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Susan Narucki is a familiar presence in the world’s major concert halls and opera houses, with recent appearances at the San Francisco Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Netherlands Opera, London Sinfonietta, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. Recent performances include the Great Performers series at Lincoln Center in Louis Andreissen’s opera De Materie; revivals of Andriessen’s Writing to Vermeer (Netherlands Opera) and Rêves d’un Marco Polo at the Holland Festival and the Norfolk Festival Nominated in the Best Classical Vocal Performance category for a 2002 Grammy®, her extensive discography reflects the exceptional range of her activities. In addition to her 2001 Grammy® Award-winning disc of George Crumb’s Star-Child with the Warsaw Philharmonic, and her Cannes Award-winning CD for Best Recording of Works by a Living Composer (works of Crumb with Speculum Musicae)—both on Bridge Records—she may be heard on Sony Classical, Philips, Angel, Chandos, Nonesuch, Decca and many other labels.
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Festival: When you are away touring, do you bring anything special with you to remind you of home?
SN: Well, when it works out with our schedules, I bring my husband, David.
Festival: Are there any good-luck rituals that you observe while one the road?
SN: I used to have an obsession about bringing a banana to eat at intermission, but that fell by the wayside. Now what I do is try to remember two things: life is a lot better if you’re relaxed - and something that my first voice teacher, Janet Parlova, used to say to me before every performance: just have fun. I’m finally beginning to understand what she meant.
Festival: When you fly what do you like to read? How do you pass the time?
SN: Actually, I love to write letters to friends while I’m flying. It must be something about looking out the window.
Festival: What are the top five most played songs on your Ipod?
SN: I don’t know if I should admit this, but I don’t have an Ipod, I’m not a technophobe, I just don’t like listening to music through earbuds. I do listen to a lot of music and my tastes are very eclectic: last week ranged from some pieces by Maurizio Kagel to Victoria de los Angeles singing Madama Butterfly to Willie Nelson’s version of Blue Skies (great phrasing).
Festival: What is a favorite non-musical past time?
SN: I love to cook ( a lot of curries these days!), take photographs and just spend time hanging out with my friends and family.
Festival: When you perform, what do try to communicate to the listener?
SN: Each piece of music has a kind of story or journey - whether it’s a traditional narrative, or a certain play on words, an abstract sound scape. I try to bring each piece to life in the most complete way that I can, to invite people to take the journey along with me. I love to sing and feel immensely grateful that I have been able to spend my life doing this; certainly, what I’ve experienced through music has changed me and given me such a rich life. I hope to share that with my audience.
Festival: Is there anything about the way classical music is presented to the world that you would like to see change or evolve?
SN: I think that there are a lot of exciting developments that are coming with younger generations of performers; one thing that’s happening is performances of “classical music” taking place in non-traditional spaces - such as clubs and in outdoor or public spaces. This is really breaking down barriers between audiences and performers. Of course, it’s great to have be able to make music in beautiful concert venues specifically devoted to that, but I think performers are becoming a lot more willing to try different approaches to reach audiences; I do it myself and I’m all for it. I think we need to be pro-active in making the music we love present and visible in the culture, in as many ways as possible.
Festival: Throughout your career, in addition to many other wonderful things, you have hadspecial success singing contemporary music. Could you describe some of thedifficulties and rewards of modern repertoire?
SN: Well, this is a difficult question to answer; I’ve been involved in modern repertoire for so many years that I can’t imagine what my life would be like without it! Let’s see - the difficulty is that, of course, it can take a substantial amount of time to learn new pieces. I can think of many, many more rewards. It’s fantastic to be able to work with composers and to bring a new piece of music to life, to be able to synthesize different elements of a unique musical language in performance. It’s a bit like being an explorer, taking a set of symbols that might not make much sense at first, and discovering that they open up the path to an entirely new world. I know it sounds a bit over the top, but I really feel this way about it. I’ve had the great fortune to work around many, many colleagues - both other musicians and the composers themselves - who feel the same way. These are amazing, dedicated and passionate people, and I’m happy to have spent my career among them.
I think that my work in modern repertoire also helps me with performances of older works- to remind me that music is always a living thing, always breathing, never stuck in time.
