Monday, December 31, 2007

Cuisine du Depression: Mock-Apple Pie

Back in 1975, Russell Baker wrote a now-legendary column in which he wryly commented on a multi-course banquet consumed by Craig Claiborne, then the Times's chief food writer, by disclosing his self-prepared gourmet meal, which featured such highlights as pate de fruites de nuts of Georgia, in which "A half-inch layer of creamy style peanut butter is trowled onto a graham cracker, then half a banana is crudely diced and pressed firmly into the peanut butter and cemented in place as it were by a second graham cracker."

Among the several main courses, "I prepared beans with bacon grease, a dish I perfected in 1937 while developing my cuisine du depression."

So it is in the spirit of cuisine du depression that I made a dessert that, as an avid reader of the backs of Ritz cracker boxes, I had long been curious about: Mock-Apple Pie.

There are indeed no apples of any kind in Mock-Apple Pie: the filling is a mixture of crushed Ritz crackers and sugar syrup. The recipe is straightforward and not particularly challenging.

As will be seen from the picture, the finished product does indeed come out looking very much like applie pie, with a filling that is the same consistency and color of the original. (The flaky crust is the Pet-Ritz frozen variety.)

It has a satisfying taste, over all, although I did not think it tasted particularly like apple pie. The lemon zest and juice that is added tends to become the dominant note, and I wonder if sneaking in a little apple juice wouldn't be more to the point. Still, it was enthusiastically received chez moi.

Saturday, December 29, 2007

Catching up with "Hansel"

Just listened to the Met's broadcast of their new Hansel. I wonder if the children in the audience realized just how well sung this performance was. Alan Held (best Wozzeck I ever heard) was luxury casting as the father, and it was nice to hear the veteran Rosalind Plowright as the mother. Christine Schafer's and Alice Coote's voices blended ravishingly for their prayer. Lisette Oropesa, her sweet voice soaring, nearly stole the show as the Dew Fairy. And while I'm still not convinced that a tenor should sing the Witch, Philip Langridge did not camp it up; he sounded, as he should, ferocious and scary.

Vladimir Jurowski certainly showed why there's so much excitement swirling around him right now. The orchestra sounded lush, and their playing was excellent. Not everyone likes transparency in this kind of music, but I thought the clarity Jurowski brought to the score kept it from getting too schmaltzy--nonetheless, his reading was appropriately mellow and well proportioned. He found nice details in the score, accompanied his singers well, and gave the climactic moments the exact right touch. Most important of all, I had goose bumps continually throughout the afternoon.

Jurowski will lead the Russian National Orchestra in music of Shubert and Brahms at Avery Fisher Hall in February ... I am sure I will try to find a ticket.

Peggy Glanville-Hicks

Today is the birthday of the Australian composer Peggy Glanville-Hicks, who died in 1990. She would have been 95 today. (The Australian Music Centre has informative space about her on their web site.)

Her music seems to have become largely forgotten, which is a pity. I've heard some of it--her opera The Transposed Heads (for which no less than Thomas Mann furnished the libretto) and a piece for tenor and chamber orchestra called Letters from Morocco (the letters are by Paul Bowles, her friend).

Letters from Morocco is one of my favorite pieces. I can think of no composition that sets English words more naturally or musically, following the inflection of the language and deriving its rhythms from the words, rather than trying to impose a musical structure upon them.

Her music on CD is hard to find. Letters from Morocco I own on an old LP from MGM's series of 20th century compositions, with MGM's orchestra conducted by Carlos Surinach; The Transposed Heads I borrowed from the Princeton Music Library twenty-some-odd years ago, a Louisville Sympony recording if I remember correctly. (You can sample her music by going to UbuWeb's collection of short films by Shirley Clarke--she wrote the score for the Unicef-funded "A Scary Time.")

Musicians, orchestras, opera companies: Please consider performing the music of this wonderful and unfairly neglected composer!

Friday, December 28, 2007

More on the Turkish March

David B. Levy, a music professor at Wake Forest, has another take on the "Turkish March," one that is based on a close reading of the words. His letter to the Times is worth reading, but here's the key part:

"In my book Beethoven: The Ninth Symphony, I argue that the so-called 'Turkish march' is the first step toward a rapprochement between West and East, the culmination of which is achieved in the finale’s second double fugue.

"A close reading of Schiller’s words reveals that the 'Turkish march' is a paraphrase of the portion of Psalm 19 that refers to a metaphorical wedding procession. The bride and groom are the Occident and the Orient. "

Here's the relevant passage from the King James version of Psalm 19 (courtesy of Bartleby):

In them hath he set a tabernacle for the sun,
which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,
and rejoiceth as a strong man to run a race.


The imagery suggests that the sun, representing the east (since that is where it rises), is akin to a bridegroom, or a champion about to run his course (in this case, its course through the heavens).

Levy's gloss certainly fits in with the spirit of Schiller's poem and Beethoven's music, to encompass polarities, break the bonds of custom, and proclaim a true brotherhood of man.

Thursday, December 27, 2007

"Forgotten" Opera

In order to show that the phenomenon of "repressed memory" (or dissociative amnesia) is a figment of the modern imagination, as it were, a researcher at McLean Hospital offered a prize "to the first person to identify a case of dissociative amnesia in any work of fiction or nonfiction prior to 1800." The winner? A French opera from 1786, Nina, by Nicholas Dalayrac. This from a report in Harvard magazine. (via Arts & Letters Daily)

Wednesday, December 26, 2007

A Peek at Chausson


The other day, I was at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's recently unveiled 19th- and early 20th-century European painting galleries and came across this impressive and large canvas by Henry Lerolle, "The Organ Recital." Lerolle was Chausson's brother-in-law; his wife was the sister of Chausson's wife. In the painting, from the mid-1880s, Chausson's wife is the singer; Chausson himself is seated at the organ. It's hard to see, but the young man standing in profile at the extreme left is Debussy. It's worth a visit to the Met (museum) to see the actual painting.

Carmen Rides the IND

Jennifer Diamond is a young mezzo who is one of the members of the Resident Artists Program of the Opera Company of Brooklyn, the group for which I do development. She's just posted on YouTube a fun video in which she sings the "Habanera" from Carmen while riding New York's subways.

Monday, December 24, 2007

The Turkish March

A piece in today's Times Op-Ed page points out how Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" has been co-opted by governments and other organizations--including some tyrants--for their own purposes, making Beethoven's masterpiece into an "empty signifier." And there's this:

"In the middle of the movement, after we hear the main melody (the 'joy' theme) in three orchestral and three vocal variations, something unexpected happens that has bothered critics for the last 180 years: at Bar 331, the tone changes totally, and, instead of the solemn hymnic progression, the same 'joy' theme is repeated in the 'marcia turca' (or Turkish march) style, a conceit borrowed from military music for wind and percussion instruments that 18th-century European armies adopted from the Turkish janissaries.

"The mode then becomes one of a carnivalesque parade, a mocking spectacle — critics have even compared the sounds of the bassoons and bass drum that accompany the beginning of the marcia turca to flatulence. After this point, such critics feel, everything goes wrong, the simple solemn dignity of the first part of the movement is never recovered. "

I'm not sure which critics are being discussed here. There is no doubt that the Turkish March section stands in sharp contrast to what has come before. It lightens the air somewhat, and provides an almost satirical commentary on the whole piece. It may also attest to Beethoven's devilish sense of humor, which is present in many of his works, although not everyone chooses to hear it. The Turkish March quickly turns into a fiendish fugato, so this moment of misrule is brief.

Still, I'm not sure if it's wise to invest too much into the Turkish March section. It's good to keep in mind the words that it's set to:

Froh, wie seine Sonnen fliegen
Durch des Himmels prächt'gen Plan,
Laufet, Brüder, eure Bahn,
Freudig, wie ein Held zum Siegen.

And the translation: "Joyously, as his suns speed/Through Heaven's glorious order,/Hasten, Brothers, on your way,/Exulting as a knight in victory." (Courtesy of Classical Music Pages.)

The Turkish March gives the sense of a small military band saluting the "knight [or hero] in victory." It's somewhat literal; I'm sure Beethoven heard bands of this style throughout his young life. It reminds me somewhat of the Salvation Army band that stalks the young lovers in Elgar's Cockaigne Overture--the semi-comical, seemingly inappropriate intrusion that introduces a crucial musical counterweight.

Let's never forget what Mahler said: "A symphony must be like the world. It must encompass everything." True for Beethoven's Ninth, too.

Saturday, December 22, 2007

Who Is Francesco Tristano Schlimé?

He's the 27-year-old piano virtuoso from Europe whose most recent recital, in Luxembourg, of the first book of Debussy's Preludes was compared favorably to that of Radu Lupu (who is bringing his reading to Carnegie Hall next month) by the reviewer at ResMusica. Schlimé has made several recordings, including the complete piano works of Luciano Berio and Bach's Goldberg Variations; he is also a composer and a jazz pianist.

