You need not know the sharps and flats of music to understand percussionist Dame Evelyn Glennie’s musical talent and genius. Glennie, the first musician in history to maintain a successful, full-time career as a solo percussionist, left a huge impact on the Phillips Academy community. She came to PA as a Kayden Guest Artist and held a lecture and performance last Friday and Saturday. In Thomas Riedelsheimer’s acclaimed documentary on Glennie’s life, he wrote, “What’s remarkable about Evelyn is not just her musicianship. She is a virtuoso who has never heard the audience cheer; never heard the orchestra playing.” The audience saw the full extent of Glennie’s capabilities during her concert Saturday night. Audience members filled the Cochran Chapel, to the extent that some were forced to sit on the floor for her performance. Glennie described this concert as a “minimal performance,” oddly, because she performed on various instruments such as the marimba, snare drum and wooden blocks. Glennie opened her concert with “To the Earth,” by Frederic Rzewski. She struck four flowerpots, each with a different pitch, reciting words that resembled a letter written to the earth. This piece was distinctive, as Glennie chanted witchcraft-like, shamanistic words that left the audience intrigued. The fragile sounds of the flowerpots and Glennie’s assertive vocals added up to create a fascinating piece. Glennie performed many of the following pieces with the marimba. This is a percussion instrument with wooden bars that are similar to a xylophone’s. The audience could sense Glennie’s advanced technicalities and musical prowess as she struck the instruments not with two mallets, but with four. She deftly swung about the instrument, hit different instruments with different tonalities and even stomped the floor to portray the diverse sounds. Emily Steingart ‘09 said, “Her performance was so powerful… It was really cool to watch her move around like that, like she was dancing along to the music she played. And she’s profoundly deaf on top of that.” “I never knew marimba pieces could be so complicated. It was almost like a piano piece in its complexity… You expect percussions to be just banging,” said Andrew Ang ’09. The different instruments resembled sounds similar to falling objects, noises of nature, quiet echoes of a mountain: everything imaginable. The emotionally compelling fortissimos, delicate sounds and echoing of the quieter measures were executed immaculately. The audience seemed to have forgotten Glennie’s hearing impediments. “The performance was much more than expected. She showed tremendous energy, her selection of music was broad… [the performance] gave a global appeal,” said Joseph Smith, father of Marcus Smith ’12. It was apparent that Glennie loved to perform; she ended the night with two encores, which the audience gladly welcomed. The performance ended with the audience’s prolonged standing ovation. Glennie lost her hearing at the age of 12. She devoted much of her Friday lecture explaining her handicap and the effects it has had on her, both positive and negative. Glennie explained that her loss of hearing led to the heightening of her other senses, that she “feels” the texture of sound. There are more ways of experiencing the sounds of music than using just one’s ears, she said. She went on to say that music is “sound creating,” communicating through sound and turning it into emotional content. “Listening isn’t all about what is heard. Music isn’t all about what is played,” said Glennie during her lecture. Glennie said she attempts to “fish out the different sounds of her instruments,” whether it is a snare drum, a marimba, a wooden block or a common flowerpot. After an hour-long question and answer session, Glennie amazed the audience with her eloquence and her phenomenal accomplishments, despite her hearing impairment. “I loved the many different kinds of instruments she used: she was like a master with all of them! She was incredible because of her precise rhythms, whether it be slow or fast. It’s as if no one could tell that she was deaf,” said Mandi Thran ’11.
