Heyde Center serves up musical gumbo
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By TOM CHISHOLM
Wednesday, November 21, 2007 9:44 AM CST
For the Herald
From Shubert to Francis Scott Key, through the Jazz Age and both World Wars and back again to the romantic composers including Franz, Frederic and Felix; it was two centuries of sound and solid entertainment last week at the Heyde Center for the Arts.
Music at modest prices and free parking right here on the hill overlooking historic Chippewa Falls. Son of a gun, we had some fun above the bayou!
Celebrating Veterans Day, on Nov. 10 Jim “Ragtime” Radloff warmed up the piano and the audience with the Star Spangled Banner, singing the national anthem and evoking memories of hard times and heroes. He played the songs of each of the armed forces, as the Vets stood and sang the songs unique to the service they belonged. Jim played two folk songs popular during The Forgotten War.
He continued with well-remembered great tunes of The Good Wars including George M. Cohan’s, rousing “I’m a Yankee Doodle Dandy,” popular in both eras and Irving Berlin’s anthem of WW II, “God Bless America.” Playing in ragtime, the audience joined Jim in melodies of “the good old days.” He ended with his arrangements of the great marches of the venerable John Phillip Sousa.
On Thursday, Nov. 15, Christ Episcopal Church brought the Connie and Kathleen Johns with the Dixie Jazz Band with the voice of Louis Armstrong to the Heyde stage together with the mellow guitars and folk songs of Walter and Carolyn Craft.
Gregory Thompson, victim and survivor of Katrina, and a great new voice from Basin Street in Louisiana, with Jerry Way on guitar and Lyle Heck on his sultry sax, sang the ever-popular ballads of an earlier generation including, “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore,” “Skylark” and “God Bless The Child;” the last a signature song of Billy Holiday.
With a perfect blend of Cajun cooking, red beans and jambalaya, the audience consumed more than great music. Finishing in a flash, the band brought the lively audience to its feet with a rollicking rendition of “The Saints Go Marching In.”
The Taste of New Orleans patrons and performers contributed generously to the relief of many still homeless or ill housed surrounding St. Anna’s Church in the Crescent City, the sister parish of Christ Church. Gabriel, blow your horn!
On Friday, Nov. 16, to a more intimate crowd, Professors Paul Kosower, cellist and Namji Kim, pianist, returned to the Heyde stage to perform the romantic music of the early 19th century. They chose the cheerful Impromtu by Shubert to open the concert and followed with the melodic variations of Chopin’s Sonata in G minor.
They concluded with the rich and vibrant tones of Mendelssohn’s Sonata in D Major in four movements.
Kim explained that the composition is based on the clever reversal of the opening notes of Beethoven’s Fifth symphony. Each of these compositions, pictures of sound created in the brilliant brains of the composers will last indefinitely. Geniuses all, these three composers died before they were forty, dead of diseases easily treated today.
We have much to be grateful for this Thanksgiving including clean water, antibiotics, great music and the Heyde Center for the Arts.
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