by Sedgwick Clark
Three Operas
Far be it for this occasional operagoer to butt heads with Peter G. Davis in a work I barely know. “What are you doing at an Italian opera performance?” he asked me in feigned horror on opening night of the Met’s revival of Verdi’s Macbeth (3/15). “I’m here for the conducting—why else?” I replied, and was pleased to read in his Musicalamerica.com review LINK that we agreed on Gianandrea Noseda’s “maximum of lyrical intensity and dramatic energy—Verdi conducting doesn’t come much better than this.” (Why isn’t Noseda conducting regularly at the New York Philharmonic???) On the other hand, Peter also praised Adrian Noble’s “bold and fearless” 2007 updating of Shakespeare’s Scotland to “a fantasy world that suggests a period roughly around the end of World War II.” Such concepts alienate me; I believe that an intelligent audience will have no difficulty apprehending the composer’s intention in a traditional staging. Most of the time, therefore, my eyes were glommed onto the MetTitles. Thomas Hampson conveyed the weak-willed Macbeth well, if a bit reticently. Verdi said that vocal beauty was not important for Lady M, and Nadja Michael filled the bill; but she emanates sex and temperament aplenty, and I look forward to hearing her in a more refined role—say, Salome or Wozzeck’s Marie. On CD my preference remains Leinsdorf’s 1959 Met recording on RCA with Leonard Warren, Leonie Rysanek, and Carlo Bergonzi.
No problems with the next evening at the Met (3/16)—a superbly sung L’Elisir d’Amore with Juan Diego Flórez (whose shenanigans when he drank the elixir were hilarious) and Mariusz Kwiecien in hot pursuit of Diana Damrau. Peter and I were equally charmed by the 1991 production’s pastel candied sets, but this Saturday matinee is their last hurrah. Catch it if you can!
Leon Botstein may look like a mortician when he takes his bows, but he was at his salesman best in extolling the virtues of the late-Romantic Austrian composer Franz Schmidt in a pre-concert lecture. Franz Who? “He was a fabulous composer.” The occasion was LB’s American Symphony unearthing of the composer’s Notre Dame—which, presumably for marketing reasons, was called “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” in the advertisements—at Carnegie Hall (3/18). “This is a terrific opera. . . . The music is spectacular. . . . It deserves a production.” To an audience member who asked why he was drawn to forgotten music, he said, wryly, “I like slow starters and also-rans. I hate prodigies and competition winners.” This was the personal Botstein we wish for on the podium, and darned if the opera didn’t deserve it. While I can’t agree that Notre Dame is “the equal of any opera on the stage today,” its Wagner-Bruckner-Strauss-Mahler harmonic impasto is a consistent pleasure to hear (“lovely” was the word most bandied around at intermission), and of course it has a compelling story. Let me add my vote to the reviews of Leslie Kandell in Musicalamerica.com LINK and Vivien Schweitzer in the Times that it does deserve a production and Botstein is the man to do it. His conducting and the orchestra’s playing had passion, commitment, and precision, and the singers were uniformly capable, with the leads more so: bass Burak Bilgili as Quasimodo, soprano Lori Guilbeau as Esmeralda, and baritone Stephen Powell as the Archdeacon. The Collegiate Chorale Singers were fine, although it would be nice if they could stand up in unison at curtain time.
Paganini Caprices Humanized
The prospect of hearing all 24 of Paganini’s devilishly difficult Caprices in a single evening, rat-a-tat-tat, seemed rather a chore on the face of it. But Chicago violinist Rachel Barton Pine invested the music with warmth and ease, without stinting an iota on the composer’s fabled virtuosity. Moreover, at suitable intervals she interspersed engaging, often witty comments about the works and the composer that kept the evening moving agreeably. For an encore she performed her own Introduction and Variations on “God Defend New Zealand.” The nearly full house at Rockefeller University’s acoustically attractive Caspary Auditorium (3/21), on the far easterly reaches of Manhattan, caused one to wonder why this talented artist—praised by Harris Goldsmith as a notable up and comer in the 2004 Musical America Directory—isn’t heard regularly at Carnegie Hall or Lincoln Center? Listen to her new Çedille CD “Capricho Latino” and see if you agree.
Murray Perahia, an “Old Master” at His Best
Few are the artists who can lure me back from the country prematurely to hear a Sunday afternoon concert of standards. Murray Perahia is one. Where many attend concerts to hear cherished artists, I’ve always been a repertoire man. My favorites mostly reside in the 20th century. But someone has to carry on tradition, and for my money no one can touch Perahia, as exemplified on Sunday afternoon at Avery Fisher Hall (3/25) in works by Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Schubert, and Chopin. Moreover, I much prefer solo piano in Fisher over Carnegie’s wetter acoustic, and at this concert Perahia’s American Steinway glowed with the tonal beauty and digital dexterity of the old masters at their best.
