Fall 2009 eNews: InterNetzo
2009: A Summer of Inspiration, Rigorous Training, and Fun

By Seth Brenzel

2009 was by all accounts another successful and fun-filled summer at Walden. For me it marked my 25th summer of involvement. In 1985, I came to camp as a young middle-school student, completely unaware of the transformative power of the creative community that I was about to experience. But ever since I first found myself changed by Walden, I have been unable to imagine my summers without it. Perhaps I just haven’t learned how to be creative enough about what to do in the summer? More likely, I am simply drawn back summer after summer by the opportunity to be a musician amidst the natural beauty of New Hampshire’s Monadnock Region and among like-minded creative musicians, students, visiting artists, and teachers alike.

In this, Walden’s 37th summer, our Concert Series represented an eclectic (“to a fault,” in one journalist’s opinion!) mix of visiting artists and music. We enjoyed original music in an ‘old-timey’ style from the M Shanghai String Band, which featured Walden’s own Renée Favand-See on vocals in several pieces. In addition to their excellent concert, the group also played at our first dance of the summer and held a songwriting workshop for students. Wet Ink Ensemble, whose leadership includes Walden faculty member Sam Pluta, performed world premieres by seven faculty composers on an electrifying concert that also included music of Ligeti and Joan Tower, one of Walden’s composers-in-residence this summer. Tower’s residency was a highlight of the summer, and we were all enriched by her musical insights and artistic presence in our community.

Lloyd Meeks and Joshua Clampitt with Joan Tower

John Weaver and his wife Marianne, both alumni of the Junior Conservatory Camp (Walden’s predecessor program, founded by Grace Newsom Cushman), performed an outstanding recital at All Saints’ Church in Peterborough. John’s artistry on the pipe organ and Marianne’s talent on the flute had the standing-room only audience mesmerized. This concert was one of two highly successful co-presentations with the acclaimed Monadnock Music chamber music festival.

Marianne Weaver, John Weaver, Maia McCormick, Julie Ryland, Nike Power, and Matt Johns

Three Walden alumni faculty returned this summer to give a concert: what a treat it was to have John Yankee, Carol Thomas Downing and Ned Quist of Cross Country back at Walden after a several-year hiatus. The sounds of old favorites filled the hall, and we were delighted that they included Walden in their 2009 New England tour. The Walden School Players, comprising Greg Hesselink, Claire Chase, Steve Beck, Jane Chung, Meighan Stoops and Nathan Davis (who marked ten years as a visiting artist in 2009), gave a stunning performance of contemporary repertoire, including music of Joan Tower, Pierre Boulez, and Stephen Jaffe, Walden’s Festival Forum Moderator. Jaffe’s music was also featured during our second co-presentation with Monadnock Music at the Dublin School, where musicians of Monadnock Music performed a free – and brilliant – concert for the Dublin Community and Walden’s Teacher Training Institute participants.

This summer’s choral concert, led by the extraordinary Leo Wanenchak, was given to a packed house, again at All Saints’ in Peterborough. Walden alumnus Bill Wisnom was our organist as we presented a concert devoted to the incredible music of Benjamin Britten, including Hymn to St. Cecilia and Rejoice in the Lamb, among other works. One audience member commented that he simply couldn’t believe that on top of all of the other things we do at Walden, we were able to put together such a beautiful and complete choral concert. I think the fact that we accomplished this is a testament to all of us and our commitment to performing a wonderful concert for the community, as well as Leo’s tremendous leadership of Walden’s choral program.

