Photographs courtesy of Gretna Music. Left to right: Gretna Music performers Vijay Iyer, Orion Weiss, Paul Jacobs and Anna Polonsky.
It’s a major birthday for beautiful Mt. Gretna and, to celebrate, Gretna Music is taking a trip back in time.
In honor of Mt. Gretna’s 125th anniversary, Artistic Director Carl Kane has programmed several concerts for the summer series that pay homage to the town’s important milestone.
“Mt Gretna was founded in 1892,” he said. “So, each of these concerts has a special element that will take audiences back to that era to get a glimpse of what was the popular music of the day.”
These events include a concert with the River City Brass Band on July 8, a piano recital with Anna Polonsky and Orion Weiss on Aug. 27, a silent film with live organ accompaniment by Clark Wilson on Sept. 2, and a performance of the Verona String Quartet and organist Ryan Brunkhurst on Sept. 10.
The River City Brass Band is a group that Gretna Music has had on their “wish list” for a long while, Kane said.
Hailing from Pittsburgh, the band is a 28-piece ensemble that is among the only full-time touring brass bands in the country. While on the Gretna Music stage, they will recreate a vintage 1890s brass band concert drawing from music that would have been in vogue when Mt. Gretna was founded. This time period was the “Golden Age” of brass band music, when American composers like John Phillips Sousa, George M. Cohan and Scott Joplin were writing the toe-tapping cakewalks, two-steps, rags and marches that defined the era.
“It’s a really fun time for brass band music—pre-jazz—but it’s the dawn of American pop music,” said Kane. “River City Brass will be bringing us the equivalent of an 1890s rock concert.”
A little detective work led to a concert featuring Anna Polonsky and Orion Weiss, a husband-and-wife duo. Considered to be two of the finest pianists of their generation, Polonsky has collaborated with musicians such as Yo-Yo Ma, while Weiss has performed with many prestigious orchestras. This special commemorative concert will include a repertoire that was performed at the first Mt. Gretna concert 125 years ago.
“I asked Sue Hostetter, president of the Mt. Gretna Historical Society, to root around the basement of the society’s building and find the first Chautauqua music program ever printed,” Kane said. “Well, she found it and passed it on to me. And now these two fabulous pianists will be playing compositions from that first-ever piano recital.”
To mix things up, an event featuring theater organist Clark Wilson will take audiences to the days of silent films when the organ was used to accentuate the twists and turns of a movie’s plotline. Wilson has been playing organ since the age of 9 and is currently associated with Organ Stop Pizza in Mesa, Ariz., where he is on the staff. He will accompany the Harold Lloyd 1924 silent comedy classic, “Girl Shy,” as well as a Laurel and Hardy short.
“Clark Wilson is properly the world’s most foremost theater organist,” said Kane. “This will be a fun evening of 1920s music.”
Kane has planned a special treat for the last concert of the season. He has commissioned Nick DiBerardino, a Rhodes scholar who is a graduate student at the Curtis Institute of Music, to write an organ prelude based on the official Chautauqua hymn, “The Day is Dying in the West.” Like Bach did with his “Choral Preludes,” DiBerardino has used the hymn’s melody as scaffolding while creating his own music around it.
“Although it has a really terrible title, the hymn is actually pretty upbeat,” said Kane. “The words and music were written for the New York Chautauqua for their daily service in the 1880s.”
And, if you need something more traditional that evening, you’re in luck—the renowned Verona String Quartet is also on the bill.
All concerts start at 7:30 p.m. at the Mt. Gretna Playhouse, 200 Pennsylvania Ave., Mt. Gretna. The Gretna Music Series offers many other concerts during the summer season. For tickets and information, visit www.gretnamusic.org or call 717-361-1508.
Author: Jess Hayden
