Women on the Verge at Opera Manhattan: Lady Macbeth, Mrs. Rowland, and “Elle” by Michael Miller


Berthe Bovy in La Voix Humaine by Jean Cocteau. Note the classical Greek peplos style of her nightgown.

I certainly didn't want to miss hearing two supremely talented friends—Kala Maxym and Roza Tulyaganova—sing Francis Poulenc's challenging monodrama, La Voix humaine, last weekend, and to my delight it introduced me to a new, still small, but thoroughly admirable operatic enterprise in the city,Opera Manhattan Repertory Theatre. Calling itself "a company for artists by artists," Opera Manhattan "serves the New York metro area by producing and performing both popular and unusual operas for the theatergoing public and under-served communities. OMRT strives to empower emerging artists, encourage creative thinking, and develop business-minded artists by creating opportunities for artists to produce operas themselves," as well as "to present New York's best emerging professional singers by providing them with performing opportunities and guidance." This special Valentine's Day performance did all these fine things and more—it was a constant delight for anyone who loves opera and the art of singing. The five singers I heard on Saturday afternoon and evening showed, for the most part, dramatic skills and a refinement of vocal development far beyond what one would expect from a "young singer." These were for the most part completely realized performances from completely formed artists. My apologies to Melinda Griswold, whom I did not hear.

Read the full review
 in New York Arts

Vladimir Ashkenazy and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra Embark On Their 2012 Season with Beethoven’s Choral Symphony and Strauss’ Metamorphosen, by Andrew Miller

From Beethoven's autograph score of the Ninth Symphony. Photo from the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin.

Sydney Opera House, Concert Hall: 11 February 2012
live broadcast of Monday's concert available from ABC Classic FM website

Richard Strauss - Metamorphosen
Beethoven - Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Opus 125

Sydney Symphony Orchestra
Vladimir Ashkenazy - conductor

Sydney Philharmonia Choirs (Symphony Chorus, Chamber Singers and VOX)
Bret Weymark - chorusmaster

Lorina Gore - soprano
Sally-Anne Russell - mezzo-soprano
James Egglestone - tenor
Michael Nagy - baritone

To open the Sydney Symphony's 2012 season and the year of their 80th birthday, Vladimir Ashkenazy. artistic director and chief conductor, has put together a generous program of powerful German music. Beethoven's Ninth finds itself played to mark great occasions, the reopening of Bayreuth in 1953 comes to mind and its own creation came at the end of decades of war in Europe. The Sydney Symphony has not played it for five years — for their 75th anniversary — so it would feel now about due for their attention. The piece is so famous and familiar, though, even as an occasional performance, there is the risk of over familiarity. With so much wonderful inherited music and worthy current music and music which would potentially exist given the opportunity of performance, should the Ninth, or any piece, be played if the performance cannot discover anything new in the piece? For the listeners, they can always seek out new aspects of the piece since one's disposition and experience in life effect one's ears so strongly, but it helps to have musicians, like Ashkenazy, full of ideas. "Occasion" implies some shared new experience anyway. But on the other hand, the earthly specificity of an occasion can in  a way put a drag on a sublime performance of the Ninth. It is such spiritual, metaphysical music, rooted in itself, in this way a universal piece, somehow worldly events seem to anchor it in time and space in an uncomfortable way, paradoxically perhaps. As a birthday party for a very fine and healthy symphony orchestra with surely many more anniversaries ahead of it, the occasion here did not "get in the way," as it were, very much, rather the music tended to come first, as it should. A symphony orchestra is after all a selfless crew in many ways.

Read the full review on the Berkshire Review, an International Journal for the Arts!


Mais qu'est-ce que c'est devant le Louvre? par Alan Miller

Mais qu’est-ce que c’est devant le Louvre?

Louvre-billboard
Uns soucoupe volante ou un peu de Venise à Paris?Photo Alan Miller 2012.

Mais qu'est-ce que c'est devant le Louvre? Une soucoupe volante ou un peu de Venise* à Paris?

*Voyez A Grand Tour, Part 2: Venice the Menaced

See it on the Berkshire Review, an International Journal for the Arts!


