Poetry set to music

This week's Upper Galilee Voice of Music Festival in Kfar Blum offers patrons plenty to choose from, including a special adaptation of Banchieri's madrigal comedy 'La Pazzia Senile'

Patrons of the Upper Galilee Voice of Music Festival will, as usual, need to plan their days very carefully. The cornucopia of events is, indeed, confusing; but the glut of choices, and the possibility you might miss something worthwhile, of course contributes to the experience.

The festival, held in Kfar Blum, offers three main options: morning lessons and competitions for string instruments (in cooperation with the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance, which is taking part in the festival for the first time ); rehearsals for festival concerts (highly recommended ); and the concert events.

Starting yesterday through August 2, patrons can enjoy an array of events. Among other highlights, the festival will sponsor discussions and performances of Beethoven's compositions, particularly the "Kreutzer Sonata" (with a Hebrew lecture given by Michael Wolpe ); an intriguing performance celebrating Israeli women composers, featuring the singer Rona Israel-Kolat; and an event showcasing works by Moshe Zorman, alongside Adriano Banchieri's Renaissance comedy "La Pazzia Senile."

Other events worth mentioning include cello solos and Bach's "Italian Concerto," as well as Schumann's wonderful "Liederkreis" with Jonathan Zak on piano and vocals by Rona Israel-Kolat.

"La Pazzia Senile" features two female singers, Anat Edri and Yeela Avital, and one male voice, Hemi Levison, along with musical accompaniment. Theatrical aspects of the performance are arranged by Julia Pevzner, an internationally known Israeli director. Festival director Michael Melzer, who is the musical director of this specific production, defines the "madrigal comedy" genre of the work as an upgraded version of commedia dell'arte - in which improvisational theater and street performers act according to prepared script and a high quality, specially composed score.

This 16th-century work features dozens of short songs, whose heroes are familiar figures from commedia dell'arte, and one actor presents the plot. Not a full-blown play, the work features three voices singing the part of each figure in the drama. Describing this work, Melzer refers to a preface written by Alessandro Striggio, another composer of madrigal comedies from the same era. Putting his words in the mouth of a narrator, Striggio states: "Our spectacle is designed to take place solely in your imagination; you should use not your eyes, but your ears. Instead of watching, listen. And keep quiet!"

Banchieri's comedy will be presented in Hebrew. In addition to the stage direction by Melzer (itself an innovation, as the work was originally aimed purely at the audience's imagination ), the performance will also include works by renowned composer Claudio Monteverdio.

The one concert at the Voice of Music Festival devoted to contemporary music will feature five premier works written by five Israeli women composers: Hagar Kadima, Hadas Goldschmidt-Halfon, Tsippi Fleischer, Alona Epshtein and Tali Assa. As is her wont, Fleischer draws inspiration from Arab influences, this time from Egyptian poet Iman Mersal who currently lives in Canada (Fleischer explains that Mersal has faced sharp criticism in the Arab world for allowing her poems to be translated into Hebrew ).

The same event will also highlight two works related to the cruelty of war by Epshtein, who says she chose them to mark the 20th anniversary of the civil war she witnessed in the city of her birth, Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan. Kadima's composition is an adaptation of Shin Shifra's poem "Homeless on Ibn Gvirol Street," which begins: "A homeless woman wanders on Ibn Gvirol, with all her belongings..."

Another impressive concert will showcase the poems of William Wordsworth and Alfred, Lord Tennyson, as well as texts by A.A. Milne. Among other poems, the concert by Israeli composer Moshe Zorman will highlight Wordsworth's "We are Seven," which presents a "simple child" and wonders "what should it know of death?" The common thread linking the poems together is their focus on the "other," figures in the social landscape who received belated attention - women, anti-heroes, small children.