Today's Birthdays

Francesco Durante (1684-1755)
Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
Joseph Küffner (1776-1856) Serge Diaghliev (1872-1929)
Clemens Krauss (1893-1954)
John Mitchinson (1932-2021)
Herb Alpert (1935)
Nelly Miricioiu (1952)
Robert Gambill (1955)
Jake Heggie (1961)

and

René Descartes (1596-1650)
Andrew Marvell (1621-1678)
Nikolai Gogol (1809-1852)
Octavio Paz (1914-1998)
Cesar Chavez (1927-1993)
Marge Piercy (1936)

Review: Conrad Tao elevates Mozart with the Oregon Symphony and two Mendelssohn works evoke the landscape of Scotland

Pianist-composer Conrad Tao returned to play with the Oregon Symphony on March 19, giving a an wonderfully expressive and technically perfect performance of Mozart’s Concerto No. 21 in C major. Tao last played with the orchestra in January of 2024 when an ice storm struck and caused power outages throughout the city and concert cancellations (see my review here). This time around, the weather complemented the sunny disposition of Mozart’s beautiful music, and concertgoers were treated to an outstanding experience.

Under Tao’s fingers, the Mozart flowed organically and with great beauty. Within immaculate technique he expressed the arpeggiated runs flawlessly, accenting some notes so that the lines were always just a tad different. Often the end of phrases deliciously lightened up, tapering off into the distance. Tao superbly contrasted gracefully elegant melodies with dramatically expressive passages, playing everything with great sensitivity but not fussiness. The exuberance of the final movement, Allegro vivace assai, was joyfully and perfectly delivered, a testament to Tao’s deep understanding of Mozart’s style.

The orchestral arrangement for the performance was one that I had not seen before. Music Director David Danzmayr placed the trumpets behind the horns on the left side, and that tutti ensemble took its position behind the violins. It all worked extremely well, creating a balanced sound with the entire orchestra.

Going in an entirely different direction stylistically, Tao followed up the Mozart with Elliott Carter's Caténaires as an encore. With his hand flying all over the keyboard, the encore generated a supercharged scattershot of notes, that ricochetted about the hall like a randomly generate pinballs. The effect also suggested an electrical jolt with sparks flying everywhere. Tao shaped the piece with his superb, lithe touch, and it resulted in a vociferously positive response from the audience.

The majority of the concert was devoted to the landscape and culture of Scotland via the music of Mendelssohn, who toured the highlands in 1829. His Symphony No. 3, “Scottish” received an outstandingly expressive performance, starting with the brooding opening statement, inspired by the Palace of Holyrood in Edinburgh. The accelerando into an agitated theme suggested a storm-swept landscape in which shimmering strings heightened the mood with fiery jabs and then the cellos, evoking sleek waves and a contrasting woodwind sound that dwindled away. The cheerful dance of the second movement ended with a super-soft touch. Danzmayr and forces lovingly caressed the notes in the third movement. That was followed by an exceptional attack into the fourth movement and the magically forlorn clarinet (Mark Dubec) and bassoon (Carin Miller) duet before breaking into the final robust melody with the horns breaking through the clouds as if to announce triumphant ships sailing into the home port.

The concert began with another Mendelssohn gem, “The Hebridies Overture” (aka “Fingal’s Cave”), which marvelously evoked the seascape and isolated beauty around the remote cave. Under Danzmayr the orchestra unleashed a terrific burst of energy that conveyed crashing waves, which contrasted especially well with the soothing sounds of the clarinets (Dubec and Todd Kuhns). The furious bowing from the strings and especially the basses was exhilarating to watch and hear. That made the one-movement tone poem a perfect set-up for the rest of the evening.

Overall, this was an exceptional concert that should have drawn a full house. It’s a life-enhancing experience to witness such superb music-making.

PS: Apologies for the lateness of this posting. Yours Truly experienced a health scare last week. That caused a delay. Things are much better now and continue to improve.

Today's Birthdays

Tommaso Traetta (1727-1779)
Ted Heath (1900-1969)
Sandor Szokolay (1931-2013)
John Eaton (1935-2015)
Gordon Mumma (1935)
Eric Clapton (1945)
Maggie Cole (1952)
Margaret Fingerhut (1955)
Sabine Meyer (1959)

and

Francisco Jose de Goya (1746-1828)
Anna Sewell (1820-1878)
Paul Verlaine (1844-1896)
Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890)
Sean O'Casey (1880-1964)

Today's Birthdays

Henri Lutz (1864-1928)
Rosina Lhévinne (1880-1976)
Sir William Walton (1902-1983)
E Power Biggs (1906-1977)
Sir Richard Rodney Bennett (1936-2012)
Guher Pekinel (1953)
Suher Pekinel (1953)

and

Ronald Stuart Thomas (1913-2000)
Eugene McCarthy (1916-2005)
Judith Guest (1936)

And from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1871, Royal Albert Hall is formally opened in London by Queen Victoria.

