Trending Stories
View all galleries
It wasn’t the most well-received of logos.
The council, which organizes the monthly open-studio event in downtown Fresno, is redesigning said logo for 2018 and its looking to you for help. That is, provided you have some design skills and can create a logo that is “legible, reproducible, and scalable for large and small formatting.”
Those logo design contest started this month and runs until Sept. 30, at which time a winner will be chosen (or not, if no suitable entries are received) by the Fresno Arts Council board of directors. There is a $500 cash prize for the winning designer, whose work will be on all the Arthop promo materials and the Fresno Art’s Council’s website and Fresno Arthop’s Facebook and related social media pages. Complete rules and details are available at the Fresno Arts Council web page.
Some professional designers and artists balk at such competition no doubt, but design contests can be fairly common. Granville’s urban development division did a contest to put a mural on its Lede development and Kuppa Joy recently held a similar contest for its Tower District location, which produced some rather awesome looking work from artist Benjamin Short.
The next question is whether the council will be shooting a new ArtHop video for 2018, because this one from Top Hand Media still holds up.
","template_type":"","story_teaser":"","lead_media":{"id":"161848658","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/ent-columns-blogs/fresno-beehive/8rrbd5/picture161848658","asset_type":"picture","state":"published","title":"fresnoa rts council","publication":"fresnobee","layout_option":"","home":"/web/v1/sections/17417","modified_date":1500332588,"allow_comments":false,"published_date":1500329368,"thumbnail":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/ent-columns-blogs/fresno-beehive/8rrbd5/picture161848658/alternates/FREE_1140/fresnoa%20rts%20council","href":"/web/v1/content/161848658","access_tags":["matbasic"],"additional_sections":["17417"],"credit":"","dateline":"","caption":"The Fresno Arts Council is holding a design contest to find the ArtHop logo for 2018. There is a $500 cash prize for the winning design.","photographer":"www.fresnoartscouncil.org","is_mugshot":false,"text_alignment":"Default","summary":"","byline":"","kicker":""},"owner":"Fresno","allow_comments":true,"image":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/ent-columns-blogs/fresno-beehive/8rrbd5/picture161848658/alternates/LANDSCAPE_768/fresnoa%20rts%20council"},{"id":"156554084","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/article156554084.html","asset_type":"story","state":"published","title":"#IMOMSOHARD thrills Lemoore ‘Navy b****es,’ mountain moms and more","publication":"fresnobee","layout_option":"none","home":"/web/v1/sections/17441","home_section":{"name":"Theater & Arts","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/"},"modified_date":1497720587,"published_date":1497631684,"thumbnail":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/2ijj5q/picture156554079/alternates/LANDSCAPE_768/unnamed%20(3)","keywords":"#IMOMSOHARD, rory appleton, Kristin Hensley, Jen Smedley, lemoore naval air station, saroyan theatre,","access_tags":["matbasic"],"additional_sections":["17441","14597","6991"],"credit":"","dateline":"","summary":"Kristin Hensley and Jen Smedley of breakout Facebook video series IMOMSOHARD delivered laughs and a generous helping of real talk during their Fresno performance on June 15.","content":"
This may come as a complete shock, but as a 28-year-old man I don’t mom very hard.
As such, I had no idea what to expect from the #IMOMSOHARD Mom’s Night Out tour stop at Fresno’s Saroyan Theatre. I knew basically nothing about Kristin Hensley and Jen Smedley, the two women behind the hugely popular Facebook page, before walking into the theater.
And what an interesting walk that was.
The night began at nearby Umi Sushi. My girlfriend noticed I was the only man in the restaurant not rolling raw fish. I began to hear the odd word from ambient conversations – “car seat,” “C-section” – and noticed a bottle of white wine had been massacred not four feet from me.
This was a pregame. A mom pregame.
As we picked up our tickets, a very nice group of women remarked that I must be the most confident man in Fresno to attend the show. What a flattering but terrifying comment. What’s going to happen in there? Will I survive?