I admit to being curious, so I imagine I'll get a ticket to his New York debut, at the Weill Recital Hall, on February 1. He won't be playing the Debussy, alas, so we'll miss his "tempestuous, expressive" interpretation (as opposed to Lupu's "distant" and "cold" one). If the two excerpts I heard (the aria from Goldberg and a piece by Berio) on his web site are any indication, then this is the kind of heart-on-sleeve playing one hears too little.

Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Off-Topic: Shanny is a Mensch

Brendan Shanahan has brought class and leadership to the Rangers since he arrived last season. In an interview with a Czech reporter, Shanny talks about his relationship with Jaromir Jagr as one of mutual support and complementary styles--in both how they play and how they lead. There is no resentment, animosity or envy. Most touching of all are Shanny's comments about his collision, in a game last year, with Philadelphia's Mike Knuble:

"Whether it’s speaking for Jagr in public or standing up for him on the ice, that’s just the way things are supposed to work for Shanahan. 'That’s how it works on the best teams,' he explained. 'Everyone cares for each other. It’s beautiful when I achieve something and I see that my teammates are happy for it. I score, take a look at the bench, and see Jaromir, a huge NHL superstar, smiling happily with his hands up. Or another example: Last season, I was knocked out after a collision in the Philadelphia game and I was taken out on a stretcher. I watched the replay and I saw Jaromir standing above me the whole time. He even came to visit me in the hospital. This gets people closer.'" (via BlueShirt Bulletin)

My son, then six, and I were at that horrible game. Seeing Shanny lying motionless was terrifying. You can watch the video yourself: Jagr did keep a vigil over Shanny. You can see Jagr, on at least two occasions by my count, bending over to try to communicate something to his fallen teammate; at another point he helps to secure the stretcher on the ice. I guess I'm just sentimental, but watching this video brought a tear to my eye. Hockey players are really something.


Beckett's Opera

According to Le Monde, the French National Library has unearthed a little-performed opera based on Samuel Beckett's Krapp's Last Tape. Alas, the music, by Beckett's friend Marcel Mihalovici (1898-1985), is, according to Le Monde's critic, "entirely mediocre," a rather uninspired example of 1960s modern atonality, and a bitch (vacherie) to play.

The Met: Can They Institute a Dress Code?

I was at the Met last night (Tuesday, December 18) to see the powerful, grimly effective production of War and Peace. I can't add to what the reviews have recorded. But I do want to channel my inner curmudgeon and say something about the dress of some people in the house. At my earlier two visits to the Met this season, I saw a lot of well dressed people--capped off last week not only by Netrebko, but by a beautiful woman with a seat in the orchestra level who was wearing a stunning black strapless gown. She looked absolutely radiant.

Now I do not expect that people wear black- or white tie (though they might want to think about it), but I do think it is important to dress for the opera, at least for the Met. An evening at the Met is a festive occasion, a special event, and should be celebrated as such.

Last night I saw several people in jeans and sneakers. A young woman in what I am sure was a very expensive hoodie. And one fellow who was wearing some kind of Klingon-style vest.

Can the Met institute a dress code? Not let people in who are wearing jeans or sneakers? Can't we have one place where the relentless casualness of dress is prohibited?

Sunday, December 16, 2007

Happy Beethoven's Birthday!

Not just Schroeder, but no less than Anton Webern believed that Beethoven's birthday should be a day of national celebration. And I concur! What a good, non-denominational way to have a winter-solstice festival. My (very indulgent) wife and I exchange gifts and then listen to a Beethoven masterwork.

Happy Beethoven's Birthday everyone!

Saturday, December 15, 2007

Top Five Items I'm Not Going To Blog About

1. New York Philharmonic Going to North Korea. Can they leave Maazel there?

2. New York City Opera Not Having a 2008-2009 Season While Renovation Takes Place at the State Theater. The problem isn't a "dark season." The San Francisco Opera managed to live through one.

3. Rumors that Anna Netrebko is Gay. The woman I saw her with the other night was not Lucy Diakovska.

4. MP3 vs. Hi Fi Audio. I'm still trying to get my Victrola to work.

5. The Gramophone and Typewriter Company's Unique Visitors Up for Third Straight Month!

Who's a Better Communist?

In The New Statesman, Andrew Hussey has an entertaining take on the memoir, just published, by France's leading post-structuralist novelist and intellectual, Philippe Sollers. One sentence amused me, when Hussey says that Sollers is "a vain, gossipy but undoubtedly talented novelist who is the epitome of snobbish, bourgeois, mondain Paris (Sollers's Maoist youth is only further proof of this pedigree)."

Follow that? Being a Maoist is merely "proof" that you're bourgeois. Get it? Because I don't.

My Take on "Happy Holidays"

I don't get this consternation over the use of the term "Happy Holidays." First off, it's not a slighting of Christmas. It's an acknowledgment that two holidays fall within a week of each other: Christmas and New Year's. It's faster than saying, "Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year" each time you greet someone.

Second, I'm a Jew, and we Jews say to each other "Good Yumtif" on our holidays. What does "Good Yumtif" mean? Well, yumtif is a Yiddishization of the Hebrew yom tov, which means "good day." So, yes, we're saying "Good Good Day," but in this case "good day" = "holiday." We're basically saying "Happy Holiday" to each other, whether it's the sacred and solemn fast of Yom Kippur or the minor festival of Hannukah. And I don't think I've ever encountered an offended co-religionist when I have greeted him or her with a "Good Yumtif." No one says, "How dare you say that! This is a war against Tisha B'av!"

Thursday, December 13, 2007

Atonal Prose

Until this interview is translated from Hungarian, we'll have to suffice with the pullquote on Sign and Sight: Imre Kertesz, the Nobel Prize winner, on modern writing. I think he has a persuasive argument:

"Back then writing was unproblematic, because all of existence didn't hang in the balance and the stories literally gushed from these writers' pens. Mozart, too, was a well-spring of wondrous, joyful abundance. Today a contemporary composer can be happy if he makes it to his second symphony. Something has happened in the world that has made art unnatural. It's as if our natural powers were blocked at the source. Perhaps our linguistic reserves are depleted. We have been confronted with the fact that humans are capable of something unimaginable. That's how atonal prose came about. Atonal music appeared after World War I, when composers were confronted by the emptiness of the language they had used until then. I call the new prose atonal because it has to deal with the fact that the fundamental ethical and moral consensus – the keynote – is lacking. Today words mean something different in every mouth. Prose must also reflect this, but in doing so it loses its natural purpose: that I tell a story, while the audience listens in amazement. If you fail to express the essence of this turn of events, you're no longer a writer, and miss out on your own life and times."

He does not mention the other stylistic choice, irony, which also explodes the multivalence of language. Still, I think he is very much on to something here, but this is the kind of point of view that prevails more in continental Europe. We in the United States tend to look upon the 20th century as more of a triumphal story, and so I don't think we have much patience for this worldview. The fact that we Americans value "narrative" so much in both fiction and non- reflects this ideological gulf.

Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Another New Brunswick (Mezzo-)Soprano

The dea ex machina who descends from the rafters on tethers at the end of the Met's Iphigenie was sung by Michele Losier, who, like Measha Brueggergosman, hails from New Brunswick. She sounded good in the small role, but she really should be given a prize for intestinal fortitude--she was easily thirty feet above the stage as her descent began.

Netrebko


I haven't blogged on Anna Netrebko because I haven't wanted to enter the controversy--quite passionate, over at Opera-L--that has swirled around her. Opera fanatics being known for their extreme positions, you can well imagine that she has excited ardent devotion and animosity in equal measure. Is she a good singer? Is she a good actress? It seems to depend on whom you ask. She is either the reincarnation of Geraldine Farrar or the worst thing to hit opera since Andrea Bocelli.

Still, I can't deny the immeasurable thrill of seeing her in the audience at last night's Iphigenie--at one point she ran past me with a female companion and I was momentarily stunned. My feeling about her, as one who has seen her recently as well as way back when the Kirov came to New York to present Betrothal in a Monastery, is that in the right role she is about as good as it gets--she can sing beautifully when the part fits her, she is a game actress, and, yes, she is a ravishingly gorgeous woman. (As an example, check out her Susanna in the Salzburg Nozze di Figaro now on DVD.) She is bringing glamor back to opera, and that is only a good thing, and beyond that I will hold my peace.

Domingo: The Marvel

I first saw Placido Domingo at the Met on March 26, 1977--I actually didn't remember the date but used the Met's indispensable online Archives feature to look it up--in Andrea Chenier. I can't say he sang the role with the headlong abandon of some other interpreters, but his sound, with his distinctive baritonal timbre, exemplary legato and hall-embracing power was unforgettable. When I saw his Cyrano a few seasons back I marveled at how well preserved his instrument was and thought that this would no doubt be the last time I heard him live.

And now here it is, 2007, 30 years after I first saw him, and he's still singing, and I'm still getting a chance to hear him. I attended last night's Iphigenie en Tauride, and his voice, if not as supple, is still something of a wonder; he can still bring it when he needs to, he hasn't developed a beat or a wobble, and his musicianship is as strong as ever. So now I am not going to say this is the last time I'll get to hear him live--he will no doubt still be singing in five, ten, fifteen years!

