Some recent reviews of Seattle events, music, books and opera.
*********************
Copyright Notice: All information you receive on this site is owned by Melinda Bargreen and is protected by the copyright laws of the United States. Information includes stories, graphics, photographs, music, sound clips, and video files. Copyright laws prohibit copying, redistributing, retransmitting and republishing of any copyright material. You may download information from this site for personal, noncommercial use, provided you do not copy or redistribute it without the written permission of Melinda Bargreen.
Review: Handel’s “Messiah,” Seattle Symphony (Dec. 20)
By Melinda Bargreen
One of the earmarks of a great musical work is that it can flourish in many different interpretations – as Handel’s “Messiah” assuredly does. In Seattle, we’ve heard small-scale ultra-baroque period versions of the “Messiah”; large-scale romanticized productions; speedy ones and soulful ones, and almost everything in between.
This year’s Seattle Symphony “Messiah” production, however, is a first: a performance that has a strongly operatic underpinning, yet some of the most unified and convincing baroque-style bowing the Seattle Symphony strings have ever mustered. Conductor Gary Thor Wedow, a regular at Seattle Opera and also an evident master of the “Messiah” score, put a persuasive and powerful stamp on the Handel classic.
Wedow conducted the recitatives and arias mostly from the harpsichord, where he is a master stylist in achieving just the right fluid interconnections; he is supportive but never intrusive. The orchestra’s strings played with very limited vibrato, and sometimes with a unified crescendo on the held notes (most effectively in the chorus “Surely He hath borne our griefs”). There was a lot of tempo variety, sometimes startling in its effect – like the odd pauses in the “Hallelujah Chorus.” Some sections were slow; others were surprisingly speedy. The soprano aria “Rejoice greatly” may have set a new land-speed record.
Enhancing the operatic feel of this production were the soloists, all with substantial opera credentials. Tenor Andrew Stenson, a former Seattle Opera Young Artist who was one of the stars of the company’s recent mainstage “Daughter of the Regiment,” was a lyrically beautiful soloist whose initial “Comfort ye, my people” was eclipsed only by the truly heartbreaking “Thy rebuke hath broken His heart.” The beautiful, crystalline soprano of Amanda Forsythe sounded remarkably agile in her arias, which were freely ornamented (right up to a high C). Mezzo-soprano Magdalena Wór sang expressively, but the music was scored too low to suit her vocal range. Kevin Burdette, who has been heard in several Seattle Opera productions, delivered tremendous drama and impact in his majestic opening recitative, “Thus saith the Lord,” and his florid account of the final aria, “The trumpet shall sound” (with solo trumpeter David Gordon).
The Seattle Symphony Chorale, prepared by Joseph Crnko, sang with impressive clarity and precision, and was highly responsive to Wedow’s direction. “For unto us a child is born” demonstrated a well-schooled ensemble that was fleet, light, strongly accented, and airy, with lots of space between notes and phrases.
The audience was unusually predisposed toward applause between movements, a tendency that probably could have been headed off by more adroit stage-managing connecting the various choruses and recitatives.
Or maybe this “Messiah” is just such a crowd-pleaser that extra applause is inevitable. Go if you can; you won’t be disappointed.
Review: Pacific MusicWorks,“Welcome to All the Pleasures, Stephen Stubbs, artistic director. Seattle First Baptist Church, October 25, 2013.
By Melinda Bargreen
Special to The Seattle Times
In the few short years of its existence, the early-music organization Pacific MusicWorks has already achieved remarkable success. This season, the group and its founder/director, Stephen Stubbs, are in residence at the University of Washington, where they’ll stage a professional production of Handel’s opera “Semele” next spring. And a collaboration with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra will result in a “Passions Project” next March, when Pacific MusicWorks will present Bach’s “St. John Passion” in conjunction with the Symphony’s production of Bach’s “St. Matthew Passion.”
Stubbs and his Pacific MusicWorks launched this eventful season on Friday evening in a new-to-them venue, the Seattle First Baptist Church on Capitol Hill. It proved a good place to present an intimate and ambitious program called “Welcome to All the Pleasures,” devoted to English music extending from Dowland and Purcell to Handel and Britten.
Acoustically warm and fairly resonant, the rotunda-like sanctuary at First Baptist also is ringed by a balcony (closed for this concert) where the sound may well be even better. The forces assembled for the Pacific MusicWorks program were not large: Stubbs on the lute and guitar, Maxine Eilander on baroque harp, a quintet of singers, and four string players. The resulting sound had both vigor and transparency, offering a smoothly professional and nicely varied vocal and instrumental concert that also was highly engaging.
The first half was devoted to Purcell and Dowland, particularly the former’s music for the royal courts of England’s Charles II and James II. Selections from Handel’s delicious “Acis and Galatea” were succeeded by two simple 20th-century Britten folksong settings, closing with Purcell’s virtuosic “Why are all the Muses mute?”
Stubbs provided minimalist leadership from the lute or guitar; the instrumental ensemble accompanied the singers with tremendous energy and agility. The players were violinists Tekla Cunningham and Linda Melsted, violist Elly Winer, and cellist Bill Skeen, with harpist Maxine Eilander.
The five singers were well-schooled performers of considerable versatility and agility. Pure-voiced sopranos Teresa Wakim and Clara Rottsolk sang with expressive finesse; mezzo-soprano Danielle Reutter-Harrah’s smoothly mellow voice coped well with a wide compass and several notes that were down in contralto territory. The tenor (Aaron Sheehan) and bass-baritone (Douglas Williams) were both first-rate singers who conveyed both the text and the musical lines with great artistry.
There were so many high points that it’d be hard to single out an isolated example. But one of the most moving and effective pieces on the program unquestionably was the closer for the first half, Purcell’s song “Hush no more.” The great word painting of the simple lyrics, the artful pauses that followed the term “hush,” all contributed to a spellbinding performance.
Review: Seattle Symphony with Alastair Willia, Pavel Gomziakov; Oct. 24
By Melinda Bargreen
It takes some creative programming to juggle the Seattle Symphony’s concert schedule with Seattle Opera’s productions – both of which employ the same body of musicians. Usually the Symphony presents smaller-scale orchestral programs (typically with repertoire from the Baroque, Classical, or contemporary eras) with the musicians who aren’t playing the Opera, plus some players drawn from the lists of excellent subs.
This time, it was a Mainly Mozart Series program, an [Untitled] concert, and three Haydn/Tchaikovsky concerts that kept Benaroya Hall full while Seattle Opera was presenting its sparkling “The Daughter of the Regiment.” The Haydn/Tchaikovsky program was of unusual interest, featuring Alastair Willis -- a conductor who earlier held two previous posts with the Seattle Symphony (assistant and associate conductor). The chance to hear the highly regarded cellist Pavel Gomziakov in his Seattle debut may also have been a factor in drawing a good-sized audience to the first of the three programs on Oct. 24.
They were not disappointed. Gomziakov, accorded a Grammy nomination for his 2009 Deutsche Grammophon recording of the Chopin Cello Sonata, gave a splendidly nuanced account of the familiar Haydn C Major Cello Concerto. His subtle bowing created a broad tonal palette, from incisive accents to the softest and most dulcet melodic lines. Rarely do you hear such a wide dynamic range in a concerto soloist; most players are afraid to take the volume down so far, fearing they won’t be heard. Conductor Willis brought the orchestra’s volume down as well, partnering Gomziakov with care and finesse. The airy second movement was particularly fine.
Technique, expressive mastery, a beautiful array of sounds: this is an imposing and important cellist whom audiences will want to hear again.
Willis’ program also offered two familiar serenades: Elgar’s Serenade for Strings (Op. 20), and Tchaikovsky’s even better-known Serenade for Strings (Op. 48). A so-called “Mozart symphony,” the No. 37, filled out the program. (Mozart actually wrote only a brief introduction to a three-movement symphony by Michael Haydn, the younger brother of the more famous Franz Joseph Haydn.) The symphony isn’t bad; there are some charming turns of phrase, but it’s not Mozart.
Willis proved a deft and expressive interpreter of Elgar and Tchaikovsky, scoring lots of points with clarity, restraint and delicacy of phrasing. He drew a rich, full sound from the strings, with incisive attacks and crisp playing (particularly in the final movement of the Tchaikovsky).
Willis has gone on to become the music director of the Illinois Symphony Orchestra, and has guest conducted the symphonies of Chicago, New York, San Francisco, St. Louis and Cincinnati. His appointments at the Seattle Symphony (2000-2003) ended a decade ago, and he has moved on – but it’s clear from this program that Willis is a most welcome returnee.
Review: Seattle Opera’s “La Fille du Regiment,” October 19/20, 2013.
By Melinda Bargreen
Nobody goes to “The Daughter of the Regiment” for the plot and the libretto. Both are charmingly preposterous. Instead, you go to hear glorious voices navigating Donizetti’s dizzying bel canto arias. You go for the thrill of the “High Cs” tenor aria (“Ah, mes amis,” which has nine of those Cs), and the even more stratospheric notes assigned to the soprano.
And, if you’re lucky, you go to see and hear the exquisitely hilarious nuances of a singing actress who has been commanding the stage for the past 43 years: mezzo-soprano Joyce Castle, as the richly comic Marquise of Berkenfield. Topping it all off, in Seattle Opera’s current production that opened this past weekend, is a chance to experience Peter Kazaras, tenor and director, in drag as the snobby Duchesse de Krackenthorp.
“The Daughter of the Regiment” is like a gust of champagne bubbles in the wake of last summer’s ultra-serious Wagnerian “Ring”: short, sweet, light, and fast-moving. Conductor Yves Abel gives his singers and his responsive orchestra plenty of lyrical scope and freedom, while never losing the forward momentum of the score.
The two opening-night stars, tenor Lawrence Brownlee and soprano Sarah Coburn, cast the best possible light on Seattle Opera’s Young Artists program (both are alums). It would be hard to find two singers anywhere who could do more credit to these roles. Brownlee, at the international top of his form, sings his high-flying arias with an ease, purity and polish that could hardly be bettered. He is thoroughly at home as the lovestruck Tonio, who joins the regiment to woo its adorable mascot Marie (Coburn, whose coloratura voice has gotten bigger but has lost none of its lovely agility). Both are singers are vital, winning actors and fun to watch; the opera’s two acts seem to fly right by.
On Sunday, the only cast change was the arrival of tenor Andrew Stenson as Tonio. Another former Young Artist, Stenson is an adroit performer who seems born to sing this music; his Tonio has a lot of finesse.
The supporting cast makes substantial contributions to this comic show, particularly Alexander Hajek’s lively and compassionate Sulpice, with Karl Marx Reyes (as Hortensius) and Stephen Fish (Corporal). The male choristers, as the Regiment of the title, have a lot to do, and in Emilio Sagi’s cleverly comic staging, they dash about the serviceable Julio Galán sets with the elan of a corps de ballet. The audience roared during the wedding-party scene, when the arriving guests were introduced as nobility hailing from Medina, Puyallup, Hoquiam … even Humptulips. (There also was a pair of “Mademoiselles Hunts-Point.”)
Kazaras’ star turn as the haughty and bibulous Duchesse, attired in a frothy confection and spinning off the “drunk aria” from “La Perichole,” must be seen (and heard) to be believed. And some of the exuberant supernumeraries at the Countess’ chateau are having so much fun that you long to rush the stage and join the party.
Review: Emerson String Quartet, with pianist Craig Sheppard; Meany Theater, October 15.
By Melinda Bargreen
Anticipation ran high for the October 15 return of the Emerson String Quartet to Meany Theater – for the first time in 37 years without founding cellist David Finckel. Replacing him is British cellist Paul Watkins, a highly regarded player who fits right in with the rigorous, dashing style that has made the ESQ one of the world’s most highly regarded chamber ensembles.
The program, drawn from the bread-and-butter quartet repertoire, traversed no new ground but nonetheless gave an excellent opportunity to assess the new configuration of the ESQ in three markedly different styles. They presented 18th-century Mozart (String Quartet No. 16 in E-Flat Major, K.428), 19th-century Mendelssohn (String Quartet No. 6 in F Minor, Op. 80), and 20th-century Shostakovich (Piano Quintet in G Minor, Op. 57).
From the beginning, it was clear that Paul Watkins is an excellent fit for the ESQ, in terms of tone quality and that vital sense of ensemble. Initially he seemed a little less assertive than the other three players (violinists Philip Setzer and Eugene Drucker, and violist Lawrence Dutton), but that impression disappeared as the performance went on. By the end of the Mozart, the final declamatory chords seemed to announce to the audience, “We’re back!”
The Mendelssohn, furiously energetic and full of incisive virtuoso playing, found the ensemble in top gear. Melodic lines were sharply etched; rapid-fire figures were executed with remarkable precision. The final Allegro molto was fiery and intense: four players acting as one, at the top of their game. Audience members went out to the intermission uttering variations on “Whew!” and “Wow!”
The treat of the evening, though, was the Shostakovich quintet, with pianist Craig Sheppard providing the vital pulse for a great performance. The five musicians created an almost orchestral sonority, but they also refined the sound down to a thread for the more introspective Intermezzo: Lento movement, with its measured tread from the piano. The Scherzo was suitably raucous, but it was the triumphant Finale: Allegretto movement that inspired some audience members to try to sing the buoyant, angular theme on their way out of the hall. That’s just what audiences did at the 1940 premiere of the Quintet, during the dark days of World War II. There is an irrepressible, “whistling in the dark” feel about this finale that accords well with the uncertain tenor of our own times.
Review: Seattle Symphony, Andrew Manze/Simone Dinnerstein, Oct. 12, 2013, Benaroya Hall
By Melinda Bargreen
Andrew Manze is back in town, and that’s excellent news for music lovers.
The British-born conductor, who first shot to fame in the 1990s as a particularly charismatic baroque violinist, returned to the Seattle Symphony podium Thursday to conduct an excellent concert that solidified his earlier impression of depth, charm, and great communication with both the orchestra and the audience. Thursday’s was the first of two programs spanning several centuries – 17th-century Purcell through 20th-century Vaughan Williams.
In between those two English composers was one of Mozart’s most charming piano concertos, the No. 23 in A Major (K.488), with soloist Simone Dinnerstein. An introspective, thoughtful, and sensitive artist, Dinnerstein launched her career with a distinctively original 2007 recording of Bach’s “Goldberg Variations” – a work of which there’s no shortage of great interpretations. Hers had an eloquently limpid, dulcet fluency and clean articulations, qualities Dinnerstein brought to her Mozart concerto here. The smoothly flowing piano lines might have pleased Mozart himself, who famously wrote that his music should “flow like oil.” But it also was possible to wish for more variety of touch and more dynamic range in all that elegant playing.
Manze took the microphone to introduce the works on the program, a practice that works best when the conductor’s remarks are witty, illuminating, and fairly short. This was mostly the case on Thursday, when listeners learned everything from the correct pronunciation of “Purcell” (equal emphasis on both syllables, “like ‘ice cream’ ”) to the emotional wartime reception to the premiere of Vaughan Williams’ Symphony No. 5 in the dark days of 1942.
But mainly, Manze let his fingers do the talking – specifically, his long, expressive left hand, which reached right into the orchestra and drew the most eloquent, involved playing from the musicians. An active and dynamic conductor, Manze urged the players on, encouraging and coaxing with his gestures, and they responded with alacrity. Many of them (though not all) even cut back on the vibrato for the nicely detailed suite of four Purcell pieces, in arrangements by both Benjamin Britten and Manze. Most of the playing was excellent, too, though Thursday wasn’t a great night for the brass section.
Some sprightly Purcell, some serene Mozart, and a heartfelt Vaughan Williams Fifth: quite an enticement for Saturday night.