One of the women said her husband told her as she left the house that she looked so good he worried someone may hit on her.
“There won’t be anyone to hit on me,” she said with a laugh.
As we lined up, I locked eyes with another man – the first of a few such exchanges – and wondered if a casual fist bump among strangers would be appropriate. I decided against it.
Inside was about what I expected. Throngs of women – some sipping pink drinks and wearing matching shirts – were talking in the intermission area. I would conservatively put the ratio of men to women at 1:100.
As I sat down, I was conscious of my manspreading. I have pretty long legs. I usually try to keep it in check but was aware that a failure to do so in this scenario could be fatal.
The theater was still filling as a video of Smedley and Hensley began the show. It was clips of from their YouTube channel, I think, but the volume was too low for me to make out what they were saying.
The audience erupted as the analog versions of Smedley and Hensley hit the stage. They were much easier to hear, and I was struck by how different they are. Hensley exploded with energy, while Smedley remained relatively still and delivered her jokes as a wonderful deadpan counterweight to her boisterous partner.
It was clear this was a scripted, rehearsed performance by professionals. I did not know until after the show that both Smedley and Hensley are working comedy writers and actresses. Hensley has acted in “Parks and Recreation” and “Brooklyn Nine-Nine.”
The show started a little slow, but the moms hooked the audience with a hilarious bit about “Game of Thrones” star Jason Momoa. Smedley’s delivery in particular sealed it.
By this point, every seat I could see in the orchestra section had been filled. If it wasn’t a sellout, it was close.
Hensley and Smedley then descended upon the audience to snatch up as many “mom bags” as they could. They then spent about 20 minutes digging through these strangers’ purses and riffing, which put the entire audience – myself included – in stitches. We would not have been mad if they just rifled through bags for the remaining 90 minutes. It was the highlight of the show.
The performance focused almost entirely on issues pertaining to women and motherhood, but I didn’t need first-hand knowledge of either to enjoy it. Hensley and Smedley are genuinely funny people with great comedic timing. I imagine either could make any subject funny to anyone.
That said, there was a wave of menstruation jokes that seemed particularly funny to the hundreds of women on all sides of me. I laughed, but it was sort of a nervous laugh that said “is it OK for me to laugh or should I sit this one out?” I spotted the stage-right usher in the same conundrum.
I explained this to my girlfriend. She laughed. “Yes, neither is correct.”
There also was a moment in which Hensley and Smedley described in graphic detail “what happens to your body after having kids that no one tells you about.” I felt the icy gaze of my girlfriend, who is pregnant with our first child, peer deep inside me. “May my death be quick and painless,” I thought.
The moms did a great job of transitioning between scripted routines and improvisation. In addition to the purse search, they also read questions from the audience.
This bit certainly jazzed up the crowd, but I found it more informative than funny. For instance, I did not know people from Nebraska have considerable difficulty saying Visalia. I also was surprised to learn of a group in attendance self-identified as the “Navy Bitches,” who are apparently the wives of sailors at Lemoore Naval Air Station. There was another group of about 60 women known as the “Mountain Moms.” I would love to hear their stories.
I had no idea what to expect from #IMOMSOHARD, but I ended up having a great time. I laughed deeply and often. Did I learn some things that will haunt my dreams? Probably, but it was worth it.