Monday, December 10, 2007

Thank You, ANA Blog

The blog of the Analog Arts Ensemble posted a link to my Stockhausen post, so I want to thank them for their acknowledgment, and welcome any readers who have come from that web site.

Not Since George Szell's Cleveland Orchestra

So says the San Francisco Classical Voice critic of what sounds like an exciting concert by the San Francisco Symphony. Michael Tilson Thomas programmed the rarely heard Lelio by Berlioz, a work that calls for enormous forces, three male singers, even an actor-narrator (here dropped). It was originally written as a kind of sequel to the Symphonie Fantastique. If that isn't enough to make me wish I had been there, there's this:

"The San Francisco Symphony is in wonderful shape these days, but what was so extraordinary was the level of unanimity of phrasing and dynamics. Everyone sounded in perfect sync with all their colleagues. The only other time I have heard an orchestra with that form of cohesion was from George Szell’s Cleveland Orchestra in its heyday."

High praise indeed. The concert also included the Fantastique, which was recorded for eventual broadcast and/or DVD release. Unfortunately, it does not sound as though Lelio was similarly memorialized--a great loss, if true.

Sunday, December 9, 2007

Le Pays in Tours

Alberic Magnard's close friend and devoted champion, Joseph-Guy Ropartz, wrote one opera, Le Pays. It's a grim tale of fishermen, one I am curious to hear. According to ResMusica, the Opera de Tours will be performing it next month; there is also, apparently, a recording on the Timpani label.

A Look at Mikrophonie

Musicareaction, mourning the death of a "giant," has posted a video made up of scenes from a rehearsal of Stockhausen's piece Mikrophonie, in which a tam-tam is subjected to various objects while a microphone captures the sounds produced. The video gives a sense of the preparation and precision needed to pull such a work off: the percussionists look like a team of surgeons operating on the tam-tam.

Saturday, December 8, 2007

The Hole in Thursday Nights

Hardly a Thursday evening goes by without some part of me itching to tune into George Jelinek's long-running and now defunct radio show "The Vocal Scene." But a good replacement is Andy Karzas's "From the Recording Horn," which airs--and streams--on Chicago's WFMT Saturdays at 4 (central time; 5 in the east). I wish they made it available as a podcast!

Get Your Tickets Now

The Lincoln Center Festival will present Bernd Alois Zimmermann's searing masterpiece, Die Soldaten, at the Park Avenue Armory in July, according to the Times. I think this venue might serve the work better than NYCO's claustrophobic production of several seasons ago; this production, premiered at the RuhrTriennale, was performed originally in the Jahrhunderthalle, a converted gas power plant for the Bochum steel works.

Friday, December 7, 2007

Stockhausen Has Died



I am tremendously saddened to learn of the death of one of the 20th century's greatest composers, Karlheinz Stockhausen.

Stockhausen had an alchemist's ability to transform the base metals of total serialism into music of purest gold; in his hands the pedagogical rigors of the twelve-tone system melted into playfulness and joy.

He was the first living composer whose music bowled me over, for its sheer daring, its mixture of the monumental and the intimate, its sheer aural splendor. It is easy to make fun of his earnestness, his oddball mysticism, his late-in-life musical megalomania. But one should never forget that this was a man traumatized as a child by the Nazis, who euthanized his mentally ill mother. The fact that he could write music of such world-embracing scope is something of a miracle.

About ten years ago or so I was listening to a recording of his marvelous dual-piano work Mantra, about as good an example of his aesthetic as any, and following along with a score I borrowed from the New York Public Library. I noticed some mistakes in the score--not as hard as it seems to detect, given the way the piece is plotted. So I wrote to Stockhausen to let him know. And to my surprise and delight received a response handwritten by him, thanking me for the letter, acknowledging the mistake (the score is full of mistakes, he wrote), suggesting other recordings of the work, and finishing with his famous signature -- Stockhausen.

May his music live long.

Tuesday, December 4, 2007

Does It Come in a Violin Model?

Gibson invents a guitar that tunes itself. If they had had this technology for the violin when I was a kid, I'm sure I would have practiced more. (Or at all.) (Via ArtsJournal/Music)

Monday, December 3, 2007

A. S. Byatt, the Novel, and the Brain

A. S. Byatt's essay in the TLS on the modern novel's fascination with the body is stimulating--and too short, alas. I hope she considers writing on the same subject at greater length. Essentially she follows Richard Sennett in saying that our habit of forming our sense of personal identity through our sexuality, and hence our bodies, has led to both alienation and narcissism.

Byatt looks toward current neurological research as an antidote to our obsessions, at least where the novel is concerned:

"A novel is made of language, and arouses both feelings and thoughts in its readers, as it should depict both feelings and thoughts in its people and its microcosm. [French neuroscientist Jean-Pierre] Changeux’s descriptions of the cells of the brain and the way they combine and recombine give me a sense of understanding the excitement, the drive, the pleasure, I get out of making worlds with words. We have had a lot of the body as desire, and listened to many professors of desire. There is something else – the human capacity to think, and to make feelings into thoughts. It is a way out of narcissism."

This linking of our new understanding of how our brains work with how we experience art is very much at the core of Jonah Lehrer's rich and beautifully written new book, Proust Was A Neuroscientist, which I reviewed for the Los Angeles Times back in October. Lehrer sees in the work of several artists--among them Proust, Gertrude Stein, Whitman, Stravinsky--anticipations of the model of the brain that is emerging from laboratories and research centers.

Lehrer and Byatt are both on to something: how writers and other artists can be the medium of an understanding of ourselves that science winds up catching up with; and how science can help bring about a new understanding of ourselves, one that can liberate us from treacherous or demoralizing worldviews, and that can open up new possibilities for artists. I am sure we'll be reading more essays and books like Byatt's and Lehrer's.

Friday, November 30, 2007

More Cool Stuff

Tyler Cabot's excellent profile of the composer Ricardo Romaneiro is up at the Esquire site. What's great is the illustration of Romaneiro's method--you can see how his compositions start as conventional notation and then, through a series of computerized translations, morph into a multi-colored map that is quite beautiful. Romaneiro's music--both his "electronica" and "classical" works--can be heard on his myspace page.

Ten Books, Two Women

The Times Book Review has announced its list of the ten best books of the year. Eight of them are by men, including all five of the novels (and Philip Roth was not among them).

Congrats to Alex Ross for making the list with The Rest is Noise. That book is a wonderful introduction to the music--classical music, I suppose one should say--of our time, written with the warmth and pluralistic outlook that grace his columns and blog. It's reassuring to know that the Times Book Review sees its worth. If anyone can bring this kind of music back into the cultural conversation, it's Ross.

The rest of the list looks equally worthy. Still, it's a surprise to see so few women on it.

Thursday, November 29, 2007

A Veritable Musical Orgy

Well, that's what the reviewer at ResMusica says about a concert in Luxembourgh of excerpts from the Ring performed by the Bayreuth Festival Orchestra and conducted by the "truly inspired" Christian Thielemann. It's disappointing that as far as I can tell Thielemann won't be performing in New York City this season.

Measha: Come Back Soon!

I had tickets--front row, egad--for last night's recital by Measha Brueggergosman (proud native of New Brunswick, Canada) at Carnegie's Zankel Hall. It was one of the most enjoyable vocal recitals I've heard in a long time. Measha (prounounced "Me-sha," in case you were wondering) sang a program of cabaret songs by "serious composers"--Britten, Schoenberg, Bolcom--with some songs by Satie, Poulenc and Rorem sprinkled in. She sings this music with complete ownership, aided by her big personality and charming presence. Her voice sometimes sounds small, but since she expanded it convincingly in the spiritual she sang as an encore, it is hard to know whether that is a built-in feature or whether she was tailoring the size of her voice for the hall. It's a sweet, expressive voice, and her diction, especially in English, is superb; she makes every song a story, and conveys each song's spirit--playfulness, wistfulness, desire, sorrow--with real authority and conviction. She is such a delight that all I can ask is for her to come back to New York soon--real soon!--and put on another recital like this.

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

DG Online

Alex Ross has a great post on Deutsche Grammophon's new web store. One thing I'd like to add: if you are interested in doing as he has and downloading Kurtag's Stele, please avail yourself of the opportunity of also buying another "track" on that same CD, Stockhausen's magnificent Gruppen. This is one of the pieces that made a Stockhausen fan out of me; it's music that's planned to the last hemidemisemiquaver, but still manages to sound improvisatory (and dig the part for electric guitar). I hope that the DG people will add more from their large Stockhausen catalogue.

Plug

I'm now the Development Director for the Opera Company of Brooklyn, a dynamic group that secures opera's future by nurturing young singers and building new audiences. OCB likes to go where no opera company has gone before, and tonight it's putting on Tosca at a new development in Brooklyn, Northside Piers--in the building's garage (which will be suitably outfitted for the performance). There's a nice preview in today's Daily News.

