Gala Celebration & Performance
June 28, 2018
NYRG's Season End Extravaganza
The festive evening was led by NYRG Music Director Deborah Booth, featuring consort performances, tutti playing, cake, bubbly and lots of fun!
The Advanced Ensemble: John Forster, Stephen Bloch, Deborah Peters, Wendy Steiner, Nancy Hathaway and David Hurd.
The Fifth Street Consort: Natalie Lebert, Gloria Brandman, Judy Von Foerster, Ben Frisch
The Loud Band: Robert Sterner, Stephen Bloch, Deborah Peters.
Visit our Archives page for program and repetoire listings.
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Have a Great Summer--See You in the Fall
The 2018-2019 schedule is: September 27, October 25, November 29, December 20, 2018; January 24, February 28, March 28, April 25, May 23, June 27, 2019. All meeting dates are Thursday evenings. Mark your calendar now.
All monthly sessions are held at 6:30 PM at All Souls Unitarian Church, 1157 Lexington Avenue, at the corner of 80th St. Doors open at 6:30 PM. Downbeat is at 6:45 PM SHARP.
NYRG Meeting Fees:
$12 per meeting for members
$15 per meeting for non-members
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Visit our Events page for photos of other recent playing meetings.
Visit our Archives Page to keep up with all of the music played at our Monthly Meetings. Music listings of workshops and other events will be added as they occur.
Play Recorder this summer: Our Workshops page has all the information on Recorder and Early Music Workshops taking place in the area.
Recorders need repairs; looking for music downloads? Visit our Resources page for information on everything recorder-related.
Consort FinderThe board and music director are pleased that you are attending New York Recorder Guild sessions to play with and meet other recorder players. It is certainly a great place for this! You may also wish to enjoy playing recorders in a consort or smaller group setting, but it is often difficult to get the right players together for levels, geography, and temperaments. We can help. If you are interested in being matched with other players, write to our music director, Deborah Booth, explaining your thoughts, wishes, level, location, and years of experience. Coaching is also available if desired. Ms. Booth will attempt to put you in touch with others who match your skills. NYRG has had success with this program in starting a consort meeting in Brooklyn and Manhattan. Give it a chance and you may be pleasantly surprised. Contact Deborah Booth at: deborah@flute-recorder-deborahbooth.com |
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NYRG Music Director and WRG Coach, Deborah Booth performed an all-Telemann program at a GEMS Concert on October 5, 2017 with Louise Shulman to a full house in the beautiful chapel of St. Bartholomew's on Park Avenue. This program offered some of Telemann's lesser known and later works from Der getreue Music-Meister (Germany's first music periodical) and also the 1752 print of bolder and more original duo pieces which survived in the Civico Museo Bibliografico Musicale in Bologna.
Deborah and Louise performed as part of an on-going series: Midtown Concerts; lunchtime performances of music of the 18th century and earlier at The Chapel at St. Bartholomew's Church, 50th St. and Park Avenue. Time: 1:15-2:00 pm. All concerts are free; no tickets or reservations are necessary. For more information, visit www.gemsny.org.
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Musica Viva NY
Musica Viva NY is a chamber choir driven by a desire to share the transcendent power of choral and instrumental music. All concerts are hosted byAll Souls Church, the organization which graciously provides our meeting space. For program information and performance dates, visit their website at http://musicaviva.org
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Subscribe to the New York Recorder Guild Mailing List and get the latest news on NYRG happenings as well as keeping up to date on the Metro New York Recorder scene. Contact: newyorkrecorders@gmail.com
Recorder Myths??
Joy Awaits You
Here Are The Facts by Judith WinkThe recorder has been around since the Middle Ages. You’d think something that venerable would get some respect. But no. Too many people out there think it’s just a folk instrument, or a starter instrument for school kids, or a pocket-sized pipe with a shrill, obnoxious sound. Even Anthony Baines, who wrote or edited dozens of articles and books about music and instruments, dismissed the recorder as “easy to play and cheap to buy,” perfect for the musician who is both lazy and tight-fisted.
Sure, in some cultures recorder-type instruments are used for folk music — Israel, for instance, which produced those abysmal Gill recorders that were made of balsa wood and left splinters in your mouth. But in Western Europe, throughout the Renaissance and Baroque periods (and that’s a long time, let me tell you), the recorder was used for art music. Recorder consorts entertained Henry VIII. Bach wrote some of the solo parts in the Brandenburg concertos with recorders in mind. In the Baroque period, the recorder was one of the premiere solo instruments, right up there with the violin. There’s a ton of serious music just from this era. Telemann alone will keep you busy for decades with his sonatas and duets.
Sure, the recorder is a great starter instruments for kids. You don’t have to struggle to get a sound out of it, as you do with the flute; you don’t have to futz with reeds, as you do with the clarinet and the saxophone and the oboe; and the finger holes on the soprano are easy for small hands to reach. But don’t stop there! The instrument may be easy to learn, but you can spend a lifetime mastering it, as any professional player will tell you. And once you start exploring articulation and alternate fingerings, you will find that the recorder is as sophisticated as any orchestral instrument. It may not have the range or the dynamics, but boy, is it expressive! And no matter how good you get, there will always be another piece that’s just beyond your technique. Like any other instrument worth playing, the recorder is inexhaustible.
As to the shrill and obnoxious sound people complain of, that’s the soprano you’re talking about, and a badly-played one at that. The soprano has a lot of big brothers, down to the F contrabass. Six feet tall, this monster has bottom notes that sound like the QEII setting sail. Now and then an instrument maker with time on his hands and trees at his disposal will make something bigger. Victor Mahillon, onetime director of the Brussels Museum of Musical Instruments, copied a Renaissance extended great bass in C. This thing is about eight feet long and virtually unplayable, but what serious musician doesn’t love a challenge? A low consort — tenor, bass, great bass and contrabass — has the richness and sonority of an organ, and a lot more flexibility.
Is the recorder useless except for old music? Absolutely not. In Philadelphia jazz clubs, customers would laugh when Joel Levine got up to play his soprano recorder. They stopped laughing after the first few licks. Go on You Tube to hear a recorder quintet play “Purple Haze,” the Jimi Hendrix classic. Go to Europe and hear conservatory-trained musicians play new works for the recorder. Adventurous composers have discovered that there’s more to this instrument than a sweet sound and nimble articulation, and they’re making the most of it.
For most amateurs, though, the recorder means the Handel sonatas and Josquin motets. And that’s fine. Just work on style and technique, and buy some big instruments. Joy awaits you.
The New York Recorder Guild is a member of the American Recorder Society