Rory Appleton: 559-441-6015, @RoryDoesPhonics
","template_type":"","story_teaser":"","lead_media":{"id":"156554079","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/2ijj5q/picture156554079","asset_type":"picture","state":"published","title":"unnamed (3)","publication":"fresnobee","layout_option":"","home":"/web/v1/sections/17441","modified_date":1497720587,"allow_comments":false,"published_date":1497631684,"thumbnail":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/2ijj5q/picture156554079/alternates/FREE_1140/unnamed%20(3)","href":"/web/v1/content/156554079","access_tags":["matbasic"],"additional_sections":["17441"],"credit":"Luther Burbank Center of the Arts","dateline":"","caption":"Kristin Hensley and Jen Smedley of #IMOMSOHARD","is_mugshot":false,"text_alignment":"Default","summary":"","byline":"","kicker":""},"owner":"Fresno","allow_comments":true,"image":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/2ijj5q/picture156554079/alternates/LANDSCAPE_768/unnamed%20(3)"},{"id":"154744709","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/article154744709.html","asset_type":"story","state":"published","title":"Beethoven and beer? Fresno Philharmonic’s first woman musical director promises change","publication":"fresnobee","layout_option":"none","home":"/web/v1/sections/17441","home_section":{"name":"Theater & Arts","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/"},"modified_date":1496887843,"published_date":1496796784,"thumbnail":"https://cf-images.us-east-1.prod.boltdns.net/v1/static/5596404782001/b0bec35e-520f-4a80-a786-e4e71648224d/5358bcb8-c923-4703-b265-3258f5e308f1/160x90/match/image.jpg","keywords":"fresno, philharmonic, symphony, orchestra, rei, hotoda, classical, music, utah symphony, dallas symphony, winnipeg symphony, contemporary music, director","access_tags":["matbasic"],"additional_sections":["17441","17840","14597","6990","6991"],"credit":"","dateline":"","summary":"Utah Symphony associate conductor Rei Hotoda will take over as the Fresno Philharmonic’s music director.","content":"
When Rei Hotoda and the Fresno Philharmonic finished a raucous March performance of the conductor’s ambitious program – one that began with a song composed 14 years ago and ended with a century-old Tchaikovsky classic – the Saroyan Theatre audience refused to let her leave. It brought Hotoda back to the stage for a bow. Again. And again. And again.
After the performance, some in attendance described a buzz sweeping through the normally reverent crowd that was far more akin to the feeling after a rock concert than that of an orchestral performance. They too, it seemed, did not want to leave.
It would seem Fresno’s classical music faithful should get used to that feeling.
The Fresno Philharmonic has named Hotoda as its new musical director following a six-month audition and interview process with a talented field of six finalists. She will replace Theodore Kuchar, who left the orchestra in 2016 after 15 years at its helm. She is the first woman to hold the position in the philharmonic’s 63-year history. Her first performance will be Oct. 15.
“This is going to be a season where someone who has never been here must set aside any preconceptions of they think a Fresno Philharmonic concert will be,” President Stephen Wilson said. “Under her leadership, this will be exciting, welcoming – something people regardless of musical background will find enjoyable and worthwhile to attend.”
Hotoda, who finishes her stint as the Utah Symphony‘s associate conductor in August, said she was thrilled to take over a top-notch orchestra filled with great players capable of playing complex music of various genres. This will be her first gig as a music director, having also served as assistant conductor for the Dallas Symphony and Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra.
The new director hopes to entrench herself within the community as soon as possible. She believes a more inclusive music program with pieces chosen to reflect the diversity of Fresno will help grow the city’s symphony community.
However, Hotoda has no immediate plans to move to Fresno. She currently lives in Salt Lake City. Her family lives in Chicago. She’s also still interviewing and trying out for other music director positions throughout the country (it’s not uncommon for conductors to hold multiple director jobs at part-time orchestras, like Fresno).
“It’s the life of a conductor,” she said. “But I will be (in Fresno) quite a lot.”
She also wants to bring the symphony to the people. Hotoda, Wilson and the philharmonic’s board of directors are considering adding shows to the season that would take place outside of the Saroyan Theatre.
“One concert every couple of months is great, but I’d like to be more embedded in the community,” Hotoda said. “It could be at a lounge or bar. One idea I have is Beethoven and brews. We could do piano sonatas in a bar. We have incredible musicians in this community. I want to showcase them in a more intimate setting, that way people get to know the players more.”
Hotoda, also plans to bring more contemporary music to the Fresno Philharmonic. She’s not looking to force-feed new music to audiences, she said, but rather incorporate modern pieces into programs still built around the classical cornerstones.
