San Diego Spotlight : Commission Brings Rosner Back to His Jewish Roots

It’s not unusual for a composer to dig into his own ethnic heritage. Jean Sibelius peopled his tone poems with the heroes of Finnish mythology, and Dvorak ennobled Czech peasant dances in his chamber music.

Arnold Rosner, a 46-year-old composer from Brooklyn, has approached his own Jewish heritage somewhat belatedly. Among his 90 earlier compositions are three Latin Masses as well as a Magnificat recorded in 1987 at St. Paul’s Cathedral in San Diego and released as a compact disc on the Laurel label.

“I’ve bent over backward to be pantheistic or pan-cultural, although some of my Jewish friends might say assimilationist,” Rosner explained in an interview Tuesday. “I’ve even made some references to Buddhism in my work.”

But three commissions from San Diego’s Jewish Community Center Orchestra have brought him closer to his Jewish roots. “Gematria,” the first of Rosner’s three JCC Orchestra commissions, will be premiered this weekend by the orchestra under the baton of music director David Amos. Rosner, a member of Brooklyn’s Kingsborough College music faculty, arrived in San Diego earlier this week. As part of his residency, he attended orchestra rehearsals of “Gematria,” and local musicians presented a program of his chamber music Wednesday night at the Jewish Community Center.

“At times I’ve tried to avoid my own heritage,” Rosner said. “But I think I’m in a position to compensate for that now, partly due to David’s quiet influence. He has never pushed me in that direction, but he is a person of very definite Jewish character. I decided that, since the commissions are from a Jewish Community Center orchestra, that I would write pieces that were connected to Jewish things.”

Rosner noted that the term “gematria” (pronounced geh-MAH-tree-uh) refers to a type of cabalistic scriptural interpretation that assigns numerical values to letters of the Hebrew alphabet.

“In a single word, gematria is numerology. The theory is, you can have a text with a clear verbal meaning, but some other shade of meaning or implication may be encoded in the numbers.”

A 13-minute piece for full orchestra, “Gematria” employs cross rhythms played simultaneously by different sections of the orchestra. According to Rosner, this structure parallels in musical terms the dual interpretations of Hebrew Scripture discerned by the use of gematria.

“I intended the piece to be seriously religious, yet playful and fantastic at the same time. I think that’s what gematria is like as an actual concept in religion. On the other hand, ‘Gematria’ would not strike anyone as Jewish music without their knowing the title.”

Rosner’s other compositions for the JCC Orchestra will have more obvious Jewish themes, however.

“I have already finished next year’s commission, ‘A Sephardic Rhapsody,’ which will have intervalic and modal aspects that sound Jewish. And the project I think I’m going to write for the third year is a setting of a page out of Kafka’s ‘The Trial,’ probably for baritone and orchestra. Kafka was Jewish, and there is a lot about his literary and psychodramatic attitude that ties in with his Jewishness.”

Under music director David Amos, the Jewish Community Center Orchestra plays Rosner’s “Gematria,” Bizet’s “Carmen” Suite no. 2, and Brahms Second Piano Concerto with soloist Ingrid Jacoby” on Sunday at 3 p.m. at Theatre East, 210 E. Main St., El Cajon.

Soprano power. When soprano Pamela Arnold sang in Europe, she performed the title role of Richard Strauss’ “Salome” so frequently that she owned her own Salome costume and had her own choreography for the notorious “dance of the seven veils.” But, after a seven-year stint singing dramatic soprano roles in German-speaking opera houses, Arnold returned to San Diego in 1989. Commuting between Germany and San Diego had worked for the San Diego soprano’s career, but not for her marriage to Coronado businessman Robert Arnold.

Although she quickly discovered there was not a great call here for her strong dramatic voice, she finds the title role of Gilbert and Sullivan’s “Princess Ida,” which she will sing for San Diego Comic Opera June 19-28, to be right up her alley.

“This Gilbert and Sullivan role is actually very operatic,” Arnold said. “The character of Princess Ida is a parody of (Richard Wagner’s) Brunnhilde, so it requires a large, dramatic Brunnhilde-like voice.”

When Gilbert and Sullivan wrote “Princess Ida” in 1884, Wagner’s “Ring” cycle was all the rage. London audiences heard their first complete “Ring” in 1882, and the opportunity for timely satire was not lost on the clever duo. It was also a time when British women were protesting to obtain suffrage, so Gilbert and Sullivan targeted the strong-willed women of their age with a plot that has a colony of women withdrawing all contact from the opposite sex. But Arnold is not willing to call it a feminist work.

“It’s a joke on the pretensions of both women and men,” she said. “The plot does show strong women, but it also makes fun of them.”

“Princess Ida” is not the most popular of Sullivan’s 20 operettas, but its overall musical sophistication makes it a connoisseur’s choice. Arnold listed some of the musical allusions in the score.

“One of my arias is straight out of Verdi’s ‘Attila,’ and, since I’ve sung that opera, whenever that theme comes in ‘Princess Ida’ I’m tempted to go into Odabella’s aria. Sullivan also quotes Handel, but I don’t know if our audience will pick up all these operatic allusions.”

Composer kudos. James Whitsitt was honored by the Illinois State University at Bloomington-Normal last month with its “Fine Arts Festival Music Award” for his Piano Quartet composed in 1983. Recently retired from the Mesa College music faculty, Whitsitt continues to compose in his San Diego studio. The first-prize award in this national competition included $1,000 cash plus a trip this fall to Bloomington-Normal to attend the performance of the composer’s Piano Quartet by members of the ISU faculty. Another Whitsitt opus, “Siclienne,” was commissioned by the Allegro Quartet, a local ensemble which will premiere the work this fall.

CRITIC’S CHOICE

PREMIERE FOR A MASS

William Lullo’s Requiem Mass will be given its premiere at Our Mother of Confidence Catholic Church, University City, Friday at 7:30. Conducted by the composer, the Requiem will be sung by members of the San Diego Master Chorale and local church choirs. Proceeds from the concert will benefit the AIDS Foundation of San Diego.