| | Qua resurget ex favilla judicandus homo reus
Requiem: "Lacrymosa" Mozart
Dr. Allen recently announced that he will not be directing the university choir next semester. He has been promoted to some new position; he has been given a bigger desk, a raise, a new title for his business card. When he told us, he seemed so nonchalant. He must have practiced, saying it front of the mirror that morning while he was putting on his glasses or lacing up his shoes. How he would explain the situation. How he would smile as he was saying it. Not too wide, not too phony. His kind eyes. How he would segue into it so that it seemed like no big deal. "Speaking of new and exciting things..." Dr. Gilliam would be taking over the university group, but after all, Dr. Allen would still reign over chamber choir and a handful of students taking voice lessons. He would still have the Mac in his office, the framed certificates and awards hanging up on the walls.
When he directs us in rehearsal, he loses himself sometimes. I look at some of the students who are thinking about the biology exams they bombed that morning or the boys they can't seem to snare, but when I look back at Dr. Allen, I smile. He briefly closes his eyes, swept away by the somber beauty of Mozart's Requiem. His hands float over his music stand and within moments he is miles away, wearing shiny black shoes and a tuxedo with tails, his podium rising out of the orchestra pit. And I can't even begin to describe it. The weight of the baton. The shiny slide trombones. The fierce shrillness of the soprano section in Dies Irae. My clumsy experimentation with sentence fragments and comma splices are so inadequate when compared with his dedication to his craft. What good is it to have power over a hundred thousand words when he can take fifty individual voices and make one glorious sound? Vowels gliding into an audience like ghosts, echoing, filling the hall with emotion, then dissolving.
Timing is essential with Mozart. The syncopation of each fugue is vital to the message.
One missed note could change everything.
I am surprised and not surprised. This kind of thing happens all the time, you know. Dr. Allen has been conducting concerts, offering advice and building the careers of hundreds of musicians since before I was born. A younger director has arrived, and he has such great energy, and he is doing wonderful things for the music department. I respect him and I'm in awe of his enthusiasm and knowledge, but at the same time, I know exactly what is happening. It all comes down to this. The new plaque on the door, a few signatures, a figurehead for ceremonies and banquets. A man in a suit. Richard Gilmore's new parking space. A farewell, a dead language.
More later
Kelli
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| | Posted 4/26/2008 11:06 PM - 1 comments
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