“I want to play music that’s about where we live and we’re talking about now – a 21st Century orchestra,” she said.
The response to her March concert’s opening piece, Zhou Long’s “The Rhyme of Taigu,” proved to Hotoda that Fresno is “willing to listen and participate in the music of our time.” It also set her apart from the other candidates.
Fresno State composition professor Kenneth D. Froelich called it his “single favorite piece of music this season.”
“She opened with a really interesting and complicated piece,” Wilson said. “And she really brought the audience along with that piece. One person commented that she ‘played the orchestra’ rather than conducting it.”
Hotoda, a concert pianist with a doctorate in the field before switching to conducting, said she’d never heard anyone say that about her before, but she agrees with it.
“It’s kind of true,” she said. “(Conducting) is my calling, my passion – my lifeline to the music.”
Wilson noted that the audiences at each of the Fresno “tryout” concerts were extremely involved in the selection process. About 20 percent submitted comment cards after each performance. The response to all six finalists was overwhelmingly positive, he said, but Hotoda received the most comments and generated just a bit more excitement.
“There was a very strong consensus that Rei was the best choice,” Wilson said. “She connected very strongly with both the orchestra and the audience. She impressed us with her ideas and her vision for programming and our future.”
With a new director in tow, the philharmonic’s brain trust must now answer questions familiar to all in the arts community: How do attract new patrons while also appealing to a loyal subscription base? How do we try new things without disrupting decades of tradition? How do we compete in the Spotify and Netflix era?
The season will open with the philharmonic’s popular guest-conducted Pops concert, this year featuring the music of “Star Wars” composer John Williams, on Sept. 16. But our first glimpse of the new-look organization will be the following month, when Hotoda takes the reins.
Rory Appleton: 559-441-6015, @RoryDoesPhonics
","template_type":"","story_teaser":"","lead_media":{"id":"153642394","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article153642394.html","asset_type":"videoIngest","brightcove_id":"5727805520001","state":"published","title":"Meet the new Fresno Philharmonic conductor","publication":"fresnobee","layout_option":"","home":"/web/v1/sections/17504","modified_date":1519672349,"published_date":1496796667,"leadtext":[{"text":"Rei Hotoda was chosen as the new music director for the Philharmonic after an audition process that saw six candidates."}],"thumbnail":"https://cf-images.us-east-1.prod.boltdns.net/v1/static/5596404782001/b0bec35e-520f-4a80-a786-e4e71648224d/211b00f8-6b69-456f-9f9d-425cef57c412/1280x720/match/image.jpg","href":"/web/v1/content/153642394","access_tags":["matbasic"],"additional_sections":["17504"],"credit":"","summary":"","content":"","brightcove_thumbnail":"https://cf-images.us-east-1.prod.boltdns.net/v1/static/5596404782001/b0bec35e-520f-4a80-a786-e4e71648224d/5358bcb8-c923-4703-b265-3258f5e308f1/160x90/match/image.jpg","photographer":"McClatchy","allow_ads":true,"ads":[{"publication":"fresnobee","tag":"https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/ads?ciu_szs=300x250&correlator=%5Btimestamp%5D&cust_params=sect%3Dlocal%26id%3D153642394%26eid%3D153642394%26vidlength%3Dshort%26pl%3D&description_url=%5Breferrer_url%5D&env=vp&gdfp_req=1&hl=en&impl=s&iu=%2F7675%2FFRS.site_fresnobee%2FNews%2FLocal&output=vast&sz=400x300&unviewed_position_start=1&url=%5Breferrer_url%5D&vidlength=short&vpos=preroll","lang":"en","sz":"400x300","vpos":"preroll","cust_params":"sect=local&id=153642394&eid=153642394&vidlength=short&pl="}],"kicker":"","allow_comments":false},"owner":"Fresno","allow_comments":true,"image":"https://cf-images.us-east-1.prod.boltdns.net/v1/static/5596404782001/b0bec35e-520f-4a80-a786-e4e71648224d/5358bcb8-c923-4703-b265-3258f5e308f1/160x90/match/image.jpg"},{"id":"154267669","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/article154267669.html","asset_type":"story","state":"published","title":"‘Star Wars,’ DreamWorks and more represented as CSU Summer Arts returns to Fresno","publication":"fresnobee","layout_option":"none","home":"/web/v1/sections/17441","home_section":{"name":"Theater & Arts","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/"},"modified_date":1496536979,"published_date":1496536979,"thumbnail":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/gfpkw2/picture154267664/alternates/LANDSCAPE_768/contra%20(2)","keywords":"arts, festival, student, showcase, california state university, star wars, dreamworks, music, acting, poetry, performance","access_tags":["matbasic"],"additional_sections":["17441","14597","6991"],"credit":"","dateline":"","summary":"CSU Summer Arts is back in Fresno from June 25 to July 22, bringing performances and lectures from artists across a variety of mediums.","content":"
After five years away from the Valley, CSU Summer Arts is returning to Fresno State with a full schedule packed with student showcases and performances from a star-studded list of guest artists.
