New Jersey Symphony. Xian Zhang – conductor; Ning Feng – violin. November 7, 2019.

Prudential Hall at NJPAC, Newark, NJ.  Orchestra (Seat J107, $25).

Program

Capriccio espangnol, Op. 34 (1887) by Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908).

La joie de la souffrance (The Joy of Suffering) for Violin and Orchestra (2016-17) by Chen (b. 1951).

Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso in A Minor, Op. 28 (1863) by Saint-Saens (1835-1921).

Suite No. 2 from El Sombrero de tres picos (The Three-Cornered Hat) (1916-19) by de Falla (1876-1946).

NJSO was offering deeply discounted tickets for this (and the next) concert, so I got tickets for both.  Anne couldn’t make this one, we plan on attending together the one in early December.

The title of the concert is “Spanish- and French-Inspired Showpieces.”  The connection may not be completely obvious for all the pieces on the program.  I will get to those connections in due course.  There probably is no need to further understand the program – it is one of crowd-pleasers, by-and-large.

Rimsky-Korsakov visited Spain only once, but all things Spanish were in vogue at the time he put this to music, which was around the time that he was doing the orchestration for Borodin’s Prince Igor.  Originally Rimsky-Korsakov set out to write a violin fantasy, but settled on this form instead.  That would explain why the concertmaster had to do so many solo passages, some rather challenging technically.  Wyrick managed that without any problems, but could sound quite a bit louder. The piece consists of five movements played without pause: Alborada (Morning Song); Variazioni (Variations); Alborada; Scena e canto Gitano (Scene and Gypsy Song); and Fandango asturiano (Asturian Fandango).  It was a lively performance, and enjoyable, even with the occasional imperfection.

As for the piece by Chen Qigang, the title certainly is French.  A victim of the Cultural Revolution, he didn’t get to start his music education until 1977, and in 1984 went to Paris to become a student of Messiaen (the last one, it turns out).  So it won’t be an exaggeration to say there is much French influence in his music.  There is also a heavy dosage of Chinese in this work.  The Program Notes talks about the use of the old Chinese melody “Yangguan Sandie,” although one could make the case the composition makes use of several other Chinese tunes (perhaps some were invented by Chen).

I jotted down these phrases during the performance: started Chinese enough; moved away after about five minutes; back to a Chinese tune again, this time with flourish; cadenza full of double-stops; slow section with violin and clarinet; at about 17 minutes melody shifts to orchestra; violin has a lot of flourishes; ends calm and quiet.  One thing about Feng’s playing: his intonation was great.

Ning Feng after performing Chen Qigang's Joy of Suffering.

Notice there was no reference about hearing any suffering in my notes, which is interesting as the power of suggestion usually works very effectively on me.  Compared to the Salonen piece Gemini I heard just the day before, Joy of Suffering was much easier to get.  (I realize this is comparing a violin concerto with work for a large orchestra, and Salonen also writes compelling concertos.)

After the intermission, Feng played Saint-Saens Introduction and Rondo.  He had this habit of stressing individual notes that detracted a bit from the otherwise crowd favorite.

Manuel de Falla was one of the composers that lifted the level of Spanish music; his own stated goal was to achieve a comparable legacy to what Grieg did for Norwegian music.  Tonight’s Suite consists of three different dances: The Neighbor’s Dance (Seguidillas); The Miller’s Dance (Farruca), and Final Dance (Jota).  They together constitute the major numbers in the ballet “Three-Cornered Hat.”  Here the power of suggestion was in force: one could definitely feel a strong Spanish component to the tunes.

Zhang and the Orchestra at the end of the concert.  They have a new Principal Bass by the name of Ha Young Jung.  The former principal passed away at the beginning of last season.

This was also a short concert, with the four pieces adding up to about 61 minutes of performance time.

I actually thought to myself this afternoon’s concert (it started at 1:30 pm) was as enjoyable as the one by NY Phil last night.  Perhaps it was not as intellectually stimulating, but sometimes that is a good thing.  Today's audience seemed very enthusiastic, and attendance was okay (still quite a few empty seats).

I took the train to Newark Penn station and NJPAC was about a 10-minute walk from the train station.  The walk to Newark Broad Street Station took me past some abandoned area – I was glad it was early afternoon, in full daylight – there I caught a train to Hoboken to meet up with Anne to go to a Met opera that evening.  That will be the subject of the next blog entry.

New York Philharmonic. Esa-Pekka Salonen – conductor. November 6, 2019.

David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center.  Orchestra (Seat U1, $54).

Program

Ragtime (Well-Tempered) for Large Orchestra (1921) by Hindemith (1895-1963).

Two Chorale Preludes (ca. 1708-17, revised ca. 1740) by J.S. Bach (1685-1750), orch. A. Schoenberg (1922)

Gemini (2018/19) by Salonen (b. 1958).

Symphony, Mathis der Maler (1934) by Hindemith.

Yesterday (I started writing this on November 7) and the day before I went to two concerts and one opera, so I would have to rush through these reviews before I forget all about the performances.  Realizing this may be a problem, I did jot down a few notes during the concerts, we shall see how helpful they turn out to be.

If anyone had any qualms about the lack of “modern” music in the last NY Phil concert (the NY Times music critic was one), this concert more than made up for it.  Per the Playbill, both Ragtime and Gemini are premiered in this series; Mathis der Maler was last performed by NY Phil in 2002, in Hong Kong; and the Chorale Preludes? March, 1958, more than 60 years ago.  So I dare venture to say most in the audience hadn’t heard any of the pieces before.

The entire program was quite short, with Ragtime at 4 minutes, Chorale Preludes at 7 (played without pause), Gemini at 23, and Mathis der Maler at 25; totaling less than an hour.  The music all looked complex (if the instruments on stage were any hint), and indeed sounded complex.  The orchestra had to have put in much practice time to prepare for it.  And then they can probably forget all about it as they probably will be retired the next time these pieces show up.

