Ravinia 2022, Issue 3

JIYANG CHEN (MONTGOMERY) JESSIE MONTGOMERY (b.1981) Because, A Symphony of Serendipity Scored for two flutes and piccolo, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, two tenor and one bass trombones, timpani, vintage typewriter, triangle or glockenspiel, snare drum, various implements to mimic the sounds of workers (sweeping broom, screwing in light bulb, hammering, etc.), piano (doubles on toy piano), strings, and three actors Author, illustrator, and voice actor Mo Wil- lems (b. 1968) was born Maurice Charles Wil- lems in Des Plaines, IL, the son of Dutch im- migrants. Willems’s interest in cartooning emerged during his youth in New Orleans as a form of personal preservation: “In second grade, the class bully would not tease me or bully me if I had a gag,” he explained in an interview with CBS News. “So, I had a daily strip in second grade. Just come up with a lit- tle gag, and I’d show it to him. And if he laughed, then I was off the hook for the day.” Willems developed grand ambitions for him- self as boy, even nominated himself to become Dr. Seuss’s successor—to Dr. Seuss himself! After high school graduation, he performed standup comedy in London before entering New York University, where he earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree cum laude from the Tisch School of Art. Willems backpacked around the world for one year following his undergraduate studies, sketching one cartoon each day, a collection published as You Can Never Find a Rickshaw When It Monsoons . From 1994 until 2002, Willems worked as a writer and animator for Sesame Street , win- ning six Daytime Emmy Awards and devel- oping memorable animated characters such as Zoe’s hero, Suzie Kabloozie (portrayed by Ruth Buzzi, who also voiced Suzie’s cat Feff). Willems next created the comic animated se- ries Sheep in the Big City (2000–2) for Amber Ren and Mo Willems Cartoon Network before deciding to write and illustrate children’s books. His debut pic- ture book, Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! , won a 2004 Caldecott Honor Award. Willems has received the award twice since, for Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale (2005) and Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity (2008). His 50 children’s books also have re- ceived two Theodor Seuss Geisel Medals ( There Is a Bird on Your Head , 2008; Are You Ready to Play Outside , 2009), five Theodor Seuss Geisel Honor Medals, four Notable Children’s Recordings from the Association for Library Services to Children, and the 2020 Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Produc- tion—Theatre for Young Audiences for Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! (The Musical!) . On February 22, 2019, Willems was named the inaugural Kennedy Center Education Artist-in-Residence, a position he held through October 9, 2021. Hyperion Books for Children released the picture book Because in March 2019. Wil- lems partnered with illustrator Amber Ren in her picture-book debut. Ren grew up in China before moving to the United States and studying at the California Institute of the Arts, where she graduated in 2015. North Carolina–based composer Hilary Purr- ington—who has received degrees from the Shepherd School of Music at Rice Universi- ty, The Juilliard School, and Yale Universi- ty—composed a 49-measure work entitled The Cold , printed inside the back cover as a counterpoint to a two-page excerpt from Franz Schubert’s Symphony No. 8 in B minor, D. 759 (“Unfinished”), which appears inside the front cover. Willems explained the prem- ise behind Because : “I wanted to tell the story of how, when people agree that something is important enough to work on together, they can inspire and change lives. I wanted to tell the story through the life of one girl.” Jessie Montgomery Because opens with the admiration that a musician named Franz (Schubert) felt for an- other musician named Ludwig (van Beetho- ven). That admiration led Franz to compose a symphony, which, many years later, a group of dedicated instrumentalists, librarians, staff, and conductor prepare for a performance in a grand concert hall. A little girl receives a free concert ticket from her aunt when her uncle comes down with a cold. The grandeur, the performance, and Franz’s symphony inspire and transform the little girl. She dedicates herself to music, learning how to play instru- ments and to compose, until one day she takes the podium in the same grand concert hall to conduct her own symphonic composition— dedicated to her uncle—entitled The Cold . The John F. Kennedy Center for the Perform- ing Arts and the National Symphony Orches- tra commissioned a full-scale symphonic in- terpretation of Because with a script by Mo Willems and music by composer Jessie Mont- gomery, who currently serves as Mead Com- poser-in-Residence with the Chicago Sym- phony Orchestra and professor of violin and composition at The New School in New York City. Another violinist-composer, Jannina Norpoth, arranged the music. The National Symphony Orchestra, conductor Jeri Lynne Johnson, and a trio of narrators gave the world premiere on March 20, 2022. Actress Felicia Curry, who starred as The Bus Driver in Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! (The Musical! ,) directed the production. Coinciding with performances of Because at The Kennedy Center, Mo Willems exhibited a series of large paintings inspired by the nine symphonies of Ludwig van Beethoven in the Hall of Nations. Willems described his interpretation of Symphony No. 2 in D major, op. 36: “The sections of a sym- phony are called ‘movements’ because the music should ‘move’ you. Similarly, I want the images in each symphony to look as if they are alive and in transit. As Beethoven loosens up in his second symphony, so does this painting, with the funda- mental circles (or notes?) being guided throughout the work in and on waves of colored ink. It is the circles’ journeys that connect all nine paintings.” Mo Willems’s Beethoven Study LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN (1770–1827) Symphony No. 2 in D major, op. 36 Scored for pairs of flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns, and trumpets, timpani, and strings The years 1801 and 1802 brought an intense personal turmoil to the life of Beethoven, tempering the success he was beginning to achieve as a composer. Beethoven lavished his affections on the Countess Giulietta Guic- ciardi, a young piano student. “I am now leading a slightly more pleasant life, for I am mixing more with my fellow creatures. … This change has been brought about by a dear, charming girl who loves me and whom I love. After two years, I am again enjoying a few blissful moments, and for the first time I feel that marriage might bring me happiness. Un- fortunately she is not of my class, and at the moment I certainly could not marry—I must still bustle about a good deal.” Giulietta did not share Beethoven’s depth of feeling, and his hopes of marriage were never realized. The Countess wed Count Wenzel Robert Gal- lenberg, a composer of ballet music, in 1803. More devastating was Beethoven’s increas- ing hearing loss. The first signs of his deaf- ness were detected as early as 1796. Despite treatment by the finest physicians in Vienna, the condition could not be reversed. The permanence of this affliction deeply affected Beethoven, and he began to withdraw from society. On the advice of Dr. Johann Adam Schmidt, professor of general pathology and therapy at the Josephine Academy, the de- spondent composer retreated to the tiny vil- lage of Heiligenstadt in 1802. In those peace- ful surroundings, Beethoven began to record his innermost thoughts in the document today known as the Heiligenstadt Testament: Ludwig van Beethoven by Christian Horneman (1802) RAVINIA MAGAZINE • JULY 18 – JULY 31, 2022 52 JIYANG CHEN (MONTGOMERY)