The program will kick off June 25 with an orchestral performance from the FOOSA Festival and the Fresno Summer Orchestra Academy. The final two days will be a showcase on July 21-22 for the program’s 450 students from throughout the state. Most of the performances and lectures takes place at a variety of venues across the campus, but Roosevelt High School for the Performing Arts will also host a few.
The month-long arts festival is packed with notable guest performers in a variety of mediums, including dance, film making, poetry, wood carving and musical performance. You won’t want to miss the June 28 cinematography lecture from Bruce Logan, whose work includes “Star Wars,” “2001: A Space Odyssey” and “TRON.” Fun fact: He’s the guy who actually blew up the Death Star on screen. So he’s clearly a galactic hero who is worth your time.
The organizers also recommend David Sanchez & Friends on July 5, Urban Bush Women on July 10 and Nimble Collective on July 19. Sanchez is a Grammy award-winning Latin Jazz saxophonist, while Urban Bush Women is a socially charged dance performance. The Nimble Collective is a lecture from a group of animators including Rex Grignon, the founding head of character animation at DreamWorks who also worked on “Toy Story” and “Madagascar.”
Fresno State beat out seven other schools through a competitive bidding process to bring the program back to its campus, where it will remain until 2021. The university hosted the festival from 1999-2011 before it moved to California State University Monterey Bay.
The program’s departure was a blow for the university and local arts community, but it also affected the local economy by removing Fresno as a destination for art lovers outside the Valley. But organizers say CSU Summer Arts’ return has restored that vigor.
“People are planning their summers around this,” spokeswoman Tanya Osegueda said.
Tickets for each performance go on sale Monday and can be purchased in person at the CSU Summer Arts box office in Fresno State’s Speech Arts Building or online. Regular tickets range from $10-$20 per event, with discounted rates available for seniors, students, faculty and staff. Children under 12 get in for free. The student showcases are free to the public, but seats are only available on a first-come, first-served basis. Check the festival’s website for a full rundown of ticketing rules.
