Metropolitan Youth Symphony shows off three ensembles in season ending concert

 Concert Review by Susan Joyce

The Metropolitan Youth Symphony is a Portland institution. Founded by Lajos Balogh in 1974, it gives young people the opportunity to play and perform in band and orchestra settings beyond the typical high school milieu. MYS incorporates 438 local students in 13 ensembles in 11 yearly concerts. On June 9, the MYS gave its spring concert, "Finale", at Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, in which the Jazz Band I, the Concert Orchestra and the Symphony Orchestra presented their offerings in fine form. Derek Sims conducted Jazz Band I, Ken Selden conducted the Concert Orchestra, and Andres Lopera, Balogh's successor, conducted the Symphony Orchestra.

If you happen to live or "vacation" in or around Lake Oswego, as I do, you may have seen the erstwhile director of the Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra and beloved local figure, Lajos Balogh, as I did recently at an art opening. Over cheese and wine, the Maestro with personable blue-grey eyes and bushy Einsteinesque hair may answer questions about how his tenure in Oregon came about (his Hungarian mother preferred that he move to Oregon, where she was, rather than to continue to tour on the east coast as a violinist) how Oregon got its name (German immigrants traveled north from California in search of rain, which reminded them of home, and then exclaimed, 'Oh! Regen!') and which concert repertoire he likes best (rather evenly, as if to preserve the egos of the composers involved, he stated that he likes all of it). Those who have seen Maestro Balogh speed by in his red sports car, bearing the license plate tag, "HAYDN", however, know that he has at least one favorite. Mr. Balogh was present at this concert, and received an ovation at intermission before Andres Lopera took up the baton in conducting the Symphony Orchestra.

The concert opened with Jazz Band I, conducted by Derek Sims. "Samba De Rollins" by Don Menza featured the brisk, uptempo drumming of Grace Choi. Randy Brecker's "Some Skunk Funk" followed, with competent solos from each section of the band. "Fingers", a Thad Jones tune, featured a piano and trumpet duet with the pleasant noodling of a muted trumpet contrasting with the crisp piano chording of Justin Salisbury. The trumpet section, the largest in the band, impressed by being in tight ensemble throughout and in good balance with the rest of the group.

The Concert Orchestra then took the stage to play the dark, brooding opening of Beethoven's "Overture to Egmont", which was conducted both defiantly and lyrically in proper Beethovenian spirit by Selden, who is also the conductor of the PSU Symphony. The final section was particularly well done, with an accelerando and crescendo that were truly exciting. The sole trumpet of the orchestra, Nolan Sester, was notable in this piece for his good intonation and phrasing.

Faure's prelude to the  "Peleas et Melisande Suite" followed. This selection appeared to be a favorite of the orchestra, especially of the strings, who seemed to fall into the lush string writing with pleasure. The opening phrases were warmly and expressively played. The highlighted woodwind section gelled during the Faure.

The Haydn Presto is from Symphony No. 100, Haydn's "Military" symphony, which features the so-called "Turkish" instruments of the day, such as timpani and triangle. It opened with crisply articulated and bouyant phrasing and continued with good dynamic contrast throughout. After this bout of Haydn's typically rhythmic and good-natured tomfoolery, the audience repaired to the Schnitzer lobby in a fine mood to cogitate and imbibe before the second part of the program.

After the intermission, the Symphony Orchestra assembled on stage and Andres Lopera, introducing himself as Balogh's successor, took the baton. Lopera, originally from Columbia, studied at the University of Texas and New England Conservatory. He is finishing his first year at MYS.

Lopera's conducting is precise and energetic, and the orchestra responded in kind to his direction. During Brahm's ''Academic Festival Overture,'' a brooding motive in the strings is gradually joined by brass and woodwinds. The piece contains long string sections of both lyricism and profundity, jettisoned by sprightly rhythmic upsurges. The bassoons and oboes charmed in their delivery of this rhythmic motive before it repeated in other sections.  (Brahms seemed to like the triangle, perhaps as an homage to Hadyn, and puts plenty of it in the impressive crescendo at  the end.) It's a heavy offering, which, like much of Brahms, must be carried like a large piece of furniture in danger of bumping into corners. The Symphony Orchestra handled it well.

The opening of Dvorak's Symphony No. 8 was conducted with great expression by Lopera. The orchestra was at its best in this symphony. The strings at times achieved a near-professional sound, with an impressive warmth and dynamic range displayed in the lyrical passages of the Allegretto. Uncommonly sensitive playing was produced throughout by a young bespectacled bassist. The entire cello section tackled its several unison themes savagely, deeply, and soulfully as required in the various movements. There was lovely phrasing of the flute solos which alternate in question and answer phrasing with the orchestra.

The finale of "Finale" was a piece written by the pianist Michael Allen Harrison, entitled "Samba."  Harrison, attired in a melon green shirt and sporting a suave grey halo of hair, ambled onto the stage to introduce it. He wrote this piece in the 90's to spotlight his drummer, Israel Annoh. Harrison and Annoh started out the samba, and were joined by the orchestra and jazz band. Lopera invited the audience to dance before this piece, and indeed, this frothy tune with its sweeping string phrasing put me in mind of dancing on the Love Boat with Lucy and Desi Arnaz, and perhaps the Skipper and Marianne, too. The piano, drums, jazz band and orchestra were suprisingly well blended, and this piece ended the evening on a a spicy up-note.

Tri-Met bus riders informally polled (OK, they were just spontaneously gushing) after the concert were definitely satisfied.

Chamber Music Northwest's Summer Festival begins with 'A Muse of Fire'

Wu Han and David Finckel

Chamber Music Northwest's 43rd annual Summer Festival kicked off at Kaul Auditorium on the Reed College campus at 8pm on Monday, June 24th. Longtime executive director Linda Magee stepped down after 33 years, and interim executive director Elizabeth Harcombe gave the opening remarks. The evening featured three works for piano, cello and clarinet, with Wu Han, David Finckel, and CMNW stalwart David Shifrin playing those instruments, respectively.

