I'm really not feeling like writing a review at the moment, so I'm simply going to talk about yesterday's concert the way I would to a friend, and it will likely come out as a very short blog post.
Ludovic Morlot was conducting the Seattle Symphony last night, and they performed Chabrier's Bourrée fantasque, Schumann's Cello Concerto in A minor and Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique. Xavier Phillips was the soloist for the cello concerto.
The Chabrier was a somewhat catchy piece of music, but overall I found it slightly silly. It was over after six or seven minutes, and the stage was reset for the cello concerto.
I am extremely familiar with the Schumann cello concerto because my brother is a cellist, and so I enjoyed it more than I might have if it was a piece I was less intimate with. Xavier Phillips was not a great cellist, but he was adequate, and I particularly enjoyed the first movement because of my familiarity with it and the fact that the music is very beautiful. I was surprised to find myself not very familiar with the second movement, but in the third movement I was again very close to it.
After the concerto was over intermission began. And after intermission was over, Morlot returned to the stage to conduct the Symphonie fantastique by Berlioz. I had only listened to the piece a few times before yesterday evening, and so I was not familiar enough with the music to fully appreciate it. However, I feel like this would not be one of my favorite pieces no matter how much I got to know it. There were parts here and there that I enjoyed, but overall this piece for me played the role of capping off an evening which was something less than inspiring.
That's what it is really. I just wasn't very inspired by any of the concert. The only reason I'm here writing this is because I've written a post for every concert that I've been to since January of last year, and I want to be consistent. But there isn't really anything about yesterday's concert that is worth talking about. At least not for me. The orchestra appeared to be in good form under their music director, and I'm sure that a lover of the Symphony fantastique would have been enraptured by this performance.
Next week is Bach's St. Matthew Passion!
____________________________
http://www.seattlesymphony.org/symphony/buy/single/production.aspx?id=13626&src=t&dateid=13626
Sunday, February 16, 2014
Sunday, February 2, 2014
February 1st, 2014: Shostakovich & Adams
Last night's concert was absolutely splendid. Olari Elts led the Seattle Symphony in John Adams' The Chairman Dances: Foxtrot for Orchestra, Adams' arrangement of Liszt's The Black Gondola, and Shostakovich's Symphony No. 9 in E-flat major. Alexander Melnkov soloed in Shostakovich's Piano Concerto No. 2 in F major, also led by Elts.
This was a very welcome contrast to the last two concerts we heard at the Symphony. Olari Elts was an excellent conductor who brought out the best of the Seattle Symphony with a refined, powerful and skilled technique, and Alexander Melnikov brought an authentic and masterful artistry to the piano.
The program opened with John Adams' The Chairman Dances: Foxtrot for Orchestra. I hadn't listened to it at all in advance, but I enjoyed it overall. For the first several minutes the novelty of Adams' unique orchestration techniques combined with his signature ostinato rhythms kept my attention, and as the piece went along it contained just enough variation and deviation from the repetitive motifs of the first few minutes to mostly keep me interested. I say mostly because it did lose my attention from time to time, but overall I enjoyed the piece. Olari Elts was able to demonstrate his competence as a leader throughout the work, holding the orchestra together through difficult syncopated rhythms, and guiding them from beginning to end through a convincing rendition of the work. Though I'd never heard the piece before, I could tell it was a very professional performance.
Next came Shostakovich's Piano Concerto No. 2. This was the piece both my fiancé and I were most excited to hear, most specifically the second movement. We both really love that second movement, and personally I had very little hope that the live concert would live up to our hopes and expectations, because when you really love something it's very easy to find a performance of it slightly lacking.
Alexander Melnikov demonstrated a social awkwardness from the first moment he appeared on stage. He seemed unsure of whether to walk on or not, and seemed a little bit like he was in the zone. Perhaps he has some kind of high functioning autism like aspergers. In any case, it didn't interfere with his ability to play the piano. Olari Elts kicked off the first movement at a brisk tempo, and when Melnikov entered on the piano he displayed a pure, authentic and compelling musicality which breathed life into the music and made it speak crystal clear. The orchestra again displayed their best work under Elts' leadership, and Melnikov was Elts' equal in mastery of his craft; together they led a truly wonderful performance of Shostakovich's piano concerto.
The first movement was over soon enough, and by now I had reasonably high hopes for the second movement. But not nearly high enough.
What happened next is something that I would give up all my tickets for the rest of the season to experience even once more.
Olari Elts gave the orchestra a broad gesture that was both firm and sweeping, and the strings began the second movement. It was much slower than I expected. And much more magical. It was as if every single musician on stage loved that movement as much as we did, and every single player knew that this is a precious thing, to be given the utmost focus and dedicated care. The tone in the strings was liquid gold, their musical expression suited to tug on the heartstrings of even the most hardened audience member. Elts was leading them through this waking dream with subtlety, depth and mastery. Every player was right there with him, keeping the music as fluid and natural as a stream of water, even at the difficultly slow (and hauntingly beautiful) tempo that they were taking. And the dynamic contrasts that Elts elicited from the orchestra were utterly sublime and to chilling effect.
My chest constricts with the memory of the almost unbearable beauty even as I write this. I feel I would do anything to hear that performance again.
By the time Melnikov began the first piano entrance, I was in heaven. The lush, warm velvet ground had been lain, and the eternal beauty had been thoroughly established. Within that, Melnikov's first notes were like a white angel entering the scene, a perfect being of crystalline beauty set into motion to dance with the utmost grace amongst the endless warmth and unconditional love emanating from the orchestra. His playing was utterly superb, and together with the orchestra under Elts astounding leadership, they embarked on the journey through this precious gem that Shostakovich has given us. It was an experience I will never forget, and at times joy simply overflowed in me and a smile broke out. Throughout intermission and the rest of the evening I was aching to go back to that heaven they had created.
At the end of the second movement Elts led the orchestra directly into the third, which is naturally in a much more upbeat tempo, more similar to the first. Melnikov missed a few notes in some of the virtuosic passages, but it mattered little, for his musicality was authentic, and the orchestra supporting him kept up their stellar playing. There were a few moments in the third movement where soloist and orchestra weren't quite in sync, but for the most part it was a great performance. There was even a moment where Melnikov wiped his face with his handkerchief in rhythm to the music in the orchestra. That was priceless and wonderful. Anyways, the concerto came to an end with a bang, and then intermission began.
We walked around the lobby, and I continually lamented the inability to replay the performance of the second movement. It was truly, truly remarkable.
The second half of the program began with John Adams' arrangement of Liszt's piano work The Black Gondola. There's a very interesting story behind this work, but long story short, it was inspired by Liszt's obsession with the idea of a black gondola carrying Richard Wagner's dead body.
Right towards the beginning of the piece, when it was still rather quiet, an audience member coughed/sneezed very loudly, which unfortunately set Christine and I off on a laughing fit. I was able to control myself fairly quickly and just keep my eyes on the orchestra and not laugh, which helped her to stop laughing eventually as well. But the consequence of this was that our focus was not as much on the music as it should have been for the first few minutes of the piece.
The work really caught my attention the first time it really took motion and seemed to describe the gondola moving along. A haunting, dark melody in the violins was accompanied by slow, churning music in the lower instruments, and it seemed to describe the morbid scene perfectly. The piece then built up and reached a climax with soaring melodies in the violins, but it maintained its dark character throughout. In retrospect I was quite impressed by the work and am definitely going to give it another listen. It goes without saying that the orchestra and Olari Elts performed this piece at the same excellent level as everything else.
And finally, Shostakovich's 9th symphony brought the evening to a close. Before performing The Black Gondola, Elts actually spoke to the audience about the Shostakovich symphony, and he said that while it often appears to be a light piece full of jokes and what not, that he thinks the key to the piece is actually in the Bassoon solo in the fourth movement, and in the second movement. And he said that looking from there, it appears that the happy, humorous moments of the symphony are actually a false happiness, like somebody "making your smile bigger with their knife." The audience chuckled at that.
I performed this work with the Bremerton Symphony back in 2009 when I was in the Academy Chamber Orchestra under Alan Futterman. He took several of the ACO students with him when he conducted concerts in Bremerton, and this was on one of the programs. So I have a kind of history with the piece, and a certain fondness for it.
Both conductor and orchestra were solid throughout the piece. The upbeat, "humorous" moments were crisp and lively, and the dark moments were dark. Seth Krimsky's Bassoon solo in the fourth movement was excellent. All in all it was a very good performance of the symphony, in keeping with the quality of the rest of the evening.
It is concerts like these that keep me coming back, and I wish there were more of these and less of the strikeouts.
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http://www.seattlesymphony.org/symphony/buy/single/production.aspx?id=13623&src=t&dateid=13623
http://www.seattlesymphony.org/symphony/buy/single/production.aspx?id=13623&src=t&dateid=13623
Sunday, January 26, 2014
January 25th, 2014: Rigoletto at the Seattle Opera
Last night was the closing night of Rigoletto at the Seattle Opera. It was an enjoyable evening, and there was much to be admired in the orchestra and the singers, but overall this production was slightly below the level that I have come to expect from the Seattle Opera.
Riccardo Frizza was the conductor for the evening. He's Italian of course, and he has conducted in several major opera houses around the world. He took the overture slowly and gravely, setting a dark and dramatic mood for the beginning of the opera. The orchestra sounded solid and impressive throughout, and at the end of it the curtain rose to reveal the opening scene of the Duke's party.
Francesco Demuro, who we saw in La Bohème back in March, was excellent as the Duke. He has a clear, rich voice and great lyricism. Already though, throughout the opening party scene, it began to be evident that the different components of the production weren't quite locked in right. Some of the dancing in the party looked awkward and contrived, and some of the singing was slightly out of sync with the orchestra. It didn't have the complete cohesion and togetherness that were present in La Bohème, The Daughter of the Regiment and Wagner's Ring Cycle.