Great News

First Sirius, then digitally-projected telecasts in movie theaters, and, now, on-demand television: the Met will be making its movie-theater transmissions available to homes with on-demand cable service, according to Variety. (The taped performance will then be made available for broadcast on PBS.) The first such transmission will be "Romeo et Juliette" in January. How cool is this? This is a win for everybody. The Met's initiatives in making their live performances more accessible have been imaginative and masterly. (via ArtsJournalMusic.)

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

How It Should Be Done

There are many reasons why Parterre Box is the best opera blog: it has juicy gossip, catty comments, and perceptive reviews. Like this review of Maria Guleghina as Norma, written by the avowed Guleghina partisan who goes by the caro nome of Gualtier Malde. Note how he discloses his fanaticism at the outset, and then proceeds to give an unblinkered account of how his idol fared. His long familiarity with her art allows him to write with great insight about both her strengths and failings--and with real style, too:

"Guleghina is often happiest when she can hurl her voice like steel javelins at the music - preferably in the higher range. Some of these vocal assaults miss the target but the energy and force is always exciting. However as Norma, Guleghina attempted many soft attacks, sustained piano singing and modulated phrasing. This in itself was admirable but years of daredevil oversinging are hard to shake off for one role. These piano phrases - including the opening and ending phrases of 'Casta Diva' - suffered from hollow, unsteady tones and fell short of the intended pitch."

Gualtier Malde's admission of his partisanship actually makes this a more balanced and convincing review.

The TLS Goes to See "Beowulf" ...

... and likes it! Carolyne Larrington, an Old-English scholar, has seen more film adaptations of the tale than anyone knew existed. "Zemeckis’s Beowulf is in touch with critical debate about the poem," we learn. And: "Beowulf [the film] tells us quite a lot about twenty-first-century anxieties about masculinity and power, and about the ways in which we reframe stories from our national past, but it is also rip-roaring fun." Read the whole thing here.

I Play Language Cop

When did an actor's performance in a movie start getting characterized as "work"? My first recollection of hearing this term is probably from some point in the 1990s--something like Mary Hart saying on "Entertainment Tonight" that some actor was up for an Oscar for "his work" in some movie. I dismissed it as an irritating kind of Hollywood press-release-ese, with its inferiority-complex-driven need to sound serious and substantial. (I guess a "performance" sounds somehow less authentic than a good day's "work.") But all the same, it's pretentious blather. There is nothing wrong with saying that a performer gives a "performance." I'm not denying it's work--of course it is work, but what is being analyzed or praised or trashed or in some way experienced by the viewer is not the work, but the performance.

That's why I get put on edge when I come across an actual writer, and not a publicist or entertainment reporter, using this term, as in this example: " ... L[aura] Linney ... does her naughtiest, most secretive work yet." That's from David Denby's review of The Savages in the December 3 New Yorker. Denby is such an effective stylist that he just gets away with this, but, gosh, I wish he had phrased it differently. Why not just say she is naughty and secretive? Saying she does naughty and secretive work makes it seem as though she's a CIA agent.

This is Cool

A very clever YouTuber has videoed Rainer Wehinger's "listening score" to Ligeti's 1957 electronic piece Artikulation and syncronized it to the music. Wehinger's score is a work of abstract beauty; following it to the music opens up a new understanding of Ligeti's procedures. (I especially like how Wehinger gives a shaded background for reverberating tones but leaves the space behind the more clipped or spliced tones blank.) I owe a tip of the hat to Musicareaction for the link.

Friday, November 23, 2007

Leben und Schicksal

According to Sign and Sight, a new translation of the complete version of Vassily Grossman's masterpiece, Life and Fate, goes on sale in Germany. It's a chance for me to say that this book is well worth reading--its more than 1,000 pages rush by, thanks to Grossman's narrative gifts. It also has some of the most unforgettable scenes and characters I have ever encountered in literature, and the comparison some make between it and War and Peace is completely deserved.

Monday, November 19, 2007

Visualizing Hansel

Lorenzo Mattotti gets it: his beautiful, scary, mystery-laden images inspired by Hansel und Gretel are on view at the Gallery Met, which teamed up with New Yorker cartoonists to mount an exhibit in connection with the Met's new production. Mattoti's images capture the story's sense of foreboding, and the wide-angle perspectives make the viewer feel small, childlike, and vulnerable. The New Yorker web site has an online slide show of the drawings and paintings from the exhibit. Edward Koren's and Jules Feiffer's contributions are also atmospheric and not merely decorative, but Mattotti seems to feel about the story the way I do.

Sunday, November 18, 2007

Popularity Contest

According to StatCounter, my most viewed post is the one about Anu Tali. Not sure what that says ...

Reviving Friedemann

The enterprising folks at Naxos have embarked on a complete set of recordings of the keyboard music of Johann Sebastian Bach's son Wilhelm Friedemann. The first volume is out, and it's a real treat. It includes 12 feisty and playful polonaises (in contrasting major and minor keys), a beautiful sonata which reminded me a little of Scarlatti, and an A-minor fantasia that oscillates between courtly grace and passionate outburst. Robert Hill captures all the twists and turns of the music on a delightfully untwangy fortepiano, which deftly undercuts any tendency toward sentimentality that might creep in. I greatly look forward to the next volumes in the series.

A Bad Idea Returns

I received the December Opera News over the weekend, and was reminded by the cover image of Philip Langridge, that once again the Met will be camping up Hansel und Gretel by having the witch played by a tenor. I suppose there are those who find this kind of thing wicked and great fun, but it adds a layer of silliness to an opera that is already misunderstood. It's my firm belief that Hansel und Gretel is not at all for children, that it's beyond their capacities to appreciate. Hansel und Gretel indulges, it is true, in any number of superficially sentimental gestures, from the Sandman and the Fourteen Angels to the wood spirits and so on. But the strategy is one of purposeful regression: it is meant to take us back into the world of our childhood, of primal fears and naive beliefs. Without this tug of memory and nostalgia, the shattering, cathartic finale, in which the lost children are returned to life and to their parents, is ineffective. A drag-queen witch only breaks the spell.

However, one compensation will be the magnificent Christine Schafer, just about the finest Lulu I ever heard, as Gretel. And, as mentioned earlier, a chance to sample Vladimir Jurowski.

Thursday, November 15, 2007

G & T Is Growing

According to StatCounter, this blog is experiencing a healthy upward trend in visitors. Last month, October, the first full month for which I have statistics, StatCounter recorded 183 unique visitors. For the first two weeks of this month there have already been 134 unique visitors. Returning visitors are up, too. I know that these numbers are not always accurate, but whatever the actual counts, the trend is most likely still there. Thanks to all for visiting my blog!

Orchestral Maneuvers

Greg Sandow makes an important point about the Berlin Philharmonic (and by extension most non-American orchestras): they move when they play: "You can see the violinists putting their entire bodies into many bow strokes. You see them bend forward, then swing their bodies back. The basses were especially dramatic."

That kind of passionate intensity is striking when encountering the Berliners. And something of a trademark. There's a story that during the Karajan years the orchestra was trying to decide on new chairs, and the decision hinged on the comfort of the backs of the chairs. To which one longtime member of the ensemble said, "Since when has a Berlin Philharmonic player needed the back of his chair?"

But what's shocking is the contrast to American orchestras, so often slouched back on their seats, looking bored to the point of somnolence. Sandow thinks this comes from how they're taught: "Classical musicians are taught not to move. I've heard that from my Juilliard students. Their teachers tell them not to move when they play. It's undignified, they're told, it's not artistic."

Sandow believes the Berlin sounds better because it moves. That may be. I don't know. I do know, however, that their energy and passion come through, and American orchestras might want to consider the example.

Off-Topic: Why Jagr is Great

I don't think this photo from Wednesday night's Rangers-Devils game is from the moment I'm thinking of, but at one point during the game, Jagr was all alone in the Devils' zone while his teammates where shifting. He had five guys in red sweaters swarming around him. And he somehow managed to hold onto the puck.

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Doing Haydn Right

Over at San Francisco Classical Voice, Michelle Dulak Thomson praises the new attention Haydn's vast oeuvre is getting. I love the way she describes how interpreters are approaching this magnificent music, capturing its playfulness and wit:

"But it’s more than that — it’s the way players are increasingly approaching Haydn today, with a degree of intensity and alertness and specificity quite incompatible with 'letting the music take care of itself.' Often the first thing you’ll notice in such performances, interestingly, is that the players are making much of Haydn’s humor. They will point up the famous outright 'jokes' with glee, they’ll add insinuating or flippant or mock-tragic inflections at whim, they’ll seize on a prominent leap or an unexpected repetition or a quirky rhythm as an occasion for horseplay. I’ve heard sheer high spirits take over an ordinarily sober-minded ensemble to the extent that the players seemed determined to one-up each other in plain clowning around."

It's this kind of high spiritidness that informs Bernstein's famous readings of Haydn symphonies. I'm glad to know so many musicians are finding ways to communicate this quality.

