Tenor Dann Coakwell made his first appearance at the Victoria Bach Festival in 2006 as a New Young Artist. Dann’s performing career has taken him all over the world, and we’re excited to bring him back to Victoria as the Evangelist in J.S. Bach’s St. Matthew Passion.
We asked Dann a few questions about the role of the Evangelist and returning to Victoria.
VBF: We’ve heard from a number of fans eager to see you back with the Victoria Bach Festival! Tell us about your role in the St. Matthew Passion.
Dann: I am singing the role of the Evangelist, which in this context could just as easily be called the “narrator,” where the disciple (in this case, Matthew) “evangelizes” the story of Christ’s Passion on the cross and death. The Evangelist, as Bach has set him, is much more than a passive narrator, describing each scene. Bach’s musical framing is filled with such complexity and clear connection to what the text describes, it is hard not to argue that the Evangelist is part of the action, as if Matthew himself means for the audience to directly see each event as he witnesses it.
This is my challenge as a musician: how do I communicate this passion (in every sense of the word) in the moment, conveying my own awe, wonder, disgust, disbelief, frustration, sorrow, empathy (as a brother, mother, and as part of the humanity that either sent Christ to the cross or did nothing to stop it), triumph, joy and, ultimately, bittersweet acceptance? How do I then do that sincerely and convincingly without coming across as a melodramatic caricature? Every time I take this role on, my goal is just that.
VBF: You’ve been performing the Evangelist all over the country lately. What are some of your recent and upcoming engagements?
Dann: Yes, indeed! I have to pinch myself every time I think about it, but this 2013-14 season I have performed the Evangelist role (including all three versions of the role: St. Matthew, St. John and Christmas Oratorio) in Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall in New York, Caracas, Venezuela, Spivey Hall in Atlanta, and in other halls around the country, including South Carolina, Idaho and in Texas. In Texas alone, have been blessed to perform it in Dallas, and before our performances this June, I performed the St. John Evangelist with Victoria and Austin’s beloved musical director Craig Hella Johnson in San Marcos this past April with the Texas State University Chorale. This group of performances will be my last with the role until the 2014-15 season, where I am so far slated to appear as Evangelist in Cincinnati (with Craig, the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra and Vocal Arts Ensemble), in Kansas City, in Tuscaloosa, Ala., and again in Dallas.
Before this season, I have performed the role on tour in Italy with Bach scholar and celebrated conductor Masaaki Suzuki, a few other locations around the U.S., and I was also fortunate to get to cover the role (St. Matthew and St. John) for Nicholas Phan at the Oregon Bach Festival under renowned German conductor Helmuth Rilling. After the Victoria Bach Festival, I return to Oregon as a featured soloist in many of the concerts there under both artistic director emeritus Helmuth Rilling and new artistic director Matthew Halls. I then go onto Germany and Belgium in August and September to perform further Bach cantatas with both Helmuth Rilling and Masaaki Suzuki.
VBF: What do you like about the part of the Evangelist?
Dann: Every time I do the role, I learn more and am able to dig deeper and farther into it, hoping to understand even more Bach’s vision. In fact, I am not exaggerating when I say that Bach’s St. Matthew Passion is my “desert island” piece.
VBF: What are you looking forward to at the 2014 Victoria Bach Festival?
Dann: It’s more like what am I not looking forward to! The people are some of the best I come across in the business, not to mention the hospitality (I hope there is a cheese wheel out there somewhere!), the elevated understanding and appreciation of Bach and his contemporaries, and most of all, getting to work with Craig. I have been incredibly blessed to have had the fortune of working with Craig since I was an 18-year-old freshman at the University of Texas at Austin back in 1995.
It doesn’t happen too often in musicians’ lives that someone as important to the world of music as Craig is so directly integral to one’s musical path. I deeply cherish every opportunity to collaborate with him. Victoria is near the heart of the connection that Craig and I have, as I have performed as part of Conspirare in Victoria too many times to count, and my first solo experience there was in 2006, when I was the VBF New Young Artist. I always look forward to coming back to Victoria, and I can’t wait for this concert!
Dann Coakwell performs the Evangelist in J.S. Bach’s St. Matthew Passion on Friday, June 13, at 7:30 p.m. at the Victoria Fine Arts Center, 1002 Sam Houston Drive. For information on performances in Austin on June 14 and 15, go to conspirare.org.
Dann Coakwell, tenor soloist in Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, 2013 Victoria Bach Festival