I was immediately disappointed with Marco Vratogna's Rigoletto, both visually and aurally. He didn't look like much of a hunchback, and there was something coarse and distant about his acting. In addition, his voice didn't project very well.
The whole production was set in Fascist Italy, which I won't speak too much about as it had no impact on my impression of it. I didn't see the point of setting it there, but it also didn't interfere too much with the story, so I was neutral about it. One very interesting element of that setting though was the fact that they made Count Monterone into a sort of Jewish stereotype. He had a yarmulke on his head, glasses, and he looked slightly disheveled and was the spitting image of the concerned father. He got beaten up quite badly by the brutish courtiers who here took on the appearance of the fascist police. They would often give the Hitler salute throughout the production.
Monterone, played by Donovan Singletary, also didn't have a voice that projected very well, which is a terrible thing given that he sings about his voice "falling upon you like thunder," and his placing of the curse on Rigoletto is supposed to be imposing and terrifying; here it was neither. Soon enough the first scene came to an end, the curtain came down for a little while, and then we found ourselves in the dark alley where Rigoletto bumps into the assassin Sparafucile. Andrea Silvestrelli was a wonderful Sparafucile. I was very much looking forward to seeing him again after his performance as Hunding in The Ring. Here he didn't quite give as stellar a performance, but his appearance, mannerisms and voice all worked perfectly for the shady character.
Once we got into Rigoletto's house and he greets his daughter Gilda, the production took on a greater level of subtlety and involvement. The interactions between the two were wonderful, and Nadine Sierra was a perfect Gilda. Vratogna's stale acting and quiet voice notwithstanding, everything was done very well, and Sierra carried the show through most of this scene and into her famous aria, Caro Nome. The Duke of course appears before then, wooing Gilda and thereby prompting her to sing Caro Nome after he leaves. Demuro gave a stellar performance in this scene as well, and Gilda perfectly portrayed the innocent, naïve girl.
I should mention that my expectations for the character of Rigoletto have been set by Cornell MacNeil's performance in the 1977 Metropolitan Opera DVD. It is a truly exceptional performance and an example of a singer completely transforming into their character, so it is extremely difficult to meet that standard.
Anyways, towards the end of Caro Nome, Nadine Sierra went out on a limb and had what seemed like an extended series of elaborated endings which consisted mostly of herself singing very high notes with no orchestral accompaniment. I'm not familiar enough with the music to know whether everything she sang was merely a stretched version of what's in the score, or whether she was actually adding ornaments as well.
There were dramatic and suggestive touches added to many scenes throughout the opera. The first one was the fact that Monterone's daughter was actually present at the opening party scene, drunk and almost taken advantage of by the Duke. The next major one was in the concluding segment of the first act, when the Duke's men come into Rigoletto's house to kidnap Gilda. One of the thugs gags and binds Rigoletto's maid, and as the tense scene unfolds she sits tied to a chair sobbing.
Even though the tension and drama in the act's conclusion wasn't quite what I hoped it would be, it did achieve a certain erie quality to it. When Rigoletto tears off his blindfold and begins searching the house for Gilda, the rising motives in the orchestra were slow and deliberate, giving it a fluid drive that differs from the standard sharp-edged interpretations that move more hastily. Vratogna took no deviations from the score in his closing cries, which dampened the drama compared to some of the recordings we are used to now, but I can't complain if Verdi wouldn't have. Then the curtain fell, concluding the first act.
A long intermission followed, scarcely shorter than the second act that was to follow it. We wandered around, looked into the orchestra pit, and returned to our seats. A woman who sat next to us asked us how we were liking it so far, and apparently she was a singer herself.
The second act takes place entirely inside the Duke's home, and it is about half the length of the first act. The Duke is flustered over the fact that Gilda has gone missing, unaware that his own men kidnapped her. He figures it out quickly and goes to join her in whatever room his men put her. Rigoletto then comes in and has a dramatic confrontation with the Duke's men over the kidnapping of his daughter. The strings in the orchestra played their most fiery during the moments when Rigoletto calls the courtiers a vile race and begs them to give him back his daughter. All in all this act was very solid, moreso even than the first, and by the end of it I began to get the feeling that my slight lack of enthusiasm for the production was simply for the same reasons that I've always had a slight lack of enthusiasm for this opera compared to Verdi's other masterpieces. I couldn't pinpoint anything that was flawed musically, I think it's just not my favorite opera.
I did particularly enjoy the closing number of the second act. After Gilda and her father are reunited (this included some surprisingly emotional acting from Vratogna when he realizes that the Duke has been with his daughter) Rigoletto swears vengeance on the Duke whilst Gilda begs him to forgive him. This closing piece is very catchy and I found the interpretation and tempo to be such that it spoke to me in a way it never had before. The curtain then fell, and another long intermission followed.
The third and final act of Rigoletto is arguably the best of the three; definitely the most dramatic anyway. It takes place at Sparafucile's house on a stormy night, and Rigoletto and Gilda approach and observe the Duke inside his house, having entered in order to woo Sparafucile's sister. Gilda realizes that the Duke deceived her, but she continues to love him anyway. This act is famous for the quartet between the four characters in the scene (everyone but Sparafucile), which was performed very well by all involved. The blending of the voices on stage was particularly smooth and impressive. This act becomes very dramatic towards the end, as Gilda contemplates sacrificing herself to save the Duke, and Sparafucile argues with his sister about whether or not the Duke is to live. Eventually Gilda rushes into the house and gets stabbed, saving the Duke's life.
The musical performances from the orchestra and the singers throughout all this drama were very good, and I got very emotionally wrapped up in it. The moment that Gilda runs into the house was the only moment in the opera where my heart pounded and my eyes watered. If that doesn't happen at least once during a dramatic opera, I consider the performance to be a failure.
The rest of the act was good, although predictably Vratogna was not very convincing in his reaction to finding that Gilda was killed instead of the Duke. It's very hard to convincingly portray this, and perhaps that's another element of this opera that makes it difficult to stage effectively; many of the emotional moments are so extreme as to be impossible to actually pull off, and so it appears to fall flat. Rigoletto's final cry of "The Curse!" was quite good though; his voice soared up and out into the hall, riding on the thick orchestral texture beneath him, but ultimately I think it could have been more.
Overall, I would say that both the orchestra and Marco Vratogna lacked a certain level of intensity and emotion, while Nadine Sierra and Francesco Demuro gave stellar performances, balancing it out to make a rather good and enjoyable production, but certainly not a great one.
After the opera was over, the cast took their bows wearing Seahawks shirts, and a "12" flag descended from above the stage. I don't have much to say about this. It speaks for itself, and we can only hope it never, ever, ever happens again.
Riccardo Frizza was the conductor for the evening. He's Italian of course, and he has conducted in several major opera houses around the world. He took the overture slowly and gravely, setting a dark and dramatic mood for the beginning of the opera. The orchestra sounded solid and impressive throughout, and at the end of it the curtain rose to reveal the opening scene of the Duke's party.
Francesco Demuro, who we saw in La Bohème back in March, was excellent as the Duke. He has a clear, rich voice and great lyricism. Already though, throughout the opening party scene, it began to be evident that the different components of the production weren't quite locked in right. Some of the dancing in the party looked awkward and contrived, and some of the singing was slightly out of sync with the orchestra. It didn't have the complete cohesion and togetherness that were present in La Bohème, The Daughter of the Regiment and Wagner's Ring Cycle.
I was immediately disappointed with Marco Vratogna's Rigoletto, both visually and aurally. He didn't look like much of a hunchback, and there was something coarse and distant about his acting. In addition, his voice didn't project very well.
The whole production was set in Fascist Italy, which I won't speak too much about as it had no impact on my impression of it. I didn't see the point of setting it there, but it also didn't interfere too much with the story, so I was neutral about it. One very interesting element of that setting though was the fact that they made Count Monterone into a sort of Jewish stereotype. He had a yarmulke on his head, glasses, and he looked slightly disheveled and was the spitting image of the concerned father. He got beaten up quite badly by the brutish courtiers who here took on the appearance of the fascist police. They would often give the Hitler salute throughout the production.
Monterone, played by Donovan Singletary, also didn't have a voice that projected very well, which is a terrible thing given that he sings about his voice "falling upon you like thunder," and his placing of the curse on Rigoletto is supposed to be imposing and terrifying; here it was neither. Soon enough the first scene came to an end, the curtain came down for a little while, and then we found ourselves in the dark alley where Rigoletto bumps into the assassin Sparafucile. Andrea Silvestrelli was a wonderful Sparafucile. I was very much looking forward to seeing him again after his performance as Hunding in The Ring. Here he didn't quite give as stellar a performance, but his appearance, mannerisms and voice all worked perfectly for the shady character.
Once we got into Rigoletto's house and he greets his daughter Gilda, the production took on a greater level of subtlety and involvement. The interactions between the two were wonderful, and Nadine Sierra was a perfect Gilda. Vratogna's stale acting and quiet voice notwithstanding, everything was done very well, and Sierra carried the show through most of this scene and into her famous aria, Caro Nome. The Duke of course appears before then, wooing Gilda and thereby prompting her to sing Caro Nome after he leaves. Demuro gave a stellar performance in this scene as well, and Gilda perfectly portrayed the innocent, naïve girl.
I should mention that my expectations for the character of Rigoletto have been set by Cornell MacNeil's performance in the 1977 Metropolitan Opera DVD. It is a truly exceptional performance and an example of a singer completely transforming into their character, so it is extremely difficult to meet that standard.
Anyways, towards the end of Caro Nome, Nadine Sierra went out on a limb and had what seemed like an extended series of elaborated endings which consisted mostly of herself singing very high notes with no orchestral accompaniment. I'm not familiar enough with the music to know whether everything she sang was merely a stretched version of what's in the score, or whether she was actually adding ornaments as well.