A Master Clarinetist at 27
Remember the name: Moran Katz. She’s terrific—a young Israeli clarinetist hailed by Harris Goldsmith in the 2011 Musical America Directory. He wrote of her “magnificent color, agility, and breath control” being “magically persuasive in the early Romantics,” and also of her devotion to contemporary music—all of which she demonstrated vividly in John Adams’s clarinet concerto, Gnarly Buttons, at Zankel Hall soon after the Perahia recital. It’s one of Adams’s most attractive works, witty, virtuosic, but also verging on profundity in the final movement, which Katz rendered movingly. There’s star quality here, waiting for the right management.
The admirable Ensemble ACJW, directed on this occasion by David Robertson, also impressed in Ligeti’s Chamber Concerto for 13 Instruments.
Looking Forward
My week’s scheduled concerts:
3/28 Carnegie Hall. San Francisco Symphony/Michael Tilson Thomas; Emanuel Ax, piano. Ruggles: Sun-Treader. Feldman: Piano and Orchestra. Ives: A Concord Symphony (orch. Brant).
3/29 Zankel Hall. Members of the San Francisco Symphony/Michael Tilson Thomas; Kiera Duffy, soprano; Paul Jacobs, organ; Mason Bates, electronics; Newband; Young People’s Chorus of New York City. Partch: Daphne of the Dunes. Mason Bates: Mass Transmission. Harrison: Concerto for Organ and Percussion Orchestra. Del Tredici: Syzygy.
3/30 Zankel Hall. Members of the San Francisco Symphony/Michael Tilson Thomas, host; Jeffrey Milarsky, conductor; Meredith Monk & Vocal Ensemble; Joan La Barbara, vocalist; Jeremy Denk, piano. Monk: Realm Variations. Reich: Music for Pieces of Wood. Foss: Echoi. Subotnick: Jacob’s Room: Monodrama.
4/2 Leonard Nimoy Thalia at Symphony Space. Cutting Edge Concerts/Victoria Bond, host. Danjam Orchestra, with Peter McNeely, piano; Rufus Müller, tenor; Jenny Lin, piano. Paul Barnes, piano. Daniel Jamieson: Phantasm; A Desperate Act. Jim McNeely: Tod und Feuer; Der Seiltänzer. Victoria Bond: Leopold Bloom’s Homecoming. N. Lincoln Hanks: Monstre Sacré.
4/3 Alice Tully Hall. Juilliard Orchestra/Esa-Pekka Salonen. Sibelius: Pohjola’s Daughter. Beethoven: Symphony No. 7.
Salzburg Coda
Friday, October 31st, 2014By ANDREW POWELL
Published: October 31, 2014
SALZBURG — Alexander Pereira is now gone from the main festival here, and two tenuous summers are in the offing before Markus Hinterhäuser replaces him as Intendant in 2017. His exit, under a cloud, ends a budget tempest but threatens reversals of worthy initiatives he took: lengthening the schedule to six weeks, deepening the commitment to sacred music, insisting on fresh stagings for opera. Pereira did not adapt to the old-boy (and old-girl) Salzburg bureaucracy but he restored an element of decisiveness that had been lacking since Karajan and later Mortier ran things. And despite fiscal overages and gripes about casting, his programs were a Karajanesque blend of tradition and vetted novelty, exemplified on three August days in the paired artistry of Vilde Frang and Michail Lifits; concerts by the Mozarteum-Orchester and the Academy of St Martin In the Fields; and new productions of Fierrabras and La Cenerentola.
Peter Stein, wise yet out of fashion, told Schubert’s 1823 Carolingian tale straight, using monochrome flats and simple lighting tricks to paint and speed between differentiated, handsome scenes (Aug. 22, Haus für Mozart). His target: the seated theater audience, not roving DVD cameras. He stressed Christian values of compassion and peace, contrasting the vehemence of the Moors; Fierrabras was Fierrabras, destined for conversion, not an impersonation of the composer. But coarse horn playing marred the presentation of a score much dependent on that instrument, and conductor Ingo Metzmacher tended to allow the Vienna Philharmonic winds to swamp the luscious strings, the orchestra to swamp the singers. Of the six principal roles, Julia Kleiter’s silvery-voiced Emma did the music fullest justice. The Vienna State Opera Chorus sang magnificently, also magically.
Taking for La Cenerentola the opposite but these days routine path, Damiano Michieletto deployed hard-surface, camera-friendly sets and updated Perrault’s story (Aug. 23 matinee, same venue). His homey cafeteria, “Buffet Don Magnifico,” buzzed with credible characters and tightly calibrated action; a startling scenic transformation added depth. Angelina, in her middle years, found love at first sight while busing tables, and goodness triumphed at the close through gifts to her wedding guests: rubber gloves, buckets and soap; as those guests were put to work, she blew bubbles. In a probable farewell to this signature role, Cecilia Bartoli (48) exerted feisty charm, her sound opulent, the vocal ornaments expressive and fresh as ever. Mirroring her comedic sincerity, Javier Camarena sang a stylish Ramiro and a modest one, too, until Sì, ritrovarla io giuro. This he peppered with loud highs and a long last C brightened in a timbral arc. The basso roles were contrasted: Enzo Capuano a bully of a Magnifico with lucid patter and smooth legato, Ugo Guagliardo a cupid-magician Alidoro of rich tones but somewhat graceless phrasing, and Nicola Alaimo a robust Dandini who overplayed his comic hand. Jean-Christophe Spinosi and the Brest-based Ensemble Matheus rose to the witty occasion.
