A personal account by Rebecca Moranis.
In mid-August, a group of nine Equilibrium Young Artists – three vocalists and six instrumentalists, including myself on flute – performed a gala concert at the Lunenburg Academy of Musical Performance (LAMP) to an enthusiastic full house. This event was the culmination of a special week of music and artistry, brilliantly coached by our fearless leader, Barbara Hannigan. LAMP’s Founder and former Artistic Director, Burt Wathen, also contributed to the week by coaching Il Tramonto by Respighi. Our EQ-LAMP group rehearsed in various chamber music configurations, had daily sessions with Performance Coach Jackie Reardon in mental training techniques to sharpen our performance skills, and were coached in Qi Gong and Tai Chi by Patrick (Pat) Stanley. By training our minds and bodies with Jackie and Pat, we were able to reach a deeper level of connection across our team that benefited our chamber music immensely.
The music we worked on during the week was diverse in style and era. Written from 1898 to 2023, the works spanned the 20th century and then some. We performed chamber works by Barber, Chausson, Harvey, Khayam, Respighi, Saariaho, and Vivier. The newest work was by Persian composer Golfam Khayam, entitled Je ne suis pas une fable à conter with text by Ahmad Shamlou, written for Barbara Hannigan for voice and orchestra in 2023 and arranged by Levi Hammer for our chamber ensemble. One of the most memorable moments of the week was the rehearsal in which we met Golfam on a virtual call from her home in Iran. Golfam was set up on a big TV screen in front of us, and we exchanged introductions before performing a run-through of the piece for her. Afterwards, we rehearsed the piece, making small edits to the arrangement to bring out certain orchestral colours and hone specific moments and transitions. The energy of the rehearsal was powerful; being able to work with a composer on their music is always thrilling, and Golfam’s enthusiasm for this collaboration was clear through the screen. The mutual respect and admiration between Barbara, Golfam, and all of us EQ artists was overwhelming; our emotions were right on the surface as we worked on the piece. I was not alone in believing that we were creating something important through our interpretation of Golfam’s impactful, sombre work.
The most challenging piece that I worked on was Claude Vivier’s Paramirabo, a fifteen-minute work for flute, violin (Maitreyi Muralidharan), cello (Jonathan “JD” Dormand), and piano (Tong Wang) with challenging rhythms that were made even more difficult because of their exact unisons across multiple parts. Though we were filled with fear at first over how we would perform this piece within a week, Barbara expertly coached us in her focussed, imagery-filled way, teaching us about Vivier’s life, childhood, and his relationship with his mentor, Stockhausen. Barbara shared how a “sectional” approach, where each section of the piece has a distinct, marked quality (especially those invoking childlike emotions), would make for a compelling interpretation. We worked diligently all week, and in moments where our energy began to wane, Barbara regaled us with stories about Vivier and Stockhausen, making us laugh or exclaim and giving us a renewed drive to continue. We knew we had brought the audience of Lunenburg into our world successfully because the final “ha” of the piece brought many exclamations from the audience and an animated applause.
I have been lucky enough to work with Barbara, Jackie, and Pat at LAMP in 2021 and 2022, so I consider myself experienced in Jackie’s “Friendly Eyes” method. However, she is always updating her exercises, so there were several times where I experienced “aha” moments about familiar concepts presented in new ways. For example, we were given a basketball activity designed to create a stressful, competitive environment where we were tasked to remain centred, focused, and aware. We played this game with light beach balls on a day of extreme wind, and many laughs were had at the comedy of us missing nearly every shot, but equipped with kindness to ourselves and others, as well as a good dose of controlled breaths, we were able to triumph.
In our Qi Gong and Tai Chi lessons with Pat, we spent much time engaging in a partner exercise known as “push hands,” in which two people shift weight and energy toward and away from each other through a connection at the hands and wrists. The nuances of weight transfer, position, resistance, timing, awareness, and clarity that this exercise required made it enriching and challenging. We would spend up to half an hour pushing hands in some lessons, usually in silence. It was a ritual for us, and in a week of performing demanding music with a group of musicians that I had never worked with before, “push hands” connected us in a way that improved our music-making.
During the concert, I performed in three works on the second half (Khayam’s piece and Vivier’s Paramirabo, along with Vivier’s Pièce pour flûte et piano), so I had the chance to listen to the first half of the concert from the audience. I was impacted by every performance – Ellita’s impassioned, brilliant Il Tramonto, Bruno’s exquisite and solemn Dover Beach (Barber), Barbara and Tong’s stunningly emotional Hymnen an die Nacht (Vivier), and Barbara, Jon, Maitreyi, Matthias, JD, and Tong’s extremely sensuous, fervent interpretation of Chanson perpétuelle (Chausson). I experienced tremendous admiration while listening to these performances and felt lucky that after the intermission I would get to join these artists on the stage.
I am immensely grateful for this week of music with Barbara Hannigan, the EQ artists, and the entire LAMP team who worked tirelessly to make sure everything ran smoothly. (The delicious lunches from local Lunenburg eateries were a highlight – thank you LAMP!) I feel renewed for the upcoming season, and excited about the future artistic collaborations that Barbara, Bruno, Ellita, JD, Jon, Maitreyi, Matthias, Tong, and I will explore together.