The night began with Beethoven's Trio in B-Flat Major, Op. 11. An early work, it was very straightforward and delightful to hear. Finckel appeared to be having a lark--playing much of the opening movement in a spritely saltando with an infectious giddiness that did nothing to overshadow Han's dazzling fireworks on the piano, betraying deft melodic sensibility. Shifrin's playing was sometimes overpowering in the opening movements, but by the third movement, a sort of scherzo that featured a delightful fughetta, all players found the proper alignment; all in all this work was great fun and a nice way to open the festival.

Four pieces from Bruch's Eight Pieces for Clarinet, Viola (Cello) and Piano, Op. 83 rounded out the first half. Finckel's touch again seemed to steal the show in the opening Nachtgesang, filling the hall with a dark, glorious cantabile that continued on through the second movement, which was like a somber lied, and the third, an andante con moto wherein the cello ranged from mournful to angry. Shifrin and Finckel seemed to trade arias, a series of contrasting monologues in which the cello kept up its threnody while the clarinet spoke in opposition, providing an emotional counterpoint through brief, poignant moments of hope, almost angelic in quality.

The second half was composed entirely of Brahms' Trio in A Minor for Clarinet, Cello and Piano, Op. 114. A stormy opening gave way shortly to contemplative reflection. Finckel never let one phrase pass without investing it fully with meaning from the seemingly bottomless palette at his fingertips, but the ensemble playing was also more deliciously evident in the Brahms from all players.

In the second movement this unity of ensemble was especially clear--intimate, unaffected playing, the sort of performance wherein the individual players stand aside and the music is clearly heard. Three superb musicians playing instruments of such different timbres coming together in such a way that it becomes difficult to tell where one instrument stops and another begins--now that is a rare beauty, and the Andantino grazioso provided the framework for that to happen. Gracious indeed; CMNW's Summer Festival should once again provide a month of incredible music if the opening concert is any indication.

City cancels Oregon Symphony's Waterfront Concert

It's disappointing to learn that the City will not be funding the Oregon Symphony's Waterfront Concert this year. According to the orchestra's press release (below), the popular concert has been axed. However, Sunday's print edition of The Oregonian stated that the budget is not as bad as it had looked (see "A surprise budget reversal in the Metro section). I'm wondering if it will continue to improve through the summer, and that there may still be a chance to have the concert, which was scheduled for August 29th.

Here's the press release:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

June 17, 2013

                                                                                                               

FUNDING CUTS FROM THE CITY OF PORTLAND AND

THE REGIONAL ARTS AND CULTURE COUNCIL

FORCE CANCELLATION OF WATERFRONT CONCERT

 

(PORTLAND, Ore.) –  Recent budget cuts mandated by the City and made by the Regional Arts and Culture Council have resulted in the cancellation of this year’s Waterfront Concert.

Realizing the importance of this concert to the thousands of Portland residents of all ages, ethnicities, and neighborhoods who attend each year, the Symphony made a last ditch effort to find new sponsors for the popular end-of-summer event.  When none could be found, the concert—like so many other worthwhile endeavors whose funding disappeared during these challenging fiscal times—was no longer possible.

It is anticipated that this will be a one-year hiatus for the popular event.

“Facing an unprecedented $21.5 million shortfall in the budget, the city had to make some pretty tough decisions this year,” Mayor Charlie Hales said. “Some popular and terrific programs couldn’t be funded this time, and the Waterfront Concert is a good example. But the concert will be in my proposed budget for 2014-15, if the city’s revenue picture improves – and we’re expecting that it will.”

Reporting from the Boston Early Music Festival

This year's music critics annual meeting will take place in Boston where the Boston Early Music Festival is underway. About 30 card-carrying members of the Music Critics Association of North America (including yours truly) are in Beantown to indulge in the early music scene here. We've will be hearing a number of concerts and talking with the folks who have made this festival a big success since 1980 (its inaugural year).

Here is today's schedule:

5 pm  - CONCERT - Newberry Consort
David Douglass and Ellen Hargis, directors
Rosa das Rosas: Cantigas de Santa Maria
New England Conservatory's Jordan Hall

8:00 - CONCERT - Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra
Robert Mealy, director
The Birth of the Orchestra: Extravagant and sonorous sounds of Paris and Rome, c.1700
New England Conservatory's Jordan Hall

11:00 - CONCERT - Atalante
Erin Headley, director
Reliquie di Roma: Lamentarium
Emmanuel Church

Tomorrow we have a couple of panels and then more concerts:

5:00 - CONCERT - Gli Incogniti
Amandine Beyer, director
Stylus Phantasticus: Pandolfi-Mealli, Schmelzer, Bertali, and Froberger
New England Conservatory's Jordan Hall

5:30 - Pre-Opera Talk
Members of the "Almira" Directorial Team
Cutler Majestic Theatre at Emerson College

6:40 - FANFARE - Opening Fanfare with members of the
Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra - Lobby,
Cutler Majestic Theatre at Emerson College

7:00 - OPERA - Handel’s "Almira"
Cutler Majestic Theatre at Emerson College

11:15-  CONCERT - Siobhán Armstrong, harp and Róisín
Elsafty, voice Má Bhionn Tú Liom Bí Liom:
Irish Medieval Songs
Emmanuel Church

Saturday will bring more panels and another set of concerts:

2:30 - CONCERT - Hespèrion XXI
Jordi Savall, director
Istanbul: Dimitrie Cantemir's The Book of the
Science of Music and the Ottoman, Sephardic &
Armenian traditions
New England Conservatory's Jordan Hall

8:00 - CHAMBER OPERA - Double Bill
Marc-Antoine Charpentier's "
La Descente d’Orphée
ux Enfers" and "La Couronne de Fleurs"
Nw England Conservatory's Jordan Hall

11:00 - CONCERT - Tragicomedia and Friends
Stephen Stubbs, director
Singen, Spielen, Tanzen, Trinken
New England Conservatory's Jordan Hall 

Sunday is simply:

12:30 - CONCERT
Paul Leenhouts, director
Angeli, Zingare e Pastori: Symbols & Allegories in
Italian Renaissance Music
New England Conservatory's Jordan Hall

PSU orchestra and Agnieszka Laska Dancers electrify the audience with Rite collaboration

(The Chosen One - Lauren Michelle Richmond - in action -- Photo credit: Chris Leck)

There’s nothing quite like a virgin sacrifice to attract a capacity audience to the concert hall. That’s what happened when the PSU Symphony teamed up with the Agnieszka Laska Dancers to produce an eye-catching, enthusiastic, and evocative performance of Igor Stravinsky “Le Sacre Du Printemps” (“The Rite of Spring”) on Friday (June 8). The production captivated a standing-room-only audience at Lincoln Performance Hall, most of whom, like this reviewer, had probably never before seen a live ballet performance of Stravinsky’s iconic work. They were rewarded with an electrifying production that worked exceedingly well to interpret the music and the story.