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Crazy Eights

In honor of a recent performance of Philip Glass's Eighth Symphony, David Bratman of San Francisco Classical Voice has a lively and surprising round-up of other symphonies with that number. Sure, he includes Beethoven, Schubert, and Bruckner. But how about Kurt Atterberg, Havergal Brian, and Vagn Holmboe?

Monday, November 12, 2007

An Excuse to Run a Picture of Anu Tali

Seriously, the young Estonian conductor (managed by HarrisonParrott) got a nice review for a concert of Beethoven (the "Emperor" with, ahem, Helene Grimaud) and Shostakovich's Ninth.

On Kubelik

Over at the Horizon blog, Benjamin Ivry, whose music posts are always interesting, discusses a new DVD documentary about Rafael Kubelik. It reminded me of a Chicago Symphony concert I heard in a radio broadcast some years ago. It was the orchestra's 100th anniversary, and several conductors, Solti and Barenboim, were on hand to lead a recreation of the CSO's first concert. What I remember is that things sounded somewhat adequate but unspectacular, and then Kubelik took the podium to conduct Dvorak's Husitská Overture--and I have rarely heard such a full, deep and rich sound from an orchestra.

Rumor is True, But ...

Playbill Arts is reporting that Bocelli did indeed try out at the Met, but there are no plans for him to sing in an opera. He might be enticed to sing a concert there. Phew!

Friday, November 9, 2007

Spreading a Rumor

This will nuture the fears some have of the Gelb regime's risking artistic integrity in a search for crossover success ... Please let's hope it's only a rumor.

Thursday, November 8, 2007

Donizetti via Liszt

Naxos's worthy complete Liszt piano music project is now in its 27th volume, which is dedicated to transcriptions of melodies from Donizetti's operas. Donizetti's punctuated lyricism--not so far from Liszt's own (think of the Consolations)--is the perfect mechanism for Liszt's dazzling shifts in mood and color; it's as though Donizetti's music were refracted through a sonic prism.

Pianist William Wolfram commands every aspect of this mercurial music--its ferocity, playfulness, soulfulness, and drama--and plays it for everything it's worth. In his hands the transcriptions sound like much more than showpieces: they attain a quality all their own, a kind of semi-improvisatory meeting of musical minds that discovers new depths in both.

Commentary's Arts Blog

Commentary magazine has a new arts blog, The Horizon, which is actually quite good--it's meaty and well written. Best of all, you don't have to be a Neocon to enjoy it!

Wednesday, November 7, 2007

Blogging in All Twelve Tones

Musicareaction is the name of the new blog by the Ensemble Intercontemporain (Pierre Boulez's outfit) in Paris. It highlights the Ensemble's activities and contermporary music in general. Looks like there was an interesting program of contemporary music inspired by, evocative of, or in some numinous way under the influence of Wagner that included early Stockhausen. Be aware the site is in French. (Via Le Journal de Papageno.)

Support the Writers


The issue at the heart of the strike by members of the WGA is simple: will writers benefit from revenues that derive from the presentation of their work online? Considering the fact that just about every form of filmed entertaintment is migrating to the internet, this is clearly more than just an ancillary revenue stream. I hope that the studios see the sense in treating writers as creative partners and finding ways to share revenues fairly.

End for the Donnell?

The Times reports that the Donnell Library on W. 53rd Street, where the original Winnie-the-Pooh is housed, is going to be torn down. In return from $59 million from Orient-Express Hotels, the library will return as part of two floors of an eleven-story hotel on that space.

I was very saddened to read this news. I am a library hound, and the Donnell is one of my favorites. It has a decent general-circulation section, extensive research and children's sections, and an auditorium that features a variety of performances. It is also a great place to stop into if you're in midtown and you need to use the bathroom.

It sounds as though the new Donnell is going to be much smaller. I realize the New York Public Library needs that $59 million, but do they have to downsize a library to get it?

Monday, November 5, 2007

Get Ready to Start Explaining What Makes for Good Singing

First there was Charlotte Church, then there was Andrea Bocelli, now we're all going to have to brace for Paul Potts--and once more try to explain to people why this latest sensation isn't a very convincing opera singer. (Via ArtsJournal)

Sunday, November 4, 2007

Why Callas Turned Down "Vanessa"

Peter G. Davis explains it all in his revealing article on Vanessa, Barber, Menotti, the rise and fall of the opera's fortunes in the last fifty years, and who else besides Callas turned down a juicy role that Eleanor Steber pounced on.

Cendrillon at City



Most of the critics disliked City Opera's new "Fabulous 50s" production of Massenet's Cendrillon. My wife would have agreed with them. At intermission last Thursday night (November 1st), she told me that it reminded her of Pump Boys and Dinettes. Which is quite a slam, when you think about it: she was basically saying that it didn't rise to the level of Grease.

I am going to be the dissenter here, and take the risk of holding myself up to mockery--and my wife's continued bafflement. But I will try to defend a production I found entertaining, clever, and often quite touching.

By setting the action in the 1950s, the production team, Renaud Doucet and Andre Barbe (who received a lusty boo from someone in the half-filled auditorium), found a smart way to realize Cendrillon's and the Prince's alienation. All around the two lovers were those hallmarks of what we associate with the 1950s: empty consumerism (personified by a troupe of marching Mr. Cleans, a touch that was perhaps a bit de trop); relentless conformity; and gender-role stereotyping. These last two were beautifully illustrated by the second act's ballet, choreographed by Doucet, in which the five princesses vying for the Prince's attention variously cooked, cleaned, sewed, ironed, and tended to the needs of a baby, in a tour-de-force sequence that included such Ed Sullivan Show-esque acrobatics as headstands and plate-spinning.

Is it any wonder that Cendrillon, for whom all of this is endless drudgery, and the Prince, who is bored by the hollowness of it all, fell in love with each other? Their scene in the forest--here transformed to a drive-in movie theater (one of the cars memorialized the opera's creator and year of creation with the license plate "JM 1899")--was prefaced by documentary footage of royal weddings from the period, most notably Grace Kelly's, that are romantic only in their pageantry. But then, as an appropriate counterpoint, the entr'acte to the fourth act was accompanied by a home movie of a 1950s wedding--real people, really in love, a beautiful objet trouvee that brought it all down to earth. While these newlyweds were also caught up in the gestures of the period--they're seen driving off in an enormous new car at the end--they also seemed so innocent that you couldn't help but feel charmed. It captured why all but the most heartless of us indentify with the Cinderella story: Cendrillon and the Prince are all of us on our wedding day.

It's true that by updating the setting, the production eliminated the dichotomy the libretto sets up between the pure world of nature for which the lovers long, exemplified by Pandolfe (who regrets giving up his farm in the country), the fairies, the scene in the forest; and the corruptions of the court, as seen in the ambition of Madame de la Haltiere. However, Doucet and Barbe were able to supply a metaphor which presented its own dichotomy, and, in the end, the longing for true love and freedom that is at the libretto's heart was here as well.

In addition, the production was in keeping with the spirit of the libretto's and music's mix of irony and poignancy. Massenet's score commands a whole range of mood and affect--he takes us from the deliberate archaicisms of Madame de la Haltiere and the retinue of the court to the lilting melodies of Cendrillon and the Prince with such ease and grace that you hardly register the change in style. Not to mention his mastery of the orchestra, which goes from chamber-music-like intimacy to a lush neo-romantic Niagara of sound and back throughout the course of the evening. The New York City Opera Orchestra played well under George Manahan's baton--it was a lucid, clean and clear account. I wish, though, that Manahan had infused his reading with more drama and bite.

As for the singers, they all should be praised for being so game, either for wearing oddball costumes or for the complicated movements that were required of them--the step-sisters, Lielle Berman and Rebecca Ringle, who danced as much as they sang, need to be singled out in particular. Cassandre Berthon's Cendrillon and Frederic Antoun's Prince were sincere and impassioned. Unfortunately, I cannot really comment on the quality of anyone's voice, because I couldn't really hear them. This might have been on account of where I was sitting--second-tier, left side, above the pit; the orchestra may have drowned them out from that vantage. It might also have been the fault of the set, which placed a scenic procenium behind the actual stage procenium. Quite often the singers were positioned well back on the stage, behind those two proceniums, which did not help them get heard. It could also be the case that none of the singers had a particularly large voice.

The production team might have been able to make their points about rebellion against conformity with even more emphasis had they insisted on the original vocal distribution of roles and had the Prince played by a soprano. (Which leads to an interesting thought: why not a countertenor in the role?)

There are five performances left of this too-infrequently performed opera, and tickets are available. It's definitely worth a trip.

Saturday, November 3, 2007

Metcalf on Roth

After I read Exit Ghost, I considered posting, but I had trouble wrestling to the ground what I really thought. There is much to celebrate in it, but there is also much of the dross that has crept into late Roth--the often flat writing, the unnaturalistic dialogue in which characters give speeches that go on for paragraphs. Worse in Exit Ghost is a female character to whom Nathan Zuckerman is drawn, and who seems to possess absolutely no attractive qualities whatsoever, aside from youthful good looks (which we have only on Zucerkman's say-so). But there is also the Rothian honesty, of looking at life squarely and unflinchingly, of testifying to emotions that we may not have rights to but that still need to be expressed. Few writers have that kind of courage.