Blomstedt Returns to the San Francisco Symphony in Tchaikovsky and Bruckner Fifths; Garrick Ohlsson Plays Mozart Piano Concerto K. 271, by Steven Kruger

Blomstedt-herbert-12
Herbert Blomstedt

The San Francisco Symphony
Davies Hall, San Francisco

Saturday, February 4, 2012
Herbert Blomstedt, conductor
Garrick Ohlsson, piano

Mozart - Concerto No. 9 in E-Flat, K.271 (1777)
Tchaikovsky - Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Opus 64 (1888)

Friday, February 10, 2012
Herbert Blomstedt, conductor

Bruckner - Symphony No 5 in B-flat (1878)

Imagine an apocryphal New Yorker magazine cover depicting an evening at the symphony. Onstage sits the pianist, a tall figure in black, motionless at his instrument but for the whir of fingers. The lacquered piano lid conceals a conductor's head and body, but black arms and a baton poke sideways from it, indicating his presence. The audience is attentive and faces forward. But somewhere near row X, a grey-haired woman lies prostrate on her back, motionless in the aisle. Nobody seems to notice, except for a patron a few rows beyond. His head is turned sideways and one eyeball bulges with amazement and alarm. That eyeball is mine.

Read the full review on the Berkshire Review, an International Journal for the Arts!


La France en Relief at the Grand Palais (English Version)

Grenoble

Architecture students quickly learn the value of a good model. Although nothing expresses the true intention of a design as well as a model, especially for the general public, the life of a model is often sad and brief. After the big presentation day, the little pieces of cardboard and wood, so carefully carved during too many all-nighters, begin to deteriorate in closets and attics. Models are too delicate for a world built at 1:1. Once dust starts to appear, the garbage can soon follows. 

Read the full review on the Berkshire Review, an international Journal of the Arts!

La France en relief au Grand Palais (version française)

Grenoble

Les élèves d’architecture apprennent bien vite la valeur des maquettes. Quoique rien peut évoquer la vérité d’un dessin comme une maquette, surtout pour le grand public, la vie d’une maquette est souvent triste et court. Après la grande épreuve devant les profs, les morceaux de carton et de bois si précisément ciselés pendant les nuits blanches s'écroulent lentement dans les ombres des placards et des greniers. Les maquettes sont trop délicates pour un monde construit en 1:1. Après la poussière, la poubelle. 

Lisez le reste au Berkshire Review, un journal international des arts!

Vladimir Ashkenazy and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra Embark On Their 2012 Season with Beethoven’s Choral Symphony and Strauss’ Metamorphosen

Beethoven-9-autographallegro-e
From Beethoven's autograph score of the Ninth Symphony. Photo from the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin.

Sydney Opera House, Concert Hall: 11 February 2012
live broadcast of Monday's concert available from ABC Classic FM website

Richard Strauss - Metamorphosen
Beethoven - Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Opus 125

Sydney Symphony Orchestra
Vladimir Ashkenazy - conductor

Sydney Philharmonia Choirs (Symphony Chorus, Chamber Singers and VOX)
Bret Weymark - chorusmaster

Lorina Gore - soprano
Sally-Anne Russell - mezzo-soprano
James Egglestone - tenor
Michael Nagy - baritone

To open the Sydney Symphony's 2012 season and the year of their 80th birthday, Vladimir Ashkenazy. artistic director and chief conductor, has put together a generous program of powerful German music. Beethoven's Ninth finds itself played to mark great occasions, the reopening of Bayreuth in 1953 comes to mind and its own creation came at the end of decades of war in Europe. The Sydney Symphony has not played it for five years — for their 75th anniversary — so it would feel now about due for their attention. The piece is so famous and familiar, though, even as an occasional performance, there is the risk of over familiarity. With so much wonderful inherited music and worthy current music and music which would potentially exist given the opportunity of performance, should the Ninth, or any piece, be played if the performance cannot discover anything new in the piece? For the listeners, they can always seek out new aspects of the piece since one's disposition and experience in life effect one's ears so strongly, but it helps to have musicians, like Ashkenazy, full of ideas. "Occasion" implies some shared new experience anyway. But on the other hand, the earthly specificity of an occasion can in  a way put a drag on a sublime performance of the Ninth. It is such spiritual, metaphysical music, rooted in itself, in this way a universal piece, somehow worldly events seem to anchor it in time and space in an uncomfortable way, paradoxically perhaps. As a birthday party for a very fine and healthy symphony orchestra with surely many more anniversaries ahead of it, the occasion here did not "get in the way," as it were, very much, rather the music tended to come first, as it should. A symphony orchestra is after all a selfless crew in many ways.