Which is what I basically have done with the music.  However, the stories behind them – such as they were – were somewhat intriguing.  A lot of what I am about to jot down is from the Playbill, and Salonen also talked a bit about the genesis of Gemini.

Gemini started with Salonen hearing a post-grunge (whatever that means) tune in a Paris restaurant, the rhythm (he had the bassoon demonstrate it) was used in various tempos throughout Pollux.  Another source was Salonen’s fascination of the lines from “Sonnets to Orpheus” by Rilke: “There rose a tree.  O Pure transcendence! O Orpheus sings! O tall tree in the ear!”  Don’t worry if the lines don’t make sense, they don’t to Salonen either, other than the desire he had to combine art and nature.  As he was writing the music, he found two musical identities (he called that a dichotomy) emerging that couldn’t be combined, and thought of the two main stars (Pollux and Castor) in the Gemini Constellation.  As such Pollux oscillates between cloud-like formations and Castor gesticulates wildly, often in extreme registers.

At this time of the year Gemini shows up late evening, to the left of Orion as they clear the east horizon.  Clearly visible are the two brightest stars; I never learned their names, until now.  The mother of the twins was Leda, and the fathers were a Sparta king (Castor) and Zeus (Pollux). (These Greek myths don’t always make sense.) When Castor as a mortal died in battle, Pollux gave him half of his immortality, so the twins now spend half their time on Mount Olympus and in Hades.  Astronomers have determined that Pollux is the 17^th brightest star and is an evolved orange giant about 34 light-years from the Sun.  Castor is 51 light years away and is actually a sextuplet star system.  It is the 44^th brightest.

Gemini Constellation.  Jupiter being a planet moves in and out of this configuration.

The instrumentation list in the Playbill is quite long, but I could see some percussion instruments, especially the two pairs of drums at the corners.  The piece is undoubtedly technically difficult, just like Salonen’s concertos for the violin and the cello.  However, it was much more difficult to “get”.  Yes, I could listen for the moods as he described them, and could clearly tell when Pollux transitioned to Castor, but I couldn’t gleam any kind of message from the music.  And I felt sorry for the hard work the orchestra had to put in, and the little they had to show for it.  At some point the cellos were furiously pounding away but could barely be heard above the rest of the orchestra.  Even with the rhythmic underpinning demonstrated, I had trouble picking it up during the actual performance.

Hindemith fled Germany in 1938, but he was already blacklisted around 1934, while he was in the process of composing the three-hour opera Mathis der Maler (Matthias the Painter).  He did use some of the material in the crafting of a Symphony of that name that was successfully performed in Berlin.  The work describes several panels the Painter’s Isenheim Altarpiece.  The first movement is designated Engelkonzert (Angelic Concert): In quiet motion – Fairly lively half-notes).  The second movement is Grablegung (Entombment): Very slow.  The last movement is Versuchung des heiligen Antonius (Temptation of St. Anthony): Very slow, not in strict time – Very lively – Slow-lively – Very lively.

Perhaps Hindemith felt a parallel between his life and that of Mathis’s as the latter’s support of the Peasants’ Revolution in Germany during the Reformation caused him the patronage of the Cardinal-Archbishop of Mainz.

In looking up the altarpiece I discovered that I didn’t know as much about altarpieces as I thought I did.  The Isenheim one has leaves that can fold and thus display different paintings.  St. Anthony the Great was a third century Egyptian monk who endured temptation in many different realms.

The piece was reasonably easy to get (with the help of the tempo markings).  The last movement was supposed to be a dream or a hallucination, but not quite at the level of Symphonie Fantastique.

St. Anthony's Temptation in the Isenheim Altarpiece.

The other two pieces have some relationship with Bach, revered by both Schoenberg and Hindemith.  Schoenberg’s chorale preludes were premiered by the NY Phil in 1922, and the Program Notes ran five pages (for seven minutes of music).  The two chorales are “Deck thyself, my soul, with gladness” and “Come God, Creator, Holy Spirit.”  The Playbill contains Schoenberg’s view on the phrasing as 1. To apportion correct relative weights within the lines, 2. At times to reveal the motivic work, at others to obscure it, and 3.  To ensure that each part exercises consideration, in terms of dynamics, for all the other parts, and for the sound as a whole (transparency).  So there is a method to the madness.  While one could definitely tell the orchestration is not by Bach (large orchestra), I couldn’t say it was by Schoenberg as the tunes sounded tonal.  One drawback: the solo passages sounded weak against the orchestra.

Hindemith also revered Bach, and paid homage to him by imagining Ragtime the way Bach might embrace the 20^th century, and how Bach would including the practices of the day if he were to write the Well-Tempered Clavier.  It was a lively and enjoyable 4 minutes.

Salonen and the New York Philharmonic.  Note the two pairs of raised drums in the back.  They were not listed in any of the Instrumentation lists for the pieces performed tonight.

I bought tonight’s ticket through TodayTix at a considerable discount.  I met up with Roger at Cheesequake Rest Area before I caught the 6:16 pm train to NY.  The train was running about 5 minutes late, so I didn’t get to NY Penn until 7:15 pm.  And I had to pick up the ticket at the box office.  All said and done, I made it by about 2 minutes, thanks to the NY Phil tradition of starting a few minutes late.  Dinner was sandwich I brought along.

New Jersey Symphony. Markus Stenz - conductor; Juho Pohjonen - piano. November 2, 2019.

Count Basie Theater, Red Bank, NJ (Rear Orchestra, Seat U116, $36).

Program

“Chaos” from Les Elemens (1737) by Rebel (1666-1747).

Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 16 (1868-69, revised through 1907) by Grieg (1843-1907).

Symphony No. 2 in D Major, Op. 73 (1877) by Brahms (1833-1897).

When Lacombe was its music director, I often described the NJSO as a “Jekyll and Hyde” orchestra, doing great when Lacombe was conducting, not so great when guests took the podium.  One thing about the NJSO today, it does quite well under the batons of guest conductors, even in the case of a conductor who was the “lead the music” type.  Today’s performance provided affirmation, for me at least, that orchestras can, and do, improve.

