Well I’m a day late, but I’m a mom with a 7 year old who has been on virtual school since November 16. Yesterday was the 250th anniversary of Beethoven’s birth. The year 2020 was so unbelievable with the Covid-19 pandemic cancelling many performances, including some of my own. I was fortunate this summer to record the first of my three CD’s of the Beethoven Diabelli Variations Op. 120.

Yet there were many virtual concert celebrations around the world despite the pandemic and I have a feeling we will be hearing some previously scheduled in person concerts after 2020 is over as well. Since it’s very close to the holidays, I want to wish everyone a safe and happy holiday however you celebrate, and here’s looking to the year 2021 with new hope.

I realize that I don’t post enough. I guess the quarantine has been taking up a lot of my energy getting ready to go back to teaching here at Albion College and trying to figure out what to do with my son’s school. I don’t envy any parent or family trying to make these decisions. But I was reflecting the other day about this project since I have been able to distribute some of my CD recording of the Beethoven Op. 120 recently.

I owe a great deal of gratitude to my late Professor, Edmund Battersby (1949-2016). I miss him so much. It is entirely because of him that I ever connected with Anton Diabelli, Beethoven’s Op. 120, and now my own variations project. Professor Battersby made two landmark recordings on Naxos of Beethoven’s Op. 120–one on a modern instrument, and one on a historical fortepiano. Please check them out. His performances are insightful and inspiring on all levels. I was a doctoral student at the time, and he gave me the greatest possible gift: he asked me to write the liner notes for the recordings. What seemed like a huge mountain of work at the time to a doctoral student with a teaching assistantship and her own practicing and class work to contend with, turned out to be the basis of my dissertation in 2006.

I could not have known at the time what a truly gracious and humbling request this was from my friend and former teacher. I could not have known over fifteen years later, where that endeavor would bring me–how it has made me try to connect with the larger musical world. It was just a simple request from him, and yet it has had profound meaning for me. I wish he were still alive so I could talk to him and reflect with him about this project. While I miss him dearly, I need to pay homage to him and the great gift he bestowed upon me for my musical career. Thank you Edmund! You are loved and missed dearly by so many!

With some of my out of state/country performances were canceled due to Covid-19, I was able to repurpose some grant money in order to get started on my three cd recording project. So, on May 18-20, I descended, mask and all, upon Albion College’s Goodrich Chapel. I managed to record the entire Beethoven Diabelli Variations, Op. 120! It is completely edited and ready to go. I’m so happy. I feel like my journey has really come alive with this project.

Managing this project is a big deal–I have the website to work on, practicing of course, trying to get the website out to non-commissioned composers, and trying to have a blog post every now and again. My sabbatical semester in Spring 2021 will allow me the time to record the other two CD’s throughout the semester and I’m thrilled that I have one CD finished at this point.

I need to thank my recording engineer, Kurt Juday, and my CD cover designer, Jim Stuart (who is also my awesome web designer). Additionally, I want to thank Jim Reeder of James Reeder Pianos, Inc., of Lansing Michigan for taking care of Albion College’s Steinway D so beautifully. My husband listened faithfully to every track and I am very thankful. Well, until my next post!!!

Well who would have known after my website launch party was canceled on March 16, 2020, that life as we basically know it has halted. Fortunately, my family and I are safe and healthy and staying home! I have, like many musicians, been given a gift of some more focused practice time (or at least that should be the case). In reality, I have been forcing myself to practice, but with difficulty. I find myself unfocused, unmotivated, and probably depressed.

But I try to press onward, as I am still planning on recording Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations, Op. 120 this summer as part of my project. I have secured two new variation commissions from South America and Asia and I am quite excited to learn this new music. And finally, I am finding new joy in practicing all of the new music. So here is to finding joy and peace in these difficult times. I hope to have some recordings posted later this summer after our campus (hopefully) opens up so I have access to our recital hall to record. I wish anyone reading this health, rest, and purposefulness in this difficult time. Perhaps this quarantine enlivens my concept of the Diabelli Squared project even more, as its main focus is to bring the humanity of music together.

Today was supposed to be a great day. After three years of imagining my Diabelli Squared website, this evening was supposed to be the official Albion College live event where the website was put out into the world. My many thanks to Jim Stuart of Albion College and owner of Stirling Books and Brew in Albion, MI, for all of his time and incredibly creative ideas. I couldn’t have this even happening without him. He brought my imagination to reality.

But, the coronavirus situation has made that event not possible. For now. While this is a small disappointment compared to the larger global issues, this website’s entire purpose is to bring people together through music. So from that standpoint, I think everything will turn out just fine. My upcoming concerts where I was going to officially premiere several of my new commissioned variations have been cancelled as well, but I have great hope that I will get to perform them very soon in public. Thank you everyone!

Today marks a truly pivotal time for me with this endeavor.  This is the first blog post I get to write for my website about my Albion College Diabelli Squared initiative. 

Thank you for visiting this site!  I hope after reading this, you will strongly consider submitting a variation to this project.  Hopefully you have read the history and genesis of my ideas, so now I’d like to talk to you about why I think this is so crucial in our world today. 

For me, the very essence of a variation symbolizes in microcosm the struggles of our social world.  It makes me sad to see people discriminating against other human beings, and it’s happening constantly.  Variations in a small way, heal these wounds.  Their nature is to embrace all that is constant and common between itself and its variation.  Translation for society?  We are all human.  We are all deserving of dignity and respect.  Then, a variation transcends these commonalities and completely embraces and empowers diversity of all kinds.  Translation for society?  We must love and respect each other for our uniqueness and our wonderfully diverse ideas.  It makes us grow. 

Variations accomplish this so magically.  By submitting a variation for this project, your art will become part of a living, organic piece of music.  My website will never end.  There will always be more submissions, giving me, the performer, the chance to present a new “version” of the Diabelli theme all the time.  Furthermore, I have had the chance to commission nine (to this point) variations from persons around the globe. 

I don’t have endless funds, and while I cannot compensate you for your submission, I will play your music.  I will champion you as a composer, where you’re from, and I will give you space on this site to promote yourself beyond the variation you submit.  Please be part of my Diabelli world.  I hope to spread kindness, compassion, art, music, and hopefully, joy, enrichment, and understanding, throughout our planet through this virtual project. 

All I ask of you is that you agree to let me perform and record your work once it is submitted.  In return, you will be part of a large conglomerate of artists, all striving to give a new and different voice to a two hundred year old theme.  Please embrace this history and its future.  I believe, in a small way, that this can change our world for the good. 

I am honored you have chosen to consider this important work.  I am grateful if you submit.  If you do not have time, please consider sharing my website with your colleagues and your students.  I will play every work submitted as long as I can read the score.  I will love trying to get to know you over time.  And I value you as a musician.  Please submit your variation to me by email (ljensen@albion.edu), and if you have any questions about this endeavor, do not hesitate to contact me. 

Warmly,

Lia Jensen-Abbott

Well we had a good first meeting on the initial release of the website today, with Lia and Jim (there’s something about those three-letter names).

We’ve got consensus on the overall structure and made some initial corrections to the content. And we’ll continue with content development through the end of 2019, with Jim working on initial population of the Anton Diabelli project page and the Albion College Diabelli Squared commissioned pieces, while Lia works on the verbiage for voluntary submissions and the first Director’s blog. We’ll meet again after the new year.

Progress!