ON the Beat | Sublimity, in Slices

Santa Barbara Symphony | Photo: Courtesy

Brahms’ A German Requiem is unique in the family of great requiems, in part because it doesn’t neatly fit into the family rules of order or lineage. Brahms’ moving work, putatively penned in response to the deaths of his friend Robert Schumann and his mother, steers clear of the standard Latin text of the requiem form, instead drawing on various Biblical sources from both testaments and written in German.

The last time we heard Brahms’ masterpiece — possibly his greatest — in town, before the Santa Barbara Symphony’s (SBS) performance last weekend, the Santa Barbara Choral Society (SBCS) gave a memorable rendering in the First Presbyterian Church in 2017, a sacred setting which seemed to enhance the spiritual resonance of the score. With the Symphony’s performance, the connotation shifted in the opposite, secularizing direction, mostly because of a bizarre, jukebox-ing effect of interrupting the requiem’s all-important epic contouring with irrelevant Mahler songs within Brahms’ perfectly-stitched structure.

The Santa Barbara Symphony Chorus | Photo: Courtesy

By way of an introduction to, or defense of, his odd choice of the cut-up technique, the Symphony’s maestro Nir Kabaretti explained that when Brahms first conducted the piece in Bremen, in 1868, the powers that be were concerned that it “wasn’t religious” enough. A compromise was brokered in which other sacred music, by Bach and others, was folded into the program. Brahms was unhappy about the decision and, no doubt, is wincing in his grave over what occurred in Santa Barbara.

Whatever the justification, the Granada experience was discombobulating, disrupting the flow and arching wonder of Brahms’ grand design. The integrity and continuity of Brahms’ piece took a holiday, regrettably. Nonetheless, the Symphony and massive choral forces gathered managed to offer a powerful performance, even in piecemeal pell-mell fashion.

This performance, the penultimate program of the Symphony season, marked the debut of the newly formed Santa Barbara Symphony Chorus, a massive culling of singers from the area, which packed the Granada stage and produced a mighty, sonorous, and impressive noise.

Daniel Scofield performs with Santa Barbara Symphony, April 26, 2025 | Photo: Courtesy

Kabaretti led the orchestra in clean, dynamically nuanced style and kudos were well-earned by the soloists: In addition to their work in the Brahms, soprano Magdalena Kuźma projected her rich and resonant voice on love songs from Mahler’s setting of texts by Friedrich Rückert, and baritone Daniel Scofield conjured apt existential longing in the legendary Mahler song “I am Lost to the World.”

We couldn’t help but notice, however, the cognitive dissonance between Mahler’s secular perspective and the Biblical leaning of the Brahms, as when “I am Lost to the World” leads up to the key line, “I live alone in my heaven, in my love, in my song.” Brahms’ “heaven” and redemptive healing are of a less earthly sort. The grimmer, grieving passages of the seven-part requiem strategically works its way from sorrow and sadness to an uplifting acceptance and healing, with the triumphant statement of “O death, where is thy sting? Hell, where is thy victory?” (from 1 Corinthians 15:55) in the sweeping, hopeful climax of the sixth movement. In the calmer final movement, “Blessed are the dead,” a tranquil resolution is at hand, although the desired emotional effect here was blunted by the crazy quilt circumstances.

As much as we can admire taking chances and bending rules of order within classical orthodoxy, certain truisms stand. You can’t mess with Mother Nature, and shouldn’t mess with the structural integrity of a major musical opus.

Further Adventures of Fusion Gymnastics

Hiromi’s Sonicwonder | Photo: David Bazemore

It’s possible that last Friday’s appearance by Hiromi’s Sonicwonder, hosted by UCSB Arts & Lectures at Campbell Hall, contained more adrenaline-fueled energy per minute than any concert so far this season in town. The technically virtuosic and charismatic crowd-stoking, Japanese-born keyboardist and bandleader is known for conjuring up a neo-jazz fusion bursting at the seams with syncopated choreography, tight ensemble turns, and high energy funk and emo fusion/smooth jazz melodies.

With her current band Sonicwonder, she has found sympathetic and athletic allies to suit her mission — in legendary electric bassist Hadrien Feraud, drummer Gene Coye and the formidable young trumpeter Adam O’Farrill — while she commands attention, in a friendly, benevolent leader way, from her perch mostly at the grand piano with asides on synthesizers. She wrote to this band’s strengths for her new album Out There, the source of most of the concert’s setlist.

Live, her music can be an exciting experience to behold, even if its deeper musical values are wanting. Campbell Hall turned into a high wire act of the post-fusion sort, and the crowd went suitably wild. Her varied musical flavors are woven into the long, four-part “Out There” suite, compromising the lion’s share of the concert, closing out with the clearly Weather Report–influenced movement “The Quest.” The Weather Report connection continued as she explained the designer of her new album was Lou Beach, whose illustrations graced such classic Weather Report albums as Heavy Weather and Mr. Gone.

Hiromi strategically closed the evening with the lovely and luminous solo piano ballad “Pendulum” followed by the giddily cheerful and aptly titled “Balloon Pop.” The sneaky trick with this tune is that its almost cartoony main theme subversively veers off into tricky rhythmic “new math” musical equations and taut unison punches by the band. Early attempts of the crowd to clap along soon left us in the polyrhythmic dust. We left this brainy circus in a happy haze, humming the childlike “Balloon Pop” theme.

Jazz comes in many flavors and intensities. Hiromi has cooked up her own mode of jazz ramen.

To-Doings:

Opera Santa Barbara’s ‘The Daughter of the Regiment’ | Photo: Courtesy

Given that Opera Santa Barbara’s (OSB) current season consists of only three productions, each event arrives with added weight and anticipation, making this weekend’s season-closing of Donizetti’s The Daughter of the Regiment a clear choice on the serious music what-to-do list. Performances are on Friday night and Sunday afternoon at the Lobero Theatre.

The two-act comic opera, by the Italian composer working with a French libretto, premiered in Paris in 1840. Soprano Jana McIntyre stars as the titular military “daughter,” who falls for a peasant boy, sung by Chris Mosz, who has the challenge of taking on the infamously difficult and high ranging aria “Ah! mes amis, quel jour de fête!” Watch for, and count out, those nine high “Cs.” The director is Josh Shaw, from the acclaimed Pacific Opera Project, and intrepid OSB head Kostis Protopapas serves as conductor in the pit, and as general-purpose overseer.

Over at SOhO, this week’s musical menu includes Celtic acoustic guitar wizard Tony McManus on Sunday night and the return of a SOhO favorite, Martin Sexton, on Tuesday, bringing his current “Abbey Road” project. The multi-talented Sexton will perform the Beatles’ landmark album Abbey Road in its entirety, followed by a set of originals. Should be a hoot. He’s the kind of guy who can carry that weight.