Today's Birthdays

Joseph Weigl (1766-1846)
Willem Mengelberg (1871-1951)
Paul Whiteman (1890-1967)
Rudolf Serkin (1903-1991)
Jacob Avshalomov (1919-2013)
Robert Ashley (1930-2014)
Martin Neary (1940)
Samuel Ramey (1942)
Richard Stilgoe (1942)

and

Raphael (1483-1520)
Nelson Algren (1909-1981)
Mario Vargas Llosa (1936)
Russell Banks (1940-2023)
Iris Chang (1968-2004)
Lauren Weisberger (1977)

And from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1842, the Vienna Philharmonic plays its first concert (as the "Vienna Court Orchestra") in the Redoutensaale under the director of composer Otto Nicolai, the director of the Vienna Court Opera. The program included Beethoven's Seventh Symphony, his concert aria "Ah, Perfido," and the "Leonore" No. 3 and "Consercration of the House" Overtures, along with other vocal selections by Mozart and Cherubini.

Oregon musicians in the Hawaii Symphony - Oregon Arts Watch

Aloha! I interviewed three pros from Oregonian who are members of the Hawai'i Symphony Orchestra. The story is now up on Oregon Arts Watch here.

Today's Birthdays

Vincent d'Indy (1851-1931)
Patty Smith Hill (1868-1946)
Ferde Grofé (1892-1972)
Anne Ziegler (1910-2003)
Sarah Vaughn (1924-1990)
Mstislav Rostropovich (1927-2007)
Poul Ruders (1949)
Maria Ewing (1950-2022)
Bernard Labadie (1963)

and

Henri Murger (1822-1861)
Heinrich Mann (1871-1950)
Edward Steichen (1879-1973)
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (1886-1969)
Budd Schulberg (1914-2009)
Louis Simpson (1923-2012)
Julia Alvarez (1950)
John O'Farrell (1962)

And from the Composers Datebook:

On this date in 1808, Franz Joseph Haydn makes his last public appearance at a performance of his oratorio "The Creation" in Vienna in honor of the composer's approaching 76th birthday. Beethoven and Salieri attend the performance and greet Haydn.

Today's Birthdays

Josef Slavík (1806-1833)
Wilhelm Backhaus (1884-1969)
André Cluytens (1905-1967)
Harry Rabinowitz (1916-2016)
Pierre Boulez (1925-2016)
Kyung Wha Chung (1948)

and

Edward Bellamy (1850-1898)
A. E. Housman (1859-1936)
Robert Frost (1874-1963)
Joseph Campbell (1904-1987)
Tennessee Williams (1911-1983)
Gregory Corso (1930-2001)

Today's Birthdays

Johann Adolph Hasse (1699-1783)
Arturo Toscanini (1867-1957)
Béla Bartók (1881-1945)
Haydn Wood (1882-1959)
Magda Olivero (1910-2014)
Julia Perry (1924-1979)
Cecil Taylor (1929-2018)
Sir Elton John (1947)
Makoto Ozone (1961)

and

Flannery O'Connor (1925-1964)
Gloria Steinem (1934)

and from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1949, Shostakovich (accompanied by KGB "handlers") arrives in New York for his first visit to America, for the Cultural and Scientific Conference for World Peace, held at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. His anti-Western statements and criticism of Igor Stravinsky embarrassed his American sponsors, including Aaron Copland, and later provided political fodder for the notorious Red-hunter, Senator Joseph McCarthy.

Today's Birthdays

John Antes (1740-1811)
Maria Malibran (1808-1836)
Fanny Crosby (1820-1915)
Byron Janis (1928-2024)
Christiane Eda-Pierre (1932-2020)
Benjamin Luxon (1937-2024)

and

Malcolm Muggeridge (1903-1990)
Dwight Macdonald (1906-1982)
Lawrence Ferlinghetti (1919-2021)
Dario Fo (1926-2016)
Ian Hamilton (1938-2001)
Martin Walser (1927-2024)

and from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1721, J.S. Bach dedicates his six "Brandenburg" Concertos to Margrave Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg, whose orchestra apparently never performed them.

