Composer-pianist takes center stage for Wichita Symphony Orchestra performance

Michael Brown’s “Concerto for Piano and Strings,” which the composer will play with the Wichita Symphony Orchestra next weekend, was inspired by two masters.

It was written in the home of Aaron Copland, where Brown was staying during a residency program, and by Brown dissecting Beethoven’s concertos.

“It was inspired by what would have been Beethoven’s 250th birth year in 2020, which got all messed up for obvious reasons,” Brown said in a phone interview from his home in New York.

“I was studying Beethoven’s structures and his concertos and the way he put his materials together,” he continued. “My piece doesn’t really sound like Beethoven at all, but it has a similar sense of structure or architecture, in terms of three movements and the way themes appear in a similar form. Also, Beethoven’s connection with the piano as an instrument is a big part of the piano writing – the little Beethoven tricks (like) long, extended trills and a keen sense of rhythmic backbone.”

He has already performed the piece with the Kalamazoo and Maryland symphonies.

“It’s sort of evolved during the extra time of the pandemic, which was great because I had more time for rewriting and editing and playing around with it,” said Brown, who will be featured on the WSO’s Steinway, which will be on stage at Century II for the first time since February 2020.

The concert will begin with selections from Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, a mixed-race, English composer from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and conclude with Brahms’ “Symphony No. 2 in D Major,” a piece that was supposed to be played in March 2020 but canceled a day the day before dress rehearsal.

“It’s sentimental, because the musicians remember it as the last thing they rehearsed before they had to part,” conductor/music director Daniel Hege said this spring.

The 34-year-old Brown, whom the New York Times called “one of the leading figures in the current renaissance of performer-composers,” is featured in a concert the Wichita Symphony is calling “Composer at the Keys.”

He said playing his own music was fun, but also describes the experience as nerve-wracking.

“It’s a little intimidating because I’m wearing a lot of hats,” he said. “I go into rehearsals and I’m like, ‘I’ve got to remember and play my part at a level I’m happy with. I have to know everyone else’s part and have to be on call for whatever questions they may have immediately.’”

Brown said he still considers the piece a work in progress and has taken feedback from the musicians and conductors that he has worked with to make changes.

“Even between the performances I’m still editing the string parts or changing stuff in the piano part. I don’t feel like I’m done-done-done with it,” he said. “I’m also trying to find my way with the piece as well, and people need decisive answers. And often in rehearsals you don’t have a month to workshop it. You have to go in and decide and go on your gut intuition. It’s fun, it’s nervous, and I enjoy the whole process.”

He did get to do one workshop of the piece, in January 2020, and had plans for follow-ups a few months later.

“But that was the time that no one gathered together and getting five people in a room was unthinkable,” he said. “I just had to imagine what that was like.”

Concerts like “Composer at the Keys” are the best way to get his music out at this level in his career, Brown said.

“If I don’t champion it, who’s going to do it?” he asked.

Brown said he composes as it’s believed Beethoven did, with a series of musical sketches that are eventually linked together.

Brown said he considers himself equally a composer and a performer.

“They’re all part of me. I feel like I’m constantly doing both. When I’m stressed and preparing for a concert or a recital I do just that,” he said. “I need both of them. They both shaped the musician that I am.”

WICHITA SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

When: 3 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 7

Where: Century II concert hall, 225 W. Douglas

Tickets: $25-$65, at the Wichita Symphony box office, by phone at 267-7658 or at wichitasymphony.org