Metropolitan Opera at Home - Puccini's Turandot. April 26, 2021.

Original  Broadcast Date: ???

Conductor - Yannic Nezet-Seguin.  Turandot - Christine Goerke, Calaf - Yusif Eyvazov, Liu - Eleonora Buratto, Timur - James Morris, Ping - Alexey Lavrov, Pang - Tony Stevenson, Pong - Eduardo Valdes.

I am writing this down on July 2, so don't remember the specifics.  I suppose one could go back and at least find out when the live performance occurred ...

Below are some screen shots from the TV:

2021 NJSO Lunar New Year Celebration Concert. Online premiere February 6, 2021.

Program
Andante Cantabile for Cello and Orchestra by Tchaikovsky.
Manha de Carnaval by Luiz Donfa.
Der Erlkonig by Schubert arr. Liszt.
Purple Bamboo Tune, Traditional.
Fisherman’s Song at Eventide, Traditional.
Happy Days by Chu Wang-Ha.
Libertango by Piazzolla.
Spring Dawn by Gu Jianfen; Lyrics by Meng Haoran.
Singing and Smiling by Gu Jianfen; Lyrics by Wang Jian.
Flying Free by Don Besig.
Farewell, Traditional arr. Nicholas Hersh.
Gong Xi Gong Xi, Traditional.
 

This was the premiere broadcast of the “event,” which consists of new recordings made at NJPAC on January 22, and archive footage from 2019 and 2020.

Took quite a few screenshots during the broadcast.  There were over 600 people watching, which is a good turnout.

Several NJSO Chinese members introduced pieces in the program, and there were guest appears by Gabriel van Aalst, NJSO CEO; Huang Ping, Chinese Consul General; Lang Lang; and others.

The program was pre-recorded, but still very enjoyable.  Usually I am out-of-town during Chinese New Year, I am glad I caught it this year.

Jonathan Spitz playing cello solo, Andante Cantabile by Tchaikovsky.

Xuefei Yang performing Luiz Bonfa's Manha de Carnaval.

George Li played Erlkonig and Happy Days.

The Purple Bamboo Tune has solo passages for various instruments.  Here is Wyrick doing the violin solo.

Yuefei Yang also performed the traditional tune Fisher's Song at Eventide.

Na-Young Baek at the Cello for the performance of Piazzolla's Libertango; Yufei Yang joined in remotely with the guitar.

Gao Jinfan set the famous poem "Spring Dawn" by Meng Haoran to music.  The Starry Arts Group Children's Chorus is conducted by Rebecca Shen.

The ensemble also sang the song "Singing and Smiling" by Gu Jianfen.

Bart Feller's flute solo in the song "Flying Free" was accompanied by Xian Zhang.  No idea which parts of the chorus were produced in 2021 or spliced in from archived performances.

This is archival footage.  The Song farewell sung by the Starry Arts Group Children's Chorus and the Peking University Alumni Chorus.

The program concluded with the traditional song "Gong Xi Gong Xi," archived from 2020.

Sight and Sound Theater - Noah. Viewed January 30, 2021.

Viewed via the TBN iOS APP.  Free.

The familiar biblical account of Noah, embellished by characters and events not inconsistent with the story told in the Bible.  For instance, names were given to folks such as Noah's family members.

Some shots I took from the TV.

92Y Online Concert - New York Philharmonic String Quartet. Viewed December 20, 2020.

Concert recorded December 17, 2020.  Part of the 10-concert subscription series.

Program

Schubert, Quartettsatz, D. 703 (1820).

Mendelssohn, Quartet No. 2 in A Minor, Op. 13 (1827).

Ravel, String Quartet.

The concert originally had Emanuel Ax appearing as well, a few weeks ago 92Y sent out an email announcing that Ax won't be on the program.  I was quite disappointed as I had always enjoyed Ax's musicianship.

Despite that, this program was thoroughly enjoyable.  From what I could tell, both the Mendelssohn and the Ravel pieces were not easy to pull off; they were performed brilliantly.