Today's Birthdays

Léon Minkus (1826-1917)
Eugène Gigout (1844-1925)
Franz Schreker (1878-1934)
Josef Locke (1917-1999)
Norman Bailey (1933-2021)
Boris Tishchenko (1939-2010)
Michael Nyman (1944)
David Grisman (1945)

and

Roger Martin du Gard (1881-1958)
Louis Adamic (1898-1951)
Erich Fromm (1900-1980)
Kim Stanley Robinson (1952)
Gary Joseph Whitehead (1965)

Today's Birthdays

Carl Rosa (1842-1889)
Hamisch MacCunn (1868-1916)
Joseph Samson (1888-1957)
Martha Mödl (1912-2001)
Fanny Waterman (1920-2020)
Arthur Grumiaux (1921-1986)
Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021)
Joseph Schwantner (1943)
George Benson (1943)
Alan Opie (1945)
Rivka Golani (1946)
Andrew Lloyd Webber (1948
Edmund Barham (1950-2008)

and

Anthony van Dyck (1599-1641)
Louis L'Amour (1908-1988)
Edith Grossman (1936-2023)
James Patterson (1940)
Billy Collins (1941)
James McManus (1951)

and from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1687, Italian-born French composer Jean Baptiste Lully, age 54, in Paris, following an inadvertent self-inflicted injury to his foot (by a staff with which he would beat time for his musicians) which developed gangrene.

Today's Birthdays

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) (note that the new style birthday is the 31st of March)
Modeste Moussorgsky (1839-1881)
Eddie James "Son" House (1902-1988)
Nikos Skalkottas (1904-1949)
Paul Tortelier (1914-1990)
Nigel Rogers (1935-2022)
Owain Arwel Hughes (1942)
Elena Firsova (1950)
Ann MacKay (1956)

and

Phyllis McGinley (1905-1978)
Nizar Qabbani (1923-1998)
Ved Mehta (1934-2021)

From the New Music Box:

On March 21, 1771, the Massachusetts Gazette published an announcement for a musical program including "select pieces on the forte piano and guitar." It is the earliest known reference to the piano in America.

Deanna Tham named music director of Redlands Symphony

Deanna Tham, former associate conductor of the Oregon Symphony, has a new gig - with the Redlands Symphony Orchestra, which is located on the eastside of the Los Angeles metropolitan area. Here's is a link to the annoucement.

Today's Birthdays

Beniamino Gigli (1890-1957)
Lauritz Melchoir (1890-1973)
Sviatoslav Richter (1915-1997)
Dame Vera Lynn (1917-2020)
Bernd Alois Zimmermann (1918-1970)
Marian McPartland (1918-2013)
Henry Mollicone (1946-2022)

and

Ovid (43 BC - AD 17)
Ned Buntline (1823-1886)
Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906)
Peter Schjeldahl (1942-2022)

and from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1928, the New York Symphony and the New York Philharmonic Society united to form the Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra of New York - now known as simply "The New York Philharmonic."

Today's Birthdays

Francesco Gasparini (1661-1727)
Max Reger (1873-1916)
Elizabeth Maconchy (1907-1994)
Nancy Evans (1915-2000)
Dinu Lipatti (1917-1950)
Robert Muczynski (1929-2010)
Ornette Coleman (1930-2015)
Myung-Wha Chung (1944)
Carolyn Watkinson (1949)
Mathew Rosenblum (1954)

and

Tobias Smollett (1721-1771)
Nikolay Gogol (1809-1852)
Richard Francis Burton (1821-1890)
Philip Roth (1933-2018)

Oregon Symphony Review: The Enduring Music of Stravinsky, Ibert, and Shostakovich

Guest review by Thomas Meinzen

Marina Piccinini and conductor Hans Graf | Photo credit: The Oregon Symphony

The Oregon Symphony’s matinee on the Ides of March was a beguiling and dramatic testament to the transcendency of music through time. Under the steady and artful guidance of Austrian conductor Hans Graf, the symphony performed three remarkable works, each written close to a century ago in the period between WWI and WWII. At times dazzling, unsettling, and even sinister, these compositions recall the brutal and tumultuous times of their authors, reflecting and resonating with the conflicts and fears we face today. The show left me wondering if my contemporaries will pen works that capture the sorrows, injustice, and strife of our society in so enduring a manner as Stravinsky and Sostakovich.

Belying its forthcoming dark intensity, the concert began gently, with melodic woodwinds and accenting strings. Igor Stravinsky’s four-movement Divertimento from La Baiser de la fée (The Fairy’s Kiss) follows the story of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Snow Maiden: a young man, kissed by a fairy at his birth, is claimed and taken away by the fairy on his wedding day. Stravinsky draws the ballet’s themes from the piano music and songs of Tchaikovsky. He writes, “The fairy’s kiss on the heel of the child is also the muse marking Tchaikovsky at his birth—though the muse did not claim him at his wedding, as she did the young man in the ballet, but at the height of his powers.” As strings and brass coalesced with rising potency, this sense of music claiming the composer was palpable in the Oregon Symphony’s performance; the muse may even have reached out and pulled in the audience.