There were dramatic and suggestive touches added to many scenes throughout the opera. The first one was the fact that Monterone's daughter was actually present at the opening party scene, drunk and almost taken advantage of by the Duke. The next major one was in the concluding segment of the first act, when the Duke's men come into Rigoletto's house to kidnap Gilda. One of the thugs gags and binds Rigoletto's maid, and as the tense scene unfolds she sits tied to a chair sobbing.
Even though the tension and drama in the act's conclusion wasn't quite what I hoped it would be, it did achieve a certain erie quality to it. When Rigoletto tears off his blindfold and begins searching the house for Gilda, the rising motives in the orchestra were slow and deliberate, giving it a fluid drive that differs from the standard sharp-edged interpretations that move more hastily. Vratogna took no deviations from the score in his closing cries, which dampened the drama compared to some of the recordings we are used to now, but I can't complain if Verdi wouldn't have. Then the curtain fell, concluding the first act.
A long intermission followed, scarcely shorter than the second act that was to follow it. We wandered around, looked into the orchestra pit, and returned to our seats. A woman who sat next to us asked us how we were liking it so far, and apparently she was a singer herself.
The second act takes place entirely inside the Duke's home, and it is about half the length of the first act. The Duke is flustered over the fact that Gilda has gone missing, unaware that his own men kidnapped her. He figures it out quickly and goes to join her in whatever room his men put her. Rigoletto then comes in and has a dramatic confrontation with the Duke's men over the kidnapping of his daughter. The strings in the orchestra played their most fiery during the moments when Rigoletto calls the courtiers a vile race and begs them to give him back his daughter. All in all this act was very solid, moreso even than the first, and by the end of it I began to get the feeling that my slight lack of enthusiasm for the production was simply for the same reasons that I've always had a slight lack of enthusiasm for this opera compared to Verdi's other masterpieces. I couldn't pinpoint anything that was flawed musically, I think it's just not my favorite opera.
I did particularly enjoy the closing number of the second act. After Gilda and her father are reunited (this included some surprisingly emotional acting from Vratogna when he realizes that the Duke has been with his daughter) Rigoletto swears vengeance on the Duke whilst Gilda begs him to forgive him. This closing piece is very catchy and I found the interpretation and tempo to be such that it spoke to me in a way it never had before. The curtain then fell, and another long intermission followed.
The third and final act of Rigoletto is arguably the best of the three; definitely the most dramatic anyway. It takes place at Sparafucile's house on a stormy night, and Rigoletto and Gilda approach and observe the Duke inside his house, having entered in order to woo Sparafucile's sister. Gilda realizes that the Duke deceived her, but she continues to love him anyway. This act is famous for the quartet between the four characters in the scene (everyone but Sparafucile), which was performed very well by all involved. The blending of the voices on stage was particularly smooth and impressive. This act becomes very dramatic towards the end, as Gilda contemplates sacrificing herself to save the Duke, and Sparafucile argues with his sister about whether or not the Duke is to live. Eventually Gilda rushes into the house and gets stabbed, saving the Duke's life.
The musical performances from the orchestra and the singers throughout all this drama were very good, and I got very emotionally wrapped up in it. The moment that Gilda runs into the house was the only moment in the opera where my heart pounded and my eyes watered. If that doesn't happen at least once during a dramatic opera, I consider the performance to be a failure.
The rest of the act was good, although predictably Vratogna was not very convincing in his reaction to finding that Gilda was killed instead of the Duke. It's very hard to convincingly portray this, and perhaps that's another element of this opera that makes it difficult to stage effectively; many of the emotional moments are so extreme as to be impossible to actually pull off, and so it appears to fall flat. Rigoletto's final cry of "The Curse!" was quite good though; his voice soared up and out into the hall, riding on the thick orchestral texture beneath him, but ultimately I think it could have been more.
Overall, I would say that both the orchestra and Marco Vratogna lacked a certain level of intensity and emotion, while Nadine Sierra and Francesco Demuro gave stellar performances, balancing it out to make a rather good and enjoyable production, but certainly not a great one.
After the opera was over, the cast took their bows wearing Seahawks shirts, and a "12" flag descended from above the stage. I don't have much to say about this. It speaks for itself, and we can only hope it never, ever, ever happens again.
Monday, January 13, 2014
January 11th, 2014: Bach's Coffeehouse
Just two weeks after guest conductor Carlos Kalmar took the 'worst conductor of the season' award, he is usurped by Jeannette Sorrell, the conductor and harpsichord player at Saturday night's concert. It is hard to believe that she actually led the Seattle Symphony in the manner that she did, and in trying to describe her utter childish and incompetent disposition I am sure I will often find myself at a loss for words. But to ensure that you, dear reader, always run like the wind if you ever hear her name, I will do my best to relate to you what occurred on the Benaroya Hall stage this weekend.
This concert was one of the Baroque & Wine series, aptly titled 'Bach's Coffeehouse' for it contained almost entirely music that would have been performed by Bach in a famous coffeehouse in Leipzig in the early 18th century. It opened with Bach's Orchestral Suite No. 2 in B minor, followed by Telemann's Horn Concerto in D major and Vivaldi's Concerto for Two Violins in A minor. An intermission then took place, and the second half consisted of Bach's "Brandenburg" Concerto No. 5 in D major and Sorrell's own arrangement of Vivaldi's "La folia" after his Trio Sonata in D minor.
I love baroque music, and I was particularly excited about the Orchestral Suite, the Concerto for Two Violins and the Brandenburg Concerto. As musicians came on stage it was evident that the symphony had successfully reserved several of the key players for this concert tonight even though the orchestra was split with the opera, which was performing the opening night of Rigoletto on Saturday. This was very promising, and I couldn't think what could go wrong. I didn't have high expectations for Sorrell, but I also assumed that she would be sitting at a harpsichord for most of the performance, for there were two on stage. Demarre McGill, who is on extended leave from his Principal Flute position this season, was featured in the program as well, soloing by himself in the Orchestral Suite and along with others in the Brandenburg Concerto.
After the small orchestra had finished seating themselves, Emma McGrath came out to tune them, and then Demarre McGill and Jeannette Sorrell entered the stage to perform the Bach Orchestral Suite.
Sorrell was dressed in some sort of black outfit that had flowing fabrics here and there, and her red hair was done up in a fancy style. Rather than taking a seat at the conductor's harpsichord, she stepped up on the podium just to the right, picked up a baton, and very slowly and pretentiously raised her arm to give the downbeat whilst gazing melodramatically into the distance.
I could have walked out then. We all know what happens next.
But if I did walk out, I wouldn't be able to write this review and warn people. So here I am. For you I have suffered. You may as well benefit.
Under her absolutely incompetent, pretentious, insipid leadership, which was entirely obsessed with childishly dramatic faces and gestures, the orchestra lurched unsteadily into the Orchestral Suite. Whilst Sorrell stood on the podium practically masturbating, the orchestra, which would have had no problem playing together without a conductor (due to their small size tonight) were utterly disarrayed by her distracting, meaningless and useless faces and gestures. It seemed as though the orchestra was always playing just a touch faster than it wanted to, and there was almost never a time throughout the entire suite that it did not feel as though the ensemble was barely holding together. The music spoke nothing, for there was no pulse and no drive; just what appeared to be a constant tripping over itself in an attempt to gain some coherence and rhythmic integrity.
Demarre's playing was good, but it was also rendered ineffective by the havoc that Sorrell was wreaking on the performance. Her arms flailed about in grotesque and abrupt movements as her face seemed to mock some mediocre, dramatic actress. What we were seeing was the absolute worst of the musically bankrupt, self-obsessed performances typical of young European soloists, except that this was the first time we observed it in a conductor, and the result was horrifying.
It was hard to believe that Sorrell was doing what she was doing. What do you suppose she's thinking when she goes about attempting to lead an ensemble in that manner? Or is there any room for thinking with an ego as large as she appeared to have? Did she think that she was going to do something novel which nobody else had done before? Did she feel that others were merely silly for restraining themselves from some kind of "authentic artistry" in which one would bring out the emotion in the music by making melodramatic faces at the orchestra from beginning to end?
Though to be realistic, with as much self-indulgence and philosophizing as she was going through on the podium, it's hard to believe many thoughts about the orchestra entered her head. She was the star of the show, and she was going to go to the ends of the earth (and to the limits of musical masturbation and self-obsessed pretentiousness) to prove to everybody how "into the music" she was.
It may sound like I must be exaggerating, but I'm not. She completely and utterly destroyed the coherence of the ensemble and its ability to speak the music to the audience. She made the concert about herself. There was a moment or two in the orchestral suite where she did move over to the harpsichord, and during those moments the ensemble became noticeably more together. And the last movement, the Badinerie, was slightly more together than the rest of the suite, featuring brisk and impressive playing by Demarre McGill.
Sorrell took up a microphone a few times throughout the evening, and would talk about the composers they were performing and about the coffeehouses in Leipzig where this music would have been performed. Her voice was unsurprisingly that of a bimbo, and her jokes and comments were insipid.
Following the Orchestral Suite was Telemann's Horn Concerto in D major. It was a fine little piece, and the horn soloist, Mark Robbins, was exactly what you'd expect for a professional horn player who didn't feel the need to practice a little piece by Telemann before going on stage. He played well, but cracked occasionally during tough passages. Particularly during this concerto the concert took on the feel of an actual coffeeshop performance. And at the end of the slow movement Sorrell outdid herself in melodrama; the orchestra had a sequence of passages that would each end in a fermata, and as each one drew to an end Sorrell would 'cut them off' with a drawn out series of flowing movements and a laughably insipid, 'thoughtful' look up towards the ceiling.