Rory Appleton: 559-441-6015, @RoryDoesPhonics
","template_type":"","story_teaser":"","lead_media":{"id":"154267664","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/gfpkw2/picture154267664","asset_type":"picture","state":"published","title":"contra (2)","publication":"fresnobee","layout_option":"","home":"/web/v1/sections/17441","modified_date":1496536979,"allow_comments":false,"published_date":1496536979,"thumbnail":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/gfpkw2/picture154267664/alternates/FREE_1140/contra%20(2)","href":"/web/v1/content/154267664","access_tags":["matbasic"],"additional_sections":["17441"],"credit":"Contra-Tiempo","dateline":"","caption":"Contra-Tiempo, a dance performance group encompassing various genres, will be one of the guest performers at CSU Summer Arts in 2017.","photographer":"STEVE WYLIE","is_mugshot":false,"text_alignment":"Default","summary":"","byline":"","kicker":""},"owner":"Fresno","allow_comments":true,"image":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/gfpkw2/picture154267664/alternates/LANDSCAPE_768/contra%20(2)"},{"id":"148647734","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/donald-munro/article148647734.html","asset_type":"story","state":"published","title":"Reaching ever higher, the arts capture a fundamental aspect of being human. And for that I’m thankful.","publication":"fresnobee","layout_option":"none","home":"/web/v1/sections/17444","home_section":{"name":"Donald Munro","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/donald-munro/"},"modified_date":1493925766,"published_date":1493925766,"thumbnail":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/donald-munro/ifvxlr/picture148647724/alternates/LANDSCAPE_768/0O5A6440","keywords":"fresno community chorus, master chorale, donald munro, bach, sarah larsen, anna hamre, arts, entertainment","access_tags":["matbasic"],"additional_sections":["17444","14597"],"credit":"","dateline":"","summary":"Farewell column: Arts writer Donald Munro muses on the Fresno Community Chorus Master Chorale’s monumental performance of the Bach Mass in B-minor.","content":"
The famed conductor Sir John Eliot Gardiner called Bach’s Mass in B minor the “Everest” of music.
Anna Hamre of the Fresno Community Chorus Master Chorale knew she wanted to climb that mountain.
By the time Hamre and her musicians last Sunday at Shaghoian Hall reached the “Laudamus Te” section, the sixth of 27, in Bach’s monumentally difficult piece, the 200 singers and instrumentalists on stage were still on their upward climb. But it was already clear to those in the audience that the summit was very much in reach.
And that at the top we’d be treated to an exhilarating view.
In the years ahead, I am sure I will remember several things about this concert. One is simply as a mark on a personal timeline: It turned out to be the final cultural event I would cover for The Fresno Bee after 26 years at the paper and 16 years on the arts beat.
I’m sure I will remember, too, the high level of musicianship demonstrated by both singers and orchestra members. This was a piece so monumental that it hadn’t been performed in Fresno for 22 years, and Hamre – who has brought the Fresno Community Chorus to impressive heights in her tenure over the years – got to finally conduct it for the first time in her long and distinguished career, always a dream of hers.
But likely my most searing memory will be of a moment so tiny it was barely noticeable. At the end of the “Laudamus Te” section, mezzo-soprano soloist Sarah Larsen finished her solo and the orchestra played the last phrase. It was then that it happened: Somewhere near where I was sitting at the front of the hall, soft enough that it could have been a distant cat purring, an audience member gently hummed along with the instrumentalists the final three notes.
I bet it wasn’t meant to be done out loud. Something about the “Laudamus Te” so moved this person that he or she couldn’t help but join in the music. It was a tiny declaration of solidarity with the singers and instrumentalists. It was the mountain-climbing equivalent of throwing on a shell jacket and grabbing some crampons.
This is why I love live performance.
Sure, there are a dozen professional recordings of the Bach Mass that I could access in mere seconds with Apple Music. In terms of other artistic genres, there are so many opportunities for distraction in our wired world: Instead of trooping out to live performances of local theater or experience an art exhibition in person, I could sit at home and binge-watch Netflix and Hulu until my sofa cushions mutate into mush.
Would those digital offerings be “better” than the live versions? Perhaps in a technical sense.
But nothing beats being there live. Nothing is quite like the feeling of being ensconced in an audience as you share a communal experience. As I’ve told people almost ad nauseum ever since I started covering the arts, being at a live performance is a once-in-a-lifetime event. No creative interpretation is going to be exactly the same, no audience reaction exactly similar. It’s precisely because such a moment can’t be relived that makes it so special.
I’m not advocating sing-along Bach, just to be clear. But I believe the spontaneous hummer in my midst was an expression of something bigger: how the arts are at the core of humanity.
For how many millions of years did humans – an intensely social species – make music and art in communal settings before that role was bequeathed (at least in some people’s eyes) to professional artists? Tens of thousands of generations. Apple Music has been around for what, a year?