I was wondering why the first movement of Schubert was played (the "satz" in the title should have been a giveaway).  Turns out this was a quartet Schubert never completed.

It always amazes me how easy Schubert made key changes effortless, he seemed to be able to jump to any key he wanted with a few transitional notes.

I could find scores for all three pieces on the web, and followed along best I could.  This was my first listening of all three pieces, I am torn between just sitting back and enjoy versus not being able to follow where the music is going.  (The simple answer is to listen multiple times, but not practical in many instances.)

The movements of the other quartets are as follows.  Mendelssohn: Adagio-Allegro vivace; Adagio non lento; Intermezzo: Allegretto con moto-Allegro di molto; Presto-Adagio non lento.  Ravel: Allegro moderato-tres doux; Assez vif-tres rythme; Tres lent; Vif et agite.

92Y Online Concert - Jeremy Denk, piano. Viewed December 17, 2020.

Concert recorded Sunday December 13, 2020.  Part of the 10-concert subscription series.

Program

MOZART: Sonata No. 14 in C Minor, K. 457
BLIND TOM WIGGINS: The Battle of Manassas
JOPLIN: Heliotrope Bouquet (arr. Chauvin)
TANIA LEÓN: Rituál
FREDERIC RZEWSKI: Winnsboro Cotton Mill Blues
BEETHOVEN: Sonata No. 32 in C Minor, Op. 111

Ellie and family were baking Christmas cookies at house on December 13, so I didn't get to see this live.  From the closing credits it appears the concert was not recorded on the 92Y stage, but somewhere in San Francisco instead.

Regardless of when or where it was recorded, this is a concert one will enjoy no matter when one sees it.

Below are some of the notes I took during my viewing of the event.

After Mozart, Denk talked about bookending the recital with the tragic sonatas by Mozart and Beethoven, which to him is a reflection of the year.

The Battle of Manassas is a collection of favorite "patriotic" tunes woven together as a fantasy/impromptu.

Joplin's unmistakable sound followed.

Rzewski's Cotton Mill Blues started sounding like a cotton mill (as close as the piano can come to imitate it).  Keys hit with entire palm and fist.

(Not sure what happened to the Tania Leon piece!)

Talked about the Beethoven sonata.  Beethoven used C Minor key multiple times.  Some Bach themes.  In two movements.  Second a set of variations with infinite patience.  Long-short-long- series of themes, gets into the wilderness, and comes back.

92Y Online Concert - Xavier Foley, double bass, and Kelly Lin, piano. Viewed December 10, 2020.

Live Broadcast on December 4, 2020.  Part of the 10-concert subscription series.

Program

Bottesini, Elegy No. 1.

Bach, Cello Suite No. 2 in D Minor, BWV 1008.

Xavier Foley, Irish Fantasy.

Foley, Always on the Move.

Gliere, Intermezzo & Tarantella, Op. 9

I couldn't get to this program until about a week later.  Besides being a bit busy with other (mostly trivial) things I needed to take care of, I also didn't think I would get too excited about the double bass as a solo instrument.  My experience with bass as more than a "double bass" was limited to its chamber role in Schubert's "Trout Quintet" and every now and then listening to Max's playing on the instrument (in person or on TV).

In that regard I was glad I caught this program.  The most prominent takeaway for me was the instrument sounded good for most of the 60-plus minutes of the program.  Perhaps - as my aforementioned friend insisted at one time - there is no parallel between cello and bass techniques, nonetheless the similarity in sound was a lot more than I expected.  (I realize saying "wow, it sounded like a cello" may be the biggest compliment or biggest put-down you can have on the instrument.)  It was also unexpected that, at least in this case, the bass can't take that much punishment either, if the need for frequent tuning was any indication.

Foley made quite a few remarks on stage.  One puzzling statement was Bach's Suite was in D-flat minor, and it had to do with the tuning of the instrument.  And after the Bach piece he did retune the strings.  Irish Fantasy was his work based on the theme music in the game (Fate?) that came with a Windows XP computer he bought in Costco.  And Always on the Move has elements of CSI: Miami and lots of R&B to it.  The piece did start and end with traditional classical pieces, which I appreciated.