Then came Vivaldi's Concerto for Two Violins in A minor. This is one of my all time favorite pieces of baroque music, probably the one I was most excited to hear that night. In keeping with the fact that Vivaldi wrote all his concertos for the girls at the orphanage where he worked, they had two women soloing in it; Elisa Barston and Cordula Merks. And in keeping with the rest of the concert, the first few notes of the piece were hardly together at all, and this was followed by a seemingly endless pursuit towards coherence of pulse, endless because it's never quite attained. It was like riding on a horse who never has his left legs and right legs moving quite in sync.
Barston and Merks are both fine violinists who also know when it's not important to practice. Barston made two very serious and noticeable mistakes within the first minute of the concerto. It was clear that they just saw this as a fun thing to do, figured they know the music well enough to not spend too much time practicing it, and didn't think too much about how much money the audience had paid to hear a professional performance. Sorrell kept up her antics, consistently rendering the performance lame, and finally at the end of that concerto, intermission began.
Not much happened during intermission, so we'll get right on with it.
For Bach's "Brandenburg" Concerto, Sorrell was situated at a harpsichord in the midst of a chamber ensemble. Laudate dominum. With her absence from the podium, we got the first reasonably performed piece of the evening. The "Brandenburg" Concerto No. 5 is a lovely work, and the small group of players who performed it did quite well, delivering an enjoyable performance of Bach's masterpiece.
And to close off the evening, Sorrell again led her own arrangement of Vivaldi's Trio Sonata in D minor, "La folia." With her at the helm the disjointed pulse returned, and even as the piece got faster and faster in what is supposed to be a toe-tapping endeavor, there was no toe-tapping because the orchestra wasn't on the same page. Every moment felt like a yearning for greater coherence of ensemble, and it always felt like in a measure or two it could be reached, but it never was. For an orchestra to intentionally play like this would be impossibly difficult, and it's fascinating when it happens, but such was our fate on Saturday night. Jeannette Sorrell demonstrated the power the conductor wields; she single-handedly destroyed the pulse of the music.
My girlfriend kept commenting on how Sorrell looked like a witch who was casting spells, and throughout the course of the evening it dawned on me that I was witnessing the greatest act of musical crime I have ever seen.
I am again disappointed in the Seattle Symphony for not demanding more preparedness from their own soloists and for hiring incompetent guest conductors. They think that because the audience doesn't feel ripped off on the given night of the performance that it's not doing harm to the reputation of classical music. But it is, because people are bored at such concerts, and if they aren't blaming the performers or the administration, where else can the blame fall?
____________________________
http://www.seattlesymphony.org/symphony/buy/single/production.aspx?id=13762&src=t&dateid=13762
This concert was one of the Baroque & Wine series, aptly titled 'Bach's Coffeehouse' for it contained almost entirely music that would have been performed by Bach in a famous coffeehouse in Leipzig in the early 18th century. It opened with Bach's Orchestral Suite No. 2 in B minor, followed by Telemann's Horn Concerto in D major and Vivaldi's Concerto for Two Violins in A minor. An intermission then took place, and the second half consisted of Bach's "Brandenburg" Concerto No. 5 in D major and Sorrell's own arrangement of Vivaldi's "La folia" after his Trio Sonata in D minor.
I love baroque music, and I was particularly excited about the Orchestral Suite, the Concerto for Two Violins and the Brandenburg Concerto. As musicians came on stage it was evident that the symphony had successfully reserved several of the key players for this concert tonight even though the orchestra was split with the opera, which was performing the opening night of Rigoletto on Saturday. This was very promising, and I couldn't think what could go wrong. I didn't have high expectations for Sorrell, but I also assumed that she would be sitting at a harpsichord for most of the performance, for there were two on stage. Demarre McGill, who is on extended leave from his Principal Flute position this season, was featured in the program as well, soloing by himself in the Orchestral Suite and along with others in the Brandenburg Concerto.
After the small orchestra had finished seating themselves, Emma McGrath came out to tune them, and then Demarre McGill and Jeannette Sorrell entered the stage to perform the Bach Orchestral Suite.
Sorrell was dressed in some sort of black outfit that had flowing fabrics here and there, and her red hair was done up in a fancy style. Rather than taking a seat at the conductor's harpsichord, she stepped up on the podium just to the right, picked up a baton, and very slowly and pretentiously raised her arm to give the downbeat whilst gazing melodramatically into the distance.
I could have walked out then. We all know what happens next.
But if I did walk out, I wouldn't be able to write this review and warn people. So here I am. For you I have suffered. You may as well benefit.
Under her absolutely incompetent, pretentious, insipid leadership, which was entirely obsessed with childishly dramatic faces and gestures, the orchestra lurched unsteadily into the Orchestral Suite. Whilst Sorrell stood on the podium practically masturbating, the orchestra, which would have had no problem playing together without a conductor (due to their small size tonight) were utterly disarrayed by her distracting, meaningless and useless faces and gestures. It seemed as though the orchestra was always playing just a touch faster than it wanted to, and there was almost never a time throughout the entire suite that it did not feel as though the ensemble was barely holding together. The music spoke nothing, for there was no pulse and no drive; just what appeared to be a constant tripping over itself in an attempt to gain some coherence and rhythmic integrity.
Demarre's playing was good, but it was also rendered ineffective by the havoc that Sorrell was wreaking on the performance. Her arms flailed about in grotesque and abrupt movements as her face seemed to mock some mediocre, dramatic actress. What we were seeing was the absolute worst of the musically bankrupt, self-obsessed performances typical of young European soloists, except that this was the first time we observed it in a conductor, and the result was horrifying.
It was hard to believe that Sorrell was doing what she was doing. What do you suppose she's thinking when she goes about attempting to lead an ensemble in that manner? Or is there any room for thinking with an ego as large as she appeared to have? Did she think that she was going to do something novel which nobody else had done before? Did she feel that others were merely silly for restraining themselves from some kind of "authentic artistry" in which one would bring out the emotion in the music by making melodramatic faces at the orchestra from beginning to end?
Though to be realistic, with as much self-indulgence and philosophizing as she was going through on the podium, it's hard to believe many thoughts about the orchestra entered her head. She was the star of the show, and she was going to go to the ends of the earth (and to the limits of musical masturbation and self-obsessed pretentiousness) to prove to everybody how "into the music" she was.
It may sound like I must be exaggerating, but I'm not. She completely and utterly destroyed the coherence of the ensemble and its ability to speak the music to the audience. She made the concert about herself. There was a moment or two in the orchestral suite where she did move over to the harpsichord, and during those moments the ensemble became noticeably more together. And the last movement, the Badinerie, was slightly more together than the rest of the suite, featuring brisk and impressive playing by Demarre McGill.
Sorrell took up a microphone a few times throughout the evening, and would talk about the composers they were performing and about the coffeehouses in Leipzig where this music would have been performed. Her voice was unsurprisingly that of a bimbo, and her jokes and comments were insipid.
Following the Orchestral Suite was Telemann's Horn Concerto in D major. It was a fine little piece, and the horn soloist, Mark Robbins, was exactly what you'd expect for a professional horn player who didn't feel the need to practice a little piece by Telemann before going on stage. He played well, but cracked occasionally during tough passages. Particularly during this concerto the concert took on the feel of an actual coffeeshop performance. And at the end of the slow movement Sorrell outdid herself in melodrama; the orchestra had a sequence of passages that would each end in a fermata, and as each one drew to an end Sorrell would 'cut them off' with a drawn out series of flowing movements and a laughably insipid, 'thoughtful' look up towards the ceiling.
Then came Vivaldi's Concerto for Two Violins in A minor. This is one of my all time favorite pieces of baroque music, probably the one I was most excited to hear that night. In keeping with the fact that Vivaldi wrote all his concertos for the girls at the orphanage where he worked, they had two women soloing in it; Elisa Barston and Cordula Merks. And in keeping with the rest of the concert, the first few notes of the piece were hardly together at all, and this was followed by a seemingly endless pursuit towards coherence of pulse, endless because it's never quite attained. It was like riding on a horse who never has his left legs and right legs moving quite in sync.
Barston and Merks are both fine violinists who also know when it's not important to practice. Barston made two very serious and noticeable mistakes within the first minute of the concerto. It was clear that they just saw this as a fun thing to do, figured they know the music well enough to not spend too much time practicing it, and didn't think too much about how much money the audience had paid to hear a professional performance. Sorrell kept up her antics, consistently rendering the performance lame, and finally at the end of that concerto, intermission began.
Not much happened during intermission, so we'll get right on with it.
For Bach's "Brandenburg" Concerto, Sorrell was situated at a harpsichord in the midst of a chamber ensemble. Laudate dominum. With her absence from the podium, we got the first reasonably performed piece of the evening. The "Brandenburg" Concerto No. 5 is a lovely work, and the small group of players who performed it did quite well, delivering an enjoyable performance of Bach's masterpiece.
And to close off the evening, Sorrell again led her own arrangement of Vivaldi's Trio Sonata in D minor, "La folia." With her at the helm the disjointed pulse returned, and even as the piece got faster and faster in what is supposed to be a toe-tapping endeavor, there was no toe-tapping because the orchestra wasn't on the same page. Every moment felt like a yearning for greater coherence of ensemble, and it always felt like in a measure or two it could be reached, but it never was. For an orchestra to intentionally play like this would be impossibly difficult, and it's fascinating when it happens, but such was our fate on Saturday night. Jeannette Sorrell demonstrated the power the conductor wields; she single-handedly destroyed the pulse of the music.
My girlfriend kept commenting on how Sorrell looked like a witch who was casting spells, and throughout the course of the evening it dawned on me that I was witnessing the greatest act of musical crime I have ever seen.
I am again disappointed in the Seattle Symphony for not demanding more preparedness from their own soloists and for hiring incompetent guest conductors. They think that because the audience doesn't feel ripped off on the given night of the performance that it's not doing harm to the reputation of classical music. But it is, because people are bored at such concerts, and if they aren't blaming the performers or the administration, where else can the blame fall?