There is no other to describe Jean-Fery Rebel, a French composer, as being obscure.  I had never heard of him, and this NJSO series was the premiere performance of this short piece.  The Program Notes describes Rebel as from a French musical dynasty, and was trained as a violinist and harpsichordist, and a member of the Vingt-quatre Violons du Roy string orchestra.  He composed “Chaos” at age 71 to add to the dance suite Les Elemens.  As the Notes says, the dissonances were revolutionary for the time; however, it is a stretch to say they could have been mistaken for music composed two centuries later.  All in all, it was an interesting piece, although I probably won’t recognize it if I were to listen to it again.

We heard the Grieg piano concerto performed in an NJSO concert about three years ago (October 2016).  My remark about the solo performance was that the soloist could do the melodies and the virtuoso well, but failed to string the passages into a coherent story.  Tonight’s was a completely different experience, instead of moving from highlight to highlight, the performance took the audience on a compelling journey from start to finish.  I do need to analyze the concerto more to catch the Schumann influence, though.

Puhjonen acknowledging the orchestra after Grieg's Piano Concerto.

The name Pohjonen sounded familiar.  He also looked familiar when he came on stage.  I was therefore surprised that I had heard him only once, in 2011, at a Mostly Mozart concert.  He certainly made a lot of improvement in the intervening eight years.  The MM Program Notes described him as “one of the brightest young instrumental talents to emerge from Finland;” today he is “one of today’s most exciting and vibrant instrumentalist.”  I have no quarrel with that.

I am quite familiar with Brahms’s second symphony and thus had a favorite “interpretation” in mind.  Tonight’s performance didn’t quite follow that script, but was nonetheless enjoyable.

This was Stenz’s conducting debut with the NJSO.  As remarked at the beginning of this entry, he certainly pulled it off.  He was quite energetic, and his “lead the beat” style resulted in some minor precision problems, but the orchestra responded very well to his direction.

Stenz and the NJSO.

We were seated in the rear orchestra section, but had a good view of the stage.  The attendance was quite good at this level, I wonder what it was like in the balcony.

New York Philharmonic. Philippe Jordan – conductor; Julia Fischer – violin. October 31, 2019.

David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center.  (Orchestra 3, Seat HH105, $46.50).

Program

Symphony No. 1 in D major, Op. 25, Classical (1916-17) by Prokofiev (1891-1953).

Concerto in E minor for Violin and Orchestra, Op. 64 (1844) by Mendelssohn (1809-47).

Symphony No. 7 in A major, Op. 92 (1811-12) by Beethoven (1770-1827).

Just as with the NJ Symphony concert a few weeks ago, I was looking forward to this first NY Phil concert we were about to attend.  I was not quite sure what to make of the Program.  Both the Mendelssohn and Beethoven pieces are staples of the concert repertoire.  I don’t recall having heard the Prokofiev symphony live before, but it is on one of the CDs in our car, and gets played quite often (more because we have only a couple of CDs in the car than anything else), and it is a short and pleasant composition.

Prokofiev’s first symphony was written when Prokofiev was a student at the St. Petersburg Conservatory, and “would earn an enduring spot in the orchestral repertoire … and in the history books as a forebear of the widespread neoclassicism of the 1920s.”  The short symphony (less than 15 minutes) consists of Allegro con brio, Larghetto, Gavotte: Non troppo allegro, and Finale: Molto vivace.

If one had listened to one version of performance many times, that version tends to be the standard by which other performances are measured.  But that’s not what I came away with at all with this delightful, fast, and light-hearted rendition.  The orchestra sounded precise and crisp, just like how Mozart would have wanted it.  After listening to this piece I was ready to settle in for an enjoyable evening of familiar music.

(I did hear this performed by NJ Symphony a couple of years ago, with Zhang conducting, and liked that performance too.)

Julia Fischer’s name is very familiar.  A search of my blog returned only one instance where I heard her perform, and that was in 2008, when she was in her twenties.  The aspect about her that was special was that she’s both a concert violinist and concert pianist, and was at that time the youngest professor at some school.  Interestingly, that was the only concert of hers that I had ever attended.

More than ten years down the road, that’s still her career path.  And by all indications tonight she could get most of Mendelssohn right, one could quibble with the interpretation (e.g., tempo), the occasional off-pitch here, or that some notes were played too softly, but it was a well-done performance.  That Mendelssohn’s concerto highlights the melodic and technical skills of the violinist, and she took advantage of it.

Fischer and Jordan after performance of Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto.

How does one distinguish between a tier 1 level soloist and a superstar?  She didn’t come across as such tonight, perhaps it was the occasional mistake, or the inability to engage the audience more, or may be it was simply projecting an aura of confidence.  I don’t know if it would make her a superstar in the instrument, but I would say trying to straddle both the violin and piano may not get her there.  Even though a typical soloist does only a few pieces per season, one still has to live and breathe the art day in and day out.  What you want to be able do with a violin is quite different from with a piano (e.g., latter has no pitch issues, and interval jumps are done very differently).  Not that any one needs any advice from me, but I wanted to write down this observation.

She performed Paganini's Caprice 24 as an encore piece.  It was well done, but not quite up to how Hadelich did it a few years back, which I described as "perfect."

Frank Huang stayed for the Mendelssohn.  I do wonder if he sometimes should excuse himself as I am sure many (some?) in the audience were wondering if he could do a better job.

Many people think of the film Immortal Beloved when it comes to Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony, specifically the slow movement.  It indeed is one of the more lovely movements in the repertoire, conjuring up thoughts of regret, introspection, and longing.  However, it would be unfortunate not to appreciate the other movements which are not as “sturm und drang” and Beethoven’s odd-numbered symphonies.  I very much enjoyed the piece.

Curtain Call after Beethoven's Seventh Symphony.

We last saw Philippe Jordan conducting the Met’s Ring Cycle in the spring.  Today we had a good view of the stage, and noticed that he conducted with a lot of energy and movement.

