A FETE-- and Q-TETS!

Last night, there was an event in the Old City feting Lucas and Debbie Richman in honor of their involvement with the Stanford Eisenberg Knoxville Jewish Day School. The venue was a relatively new one, called The Standard. A whole host of KSO fans, KJDS supporters and friends were in attendance, and a number of presentations were made, including a very charming PowerPoint collage of interviews with current KJDS drama students. Radio personality Hallerin Hilton Hill gave a short keynote testimonial, and introduced the Principal String Quartet’s performance. We performed three compositions by Maestro Richman, an arrangement of the Jewish Hymn Hine Mah Tov, his Gerhardt Variations, from the score of the film Four Faces, and a set of variations based on Music Can Make Your Life Complete, the theme song of Picardy Penguin. Debbie Richman sang Pure Imagination from the musical Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, with the Maestro accompanying her on piano.

It was an interesting venue, to say the least. For years and years, the Standard Wilson Glass Company was headquartered in the building, but they moved to Morgan Street in the Fourth and Gill neighborhood a few years back. I’d bought a variety of windows and screens for our home and had glass installed in a couple of our cars there over the years, but never did I expect to be performing music there, let alone in a tux. Unsure of the exact location, I consulted Google Maps, but the Street View photos they provided showed a pretty abysmal, blighted looking property, obviously taken before the building was renovated! Dewhirst Properties has done a wonderful job with the transformation of the building and I hope to perform there again.

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Just down the street, at the Emporium Center for Arts and Culture (home of the KSO office) at 100 South Gay St., another instalment of the new "Q" Series will take place Tuesday at noon. The Principal Woodwind Quintet and String Quartet will bring an eclectic program to a lunchtime crowd.

The String “Q” will perform Heitor Villa-Lobos’ String Quartet No. 1, which is drawn from his 1946 Suite Gracioso. Its six movements are in various moods, ranging from lyrical to impish. The melody of the finale, Saltando como un Saci (Jumping like a jumping bean), bears an uncanny resemblance to Glinka’s Kamarinskaya, frequently played on KSCO runouts. The Woodwind “Q” will present three works, Shostakovich’s charming Polka from the Age of Gold ballet, Henri Tomasi’s colorful Cinq Danses, and Justinian Tamusuza’s Abafa Luli. The concert is free. See you there!