Anyway, Stephen Metcalf (a friend), in his usual adept fashion, has reviewed the book and has done a much better job than I could have in getting a handle on Roth and his contradictions.

Friday, November 2, 2007

Off-Topic Update

After extensive video review, the NHL has determined that the winning goal in Monday night's Rangers-Lightning game should be credited to Brendan Shanahan, whose skate deflected Jagr's slap shot. Not as good a story, but it still attests to Jagr's toughness.

(Related post is here.)

Shock of the New

There's a wonderful French music blog called Le Journal de Papageno, very much worth a look if you can read the language. Currently there's an interesting post about a live recording of the first Parisian performance of Edgard Varese's Deserts. Apparently one can hear quite distinctly the cries and whistles of the audience, including one person who waggishly shouted, "It's too slow!" Maybe not the kerfuffle that the first performance of The Rite of Spring was, but still an interesting document.

There's another post that reviews a book (Tuning, Timbre, Spectrum, Scale by William Sethares) on the organization of pitches into scales; the book's argument is that an instrument's timbre should best determine the scale it uses. Voice, violin, piano are well suited to the well-tempered scale, but, goes the argument, certain percussion instruments do better with the scale of the gamelan. Apparently there is some science to back this up. It's an interesting argument--can one expect to hear a piece scored for Harry Partch-type percussion instruments and traditionally pitched string instruments?

Thursday, November 1, 2007

Mendelsohn on "Lucia"

I'm not sure if Daniel Mendelsohn, who happens to be a friend, has ever written about opera before. But in the current issue of The New York Review of Books, he has an absolutely brilliant article/review of the Met's "Lucia." It has tons of insights into bel canto opera, Donizetti, and "Lucia," and his take on Dessay's performance resonates with what another connoisseur expressed to me, that her interpretation was somehow underwhelming despite her vocal endowment.

To the editors of the New York Review: Please have Daniel review more opera! His voice is much needed. And I'd say that even if he weren't a friend!

Wednesday, October 31, 2007

This Stinks

I never much liked it when the otherwise great Andrew Porter reviewed performances that either used his translations or, in the case of John Eaton's lousy Tempest, featured his own libretto. (And surprise! He gave it a favorable review!) But he was Andrew Porter, and I suppose that was part of the price one paid for the benefit of his wisdom.

Jay Nordlinger, music critic for The New Criterion, is no Andrew Porter, and his shameless report on Salzburg makes for disturbing reading. Nordlinger not only attended the summer festival as a member of the press. He also conducted public interviews, sponsored by the Festival, of the performers. So, unless I've missed something, he was on the Festival's payroll. That should disqualify him from reporting on it, no?

You will not be surprised to find that all his interviewees were wonderful. Tenor Michael Schade, we learn, is "Wunderlichian." Ferrucio Furlanetto "is one of the great King Philips in history." Who knew? Perhaps most risible is Nordlinger's characterization of a response from Valery Gergiev:

"Valery Gergiev, the Russian conductor, was in Salzburg, conducting Benvenuto Cellini, the Berlioz opera. He was an interviewee, too, and I questioned him about Cellini: 'Is it a great opera, a good opera, an okay opera?' Gergiev’s answer demonstrated his integrity, certainly his honesty."

I'm stopping here, because I want you to fully appreciate the "integrity" and "honesty" of Gergiev's response. Ready? Here it is: "It is an interesting opera, an unusual opera, an imaginative opera." Wow! What a bold thing to say! Well, I suppose someone who reports on a festival that pays him would know all about "integrity."

It doesn't help that Nordlinger bathes his reactions and pronouncements in an orotund style. Try to figure out the vocal qualities of Anna Samuil, the soprano who sang Tatiana in Eugene Onegin:

"She has a most interesting voice, Samuil: It is darkish, as you can expect from the East, but it is also changeable, adaptable, and beautiful. Even more than beautiful, it is interesting (as I’ve said). And it is alive, always alive. As for technique, that was 100 percent secure, on the night I attended. And Samuil’s musical and dramatic instincts were faultless—faultless. This is a mightily intelligent singer. You can go five, ten, fifteen seasons without hearing a Tatiana so right."

OK, but what made it so right? Can you give us any details? This is the kind of writing that C. S. Lewis warned his pupil, Kenneth Tynan, about when he told Tynan that a critique should "distinguish (and not merely praise)." Throwing a bunch of words at Anna Samuil tells us nothing about her voice ("darkish"?--is that even a word? And what "East" are we talking about here?).

Such is what passes for music criticism these days.

Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Off-Topic: Why I Love Hockey

In the second period of Monday night's game against the visiting Tampa Bay Lightning, something knocked out two front teeth of the Rangers' Jaromir Jagr. (It wasn't clear if it was a puck, a stick, or an elbow.) That came after his skate broke in the first period, and his glove broke earlier in the second.

Jagr didn't miss a shift, and wound up shooting the winning goal in the third period. You can't beat the work ethic of a hockey player.

Self-Promotion

My review of Jonah Lehrer's remarkable book, Proust Was A Neuroscientist, is up at the Los Angeles Times. Lehrer writes with authority and real sparkle, and his command of subjects is terrifying. And he's only 25.

Sandow on Berio

Greg Sandow writes in his usual perspicacious way about music by Luciano Berio--how he enjoyed a piece, and how two composer friends of his hated it. Worth reading: the fault lines in "modern music" are still strong. Personally, I endorse Sandow's implicit pluralism.

Sunday, October 28, 2007

Literary Real Estate


For Sale: Guy de Maupassant's home. Asking 1.3 million Euros. In case you were interested.

Thursday, October 25, 2007

The Two Stephens

Last night, Tuesday, the 24th, Sirius broadcast Verdi's Aida live from the Met. The standout was Stephen O'Mara, who had already sung a previous performance, covering for Berti. O'Mara has the sound of a real tenore di forza, burnished and powerful, with a ringing top. Given the roles in his repertory, I hope the Met finds a way to make use of him. (Does he really sing both Siegfrieds?)

Tonight, the 25th, was the much-anticipated Lucia, also broadcast on Sirius, with Stephen Costello as Edgardo--much-anticipated by opera mavens, who know him from appearances in Philadelphia and with OONY, not to mention clips that can be found on YouTube. Despite a few signs of tiring at the end, he was spectacular. His beautiful lyric voice has focus, color, and a real liquid grace. He's so young, though, that I hope he's not being rushed.

Annick Massis was a splendid Lucia, tossing off high Ds with abandon, floating notes with ethereal grace, showcasing her marvelous trill, and giving point to the text. I wish she hadn't opted for the flute obligato in the Mad Scene, however. Amazing, though, to have two such accomplished artists--Dessay and Massis--perform this role in tandem.

Kurtag on Ligeti

The composer Gyorgy Kurtag accepts a prize and eulogizes his namesake, Gyorgy Ligeti. The remarks are elliptical but still moving. Here was my favorite Ligeti quote, as cited by Kurtag:

"As different as the criteria for art and science are, they are similar in that those who work in them are driven by curiosity. The key thing in both areas is to investigate coherences still undiscovered by others, and to create structures that haven't existed until now."

(It turns out he was especially interested in science, especially during his final illness.) Usually comparisons between art and science are glib and banal, but I'm struck by this idea of "coherences," and "creating structures." It's an interesting glimpse into Ligeti's aesthetic.

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Superman is Jewish

Here's an interesting exhibit: the Museum of the Art and History of Judaism, in Paris, is documenting the Jewish origins of the comic strip. As an article on the exhibit in Le Monde points out, all the great superheroes were created by Jews. It also relates the interesting story that after seeing a World War II-era Superman in which the Man of Steel crushes Nazi Germany, Joseph Goebbels was said to write, "Superman is Jewish!"

This exhibit may cause some dismay to those who want only to stress Superman's universalism.

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

Where are the Women?

What do the table of contents of a recent issue of The New Yorker and Oprah's Book Club have in common? Leslie Pietrzyk answers this interesting question on her blog.

Hitchens on Bellow

Christopher Hitchens's review in the November issue of The Atlantic is not online, but it's worth paying the $6.99 cover price to read. The first two volumes of the Library of America's Saul Bellow edition give him a chance to deliver one of his typically personal, erudite and insightful readings of a great writer's work.

At the start of the review, Hitchens asks an interesting question, one I've been turning over for some time, too:

"At Bellow’s memorial meeting, held in the Young Men’s Hebrew Association at Lexington Avenue and 92nd Street two years ago, the main speakers were Ian McEwan, Jeffrey Eugenides, Martin Amis, William Kennedy, and James Wood (now the editor of this finely produced collection). Had it not been for an especially vapid speech by some forgettable rabbi, the platform would have been exclusively composed of non-Jews, many of them non-American. How had Bellow managed to exert such an effect on writers almost half his age, from another tradition and another continent?"