With Ken Selden conducting the orchestra, which was placed in the back part of the stage, the dance ensemble had a generous area at the front in which to explore the sonic textures and interpret an imagined pagan ritual. Choreographer Agnieszka Laska created a highly imaginative series of movements for the dance ensemble of nine women and four men. Some of the movement by the women was sexy and at other times very playful. They often seemed to be testing each other in order to figure out who might become the chosen one – that is, the one who is selected to dance herself to death and save the community. At one point, when the music became more adversarial, the men entered into the picture, and they also tested the mettle of the women. One of the most memorable situations occurred with the women sitting in a diagonal line across the floor and the men leaping over them. This seemed to suggest the jumping of the broom fertility ritual that extends back to ancient times in a number of cultures.

Terrific dancing by Lauren Michelle Richmond as The Chosen One helped give this “Rite” a lasting impression, and the ending, with the shower of rain and the giggling young girls, was a refreshing take on the story. Aside from a some intonation issues, the orchestra excelled under Selden’s direction, capturing the spirit of the music with verve and intensity.

In the first half of the concert, the PSU Percussion Ensemble played John Cage’s “Third Construction.” I lost count on all of the percussion instruments that were played by the four musicians, but it was simply amazing to hear all of the different sounds that they produced and the variety of rhythms they used.  Overall, the piece had a randomness and quasi-anarchic feeling that was very appealing.

This was followed by the H. K. Gruber’s “Manhattan Broadcasts,” which was played by the PSU New Music Ensemble under the baton of Ken Selden.  The first movement of this piece was entitled “Tammany Hall,” When I think of Tammany Hall, I think of Boss Tweed and the 1890s, but with his jazz-based inflections, Gruber seemed to be hinting at Tammany Hall of the Roaring Twenties. The second movement, entitled “Radio City” had a big band, swinging night clubby sound that was delightful. It was also sprinkled with solos and flutist Jayde Weide delivered one of the best.

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The ALD ensemble will present "The Rite of Spring" on June 29 as part of the Astoria Music Festival. This performance will be done with members of the Maddox Dance Studio Little Ballet Theatre (Jeanne Maddox Peterson, Director) and accompaniment provided by Jeffrey Payne and Susan Smith in Stravinsky's original version for Piano 4-Hands. Readers should take note that the Astoria Music Festival has a special 2 for 1 offer going on right now.

Nashville Symphony and Schermerhorn Symphony Center in financial crisis

The Tennessean newspaper has recently pointed out that the Nashville Symphony and its performance space, Schermerhorn Symphony Center, are at the edge of a financial cliff. According to this article, the Bank of America is still owed $82 million for the construction of the concert hall, which was completed in 2006. The Nashville Symphony owns the hall, but has been struggling to make payments, and orchestra reported severely declining revenue for the previous season (ending July 31, 2012).

You may be wondering what this has to do with Oregon. For starters, Jun Iwasaki, the concertmaster of the Nashville Symphony, was the former concertmaster of the Oregon Symphony. With a newly built concert hall and recording contracts with Naxos, it was a very smart move for Iwasaki. Also, the music director of the Nashville Symphony is Giancarlo Guerrero. Guerrero is the former MD of the Eugene Symphony. He also made an excellent decision to take the helm in Nashville, where, according to this article, his salary is $471,458 "with additional income of $18,688 from a related organization." In contrast, according to this article in Adaptistration, Carlos Kalmar's income from the Oregon Symphony was $364,200 (2009-2010 season - last public record).

Also, there is always talk in Portland about the sonic deficiencies of the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, and that the orchestra needs a new performance space. That is true, but there are a lot of dangers when considering the construction of a new hall, as the folks in Nashville are finding out.

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Extra note: The musicians of the Nashville Symphony have written a press release about the situation with the Schermerhorn. You can read their  statement on Charles Noble's blog here.

Portland Columbia Symphony Orchestra to audition five conductors for MD position

The Portland Columbia Symphony Orchestra has announced five finalist candidates, who will be vying to become the orchestra's next Music Director (Huw Edwards resigned from the position in 2011). Each candidate will conduct concerts in the 2013-2014 season.

Here's the list of candidates and next season's schedule:

• James Fellenbaum (Oct 11 and 13, 2013) with soloist Jun Iwasaki, former Oregon Symphony Concertmaster
• Scott Seaton (October 26, 2013) with Tears of Joy Theatre and Portland Symphonic Girlchoir
• Steven Byess (Nov 22 & 24, 2013) with soloist JáTtik Clark, Principal Tuba of the Oregon Symphony
• Jeffery Meyer (March 7 and 9, 2014) with pianist Stephen Beus
• Peter Shannon (May 2 and 4, 2014) with soloists Oregon Symphony Concertmaster Sarah Kwak and her husband Vali Phillips. 

The orchestra received 151 applications last fall and a search committee composed of players and board members narrowed the field to a short list of ten in May.

Executive Director Betsy Hatton acknowledges that “Portland seems to be a highly desirable destination for conductors. Each of these finalists had done considerable research about Portland and about us, before we interviewed them, and many asked intelligent and probing questions. We’re very excited about this outstanding group of highly competent and engaging musicians.”

Terry Ross on KWAX classical radio station in Eugene

[Caitriona Bolster at KWAX]

Article by Terry Ross

The classical music radio station KWAX, on the dial in Eugene at 91.1, is a tiny operation, with a total of exactly three employees. Yet it’s the most satisfying classical station in the Pacific Northwest and one of the best in the country. The fact is, in the world of classical music radio, small is beautiful.