Review: Byron Schenkman & Friends, Nordstrom Recital Hall at Benaroya Hall, October 6, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
Nearly 20 years have passed since Byron Schenkman came to Seattle and co-founded Seattle Baroque with violinist Ingrid Matthews. During that time, the expressive and charismatic Schenkman has migrated from the harpsichord to the fortepiano and the modern piano (and occasionally back again). You can never tell which instrument he might favor in a given concert – but you know it’s going to be good.
That was the case in Sunday night’s spirited and nicely detailed inaugural concert in the new “Byron Schenkman & Friends” series of classical and baroque chamber music. With violinist Liza Zurlinden, violist Jason Fisher, and cellist Nathan Whittaker – all excellent -- Schenkman undertook not only three early Beethoven piano quartets, but also sonatas of Haydn and Boccherini.
Those latter two composers were well established in their careers when the 14-year-old Beethoven was writing these quartets. In his impromptu commentary, Schenkman quipped that the Haydn and Boccherini works were included on this program to show “what the grownups were doing.”
The three early Beethoven quartets are interesting for a number of reasons: the prominence of the piano, the quality of Beethoven’s imagination, and the influence of Mozart gently hovering over the pages. Pianists unfamiliar with Beethoven’s C Major Piano Quartet might be startled to hear themes that would be recycled later, virtually unaltered, in a couple of Beethoven’s piano sonatas.
Schenkman chose a modern Steinway for these performances; the three string players opted for a performance style in which vibrato was used relatively sparingly. The results were a bit heavy on the keyboard, but then, these works give unusual prominence to that instrument.
The Beethoven piano quartets are fascinating blends of marvelous innovation and uninspired passages in which lots of arpeggios go up and down without much musical effect. The performances, fresh and engaging, also had their uneven moments. But there also were lots of high points: the wild gallop of the final Presto movement in Boccherini’s Trio Sonata (Op. 12, No. 4), for example, and the robust ensemble playing of the Beethoven D Major Quartet. Some of the evening’s loveliest moments came in the lone piano solo on the program: Schenkman’s traversal of the Haydn Sonata in D Major, which was crisply articulated and full of character.
In the next program in the series, Schenkman reverts to the harpsichord for an evening of Bach sonatas with violinist Ingrid Matthews, his longtime duo partner (Nov. 24). Expect musical fireworks.
Review: Seattle Symphony with conductor Thomas Dausgaard, Oct. 3, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
Conductor Thomas Dausgaard’s ties with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra extend back to 2003, and it’s always a pleasure to have him back in town – particularly since he now holds the new title of “principal guest conductor.” With a music director who is gone for extended periods in Europe (Ludovic Morlot has another major post at Brussels’ Theatre de la Monnaie, as well as guest conducting engagements), it makes a great deal of sense to have an additional maestro with whom the Seattle orchestra and audiences also can build a relationship.
The wisdom of Dausgaard’s selection was certainly apparent on Thursday evening, when the Danish-born conductor led a highly rewarding subscription program that will be repeated twice this weekend. Two major works – the Beethoven Triple Concerto and the big Schubert Symphony No. 9 – found the maestro and the orchestra on the same page, with music-making of considerable excitement and finesse.
Three young soloists were on hand for the concerto: Russian-born violinist Alina Pogostkina (born in 1992), Danish/Swedish cellist Andreas Brantelid (1987), and Norwegian pianist Christian Ihle Hadland (1983). The performance featured a lot of compelling individual playing, though it wasn’t until the third movement that the soloists really seemed to be settling in together. Dausgaard provided careful support from the podium.
The lengthy Schubert “Great,” which Dausgaard conducted without a score, found him perfectly at home with both the orchestra and the music. Leaning forward from the podium, Dausgaard seemed to conduct from inside the orchestra, with an economy of gesture that gave way to demonstrative leadership in the more impassioned passages. At times he lowered his arms and stopped conducting altogether, and merely leaned his body toward the players to communicate his interpretation.
Whatever he was doing, it worked. The Schubert was given an unusually wide dynamic range, with careful attention to the gradual development of crescendos. The strings provided crisp, incisive playing (particularly in the Scherzo movement); there were a few brass intonation problems, but overall quality of orchestral sound was imposingly good. The orchestra seemed “on the alert,” with players unusually engaged and responsive. All these are good signs.
Known particularly for his interpretations of Scandinavian repertoire, Dausgaard will be back in Seattle for three weeks each season (starting with 2014-15). Judging from the success of the current program, his appointment is excellent news for this region’s music lovers.
Review: Seattle Symphony Ravel program with Ludovic Morlot, conductor, and Jean-Yves Thibaudet, piano soloist
By Melinda Bargreen
The chance to hear the esteemed pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet play not one, but two Ravel concerti in the same program would be enough to draw floods of music lovers to Benaroya Hall. The all-Ravel program also offered a generous assortment of pieces usually found on light-classics concerts, including the “Pavane for a Dead Princess,” “Rapsodie espagnole,” and the ever-popular “Boléro,” so it was no surprise to find a good-sized audience for the first subscription concert of the 2013-14 season on Sept. 19.
Like conductor Ludovic Morlot, Thibaudet hails from Lyon (France); perhaps their hometown rapport accounts for some of the felicities of the Seattle performance on September 19. After a brief curtain raiser, Ravel’s orchestration of his piano piece “Alborada del gracioso,” Thibaudet emerged from the wings to play the Piano Concerto for the Left Hand in D Major – a work originally composed for the Viennese-born pianist Paul Wittgenstein, who lost his right arm in combat during World War I. Ingenious, challenging, and frequently gorgeous, this concerto demands both considerable virtuosity and concentration from the soloist; Thibaudet rose to the occasion with exquisite phrasing and spectacular fingerwork.
Later in the program, the more frequently played Piano Concerto in G Major – all jazzy insouciance and easy, unforced elegance. The middle movement emerged as a private reverie, limpid and smooth and subtle – greatly enhanced by excellent solo work from Stefan Farkas, English horn, who had a first-rate night. So did principal horn Jeff Fair (in the “Pavane”), bass clarinetist Larey McDaniel, bassoonist Seth Krimsky, and contrabassoonist Mike Gamburg, to name but a few. Guest bassoonist David Sogg also made a very fine impression, as did guest clarinetist Frank Kowalsky and acting principal flutist Christie Reside.
Despite the popularity of the banal “Boléro,” it would have made more sense to place that work elsewhere (perhaps at the conclusion of the first half?) and end the concert with the brilliant Ravel G Major. Thibaudet, the evening’s hero, deserved the reward of an ovation that didn’t have to make way for the next work on the program. His was well and truly a “tough act to follow.”
Review: Seattle Symphony Opening Night Gala, with Ludovic Morlot, conductor, and Lang Lang, piano soloist (September 15, 2013)
by Melinda Bargreen
The Seahawks fans may have broken the Guinness Book of Records entry for the loudest stadium on Sunday – but inside Benaroya Hall on the same evening, it sounded as if the Seattle Symphony fans were also going for a world ovation record. When pianist Lang Lang tossed off the final bravura cascade of notes in the Prokofiev Piano Concerto No. 3, the audience erupted in a stadium-sized ovation punctuated by roars of approval.
It was a suitably gala conclusion to the Symphony’s Opening Night Gala concert, a season-launcher that changed formats this year: an afternoon concert, followed (for guests who also bought the post-concert dinner tickets) by a short trek from Benaroya Hall to the Fairmont Olympic Hotel for further festivities.
The concert program got off to a different start, too: music director Ludovic Morlot led the Seattle Symphony Chorale (sans orchestra) in the Star-Spangled Banner. Following that was what you might term the traditional gala concert format: a series of short musical bonbons, some well-chosen remarks from Morlot and board chairman Leslie Chihuly, and a spectacular soloist.
The Slavic-accented, dance-centric bonbons (two of Dvorak’s “Slavonic Dances,” Bartok’s “Rumanian Folk Dances,” three of Brahms’ “Hungarian Dances,” and Borodin’s “Polovtsian Dances,” plus the “Toccata” of Bulgarian composer Pancho Vladigerov) demonstrated that the orchestra is opening the season in a state of fairly robust health. Morlot and his players demonstrated rapport and spirit in these colorful works, with associate conductor Stilian Kirov taking over for the Vladigerov. The Chorale, prepared by Joseph Crnko, sounded overpowering and occasionally a bit unsteady in the Borodin.
Lang Lang, one of today’s most sought-after soloists, was the big draw of the afternoon, and he gave an account of the Prokofiev Third that pushed hard against the boundaries of what is technically possible to achieve on the piano: playing of almost unbelievable speed and prowess, overlain with a showmanship that may be unequaled in the piano world. It was a performance of huge contrasts: whisper-soft passages, and violent attacks that singled out a note or a chord for particular emphasis. This may not have been exactly what Prokofiev had in mind, but for this listener, the level of sheer headlong virtuosity was thrilling to hear.
Lang Lang is the king of the showy gesture, the swooping and soaring hands, and the kind of piano-bench choreography that expresses his approach to the music. Some may dislike this kind of showmanship; most are thrilled by it, and that latter group was clearly in the ascendant on Sunday evening. The ovation that followed the Prokofiev concerto was met by a lone encore, a considerably more dulcet account of Chopin’s E-Flat Major Nocturne (Op. 55, No. 2).
Review: Seattle Opera’s “Der Ring des Nibelungen” (Cycle 1), August 4-9, 2013
DAS RHEINGOLD
by Melinda Bargreen
Seattle Opera has served up a glittering “Das Rheingold” as the opening production in its four-opera “Ring,” which drew football-stadium cheers Sunday evening from an audience of Wagner devotees from all 50 states and 22 foreign countries.
Propelled by the vivid, exciting conducting of Asher Fisch and the strongest “Ring” cast in memory, this “Rheingold” reached new heights for the so-called “Green ‘Ring,’” with Thomas Lynch’s verdant Northwest-forest sets depicting nature not yet despoiled by mankind. The few intonation missteps in the brass section paled beside the thrilling surge of the orchestra, where Fisch’s crescendos underscored the drama on the stage to telling effect. He draws a lush, radiant sound from the orchestra, but also gets the lower brass to snarl and snap.
There’s always an excited buzz in the house for the opening of a “Ring,” and this time, there’s also the awareness that 2013 may be the last go-round for this production (first unveiled in 2001, and repeated in 2005 and 2009). It’s the last Seattle Opera “Ring” for company general director Speight Jenkins, who will be succeeded by new director Aidan Lang next year, so many operagoers are conscious of the passing of an era.
If the rest of this cycle equals this “Rheingold,” it’s going to be a gilded passage indeed. From the opening scene – with the marvelously naturalistic Rhinemaidens (Jennifer Zetlan, Cecelia Hall, and Renée Tatum, all superb) swooping and swimming in midair – to the ambiguity of the triumphant but already-doomed entry of the gods into Valhalla, there’s not a weak voice anywhere in the cast. Stephen Wadsworth’s brilliantly re-imagined staging gives each character more complexity, and more clearly defined relationships with the other characters. Sometimes, in the scenes where there are eight or nine singers on the stage at once, there’s so much going on in their interactions that you’re almost certain to miss something.
This is the one “Ring” opera particularly rife with special effects, especially disappearances (Alberich’s invisibility when donning the Tarnhelm) and appearances (Erda’s magical rise from the earth); they all came off as if charmed, enhanced by Peter Kaczorowski’s lighting.
Greer Grimsley’s pivotal Wotan is his strongest work yet in this role, right down to his despairing “Nein!” when he resists relinquishing the dangerous Ring he so covets. Stephanie Blythe’s sumptuous Fricka, passionate and mighty, awakens Wotan not with a stentorian opening statement, but with a quick, whispered injunction that’s much more realistic. Richard Paul Fink revels in the villainous role of Alberich, mighty of voice and almost over-the-top in growling menace. Some newcomers to the cast, including the powerful soprano Wendy Bryn Harmer (Freia) and tenor Mark Schowalter (Loge), made outstanding contributions, as did Lucille Beer as Erda.
Dennis Petersen was a terrific Mime; Markus Brück and Ric Furman were both excellent as Donner and Froh, and the giants – Andrea Silvestrelli and Daniel Sumegi – surpassed themselves in the emotional range of their portrayals.
The Valkyries are up next, and we get to hear the new Brünnhilde, Alwyn Mellor. Be still my Wagnerian heart.
DIE WALKÜRE
There’s nothing quite like being in the middle of a successful “Ring,” with that sudden transition from ferocious conversational buzz at intermission to rapt silence the moment the music starts. McCaw Hall is definitely the place to be for music lovers this week, as opera cognoscenti from around the world explode in rock-star cheers every time conductor Asher Fisch stands up to take a bow and acknowledge the orchestra.
As they did in Sunday’s “Das Rheingold” opener, Fisch and his first-rate players provided the surging energy that fueled an unforgettable “Die Walküre” on Monday evening. This is many opera lovers’ favorite of the four “Ring” shows: the dramatic and passionate first act bringing together the ill-fated lovers Siegmund and Sieglinde; the mother of all husband-and-wife conflicts in the second act; and the epic Ride of the Valkyries in the third. The stage was smoking on Monday night, and not only in the finale (in which Brünnhilde does a Sleeping Beauty on a rock surrounded by flames).
Among the many returning cast members, operagoers were especially eager to hear an important debut: Alwyn Mellor as Brünnhilde. She had us at “Hojotoho.” Seldom has the Valkyrie’s famous calling card sounded so opulently secure: no vague swoops or screeches, just thrillingly accurate quality. Elsewhere, Mellor’s vibrato can get a bit wide, but she proved a compelling and intelligent singer with the necessary volume, stamina, and theatrical savvy to make an impact in this role.
Stephanie Blythe is a revelatory Fricka, with the power to blow everyone else off the stage, and the intelligence to shape that mighty instrument in more interesting ways. She continues to amaze the ear.
Stuart Skelton’s Siegmund and Margaret Jane Wray’s Sieglinde were both opulent of voice, passionately convincing as actors, and persuasive in their ardor. Wray’s voice is even more sumptuous than it was four years ago; the excellent Skelton may well have set a new Seattle distance record for the sheer length of his “Wälse!”
Andrea Silvestrelli is the bully you love to hate, reveling impressively in the nastiness of Hunding (he’s a bit careless of pitch, however). The troupe of Valkyries – Wendy Bryn Harmer, Jessica Klein, Suzanne Hendrix, Luretta Bybee, Tamara Mancini, Sarah Heltzel, Renée Tatum and Cecelia Hall – are terrific, moving from roistering jollity to terror and grief at Brünnhilde’s punishment.
The show may be called “The Valkyrie,” but it’s Wotan who does the heavy lifting, and Greer Grimsley has never been more impressive in that role with its lengthy narratives and its wide emotional range. This is remarkable work. Grimsley’s stamina seemed to flag a bit toward the end, but he still rose to a final scene that had many audience members reaching for their hankies.
Director Stephen Wadsworth has enriched and deepened much of the staging, and there is a valedictory feel about this show as the characters express the human cost of their mistakes. Brünnhilde turns away repeatedly in the Todesverkundigung scene (in which she announces Siegmund’s impending death), as if she can’t quite bear to deliver the news. A Valkyrie turns back suddenly in regret for a final farewell to her exiled sister. Wotan sags with grief, clinging to the wall, as he leaves Brünnhilde on her rock in the opera’s last moments. This is a “Ring” that gives the operagoer plenty to ponder – and plenty to applaud.
SIEGFRIED
When Seattle Opera general director Speight Jenkins stepped on to the stage just before the last act of “Siegfried,” the grateful audience erupted in applause. How nice! He came out for a curtain call! In their enthusiasm the listeners had forgotten that almost the only reason a general director takes the stage is to deliver bad news: in this case, the cancellation of Alwyn Mellor (as Brünnhilde), who had awakened with an allergy attack that morning and could not sing. (Jenkins later said he had waited until the last act of “Siegfried,” the only act in which Brünnhilde sings, for the announcement so that the audience wouldn’t be thinking about the cast change during the two preceding acts.)