Here is the New York Times review.

Today’s is Halloween, so we left candy outside our door for the late trick or treaters, and I was surprised at how many people were out and about around the Lincoln Center area.  A block of 69^th was dedicated to pedestrians.  I, for one, can’t understand the point of walking around in a costume.

New Jersey Symphony. Xian Zhang – conductor. October 12, 2019.

Count Basie Center, Red Bank.  (Balcony, Seat Balcony J104, $36).

Program

Pomp and Circumstances Military March in D Major, Op. 39, No. 1 (1901) by Elgar (1857-1934).

Hiraeth (with film by Mark DeChiazza) (2015) by Snider (b. 1973).

The Planets, Suite for Large Orchestra, Op. 32 (1914-16) – An HD Odyessey by Holst (1874-1934).

Artists

Newark Voices, Heather J. Buchanan, conductor.

Film of Planets produced by Duncan Copp.

This was the opening series of NJ Symphony’s 2019/20 season, and our last orchestral concert was a Mostly Mozart in August.  I was looking forward to it.

For a season opener the program is somewhat unexpected.  Two of the pieces were by British composers; and there was a NJSO premiere of a piece by a Princeton (town, not University) composer.  I vaguely recall the National Anthem being played at the beginning of last season, although I didn’t note that in my blog entry.  Zhang did talk a bit about the program before the concert, and introduced the composer to the audience.  The other “new” aspect was the projection of videos onto the screen with the music.  A little more on that later.

Pomp and Circumstances is often played during graduation ceremonies (usually the middle portion), and is as good as any other piece of “incidental” music to start a program.

Hiraeth is a Welsh word that per the Program Notes translates roughly into “homesickness tinged with grief or sadness over the lost or departed; a mix of longing, yearning, nostalgia, wistfulness.”  Sarah Kirkland Snider, born and currently resides in Princeton, spent considerable time in North Carolina as a kid, and the music was further informed by the funeral of her father.  In the Program Notes there are some references to specific incidences, and the film showed a few additional ones (frog being released, rain drops, cigarette smoking, and images of her father’s twin brother come to mind).  One can certainly conjure up feelings and images of hiraeth, but I am also sure most would have different musical ideas.  Putting feelings into music is always a tricky thing, sometimes you “resonate,” sometimes you don’t.  In this case I didn’t resonate.

And as far as I know, neither Kirkland nor Snider is a Welsh family name.

Having a video playing at the same time also taxed my “appreciation bandwidth.”  I could either pay attention to the video, or focus on the music, but not both.  And between visual and aural, visual won.  Even though the video wasn’t particularly exciting, I still had to remind myself the music was not the accompaniment, but was the main “attraction.”  There was a continuity to the music that bordered on being monotonous, and some passages reminded me of Philip Glass, and that may or may not be a compliment.

Mark DeChiazza and Sarah Kirkland Snider after the performance of Hiraeth.

Anyhow, I didn’t think it was a waste of time, but have no urge to hear it again.

Most people know about Holst’s The Planets, including me, but other than isolated movements (Jupiter probably is the most popular), haven’t heard the composition in its entirety.  Tonight we got the chance to do so.

Holst wrote seven movements, he skipped Earth, and Pluto wasn’t discovered until 1930 or so. Different section principals got to perform some pleasant solo passages, in that sense this could be considered a “concerto for orchestra.”  The movements are (i) Mars, the Bringer of War; (ii) Venus, the Bringer of Peace; (iii) Mercury, the Winged Messenger; (iv) Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity; (v) Saturn, the Bringer of Old Age; (vi) Uranus, the Magician; and (vii) Neptune, the Mystic.  The last movement had a treble choir singing (no words), supposedly to add to the mysticism.

Overall, the music was pleasant.  For each movement actual images of the specific planet were projected onto the screen.  As I sat through the images, I was struck by how little I knew about the planets beyond the superficial facts.  For example, I knew about the rings of Saturn, and that the rings are very thin, and that it has a contingent of moons.  However, I wasn’t sure if the planet was gaseous (it is, but has a solid core), or how many moons there are (60 or more; Wikipedia claims 82), or what they are made of (Titan is a rocky core with layers of ice).

Now it would be quite something if Holst had been writing the individual movements with this latest scientific information in mind.  He certainly couldn’t have.  Instead he was for instance probably trying to conjure up images of war with the Mars movement instead of trying to describe the rugged red planet as videoed by the rovers Spirit and Opportunity.  Someone with enough bandwidth for both the audio and visual components would end up with cognitive dissonance.

Newark Voices, a female vocal group, sang (without words) during the last movement.

The NJSO and the women’s group performed an encore: Ralph Vaugh Williams’ adaption of Greensleeves.

It’s clear I am not a fan of this sort of multi-media projection.  On the other hand, this seemed to be one of the better attended Count Basie NJSO concerts, so the NJSO may be onto something here.

Today was a relatively long day.  We left our house a bit before 11 am to go to Princeton for lunch with Tammy, and then attended Maryann’s birthday party in Little Silver.  We did have a bit of time to spare between that party and the concert, but not enough time that we could go back to South Amboy.  It was close to 11 pm when we got home.

Metropolitan Opera – Verdi’s Macbeth. October 8, 2019.

Metropolitan Opera at Lincoln Center.  Balcony (Seat A18, $125.50).

Story.  See previous post.

Conductor – Marco Armiliato.  Macbeth – Zeljko Lucic, Banguo – Ildar Abdrazakov, Lady Macbeth – Anna Netrebko, Duncan – Raymond Renault, Macduff – Matthew Polenzani.

This was the first event for us for this concert season (let’s say it started in September), and I had high expectations for it.  The music and the singing was certainly great, but the whole experience was not as fulfilling as I expected.

First the music, as described in the Program Notes, there aren’t a lot of hummable tunes (or any, for that matter) in this opera, but indeed the music is so integral to how the drama unfolds that one doesn’t quite notice this lack of hummability.  All the principals did superbly.  And the orchestra put in a great performance, starting with the dramatic overture that captured the tension that was to unfold.