KWAX broadcasts 24 hours a day, 365 days a year from its tiny office at 75 Centennial Loop in Eugene, but there’s no one at home evenings, nights, and weekends. The station was one of the first in the country to use automated transmission, so Mondays through Fridays, from 9:00 in the morning till 1:00 p.m., you’ll hear Caitriona (pronounced Katrina) Bolster, and from 1:00 until 5:00 it’s Rocky Lamanna, but that’s it for live broadcasting. Thereafter, depending on the day of the week, a variety of shows originated by other stations and music services fill the schedule until 10:00 p.m., when Peter Van De Graaff and the Beethoven Satellite Network take over until 6:00 a.m. Then it’s Performance Today with Fred Child from 6:00 to 8:00 and Bill McLaughlin’s Exploring Music until 9:00, and the whole cycle starts over.

Child’s and McLaughlin’s syndicated shows are two of the best, and most popular, in the country, and the quality holds true for the rest of KWAX’s satellite feeds, which include, among others, Tony Morris’s Classical Guitar Alive, Marjorie Herman’s Sounds Choral, On the Wind (chamber music for wind instruments), Fred Flaxman’s Compact Discoveries, Henry Fogel’s Collector’s Corner, David Dubal’s The Piano Matters, and Ross Amico’s show featuring film music, Picture Perfect. A host of live symphony broadcasts round out the automated schedule. In May these will feature no fewer than 25 full concerts by nine orchestras, from the Orpheus and St. Paul Chamber Orchestras and Daniel Barenboim’s West-Eastern Divan Orchestra to the Philadelphia, Chicago, and New York bands and Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, not to mention 4 broadcasts from the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival and two each from the Metropolitan Opera and the Lyric Opera of Chicago.

The satellite shows are great, but even better are Bolster’s and Lamanna’s regular weekday shows, in which a satisfying selection of music (very few warhorses, whole pieces instead of movements, no time-fillers, no “drive time” or “lunch time” nonsense) is mixed with occasional announcements of upcoming local concerts and interviews with visiting musicians and composers. Bolster and Lamanna choose their own music, and they avoid overlapping by paying attention to each other and by using a 400-piece “A list” of so-called “most popular” pieces, ranging from Pachelbel’s ubiquitous Canon to Prokofiev’s Lt. Kijé Suite, and including all of Beethoven’s piano concertos, the first 8 of his symphonies, Bach’s Brandenburgs, orchestral suites, and cello suites, 12 Dvoraks, 14 Haydns, 15 Brahmses, 20 Mozarts, and 20 Tchaikovskys. These “A list” pieces are played not more often than once a month or so.

By not having their music chosen for them, as, for instance, Portland’s KQAC does (Music Director John Pitman picks every announcer’s playlist in advance), the deejays at KWAX are not only able to respond to listener requests, which they do heavily on Fridays, but also to react in a timely fashion to events in the world of classical music. This past Monday, April 29, for example, Caitriona was able to focus on cellist Janos Starker, whose obituary had appeared in The New York Times that morning. According to Station Manager Paul Bjornstadt, keeping KWAX small has been a conscious decision, not simply a cost-cutting measure. He believes that the station’s no-frills approach in no way compromises its ability to serve its audience, who respond readily to modest twice-annual fundraising drives of $175,000 each, which supply almost 90% of the operating budget. KWAX, although affiliated with the University of Oregon, receives no funding from the university and none from foundations. Its independence leaves it entirely free to enter into a tacit agreement with its listeners to do the sort of programming they both like. Local businesses and arts organizations have approached the station to give underwriting support — those short blurbs you hear from time to time: “The music on KWAX is made possible in part by the Oregon Bach Festival, bringing the world’s great performers to Eugene since 1976.”

Listening to KWAX, I ask myself why so many bigger and richer classical music stations are in such a lather about getting their share of the so-called radio listening audience. Seems to me that in a given listening area, there will be a small but loyal group of classical music lovers who will tune in the local classical music station, if it’s halfway decent, which is to say if its music isn’t hackneyed, if it doesn’t constantly play mere movements of pieces, if it doesn’t program a diet of solo guitar music, and if its on-air personnel don’t sound like complete ignoramuses. By the same token, it seems unlikely that any significant number of radio listeners in a given broadcast area will suddenly switch from easy listening or country classics or all-talk stations to the classical one. So why do classical stations beat themselves up? All they have to do is offer a decent product to people already predisposed to want it.

In Eugene that’s what they do, and they don’t have to kill themselves with all kinds of extra shows or with gaudy incentives to lure supporting members — KWAX subscribers are allowed to choose a piece to be aired, and that’s their only perk, and they love it. After all, a certain percentage of listeners will pledge their support, and a certain percentage won’t. One suspects that these percentages are more or less constant. So create your station using the percentage who will, make good use of the wealth of excellent satellite feeds, hire a few intelligent and knowledgeable on-air folks, and call it good. It helps, I reckon, if you’re a non-union shop, and not locked into a certain percentage of live programming.

I can’t for the life of me understand why any city, of whatever size, needs to have a not-for profit FM classical music station with a budget of several million dollars. KWAX proves that the Eugene model could work just as well in Chicago, Los Angeles, or Portland, where at KQAC Andrea Murray and Brandi Parisi handle the airwaves from midnight to 9:00 a.m. for no good reason. KWAX pays $5,000 a year — a YEAR! — for Peter Van De Graaff to do the duty from 10 p.m. until 6:00 a.m., and Van de Graaff is an almost ideal late-night host. He plays a nice variety of largely unhackneyed music, he has a pleasant voice, and he keeps his talk to a minimum.

See for yourself what Eugene can offer; KWAX streams round-the-clock on the internet. Give it a try and hear what a sensible classical music station sounds like.

Denna Good-Mojab singing up a storm

Fifteen-year-old Denna Good-Mojab recently sang an excerpt from the aria, "Una voce poco fa," from Rossini's opera, "The Barber of Seville," at two concerts as part of her participation in the 2012 More Music @ The Moore training and performance program for select young artists in the Seattle area. The video clip of her performance is now up on Youtube (http://www.youtube.com/DennaGoodMojab) as well as on her professional Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/DennaGoodMojab) which provides news on her musical endeavors. Ms. Good-Mojab is a student of vocal performance at the University of Washington School of Music. She's finishing up her sophomore year in the music program, but has just become a senior by quarter hours at the University itself. She debuted with the Portland Opera at the age of 10 singing the role of the Second Spirit in the Opera’s 2007 production of Mozart’s “The Magic Flute.” She has performed with the Portland Opera several times since. She is currently in rehearsal with the Seattle Opera’s Youth Chorus for the Opera's August production of Turandot.