As it happened, the replacement singer was Lori Phillips, a company regular who opened last season in the title role of “Turandot,” and allowing for a few minor timing uncertainties, she did an excellent job of both singing and acting on Wednesday evening. Her voice is powerful and resonant, her stage presence unaffected and convincing.
The big news of the evening, however, was the Seattle debut of German tenor Stefan Vinke in the title role. Huge of voice, unflagging of stamina, imaginative and energetic on the stage: this was the finest Siegfried Seattle has ever presented, in a company that has included such greats as Herbert Becker and Alberto Remedios. The tireless Vinke bounded around the stage, leaping off of rocks and dashing hither and thither, just like the feisty adolescent Siegfried is supposed to be.
From the Forging Scene to the final passionate duet with Brünnhilde, Vinke poured out huge volumes of heldentenor sound capped by a mighty high C. Surely, we all thought, by Act III he’d have to be carried out on a stretcher – but no, Vinke was as resonant and active as ever.
Stephen Wadsworth’s staging continues to add refinements and complexities to the production. We see Siegfried’s ambivalence about his distasteful surrogate “father,” Mime (the excellent Dennis Petersen), cradling Mime in his arms even after he has killed him. We observe characters reacting to the music in the orchestra – turning around suddenly at a declamatory chord, responding to a change in the mood of the music, alert to a theme or motif in the score. Villains and heroes alike display more humanity: no one is all good or completely evil.
For all its seriousness, this “Siegfried” was often hilariously funny – never more so than in the scene in which greedy Mime and Alberich (Richard Paul Fink), gibbering with rage, hop up and down while throwing rocks at each other.
Greer Grimsley added more refinements to his portrayal of Wotan (in this opera he is called the Wanderer), completing a three-opera character arc that took him from an impetuous prime to a resolute old age. Lucille Beer was a good Erda, though she did not eclipse memories of other great Erdas past. Jennifer Zetlan was an excellent Forest Bird; Daniel Sumegi a sonorous Fafner.
The orchestra again responded with unusual dramatic brilliance to Asher Fisch’s conducting of the score many believe is the most beautiful of all four “Ring” operas. Unlike all the cast members, the orchestra plays every minute of every opera and all three cycles. Now that’s stamina at a positively Wagnerian level.
GÖTTERDÄMMERUNG
The world came to an end on Friday evening in Seattle – onstage at McCaw Hall, anyway – as Wagner’s “Ring” closed with a glorious “Götterdämmerung.” Powerful singing, compelling drama, and a surging, urgent orchestra lifted this “Ring” into the realm of legend: this is a production people will be talking about for a long time to come.
To start with, of course, there’s the cast: Stefan Vinke’s impossibly energetic, robustly sung Siegfried, who caps the role’s challenges with a breathtakingly long high C in the last act (when most tenors are gasping and rasping). Lori Phillips, who stepped in for a still-indisposed Alwyn Mellor in the role of Brünnhilde, was in excellent voice, pouring out high notes of thrilling quality and exhibiting a graceful ease throughout her middle register that only slightly faltered in the Immolation Scene at the end. Both principals are persuasive, savvy actors, a particularly vital element in this theatrically exciting staging by Stephen Wadsworth.
But it wasn’t just the two principals: there was a lot of strength throughout the cast, from Daniel Sumegi’s powerfully malevolent Hagen and his even nastier father Alberich (Richard Paul Fink) to the lovely and agile Rhinemaidens (Jennifer Zetlan, Cecelia Hall and Renée Tatum; their scene in Act III was particularly fine). Markus Brück and Wendy Bryn Harmer (who appeared earlier in “Das Rheingold” as Donner and Freia) made a success of the ill-fated brother-and-sister Gibichungs, Gunther and Gutrune.
The Three Norns – Luretta Bybee, Stephanie Blythe, and Margaret Jane Wray – are all excellent, full of power and dignity and impending doom. Blythe, who also does a compelling Waltraute, is a singing actress of such commanding power that she simply sweeps all before her: what a voice, what a presence!
This is a production full of telling details, lingering glances, and compelling gestures, right down to the Woman in White (Monte Jacobson) and Woman in Black (Emma Grimsley), two supernumerary roles created for this “Ring” that add a vital response to the horror as the characters fall in Act III – first Siegfried, then Gunther and Gutrune. There’s even a handsome horse, Brünnhilde’s Grane, who walks stolidly across the stage (observed, but not joined, by his mistress). Contributing vividly to the look of the production are the beautifully effective costumes by the late Martin Pakledinaz, whose work continues to enhance this “Ring.”
Wadsworth meets one of the biggest staging challenges of the “Ring,” its finale, by an impossibly graceful return of the airborne Rhinemaidens, the descent of the clustered gods who sink gracefully to their doom, and finally the vision of the pristine, green forest we saw in the opening of the first opera. It’s not hard to get the message: humans and other beings despoil the beauty and purity of nature, which can return to its original state when those beings are removed from the premises.
Conductor Asher Fisch and his orchestra experienced a volley of minor bloopers here and there (some of them, unfortunately, in the Funeral March), but these were of relatively little consequence beside the level of excitement and expertise that issued from the orchestra pit. Siegfried’s Rhine Journey was so lovely that you wanted Siegfried to keep on traveling right past the Gibichungs’ hall. (It would have saved him a lot of trouble.)
Go if you can; if you can’t, the first cycle of this “Ring” will be broadcast Aug. 10, 17, 24, and 31 at 7 on KING FM (98.1) and www.king.org. It’s a great chance for music lovers who missed the action in McCaw Hall.
Review: Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Summer Festival, July 24, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
It is a commonplace among music historians to write about Shostakovich’s string quartets as his most personal and intimate works, expressing the irony and the despair he felt as a victim of Soviet oppression. Of his 15 quartets, none is bleaker or more personal than the String Quartet No. 7 (dating from 1960), composed in memory of his first wife.
A spellbound audience heard this work performed – and recorded -- by festival director and violinist James Ehnes, with violinist Amy Schwartz Moretti, violist Richard O’Neill, and cellist Robert deMaine. (The same foursome recorded Shostakovich’s Quartet No. 8 in a pre-concert recital.) The four players revealed the haunted landscape of Quartet No. 7 with a tremendous and impressive variety of sound, from the subtly uneasy opening to manic intensity. There were delicate wisps of melody, slow passages of deep grief, and a third movement of furious, dangerous-sounding energy as each player attacked the phrases like a swarm of angry bees.
The details of the performance were equally telling: big, bold, and solidly unified playing from O’Neill and deMaine; the interplay between the two violins, and most of all, Ehnes’ subtle lead in phrasing that made every musical line speak to the listeners.
The temperature inside the hall rose from warm to downright toasty during the performance, because the air conditioning was turned off (its noise level interferes with the recording). The rising temperature did nothing to diminish the audience’s enthusiasm for the performance, however, though no one complained when the climate-control system was reactivated after the Shostakovich.
Almost any piece that followed might suffer by comparison, and that was the fate of a perfectly nice but less inspired Mendelssohn Violin Sonata (in F Major) that came after the Shostakovich. Violinist Erin Keefe gave the score a lively energy and strong lyricism; at the piano, Anna Polonsky provided impassioned support. It was an accomplished performance, but not an exceptional one.
The Seattle Chamber Music Society has always featured outstanding local talent on the artist roster alongside visiting musicians, and interest in Wednesday’s finale was high when Alexander Velinzon joined the ensemble for the Brahms Piano Quartet in A Major. Velinzon, concertmaster of the Seattle Symphony, brought his first-chair talents – elegant phrasing, eloquent tone, and leadership – to the ensemble (which included pianist Orion Weiss, violist David Harding, and cellist Amit Peled). Balances were sometimes a bit off in favor of the piano and the cello, but the playing was nonetheless beautiful: full of contrasts and artful details, with a pulse-pounding finale that propelled the audience members right out of their chairs .
Review: Bellingham Festival of Music, July 21, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
Concert audiences seem to love things that arrive in threes (e.g. “The Three Tenors”), so there was more than usual interest in the final program of the 2013 Bellingham Festival of Music. The concert, which concluded the festival’s 20th anniversary season, offered “the Three Sopranos,” a trio of highly regarded singers, performing arias and uniting for an Act III Finale from the Strauss opera Der Rosenkavalier.
Capping a 16-day span of concerts that featured such soloists as pianist Garrick Ohlsson, cellist Joshua Roman, and guitarist Pepe Romero, the July 21 finale was led by artistic director and festival co-founder Michael Palmer. It was a big program, starting off with Haydn’s Symphony No. 87, and moving on to Verdi’s 1896 Te Deum before concluding with the “Three Sopranos” selections.
The low point of the evening was the Verdi, where the Festival Chorus (Vance George, director) was divided into two as required by the score, and suffered from serious problems in pitch, support, blend, and accuracy. The performance had more clams than an Ivar’s restaurant.
The “Three Sopranos” – mezzo-soprano Frederica von Stade, and sopranos Heidi Grant Murphy and Katie van Kooten – took over after intermission, with mixed results at first. Van Kooten all but lifted the lid right off the Mount Baker Theater with an opulent, artful performance of Dvorak’s “Song to the Moon” from Rusalka.
Von Stade, whose Met debut occurred 43 years ago, gave a careful but rather wan performance of a movement from Berlioz’s Les nuits d’ete, whose low compass found her struggling for vocal support. Grant Murphy, a Bellingham native whose radiant voice has also graced the Met, chose an arrangement of “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands” whose range lay awkwardly over her “break,” though her high notes still had the beautiful clarity of her debut years.
The Rosenkavalier finale presents significant challenges to the orchestra as well as the singers, and Palmer led an enthusiastic, high-energy reading of selections from that richly orchestrated score. Here, too, was the best singing of the night. Von Stade’s voice, as Octavian, rose to all the high notes with a power and finesse that had been missing in the Berlioz; Grant Murphy sang Sophie’s lines with exquisite charm and ease, and van Kooten was a sumptuous, eloquent Marschallin. This finale surpassed all that had come before, and the concluding ovation was richly deserved.
Review: Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Summer Festival, July 22, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
Scanning the audience at Monday’s concert, it was hard to find an empty seat anywhere. And it’s going to be difficult to score any tickets to the remaining two programs in this final week of the 2013 Summer Festival of the Seattle Chamber Music Society. When you can pack the house for a program including a work of Elliott Carter (famous for his audience-repellent properties), a much-revised effort by Charles Ives, and a rather thorny piece by a teenaged Leonard Bernstein, you know you’re doing something right – and this festival is doing just that.
Artistic director James Ehnes not only programmed these works, but also lined up musicians who could make an excellent case for them, and arranged for a commercial recording project featuring them (the three pieces were recorded live during this concert). Rounding out the program – though not the recording – were two great classics: Mozart’s “Kegelstatt” Trio, and Schumann’s Op. 47 Piano Quartet. This was enough to lure even the Carter-averse music lovers into the audience.
It was definitely safe to go into the water, so to speak. The Carter “Elegy” turned out to be quite lovely, a lyrical and tonal piece dating from 1943 for viola and piano. Violist Richard O’Neill’s richly inflected tone and pianist Anna Polonsky’s able partnership made many fans for this work, which Ehnes unearthed during one of those repertoire searches regularly undertaken by artistic directors.
The evening’s opener, the Bernstein Piano Trio, proved inventive, jaunty, and challenging (sometimes for the listeners as well as the musicians). Violinist Erin Keefe, cellist Amit Peled, and pianist Adam Neiman were the performers, sounding a bit careful at first, in the way of musicians who know they’re performing for posterity. The performance gained in energy and strength as it went forward.
The gently undulating Ives “Largo for Violin, Clarinet, and Piano” brought violinist Amy Schwartz Moretti, clarinetist Ricardo Morales, and pianist Polonsky together for a detailed and nuanced reading. Morales returned in the “Kegelstatt” Trio (with O’Neill and pianist Orion Weiss), with a performance so subtle that his diminuendo effects brought the tone down to a tiny thread of sound, as if the clarinet were barely breathing.
The finale was a remarkably fine version of the Schumann Piano Quartet, led off by spontaneous, lyrical playing by Polonsky in some of the best work we’ve heard from her. Cellist Robert deMaine stepped forward in the third movement with a lovely account of the arch-romantic theme, joined by violinist Moretti and violist David Harding. Not surprisingly, the high-energy finale brought the listeners to their feet in acknowledgement of playing that reached the heart of the music – and the hearts of the audience.
Review: Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Summer Festival, July 10, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
“I always knew those musicians would set the place on fire one of these days,” quipped an attendee at the July 10th performance of the Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Summer Festival.
During the last movement of the last piece on the program – Tchaikovsky’s stirring Op. 50 Trio in A Minor – alarmed concertgoers began sniffing the air in the Nordstrom Recital Hall at Benaroya Hall. Something was burning; there was a thin film of smoke in the air, but no smoke detectors went off.
Gradually, listeners rose from their seats and headed to the exits. The three musicians, still playing on, soon noticed the exodus and stopped the music. There was no panic, no shoving, no shouting of “Fire!” As everyone headed for the street outside, it became clear that the source of the fire was across Union Street, where a fire truck was parked outside and firemen were checking out a fire in a dumpster. (One wonders, though, why the smoke alarms in the recital hall didn’t go off; even if the source of the smoke was outside, it obviously had been sucked into the hall through the ventilation system. If human noses can detect the smoke, the alarms should have been able to detect it too.)
“Do you think we can go back inside and hear the rest of the Tchaikovsky?” wistfully queried one disappointed concertgoer, and he wasn’t the only one. The performance was too good to stop – even for smoke in the air.
Violinist Andrew Wan, cellist Julie Albers, and pianist Adam Neiman were the interrupted players, in music whose first movement made possibly the best use of a four-note opening theme since Beethoven’s Fifth. All three players were impassioned and expert, but Neiman’s exquisitely precise and nuanced performance lifted the trio into the realm of the truly remarkable. The piano’s orchestral-sounding part is crucial in setting the tone and most of all the dynamics; Neiman’s dynamics were subtle and exemplary. No wonder the audience disappointment at the interruption of the finale was intense.
Earlier in the program, Ronald Thomas took the unusual step of chatting with the audience about the Beethoven Cello Sonata in D Major (Op. 102, No. 2) before his performance with the excellent Anton Nel at the keyboard. It was illuminating to hear his views on the sonata, which in his view marks the end of Beethoven’s “heroic, noble” middle period and the start of a more complex, multi-directional late period. Thomas and Nel made an excellent case for sonata, playing with a fine rapport and well-honed expertise. The sublime second movement was especially successful.
The opening work on the program was the relatively obscure but nonetheless charming String Quartet of Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel, the short-lived sister of composer Felix Mendelssohn. Dark-toned and passionate, this quartet got a terrific performance from violinists Augustin Hadelich and Nurit Bar-Josef, violist Cynthia Phelps, and cellist Bion Tsang, all of them determined to make every note count. First among equals was the performance of Hadelich, a violinist so fine that I’d happily listen to him play C-major scales.
The final movement took off with a zest that eventually dislodged Hadelich’s multi-paged score, which swooped to the floor – but not before the foursome played the final triumphant phrase. The audience, not surprisingly, accorded the performance a warm “festival ovation.”
Review: Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Summer Festival, July 8, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
The second season of James Ehnes’ artistic directorship at the Seattle Chamber Music Society is well underway, and audiences now are accustomed to his programming philosophy: blending traditional favorites with the new and unusual.