Jane Lange, Caroline Mallonée and Sam Pluta

There are indeed many other things that we do at Walden’s Young Musicians Program in a summer, notably six composers forums, a musicianship frolic and classroom demonstration, and a full line-up of inspiring, challenging and fun classes. This year there were 30 classes taught to 55 students (a record enrollment!), and our faculty was drawn principally from veteran teachers, including Sam Pluta, Bill Stevens, Renée Favand-See, Marshall Bessières, Leo Wanenchak, Carrie Mallonee, Osnat Netzer, Whit Bernard and Eliza Brown. We welcomed Tony Makarome of Singapore onto Walden’s faculty for the first time this summer. Tony, a colleague of Thomas Hecht (a Walden alumnus, former faculty member, and guest artist), taught conducting this summer and played upright and electric bass in dozens of composers forum pieces. It was also the first summer on faculty for Walden alumnus D.J. Sparr. D.J. holds a doctorate in music composition from the University of Michigan and is an accomplished guitarist and composer. Enrichment classes this summer included Osnat Netzer’s Figured Bass and Fugues; Caroline Mallonée’s Instrument Builders; and the return of Sam Pluta’s course, Audio/Vision. In addition to enrichment courses like these, there were nearly a dozen musicianship classes, and a similar number of composition classes.

Osnat Netzer and Julie Ryland

Hailing from places as far flung as Singapore, Seattle, and San Francisco, our students this year – both new and returning, younger and older – displayed the kind of diverse talents we’ve come to expect (and relish). Student singers, songwriters, drummers, guitarists, bassists, and other instrumentalists performed regularly on weekly open mics, in addition to jamming on their own, playing music on the lawn and honing their instrumental skills during practice periods. All told, students this summer wrote more than 100 new pieces of music, including choral music, computer music, solo piano works, inside-the-piano pieces and more. Festival Forum pieces were (mostly) finished on time this year; some students even completed their pieces a day early, driven by an added incentive: a private showing of the latest Harry Potter film at the movie theater in Peterborough. And later in the summer, several students, faculty and staff were treated to a presentation and tour at the nearby MacDowell Colony, one of the nation’s oldest and most esteemed artist colonies.

Together students, faculty and staff made all four Saturday mountain hikes, including our crowning ascent of Mount Monadnock, despite it having been the rainiest summer in at least 25 years. Indeed, the hike up Monadnock was more of a hike up a rushing stream, but it was well worth the effort. There were lots of ultimate Frisbee games, as the weather permitted, and for much of the summer, the entire campus community was engaged in a high-stakes game of espionage, trying to take over each other’s ‘embassies’ through cunning and subterfuge!

And at the end, we said goodbye to six students graduating this year: Greg Cole, Jonathan Leung, Kendrick Chow, Cara Haxo, Skylar van Joolen and Anthony del Barrio. We wish all of them well as they head off to college and hope they will come back and visit us often at Walden. For the rest of our students, June 26, 2010, is just around the corner and will be here before we know it!

After the Young Musicians Program wrapped up, faculty and staff began the “big switch” to get the campus ready for 33 music teachers who would arrive just days later for the Teacher Training Institute (TTI) Intensive, led by Pat Plude and TTI faculty Pam Quist, Leo Wanenchak, Brooke Joyce, Tom Lopez and Bill Stevens. The teachers came from a wide variety of backgrounds: college music professors, studio music teachers, composers, active music performers and improvisers, and K-12 classroom teachers, and nine of the 33 participants were coming back for their second or third session of TTI. Esther Landau, Walden’s Development Director, who is herself a flute teacher and professional flutist, was able to participate for the first time this year, along with several Walden Young Musicians Program alumni.

Once again, we were all grateful for the wonderful food provided to our program participants by Jay Whitaker and his colleagues Judy, John and Georgette at the Dublin School. Many, many thanks to Andy Hungerford, Larry Ames, Dawn, Ed, and the entire Dublin School facilities team for continuing to make Dublin home for all of us during the summer. And special thanks to head of school Brad Bates, as well as Anne Mackey, Sheila Bogan, Erika Rogers, Jen Whitesel, and many others who so graciously extended their welcome to Walden staff, faculty and students throughout the summer. We at Walden are so grateful to count Dublin School as our summer home. You can click here to listen to a recent interview I had with Brad Bates.

While it is good to be back home in San Francisco, I am already longing for the New Hampshire woods and the creative sounds of summer music-making at Walden.

Evan Johnson

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Mint Park

Emma Eisenberg, Allison Bartkowski and Lloyd Meeks

En-Wei Hu-Van Wright and Leo Liebeskind

Justin Yip

Nike Power

Julie Ryland, Emma Friedberg and Brooke Adams