Posts Tagged ‘München’

BR’s Full-Bodied Vin Herbé

Friday, March 18th, 2016

By ANDREW POWELL Published: March 18, 2016 MUNICH — It would be a novelty to hear Le vin herbé the way composer Frank Martin conceived it. The 1940 secular chamber oratorio reportedly soars when realized in concert by twelve French-singing voices, double string trio, double bass and piano — its lean forces yet complex harmony […]

Read the rest of this article »

Six Husbands in Tow

Sunday, March 13th, 2016

By ANDREW POWELL Published: March 13, 2016 MUNICH — Some contracts come with strings attached, others with husbands. In a remarkable set of coincident artistic priorities for company boss Nikolaus Bachler — or a broad capitulation — Bavarian State Opera’s 2016–17 season, announced today, features no fewer than six divas in performance with their husbands. […]

Read the rest of this article »

Die Fledermaus Returns

Sunday, January 31st, 2016

By ANDREW POWELL Published: January 31, 2016 MUNICH — Three years ago Bavarian State Opera’s yearly Silvester performances of Die Fledermaus came to a sudden, poorly excused halt. Never mind that they were a global signature of the company; Carlos Kleiber famously led ten of them. As substitutes, the powers-that-be provided La traviata (Verdi was […]

Read the rest of this article »

Muti Crowns Charles X

Thursday, January 14th, 2016

By ANDREW POWELL Published: January 14, 2016 MUNICH — Framed by an andante Kyrie and a beguiling instrumental Communion marked grave, Cherubini’s 1825 Coronation Mass for Charles X is one handsome piece of music. No, its movements are not exactly symphonic. They sound bonded to the flow of the service, so much so that unset […]

Read the rest of this article »

Poulenc Heirs v. Staatsoper

Thursday, January 7th, 2016

By ANDREW POWELL Published: January 7, 2016 MUNICH — Bavarian State Opera will defy the heirs of Francis Poulenc and proceed with revival performances of its literally explosive staging of Dialogues des Carmélites later this month, the company said today. The 2010 production by Dmitri Tcherniakov departs from the scheme of the composer and the […]

Read the rest of this article »

Trifonov’s Rach 3 Cocktail

Wednesday, December 30th, 2015

By ANDREW POWELL Published: December 30, 2015 MUNICH — The first-movement cadenza exploded out of its context in Daniil Trifonov’s novel reading here Dec. 14 of Rachmaninoff’s Third Piano Concerto. This meant, among other compromises, a slight suppression of everything that preceded it, including the 130-measure development. Trifonov understated the folksy first subject and sped […]

Read the rest of this article »

Maestro, 62, Outruns Players

Sunday, November 22nd, 2015

By ANDREW POWELL Published: November 22, 2015 MUNICH — At five o’clock last Sunday afternoon, Munich time, three Mariinsky Orchestras began to play. Two of them launched into Pikovaya dama and Die Zauberflöte at the Mariinsky complex in St Petersburg. The third, here at the Gasteig, opened the accompaniment to a witty Shchedrin vocalise. Such […]

Read the rest of this article »

With Viotti, MRO Looks Back

Thursday, November 19th, 2015

By ANDREW POWELL Published: November 19, 2015 MUNICH — Eleven years ago the late Marcello Viotti quit as chief conductor of the Münchner Rundfunk-Orchester because he foresaw existential cuts in its budget. Happily the MRO survived, and today thrives. Tasked with exploring rare repertory, it is artistically the livelier of BR’s two orchestras, forcibly more […]

Read the rest of this article »

MPhil: €24,200 for Refugees

Monday, October 5th, 2015

By ANDREW POWELL Published: October 5, 2015 MUNICH — Members of the Munich Philharmonic, positioned as the “orchestra of the city,” have privately raised money for work and supplies in the refugee crisis here. Together with colleagues at the Philharmonischer Chor München, their management teams, and new MPhil chief conductor Valery Gergiev, the musicians amassed […]

Read the rest of this article »

Ettinger Drives Aida

Wednesday, September 30th, 2015

By ANDREW POWELL Published: September 30, 2015 MUNICH — Bavarian State Opera’s irredeemably banal 2009 Aida has been spiffed up and its awkward action scheme apparently restudied for a fall run here. Even so, the honors at Monday’s performance (Sept. 28) belonged firmly with the musicians, instrumental and vocal. Mannheim-based conductor Dan Ettinger exerted a […]

Read the rest of this article »