Yes, I love reveling in the highest levels of artistic expression. I’ve attended many of the world’s great venues and institutions devoted to such talent and artistry, from Broadway and Carnegie Hall to the Vienna State Opera House to the Hermitage in St. Petersburg. Visiting these places can be like a religious experience.
Yet if these world-class institutions are high temples of culture, then local arts is one of those robust storefront churches exploding with feeling and commitment on a Sunday morning.
When I sat down to write this column, I considered highlighting a few of the superlative artistic experiences I’ve had in the central San Joaquin Valley during my tenure. But I decided against it. Each year I compile my “Top 20” retrospective list of notable events, and I go through spasms of agony trying to narrow it down each time. How could I multiply that times 16?
So I’ll stick with Bach. Which is fitting. Emil Cioran, a Romanian philosopher and essayist, put it this way: “Bach’s music is the only argument proving the creation of the Universe cannot be regarded a complete failure.”
As Hamre told the audience beforehand, the Mass in B minor is like a great novel in the mold of “War and Peace,” filled with the vast range of human emotions. At one of the highest points, at the beginning of the “Cum Sancto” section, the musicians were unleashed like a high-pressure hose, the sound washing over the audience in a powerful wave. As the singers performed Bach’s vocal gymnastics and the brass rang in triumph, it was a rousing and spiritually-charged moment, the kind that can make your pulse pound.
Then came moments of exquisite tenderness. Near the end of the entire piece, Larsen returned to perform the touching “Agnus Dei.” She brought an electric connection to the music. I watched her face closely as she sang. It was almost as if she were in a trance-like state, moved to the point of near rapture as she sang of the “Lamb of God.” Her voice managed somehow to be both light in touch and heavy in heart.
And, finally, the majestic “Dona nobis pacem” (“Grant us Thy peace”), with Hamre and the singers building the sound, layer upon layer, as if constructing a musical staircase, then extending a hand to the audience to guide us up those final steps. For Bach, we’re as physically close to Heaven as you can be on this big, flawed world.
I thank you, the Fresno Community Chorus Master Chorale, for taking me on this climb. I feel the same way about the other artists whom I’ve had the pleasure of covering for 16 years.
Looking ahead, I still plan to be in the audience. Maybe, if you listen carefully, you’ll hear me softly humming along.
----------------------------------
A special thanks to my Bee colleagues, past and present, who have made this journey so special. If you have arts and entertainment news you want to let The Bee know about, send it to features@fresnobee.com. And I’ll still be around. Feel free to drop me a line at donaldfresnoarts@gmail.com.
Donald Munro: 559-441-6373, @donaldbeearts
","template_type":"","story_teaser":"","lead_media":{"id":"148647724","url":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/donald-munro/ifvxlr/picture148647724","asset_type":"picture","state":"published","title":"0O5A6440","publication":"fresnobee","layout_option":"","home":"/web/v1/sections/17444","modified_date":1493925766,"allow_comments":false,"published_date":1493925766,"thumbnail":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/donald-munro/ifvxlr/picture148647724/alternates/FREE_1140/0O5A6440","href":"/web/v1/content/148647724","access_tags":["matbasic"],"additional_sections":["17444"],"credit":"Special to The Bee","dateline":"","caption":"The Fresno Community Chorus Master Chorale performs the Bach Mass in B minor.","photographer":"Ronald Webb","is_mugshot":false,"text_alignment":"Default","summary":"","byline":"","kicker":""},"owner":"Fresno","allow_comments":true,"image":"https://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/performing-arts/donald-munro/ifvxlr/picture148647724/alternates/LANDSCAPE_768/0O5A6440"}],"showSummary":false,"initialQuantity":0,"isLoading":true,"isVisible":false,"areMoreResults":false,"page":0,"offset":0},"sectionConfig":{"lang":"en","pubTimeZone":"America/Los_Angeles"}}