However, I am not sure how well the Bach Suite worked on the bass.  There was a distinct lack of counterpoint in the music, perhaps to play two notes "simultaneously" (by jumping quickly from one string to another) only works in specific instances.

He ended the program with an encore piece: an etude called "The Dance."

Foley plays an instrument made by Solano.  Notice the fingerboard: it ends in a notch.

92Y Online Concert - The Emerson String Quartet and Yefim Bronfman, piano. Viewed November 19, 2020.

Live Broadcast on November 19, 2020.  Part of the 10-concert subscription series.

Program

Schumann, Movements 2 & 3 from String Quartet in A Major, Op. 41, No. 3 (1842).

Brahms, Piano Quintet in F Minor, Op. 34 (1864).

Even during these COVID times when I seldom go anywhere, I still had trouble catching too many of these 92Y concerts live.  Go figure.  In any case, I caught up with this later in the evening, thus both "viewed" and "live" dates are November 19.

Another enjoyable concert.  Only remark I had was about Bronfman's appearance: he appeared thinner, not as impeccably groomed as he used to be for the live concerts I attended (most notable was his somewhat unkempt hair, which was a lot whiter than I expected), and didn't push himself up as much.  Overall, he looked a lot healthier.

The quartet only played two of Schumann's four movements: Assai agitato and Adagio molto.  Brahms's quintet also has four movements: (I) Allegro non troppo; (II) Andante, un poco adagio; (III) Scherzo: Allegro; and (IV) Finale: Poco sostenuto - Allegro non troppo - Presto, non troppo.

For the Brahms piece, I was following along with the score.

92Y Online Concert - Aaron Diehl, piano. Viewed November 18, 2020.

Live broadcast on November 17, 2020.  Part of the 10-concert subscription series.

Program

William Grant Still (1895-1978): Seven Traceries (1940)

Sir Roland Hanna (1932-2002): Century Rag

Willie “The Lion” Smith (1893-1973): “Fading Star”

James P. Johnson (1894-1955): “Keep Off the Grass"

Wynton Guess: “J-Walking”

Duke Ellington (1899-1974): “New World A-Comin’”

R. Nathaniel Dett (1882-1943): “Juba Dance”

This is a program of works by (mostly) African American composers, with quite a few in what I would call the Jazz genre.  Below are some of the notes I jotted down, some from what Diehl said on stage, and some from the web.

Diehl is a young (early 30s) jazz pianist with classical training at Julliard.  We heard him performing with the New Jersey Symphony in December, 2018.

The piece by Still was the longest, the seven traceries being the seven attributes of God.  The movements are: Cloud Cradles, Mystic Pool, Muted Laughter, Out of the Silence, Woven Silver, Wailing Dawn and A Bit of Wit.  I managed to locate a webpage describing the work, which I used to follow along. Still is known as the "Dean of African American Music."

Hanna dedicated "Century Rag" to Eubie Blake, who was the founder of Eastern Ragtime, which later evolved to the "strike style" (just quoting Diehl here).  Diehl proceeded to mention that the pieces by Smith and Johnson were written in that style.

Guess is a young American composer, about 24.  The work "J-Walking" was commissioned by American Composer Orchestra.

Dett was an Canadian-American Black composer per Wikipedia.

92Y Online Concert - Anthony McGill, clarinet and Members of the New York Philharmonic. Novemeber 12, 2020.

Live Broadcast from 92Y ($10).

Program

Mendelssohn, String Quartet in D Major, Op. 44, No. 1 (1838)

Coleridge-Taylor, Clarinet Quintet in F-sharp Minor, Op. 10 (1895)

New York Philharmonic members

Yulia Ziskel, violin; Na Sun, violin; Cynthia Phelps, viola; Nathan Vickery, cello.