Lucic was simply dependable, and he played the part of Macbeth well – from his initial hesitancy to eventually becoming comfortable with murdering his way to being the king.

Netrebko never ceases to amaze.  There is no doubt that she has a strong voice, but as Lady Macbeth there were some passages that called for a soft, high note (D-flat), and she pulled it off.  (In looking over my previous entry on this opera, from 2008, I remarked that Maria Guleghina shouted most of the time; so it is not a given.)  In Anna Bolena Netrebko proved that she could project her voice with her back towards the audience, and tonight she did equally well, lying down.  A case perhaps can be made that her acting skills have improved, but she should “keep her day job,” as that alone is worth the price of admission.

Polenzani as Macduff had one significant aria, and he made great use of that opportunity.

Curtain call.  Lucic, Netrebko, Chorus Master Palumbo and Armiliato are in the middle.  As far as I know, the green flag has nothing to do with Scotland or England.

Before I reread my 2008 blog entry, I had thought this was a new production, and that the one I saw back then was more “traditional.”  Not true, it was the same production – post-WWII Scotland.  Completely unnecessary as one can do away with the jeep and guns and the drama would be equally compelling.

Which brings me to the next point.  I appreciate Shakespeare as opera because (i) the story is simpler, like a Cliff notes version of the play; (ii) I have trouble with spoken Shakespearean English, and find the subtitles much easier to understand; and (iii) I am not that much into plays anyway.  However, sitting through this opera the second time, I thought the story was really a Cliff notes version, and the drama I felt last time wasn’t there anymore.  Yes, many parts of the story have to be cut, but there are so many repetitions in the opera that one wonders if they can be replaced with some of the cut plots to make for a more complex story.

When I did the CYO subscription for this Met season, I had picked a performance on a different date with Domingo as Macbeth and Netrebko as Lady Macbeth.  A schedule conflict made the switch to tonight’s performance necessary; and Domingo has withdrawn from his Met commitments due to allegations of inappropriate behavior.  A sad coda to an otherwise great career.

There was little traffic on the way up, so we got to the City at around 6 pm.  Coming home turned out to be slightly problematic as there was construction at Lincoln Tunnel.  After we exit the tunnel, Google Maps directed to the Turnpike’s western spur, it was a good thing I ignore that advice as that spur was very congested.

Given I came back a couple of days ago from a long overseas trip, I was surprisingly awake for the afternoon and the evening.

Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra – Louis Langree, conductor; Steven Osborne. August 9, 2019.

David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center.  Orchestra (Seat K114, $52.50).

Pre-Concert Recital

Sonata in E minor, Hob. XVI:34 (c. 1780) by Haydn.

Daisies, Op. 38, No. 3 (1916) by Rachmaninoff.

Etude-tableau in D minor, Op. 39, No. 8 & 9 (1916-17) by Rachmaninoff.

Yi-Nuo Wang, Piano

Program

Overture in D manor (1777) by Haydn (1732-1809).

Piano Concerto No. 2 in F major (1957) by Shostakovich (1906-1975).

Moz-Art a la Haydn (1977) by Schnittke (1934-1998).

      Ruggero Allifranchini and Laura Frautschi, violins

Symphony No. 35 in D major (“Haffner”) (1782) by Mozart (1756-1791).

The main concert has two classical pieces bookending two pieces by Russian composers.  One usually doesn’t associate either Shostakovich or Schnittke with Haydn or Mozart, but the Annotator definitely made a plausible (albeit short) case for such a sentiment.

The very short (5 minute) overture is probably interesting in its own right, and it also allow the (not too) late-comers a chance to be seated.

If the program didn’t state the composer of the piano concerto was Shostakovich, most people in the audience probably wouldn’t be able to guess the authorship.  For one, the melodies were easy to get, and quite traditional in their tonality and singability.  The piano sounded percussive quite often, and produced a “pitter-patter” effect that was interesting and pleasant.  It wasn’t an easy piece by any measure, and Osborne dispatched the notes with ease.  The interplay with the orchestra was good, although the orchestra was mostly in the role of accompanist.  As far as I could tell, there was only one cadenza (by Shostakovich), which sounded like a flourish by the soloist. The short concerto consists of three movements: Allegro, Andante, and Finale: Allegro.

Steven Osborne after performing Shostakovich's Second Piano Concerto.

The audience’s enthusiastic applause ended after a couple of curtain calls.  As people were getting ready to take a break, Osborne came out to do a piece that had quite a bit of jazz element to it.  And the piccolo player – who usually got little work as second flutist – certain earned her pay on this piece.

Our first encounter with Osborne was in Singapore, where he played the Britten piano concerto.  That was 2013.

If I connect my iPod to my car the first song that comes up would be a violin concerto by Schnittke (by virtue of his first name being Alfred).  I didn’t know he was Russian.  The 12-minute piece had only string players (maybe 15?) with Allifranchini and Frautschi listed as the leads.  It began in complete darkness (well, the Exit signs are always lit) with only Langree visible.  I don’t know how to describe Schnittke’s violin concerto, and I must have heard it many times.  I won’t even attempt to describe this one.  Visually the violins and violas move about, with one episode where the leads scared the others back to where they were originally.  And the piece ended with the violins and violas exiting the stage.  Somehow this reminded me of something I had written about, and a search of my blog found an entry on the same piece in 2014, with same cast of characters.  I must say that writeup was better than this one, getting lazy with age here.

Langree with Allifranchini and Frautschi.

Allifranchini’s violin actually sounded very good, Frautschi’s was a bit weak.

The Haffner Symphony was distilled by a serenade Mozart wrote for patrons in Salzburg after he moved to Vienna, in celebration of the Haffner family being elevated to aristocracy.  Mozart subsequently reduced and modified the score to this symphony; I guess he was also a recycler, although not nearly as much as Haydn did, from what I can tell.  The movements are Allegro con spirit, Andante, Menuetto, and Presto.