On Monday evening, that blend produced a mostly successful concert by combining two well-known trios – a Beethoven and a Mozart – with the world premiere of “Sanctuary,” a septet in four movements by Lawrence Dillon. The premiere was funded by the Society’s commissioning club, an imaginative group approach to the creation of new repertoire.
So what was the new piece like? Composed for French horn, two violins, viola, cello, bass and piano, Dillon’s work explores four kinds of solitude in music that has a cinematic feel – almost like a soundtrack for an action movie with some quieter scenes. Lots of heavy accents punctuate the textures (especially in the first and last movements); there are moments of lovely, wistful repose, and eerie harmonics, and some well-crafted string passages (notably in the third movement). The fourth movement has a jazzy vibe that gives way to an abrupt ending in open fifths on the keyboard.
There’s no question that Dillon is a skilled craftsman who understand the possibilities of instruments and uses them in imaginative ways. “Solitude” greets the ear, however, more as a succession of interesting ideas and episodes than as a cohesive piece in which the ideas are more fully developed. Still, it’s an audience-friendly score that was well received – and well played by Jeffrey Fair (horn), Nurit Bar-Josef and Ehnes (violins), Rebecca Albers (viola), Julie Albers (cello), Jordan Anderson (bass), and Andrew Russo (piano).
The opening Beethoven “Ten Variations on ‘Ich bin der Schneider Kakadu’,” a piano trio featuring violinist Andrew Wan, cellist Bion Tsang, and pianist Anton Nel, got an impressive performance that contrasted a dark, introspective opening with the light-hearted variations which followed. The performance was nicely detailed, with fine playing all around.
The program’s finale, Mozart’s Divertimento for String Trio in E-Flat (K.563), brought together violinist Augustin Hadelich, violist Cynthia Phelps, and cellist Ronald Thomas. Hadelich’s beautifully nuanced violin found its answer in Phelps’ energetic replies from the viola; cellist Thomas was not at his best.
When Hadelich’s multi-paged, much-extended score crashed to the ground in the final movement, the violinist was undaunted, restarting the group at the right place and proceeding to the triumphant finale. It takes more than a minor crash to derail these players, who received an enthusiastic ovation after the final chord.
Review: Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Summer Festival, July 1, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
Seldom do you see six musicians having more fun onstage than on Monday evening at the Nordstrom Recital Hall, with Martinu’s “La Revue de Cuisine” on the musical menu. This jazz ballet suite, witty and jokey and full of fun, got the high-spirited treatment from the musicians of the Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Summer Festival in the second concert of the season.
Introduced by a witty reading of the ballet’s synopsis by festival director and violinist James Ehnes, the ten-movement suite proved jaunty, colorful, and full of clever and inventive scoring. The small but vivid instrumental palette for the Martinu included clarinet (Sean Osborn), bassoon (Seth Krimsky), trumpet (Jens Lindemann), cello (David Requiro), and piano (Inon Barnatan), in addition to Ehnes’ violin – all playing with evident enjoyment.
Jolly and highly pictorial, the Martinu sometimes sounds like a cartoon soundtrack, full of sound effects and vivid musical colors. The sextet really let loose in the jazzy Charleston sections, much to the delight of the audience, which gave the ensemble rousing cheers at the finale.
The Prokofiev Violin Sonata No. 2 in D Major began life as a flute sonata, and remains one of the great solo pieces for that latter instrument. Reworked by the composer for violin at the suggestion of famed violinist David Oistrakh, the sonata also is an effective vehicle for the violin – this time performed by Jesse Mills, with pianist Andrew Armstrong.
Mills commands a beautiful, big tone and impressive technical skills, but as the performance went on, it was clear that what was missing in this otherwise excellent reading was an individual interpretive stamp on the music. Phrase after lovely phrase didn’t seem to develop in a cohesive artistic statement; expressive opportunities were lost as important transitions and resolutions marched past without much distinction or characterization. Armstrong was a responsive partner at the piano, though there were a few ensemble issues in the tricky Scherzo movement.
The evening’s finale, the Tchaikovsky String Quartet No. 3, was quite different: a full-blooded and eloquent account of this romantic score, with the passionate and authoritative violin of Ida Levin setting the tone for an excellent ensemble (violinist Stephen Rose, violist Rebecca Albers, and cellist Brinton Smith, all displaying considerable finesse and eloquent phrasing).
The Tchaikovsky is a highly exacting piece requiring deadeye accuracy in intonation and artistic approach; it’s almost miraculous to achieve this in a festival setting with four musicians who don’t regularly play together. Levin’s utter conviction and interpretive depth were echoed by all three of her colleagues, who matched her line for line in an exciting performance that drew a sustained ovation from the audience.
Review: Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Summer Festival, June 29, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
Beautiful summery weather? – Check.
Charming and urbane speech by festival director James Ehnes? – Check.
Audience leaping to its feet and bellowing “Bravo!”? – Check.
Yes, it’s the annual Summer Festival of the Seattle Chamber Music Society, back for another month of high-level and intimate concerts in the Nordstrom Recital Hall at Benaroya. This well-loved festival has survived a venue change and an apparently seamless transition in leadership, and its vital signs (artistic quality and ticket sales) are still excellent.
The happy opening-night crowd settled in for a program of Beethoven, Brahms, and shorter works by Enescu and Honegger. The opener, Beethoven’s early C Minor Piano Trio, featured the always-excellent violinist Ida Levin as first among equals, giving an assertive performance with her usual flair and fire. The pianist was the brilliant and artful Inon Barnatan, and David Requiro was the capable cellist (a bit too far in the background for an ideal balance). This familiar piano trio has seldom sounded so elegantly burnished.
Trumpet virtuoso Jens Lindemann appeared next, playing a pair of virtuoso solo pieces (Honegger’s “Intrada” and Enescu’s “Légende”) with pianist Andrew Armstrong. Formerly a member of the Canadian Brass and now an international soloist, Lindemann addressed the audience with an extended joke (first in German, then in heavily accented English, then dropping the accent), and briefly discussed the two works (both bravura concert pieces). Lindemann’s technique proved spectacular, but there also were pitch problems, and a lot of the playing sounded more forceful than artistic. At one point, the stage was bathed in red lights, an odd counterpoint to the music.
It was the Brahms – the famous Clarinet Quintet (Op. 115) – that stole the show, with the clarinet wizard Ricardo Morales playing with almost miraculous delicacy. The melting beauty of his sound and the subtlety with which it was produced were beyond praise. Morales joined violinists James Ehnes and Stephen Rose, violist Rebecca Albers and cellist Brinton Smith for this performance. Morales’ musical exchanges with Ehnes were exquisitely crafted.
Morales receded at times into the ensemble, emerging again to produce subtle arpeggios or a rising line that gradually emerged as a solo. His command of dynamics was matched by the four string players, and the quintet members sounded as if they had been playing together regularly for at least a decade. What a pleasure to hear a great work given its full due.
The festival’s season, which continues on Monday (July 1), is dedicated to the memory of two recently deceased supporters who played vital roles in its history: the vibrant Arlene Wade, a founding board member, and the energetic Helen Gurvich, who launched the festival’s endowment. Both will be greatly missed.
Review: Seattle Symphony, June 20, 2013, with Ludovic Morlot conducting, and Sergey Khachatryan, violin soloist; Benaroya Hall, June 20
By Melinda Bargreen
Thursday night was a terrible time to brave Seattle’s rainy and accident-clogged freeways – but a great time to be in Benaroya Hall with the Seattle Symphony and Armenian-born violin soloist Sergey Khachatryan, who was accorded one of the most wildly enthusiastic and heartfelt ovations the hall has seen in some time.
Born in 1985, Khachatryan became the youngest winner in history of the Sibelius Violin Competition in 2000, and went on to win the prestigious Queen Elisabeth Competition of Belgium five years later. But he doesn’t play like a competition winner; there was no sense of the mainstream or of “playing it safe” in his deeply sensitive, impassioned performance of the Shostakovich Violin Concerto No. 1 with the orchestra and conductor Ludovic Morlot. The opening Nocturne was a profound reverie; the Scherzo movement rose to a triumphant, whirling finale, and the somber Passacaglia was profoundly affecting. The fierce difficulty and staggering virtuosity of the final movement brought the audience to its feet, hoping (in vain this time) for an encore.
After intermission came the 45-minute “Become Ocean,” an eagerly awaited world premiere by Alaskan-based composer John Luther Adams.
Much is riding on this piece; Morlot and the orchestra are reportedly taking it to Carnegie Hall in May of next year. Adams unfortunately missed his premiere Thursday evening because of a health issue, so Morlot took the stage before the performance to explain the work to the audience (this is seldom a good sign). The new piece was, he said, a “musical landscape that doesn’t tell any story,” but one that is “more like looking at three clouds in the sky.” (The orchestra, wearing solid black in order to maximize the effect of the lighting, is divided on the stage into three groups for the performance, each lighted in a different color. During intermission, the stage was also bathed in light that suggested watery waves, presumably to get everyone in an aquatic mood.)
The new piece was a rather murky “ocean” at first, with deep rumblings that slowly evolved in complexity, as the work gradually took shape in a series of busy arpeggiated figures and oscillations of sound that rose and subsided over time.
As each section made a gradual crescendo, colored lights shone on the respective players; the mallet percussion instruments were kept especially busy with repeated figures that rippled up and down. It was a pleasant soundscape, one that deployed the full orchestral palette of colors. But after the first 20 minutes or so, the musical ideas had pretty much run their course, and there were no further developments to justify sustaining the piece. (Some listeners in the balcony areas took a discreet but early retreat.) At least the music fell gratefully on the ear, delivering consonance rather than dissonance, and in its very length, “Become Ocean” evoked a sense of vast oceanic scale.
Review: Seattle Symphony, Britten War Requiem
By Melinda Bargreen
Sometimes listening to a great work of music can lift you out of the concert hall and into the realm of the religious experience. That was the case for many listeners on June 13 and 15, when the Seattle Symphony Orchestra and music director Ludovic Morlot presented Benjamin Britten’s monumental 1962 “War Requiem” in a format that did full justice to this masterpiece. The Symphony was joined by a multi-faceted and expert choral complement: not only the Seattle Symphony Chorale, but also the Seattle Pro Musica and Northwest Boychoir.
First off: a huge round of applause to Joseph Crnko (director of both the Chorale and the Boychoir) and Karen P. Thomas (Seattle Pro Musica) for their choral preparation; the singing was not only accurate and beautiful, but conveyed the urgency and majesty and despair of the texts.
Before the performance started, the audience was asked not to applaud the entrance of the conductor and the three soloists. This clearly was an uncommon concert. The “War Requiem,” presented for the first time in almost 50 years in Seattle, was not only a wrenching memorial to all who have died and all who continue to die in combat around the world, but also an observance of the English-born Britten’s centenary – and a central attraction for the hundreds of choral fans/artists who were in Seattle for the annual conference of Chorus America.
Britten’s design for the “War Requiem” is brilliant and ingenious: juxtaposing the traditional structure of the Requiem mass (with its usual trajectory from “Requiem aeternam” through “Libera me”) with heart-wrenching poetry by one of the English “battlefield poets,” Wilfred Owen. Owen, who was killed in the final days of World War I, expressed the horrors of war and the despair of the combatants with a vivid “you are there” clarity that is scarcely equaled anywhere else.
With the huge array of musical forces on the stage, in the organ loft, and in a side balcony, the music rose to awe-inspiring power in several sections – most notably, perhaps, in the “Sanctus,” where the mighty crescendo of “Hosanna in excelsis” rose to fill the rafters at Benaroya Hall. Passages such as these were juxtaposed elsewhere with music of poignant delicacy, particularly in the lengthy solo passages assigned to the extraordinarily expressive tenor Anthony Dean Griffey and the excellent baritone Ivan Ludlow. Soprano Christine Brewer, apparently singing into a microphone from her perch way back in the organ loft, has a big and resonant sound, but she struggled mightily with the higher lines that lay above the staff. This was not music that displayed her abilities to advantage.
The singers’ clarity of diction – both the choristers and the soloists – was so remarkable that listeners didn’t really need to look at the texts (though each audience page-turn in the program libretto caused a lengthy sibilant fluttering that sounded like a waterfall).
Morlot carefully balanced the soloists and the accompanying forces with great success, and the orchestra was in generally fine form except for some brass intonation issues. The effect of the final “Libera me” movement was that of a vast swirling sound universe, circling and circling around the hall, and lifting the lucky listeners into a new dimension. What a masterpiece; what a fine performance!
Review: Seattle Symphony, May 30, 2013 with Jakub Hrůša, guest conductor, and Alina Ibragimova, violin soloist.
By Melinda Bargreen
It was Czech Night at the Seattle Symphony, when Prague-born guest conductor Jakub Hrůša returned to the Benaroya Hall podium to lead works of Smetana and Dvorák. Plus the Beethoven Violin Concerto – usually a work that is the high point of any program.
Not this time. The soloist, Alina Ibragimova, is a highly regarded young Russian-born violinist with many admirers, and her Seattle performance made it clear that she has much to recommend her: technical alacrity and a strong musical imagination, among other attributes.
Her highly idiosyncratic Beethoven Concerto, however, was frustrating to hear. Instead of the strength and nobility of line many soloists bring to the concerto, Ibragimova apparently decided that pianissimo was the way to bring many passages to life. It didn’t work. The Beethoven is a bravura piece, with quieter passages to be sure, but Ibragimova’s sound was all too often lacking in focus and intensity. The bow seemed to skitter weakly over the strings, and there were many pitch problems – disconcerting in a soloist who has won international repute. Ibragimova’s choice of cadenzas also verged on the bizarre: she played Wolfgang Schneiderhan arrangements (with her own alterations) of cadenzas Beethoven wrote for his piano transcription of the Violin Concerto. The total effect was that of a soloist who has wandered off track in a quest to be different.
Hrůša, an alert and energetic conductor, partnered the soloist carefully and tried (not always successfully) to mute the orchestra enough for Ibragimova’s pallid tones to be heard. He and the Symphony had more success with the other two works: a lively and varied account of Smetana’s odd, episodic, and brilliantly colorful “Wallenstein’s Camp,” and a well characterized and distinctive reading of the tuneful Dvorák Symphony No. 6.
The orchestra was responsive, though the total effect was marred by lots of bloopers from the horns and brass (particularly the trumpets). It was a good evening for the strings, however, who dug into the music with the kind of zest we’d like to have heard from the program’s soloist.
Review: Seattle Symphony, May 17, 2013, with conductor laureate Gerard Schwarz, and cello soloist Julian Schwarz.
By Melinda Bargreen
For the past week, Benaroya Hall has been the scene of a “Russian Spectacular” – a series of Slavic-accented Seattle Symphony programs led by conductor laureate Gerard Schwarz. Friday night’s concert, the second one devoted solely to the music of Shostakovich, proved spectacular indeed in every respect: the orchestra, the soloist, and the conductor.
The concert spanned Shostakovich at his jolliest, and at his most grimly uncompromising. The brief Festive Overture of Op. 96 may have been written partly as an expression of the composer’s joy at the death of his tormentor, Josef Stalin, but the rest of the program was almost unremittingly serious.
The evening’s soloist was the young cellist Julian Schwarz, born in 1991 and currently a student at the Juilliard School. He also is the son of the conductor, but his performance of the difficult Shostakovich Cello Concerto No. 1 made it clear that this engagement was considerably more than an act of nepotism: this is a cellist who deserves to be heard on his own merits.
Those merits are substantial, and they include a stellar technique, a dark and burnished tone quality, a secure sense of intonation, and a passionate intensity of interpretation. The concerto’s heroic technical requirements, including extended passages in harmonics, were negotiated with apparent ease and accuracy, and it was evident that much thought and musicianship had gone into the details of interpretation. The performance was accorded an enthusiastic standing ovation.