In Bayreuth this summer

I will be in Bayreuth this summer to attend the Bayreuth Festival. This opportunity came through the folks at the festival who have selected critics from the Music Critics of North America (MCANA.org) roster. Those of us who were selected will receive free tickets to the operas that take place from August 18th through the 22nd. So, I will hear the following operas:

Saturday	18. August, 06:00 PM	Der fliegende Holländer
Sunday	19. August, 04:00 PM	Lohengrin
Monday	20. August, 04:00 PM	Tristan und Isolde
Tuesday	21. August, 04:00 PM	Tannhäuser
Wednesday	22. August, 04:00 PM	Parsifal

Five Wagner operas in five days. My ears will be pummeled into pulp. I will be reporting on this in this blog and in Oregon Music News.

How classical music critics are viewed

Reviews of Oregon Symphony and Cascadia Composers concerts

My most recent reviews of the Oregon Symphony concert (Haydn's Creation) and the Cascadia Composers concert (Bang on a Can) are posted in Oregon Music News - just scroll down the main page.

Opera Feast at Mark Mandel's home

While attending Seattle Opera last weekend, I talked with fellow critic Mark Mandel, who writes for Opera News. Mark told me about the ongoing opera series in which the public is invited to come to his home to watch opera DVDs on his large screen TV. You are also invited to bring a vegetarian dish to the days in which a potluck is scheduled.

Here's the invitation from Mark with his schedule of operas. His contact information is at the end of the posting.

Friends,

Welcome to the season’s second half! We mark the Massenet death centenary with three of his operas: Manon, Werther and Thaïs. Sunday matinee options exist for Werther and Atys, which along with Jenůfa are the greatest performances here. Saturdays: dinner at 5, intro at 5:45, show at 6:15. Sundays: lunch at noon, intro at 12:45, show at 1:15. Show lengths and estimated finish times are given. Bring friends!



Sat., Jan. 28, 5 p.m. Vegetarian potluck. 129 min./8:49

LA FINTA SEMPLICE – Mozart was 12 when he composed this farcical, somewhat bawdy opera buffa about a “pretend simpleton” who feigns simplicity to further the amorous designs of herself and others. Outdoors in the Residenzhof at the Salzburg Festival, it gets a spiffy white-and-red staging by director Joachim Schlömer and designer Jens Kilian. In the title role, Malin Hartelius is exquisite, enchanting, superb. She is ably backed by singers Josef Wagner, Matthias Klink, Marina Comparato, Silvia Moi, Jeremy Ovenden, Miljenko Turk, actress Marianne Hamre and dancer Anna Tenta. Michael Hofstetter conducts the spirited Camerata Salzburg.



Sat., Feb. 4, 5 p.m. Vegetarian potluck. 145 min./9:05

MADAMA BUTTERFLY – Jean-Pierre Ponnelle’s film of Puccini’s opera delves the minds of Cio-Cio-San and Pinkerton, both victims, revealing their hopes and fears; the action unfolds as their dream/nightmare. Musically, none of Butterfly’s many recordings beats this one. Herbert von Karajan’s protracted pacing and wide dynamics yield strong climaxes, magnificently executed by the Vienna Philharmonic. Mirella Freni’s lovely, vulnerable Cio-Cio-San and Plácido Domingo’s unusually sympathetic Pinkerton get top support from Christa Ludwig’s exemplary Suzuki, Robert Kerns’ sensitive Sharpless and Michel Sénéchal’s oily Goro.



Sat., Feb. 18, 5 p.m. Mark cooks. 175 min./9:55

MANON – Little is more French than Massenet’s opera about a girl torn between love of luxury and the love of a fervent chevalier whose better sense and religious calling can’t prevent his being dragged down with her. A French Manon is a big plus, and Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu has one in Natalie Dessay, whose acting and singing are finely nuanced. Her passionate Des Grieux is the intense Rolando Villazón. David McVicar’s detailed, unsentimental staging stresses the 18th century’s seamy, mercenary side and vividly evokes the era. Manuel Lanza, Francisco Vas, Didier Henry and Samuel Ramey are in the cast. Victor Pablo Pérez conducts.



Sat., Feb. 25, 5 p.m. & Sun., Feb. 26, noon. Vegetarian potlucks. 161 min./9:21 & 4:21

WERTHER – Goethe’s Sorrows of Young Werther inspired a wave of suicides and Massenet’s best opera. No finer lyric tenor and lyric mezzo roles exist than poetic Werther and his beloved, unattainable Charlotte. For Opéra National de Paris at Opéra Bastille, Jonas Kaufmann and Sophie Koch are emotionally overwhelming, staggeringly superb. Ludovic Tézier is ideal as Charlotte’s husband Albert; Anne-Catherine Gillet is winsome as her sister Sophie. Conductor Michel Plasson expansively, expertly draws out the score’s beauty. One of the greatest stage performances triumphs over stage director Benoît Jacquot’s sometimes-goofy video direction.



Sat., March 10, 5 p.m. Vegetarian potluck. 138 min./8:58

THAÏS – Massenet’s opera sets Anatole France’s tale of ships passing in the night: the courtesan Thaïs treks from worldly Alexandria to desert convent and to God, guided by the monk Athanaël, who drifts from ascetic Cenobite order into the thrall of carnal passion. For Venice’s Teatro La Fenice (at Teatro Malibran during La Fenice’s reconstruction), Eva Mei and Michele Pertusi are the rare Thaïs and Athanaël who are believable at each step of their journeys – and sing strongly too. Director/designer Pier Luigi Pizzi tells the story clearly, stressing not the obvious contrasts but the similarity of sexual and religious fervor. Marcello Viotti conducts.