____________________________
http://www.seattlesymphony.org/symphony/buy/single/production.aspx?id=13762&src=t&dateid=13762
Wednesday, January 1, 2014
December 31st, 2013: New Year's Eve at the Seattle Symphony
Ludovic Morlot gave the downbeat, and the Seattle Symphony burst out in John Williams' iconic Star Wars music. The brass were crisp and resonant, the strings unified, the ensemble energetic and coherent. The Seattle Symphony was back! After the catastrophic performance of Beethoven's 9th symphony on Saturday, it was clear within seconds that this night would not be a repeat of that, even though most of the principal players were still missing.
With Morlot back on the podium and spirits evidently high throughout the orchestra, the New Year's Eve concert that we attended last night was a great success. It was a slight departure from the regular tradition of having Beethoven's 9th symphony performed on New Year's Eve itself in addition to surrounding nights, and although at first glance I'm always skeptical of such changes, I admit I enjoyed myself throughout most of the program last night.
Morlot and the Symphony gave a thrilling and wonderful performance of the Star Wars suite, worthy of John Williams and the London Symphony Orchestra. During passages where the strings were exposed, it was evident that the sound was just a touch thinner than normal, due to the missing principles, but the energy was definitely there.
Following the Star Wars suite, Morlot conducted Dance of the Comedians from The Bartered Bride by Smetana. It was an absolutely charming little piece, and the orchestra played it delightfully. Morlot made the most priceless gestures and facial expressions throughout this rather, dare I say, cute piece of music.
After that Jeff Tyzik, the new Seattle Symphony pops conductor, joined Morlot on stage to play a solo trumpet part in his St. Louis Blues. Tyzik appeared to be a rather boisterous personality, and his trumpet playing was very good. The piece also featured solos from Ko-ichiro Yamamoto on the trombone, as well as clarinet solos from Benjamin Lulich, who I believe is trying out for a position in the orchestra. I thoroughly enjoyed this piece from beginning to end. It was one of the most catchy pieces of jazz I'd ever heard.
Jeff Tyzik then took to the podium to conduct Glière's Russian Sailor's Dance from The Red Poppy. It's a work I was quite familiar with, and though the orchestra played it well, I felt that as it built up more and more and gained momentum, it failed to fully capture the Russian spirit that would make one tap their toes and want to start dancing to it.
And finally, to close off the first half of the program, Morlot and Tyzik traded off conducting duties in five movements from Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker suite, Morlot conducting the original version of one movement, and then Tyzik conducting a jazz version of the same movement. Morlot and Tyzik seemed to think this was a brilliant idea, and I think it was the highlight of the concert for them. I enjoyed many parts of both versions, but it definitely wasn't the highlight of the evening for me. One cute thing about it though was that Morlot would take a seat at the back of the second violins while Tyzik was conducting, and play along with the orchestra.
After intermission, Jeff Tyzik, Ko-ichiro Yamamoto and Benjamin Lulich soloed as a trio in front of a conductor-less orchestra in the "Jelly Roll" Morton Suite. It was another jazz piece consisting of a few movements with odd names. I much preferred the St. Louis Blues.
Before beginning the work, Tyzik addressed the audience and commented, among other things, on how great the Seattle Symphony is for being able to play different genres of music. I wonder if this sort of insipid hogwash is actually taken seriously by anybody in the audience. I imagine even most of those not familiar with music understand that for trained musicians it's not a big deal at all; especially for classical musicians, who are backwards compatible with most other forms of music.
And finally, to cap off the concert, pianist Jon Kimura Parker soloed with the orchestra in Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue. Parker strolled on stage in incredibly high spirits, and in a highly animated manner shook the concertmaster's hand, took a bow and seated himself at the piano. Morlot was on the podium, and Benjamin Lulich kicked off the piece with the classic trill, upward scale and glissando on the clarinet, and thus began an excellent performance of Gershwin's masterpiece. Kimura Parker's playing was solid and compelling throughout, and the orchestra under Morlot's leadership was stellar.
After vivacious applause and a few returns to the stage, Parker played a short and jazzy encore, and following that, Tyzik took to the podium to conduct Auld Lang Syne, still featuring Parker on the piano. After one verse was finished, Morlot came on stage to conduct the audience in singing along, but after a few verses not many people had joined, and he appeared to give up and walked over to the piano to hang out with Parker.
After vivacious applause and a few returns to the stage, Parker played a short and jazzy encore, and following that, Tyzik took to the podium to conduct Auld Lang Syne, still featuring Parker on the piano. After one verse was finished, Morlot came on stage to conduct the audience in singing along, but after a few verses not many people had joined, and he appeared to give up and walked over to the piano to hang out with Parker.
In conclusion, I would say that it was a very well planned program with the exception of the Nutcracker antics. With the alternating of the classical and jazz versions it just got a little bit long, and it was one of the only lulls throughout the evening.
The orchestra sounded great, and the combination of more catchy 'classical' tunes and jazz made for a festive atmosphere. And of course, following the concert was the New Year's party in the Grand Lobby. A jazz band with a rather animated singer played mostly classic tunes, and people danced on the dance floor installed in the lobby for the occasion. All in all it was a fun night!
The orchestra sounded great, and the combination of more catchy 'classical' tunes and jazz made for a festive atmosphere. And of course, following the concert was the New Year's party in the Grand Lobby. A jazz band with a rather animated singer played mostly classic tunes, and people danced on the dance floor installed in the lobby for the occasion. All in all it was a fun night!
Next up is Bach's Coffeehouse on January 11th!
____________________________
http://www.seattlesymphony.org/symphony/buy/single/production.aspx?id=14048&src=t&dateid=14048
http://www.seattlesymphony.org/symphony/buy/single/production.aspx?id=14048&src=t&dateid=14048
Sunday, December 29, 2013
December 28th, 2013: Beethoven's Ninth Symphony
Last night's performance of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony was an unmitigated train wreck; a catastrophically uninspired, discombobulated performance of Beethoven's masterpiece, which attained a level of flatness previously unknown to me in this work.
Contrary to recent tradition, the Beethoven's Ninth performances this year are taking place just before and just after New Year's, rather than on New Year's Eve itself. There were performances scheduled for December 28th and 29th, and January 2nd and 4th (plus an untuxed concert on January 3rd). The two main performances in January are part of the Masterworks series, while the two in December are billed as "Holiday Special" concerts. This will be relevant later.
Also contrary to expectations, Ludovic Morlot was not the conductor for last night's concert. Instead we were graced with Carlos Kalmar, the music director of the Oregon Symphony. In addition to the absence of Morlot, we noticed that most of the key principal players in the orchestra had taken leave for the evening. These included but were not limited to Efe Baltacigil, Alexander Velinzon, Susan Gulkis Assadi, Ben Hausmann, Christopher Sereque and of course Demarre McGill, who is absent from this entire season.
The first 'half' of the program consisted of Brahms' Variations on a Theme by Haydn. Carlos Kalmar proved to be a mediocre leader from the start, and the orchestra proved to be rather uninspired. But during intermission we didn't yet lose all hope for the Beethoven, because there was the possibility that the missing principals would return for the second half, or that the orchestra was simply bored by the Brahms and that they would give a much more involved performance for the Beethoven.
Nevertheless, due to the quality of the first half, expectations were rather low for the Beethoven symphony. But not nearly low enough.
As intermission came to a close, the choir took their seats behind the orchestra, and then Kalmar came out to lead the symphony. Our metaphorical train was off the rails from the very first beat. The opening notes in the winds and lower strings came in almost as an accident, and the repeated notes in the violas were incredibly slow and uncertain. The opening motive in the violins was clumsy, unmusical and out of sync. It was such a disaster that within seconds of the opening I was bored and couldn't wait for the whole thing to be over.
There was absolutely no unity in the orchestra, either within sections or between sections. There was no inspiration in the playing, and it seemed like there were about five different interpretations of the piece fighting for dominance throughout the orchestra. It wasn't uncommon for the descending motive in the violins to come 'too soon' due to how slow the sextuplets in the lower strings were being played, and then the lower strings would have to catch up quickly. Kalmar incompetently made sweeping gestures and shallow facial expressions throughout this abomination, and utterly failed to bring anything out of the orchestra.
Even as the first movement reached loud, climactic sections, there remained a flatness and an utter absence of drive. There was no coherent pulse, ever. No pulse, no drive; just a progression of sounds, like a dismal funeral of suicidal note heads marching inevitably to the end of the piece.
I can remember at most one or two moments in the first movement where the sound produced by the orchestra became more than the sum of its parts. In those brief, fleeting moments one was reminded of what a great orchestra sounds like under great leadership, bringing music to life, speaking it with a clear voice. But these moments were few and far between, like the occasional glimpse of the stars one might get while in Mordor, in those rare instances when the poisonous fume allows for a small break in its impenetrable shroud.
It's hard to describe how incompetent this performance was, because it's even hard to comprehend that a performance that incompetent was possible. No one element that contributed to the catastrophe would have made it such if everything else was properly set. The absence of principal musicians and the presence of mediocre subs was certainly a big blow, but under a great conductor, while the sound would have still been less refined than the actual Seattle Symphony, it could have nevertheless been an energetic and captivating performance. But we had a combination of a handful of missing key players, a probable lack of rehearsal time, and a conductor whose unusual interpretation sparked an apparent civil war within the orchestra, with some of the veteran players trying to keep alive some sense of semblance of the work, and others trying to comprehend what Kalmar was asking of them.
By the time they arrived at the coda of the first movement, it felt as though nothing had been played and nothing had been expressed throughout the previous fifteen minutes; just a meaningless progression of notes. The coda followed suit, with the chilling and brilliant music being played as if it were a bowl of dried up granola eaten with water on a morning when you're late for work.