Bleak, powerful, and chilling, the Symphony No. 11 represents Shostakovich at his most uncompromising, as he depicts the events of the work’s subtitle (“The Year 1905,” when imperial troops slaughtered peaceful protesters in the St. Petersburg Palace Square). Dark, moody, and unsettling, the Symphony No. 11 is full of moments of impending doom, terrifying eruptions of percussion “gunfire,” menacing crescendos, eerie calm, and rhythmic martial passages. Gerard Schwarz developed each section with great patience and an inexorable forward momentum, drawing virtuoso playing from the orchestra (there were, however, some brass intonation issues). Stefan Farkas’ English horn solo was exceptionally fine. It was a thrill to hear this work, which truly deserves the term “spectacular,” performed at this level, and the audience left no doubt about its delighted reaction.
Review: Jon Kimura Parker, in President’s Piano Series, May 8.
By Melinda Bargreen
It’s a big month for Russian music, with a “Russian Spectacular” at the Seattle Symphony through next week – and a spectacular Russian recital Wednesday evening by pianist Jon Kimura Parker.
Parker, whose recital concluded this season’s President’s Piano Series, strode onto the Meany stage to greet an enthusiastic hometown crowd (he hails from Vancouver, B.C., but has performed extensively in Seattle, and his wife, Aloysia Friedmann, grew up here. His mother-in-law, the oboist and retired UW faculty member Laila Storch, actually performed “The Rite of Spring” twice under the baton of composer Igor Stravinsky).
Chatting informally with the audience, Parker established a relaxed, friendly vibe – and then knocked everyone’s socks off with a powerhouse recital of jaw-dropping intensity and finesse.
The all-Russian program offered tough, uncompromising repertoire, much of it also written for full orchestra, and all of it so technically demanding that playing it qualifies as an “extreme sport,” so to speak. Parker performed his own transcription of Stravinsky’s “The Rite of Spring,” a work so explosively difficult that it would be the centerpiece of any pianist’s program. And then he followed that with a viscerally exciting reading of Mussorgsky’s mighty “Pictures at an Exhibition.”
Just to round things out, there were two shorter Russian pieces composed for the piano: Rachmaninoff’s martial Prelude in G Minor, and the dizzying, high-energy Sonata No. 3 of Prokofiev. The Prokofiev sonata established the tone of the recital: tremendous virtuosity, tonal variety, and sheer firepower.
It was the “Rite” that riveted the ear, with the orchestral sonorities and driving rhythms all realized on the keyboard by a pianist/transcriber who seemed at some points to have at least four hands. So great was the intensity of the performance that Parker stopped at one midpoint to mop his brow before continuing on.
From the opening melody of the “Rite” (and Parker somehow managed to make the piano’s melody sound like a bassoon) to the final Sacrificial Dance, Parker expanded the normal expressive range of the keyboard, from a delicate whisper to a thunder that rocked the house.
Here, and also in the Mussorgsky, he drew an enormous variety of colors and textures from the piano, in the punchy percussive effects of the “Rite” as well as the delicate traceries of the “Tuileries” movement of “Pictures.” He offered an unusually robust account of Mussorgsky’s “Bydlo” movement, and let the chords linger sumptuously in “The Old Castle.” The massive sonorities of “The Great Gate of Kiev” were so forcefully rendered that it sounded as if Parker had a cannon or two under the piano lid.
Not surprisingly, a recital this good brought several noisy standing ovations from an audience that has always been particular connoisseurs of the keyboard. Parker returned with Rachmaninoff’s exquisitely gentle Prelude in G Major, as a kind of benediction for his fans.
Review: Seattle Opera double bill, “La Voix Humaine” and “Suor Angelica” (May 4-18, 2013)
By Melinda Bargreen
Opera can be a grand, over-the-top spectacle – like the “Turandot” that opened Seattle Opera’s season last August.
But it also can be more intimate and elemental, as the company demonstrates in its current double bill of Poulenc’s “La Voix Humaine” (The Human Voice) and Puccini’s “Suor Angelica” (Sister Angelica). This estrogen-heavy duo production may lack the bells and whistles of more spectacular shows, but as an examination of the human heart, it’s hard to beat.
Although both Poulenc and Puccini are dealing with rejected women in the depths of despair, what makes this pair of one-act operas work is the tremendous expressive quality of the principal and supporting singers. First to appear is Nuccia Focile, as the nameless protagonist (she’s called “Elle,” or “She” in French) of the one-woman show that is “La Voix Humaine.” Familiar to Seattle Opera audiences from such earlier roles as the passionate Tatyana (“Eugene Onegin”) and the generous-hearted courtesan Violetta (“La Traviata”), Focile is both appealing and harrowing as the distraught Elle.
She clings desperately to the telephone as her unseen lover of five years dumps her, and the orchestral score scurries dramatically upward to indicate her dismay. When the phone conversation is accidentally cut off, we see Focile anxiously stroking the receiver, as if willing it to speak. By turns beseeching, despairing, and momentarily furious, Focile makes the audience indignantly sympathetic … and also appalled at her neurotic clinging, especially when she grovels to her callous lover (telling him “I know this is more painful for you than for me”). Her clear, expressive voice packs an emotional punch, and her unfussy, natural acting (directed by Bernard Uzan) makes this a tour-de-force performance.
Conductor Gary Thor Wedow does a great job with the responsive orchestra, not only in the spiky, fast-moving Poulenc score but also in the lush sonorities of Puccini’s “Suor Angelica.” (Both shows employ basic but effective sets by Pier Paolo Bisleri.) Maria Gavrilova is making her Seattle debut in the title role of Angelica; her voice could be described as “Puccini heroine with a side of Valkyrie.” It’s a big instrument, rising to a mighty high C, but Gavrilova also knows how to float that voice to suggest the fragility of her character. She does a great job with the showstopper aria (“Senza mamma”).
Not surprisingly, the great Rosalind Plowright is an utterly riveting Princess, the cruelly unforgiving aunt who wreaks havoc when she visits the erring Angelica in the convent after ignoring her for seven years.
Beth Kirchhoff’s chorus contributes to a radiant finale. Connie Yun’s lighting is a bit abrupt, but effective all the same, and the supporting cast of “Suor Angelica” is a fine ensemble team (including Susan Salas as the Abbess, with Robin Follman, Dana Pundt, Mary McLaughlin, Kim Giordano, Deborah Nansteel, Sarah Larsen, Linda Mattos, and Karen Early Evans, Melissa Plagemann, Lucy Weber, Jennifer Bromagen, and Sarah Mattox). Bernard Uzan’s direction is unfussy and effective.
The audience reception seemed cool, especially for the Poulenc. But no company can survive, artistically and financially, on a steady diet of only the top-10 favorite operas in blockbuster productions. Sometimes you have to shrink the budget -- and stretch the listeners.
Review: Oregon Symphony Orchestra, with Carlos Kalmar conducting; Benaroya Hall, May 3, 2013.
By Melinda Bargreen
“It took us 117 years to get to Seattle,” quipped Carlos Kalmar from the Benaroya Hall mainstage. The Oregon Symphony maestro was referring to the Seattle debut of his orchestra; amazingly, this concert marked the first-ever appearance here for Kalmar and the OSO.
The program, a highly unusual mix of styles and periods, made it clear that the Oregonians were worth waiting for. Yet it also was a program that might have been better designed to showcase what Kalmar and the orchestra can achieve together after a decade’s partnership. Like most such concert lineups, this one featured some classic staples (Schubert’s great “Unfinished” Symphony, Ravel’s glittering “La Valse”) after the obligatory nod to the new (Narong Prangcharoen’s 2004 “Phenomenon – The Mysterious and Unexplained”).
Much of the first half, however, was expended on Kurt Weill’s “The Seven Deadly Sins,” the composer’s last collaboration with Bertolt Brecht, and a work that sounds considerably more enticing than it actually is. Described as a “ballet chanté” (sung ballet), this critique of capitalism has a dual main character, Anna, who is both a singer and a dancer. A male quartet (in this performance Jorge Garza, Carl Moe, Anton Belov and Richard Zeller, wearing a bizarre assortment of hats) acts as a sort of Greek chorus, observing Anna’s moneymaking tour of several U.S. cities and commenting on the action.
That is, if we could but understand them. The libretto is in English, and the main singer – the gorgeous and sultry Storm Large – manages to enunciate clearly enough to make about half of her words intelligible. But most of the quartet’s lines could have been rendered in Icelandic for all the audience knew, and it was too dark in the hall to read the provided libretto without a miner’s headlamp or the glow of a trusty iPhone.
Weill’s music, a collection of cabaret-style songs without either the catchy brilliance of good pop music or the wizardry of good classical music, wasted the kind of opportunities that earned the Oregon Symphony rapturous reviews of their 2011 Carnegie Hall concert. (That program, by the way, included Ives’ “The Unanswered Question,” John Adams’ “The Wound-Dresser,” Britten’s “Sinfonia da Requiem” and Vaughan Williams’ Symphony No. 4.)
In the Seattle concert, the Prangcharoen opener traversed a frequently used trajectory, with a brash and noisy opening full of brass and percussion. What came next, though, was some highly accomplished orchestration creating shimmering glissandi and glittering effects, as if we were listening to birdsong in an enchanted jungle. The finale, with its gradually disappearing wisps of sound, was memorable.
Kalmar, an energetic and frequently enraptured conductor, provided a Schubert “Unfinished” that was full of intensity and energy in the sound, and the principal woodwinds were highly accomplished.
At the beginning of the concert, Kalmar announced that the orchestra would segue directly from the end of the Schubert into Ravel’s “La Valse,” uniting “a Viennese classical composer on the verge of Romanticism, and then the funeral waltz for Viennese society.” Maybe. For this listener it was a bridge too far. The pieces have no real connection musically, except for an accident of the double-bass tones that conclude the Schubert and begin the Ravel. But the “La Valse” that ended the evening, with Kalmar’s pliant, teasing tempo changes and the all-out spectacle of the orchestra at the top of its game, was a thrill, rewarded by a standing ovation from a thoroughly gratified audience.
Review: Seattle Symphony with Hilary Hahn, and Xian Zhang, guest conductor.
By Melinda Bargreen
At 17, Hilary Hahn astonished the music world with the pure, refined artistry of her debut all-Bach recording. Now, 16 years later, she is doing something even more astonishing: somehow, Hahn is becoming a more interesting musician every year.
That she continues to inspire young fans was evident Thursday evening in Benaroya Hall, where the packed house was unusually full of youthful listeners. They all came to hear Hahn in the Sibelius Violin Concerto, with the Seattle Symphony under the direction of Chinese-born conductor Xian Zhang (based in Europe, Zhang turns 40 this year).
Perhaps one key to Hahn’s success is the fact that her technique is so immaculate, so assured, that she doesn’t have to waste any time thinking about perfecting it – and can concentrate solely on artistry and interpretation. Even in a killer concerto like the Sibelius, the music just flows out of her violin, with octave passages precisely in tune, and scalar passages as symmetrical and even as a string of pearls.
From the tremendous verve of the opening cadenza to the final flourish, Hahn produced beautifully crafted phrases whose speed and accuracy were downright mind-boggling. Her tone, especially in the luscious lower register, is warmer and more focused than ever. On the podium, Zhang not only kept up with the soloist (no easy feat) but also supported her admirably.
The audience rose for an ovation at the end, applauding at such length that Hahn returned to the stage for an encore: the Gigue from Bach’s solo Partita No. 3 in E Major. This was one of the works on Hahn’s debut recording – even stronger, subtler, and more elemental now, in mid-career.
Zhang opened the program with a rousing account of Sibelius’ tuneful “Karelia” Overture, launching the music forward with vigorous, choppy gestures. Following the concerto, the second half was an interesting pairing: the U.S. premiere of Pascal Zavaro’s “La Bataille de San Romano,” and Beethoven’s ever-popular Symphony No. 7. Zavaro was in the audience for the performance of his piece (co-commissioned by the Seattle Symphony and the Orchestre National de France, and inspired by a triptych by painter Paolo Uccello), and got a warm audience response for the colorful, propulsive new work.
Tiny but authoritative, Zhang led the Beethoven Seventh with considerable energy and a kinetic technique – lots of stirring, pointed gestures that inspired a big, warm sound (particularly in the second movement) and a fair degree of precision, except for some out-of-tune moments. Despite the absence of five principal players (concertmaster, second violin, cello, horn, and oboe), the orchestra rose to this complex and challenging program with considerable alacrity.
And there’s more: in addition to Saturday’s repeat performance, Zhang and the Symphony will reprise the overture and the Beethoven symphony at 7 p.m. Friday in the “Untuxed” series, and later that night the “(untitled)” series will offer five new chamber works, three of them by Seattle Symphony players.
Review: Seattle Symphony, April 11 with Gerard Schwarz conducting and Garrick Ohlsson, piano soloist.
By Melinda Bargreen
Mozart and Mahler can make a striking pair on a symphonic program: the elegant classicism of the former, and the voluptuous excesses of the latter, both steeped in Viennese tradition. The Seattle Symphony offered up just such a pairing in three April concerts that opened with Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 9 (K.271, the “Jeunehomme”), and concluded with Bruckner’s mighty Symphony No. 4.
Gerard Schwarz, conductor laureate, returned to the podium for this series, along with a pianist who never seems to be in Seattle often enough: Garrick Ohlsson. (He returns next season for the President’s Piano Series in Meany Theater, however, doubtless a hot ticket.)
The opening concert in the April series was particularly rewarding. Ohlsson gave an elegant, thoughtful spin to the Mozart concerto, particularly in the beautiful middle movement, where he leaned into the violin section in some sensitively nuanced playing that made him sound like part of the orchestra – rather than just the featured soloist. The results were unified and glorious. Ohlsson’s Mozart was fastidious but never prissy, and it was clear that every bar in the score had come under his careful scrutiny. Schwarz gave him considerable freedom to operate in partnership with the players; it was an eloquent performance.
The Bruckner that followed made it clear that Schwarz knows how to get the best out of the orchestra – particularly the brass section, which got a workout in this spectacular score. The orchestra’s new principal horn, Jeff Fair, turned in excellent solo work that justified his claim to the position, and his fellow horn-section members followed suit with generally clean and well-tuned calls and choruses. The trumpets, trombones, and tuba emerged powerfully from the orchestra, but never at excessive volumes.
The contrast between pastoral delicacy and mighty brass in the first movement was effective, but even more so was the eloquent flute of Demarre McGill, and the lovely cello-section lines that opened the second movement. Bruckner’s favorite interval was everywhere in evidence – there were more open fifths than in the bar of a cocktail lounge. Schwarz delineated all the drama of the score in a cohesive, impressive performance. It was enough to make a Bruckner fan out of even the unconverted. For those who already love Bruckner, it was an evening to savor.
Review: PIANIST DANIIL TRIFONOV, President’s Piano Series, April 9
By Melinda Bargreen
Anticipation ran high for the Seattle debut of 22-year-old Russian-born pianist Daniil Trifonov, who played a high-velocity solo recital in the President’s Piano Series. Here was the first-prize winner of two highly prestigious international competitions, the Tchaikovsky and the Rubinstein, who also is already an accomplished composer (and plays some of his own works on recital programs).
So is he the next keyboard phenomenon?
Clearly Trifonov has a tremendous amount of ability and potential, but his Seattle recital made a mixed impression. He has great technique, and hands that easily span not only a tenth but also a tenth chord -- though when he hits the accelerator too hard, the music sounds forced and full of misplaced notes. He has a lot of interpretive finesse, but Trifonov also can draw a brash, clattery sound from the keyboard that reminds you forcibly that the piano is a member of the percussion family of instruments.