I, too, have been puzzled and concerned by the way in which Amis and McEwan have shown their enthusiasm for Bellow. It seems to me that they've somehow deracinated him.

When I was young, Bellow was thought of not just as a Jewish writer, but as the prototypical Jewish writer, moreso even than Philip Roth, who was perhaps too controversial to hold that title. The worldview of Bellow's novels seemed predicated on his Jewishness, a Jewishness that speaks to the anxieties and paradoxes of assimilation, the pride in and defensiveness of a towering intellect, the ironies that undercut anything that sounds like a grand pronouncement. Not to mention that prose, which never seems far from the cadence of Yiddish-inflected English.

For instance, Martin Amis's famous appreciation of The Adventures of Augie March ("A Chicago of a Novel," The Atlantic Monthly, October, 1995), in which he crowns that book as "the Great American Novel," manages to avoid ever using the words "Jew" or "Jewish" in its thirteen laudatory pages.

How can that be? After all, Jewishness suffuses that book, and all of Bellow's oeuvre. Augie's voice, according to Irving Howe, is "a mingling of high-flown intellectual bravado with racy-tough street Jewishness." (Howe's comment is quoted in James Atlas's Bellow, p. 191.) And as James Atlas puts it so well: "Like Bellow, Augie played down his ethnic status, but it permeated everything he did." (p. 192) For Atlas, Augie March is a synthesis of "two vital cultural strains."

"As a Canadian and as a Jew," Atlas writes, "[Bellow] would always be an outsider, but that same ancestry enabled him to renovate the language, bringing to American literature the legacy of Babel and Chekhov, whose stories he remembered his father reading aloud--in Yiddish--at the dinner table. 'It is the poetry of the Jew that makes his hero what he is,' wrote Karl Shapiro, 'in Chicago, in Mexico, wherever Augie happens to be.'" (p. 193)

Similarly, Ian McEwan's heartfelt memorial, which ran as an Op-Ed piece in The New York Times in 2005, also avoids the words "Jew" and "Jewish."

I have to admit, I find this all very strange. Hitchens's explanation, and he could be right, is that Bellow's work is universal, transcending its ethnicity. And indeed, Atlas says much the same, but note that he does so in a way that does not seem to hide or ignore Bellow's roots: "Yet The Adventures of Augie March wasn't a 'Jewish' novel, Bellow insisted strenuously. It was a novel by an American writer who happened to be a Jew. To claim otherwise would have diminished its universality." (p. 193) I think those scare quotes around "Jewish" are telling. Just because Bellow didn't write a "Jewish" novel, doesn't mean his work wasn't the product of what Atlas calls a "Jewish voice."

It is simply misleading at best--and perverse at worst--not to refer to the identity that informs all of Bellow's work. It would be like talking about James Joyce without mentioning he was Irish.

I would love to see the brilliant minds of Mssrs. Amis, Atlas, Hitchens, and McEwan hash this all out. Maybe in a public forum, such as a New Yorker panel. That would be a literary event worth paying cash money to see.

Sunday, October 21, 2007

From the Archives ...

I wish our libraries did this: the web site of the Bibliotheque Nationale de France has digitized collections of major newspapers, which can be read in PDF. It's a great resource and worth checking out. I was just reading the lead story in the Figaro of February 12, 1885, in which a parliamentary debate was raging between those who wanted to tax wheat imports from the United States (in order to protect French farmers), and those (the "economists," as the story called them) who wanted free trade in order to keep prices down. Hard to believe that the same debate goes on today.

Friday, October 19, 2007

The Unknown Wagner

While the Royal Opera at Covent Garden is doing their Ring cycle (sans Bryn Terfel), they've also spiced up the usual attendant lectures and exhibits with a concert of Wagner Rarities. The program includes excerpts from his first operatic effort, Die Hochzeit, the 1850 attempts at Siegfrieds Tod, Henze's orchestration of the Wesendonck songs, and the opening of something called Männerlist größer als Frauenlist, or Die glückliche Bärenfamilie--no doubt the difficulty involved in pronouncing the title doomed the effort.

Southbank Sinfonia/Barlow: Wagner Rarities - MusicalCriticism.com (concert review)

Chasms of Poe's Brain

Whose head is swinging from the swollen strap?
Whose body smokes along the bitten rails,
Bursts from a smoldering bundle far behind
In back forks of the chasms of the brain,--
Puffs from a riven stump far out behind
In interborough fissures of the mind . . . ?
***
That last night on the ballot rounds, did you,
Shaking, did you deny the ticket, Poe?
--Hart Crane, The Bridge

A new theory of what killed Edgar Allan Poe: brain tumor.


Poe’s Mysterious Death: The Plot Thickens! The New York Observer

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Young Conductor Watch

Asher Fisch (StageDoor) is just named principal guest conductor of the Seattle Opera (via Arts Journal). I haven't heard him conduct aside from some YouTube clips, but he has already built a reputation as a Wagner conductor.

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

A New Approach to Thematic Programming

I've been enjoying a biography of the French composer Alberic Magnard, who flourished at a time when enmity between France and Germany was high, and felt not only by the people but by artists as well. Romain Rolland, the writer, music lover, pacifist, popularizer of Indian mysticism, and Stalin-boosting communist--and also acquaintance of Magnard--had a brilliant suggestion for dealing with nationalism on concert programs. In speaking out against a decision at the 1905 Strasbourg festival to schedule a small piece of Charpentier before a concert performance of the last scene of Meistersinger--in effect marginalizing the French composition--he wrote: "If one wants to have a joust between German and French music, let it be on equal terms: oppose Berlioz to Wagner, Debussy to Strauss, and Dukas or Magnard to Mahler." (quoted in: Perret, Simon-Pierre and Harry Halbreich: Alberic Magnard. Paris: Fayard, 2001, p. 259)

I like the idea of dueling pieces on concert programs. It might be more instructive than some of the anemic thematic programming that is so fashionable these days.

Webcast Alert

Those who are fond of William Christie and Les Arts Florissants--and who isn't?--can catch a webcast of their upcoming production of Landi's Il Sant' Alessio this Thursday, October 18, according to Playbill Arts. And here's the best part: The video will be offered in streaming format for 24 hours after the live webcast. Check the link for complete information.

Thursday, October 11, 2007

Review of the Month

Joshua Kosmon of the San Francisco Chronicle attended a concert of songs by Philip Glass to texts by Leonard Cohen. L'essential:

"'Book of Longing,' which opened the new season at Stanford Lively Arts, is an evening-long song cycle that weds Glass' music with the words of songwriter Leonard Cohen. It comprises nearly two dozen numbers, performed without intermission by a quartet of singers and an eight-member instrumental ensemble, and there is scarcely a moment in the piece that doesn't inspire shame.

"Long, tedious, witless and numbingly repetitive, 'Book of Longing' is a sort of perversely virtuosic display of awfulness. The only thing keeping it from being utterly negligible is its unshakable air of grandiose self-importance."

Snap! Worth reading the whole thing.

Review: Philip Glass takes on Leonard Cohen. Big mistake.

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Florez, Recitalist

Florez's Paris recital disappoints Le Monde's critic. His singing is faultless; but his program includes pieces--songs by Tosti, the Duke from Rigoletto--best suited to other tenors.

Le Monde.fr : Un ténor un peu trop tiré à quatre épingles

Young Conductor Watch

Philippe Jordan (IMG Artists), whom I have heard at the Met twice, most recently conducting Le Nozze di Figaro, and whose conducting I disliked quite vehemently, is the latest young conductor (and IMG artist) to get a big post, as music director of the Paris Opera. Please tell me this means he won't appear as much at the Met.

PlaybillArts: News: Philippe Jordan Named Next Music Director of Paris Opera

See Me

My panel last week for The Best American Science Writing 2007 was video-recorded by the good people at Seed magazine, and you can see it, if you are interested, here.

The panel included Robin Marantz Henig, Sylvia Nasar, and Patricia Gadsby, and we had a lot of fun. You'll learn about what the brain is doing when we lie, the world's most reclusive genius mathematician, and the best way to boil an egg.

Me and Marcel P.

Listening last night to the third act of the Met's live broadcast, on Sirius, of Lucia, I thought about Marcel Proust, who, about a hundred years ago, subscribed to a service that allowed Parisians to listen to performances from the stage of the Opera in Paris over their telephones. Must have been the perfect entertainment for the reclusive opera lover in his cork-lined room. And here I was, a century later, listening over (DSL) phone lines to live opera.

One question, though: Is there something about the microphone placements or the netcast-sound quality that makes every singer sound like their vibrato is a mile wide in the upper part of their registers? That is how it's sounded to me the last two nights that I've listened, and without a reality check in the hall, it's hard for me to be completely sure of what I heard, so I'll go easy on questions of vibrato.

