Riskin-g Memories

Montecito author and screenwriter Victoria Riskin will be on hand for a Carsey-Wolf Center Classics screening of one of her father’s beloved features, Meet John Doe (1941), another of writer Robert Riskin’s celebrated collaboration with famed director Frank Capra whose earlier teamwork produced It Happened One Night (1934) and Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936). Riskin, whose biography of her parents, Fay Wray and Robert Riskin: A Hollywood Memoir, joins UCSB film prof Charles Wolfe for a post-screening discussion of the film and Robert Riskin’s legacy following the 7 pm showing Thursday, November 7, at the Pollock.

Horn-ing in on History

Blame the Johannes Brahms Horn Trio in E major, Op. 40, for the birth of American composer William Bolcom’s Trio for Horn, Violin & Piano, which will have its West Coast premiere this Saturday, November 9, 2019 at 7:30 pm at Hahn Hall at the Music Academy of the West. Or rather credit both Dr. Steven Gross, UCSB horn professor, and Bolcom for commissioning and composing the 2017 work, which will be performed by Gross and American Double members violinist Philip Ficsor and pianist Constantine Finehouse, who co-commissioned the work.

“The Brahms trio (which commemorates the death of Brahms’ mother, who died the year he wrote it) is one of the great pieces of chamber music. But it has presented a problem because it’s hard for composers to write something of equal stature, quality and power,” Gross explained earlier this week. “We wanted to have Bolcom create a 21st Century trio that would become a part of the horn and chamber music literature. We believe we have a worthy work.”

Indeed, championing the French horn – best known as an orchestral instrument – as suitable for the solo spotlight is nothing new for Gross. He came to UCSB back in 1995 for the very purpose of revitalizing the brass instrument program that had thrived under Maurice Faulkner in the ‘60s and ‘70s but had since fallen out of favor at the campus. (Saturday’s concert also serves as a celebration of the horn player’s 25 years at UCSB.) Gross left a quarter-century stint as Principal Horn of the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra to resurrect the program, basically, in his words, starting from scratch, and taking advantage of the school’s stature as a research university to try out new things, including making several recordings.

Only time will tell whether the Bolcom trio becomes as important a part of the chamber music canon at the Brahms, but there’s no question of the work’s weight. The titles of the four movements (“Plodding, implacably controlled,” “Headlong, brutal,” “As if far away, misterioso,” and “Very controlled and resolute”) are hints to not on the different flavors and hues of the piece, but also its thematic impetus. 

“It is occasioned – I don’t want to write ‘inspired’ – by the era we’re living in,” read the program notes by Bolcom, a National Medal of Arts, Pulitzer Prize, and Grammy Award-winner. “So many of us feel desperation from the constant endangering of our country and the world; I wrote the Trio to express this, hoping listeners might possibly feel less alone. The heavy plodding rhythms of the first movement are supplanted by a hectic second, a portrait of our misfortune’s principal agent. The following slow movement contains a short moment of respite toward its end – a brief breakthrough of tonal sunshine in C major – and the finale is a resolute march of resistance.”

For Gross, the work has significance beyond the current political climate and sociological issues.

“We’re certainly aware when we play it that Bolcom wrote it in reaction to our troubled times in this country,” Gross said. “But we think of it more as a lasting, universal thing about overcoming difficult times, whenever and wherever they are. The piece reflects our time but it also transcends it.”

Gross himself will have to overcome a few challenges in performing the work for the first time close to his Santa Barbara home, largely due to the nature of the instrument. “Playing the French horn is like a high wire act in that it’s rewarding but treacherous. There’s an acoustical mismatch. The horn has a lot of tubes, but the mouthpiece is very small. So it’s very difficult to produce notes but when you do it’s a very rich evocative sound.”

Both counts apply in the Bolcom work, Gross said. “The horn part is severely challenging – difficult in register, technique, everything. But I must say the third movement is so beautiful and it reflects the beauty of the horn itself.”

Gross also has a connection with another piece on Saturday’s program, Jiří Havlík’s 1976 Concerto for Horn, in that they’re both of Czech descent. Gross and the duo will play the slow movement, which sports a cadenza that uses the full range of horn registers. “It’s very poignant,” said Gross, adding that he is dedicating its performance to the memory of his parents, who recently passed.

The trio will also perform Václav Nelhýbel’s 1966 Scherzo Concertante while American Double members Philip Ficsor and Constantine Finehouse will play Bolcom’s Second Sonata for Violin and Piano. Tickets cost $15 general, $5 for students, free for children under 12. Call (805) 893-2064 or visit www.music.ucsb.edu.