Sat., March 17, 5 p.m. Vegetarian potluck. 155 min./9:15

SEMELE – Handel’s sensual/sublime music and Congreve and Pope’s rich poetry treat the myth of ambitious Semele, ardent Jupiter and jealous Juno. Great arias abound: “Endless pleasure,” “Iris, hence away!” “O sleep, why dost thou leave me?” “Where’er you walk,” “Myself I shall adore” and many more. Zurich Opera teams three reliably terrific artists in conductor William Christie, director Robert Carsen and singer Cecilia Bartoli, a scintillating Semele. Charles Workman and Birgit Remmert head a good supporting cast. Add strong work by Zurich Opera’s chorus and period orchestra La Scintilla and spare, stylish, elegant Patrick Kinmonth designs.



Sat., April 7, 5 p.m. Vegetarian potluck. 118 min./8:13

JENŮFA – Janáček’s masterpiece is a searing music drama of passion, jealousy, betrayal, infanticide, guilt, forgiveness and the transfiguring power of love. In an outwardly bucolic but morally stifling Czech village, repressed emotion erupts like a volcano. The luminous, febrile music glows and burns like lava. Nikolaus Lehnhoff’s superbly taut Glyndebourne Festival staging has an excellent cast headed by Roberta Alexander’s tender Jenůfa, Anja Silja’s haunted Kostelnička, Philip Langridge’s intense Laca and Mark Baker’s driven Števa. The London Philharmonic conducted by Andrew Davis plays as if possessed; the tension never sags.



Sat., April 14, 5 p.m. Vegetarian potluck. 141 min./9:01

DIE GEZEICHNETEN – The title of Schreker’s gorgeous, disturbing opera refers both to artists’ models and to those branded by fate. An ugly man craves beauty and creates an idyllic grotto where, to his horror, others seduce and rape women and girls. A beautiful “painter of souls” with a heart defect paints his portrait; he falls for her, but a rival vows to take her by force. Nikolaus Lehnhoff’s Salzburg Festival staging takes place on a toppled, broken statue of a woman. Robert Brubaker, Anne Schwanewilms, Michael Volle, Robert Hale and Wolfgang Schöne head a strong cast. Kent Nagano leads the plush Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin.



Sat., April 21, 5 p.m. Mark cooks. 196 min./9:56

THE CORONATION OF POPPEA – In Monteverdi’s amoral, unsettling masterpiece, Emperor Nero orders the death of his mentor Seneca and the exile of his wife Octavia and crowns as empress the courtesan Poppea. Robert Carsen’s incisive, brilliant Glyndebourne Festival staging in modern dress stars Danielle de Niese as a ravishing, riveting Poppea and Alice Coote as a ruthless, lava-voiced Nero. Tamara Mumford, Iestyn Davies, Marie Arnet, Paolo Battaglia, Wolfgang Ablinger-Sperrhacke, Dominique Visse and more add strong support. Emmanuelle Haïm extracts vibrant, beautiful playing from the period Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.



Sat., April 28, 5 p.m. Vegetarian potluck. 148 min./9:08

DIALOGUES OF THE CARMELITES – Ten days before the Reign of Terror ended in 1794, 16 Carmelite nuns were guillotined. Poulenc’s poignant, powerful opera treats their doubt and faith, their fear and courage, their humility and heroism. At Milan’s Teatro degli Arcimboldi during La Scala’s renovation, Riccardo Muti and Robert Carsen superbly conduct and direct La Scala forces. Dagmar Schellenberger as the fearful Blanche de la Force and Anja Silja as the tormented Old Prioress are gripping actresses. Gwynne Geyer is the serene New Prioress. Barbara Dever is the disciplined Mother Marie. Laura Aikin is the ebullient Sister Constance.



Sat., May 5, 5 p.m. & Sun., May 6, noon. Vegetarian potlucks. 196 min./10:16 & 5:16

ATYS – The catalyst of the French baroque opera revival was the 1987 production of Lully’s Atys by Les Arts Florissants, William Christie and director Jean-Marie Villégier. Many who saw it in Paris and on tour thought it the apex of their operagoing, and one man paid $3.1 million to finance this 2011 revival so that he could see Atys again before he died. At the Opéra-Comique, Christie leads Les Arts Florissants and a great cast: Bernard Richter, Stéphanie d’Oustrac, Emmanuelle de Negri, Nicolas Rivenq, Sophie Daneman, Marc Mauillon, Paul Agnew, Cyril Auvity and more. The rare production and performance where every facet seems exactly right.



Sat., May 12, 5 p.m. Vegetarian potluck. 117 min./8:37

CANDIDE – Bernstein’s most ambitious project was his idea-packed setting of Voltaire’s stinging little book skewering philosophical optimism. Brainwashed that “all is for the best in this best of all possible worlds,” Candide and his beloved Cunegonde trot the globe and suffer sobering misadventures. At last, free of illusion, they determine to cultivate their garden. Lonny Price’s semistaging isn’t the best of all possible Candides, but it may be the liveliest and funniest. Paul Groves, Kristen Chenoweth, Patti LuPone, Thomas Allen, Stanford Olsen, Jeff Blumenkrantz and Janine LaManna head the cast. Marin Alsop leads the New York Philharmonic.

Mark Mandel
markmandel@comcast.net
503-274-0322

Fomer principal trumpeter of the Oregon Symphony passes

It has come to my attention that James R. Smith, former principal trumpet of the Oregon Symphony, died last night (January 3rd). Smith played during the Bloomfield, Belugi, and Singer eras and sat next to John Trudeau, former principal trombonist. He also toured with Robert Shaw.

Classical Revolution Portland incorporates as a Non-Profit

CRPDX, one of the mainstays in P-town's vibrant alternative classical music scene, has incorporated as a non-profit after much hard work. They are currently seeking Founding Revolutionaries---the first 50 people to join as a sustainer at $10/month or donate $100 outright get to be CRPDX's bff and listed as such on the website.

If you are able, please consider supporting this group that has done so much through the years to spread the gospel of classical music. By presenting chamber music in non-traditional venues and formats they have done excellent work towards the goal of reaching as many people as possible with this wonderful art-form. They are truly worth your hard-earned arts-supporting dollar, and any donation large or small is gratefully accepted. Viva la Revolucion!

Radio sound-effects guy for Prairie Home Companion dies

The great sound-effects man for Prairie Home Companion, Tom Keith, died on Sunday, October 30th died of a heart attack on Sunday at his home in Woodbury, Minnesota. He was 64 years old.