How much the concert can be enjoyed depends very much on how well the internet is working at the moment of broadcast.  Today the network was somewhat unstable.  Nonetheless, I enjoyed the Mendelssohn piece and learned something about Samuel Coleridge-Taylor.  The clarinet quintet probably would sound better if one gets more familiar with it, although the last movement was quite easy to like.

The movements of the compositions are as follows.  For Mendelssohn: (1) Molto allegro vivace; (2) Menuetto: Un poco Allegretto; (3) Andante espressivo ma con moto; and (4) Presto con brio.  For Coleridge-Taylor: (1) Allegro energico; (2) Larghetto affecttuoso - Molto espressivo; (3) Scherzo. Allegro leggiero; and (4) Finale.  Allegro agitato - Poco piu moderato - Vivace.  Coleridge-Taylor also supplied the tempo for the various movements.

A few things I learned about Samuel Coleridge-Taylor.  He was born in London in 1875 and died in Surrey in 1912 from pneumonia.  His mother was English, his father a physician from Sierra Leone who returned to Africa not knowing he had left a pregnant woman behind.  He was named after the poet Samuel Taylor Colerdige, and at some point added the hyphen to his name.  A musical prodigy, he enrolled at the Royal College of Music at age 15 and eventually studied composition.  During one of his many visits to the US, he was nicknamed the "African Mahler."  His work supposedly drew on African music in the same tradition as Brahms with Hungarian music and Dvorak with Bohemian music.

92Y Online Concert - Midori, violin; Ieva Jokubaviciute, piano. November 6, 3030.

Live Broadcast from 92Y ($10)

Program

Grieg, Sonata No. 2 in G Major, Op. 13

Mozart, Sonata in E-flat Major, K. 302

Franck, Sonata in A Major

This was the fourth concert in this online series at the 92Y, and was the most enjoyable one so far.  First, the movements of the sonatas:

Grieg (1867): Lento doloroso - Allegro vivace; Allegretto tranquillo; Allegro animato.

Mozart (1778): Allegro; Andante grazioso.

Franck (1886): Allegretto ben moderato; Allegro; Ben moderato: Recitativo-Fantasia; Allegretto poco mosso.

While Midori was definitely the headline artist, Jokubaviciute also put in a remarkable performance.  It's a pity that the cameras were mostly focused on the violinist.

92Y Online Concert - Emerson Quartet. Viewed November 5, 2020.

The program was broadcast live on November 4, I viewed it a day later.  This was part of the 10-concert series subscription.

Program

Beethoven String Quartet in B-flat Major, Op. 130 (with Grosse Fuge, Op. 133).

The history of the composition is somewhat interesting.  Beethoven first completed the piece in the form played tonight.  The reception to the last movement at the work's premiere was negative, and at his publisher's urging Beethoven replaced it with Finale: Allegro in B-flat major, and the original sixth movement (Gross Fuge) was published as a stand-alone work numbered Op. 133.  Modern performances tend to go back to Beethoven's original version, although some argue the best interpretation is to play the "modified" work followed by the Grand Fugue, thus making the quartet a seven-movement work.  

Beethoven completed the replacement Finale in late 1826.  The first performance of the modified quartet was in April 1827, a month after the composer's death.

The Emerson Quartet performed the six-movement, "original version."  The movements are: (i) Adagio, ma non troppo - Allegro; (ii) Presto; (iii) Andante con moto, ma non troppo, Poco scherzoso; (iv) Alla danza tedesca.  Allegro assai; (v) Cavatina.  Adagio molto espressivo; and (vi) Gross Fuge (Op. 133) Ouverture.  Allegro - Meno mosso e moderato - Allegretto - Fuga. [Allegro] - Meno mosso e moderato - Allegro molto e con brio - Allegro.

I managed to locate the music on line and could follow along as the quartet played.  It was generally enjoyable, although there were segments that could have sounded cleaner than they did.  As this was my first encounter with the piece, I do not know if that how it should sound.  The 92Y website describes this quartet as the piece that put the Emerson Quartet on the map.

Information from the 92Y website.  Conflicting information as to when the recording was made.