Read the full review on the Berkshire Review, an International Journal for the Arts!

The 100th Birthday of Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion: The Sydney Theatre Company Celebrates With Something Different

Stc-pygmalion-2012-act-v-photo
The Sydney Theatre Company's Pygmalion, Act V, Andrea Demetriades as Eliza and Marco Chiappi as Higgins. Photo by Brett Boardman.

Pygmalion: A Romance in Five Acts
by George Bernard Shaw

Sydney Theatre, Walsh Bay: 4 February 2012
continues in Sydney until 3 March

The Sydney Theatre Company

Director - Peter Evans
Set Designer - Robert Cousins
Costume Designer - Mel Page
Lighting Designer - Damien Cooper
Composer - Alan John
Sound Designer - Steve Francis
AV Designer - Sean Bacon
Dramaturg - Toby Schmitz
Voice & Dialect Coach - Danielle Roffe

Cast:
Professor Henry Higgins - Marco Chiappi
Eliza Doolittle - Andrea Demetriades
Mrs Eynsford Hill - Vanessa Downing
Clara Eynsford Hill - Harriet Dyer
Colonel Pickering - Kim Gyngell
Mrs Higgins - Wendy Hughes
Mrs Pearse - Deborah Kennedy
Freddy Eynsford Hill - Tom Stokes
Alfred Doolittle - David Woods

Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton as artistic directors of the Sydney Theatre Company saw fit to bring out a new, modern, almost experimental approach to Shaw's most popular play for its 100th birthday. To speak of the birth of a play, or any piece or performing art, is tricky. Shaw wrote the play in 1912, but the words on in the script are no more the play than those of a poem are the poem or a score the piece of music. Even in Shaw's case where the sounds of the words are so important and the characters' accents are all precisely set out — the drama depending almost as much on the raw sounds than their words' meanings — not to mention Shaw's preface to the play and his (I think purposefully prosaic) postscript-sequel, there is still room left for at least subtle variations in interpretation. With all these pieces of information specifying Shaw’s intentions and the precise and definite stage directions, the play is already especially alive on the page, but still much of the gestural and body language and movement, which is very important to language, is left open. For all this definiteness, the end is so ambiguous, and as a "romance", itself a very broad term, it is more akin to, say, Nathaniel Hawthorne's species of romance. From a character's point of view it is almost easier to find oneself in a tragedy and leaving one’s problems behind at the end. 

Read the full review on the Berkshire Review, an International Journal for the Arts!

Vivica Genaux, Mezzo-Soprano, sings Vivaldi Pyrotechnics, with Europa Galante led by Fabio Biondi , by Roza Tulyaganova


Vivica-blue
Vivica Genaux. Photo Christian Steiner.

Vivaldi Pyrotechnics
Vivica Genaux, Mezzo-Soprano
Europa Galante
Fabio Biondi, Violin and Director

Vivaldi -  Sinfonia in C Major, RV 116
Vivaldi -  "Quell'usignolo" fromFarnace, RV 711
Vivaldi -  "Vorrei dirti il mio dolore" from Rosmira, RV 731
Nardini - Concerto for Violin in A Major, Op. 1, No. 1
Vivaldi -  "Splender fra'l cieco orror" from Tito Manlio, RV 738
Vivaldi -  "Alma oppressa" from La fida ninfa, RV 714
Vivaldi -  Concerto in A Minor for Two Violins, Strings, and Continuo from L'estro armonico, Op. 3, No. 8
Vivaldi -  "E prigioniero e re" fromSemiramide, RV 733
Vivaldi -  "Come in vano il mare irato" from Catone in Utica, RV 705
P.A. Locatelli - Concerto grosso in E-flat Major, Op. 7, No. 6, "Il pianto d'Arianna"
Vivaldi -  "Agitata da due venti" from Adelaide, RV 718