The best playing came in his first set, Chopin’s 24 Preludes, which Trifonov has performed regularly on his recital programs. Here there was subtlety and finesse as well as keyboard fireworks. Trifonov appeared to be trying to knit these Preludes together by starting one before the final chord of the previous piece has died away, with results that sometimes did disservice to both pieces. But it was impossible not to be impressed by the sheer virtuosity of the playing.
Trifonov’s own “Rachmania,” a five-movement suite that does owe a great deal to Rachmaninoff (and other Russian composers), sounded like the work of a bright young virtuoso who was in the mood to extemporize. It was more a series of vignettes than a unified work with its own internal logic.
There is a good reason why we seldom hear the final piece on the program, Rachmaninoff’s “Variations on a Theme by Chopin” (Op. 22), on recital programs. It doesn’t represent Rachmaninoff at his best. A pianist looking for a big Rachmaninoff solo work would be better advised to look at other works, such as the Piano Sonata No. 1. In one respect, it made sense to program the “Chopin Variations” because they’re built on one of the Chopin Preludes Trifonov played earlier in the program (the C Minor one, which some wags have called the “Barry Manilow Prelude” because the pop singer/composer used it as the basis for his 1970s hit song “Could It Be Magic”). But the Rachmaninoff piece sounded bombastic and shallow in Trifonov’s hands, especially when he got a little careless with that phenomenal technique and the music-making sounded forced.
Hearty applause was followed by a spectacular encore, the "Infernal Dance" from Stravinsky's “Firebird” in Guido Agosti’s ultra-challenging arrangement. The pianist clearly reveled in those challenges, producing some of his best playing of the night.
Review: VESPERTINE OPERA, April 2:
By Melinda Bargreen
How often do you attend an opera in which the “breasts” of the female lead are inflated from the sides by a helpful pair of male attendants, as our heroine prepares to change sex before our eyes?
Not often – but then, the scene described above occurs in a chamber opera that hadn’t seen the light of day in this country before the Vespertine Opera’s American premiere performance in Seattle on April 2 (repeated April 4).
Les Mamelles de Tirésias (The Breasts of Tirésias), a chamber opera by Francis Poulenc based on the surrealist Guillaume Apollinaire’s play of the same title, was reworked around 1958 by Benjamin Britten – a Poulenc fan – and his Aldeburgh Festival team into a two-piano, English-language version. Somehow this version dropped out of sight until it was rediscovered in 2011, re-edited, and performed last year in Great Britain.
Was it worth rediscovery? The music is vintage Poulenc, full of perky tunes and bittersweet harmonies, and the two-piano version strongly recalls his duo suite, “Scaramouche.” The vocal writing is colorful, taxing, and not all that brilliant. And the story is flat-out surrealist silly: set in “Zanzibar,” an imaginary town in the south of France, a woman (Thérèse) who is exasperated with her wifely role becomes a man with a beard (Tirésias). And her husband, meanwhile, produces 1,041 children in a single afternoon. Oh, and two gamblers decide to duel to the death over whether they are presently located in Zanzibar or in Paris; both die.
What saves all this – just barely – is the quality of the performance. The staging, by Vespertine Opera Theatre director Dan Wallace Miller, is fast-paced, cleverly inventive, and lots of fun, placing principal and supporting singers all over the tiny Columbia City Theater (including in the audience) and playing off the preposterous premises of the plot. The singing, particularly from the leads (Tess Altiveros, José Rubio, Daniel Oakden), is fearless and all-out; the commitment of the whole cast is evident all evening. The two pianists, both highly experienced opera people (Dean Williamson and David McDade), are not only unanimous and supportive of the cast, but also expert at conducting and cueing. They provided both the glue and the energy that kept the production on track.
Miller’s company is dedicated to performances of smaller-scale opera in uncommon venues, such as the University of Washington’s outdoor Sylvan Theatre and the Good Shepherd Center’s chapel in Wallingford. Small venues mean small audiences and limited income; here’s hoping Miller will be able to secure the funding and support that will ensure his venturesome company’s future.
Review: Seattle Symphony with David Afkham, guest conductor, and Gautier Capuçon, cello soloist; March 21.
By Melinda Bargreen
Let others sneer at the idea of today’s symphony orchestra programming Beethoven’s Fifth. Hearing the strains of an iconic masterpiece performed by an inspiring young conductor and an invigorated orchestra is highly pleasurable, as Seattle Symphony audiences found out in a recent program led by the young German-born conductor David Afkham.
There’s really not that many opportunities to hear Beethoven’s symphonies live – maybe it’s time for a festival presenting all nine of them, as has not been done for many years in Seattle. New generations of audiences (and there were lots of youngsters in the March 21 house) need a chance to hear these great works performed in a worthy concert hall, alongside newer works that challenge the ear in different ways.
Such a challenging work surely was the Britten Cello Symphony (Op. 68), a huge, complex, and thorny piece dating from 1963, and premiered the following year by the great cellist Mstislav Rostropovich. Perhaps it was because Rostropovich had virtually no limitations as a cellist that Britten felt free to compose music of extraordinary difficulty for him. The Cello Symphony (whose formal name is the Symphony for Cello and Orchestra) is joined in Britten’s oeuvre by three suites for unaccompanied cello and a Cello Sonata, all championed by Rostropovich (and all regarded with a certain degree of trepidation, even among the best of concert cellists).
Slightly longer than the Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony that followed it on this program, the Cello Symphony opens with a fiercely difficult and lengthy first movement, full of deep and rumbling passages from other bass instruments (how often do you hear a contrabassoon and tuba in a cello piece?). The soloist, Gautier Capuçon, used a score for the performance – quite understandably, in terms of the length and complexity of this score. Capuçon commanded a beautiful, lyrical sound even in passages that did not lend themselves to lyricism, and his fleet fingerwork was a marvel to watch and hear. The third movement allowed Capuçon the most opportunity to display the tonal beauty and exquisite phrasing; elsewhere, Britten’s dense scoring sometimes drowned the cello line in a mass of full-orchestral sonorities, which may have been the composer’s intention (the work is called a “symphony” and not a “concerto”).
Afkham, who turns 30 this year, did some heroic work on the podium, shaping the phrases and balancing the textures in order to give the soloist some scope for interpretation. Afkham certainly knows about balances between a soloist and an orchestra; he is also a prize-winning pianist. He has already conducted the Dresden Staatskapelle, the Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Munich Philharmonic, and dozens of other highly rated international ensembles.
The program opened with Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” Overture, given an appropriately dark and portentous treatment, and then brought the audience – most of whom were probably there for the Beethoven’s Fifth – up short with the ear-taxing Britten work. Despite the excellence of the performance, there were many dark mumblings at intermission by audience members who were clearly expecting something a bit more conventionally tonal from the composer whose most-programmed orchestral work probably is the atmospheric and decidedly tonal “Four Sea Interludes” from the opera “Peter Grimes.”
Afkham’s fleet, light approach to the Beethoven Fifth was balm to affronted ears. There was no dramatic pause between the opening statements, no heavy and ponderous pronouncements; instead, it was light and subtle and full of graceful phrase-making. The orchestra seemed to be enjoying itself as much as the audience, which arose en masse at the conclusion for a hearty ovation for an old chestnut and a young maestro.
And, while we are on the subject of fine performances featuring the cello: the Seattle Violoncello Society’s 25th annual Bach Cello Marathon took place March 23, just two days after Bach’s birthday. I heard only the second half of the marathon (Suites Nos. 3, 4, and 6), but it was a wonderful experience. The event, held in the warm acoustics of the Phinney Ridge Lutheran Church, is produced each year by cellist Cordelia Wikarski-Miedel, with the help of Seattle Symphony cellist Roberta Downey. The Bach Marathon is a cozy and welcoming succession of all-day performances, with plenty of breaks in between for snacks and coffee and just getting up and moving around. The atmosphere is friendly and collegial, with the area’s best cellists giving of their time and energy in tribute to Bach. There’s a lot of convivial support among the performers, comparing notes and instruments and approaches to Bach. The level of playing ranges from “gifted amateur” to full “concert soloist” stature, with much of it in the latter category.
For this listener, it was a revelation to hear players who are often hidden in plain sight – in the cello sections of local orchestras, or the teaching studios of the state’s institutions of higher learning. Here are a few of the high points from the Marathon’s second half (Suites Nos. 3, 4, and 6):
-- John Michel: With a nod to baroque performance practice (and a cello tuned down the requisite half-step), Michel played two Allemandes with a tone of dark velvet and natural, graceful bowing. What an artist!
-- Charles Jacot: His phrasing was impeccable and authoritative, and his sound was beautiful but period-appropriate. A first-class player.
-- Rajan Krishnaswami: The Prelude to No. 6 was performed with immense authority and compelling technique, and a huge, dark sound that blossomed under his bow.
-- Walter Gray: This Seattle Symphony regular and founding member of the Kronos Quartet brought his own brand of brio to a nicely finished Courante in the No. 4.
-- Brian Wharton: The Sarabande of No. 6 is almost a circus act for the left hand in order to get the smooth line required by the music; Wharton’s playing was eloquent and beautifully smooth.
-- Miriam Shames: She played two movements of the No. 3 with great conviction and finesse, as if they were delightful old friends. They probably were.
-- Karissa Zadinsky: At 18, she is already so musically mature and technically secure that she seems poised for a great career ahead. Her performance of the No. 6 Gigue had listeners exchanging “Did you hear that?!” glances at key points in the performances. She commands a big, confident tone; nimble fingerwork, and elegant phrasing. It should be fun to watch her ascent.
Review: Seattle Symphony with Michael Francis, guest conductor, and Vadim Gluzman, violin soloist; March 14, 2013).
By Melinda Bargreen
He has made a specialty of “saving the day” for other indisposed conductors at the last minute, but the young English maestro Michael Francis is now well on his way to making a career in his own right. His credentials – clarity, lyricism, and rapport with the musicians – were amply evident in his Thursday return to the Seattle Symphony, the orchestra with which he made his U.S. debut three years ago.
Formerly a bass player with the London Symphony, Francis may have a particular affinity for English music (works of Englishmen Michael Tippett and Edward Elgar are on the current program), but his musicality was equally evident in the Bruch Violin Concerto, with Vadim Gluzman as the soloist.
The concerto was certainly a program highlight: the Russian-born Gluzman plays with a big, powerful tone of tremendous intensity and great expressive range. Francis was with him in every measure, and the orchestra gave him supportive partnership. The Adagio movement was warmly lyrical; in the Finale, Gluzman seemed to spear the notes with incisive accuracy, generating so much excitement that the audience response demanded an encore. He responded with a jaunty, insouciant account of Bach’s Gavotte from the solo Partita No. 3 in E major.
The orchestral works on the program – Tippett’s “Ritual Dances” from the opera “The Midsummer Marriage” and Elgar’s familiar “Enigma” Variations – share a common musical language, though Tippett’s score is decidedly modern and Elgar’s is richly romantic. Both present considerable challenges, particularly the Tippett, with its tricky flurries of scurrying notes and its frenetic, kaleidoscopic twists and turns. There were some inaccuracies in various sections, but Francis’ firm hand elucidated the issues of tempo and interpretation so clearly that the overall result was quite wonderful. Several orchestral soloists outdid themselves with memorable solo work.
Francis brought a remarkable energy to the Elgar, which draws on almost every instrument in the orchestra (piccolo to tuba and contrabassoon) to spectacular effect. The “Enigma” Variations are a study in vivid contrasts, from the fluttering and flighty passages to the mighty gravity of the best-known variation, “Nimrod.” The players gave an unusually expressive reading of the Elgar, with an especially rich string sound that Francis clearly elicited from the podium.
At the performance’s conclusion, when the final crescendo brought in the full orchestra and the Watjen Concert Organ with bass stops that rival the rumble of a Boeing jet, and the energetic Francis was practically airborne off the podium, the total effect was staggering. It was a performance that made you realize yet again that there is nothing like the live sound of a great orchestra in a great hall. This is something no electronics, no earbuds, no smartphones or speakers or iDevices, can give you, try as they might. Don’t miss a chance to hear this for yourself.
Review: Seattle Opera’s “La Bohème,” March 6, 2013.
By Melinda Bargreen
When a production of “La Bohème” can make a hardened music critic sniffle, you know you have a show that is doing Puccini proud. Seattle Opera has just such a show in its current “Bohème” – a fast-paced, naturalistic staging with young, believable singers of remarkable excellence.
Add to that a conductor who knows when to make the orchestra surge forward and when to cradle the voices with warmth and delicacy, and you have quite an evening in the theater. Conductor Carlo Montanaro gave the score a propulsive energy appropriate to the young Bohemians onstage, but never rushed the singers, letting the phrases unfold naturally.
And what singers: all of them believable in their post-adolescent goofiness, falling in and out of love, shouting and weeping and seducing and despairing. First among equals was Sardinian tenor Francesco Demuro as Rodolfo, with exactly the right style and the lyricism to set Puccini’s famous melodies aloft. His Mimi, the Cuban soprano Elizabeth Caballero, sang with exquisite tenderness, surprising the audience by floating gently up to high notes that are more commonly sung full-voice. (Her “Donde lieta” was a particular triumph.) The two of them were appealing actors, all the more so because of Tomer Zvulun’s naturalistic staging – which bypasses every usual operatic cliché and concentrates on a fresh retelling of the story.
The show’s biggest staging challenge, of course, is the Café Momus scene, stuffed with people and action, changing as fast as the swirl of a kaleidoscope. Zvulun got everybody where they needed to go, in a tumult that was just this side of chaos, but also with a tremendous sense of fun. All the parading and the excited children, the toy-seller Parpignol (Tim Janecke), Beth Kirchhoff’s well-trained chorus, and above all the maneuverings of Musetta (Nora Amsellem) as she wins back her lover Marcello (Michael Todd Simpson), were all beautifully integrated.
The staging also played up the contrast between the furious energy of the bickering Marcello and Musetta, and the lower-key and more respectful relationship of Mimi and Rodolfo. Amsellem, an adroit comedienne, has a voice that’s a shade heavy for Musetta, but she was delightful to watch – especially as she flounced away from her luckless patron Alcindoro (Tony Dillon). Simpson did a great job with Marcello, highly combustible but also empathetic to those around him. Andrew Garland was an effective Schaunard. And it’s really “luxury casting” when you have a fine, resonant bass like Arthur Woodley in the small but significant role of Colline.
The sets, designed for the Opera Theatre of St. Louis by Erhard Rom, were both striking and naturalistic, with a snow scene that drew applause from the delighted audience before the singers had a chance to utter a note. What really made things work, however, was the collage of period-style images on the curtain, which dissolved (via lighting) into the “real” streets and byways of the sets themselves. Robert Wierzel’s imaginative, effective lighting created lovely tableaux, particularly at the close of the third act. The acts were linked together by a clever use of images: a large “photograph” of the last moments of the preceding scene appeared on the curtain at the start of the next scene.
The terrific costumes gave opera fans a moment to remember the greatness of designer Martin Pakledinaz (1953-2012), an important figure in Seattle Opera annals who left us far too soon.
Review: Anne-Sophie Mutter with Lambert Orkis, Benaroya Hall, March 3.
By Melinda Bargreen
When you go to an Anne-Sophie Mutter recital, you expect two hours of blissfully good music from one of the world’s pre-eminent violinists. You expect immaculate playing; imaginative phrasing; and the intelligence of a musical aristocrat fused with a passionate perfectionist.
Sunday’s recital audience got all that, and more. In a wide-ranging and well-chosen program that spanned Mozart, Schubert, Saint-Saëns and Witold Lutoslawski, the German-born Mutter and her American pianist partner Lambert Orkis rose to a level of artistic partnership that is rare, even in the highest echelons of concert performance. The two have been duo partners for nearly a quarter-century (Mutter herself, a famous prodigy, turns 50 this year), and their ensemble is so seamlessly smooth that it seems they’re both powered by the same musical intelligence.