If you're familiar with this symphony you can probably already predict the fugal catastrophe that followed in the second movement. Displaying no increased sense of unity or coherence relative to the first movement, the orchestra plundered on like an oblivious child, shredding the second movement to the same degree as they did the first. Even Stephen Bryant, a very respectable second violinist, lost his place at one point during the second movement, revealing clearer than ever that in addition to all the other unfortunate circumstances which coalesced around this performance, the players themselves were likely in a "we know this piece so well, we don't have to think about it" mindset.
And as the musicians among you are well aware, there is nothing more endless, more sinfully boring or sleep-inducing, than a long, slow movement performed devoid of any inspiration, pulse or unity. Thus we were cursed with the third movement of the symphony, which practically lie on the stage below us no different than if we had just been looking at a score of the work sitting by itself on the stage for fifteen minutes.
Before the third movement had begun the soloists came on stage and took their seats on either side of our conductor, to be ready for the fourth movement which would come with no pause after the third.
The opening blast and ensuing frenzy of the fourth movement was again weak and uninspired. This monstrosity did not improve at all throughout the evening. Movement after movement it was as if not a soul on stage cared at all about anything. And when the soloists began singing, they proved to be what you would expect of community singers soloing with a University symphony. They weren't bad, but they weren't of a professional level. They reminded me of what I might see in a small community like that of Orcas Island where I grew up, which is wonderful for that setting, but not what you hope for when you're at the Seattle Symphony.
The choir was the only reasonable part of the performance. Because they are a volunteer chorus and only perform a few concerts a year, they are always very much into the music and giving it their all, and so it was from them that we heard the first energized notes of the evening. They also benefited from the skilled instruction of their regular director Joseph Crnko, who did masterful work with them on the Verdi Requiem last month.
When the calamity finally came to an end following a desperate last few measures which seemed to cry out "wait! We still have a few seconds left to come to life before it's over!" the audience erupted in applause in typical Seattle style, but it was not what it should have been. On a subconscious level they could tell something was wrong and that the performance was a failure. When the choir was asked to stand up the applause noticeably increased.
I have a couple thoughts to share in general about this situation.
First of all, I don't know why Carlos Kalmar was chosen to conduct these concerts, and I don't know where all the principal musicians are. But I do know that the Symphony administration is aware that the vast majority of the audience "won't be able to tell the difference," especially for these first two performances which are the special holiday performances, where a large portion of the audience are people who almost never go to the Symphony. Perhaps they figured that by the time they get to the subscription concerts in January, it'll sound a little bit more passable.
But the reason I put "won't be able to tell the difference" in quotes is because the audience can tell the difference, they just don't know it. They don't know how much more captivated and inspired they would have been had it been a great performance. They go away thinking "that was nice, but classical music is kind of boring, like I thought." So the administration is right that the public won't go away thinking that they've been ripped off, but they also won't go away inspired to return; and hence this kind of cost-cutting thinking shoots themselves in the foot, and shoots classical music in the foot.
Think about it. A dry, dead, uninspired performance, and a hall full of people who think that that's all that classical music can be. That's much more harmful to the reputation of classical music than if the audience had simply gone away saying "that was a ripoff, they didn't perform that very well."
Currently I have one ticket for the last performance, on January 4th, and I'm contemplating whether or not to go, or whether I should exchange it out. I'm kind of curious if it will improve at all by then, but aside from possibly having a slightly improved agreement on tempos throughout the orchestra, I don't see it magically turning into a worthwhile performance between now and then.
Better luck next time!
____________________________
http://www.seattlesymphony.org/symphony/buy/single/production.aspx?id=14066&src=t&dateid=14066
Contrary to recent tradition, the Beethoven's Ninth performances this year are taking place just before and just after New Year's, rather than on New Year's Eve itself. There were performances scheduled for December 28th and 29th, and January 2nd and 4th (plus an untuxed concert on January 3rd). The two main performances in January are part of the Masterworks series, while the two in December are billed as "Holiday Special" concerts. This will be relevant later.
Also contrary to expectations, Ludovic Morlot was not the conductor for last night's concert. Instead we were graced with Carlos Kalmar, the music director of the Oregon Symphony. In addition to the absence of Morlot, we noticed that most of the key principal players in the orchestra had taken leave for the evening. These included but were not limited to Efe Baltacigil, Alexander Velinzon, Susan Gulkis Assadi, Ben Hausmann, Christopher Sereque and of course Demarre McGill, who is absent from this entire season.
The first 'half' of the program consisted of Brahms' Variations on a Theme by Haydn. Carlos Kalmar proved to be a mediocre leader from the start, and the orchestra proved to be rather uninspired. But during intermission we didn't yet lose all hope for the Beethoven, because there was the possibility that the missing principals would return for the second half, or that the orchestra was simply bored by the Brahms and that they would give a much more involved performance for the Beethoven.
Nevertheless, due to the quality of the first half, expectations were rather low for the Beethoven symphony. But not nearly low enough.
As intermission came to a close, the choir took their seats behind the orchestra, and then Kalmar came out to lead the symphony. Our metaphorical train was off the rails from the very first beat. The opening notes in the winds and lower strings came in almost as an accident, and the repeated notes in the violas were incredibly slow and uncertain. The opening motive in the violins was clumsy, unmusical and out of sync. It was such a disaster that within seconds of the opening I was bored and couldn't wait for the whole thing to be over.
There was absolutely no unity in the orchestra, either within sections or between sections. There was no inspiration in the playing, and it seemed like there were about five different interpretations of the piece fighting for dominance throughout the orchestra. It wasn't uncommon for the descending motive in the violins to come 'too soon' due to how slow the sextuplets in the lower strings were being played, and then the lower strings would have to catch up quickly. Kalmar incompetently made sweeping gestures and shallow facial expressions throughout this abomination, and utterly failed to bring anything out of the orchestra.
Even as the first movement reached loud, climactic sections, there remained a flatness and an utter absence of drive. There was no coherent pulse, ever. No pulse, no drive; just a progression of sounds, like a dismal funeral of suicidal note heads marching inevitably to the end of the piece.
I can remember at most one or two moments in the first movement where the sound produced by the orchestra became more than the sum of its parts. In those brief, fleeting moments one was reminded of what a great orchestra sounds like under great leadership, bringing music to life, speaking it with a clear voice. But these moments were few and far between, like the occasional glimpse of the stars one might get while in Mordor, in those rare instances when the poisonous fume allows for a small break in its impenetrable shroud.
It's hard to describe how incompetent this performance was, because it's even hard to comprehend that a performance that incompetent was possible. No one element that contributed to the catastrophe would have made it such if everything else was properly set. The absence of principal musicians and the presence of mediocre subs was certainly a big blow, but under a great conductor, while the sound would have still been less refined than the actual Seattle Symphony, it could have nevertheless been an energetic and captivating performance. But we had a combination of a handful of missing key players, a probable lack of rehearsal time, and a conductor whose unusual interpretation sparked an apparent civil war within the orchestra, with some of the veteran players trying to keep alive some sense of semblance of the work, and others trying to comprehend what Kalmar was asking of them.
By the time they arrived at the coda of the first movement, it felt as though nothing had been played and nothing had been expressed throughout the previous fifteen minutes; just a meaningless progression of notes. The coda followed suit, with the chilling and brilliant music being played as if it were a bowl of dried up granola eaten with water on a morning when you're late for work.
If you're familiar with this symphony you can probably already predict the fugal catastrophe that followed in the second movement. Displaying no increased sense of unity or coherence relative to the first movement, the orchestra plundered on like an oblivious child, shredding the second movement to the same degree as they did the first. Even Stephen Bryant, a very respectable second violinist, lost his place at one point during the second movement, revealing clearer than ever that in addition to all the other unfortunate circumstances which coalesced around this performance, the players themselves were likely in a "we know this piece so well, we don't have to think about it" mindset.
And as the musicians among you are well aware, there is nothing more endless, more sinfully boring or sleep-inducing, than a long, slow movement performed devoid of any inspiration, pulse or unity. Thus we were cursed with the third movement of the symphony, which practically lie on the stage below us no different than if we had just been looking at a score of the work sitting by itself on the stage for fifteen minutes.
Before the third movement had begun the soloists came on stage and took their seats on either side of our conductor, to be ready for the fourth movement which would come with no pause after the third.
The opening blast and ensuing frenzy of the fourth movement was again weak and uninspired. This monstrosity did not improve at all throughout the evening. Movement after movement it was as if not a soul on stage cared at all about anything. And when the soloists began singing, they proved to be what you would expect of community singers soloing with a University symphony. They weren't bad, but they weren't of a professional level. They reminded me of what I might see in a small community like that of Orcas Island where I grew up, which is wonderful for that setting, but not what you hope for when you're at the Seattle Symphony.
The choir was the only reasonable part of the performance. Because they are a volunteer chorus and only perform a few concerts a year, they are always very much into the music and giving it their all, and so it was from them that we heard the first energized notes of the evening. They also benefited from the skilled instruction of their regular director Joseph Crnko, who did masterful work with them on the Verdi Requiem last month.
When the calamity finally came to an end following a desperate last few measures which seemed to cry out "wait! We still have a few seconds left to come to life before it's over!" the audience erupted in applause in typical Seattle style, but it was not what it should have been. On a subconscious level they could tell something was wrong and that the performance was a failure. When the choir was asked to stand up the applause noticeably increased.
I have a couple thoughts to share in general about this situation.
First of all, I don't know why Carlos Kalmar was chosen to conduct these concerts, and I don't know where all the principal musicians are. But I do know that the Symphony administration is aware that the vast majority of the audience "won't be able to tell the difference," especially for these first two performances which are the special holiday performances, where a large portion of the audience are people who almost never go to the Symphony. Perhaps they figured that by the time they get to the subscription concerts in January, it'll sound a little bit more passable.