With that qualification, let me say that I thought Dessay sang with great security and her usual ability to invest every note and ornament with purpose. Giordani sounded fatigued--yes, it's easy to say that, given his heroics over the weekend. Still, his voice was hoarse and sounded effortful--although he was able to command some melting tone and Corelli-like diminuendi. (And had no pitch problems.) Heretical as it may be to say, I wonder if they couldn't have given Giordani a break and dispensed with the Wolf's Glen scene.

It's probably not fair to judge a performance on the basis of one act, but I thought Levine did a swell job. The orchestra sounded much better last night than I'd heard in a while--maybe they're on their best behavior with the music director in the pit? He brought a nice sense of detail to small moments, without being fussy. I loved, for instance, the way the orchestra echoed precisely the inflection of Raimondo's "Eccola" at the start of the Mad Scene. Also, kudos to the decision to do away with the flute obbligato that echoes Lucia's cadenza. To quote from Ashbrook's Donizetti and His Operas:

"Nor should it be assumed that the established tradition of a cadenza with flute obbligato at this point stems from [Fanny] Persiani [the first Lucia]; according to [19th-century music critic and writer Henry] Chorley, she altered her cadenza depending on her vocal health and mood, and since the flute participation must be fixed in advance, it would be highly unlikely that she used it." (Cambridge University Press, paperback edition, 1983, page 376)

How much more haunting is it to have Lucia's solo voice at that moment!

For me, the secret to conducting Donizetti is not to hold the reins too tightly or too slackly. OK, that's a little too easy to say, and I guess the same could be said about many composers. But what I mean is that if you conduct Donizetti's music too vigorously, as though it's prototypical Verdi, it will buckle under the assault. And if you leave out the rhythmic point, then it's simply boring.

Levine knew exactly how to play it, giving flexibility and scope to the singers while still maintaining the music's thrust. The storm that begins the Wolf's Glen scene was not overly wild, burnished even, but still dramatic. The introductory music to the mad scene was not goosed to sound pregnant with meaning. There wasn't the clattering and banging that some conductors bring to scores of this vintage.

I'm looking forward to listening to Annick Massis's Lucia on Otober 25th--she is an impressive coloratura soprano, who sang a wonderful Giullietta with OONY some years ago, and whose performances on various Opera Rara recordings of lesser-known Donizetti scores are superb.

Tuesday, October 9, 2007

Another Young Conductor Gets a Big Post

The conductor youth movement continues, with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra announcing the appointment of the 28-year-old Latvian Andris Nelsons (Konzertdirektion Schmid) as their chief conductor. (Via ArtsJournal.)

Monday, October 8, 2007

Getting to Ys

Le Figaro sends its envoye special to Toulose for a rare revival of Lalo's masterpiece, Le Roi d'Ys. Mezzo Sophie Koch (IMG Artists) gets special praise.

Le Capitole ressuscite "Le Roi d'Ys" de Lalo

Saturday, October 6, 2007

Sills as Zerbinetta

A web site devoted to the late Beverly Sills has a treasure trove of material, including many free audio recordings--including her stupendous 1969 concert performance of Zerbinetta's aria in the original 1912 version of Ariadne. The tessitura is actually higher than in the revised version, which is itself a test of any coloratura soprano's mettle. This is the kind of thing that formerly would only be available to the intrepid acquirers of "private recordings." Worth the visit.

More on Henze's New Opera

From Die Zeit, a visit with Henze, who seems depleted after his latest illness ...


Volker Hagedorn, Hans Werner Henze: In the cradle of the Phaedra myth - signandsight

Thursday, October 4, 2007

French Politico-Literary Gossip

A new French website, with the Gallic name nonfiction.fr, is reporting that Bernard-Henri Levy had a hand in the writing (of a significant part, if not all) of Segolene Royal's upcoming book, which will be published by the same house that publishes Levy.

It's a well understood convention here in the States that politicians have help in writing their books; I am less sure what the thinking is on that subject in France.

The Malibran Mobile

Cecilia Bartoli is publicizing her new album, Maria, with a traveling exhibition of her collection of Malibran artifacts. Literally a traveling exhibition: it's all contained in a mobile-home-sized van that is touring Europe.

Americans won't get the chance to see the exhibition without going to Europe, but they can buy the "super deluxe" version of the CD, which contains a 200-page limited edition book and a "making-of" DVD.

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

Little Einsteins Invade Lincoln Center

At least they won't have trouble getting a taxi after the show.

Last Night at the Met

Last night I went to the Metropolitan Opera for the first time this season. It looks to me as though the audience had internalized Peter Gelb's glamorization campaign--far more well-dressed people were in attendance than I remember from previous seasons. Since I am a firm believer in dressing up for the opera, this is for me a positive development.

I saw Le Nozze di Figaro in the energetic but unimaginative Jonathan Miller production. It's all farce and low comedy; the characters' humanity really has little chance of coming through. The blocking in some places is on a sixth-grade-play level, especially in the third act.

Not helping was Philippe Jordan's finesse-less conducting. His tempi in the first two acts was too fast; the second half was slack. He failed to build the musical tension of the last act so that it could be gloriously released with the Count's plea for forgiveness.

There was also sloppiness between stage and pit; at one point in the second act everything broke down.

Anke Vondung made a winning debut as Cherubino. She has a beautiful voice, and I imagine she is still trying to determine how best to apply it to the Met's acoustic. Erwin Schrott (infamous for his shritless Don Giovanni at Covent Garden) is a charismatic and likeable Figaro. His voice, with its hint of a burr, is, when he chooses to sing, both warm and powerful. Too often, though, he gooses his performance with grumblings and mutterings and other extramusical effects. He needs to dial it down a notch.

Pertusi's dark, highly covered voice was effective for the Count, although his acting is somewhat too broad. Lisette Oropesa filled in for Isabel Byrakdarian as Susanna and did an adequate job; she did, however, encounter some pitch problems. Hei-Kyung Hong sang the countess with authority. Her vibrato is widening, she blurred some of the passagework, but she can still sing with the kind of tone that commentators like to call "creamy."

It was an enjoyable evening, all told. I wouldn't be surprised if the performances improve as the cast starts to gel.

Thursday, September 27, 2007

Self-Promotion

I'll be leading a panel of contributors from The Best American Science Writing 2007 tonight at the TimeWarner Center Borders at 7 pm. The panel includes Sylvia Nasar, Robin Marantz Henig, and Patricia Gadsby.

Wednesday, September 26, 2007

Botstein's "Ariane" on Telarc

Following up on my earlier post, I did listen to Botstein's new recording of Dukas's Ariane et Barbe-Bleu. The sound is opulent and the playing by the BBC Symphony Orchestra could not be better. Botstein, if anything, makes the music sound heavier than at his NYCO run two years ago, but this could be a result of the sound engineering. The singers did their best, but I can't say anyone stood out. Still, lovers of this composer and this opera can be happy for this recording.

Opening Night at the Met

Some excellent, perceptive and insightful reactions to the Met's new Lucia can be found at Marion Lignana Rosenberg's blog, Vilaine Fille (and specifically link below). Also, the posters at Opera-L have been weighing in with smart comments--just check the threads with "Lucia" in the title.

vilaine fille: Lucia di Lammermoor

Sunday, September 23, 2007

New Opera by Henze

Hans Werner Henze's new opera, Phaedra, which received its world premiere in Berlin earlier this month, has recently been put on at the Monnaie in Brussels. A French reviewer praises the "dazzling light " and "clear and sensual orchestraion (à la lumière éblouissante et à l’orchestration claire et sensuelle)" of the new score--a somewhat stripped-down and parsimonious work otherwise. I can't wait to hear it.

Musique classique : La Scène > [Scène] Lyrique > Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie > [Bruxelles] Une nouvelle ère à La Monnaie, seconde partie [20/09/2007]

Work-in-Progress

My friend Leslie Pietrzyk, a novelist and fellow hockey fan, has a terrific blog called Work-in-Progress--absolutely worth checking out. Her posts, on the writing life, are always carefully considered and informative. She's also a supernice person. Occasionally she asks for essays from friends, and, in conjunction with the publication of The Best American Science Writing 2007, she invited me to post. You can check it out here, and do take a tour of her blog while you visit.

In honor of her kindness, I hereby place her on my Blogroll--first and, so far, only.

Thursday, September 20, 2007

Plus Ca Change

"Italy's cultural system is on the brink of collapse. Opera in Italy is a museum with dusty exhibits. But it used to be the country with the greatest composers, artists and singers! I hardly perform there anymore."--Cecilia Bartoli, in an interview with the German newspaper Der Tagesspiegel, Sept. 14, 2007.

"Italy, my dear friend, is more enchanting from a distance than close at hand. The theaters have lost much of their former splendor. The art of music, the art of song, no longer flourish as they once did, and the future does not look promising for Italian singers. The works of the masters are utterly exhausted, and one sees no young talent emerging to replace them."--Adolphe Nourrit, in a letter to the bass Gustave Euzet, January, 1839 (quoted in The Great Tenor Tragedy by Henry Pleasants).

In Today's Feuilletons - signandsight