Still as stunning as ever, the regal Mutter swept onstage in a strapless dress (her trademark) that looked like the attire of a particularly glamorous mermaid. She and Orkis launched into two of their favorite pieces: Mozart’s Sonata No. 27 and Schubert’s Fantasy in C Major. Although the music sounded utterly spontaneous, it also was clear that the two players had worked out every detail of both pieces: every phrase, each line, the duration of each crescendo, and the hesitation before the penultimate note. Orkis, who turns his own pages, played as if he didn’t really need the score; Mutter played with tremendous authority, as if she had invented and owned the music.
You don’t often hear performances that are so perfectly finished and so lovingly crafted. In the Mozart and Schubert, and later in the second half, each note was considered and shaped and refined.
It was the Lutoslawski Partita for Violin and Piano (1984), performed in honor of the late Polish composer’s centennial, that was the evening’s ear-opener. Quirky, complex, and occasionally thorny, the Partita ranges from delicate pointillist passages and drooping glissandi to explosive utterances and phrases that sound like birdsong. It’s a spectacular piece, and so complicated that it was surprising to see Mutter playing it from memory. With her big, supple sound and fleet fingers, she can get anything she wants from her instrument. Her mastery is breathtaking.
Even more spectacular was the Saint-Saëns Sonata No. 1, which found Orkis in particularly fine form. He was always in the right place at exactly the right time, both supportive and assertive; he was Mutter’s other half, and never merely the background. At the conclusion of the impossibly speedy final movement, after Mutter and Orkis accelerated like James Bond’s Aston Martin, the audience rose to its feet with the kind of ovation that demanded an encore. We got two of them, both highly entertaining: a silky, sensuous Ravel “Habanera,” and a feisty Brahms Hungarian Dance No. 2.
Review: Seattle Symphony with Ludovic Morlot, piano soloist Nicholas Angelich; Feb. 7, 2013.
By Melinda Bargreen
When Elliott Carter died last November, just short of his 104th birthday, The Guardian’s obituary hailed him for his “self-made, fabulously intricate language.” The last orchestral utterances in that language were heard Thursday evening at the Seattle Symphony, when the orchestra and music director Ludovic Morlot premiered Carter’s “Instances.” Composed for Morlot, who told the audience of his surprise and pleasure at finding “this beautiful score” in the mail, the brief new piece (it lasts about eight minutes) is very much in Carter’s late-period style: abrupt contrasts, isolated notes that arise like blurted commentary from various instruments, atmospheric percussion effects.
Scored for chamber orchestra, “Instances” nonetheless spans a wide array of orchestral colors, from the highest instrument in the orchestra (piccolo) to the deepest (contrabassoon). The musical language is a little less spiky and acerbic than some of Carter’s earlier works; there are flowing, fluttering wind choirs, and some conversational interplay between the piano and brass. The piece ends with a quieter, wistful string passage that sounded, rather appropriately, like a farewell.
The Carter premiere was not the only surprise of the evening. Morlot’s programming placed the Carter and a most unlikely finale, the “William Tell” Overture of Rossini, as bookends for a very big program of Romantic-era masterpieces: Brahms’ fourth and final symphony and the Schumann Piano Concerto. Furthermore, Morlot reseated the strings for this concert, dividing the first and second violin sections on opposite sides of the stage in the manner favored by his predecessor as music director, Gerard Schwarz. And the piano soloist, Nicholas Angelich (born in 1970), is an artist I’ve never heard live before, though I’ve long admired his terrific recordings.
Angelich’s Schumann Concerto performance was revelatory: intimate, deeply personal, highly expressive. He played the leisurely pianissimo passages with a silky touch, and attacked the thundering octave passages with spectacular bravura. Every note in his sparkling arpeggios was a polished little gem. Angelich’s playing seemed utterly natural and unforced; he certainly did the Schumann his own way. It can’t have been easy to follow him at times, but Morlot and his players were closely attuned to the soloist, and the performance was remarkably good.
The Brahms Fourth didn’t feel similarly inspired. Morlot and the orchestra missed a lot of expressive opportunities in a solid performance that had some beautiful moments (especially among the wind soloists), but didn’t often rise above the routine.
Why place the “William Tell” Overture, traditionally a curtain-raiser, at the end of the concert? With playing as brilliant as the cello-choir opening, headed by the exquisitely beautiful solos of principal cellist Efe Baltacigil, the listeners quit wondering why, and sat back to enjoy this bonbon. What a dessert!
Review: Juilliard String Quartet, Meany Theater, Feb. 6, 2013.
By Melinda Bargreen
It’s never a good sign when an eminent musician delivers an apologia for the piece his quartet is about to play.
The Juilliard String Quartet’s cellist, Joel Krosnick, stepped to the front of the Meany Theater stage after the program’s Mozart opener to deliver some words of warning about the Elliott Carter Quartet No. 5 that was next on the program. He suggested the audience consider the quartet as a “conversation among four characters who do not have similar opinions.” There was some disagreement, Krosnick explained, among Carter’s four voices about what should happen next; he concluded by observing that Carter was “a social composer commenting on mankind today.”
It was a bleak commentary indeed. One of eight works composed after Carter’s 100th birthday (he died last year, just short of 104), the Quartet No. 5 is a set of 12 pieces, starting with a fairly brief introduction that the Juilliard foursome also played beforehand for the audience, during Krosnick’s discussion of the quartet. Acerbic, argumentative, and full of musical gestures that sound like expletives (violent pizzicatos and jagged musical exclamations), the Carter quartet sounded like the antithesis of the warmly lovely, beautifully paced reading of the Mozart String Quartet No. 21 (K.575) that preceded it.
At intermission, the word “interesting” was on nearly everyone’s tongue; this is a code word for “I didn’t like it very much, but I know I’m supposed to be impressed by Elliott Carter.” Let’s just say that this is a piece unlikely to make it onto very many people’s iPod playlist for joyous listening.
You can catch the flavor of the work on a fascinating YouTube clip in which Carter himself comments on the piece during a rehearsal of the Quartet No. 5 – also with the Juilliard Quartet: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OC1KAvJ_UdA
The Seattle performance of this work wasn’t great; intonation was not as careful or precise as it was in the rest of the program, where octaves and other intervals were virtually perfect.
The program’s finale, Beethoven’s mighty Quartet Op. 131, said to be Beethoven’s personal favorite among his great late quartets. It was given an authoritative, feisty performance in which the quartet sometimes sounded like a string orchestra in some of the divisi passages. Starved for some tonality after the Carter quartet, the Meany audience gave the Juilliard a rousing and well-deserved ovation.
Review: Vancouver Symphony with Bramwell Tovey, conductor, and Jon Kimura Parker, piano soloist. Benaroya Hall, Jan. 23, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
Special to The Seattle Times
One of the particular joys of Benaroya Hall since its 1998 opening has been the occasional appearance of touring orchestras on its mainstage: great as it is to hear the Seattle Symphony on a regular basis, it’s also exciting to compare and contrast.
On Wednesday the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra and its music director for 13 seasons, Bramwell Tovey, ventured over the border for a concert in the “Special Performances” series at Benaroya. As an added attraction, the VSO brought along Vancouver-born pianist Jon Kimura Parker, a huge favorite in Seattle (he’ll also return to play a President’s Piano Series recital at Meany Theater in May).
The program was cleverly balanced to assuage potential audience consternation over the new work – the U.S. premiere of Edward Top’s “Totem” -- with the familiar strains of the Grieg Piano Concerto that followed. Rounding things out was Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 5, a hard-charging and colorful work that is a pretty good indicator of any orchestra’s strengths and weaknesses.
The Dutch-born Top (who lives in Vancouver) composed “Totem” in three movements, each underscored with a primitive and propulsive energy. Top, who discussed the new piece with Tovey onstage before the downbeat, used terms like “the fear of being followed in the forest” and “death metal” to describe atmospheres in “Totem,” which requires such percussion instruments as a siren and a thunder sheet. The piece employs lots of tone clusters, drumming, and eerie string effects, but it sounds more like a collection of soundscapes than a work with structure and direction.
Jon Kimura Parker gave the Grieg Concerto a masterly touch, extracting every ounce of drama from the declamatory passages of the opening and the visceral excitement of the first-movement cadenza, ending the movement at such a spectacular pitch that the audience burst into startled applause. Parker built the crescendos with great skill, brought out the charming folkdance elements, and attacked the virtuoso passages with tremendous verve.
Some of the most telling moments came with Parker’s uncannily perfect sense of exactly when and how to place a soft, delicate note – taking just a little extra time in the lyrical F-major section of the third movement.
Tovey was with Parker all the way, but the orchestra sounded a little unfocused and tentative in the concerto, with some ragged entrances. When the players reassembled for the Prokofiev finale, however, the orchestra emerged as a supple ensemble with a big unified sound, impressive and mostly unified brass, and plangent, expert woodwinds with lots of character. Tovey got a terrific performance out of his players, using a very expressive left hand to elucidate details, and delineating the propulsive beat with no-nonsense clarity.
A resounding ovation brought an encore, Brahms’ Hungarian Dance No. 5. Parker had earlier played an encore, too: a virtuoso version of Danny Elfman’s “Theme from ‘The Simpsons’.” This ought charm appreciative listeners as the VSO heads south on a two-week concert tour.
Review: Seattle Symphony presents Nobuyuki Tsujii, pianist, in recital. Nordstrom Recital Hall at Benaroya Hall, Jan. 22, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
Nobuyuki Tsujii’s gold medal at the 2009 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition touched off a firestorm of controversy – but the sustained cheers at his Seattle debut recital made it clear why the Cliburn judges gave him the nod.
Tsujii, 24 years old and blind since birth, is an absolute force of nature. It’s almost inconceivable that he has been able to learn every detail of huge, complicated piano works by ear, much less play them at a spectacular technical level without being able to see exactly where his fingers are going. Only in a few isolated places is the listener aware that Tsujii has to feel his way forward on the keyboard; he plays with a degree of technical security almost all sighted pianists might envy.
Tsujii’s playing thrilled his Seattle listeners, who called him back repeatedly for encores. But it is also easy to see why his playing is not to every taste – so much so that The Wall Street Journal declared of the Cliburn Competition outcome, “Nothing in recent memory has been as shocking as this year's top prizes,” and The Dallas Morning News said that if the Cliburn contestants “had been judged purely on musical values,” Tsujii would not have won.
When playing is this exciting, why all those reservations? Tsujii’s high-octane recital here focused on Debussy and Chopin, repertoire in which translucency and poetry are required along with heroic technique. The Impressionist delicacy of the Debussy set (“Two Arabesques,” “Suite Bergamasque,” “Estampes”) was trampled by Tsujii’s tendency to play almost everything fast and loud. Best of this set was the exuberant “L’Isle joyeuse,” which was joyous indeed.
Tsujii chose some of Chopin’s more assertive repertoire for the second half, including the “Grande valse brillante” of Op. 18, the B-Flat Minor Scherzo of Op. 31, and two big Polonaises (both in A-Flat Major, ending with the “Héroique”). The Scherzo in particular demonstrated Tsujii’s keyboard facility at its most explosive, though many of the more expressive opportunities were bypassed in favor of speed and volume.
The delighted audience brought Tsujii back for three encores: a heavy-handed Chopin Nocturne in D-Flat Major (Op. 27, No. 2), a wistful and unsophisticated composition of his own, and an extended fantasy on the Stephen Foster song, “Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair.”
On Sunday, you’ll have a chance to hear him in the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 1, a bravura work that should be right up Tsujii’s alley, in a special “Celebrate Asia” concert with the Seattle Symphony. Here’s betting this piano phenomenon brings down the house.
Review: Seattle Opera’s “La Cenerentola,” McCaw Hall, Jan. 12-13, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
Imaginative, fast-paced, irresistibly funny: Seattle Opera’s production of “Cinderella” (“La Cenerentola”) unites rambunctious comedy and spectacular singing in a show that will entrance the whole family. This remarkable staging features characterizations so distinctively drawn – and so expertly sung – that you almost don’t want to laugh, because you might miss some spectacular coloratura riffs from the cast.
And then, there’s the rats: six of them, cleverly costumed humans so whimsically adorable and brilliantly choreographed (by Xevi Dorca) that they rivet the eye while serving as a sort of mute Greek chorus, observing and contributing to the action. The rats move furniture, dispose themselves attentively about the set, and even whip out hankies to dab their endearing little noses at a particularly touching moment in the finale.
There’s literally never a dull moment in this production, ingeniously designed by Joan Guillén and cleverly staged by Joan Font. Every detail of the constant action underlines the character development and relates directly to the music and the libretto. This “Cenerentola” is co-produced by the Houston Grand Opera, the Welsh National Opera, Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu and Grand Théatre de Genève, and it’s a production that deserves substantial international exposure.
All the roles are sung and acted with a wealth of vocal and dramatic detail, in fully realized and hysterically funny portrayals that are attentively accompanied by conductor Giacomo Sagripanti (in his U.S. debut). The lyrical orchestral sound is enhanced by a period-replica fortepiano (with Sagripanti playing) that’s just the right texture for this work.
The Italian mezzo-soprano Daniela Pini, making her U.S. debut in the title role, is astonishingly good: her voice is rich, full, and remarkably agile and accurate throughout the role’s considerable range. Her appealing stage presence and affecting acting add to the impressive vocal goods.
Fortunately, this Cinderella gets an appropriately excellent Prince: tenor René Barbera, whose high Cs and Ds are as viscerally exciting as his bravura coloratura technique, and who also can caress a vocal line with smooth, easy intimacy.
The two wicked stepsisters, both Seattle Opera Young Artists, certainly are great arguments for the worth of that program. Dana Pundt (Clorinda) and Sarah Larsen (Tisbe) are witty actresses and compelling singers; they play off each other with considerable comic finesse.
The men in the cast all seem to be having a terrific time, from Patrick Carfizzi’s spectacularly comic Don Magnifico to Brett Polegato’s suavely funny Dandini. Arthur Woodley brings both warmth and gravity to his “fairy godfather” role of Alidoro. The men of the Seattle Opera chorus, choreographed to the hilt, sing and cavort with evident enjoyment.
And hooray for Guillén’s costumes: he has the mean stepsisters decked out in wigs that appear to have been lifted from “The Simpsons,” and presents Don Magnifico in a pointy-hat pajama outfit that might be described as “Pagliacci meets the Ku Klux Klan.” (The outfit was slightly modified on Sunday, when Valerian Ruminsky took on the role with generally favorable results.) There were a few hiccups in the Sunday show, but Karin Mushegain – an excellent singing actress -- sailed through the title role with an assured performance of her florid arias.
Tenor Edgardo Rocha, who was to sing Sunday, was unfortunately indisposed, and René Barbera returned in his stead, with a performance that was if anything even more assured and energetic than on the night before. What stamina!
Review: Seattle Symphony “Rach Fest” concert, Jan. 5, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
Benaroya Hall was bursting at the seams for both nights of the Seattle Symphony’s inspired programming coup, the “Rach Fest.” That audiences came running for these concerts in the first week of the New Year, when music lovers usually are collapsed in the post-holiday doldrums, speaks volumes about the Symphony’s understanding about what audiences want.
They want pianists.
And they want thrilling bravura repertoire.
The four Rachmaninov piano concertos fill that bill admirably for this town of piano fanciers (over at Meany Theater, the President’s Piano Series has long attracted some of the smartest and most dedicated of the city’s concert audiences). Even better, the Symphony and music director Ludovic Morlot were able to fulfill those wishes with four artists new to Seattle, rather than finding it necessary to book big, familiar, expensive names. Thus audiences also enjoyed the thrill of discovering Benjamin Grosvenor (Great Britain), Yeol eum Son (South Korea), Denis Kozhukhin (Russia), and Di Wu (China).