Festival: Often we hear people say that they don’t listen to contemporary music because they don’t like it. How would you respond to them?
SN: That’s a tricky question. There are so many different things happening in contemporary music now, that it would be difficult for me to believe that an audience member would object to all of the music out there. But sometimes people do not like it, on principle - and when I’ve had these discussions with audience members, it usually turns out that it’s because people haven’t had too much experience listening to new pieces. That’s a valid point: part of what has happened in our field is that over the past twenty years there has been a general decline in arts education, fewer radio stations playing classical music (and less and less playing modern music), and a general trend to more conservative programming, particularly in times of economic downturn.
But in places where there has been an effort by the artistic leadership of an organization to introduce audiences to new pieces, to give excellent performances and to do it consistently, people do start to find pieces which appeal to them, which resonate with them as meaningful and true. After all, this is music of our time, it reflects our time.
We need to realize that, as musicians, we have a role to play in this process. We can’t expect this situation to change without doing something about it. And if we love this music, we need to take the time to tell our audiences about it: what they might listen for, what they might enjoy, the ideas behind it.
Festival: For that same group of people, what three or for works would you recommend as an introduction to the genre, and why?
SN: I’d recommend listening to John Adams’ opera Nixon in China, George Crumb’s Voices of Ancient Children and Olivier Messiaen’s Quartet for the end of Time. They each have a very distinct musical language. Nixon in China has the amazing vitality of the minimalist musical language. And of course, the story revolves around extremely important historical figures of the 20th century - and that can be a way for people to find an access point to the music. Crumb’s Ancient Voices is such a colorful, exotic and beautifully strange musical landscape. A person can get the emotional sense of these exquisite settings of the Lorca poetry even on first hearing. And the Messaien - well, this is such strong music. Even just reading about the circumstances under which it was written and first performed, and about Messaien’s spirtual life, and then hearing the music - I think it would be impossible not to find it extremely moving.
Festival: In a song recital, the relationship between the vocalist and the pianist is veryspecial. Could you say a few words about how this works?
SN: The vocalist and pianist are really equal partners in song recitals. The pianist is tuned in to everything that the singer does, providing an underpinning for the melodic line, responding to slight variations in tempo and changes of mood, completing the musical picture in so many ways- really providing a beautiful sense of support in this best meaning of the word. I’m very honored to be working with J.J. Penna, who is an absolutely extraordinary accompanist. .
Festival: This year the topic of the Norfolk New Music Workshop is the composition of song with Virgil Thomson as a focal point. As a singer, do you see a tradition of song writing that is specifically American and, if so, what is unique about it?
SN: Well, we have a number of extremely strong traditions of song writing in American music, including jazz standards works from the American Songbook era (songs of Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Rodgers and Hammerstein, etc.), music theater of Sondheim, Kander and Ebb, Bernstein, so many others - and of course, what we call American Art Song, which includes many, many composers, including Virgil Thomson. If there is anything that might bring all these traditions together, it might be the approach to text setting; the ability to set the English language in a way that reflects its particular speech patterns and subtle rhythmic inflections. English is a language that is always morphing, transforming; American English speakers love to play with language. Many American songwriters use this sense of play and fludity to their advantage; the forms can be quite open and contain unexpected and asymmetrical patterns. No matter how expansive and open the melodies and harmonies are, this is a tradition of songwriting that is never stiff.
Festival: Who are some of the important composers in this tradition?
SN: In the American Art Song genre, which is where I spend a lot of my time, there are so many to mention that it would be a shame to mention just a few. But for those people who are looking for an introduction to these types of songs, I’d recommend Charles Ives, Aaron Copland, and Samuel Barber. In the music theater genre, I am very partial to Marc Blitzstein and Kurt Weill. And for those who don’t know Virgil Thomson’s work - well, there are some absolute gems among them; for example some beautiful settings of remarkable American poets - like Kenneth Koch and Marianne Moore. They are humourous, clear and very warm. They really stay in my imagination - to me the sign of a great song.
Festival: If you had one thing to say to young performers and composers, what would it be?
SN: You will never regret giving your time to music.
Festival: And to audiences?
SN: The very same thing.