Photo credit: The Oregon Symphony

While the darting, playful conversation of The Fairy’s Kiss showcased the deft collaboration of many orchestral sections, the next work spotlighted the superb musicianship of an individual artist. Renowned flautist Marina Piccinini headlined Jacques Ibert’s Concerto for Flute and Orchestra, Op. 37, a work at once silvery-smooth to the ear and devilishly difficult to perform. Hearing Piccinini, one quickly left behind any misconceptions of the flute as timid or peaceful: here was glittering intensity, rapid-fire arpeggios, twisting articulated lines, and swirling cadenzas.

After this bold Allegro introduction, Ibert’s Andante movement gave a brief breather, the strings laying out a subtly shifting tapestry for the flute to shimmer atop. Then the final movement, Allegro Scherzando, came flying in with syncopated accents, screaming horn triplets, and Piccinini gliding and twisting over virtuosic lines. When the flautist’s extended cadenza finally emerged, it recalled a jazz pianist’s solo, smooth held notes melting into modulating licks that spun up and down the register. Mystical and mournful tones transformed suddenly into whimsy. The orchestra rejoined Piccinini with characteristic trios of accents, soon rising to a bright and fiery ending. Piccinini’s effortless control and range of tone brought the audience to their feet.

Where Ibert’s Concerto soared to great heights, Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 1 in F minor delved deeper into the darkness and volatility of Europe’s interwar period. Shostakovich wrote this work—the first of his fifteen symphonies—as an eighteen-year-old, facing poverty, civil war, and malnutrition in the years following the Bolshevik Revolution.

The passion and irreverent genius of young Shostakovich shines through in the symphony, which filled the hall with beautiful brass chords and cheeky piano octaves, swells of energy and flashy high notes from the concertmaster. And yet, the work also seems to capture the anxiety and anguish of the composer’s early life and times. Basses and cellos shift together in low, haunting passages. The second movement’s march-like motif slides chromatically downward, majestic and foreboding—a statement of authority turned ominous. In the Lento movement, one could almost feel the lights dim in the Schnitzer. A great, lugubrious monster rouses itself, languid yet unsettling. The melody fragments into many parts, bringing to mind a nest of wasps or ants slowly stirring as the weather warms. One hundred years later, the piece still captivated, and the fine-tuned Oregon Symphony made no error to break the spell.

A rousing final movement concluded the concert, featuring a panoply of percussion and low brass. As applause filled the hall, I reflected on the symphony’s sense of great anguish, and the staying power of one teenager’s interpretation of the world through music. One hundred years later, the world is a very different place, and yet in both music and society, the past remains intensely relevant.

Thomas Meinzen is a composer, pianist, writer, and ecologist. Thomas studied music composition and orchestration with John David Earnest and Eric Funk. He has worked across the U.S. and Costa Rica as an avian field biologist and currently teaches natural history, ecology, arboriculture, and music through several local nonprofits, in addition to coordinating Portland tree-planting efforts with Friends of Trees. An avid bicyclist, birder, and public transit advocate, you can find his writing at greenbirder.substack.com and music at thomasmeinzen.bandcamp.com.

Today's Birthdays

Johann Christoph Vogel (1756-1788)
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908)
Paul Le Flem (1881-1984)
Gian Francesco Malipiero (1882-1973)
Willem van Hoogstraten (1884-1965)
John Kirkpatrick (1905-1991)
John Kander (1927)
Nobuko Imai (1943)
James Conlon (1950)
Jan-Hendrik Rootering (1950)
Courtney Pine (1964)

and

Stéphane Mallarmé (1842-1898)
Wilfred Owen (1893-1918)
Manly Hall (1901-1990)
George Plimpton (1927-2003)
Christa Wolf (1929-2011)
John Updike (1932-2009)

Today's Birthdays

Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre (1665-1729)
Manuel García II (1805-1906)
Joseph Rheinberger (1839-1901)
Giuseppe Borgatti (1871-1950)
Brian Boydell (1917-2000)
Nat "King" Cole (1917-1965)
John LaMontaine (1920-2013)
Stephen Dodgson (1924-2013)
Betty Allen (1927-2009)
Rudolf Nureyev (1938-1993)
John Lill (1944)
Michael Finnissy (1946)
Patrick Burgan (1960)

and

Edmund Kean (1787-1833)
Frank B. Gilbreth (1911-2001)
Penelope Lively (1933)

Review of Hawai'i Symphony concert in Classical Voice North America

 

Last weekend, I travelled to Honolulu to hear this concert, and my review is now available for you to read in CVNA here.