I expected better from the orchestra, especially under Langree.  The whole thing just sounded muddled, which in my view is the cardinal sin in a Mozart performance.  To be fair, there were quite a few enjoyable moments as Mozart music genius came through nonetheless.

The whole cast for Mozart's Haffner Symphony.

For my German class (Freshman in college) we had to read these simple biographies on people like Mozart and Goethe.  I still remember Mozart getting a cold shoulder from Haydn when he first moved to Vienna.  The Playbill describes the two as “two composers strongly linked by personal friendship, …”

We managed to see all MMFO performances this season.  The overall season didn’t quite meet the high hope I had at the beginning of the first concert; however, they were worth going to, and we lucked out with weather and traffic this season.

The pre-concert pianist Wang was born in Beijing and started piano lessons at four.  She is now a student at Julliard.  The Haydn sonata was about 10 minutes long and consists of Presto, Adagio, and Finale: Molto vivace.  The Rachminoff pieces were performed without pause, so I had trouble telling when one stopped and the other began.

Yi-Nuo Yang was the pre-concert recitalist.

Summer Friday afternoon traffic into New York can be brutal.  We took the train in, and the concert ended early enough that we caught the 9:38 pm train back to New Jersey.

Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra – Louis Langree, conductor; Joshua Bell, violin. August 6, 2019.

David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center.  Orchestra (Seat V7, $52.50).

Pre-Concert Recital

Alla Tarantella, from Five Pieces for String Quartet (1923) by Schulhoff (1894-1942).

Lento, from Cypresses (1865) by Dvorak.

Doina Oltului, Traditional Romanian (arr. Ljova, after Dinicu).

Budget Bulgar (2005) by Ljova (b. 1978).

Brooklyn Rider Quartet: Johnny Gandelsman, violin; Colin Jacobsen, violin; Nicholas Cords, viola; Michael Nicolas, cello.

Program

Symphony No. 38 in D major (“Prague”) (1786) by Mozart (1756-1791).

Dances of Galanta (1933) by Kodaly (1882-1967).

Violin Concerto in A minor (1879) by Dvorak (1841-1904).

As critical as I was about the last concert I attended, I wanted to heap a lot of praise on tonight’s concert.  Not only was the program well-performed, it was also a lot more exciting.

While Mozart’s Prague Symphony is popular, it is not as well-known as the Jupiter, which I heard on Sunday.  Tonight’s performance was head-and-shoulder better, a conclusion I drew a few measures into the piece.  The crispness was there, the contrast was there, the lightness was there; and – above all – the coherence was there.  I was happily following along as the orchestra went about its journey.  Langree was as energetic as Fischer, but managed to elicit a much better response from the orchestra.

The Orchestra had a delightful performance of Mozart's Prague Symphony.

One of the observations I have is concert pieces come in and out of vogue.  Dvorak’s violin concerto is a case in point.  I had not heard one for so long that I didn’t remember how it sounded (not that I was trying hard to remember it).  A search of this blog indicated that the one time I heard was performed by Sarah Chang, in 2005.

It came back to me rather quickly as soon as the piece started.  I was simply in awe of how the whole piece sounded.  This is a very difficult piece to play, it requires superb technical skills from the soloist, and there are very few breaks for him (in this case) during the entire concerto; on top of that, there is no emotional pause – in Bell’s telling tonight it was anger nearly the whole time.  Now Bell did have a slip up here or there, I was impressed with how he managed all that, and he didn’t even miss the high notes, which in the past he had problems with.  He now produces such a sweet and lovely sound few others can match; of course, he has a great Strad at his disposal, but many others do also.

Joshua Bell acknowledging the audience enthusiasm after an exhilarating performance of Dvorak's Violin Concerto.

As encore he and the orchestra played an adaptation of Chopin’s Op. 9 Nocturne (No. 2?) which offered a contrast to the Dvorak concerto.  It was gentle, inward looking, and had a dose of virtuoso elements.  Chopin didn’t write any music for the violin, and I thought if he had done so, it would sound like the piece we heard tonight.

Sandwiched between the two pieces were five dances by Kodaly (Lento; Allegretto moderato; Allegro con moto, grazioso; Allegro; and Allegro Vivace).  Kodaly and Bartok traversed the Hungarian countryside collecting folk music (I didn’t know they did it together), and the dances certainly sounded very Hungarian.  Kodaly did live in Galanta, a town about 35 miles east of Bratislava, for a few years.  Gypsy music (not sure if it is an acceptable nowadays) is nice to listen to, but by the end of the 17 or so minute program I thought we have had enough.

The pre-concert group Brooklyn Rider is by most measures a string quartet.  It claims to “offer eclectic repertoire in gripping performances that continue to attract legions of fans and draw rave reviews from classical, rock, and world music critics alike.”  Quite a statement, and I am not sure why they didn’t call themselves brooklyn rider (lower case) to sound even hipper.

Brooklyn Rider.

While they didn’t quite live up to that description, the very short program was quite interesting.  And the pieces did add to the Eastern Europe feel of the evening.  Erwin Schulhooff’s Alla Tarantella was one of five moments (the others are “alla” tango, Viennese waltz, serenade, and Czeca).  Dvorak’s Lento is arranged from his Cypress song cycle, and may be a tribute to his unrequited lover Josefina, who had already died.  Ljova is the pen name of Lev Zhurbin, and the two pieces are in the styles of Romanian music and klezmer (I had to look this up, it means Middle Ages Jewish folk music).  Certain the Romanian piece reminded me of Zigeunerweisen, and contributed to my feeling there was too much Gypsy this evening.

When we looked at the orchestra listing in the Playbill, we found Laura Frautschi listed as the concertmaster, and couldn’t find Allifranchini in the violin section.  So we concluded something definitely happened.  This Friday’s concert, however, had he and Frautschi playing together a piece by Schnittke.  To add to the puzzlement, who walked out as the concertmaster?  Allifranchini, of course.