Here are some obituaries about Keith:

- Minnesota Public Radio News
- Minneapolis Star Tribune
- St. Paul Pioneer Press
- Garrison Keillor on Prairie Home Companion (with video clips)

Tenor needed for a Christmas party

Tenor needed for quartet performing Italian Christmas repertoire, about 15 minutes worth, accompanied by strings and keyboard, at a large house party on Dec. 10, beginning at 5 p.m. There will be three rehearsals (10/19, 11/16, and 12/2).

There is lots of food, drinks, and music music music (mostly strings) at these events. The setting is quite spectacular.

The rehearsals take place near Lewis and Clark.

Please contact Joan at jglassel@gmail.com, if interested.

Mamma Mia lights up ABBA fans in Portland

If you are looking for a lighthearted story that is punctuated by the music of ABBA, then Mamma Mia is your ticket. It’s a cheesy, spandex-driven musical that will make you want to get out of your seat and start dancing. That was the scene at Keller Auditorium, when I attended Mamma Mia on Tuesday evening (August 23), which was the first night of its weeklong run in Portland as part of its North American tour.

Perhaps there is no way to explain the enduring popularity of ABBA’s music, which sold in the millions when the Swedish pop group was one of the hottest acts on the planet forty years ago. But the success of the musical, which has been playing in London since 1999, has inspired productions all over the world and a hit film version in 2008. So it is no wonder that the audience (which was predominately female) loved every second of ABBA standards like “Dancing Queen,” “Super Trouper,” “Knowing Me, Knowing You,” and “SOS.” All that was missing was a disco ball.

The musical is set on a Greek island, where a young woman is preparing to get married. She would like to be given away by her father, but she doesn’t know who her real father is. After she finds one of her mother’s old diaries, she discovers that her mother’s dalliances with three men many years ago probably means that one of them is her father. She then invites the three men to her wedding, and they actually show up. Tensions flare and a lot of dodging, singing, and dancing goes on before the final outcome.

The volume of the show on Tuesday night was turned up so high that the sound became slightly distorted at the beginning of the show. The sound crew might have been trying too hard to overcompensate for the vastness of Keller Auditorium, or they might have been trying to aid the voice of Kaye Tuckerman, who had a tough time projecting her lower range but did well in all other aspects as the mother. Chloe Tucker outstandingly conveyed the wishful naiveté of the young bride to be. The show was almost stolen by Mary Callanan as the mother’s overweight friend. Alison Ewing as the mother’s surgically-enhanced friend was also superb. The prospective fathers were expertly portrayed by Jeff Applegate, Paul De Boy, and John-Michael Zuerlen.

The exceptional comic timing, energetic dancing, and over-the-top pantomiming (while dancing and singing) made Mamma Mia delightful. But the touring version relied too heavily on one set, which depicted the outside of a hotel and courtyard (and later the nave of a church). Another set would have been refreshing.

Although the entire audience was standing and cheering at the end of the show, the bonus finale that included glitzy ABBA-inspired costumes raised the rooftop with singing from all corners. That was a great way to end the evening.

There may be some tickets left for the remaining performances of Mamma Mia on Saturday (August 27) and Sunday (August 28). Contact Broadway Across America.

How to get Schrott and Netrebko in Portland

Since Erwin Schrott and Oregon Symphony conductor Carlos Kalmar are natives of Montevideo Uruguay, it might be possible for Kalmar to appeal to his fellow countryman for an appearance with the Oregon Symphony. Of course, that would mean a duet opportunity for Schrott and his wife Anna Netrebko.

Well, it's a long, long shot, but you have to start somewhere.

New stuff at Oregon Music News

Just a quick link to a couple of new articles up at Oregon Music News:

An interview with Bobby Ray of The Electric Opera Company proved most enlightening! I'll be at their show with CRPDX at the Alberta Rose Theatre tomorrow night. I guarantee you won't have more of a blast anywhere in the 503 for 8 bucks on Friday.


I reviewed Hideki Yamaya's latest CD: a recording of Roncalli's Capricci Armonici sopra la Chitarra Spagnola for baroque guitar. Hideki is one of my very favorite solo baroque stylists in a city that is absolutely crazy for early music, boasting many top-notch performers. Simply put, this CD is marvelous.

Click on the links above for the articles and further linkage.

CRPDX and Electric Opera Company team up in 'Sympathy for the Devil'

Electric Opera Company and Classical Revolution PDX Present:
Sympathy for the Devil
A classically inspired rock concert at the Alberta Rose Theater

Portland’s favorite Electric Guitar Orchestra collides with the city’s
most accessible Chamber Ensemble to show you a side of classical music you’ve never even dreamed of, but will never want to leave behind…

PORTLAND — Alternative Classical Music. You could say they’re polar opposites. The guitarists of Electric Opera Company bringing their modern instruments into classical settings play the Ying to Classical
Revolution PDX’s Yang of chamber instrumentalists playing at bars and other comfortable settings. But this is a case where opposites
attract for a common goal: Making Classical Music more accessible to
the everyday listener!

Classical Revolution and Electric Opera Company will bring their
trademark stylings of 18th century masterworks to the Alberta Rose
Theater on August 19th for a concert that won’t soon be forgotten.
The theme is “Sympathy for the Devil” and there’s a heavy helping of
“Diablo in musica” in store including the Danse Macabre, selections
from Gounod’s Faust, Chopin, The Rolling Stones, The Beatles and
plenty more surprises. Bring your beer drinking fists and wear
whatever you want, its classical music for the 21st century!

Classical Revolution PDX in a Nutshell
Classical Revolution PDX offers chamber music performances in highly accessible venues, such as bars and cafes. By taking chamber music out of the recital hall and making it more accessible to an audience who does not otherwise hear such music in a live context, Classical Revolution strives to make the public aware that classical music is still relevant and can be enjoyed by all.