Tour appearances by the 55-year-old London orchestra (same day, at the Felsenreitschule) haven’t always validated the high standards of its early records. This one did. Tomo Keller’s work as guest concertmaster blazed with virtuosity and seemed to ignite all desks. Although uncredited by the festival, he led Mendelssohn’s D-Minor Sinfonia (1822) by himself, finding elegance and mature ideas as well as precision in the four movements. Seven winds and conductor Murray Perahia then joined the 24 strings for an exceptionally refined reading of Haydn’s Symphony No. 77 (1782) filled with neat contrasts and fresh turns of phrase; the airy Andante sostenuto could have spun for an hour without losing appeal. After the break, Beethoven’s Fifth Piano Concerto (1809) emerged in fluid streams of sound, the rhetoric measured, the attacks vivid. Perahia deftly balanced poetry and drama, piano and orchestra, signaling with his arms when not occupied at the keyboard.
Ivor Bolton, beloved Chefdirigent of the Mozarteum-Orchester, sandwiched ardent arias of Gluck and Mozart between G-Minor Sturm und Drang symphonies (Aug. 24 matinee, Mozarteum), packing quite a punch. Resilient rhythms, vigorous angular themes and tidy dynamic shifts enlivened Haydn’s Symphony No. 39 (1765), capped by an Allegro di molto that expertly whirred along. In Mozart’s Symphony No. 25, written eight years later and inspired by the Haydn, Bolton elicited equal cohesion and propulsion, favoring tautness over repose, but the volume of sound pushed the limits of the 800-seat hall. Rolando Villazón brought astounding degrees of verbal expression and ample vocal luster to his three Mozart arias — Per pietà, non ricercate (1783), Or che il dover (1766) and, as vehicle for clowning, Con ossequio, con rispetto (1775) — buoyed and gamely resisted by Bolton and the orchestra. In Gluck’s Unis dès la plus tendre enfance, from Iphigénie en Tauride (1779), the tenor delivered the French words with operatic flair.
After the recital by Frang and Lifits (same day, same venue), one woman asserted aloud that Frang couldn’t possibly play the violin to full potential for lack of flow in her body movements, while another attendee bemoaned pianist Lifits’s gum-chewing facial mannerisms. What was certain was that two unique personalities had made music. They combined best in the pieces that opened and closed their program, Brahms’s Scherzo for the Frei aber einsam Sonata (1853) and Strauss’s similarly confident and classically formed E-flat Sonata (1888). Results: clear lines, passionate phrasing, ideal balances, a definite sense of structure. Lifits could be heavy in the left hand and seemed not always aware of his partner, but she proved able to enlarge her tone when she chose, adding volatility. The stylistic jump from Brahms to Mozart’s Violin Sonata in E-flat, K481 (1785), had the effect of Frang receding: Tashkent-born Lifits played as if on solid ground and the Oslo violinist looked happy to let him dominate, especially in the crisply articulated Allegretto. Beethoven’s A-Major Sonata, Op. 30/1 (1802), after the Pause, suffered slow tempos and a lack of drama.
Where the Salzburg Festival goes now, post Pereira, will be partly evident next month when the 2015 summer plans are announced. In all likelihood there will be cost-cutting to counter past overages, such as for 2013 when a reported $5 million went out the door beyond the approved $76 million. Once Hinterhäuser fills the Intendant void, the danger is of a well-bookkept but artistically dithering institution — a return, in effect, to qualities of the ten summers preceding Pereira’s 2012 arrival; Hinterhäuser, a pianist, participated in management for some of those years and is not known as a forceful character. The compass at present is with Sven-Eric Bechtolf, grandly styled “Artistic Master Planner 2015 and 2016” (a promotion from heading just the theater programming), and the festival’s indomitable Cost-Cutter-in-Chief, a.k.a. Präsidentin, Helga Rabl-Stadler.
Photo © Silvia Lelli
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Tags:Academy of St Martin In the Fields, Alexander Pereira, Bartoli, Beethoven, Brahms, Commentary, Damiano Michieletto, Ensemble Matheus, Enzo Capuano, Felsenreitschule, Fierrabras, Gluck, Haus für Mozart, Haydn, Helga Rabl-Stadler, Ingo Metzmacher, Ivor Bolton, Javier Camarena, Jean-Christophe Spinosi, Julia Kleiter, La Cenerentola, Markus Hinterhäuser, Mendelssohn, Michail Lifits, Mozarteum, Mozarteumorchester, Murray Perahia, Nicola Alaimo, Peter Stein, Review, Richard Strauss, Rolando Villazón, Rossini, Salzburg, Salzburg Festival, Salzburger Festspiele, Schubert, Sven-Eric Bechtolf, Tomo Keller, Ugo Guagliardo, Vienna Philharmonic, Vienna State Opera Chorus, Vilde Frang, Wiener Philharmoniker, Wiener Staatsopernchor, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
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