Members of the MMFO as listed in tonight's Playbill.  Allifranchini's name was nowhere to be found.  But look at the first photo in this blog entry, who was in the concertmaster's seat?

Driving up was not a problem, and we found free parking of 65^th.  Dinner was takeout from Great Wall.  We got home at around 10:20 pm.

Budapest Festival Orchestra – Ivan Fischer, conductor; Jeanine De Bique, soprano. August 4, 2019.

David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center.  Orchestra (Seat M13, $52.50).

Program

Symphony No. 88 in G major (1787) by Haydn (1732-1809).

Arias by Handel (1685-1759).

Symphony No. 41 in C major (“Jupiter”) (1788) by Mozart (1756-1791).

Handel Arias

Disserratevi, o porte d’Averno, from La ressurezione (1708).

Ritorna, oh caro e dolce mio Tesoro from Rodelinda (1725).

Da tempeste il legno infranto, from Giulio Cesare in Egitto (1724).

This is considered one of the events in the Mostly Mozart Festival.  One may question why the Budapest Festival Orchestra would have a role in it, but at least it had one of Mozart’s best-known works in it.

The Program Notes describes the Haydn symphony as one of his best known.  Hadyn wrote over 100 symphonies, I doubt this is in his top 20.  Over the years I must have heard quite a few of Haydn’s symphonies, and I don’t recall ever hearing this one, neither could I find any entry in this blog.  Another “giveaway” is that if this is indeed a popular symphony someone would have given it a name or nickname already.  (This last point probably is somewhat controversial.)

On the other hand, it is noteworthy that Haydn didn’t write this on a commission from some nobility, and that the orchestra he wrote for had some virtuoso musicians.  The piece sounded complex enough, but I must say it wasn’t a memorable experience in that I have forgotten it, after one day.  The four movements are Adagio-Allegro, Largo, Menuet: Trio, and Finale: Allegro con spirito.

Mozart’s Jupiter Symphony is a delightful composition that showed Mozart’s genius without sounding too difficult.  Perhaps the best-known part is how at the end of the fourth movement Mozart wove together 5 or 6 melodies which (according to the Program Notes) “cannot readily be comprehended by the listener, only recognized as something transcendent and awe-inspiring.”

It was a disappointment, especially against my expectations of this orchestra.  Muddled is the word that came to mind the most.  Fischer brought out a lot of dynamics from the orchestra, but with no particular story to tell.  I like to think I have “broken the code” on the 5-melody fugue, and it was not done well at all.  Instead of clean, parallel lines, what I heard was one line overwhelming the other, which eventually descended into chaos (well, a bit of exaggeration here.)

Ivan Fischer and the Budapest Festival Orchestra at the conclusion of the concert.

The highlight of this otherwise mediocre concert was the young Trinidadian soprano De Bique.  She thrilled the audience with the three Handel arias she sang.  I am not a singer, so I can’t describe the vocal techniques she brought to bear to make her high notes exquisite, fast runs clean, and diction clear.  I sensed a bit of nervousness at the beginning, but she just “let it rip” when she realized how appreciative the audience was.

Jeanine De Bique has a delightful voice and an engaging stage presence.

While De Bique certainly has the technique and personality to go far in her singing career, there is still some ways to go, in my opinion.  All three songs sounded like vocal exercises.  The titles of the three songs, translated into English, are (i) Unlock yourselves, o gates of Hell! (ii) Return, oh my dear, sweet treasure. (iii) A storm-battered vessel.  One can imagine the emotions are very different in the three songs, but she could have done them in any order and I wouldn’t have known.  That’s not helped by my inability to follow her words along in the program.  My Italian is rudimentary, but not so bad that I couldn’t even catch a sentence here or there?

It is not surprising that the Orchestra comprised mostly of Caucasians, what is surprising was the concertmaster, Yoonshin Song, is a Korean woman.  A search of the internet indicates that she has just been named Houston Symphony’s concertmaster (vacated by Frank Huang three years ago), and was with Detroit Symphony from 2012.  Which makes it more intriguing: who is the regular BFO concertmaster?

The day after I bought the tickets to event Anne found out she would have a conflict, so I went by myself.  The train schedule was such that I had more than an hour between arrival at Penn Station and the 5 pm start of the concert.  I walked up quite a sweat, even though I did it slowly. 

Overall it was still a good experience.

Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra – Gianandrea Noseda, conductor; Pierre-Laurent Aimard, piano. August 2, 2019.

David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center.  Orchestra (Seat S112, $52.50).

Pre-Concert Recital – programmed announced from the stage

Selected Dances by Schubert (D.365, D.179, D.146, D.145, D.734. D790).

Pierre-Laurent Aimard, piano.

Program

Piano Concerto No. 4 in G major (1804-06) by Beethoven (1770-1827).

Symphony No. 9 in C major (“Great”) (c. 1825-28) by Schubert (1797-1828).

It would be difficult to associate either of the two pieces on tonight’s program with Mozart, which may or may not be disappointing.  However, both pieces should be interesting, at least on paper.

No doubt the Beethoven piece was inspiring, especially as performed tonight by Aimard.  I had seen him on a couple of occasions and liked his playing.  At the risk of sounding a bit hyperbolic, tonight Aimard made the concerto sound as “heroic” as the Emperor concerto.  The notes were clear, the lines superb; an overall coherent and imaginative telling of a story.  Undoubtedly one of the best performances of this work.

Aimard also did the pre-concert recital.  If I understood him correctly, he talked about this contrast between the romanticism of Beethoven and the lyricism of Schubert, and that people usually fall into one camp or another.  (Not I, since I didn’t even realize there were camps to fall into.)  Tonight’s program would be a nice contrast between the two composers.  For the recital he chose 20 or so of Schubert’s dances to illustrate Schubert’s lyricism; and, to allay the audience’s fear it would be interminably long, he reassured us the pieces averaged a minute each.  It was a delightful collection that are within reach of many pianists.  Aimard had this interesting gesture of seeming to be chewing on something as he played.