On January 5, the second evening of the “Rach Fest,” the composer’s last two piano concertos were on display, with Kozhukhin playing the Fourth and Wu playing the Third. (Their order of composition was switched for this concert for obvious reasons: the Third is a spectacular and popular barn-stormer, and the Fourth is a problematic and much-revised work whose charms are eclipsed by its predecessor. Better to end with the Third.)
Kozhukhin and Morlot made a good case nonetheless for the Fourth, which lacks the virtuoso opportunities and particularly the melodic invention of the more popular Second and Third Concertos. Kozhukhin is a lyrical, powerful interpreter, with nimble fingers and a wide variety of sonorities in his keyboard arsenal. He had good partnership from Morlot in terms of balance and timing, as well as considerable freedom in the tempi. But the concerto, at least in the composer’s third version of his often-maligned score, just doesn’t hold together very well, with abrupt transitions and a first-movement ending that sounds as if Rachmaninoff’s pen suddenly ran out of ink. The composer’s flair for beautiful melodies seems also to have deserted him here; the second movement sounds like variations on the theme of “Three Blind Mice.”
The audience gave Kozhukhin a warm reception, and he responded with an eloquently simple encore: the Alexander Siloti arrangement of Bach’s Prelude in B Minor.
Di Wu gave a generous, large-scale performance of the Third, attentively partnered by Morlot as she traded first-movement phrases back and forth with the orchestra – really sounding like a member of the ensemble instead of a soloist on a different planet, so to speak. Wu played the unaccompanied first-movement passages with tremendous freedom and rubato, tapering the sound into a thin thread and then exploding with tremendous energy in the fortissimo passages. She got a bit over-excited in the first movement’s big cadenza, attacking it with such force that she missed some crucial notes, but the control returned in subsequent passages.
Morlot started the second movement with plenty of Russian soul, and Wu gave a gorgeous wind-up to the beautiful D-flat major episode that is the centerpiece of the movement. The opening of the third movement again found her pushing the tempo too hard and suffering some minor technical mishaps, but the memory of those was soon eclipsed by the spectacular, hard-charging finale. Nor was “fast and loud” her only response to this score; she commands a wide variety of textural effects, and some of the rippling chords midway through the final movement sounded eerily like a celeste.
The ovation that met the performance rattled the rafters at Benaroya, and Wu responded with an encore designed to demonstrate her more poetic side: “Feux d’artifice” from Debussy’s Preludes, Book II.
Maybe the “Rach Fest” will become an annual fixture at Benaroya Hall; one can only hope so. And perhaps next time they might consider swapping the lackluster Fourth Concerto with another Rachmaninov piano/orchestra concertante work whose attraction never fades: the “Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini.”
Review: Seattle Symphony “Rach Fest” concert, Jan. 3, 2013
By Melinda Bargreen
That roar emanating from Benaroya Hall on Thursday evening was not from the Seahawks’ “Twelfth Man,” though it was nearly as loud. It was the roar of a capacity audience thrilled by a knockout performance of one of the most popular of all concertos, Rachmaninov’s arch-romantic Piano Concerto No. 2.
The soloist in that work was the 20-year-old British pianist Benjamin Grosvenor, a rising star with brilliantly dexterous digits and an interpretive finesse to go with them. Very carefully partnered by Seattle Symphony music director Ludovic Morlot, who frequently looked over his shoulder to make eye contact with the young pianist, Grosvenor gave a performance of the Rachmaninov Piano Concerto No. 2 that was equal parts clarity, lyricism, and flat-out hair-raising panache. No wonder Grosvenor has been winning awards and recording contracts, and reviews that extol his “echoes of a golden age” and call him “the darling of every pianophile in Britain and beyond.”
The Rachmaninov Second can sound muddy and cluttered when the pianist and the orchestra battle for supremacy in this dense, passionate score. Morlot and the orchestra concentrated instead on transparency as well as power, letting Grosvenor’s solo part shine through, and making his dialogues with various orchestral soloists much more effective.
The fervent audience ovation that followed the performance was rewarded by Grosvenor’s spectacular encore: Johann Strauss’ “Tritsch-Tratsch Polka,” arranged by Georges Cziffra.
What a brilliant programming coup, starting up the orchestra in the post-holiday doldrums with an ultra-popular piano extravaganza featuring four Rachmaninov concertos in two programs. Seattle has always been a city of keyboard fanciers, and choosing four highly rated but little-known pianists to unveil in the “Rach Fest” has lured capacity audiences downtown to check things out.
The first program featured not only Grosvenor, with his crystalline technique and singing touch, but also the remarkable Korean-born pianist Yeol eum Son – silver medalist at both the 2009 Van Cliburn International Competition and the 2011 Tchaikovsky International Competition.
Son’s poise and lyricism were evident in her reading of the Rachmaninov Piano Concerto No. 1, a work that is musically less substantial and certainly less famous than the Second. She nonetheless made a powerful impression, displaying both an impressive, sparkling technique and a restrained, silky touch in the more lyrical passages. Son literally let her hair down, shaking out a chignon, in the second-movement Andante, playing as if it were an eloquent private reverie. Her performance was warmly received.
Morlot and the orchestra provided sensitive and musically intelligent partnership to both pianists. On the down side: the piano slid slowly out of tune, most noticeably the Ds and D-flats of the three octaves above middle C. It should have been readjusted at intermission.
Two more Rachmaninov concertos await Saturday’s listeners: the mighty Third, with Chinese-born up-and-comer Di Wu soloing (in a work so long and convoluted that a long-ago Seattle Symphony soloist actually got lost in the last movement, and the conductor had to restart). And the Fourth will feature the 23-year-old Russian-born multiple prizewinner Denis Kozhukhin. The Fourth will be played first, perhaps because anything following the Third is inevitably anticlimactic. Here’s betting the performances won’t be, if they are anything to compare with Thursday night’s concert.
CD Review: Bryan Johanson, 24 Preludes
Michael Partington, guitar
Rosewood Recordings (700261840604)
Ever since the time of Bach, the allure of creating a set of short pieces in every major and minor key – 24 of them – has drawn composers and performers alike. Most of these prelude sets, like Bach’s original “Well-Tempered Clavier,” have been composed for keyboards: Chopin, Rachmaninoff, Shostakovich, and Scriabin come to mind.
Portland composer Bryan Johanson, however, has composed his 24 Preludes for guitar, and has not designed the set as a traversal of all the major and minor keys (several of which don’t work well for the guitar). Instead, Johanson has let his imagination run freely in this set of lovely, quirky, often brilliant short pieces (the longest is 4:28; the shortest, 0:57). Each of the 12 Preludes in the first half of the recording has a partner of sorts (often altered in intriguing ways) in the second half, though sometimes you need to listen closely to detect specifics of that partnership.
More than an academic or cerebral exercise, however, these pieces are highly enjoyable just as pure music, especially when played with the virtuosity exhibited here by Michael Partington. The University of Washington faculty guitarist has a technical and expressive arsenal of the highest caliber. His intonation is an exemplary. Particularly memorable is the variety of touch on the guitar strings, which can be rapid-fire percussive or so soft that it sounds as if Partington is breathing on the strings rather than plucking them. You may find yourself going back again and again to catch a particular phrase; these pieces are so short that they’re over before you know it.
Review: Choral Arts, Dr. Robert Bode conducting; December 15, 2012.
By Melinda Bargreen
In all the hustle and bustle that precedes the holidays, music lovers know there is one event guaranteed to provide the most aesthetically beautiful gift of peace.
It’s the annual Christmas concert of Choral Arts, the nationally award-winning Seattle-based chorus that was founded by Richard Sparks (a choral director who also founded the highly regarded Seattle Pro Musica; Sparks now teaches in Texas). Choral Arts is now directed by Dr. Robert Bode, who teaches at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, but returns regularly to Seattle for rehearsal periods with Choral Arts.
It was Bode who devised the popular formula for the Christmas concerts: an uninterrupted hour-long flow of beautiful holiday music of several eras, with an instrumental accompaniment that weaves the separate pieces together into a whole. There’s no halt for applause, or any other break in the music, until the last note of the final number.
This year’s program featured something novel: a discreetly amplified guitar instead of the piano accompanying the singers. Guitarist Bob McCaffery-Lent provided beautiful and delicate underlayment for the transitions and for some of the music as well (most memorably in the exquisite performance of Alf Houkom’s challenging “The Rune of Hospitality”). For this listener, however, there’s no question that the piano works better; it is a better balance for the chorus in terms of volume, versatility of sound, and above all, harmonic richness. Perhaps it is coincidental that some of the a cappella works sank slightly in pitch from beginning to end, finishing in a lower key than originally written, and a guitar has fewer options for finessing the transitions.
Among the program’s high points: certainly the Houkom piece, rendered in a delicate web of massed chords and sonorities, and illuminating a text that gives us plenty to ponder. The elegant simplicity of Herbert Howells’ “The Little Door” showed the chorus’ subtlety and blend. The setting of “How Can I Keep from Singing,” by Karen P. Thomas (director of another first-rate chorus, the Seattle Pro Musica), built the plain-spun melody with layers of internal echoes that grew into a rich and vibrant finale.
The audience got a turn, too, with two sing-along carols, culminating in a return of Choral Arts for a charming, honest William Hawley arrangement of “Not One Sparrow is Forgotten.”
Listeners filed out into the cold, wet night, holding on to this gift of music.
Review: Seattle Symphony “Messiah,” Dec. 14, 2012
By Melinda Bargreen
Before all those joyful Hallelujahs came a reflection on grim reality.
The Seattle Symphony’s “Messiah” performance Friday evening began with an announcement that the event would be dedicated to the memory of the lives lost in that day’s horrific school shootings in Connecticut. Heads bowed all around Benaroya Hall for a moment of silence, but there would be many moments in the “Messiah” that followed for concertgoers to ponder themes of suffering, death, and redemption.
It was a compelling performance. This “Messiah” was led by Stephen Stubbs, a Seattle native who has established an international reputation as a lutenist, harpsichordist, and conductor of baroque opera. At times, the Seattle Symphony’s “Messiah” sounded almost operatic, with vivid emotional content and dramatic energy throughout the deftly trimmed score. (A few cuts were made in the oratorio, all of them defensible.)
Sometimes a performance that attempts to marry the conventions of a modern orchestra with authentic 18th-century performance practice can be an awkward hybrid. Not this one. Stubbs got almost all the string players to play with minimal vibrato, but with a rich and well-shaped sound that was full of life and energy. He chose a cast of four soloists who were lavish in their choice of imaginative embellishments; some of those arias had more embroidery than the Unicorn Tapestries.
Stubbs got a flexible and expressive performance out of the Seattle Symphony Chorale, too: “Surely He hath borne our grief” was heart-wrenching, and the pacing of “Lift up your heads” was highly dramatic.
Not everything worked perfectly, partly due to the stage configuration. Stubbs conducted while standing in front of an elevated harpsichord, which he occasionally played – sometimes only in part of a selection, sometimes only with one hand – while giving the orchestra and chorus cues. But the four vocal soloists (Shannon Mercer, Laura Pudwell, Ross Hauck and Kevin Deas) were positioned between Stubbs’ back and the audience, and accompanying these singers was correspondingly difficult. Some of the instrumental players must have also found it hard to see Stubbs, judging from a few defects in ensemble.
Mercer’s soprano solos were beautifully focused and expressive, and her performance of “Rejoice greatly” also demonstrated a breathtaking agility and speed. Hauck, the tenor, was extraordinarily expressive, with imaginative ornamentation that gave the familiar arias some nifty new twists. Few mezzo-sopranos are able to make the “Messiah” solos shine convincingly, and Pudwell was not one of those few. Deas’ bass solos grew in strength from a rather unfocused beginning to a more triumphant “The trumpet shall sound.” (And the trumpet did indeed sound, in a heroic and error-free performance by trumpeter Alexander White.)
As the “Hallelujah” Chorus rang out, in a day that otherwise did not inspire many hallelujahs, the performance sounded more heartfelt than ever. Even as the news reports recall Herod’s slaughter of the innocents, it is possible to find some solace in music whose message and whose beauty can lift us up.
Review: Seattle Men’s Chorus, Dec. 1, 2012
By Melinda Bargreen
It’s the most ambitious audience sing-along yet – and the Seattle Men’s Chorus audience pulled off quite a coup by singing “The Twelve Days of Christmas” to new lyrics while divided into a dozen groups throughout Benaroya Hall’s seating areas.
You know something about a conductor when he can make even an audience for the annual holiday show sound like real singers. The Men’s Chorus founding conductor, Dennis Coleman, can do just that, and a lot more, in this year’s production, “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.” He’s so smart about musical choices, giving the audience something serious and classy just when they’re expecting something wacky and sassy. The skits may be hilarious, but underpinning the whole show is a sense of solid musical values.
How wise to emphasize the sheer power of all those male voices with Benaroya Hall’s Watjen Concert organ, played by a master who put that magnificent instrument through all its gears as if it were a Ferrari. Douglas Cleveland, director of music at Plymouth Congregational Church and a faculty member at the University of Washington, knows how to get the maximum brilliance from the instrument, and hearing that concert organ in the hall adds an extra depth to the performance.
The singers entered the hall to a majestic processional (by David N. Johnson), and the accompanying organ crescendos in the subsequent “Gloria” cranked up the sense of drama and excitement in the house. All those voices: all those pipes!
Following a remarkably good chorus/organ performance of a new arrangement of Gigout’s “Grand Chorus Dialogue,” Cleveland provided a scintillating finale to the first half with a famous organ showpiece, the Toccata from Widor’s Symphony No. 5.
But there was considerably more than organ music, glorious as it was. This year’s holiday show, “Baby, It’s Cold Outside,” combines the tried and true with the fun of novelty. By now, the annual holiday show has long since found a formula that works – but the details are never quite the same from year to year.
One thing that doesn’t vary, thank goodness, is the savvy musical crew, which includes not only Coleman but also Evan Stults (pianist) and Eric Lane Barnes (musician of all trades, including composing and arranging). That trio has become downright indispensable to the success of the annual holiday show. It was Barnes’ medley of “Forgotten Carols” from other countries that got some of the program’s biggest laughs (the carol supposedly from tiny Liechtenstein was predictably brief).
Over the years, the SMC has invited a bevy of guest stars for the opening pair of performances; this year, it was the entertaining Ana Gasteyer (of “Saturday Night Live” and “Suburgatory” fame).
Gasteyer had some pretty stiff competition, however, from chanteuse Arnaldo Inocentes (a former SMC member, now performing as a spectacular cabaret soloist).
This year’s second half has a tropical theme, and the Chorus changes en masse from their formal wear to aloha-wear in an onstage feat that has to be seen to be believed. There probably could have been some trimming here and there, amongst all the sambaing and south-of-the-border numbers, and the cool-jazz version of the SMC’s traditional “Silent Night” didn’t work so well at quite such a slow tempo. But the best pieces had a terrific energy and generated a lot of laughs (especially for the over-the-top Mrs. Claus of Jordan Weaver-Lee). And the Captain Smartypants troupe was in fine form.
Maybe this year’s holiday show gets some extra energy from the state voters’ recent passage of the marriage equality measure, to which there were a few references in the programming (the Chorus’ official mission includes “using the power of words and music to recognize the value of gay and straight people and their relationships”). This Christmas is a time of celebration on many levels.
The SMC has scheduled four more performances in Benaroya Hall, following runouts to Everett and Tacoma: Dec. 16, 20, 21, and 22. Go, if you can; “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” is a great way to warm up for the holidays.