But the reason I put "won't be able to tell the difference" in quotes is because the audience can tell the difference, they just don't know it. They don't know how much more captivated and inspired they would have been had it been a great performance. They go away thinking "that was nice, but classical music is kind of boring, like I thought." So the administration is right that the public won't go away thinking that they've been ripped off, but they also won't go away inspired to return; and hence this kind of cost-cutting thinking shoots themselves in the foot, and shoots classical music in the foot.
Think about it. A dry, dead, uninspired performance, and a hall full of people who think that that's all that classical music can be. That's much more harmful to the reputation of classical music than if the audience had simply gone away saying "that was a ripoff, they didn't perform that very well."
Currently I have one ticket for the last performance, on January 4th, and I'm contemplating whether or not to go, or whether I should exchange it out. I'm kind of curious if it will improve at all by then, but aside from possibly having a slightly improved agreement on tempos throughout the orchestra, I don't see it magically turning into a worthwhile performance between now and then.
Better luck next time!
____________________________
http://www.seattlesymphony.org/symphony/buy/single/production.aspx?id=14066&src=t&dateid=14066
Sunday, November 24, 2013
November 23rd & 24th, 2013: Verdi Requiem
Wow. That was incredible. So incredible that it became the first concert that I went to hear a second time. There have been a number of great concerts recently that have made me toy with the idea of returning on Sunday afternoon to hear it again, but this was the first one that actually compelled me to do so.
Giuseppe Verdi's Requiem Mass is one of the great masterworks of the classical repertoire. It has the severity of the religious mass, the scope of a romantic symphony and the drama of an opera. It truly is a magnificent work, and the Seattle Symphony and the Seattle Symphony Chorale, under the leadership of Ludovic Morlot, in presenting this work gave the best performance I have yet heard from them. Special mention must be made of Joseph Crnko of course, who is the director of the Seattle Symphony Chorale, and who worked with them to bring their level of performance close to perfection for these concerts.
Yesterday evening me and my girlfriend sat at the front end of the right side of the tier, where you can practically reach your arm over the railing and touch the heads of the musicians. The sound was crisp and immediate from there. I've realized that the issue of acoustics isn't really relevant in seats like that, because you're right there next to the orchestra, so you don't need any architectural genius to carry the sound to you.
After all of the orchestra was seated, the choir took their seats at the back of the stage. Then the four solo singers came on followed by Morlot. When they had taken their seats and Morlot had settled on the podium, he queued the lower strings to begin the quiet opening of the piece. From there the spectacle unfolded with a sweeping drama and irresistible inevitability that I will never forget. The higher strings in their hushed openings were like a fog over a still lake, and the first halting entrances of the choir were like ghosts. As the piece reached a louder dynamic, it was like a glorious monster was set loose. The power of the choir was breathtaking, and the exuberance, clarity and expression in the orchestral playing was unmatched.
As the opening movement drew to a close my heart was pounding, anticipating the coming Dies Irae. Under Morlot's captivating and inspiring leadership it exploded forth from the stage like a blazing inferno, an unrelenting cataclysm of earth shattering explosions and searing flames. The sound of the strings was as though their bows were on fire.
This truly was the best performance I have yet observed by these ensembles. Perhaps it was the nature of the music, or of the excitement of the musicians to play it, but whatever it was, something extraordinary happened on the Benaroya Hall stage this weekend.
The drama wound on and on with such a perfect coherence and seamless drive forward that it is impossible for me to really describe it here. It is solely an auditory and emotional experience, not a literary one.
The four soloists were soprano Joyce El-Khoury, mezzo-soprano Tamara Mumford, tenor René Barbera and bass Jordan Bisch. The weakest of the four was undoubtedly Jordan Bisch, whose expression and mannerisms seemed to betray an ego exactly as strong as his singing was weak. The local conductor Alan Futterman, who I have had the pleasure of playing under several times, once said "the worse the player, the larger the ego." Bisch reminded me of that. Joyce El-Khoury was a solid soprano, albeit with a bit too much vibrato, and Tamara Mumford, also a very solid singer, nevertheless lacked a richness to her voice that I've come to expect from great altos and mezzo-sopranos. The shining star of the four was tenor René Barbera, who was clearly a world class singer, hot on the heels of the likes of Plácido Domingo, José Carreras, etc.
The Tuba Mirum, immediately following the Dies Irae, employed trumpets positioned at the back sides of the third tier of the auditorium. Given the relative slowness of the speed of sound, this was evidently very difficult to pull off, but it was extremely successful, and aside from the split second delay caused by the sound having to travel from the back of the hall, it was completely in sync and had a chilling and glorious effect.
Several solo singing sections follow the Tuba Mirum, and the singing was mostly very good. These sections are reminiscent of arias from Verdi's famous opera Aïda, composed during the same time period. After not too long the piece bursts into the Rex Tremendae, one of my personal favorite movements of the work. Atypical for 'favorite sections,' this one did not disappoint me in the slightest. It was utterly divine. It's one of the most epic, soaring sections of the entire piece, and orchestra, chorus and soloists moved, sang and played as one, creating an almost overwhelming level of drama. My only quibble was that I wish Morlot had taken more of a ritardando during the lead in to the second massive outburst in the movement, but this is a minor detail.
More solo sections follow, utilizing the text of the mass between the Rex Tremendae and the Confutatis, which is the next section that consists of a buildup and a dramatic output upon its arrival. Jordan Bisch was again not the greatest in his solo in the Confutatis, but he was adequate. His solo leads back into a reprise (the second one actually) of the Dies Irae, which takes a different, darker turn this time and ends up in the Lacrymosa, the saddest part of the Requiem Mass. Tamara Mumford was a little disappointing here. I wished her voice had been smoother acoustically, and moving more as one with the accompanying strings. As more voices joined her, including eventually the chorus, it again took on the shape of a first rate performance, and came to a very effective closing at the end of the 'Dies Irae' portion of the mass.
This would be the place where an intermission would have happened if there was going to be one, but fortunately the performance continued after a short pause for everyone to catch their breath.
The beginning of the Offertorio, in every Requiem that I've heard, always takes on a tone of being in some kind of post-event phase. All this drama has happened, and the great Dies Irae hymn has come to an end with an 'amen', and now we're in this outskirt territory of the mass. Verdi begins it with a rising line played by the cellos, which is answered by a simple trio of wind instruments. After not too long though, rich, gorgeous music returns, and the ensuing solo ensembles are again reminiscent of the greatest moments of Verdi's operas.
The performance maintained its utterly extraordinary level throughout the rest of the piece. Aside from one place where the choir began a fugue and wasn't quite together at the beginning, there were scarcely even any technical quibbles I could point to. Technically and musically it was an immense success.
Upon the conclusion of the final note, Morlot kept his baton held up for at least fifteen seconds, and amazingly, a silence was actually held and prolonged in the hall. In Seattle it is difficult to make that happen. As soon as applause began I immediately stood up, the first time I have ever done that. I was surprised by how long it took for the whole audience to stand up, and there were scarcely any shouts or 'bravi' compared to some other concerts.
I really didn't want it to end, and I knew almost immediately that I would inevitably have to return the next afternoon. The last time this work was performed here was in 2005, and who knows how long it will be until it's performed again. So this afternoon I headed back to Benaroya Hall, and I traded in one of my tickets from a concert on June 14th in exchange for one ticket for this afternoon's performance.
This time I sat in Box C on the opposite side of the hall, a couple boxes from the front. I had a better view of the soloists from there, and a more straight-on view of everything, but otherwise I liked the sound and the view better from the seats that are right up next to the orchestra. There was one bass singer in the choir who I particularly noticed on Saturday evening because he was getting really into the drama and making facial expressions that were reflecting the text he was singing, and I watched for him this afternoon again, but his face was significantly less detailed from where I sat today.
One key observation that I made during the performance today was that Morlot's tempi are reminiscent of early-20th century performances, and they are a refreshing return back from the exaggerated, drawn out, slow tempi that were taken in the latter half of the 20th century. Another aspect of the Lacrymosa that I didn't like on Saturday was the relatively quick tempo, but today I began to appreciate it because it was honest and direct, much the way Toscanini would have conducted it.
A couple interesting events from this afternoon are worth noting. Speight Jenkins, the general director of the Seattle Opera, was at the concert. This concert was actually a tribute to him, so I assume he may have been there on Thursday and Saturday as well, but I'm not sure. In any case, he was sitting in Box E, which I have now figured out is the VIP box. I had for a while been trying to find out which pair of seats were given by Gerard Schwarz to Jack and Rebecca Benaroya back in 1998 when the symphony moved to Benaroya Hall, and I'm almost certain now that they are somewhere in Box E. I know that Rebecca Benaroya often sits there, and it's where Speight Jenkins was sitting this afternoon. Personally I like to be really close to the stage, so I actually wouldn't pick seats there as my first choice.
Shortly after the concert began this afternoon, a cell phone went off in Box D right behind me. I'm sure it was really embarrassing for the poor old lady. She took time to fumble around and try to find it in her purse, then she dropped it, and the clunk of it landing on the box floor was added to the sound of it ringing, and then finally she got it to stop. Later on during a quiet part of the piece, another phone went off somewhere towards the back of the floor. I suspect the reduced dedication to turning cell phones off had something to do with the fact that it was a Sunday afternoon. The orchestra was dressed in suits and ties instead of tails, and the dress code in the audience (myself included) was also downgraded one level. Everything was just a bit more casual. I don't know if this is related, but right after the loud and abrupt ending of the Tuba Mirum, one person in the audience clapped quietly twice, before realizing their error. I'm sure they were embarrassed as well.
Jordan Bisch sounded the same as last night for the most part, except for his solo entrance during the Lacrymosa, where he literally seemed to hover about a quarter tone below pitch for several measures. It was pretty bad. But the fugue that had started out not together in the choir last night was fixed today.