Noseda holding hands of Frautschi and Aimard after the Beethoven concerto.

The moniker for Schubert’s Ninth Symphony was “Great” to distinguish it from the “Little” Symphony (No. 6, also in C major).  Nowadays many take it to reference the majesty of the symphony.  At 58 minutes (per Program Notes), and the way the MMFO played it, I would call it “Long.”  It was just a disappointment, and certainly didn’t live up to the lyricism that Aimard referred to during his Pre-Concert chat.

Noseda, who was quite animated in his conducting, managed to draw out a lot of contrast from the orchestra.  However, the orchestra sounded – and often looked – disorganized, and muddled through many of the fast passages.  The one surprise for me was how fast the second movement was: I thought it was a scherzo initially.  The four movements are: (i) Andante – Allegro ma non troppo – Piu moto; (ii) Andante con moto; (iii) Scherzo: Allegro vivace – Trio; and (iv) Finale: Allegro vivace.

More observation on personnel changes.  Frautschi was again the concertmaster.  We saw the one listed in the program (Ruggero Allifranchini) sitting in the last seat of the first violins, and concluded he didn’t lead the orchestra during the first two concerts.  Also, the regular second flutist was replaced by a gentleman.  While the latter change can be attributed to scheduling reasons, I do wonder why Allifranchini moved from first to last.  He seemed cheerful enough in his new position, though.

Noseda acknowledging different sections of the orchestra after the Schubert Symphony.  One can see the listed concertmaster seated in the first violin section.

There was this gentleman who was enthusiastically applauding Aimard after the Beethoven concert, and then we discovered it was Kam L from church.  We chatted a bit during intermission.

Today was the last day of VBS, our children stayed with us during the week to attend.  We took them back to Hoboken.  Getting to Lincoln Center (by bus and subway) was easy enough.  On our way back we got something to eat in Hoboken before driving our car back to South Amboy.

Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra – Louis Langree, conductor; Martin Helmchen, piano. July 30, 2019.

David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center.  Orchestra (Seat U5, $52.50).

Pre-Concert Recital

Fantasia in D minor, K. 397 (1782) by Mozart.

Traumerei, Op. 15, No. 7 (1838) by Robert Schumann.

Nocturne in F major, Op. 6, No. 2 (1836) by Clara Schumann.

Intermezzo in A minor, Op. 118, No. 1; Romanze in F major, No. 5 (1893) by Brahms.

Ko-Eun Yi, piano.

Program

Overture to Don Giovanni (1787) by Mozart.

Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K.466 (1785) by Mozart.

Symphony No. 3 in F major (1883) by Brahms.

This was our third Mostly Mozart concert, and our first encounter with Mozart.  It won’t surprise me if they change the name of this festival in the near future.

Let us first dispense with the pre-concert.  A different pianist and a different program were on tap.  Mozart’s Fantasia was nice, but I was hoping for something a bit more substantial in our first encounter with the composer for which the festival is named.

The other surprise was between Robert and Clara Schumann, the wife’s composition was the more virtuoso one.  During the last several years we have encountered more of Clara Schumann’s music (perhaps a herd mentality at work here?), and tonight’s piece was more substantial than ever.

The program concluded with two movements from Brahms’s Op. 118.  It probably takes someone who appreciates piano playing a lot more than I to tell what kind of a pianist Yi is; she did handle the more difficult pieces with ease.  Compared to other pre-concert recitals, this wasn’t a particularly memorable experience.

Ko-Eun Yi is a Korean pianist trained in the United States.

The first surprise in the main concert was that the usual concertmaster was sitting in the assistant’s seat, and Laura Frautschi, the former (?) second violin principal, led the orchestra for the evening.  We noticed last week the concertmaster (still listed as such in the program) had lost a lot of weight; not sure whether that had anything to do with the new arrangement.  To add to my confusion, last week the second violin section was all-women, tonight there were several men in it.

The second surprise was that Langree spent a few minutes to talk about the program, particularly how the three pieces belonged together.  He mentioned Mozart was the first “freelance” composer in that he didn’t work for any royal court, and that Brahms’s symphony starts with a statement “free but happy.”  Mozart wrote the piano concerto and Don Giovanni at about the same time (although for Mozart two years was a long time), and there are “quotes” of one in the other (my take).  What I didn’t know was that Brahms had a lot to do with popularizing Mozart, and that he encouraged Clara Schumann to add Mozart to her repertoire.  Also, Brahms’s third symphony was “infused with the spirit of Mozart” in its compactness, structure, and intimacy (also quoting from the Program Notes).

We saw Don Giovanni during our European trip in May, so the overture sounded quite familiar.  What I didn’t hear was the dramatic ending of the opera when Don Giovanni was dragged off to hell: it was supposed to be there at the very beginning.

This was our second encounter with Helmchen, who performed another Mozart concerto two years ago.  Tonight’s piece wasn’t Mozart’s most popular, so it brought with it a certain degree of freshness.  One could indeed argue it contains some of the dark ideas Mozart used in Don Giovanni.  Overall I enjoyed it: Helmchen’s playing had a lot to do with it.  The cadenzas were written by Clara Schumann.  She was born 200 years ago.

Helmchen and Langree after the Mozart concerto.

In both the overture and the concerto, the orchestra didn’t sound as crisp as I thought Mozart should be.

A rather large ensemble was used for the Brahms symphony: 10 first violins and 5 French horns.  Here the orchestra did a good job, and the different sections sounded great when they had the solo parts.  Musicologists can debate whether Mozart or Beethoven had more influence on Brahms – and I suppose one can make either/both cases – this was simply nice music to listen to.  Some make a great deal out of the beginning three notes (F-A flat-F) as Brahms’s statement of “free but happy,” they are not the most memorable of the different tunes heard in the symphony.

For Mostly Mozart this is a very large orchestra.

We again drove into the city and had street food.  We stopped by the new Turnpike rest area near Exit 11 on our way home, but ended up not eating there as the line was long.