Let's start with the hall. I've been living in New York for about seven years, and it was my first time in Zankel Hall. I don't know why. It's a beautiful hall except for one huge problem: the subway! The noise was so obvious. Also, I feel that for this kind of music this hall is not the best choice. Baroque music in general is not very loud and therefore needs a hall that has really live acoustics, even church-like acoustics, and Zankel Hall does not have anything like that.

The concert started with the Sinfonia in C Major RV 116 (1729) by Vivaldi. It's been a long time since I've heard such a great ensemble. You could feel Europa Galante's team spirit. Their dynamics were exceptional, and their "togetherness" was just breathtaking—not simply a matter of playing together on the same beat, but of a real unanimity in tone, phrasing, and rhythm.

Read the full review
 in New York Arts

The Bridge Project’s Richard III, by William Shakespeare, with Kevin Spacey, at BAM, by Michael Miller


Richardiii006r_joan-marcus
Kevin Spacey as Richard III at the Brooklyn Academy of Music - Harvey Theater. Photo Joan Marcus.

Richard III
by William Shakespeare

The Bridge Project at BAM, through March 4
Produced by BAM, The Old Vic & Neal Street

Directed by Sam Mendes
Scenery by Tom Piper
Costumes by Catherine Zuber
Lighting by Paul Pyant
Projection by Jon Driscoll

Cast:

Maureen Anderman* - Duchess of York
Stephen Lee Anderson* - Sir Richard Ratcliffe
Jeremy Bobb* - Catesby & 2nd Murderer & 2nd Citizen
Nathan Darrow* - Lord Grey & Richmond
Jack Ellis - Lord Hastings
Haydn Gwynne - Queen Elizabeth
Chuk Iwuji - Buckingham
Isaiah Johnson* - Rivers & Lord Mayor
Gemma Jones - Queen Margaret
Andrew Long* - King Edward IV & Bishop of Ely
Katherine Manners - Young Prince Richard
Howard Overshown* - Brackenbury & Keeper & Sir Thomas Vaughan
Simon Lee Phillips - Tyrell & 3rd Citizen & Norfolk
Gary Powell - Lord Lovel & 1st Murderer & 1st Citizen
Michael Rudko* - Lord Stanley
Annabel Scholey - Lady Anne
Kevin Spacey* - Richard, Duke of Gloucester
Gavin Stenhouse - Dorset & Urswick
Hannah Stokely - Edward
Chandler Williams* - George, Duke of Clarence
*indicates American member of company

This production of Shakespeare’s Richard III has reached BAM after a sold-out run at the Old Vic and a tour which included Epidavros, Istanbul, Naples, Sydney, Beijing, Hong Kong, Singapore, and San Francisco, among others. This reminded me of the sort of thing the British Council does, but of course this Shakespearian globe-trotting was a private enterprise, funded largely by Bank of America and the Stavros Niarchos Foundation. And course the whole point of the production’s parent organization, The Bridge Project, was to combine British and American casts. Perhaps there should be an organization beyond the British Council to cultivate, study, and promote the global English language, as it used on the streets and in literature around the world, including Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Nigeria, Guyana, and others. And the way English is behaving in the physical and cyber-world today, it may need some international body to encourage it in good manners, kicking it under the table, when it starts to monopolize the conversation.

Richard III is The Bridge Project’s last production, and I must say that I’m sorry it’s over. As I think back over it, the performances I saw seem better in retrospect than they did immediately after the performance. Along with stupendous performances by some great actors, Simon Russell Beale above all, there were some awkwardly directed scenes and some uneven work among even leading actors—mostly the Americans, I regret to say. Yet the end result, in spite of those annoyances, was surprisingly satisfying.

Read the full review
 in New York Arts