All in all the performance today was the same as yesterday, as excellent in every way. My approach in listening to it today was based in the idea of simply sitting there and seeing what happens. I wasn't expecting it to be great because of the previous night, I just decided to sit there and listen, as though I were listening to a recording. Taking that perspective allowed me to discern with more clarity the true nature of the performance and whether it really was as great as it seemed the night before. I would say that it definitely was. But I do prefer to be right up there where I feel like I'm in it; I think that does intensify the experience.
In any case, these performances of the Verdi Requiem are definitely the highlight of this season so far, and they may remain that way for some time. Now I have a break of performances for a few weeks before Handel's Messiah in late December. See you then!
____________________________
http://www.seattlesymphony.org/symphony/buy/single/production.aspx?id=13675&src=t&dateid=13675
Giuseppe Verdi's Requiem Mass is one of the great masterworks of the classical repertoire. It has the severity of the religious mass, the scope of a romantic symphony and the drama of an opera. It truly is a magnificent work, and the Seattle Symphony and the Seattle Symphony Chorale, under the leadership of Ludovic Morlot, in presenting this work gave the best performance I have yet heard from them. Special mention must be made of Joseph Crnko of course, who is the director of the Seattle Symphony Chorale, and who worked with them to bring their level of performance close to perfection for these concerts.
Yesterday evening me and my girlfriend sat at the front end of the right side of the tier, where you can practically reach your arm over the railing and touch the heads of the musicians. The sound was crisp and immediate from there. I've realized that the issue of acoustics isn't really relevant in seats like that, because you're right there next to the orchestra, so you don't need any architectural genius to carry the sound to you.
After all of the orchestra was seated, the choir took their seats at the back of the stage. Then the four solo singers came on followed by Morlot. When they had taken their seats and Morlot had settled on the podium, he queued the lower strings to begin the quiet opening of the piece. From there the spectacle unfolded with a sweeping drama and irresistible inevitability that I will never forget. The higher strings in their hushed openings were like a fog over a still lake, and the first halting entrances of the choir were like ghosts. As the piece reached a louder dynamic, it was like a glorious monster was set loose. The power of the choir was breathtaking, and the exuberance, clarity and expression in the orchestral playing was unmatched.
As the opening movement drew to a close my heart was pounding, anticipating the coming Dies Irae. Under Morlot's captivating and inspiring leadership it exploded forth from the stage like a blazing inferno, an unrelenting cataclysm of earth shattering explosions and searing flames. The sound of the strings was as though their bows were on fire.
This truly was the best performance I have yet observed by these ensembles. Perhaps it was the nature of the music, or of the excitement of the musicians to play it, but whatever it was, something extraordinary happened on the Benaroya Hall stage this weekend.
The drama wound on and on with such a perfect coherence and seamless drive forward that it is impossible for me to really describe it here. It is solely an auditory and emotional experience, not a literary one.
The four soloists were soprano Joyce El-Khoury, mezzo-soprano Tamara Mumford, tenor René Barbera and bass Jordan Bisch. The weakest of the four was undoubtedly Jordan Bisch, whose expression and mannerisms seemed to betray an ego exactly as strong as his singing was weak. The local conductor Alan Futterman, who I have had the pleasure of playing under several times, once said "the worse the player, the larger the ego." Bisch reminded me of that. Joyce El-Khoury was a solid soprano, albeit with a bit too much vibrato, and Tamara Mumford, also a very solid singer, nevertheless lacked a richness to her voice that I've come to expect from great altos and mezzo-sopranos. The shining star of the four was tenor René Barbera, who was clearly a world class singer, hot on the heels of the likes of Plácido Domingo, José Carreras, etc.
The Tuba Mirum, immediately following the Dies Irae, employed trumpets positioned at the back sides of the third tier of the auditorium. Given the relative slowness of the speed of sound, this was evidently very difficult to pull off, but it was extremely successful, and aside from the split second delay caused by the sound having to travel from the back of the hall, it was completely in sync and had a chilling and glorious effect.
Several solo singing sections follow the Tuba Mirum, and the singing was mostly very good. These sections are reminiscent of arias from Verdi's famous opera Aïda, composed during the same time period. After not too long the piece bursts into the Rex Tremendae, one of my personal favorite movements of the work. Atypical for 'favorite sections,' this one did not disappoint me in the slightest. It was utterly divine. It's one of the most epic, soaring sections of the entire piece, and orchestra, chorus and soloists moved, sang and played as one, creating an almost overwhelming level of drama. My only quibble was that I wish Morlot had taken more of a ritardando during the lead in to the second massive outburst in the movement, but this is a minor detail.
More solo sections follow, utilizing the text of the mass between the Rex Tremendae and the Confutatis, which is the next section that consists of a buildup and a dramatic output upon its arrival. Jordan Bisch was again not the greatest in his solo in the Confutatis, but he was adequate. His solo leads back into a reprise (the second one actually) of the Dies Irae, which takes a different, darker turn this time and ends up in the Lacrymosa, the saddest part of the Requiem Mass. Tamara Mumford was a little disappointing here. I wished her voice had been smoother acoustically, and moving more as one with the accompanying strings. As more voices joined her, including eventually the chorus, it again took on the shape of a first rate performance, and came to a very effective closing at the end of the 'Dies Irae' portion of the mass.
This would be the place where an intermission would have happened if there was going to be one, but fortunately the performance continued after a short pause for everyone to catch their breath.
The beginning of the Offertorio, in every Requiem that I've heard, always takes on a tone of being in some kind of post-event phase. All this drama has happened, and the great Dies Irae hymn has come to an end with an 'amen', and now we're in this outskirt territory of the mass. Verdi begins it with a rising line played by the cellos, which is answered by a simple trio of wind instruments. After not too long though, rich, gorgeous music returns, and the ensuing solo ensembles are again reminiscent of the greatest moments of Verdi's operas.
The performance maintained its utterly extraordinary level throughout the rest of the piece. Aside from one place where the choir began a fugue and wasn't quite together at the beginning, there were scarcely even any technical quibbles I could point to. Technically and musically it was an immense success.
Upon the conclusion of the final note, Morlot kept his baton held up for at least fifteen seconds, and amazingly, a silence was actually held and prolonged in the hall. In Seattle it is difficult to make that happen. As soon as applause began I immediately stood up, the first time I have ever done that. I was surprised by how long it took for the whole audience to stand up, and there were scarcely any shouts or 'bravi' compared to some other concerts.
I really didn't want it to end, and I knew almost immediately that I would inevitably have to return the next afternoon. The last time this work was performed here was in 2005, and who knows how long it will be until it's performed again. So this afternoon I headed back to Benaroya Hall, and I traded in one of my tickets from a concert on June 14th in exchange for one ticket for this afternoon's performance.
This time I sat in Box C on the opposite side of the hall, a couple boxes from the front. I had a better view of the soloists from there, and a more straight-on view of everything, but otherwise I liked the sound and the view better from the seats that are right up next to the orchestra. There was one bass singer in the choir who I particularly noticed on Saturday evening because he was getting really into the drama and making facial expressions that were reflecting the text he was singing, and I watched for him this afternoon again, but his face was significantly less detailed from where I sat today.
One key observation that I made during the performance today was that Morlot's tempi are reminiscent of early-20th century performances, and they are a refreshing return back from the exaggerated, drawn out, slow tempi that were taken in the latter half of the 20th century. Another aspect of the Lacrymosa that I didn't like on Saturday was the relatively quick tempo, but today I began to appreciate it because it was honest and direct, much the way Toscanini would have conducted it.
A couple interesting events from this afternoon are worth noting. Speight Jenkins, the general director of the Seattle Opera, was at the concert. This concert was actually a tribute to him, so I assume he may have been there on Thursday and Saturday as well, but I'm not sure. In any case, he was sitting in Box E, which I have now figured out is the VIP box. I had for a while been trying to find out which pair of seats were given by Gerard Schwarz to Jack and Rebecca Benaroya back in 1998 when the symphony moved to Benaroya Hall, and I'm almost certain now that they are somewhere in Box E. I know that Rebecca Benaroya often sits there, and it's where Speight Jenkins was sitting this afternoon. Personally I like to be really close to the stage, so I actually wouldn't pick seats there as my first choice.
Shortly after the concert began this afternoon, a cell phone went off in Box D right behind me. I'm sure it was really embarrassing for the poor old lady. She took time to fumble around and try to find it in her purse, then she dropped it, and the clunk of it landing on the box floor was added to the sound of it ringing, and then finally she got it to stop. Later on during a quiet part of the piece, another phone went off somewhere towards the back of the floor. I suspect the reduced dedication to turning cell phones off had something to do with the fact that it was a Sunday afternoon. The orchestra was dressed in suits and ties instead of tails, and the dress code in the audience (myself included) was also downgraded one level. Everything was just a bit more casual. I don't know if this is related, but right after the loud and abrupt ending of the Tuba Mirum, one person in the audience clapped quietly twice, before realizing their error. I'm sure they were embarrassed as well.
Jordan Bisch sounded the same as last night for the most part, except for his solo entrance during the Lacrymosa, where he literally seemed to hover about a quarter tone below pitch for several measures. It was pretty bad. But the fugue that had started out not together in the choir last night was fixed today.
All in all the performance today was the same as yesterday, as excellent in every way. My approach in listening to it today was based in the idea of simply sitting there and seeing what happens. I wasn't expecting it to be great because of the previous night, I just decided to sit there and listen, as though I were listening to a recording. Taking that perspective allowed me to discern with more clarity the true nature of the performance and whether it really was as great as it seemed the night before. I would say that it definitely was. But I do prefer to be right up there where I feel like I'm in it; I think that does intensify the experience.
In any case, these performances of the Verdi Requiem are definitely the highlight of this season so far, and they may remain that way for some time. Now I have a break of performances for a few weeks before Handel's Messiah in late December. See you then!
____________________________
http://www.seattlesymphony.org/symphony/buy/single/production.aspx?id=13675&src=t&dateid=13675
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