’m rather pleased not to be playing it this year. The reason is summed up by this joke: “Did you hear about the viola player who dreamt he was playing Handel’s Messiah, woke up, and realized he was?” Still, it’s hard not to be moved by Handel’s music, especially the “Hallelujah Chorus.” What would it be like to be shopping at the mall, grabbing a bite at the food court, and all of a sudden hear this:
Did you know, you don’t even have to be able to sing or play an instrument to perform the Hallelujah chorus? Check it out.
Happy Holidays!