"Will the demise of appreciation for classical music be reversed by the Classical Revolution movement? Time will tell, it's transformational, it's unforgettable and every pair of ears that hears it is going to pass the word on. Now that's the stuff of revolutions alright." - Zaph Mann, OPB Music


Electric Opera Company in a Nutshell
Electric Opera Company is dedicated to revitalizing the popularity of
opera and classical music through education and performance; and to
breaking down the barriers to these arts by presenting them in a
modern, accessible medium. This accessible medium is the Fifteen
Piece Electric Guitar orchestra, in which musicians play the exact
parts as written by the composer. But the instruments typically
associated with classical music are replaced with an army of electric
guitars, keyboards, and drums.

The orchestra has been making waves around town as both a rock band teaching adults that classical music is way more awesome than they think it is, a company that produces fully staged operas, and an educational outreach group teaching kids basically the same thing. They’ve been spotted in opera houses, rock venues, middle schools, elementary schools, music festivals, non-profits, and more, spreading
the gospel of classical music to the unsuspecting.



Calendar Listing
What: Sympathy for the Devil, a concert featuring Electric Opera
Company and Classical Revolution PDX

Who: Produced by Electric Opera Company and Classical Revolution PDX.
Arranged by Bobby Ray and Adam Goodwin. Musical direction by
Ray/Goodwin/Kaiser

When/Where: Friday, August 19th, 8:00 pm – Minors OK when accompanied
by a parent or guardian
The Alberta Rose Theater 3000 NE Alberta St, Portland, OR (503) 719-6055

Why: To bring the joy of Classical Music to those who might not
experience it otherwise, and to share a new lens through which to view
a timeless favorite.

Tickets: $8 at the door or purchased online at
http://www.albertarosetheatre.com/


--
Mattie Kaiser
Executive Director | Classical Revolution PDX
www.classicalrevolutionpdx.org

Filmusik and Federale rock the house with 'The Grand Duel'

Filmusik, Portland's homegrown musical idea whose name expresses exactly what it does, delivered another bang-up performance with the live-soundtrack rendition of 'The Grand Duel,' a spaghetti western of the best (worst?) kind Thursday night at the Hollywood Theater.

Federale, a local band who specializes in the dramatic music of the kind found in this genre, performed a live version of the soundtrack. The main theme is probably better known to most audiences from its appropriation by Quentin Tarantino for the soundtrack to 'Kill Bill Vol. 1.' The iconic harmonium melody, doubled at various times by soprano or trumpet, was accompanied by a perfect high lonesome whistle from one of the band members (and quite an excellent display of whistling prowess it was.) After all, what's spaghetti western music without the whistling?

The performance gave you everything you want from this genre, in which, let's face it, the music is much better than the film. And much more intense from being live and in your face. The film itself was a delicious, laughable bit of nonsense, full of hyperbole, melodrama, gratuitous nudity, stereotypes, and hatchet-faced Europeans with bad teeth somehow trying to pass themselves off as Americans, replete with oompa-loompa-cum-John-Boehner tans. Starring the iconic Lee Van Cleef as a sheriff out to save an innocent man from hanging and bent on revenge agains the cruel Patriarch, this film needed great music to save it from itself.

Federale betrayed a keen understanding of the musical needs of this genre, from gritty verismo atmospherics in which inglorious death is all around, to sinister carefully layered mood music, full of atonalism and sound-effects that also showcased the droning surf-rock origin behind much of the guitar work.

Another worthwhile endeavor from Galen Huckins and Filmusik, the final performance takes place tonight at 8 pm at the Hollywood Theater.

John Richards - longtime Oregon Symphony member and tuba virtuoso passes

I've just received word that John Richards, former principal tuba of the Oregon Symphony for 53 years, died earlier today. Richards was a phenomenal musician and a real Mensch. He had a doctorate in psychology and taught a Lewis & Clark College while playing in the orchestra. He also had a huge collection of instruments. I interviewed him twice for articles that I wrote for a couple of publications (Sforzando and The Oregonian). I found out that he only needed about two or three hours of sleep to feel rested. He built instruments, arranged music, and founded the Portland version of Tuba Christmas. He will be missed.

--

I have just found out that a memorial service of John Richards will be held at the Agnes Flanagan Chapel of Lewis & Clark College on August 13th at 11 am.

Upcoming Filmusik madness: The Grand Duel

Filmusik, the unique brainchild of Portland composer Galen Huckins that combines classic cinema with all manner of live performance elements, including live original soundtracks, voice dubbing and sound effects, is at it again this upcoming week with their new project The Grand Duel.

A spaghetti western starring the inimitable Lee Van Cleef, this film marks Filmusik's first collaboration with Federale, a local alternative band who just happens to specialize in writing and performing music that, in their own words, "recapture[s] the haunting, violent atmosphere illustrated in such classic films as A Fistful of Dollars." With their ranchero-style horns and the intensely powerful soprano of Maria Karlin, Federale, besides being an extremely talented ensemble that knows exactly how to achieve their musical goals, is a plain old-fashioned kick in the pants. Marvelously fun, Filmusik and Federale are a natural fit for each other, and for this enterprise Federale composed an entirely new soundtrack and will be on hand to perform for all three shows. The showings are Thursday July 28th, Friday the 29th and Saturday the 30th at the Hollywood Theater at 8pm.

Getting a hand in on the new edition of Grove Dictionary of American Music

Because I'm a member of the Music Critics Association of North America (see mcana.org), I got the opportunity to write and/or update a number of entries to the new edition of the Grove Dictionary of American Music. What started out as three or four pieces last summer ended up encompassing entries on 41 subjects. I finished the last two entires a few weeks ago.

Here's the entire lists of entries that I wrote or rewrote:

- American String Quartet
- Mark Applebaum
- Jacob D. Avshalomov
- Claude Baker
- John Barbirolli
- Mason Bates
- Thomas Beecham
- John P. Corigliano
- Helan Donath
- ETHEL
- Brent Ellis
- Carlisle (Sessions, Jr.) Floyd
- Maureen Forrester
- Pamela Frank
- Gidon Kremer
- Kronos Quartet
- Jack Lawrence
- Robert Levin
- Keith Lockhart
- Yo-Yo Ma
- Aprile Millo
- James Morris
- Carol Neblett
- Paul Neubauer
- Yannick Nezet-Seguin
- Oregon Bach Festival
- Orion String Quartet
- Peter Oundjian
- Awadagin Pratt
- Arvo Part
- Helmuth Rilling
- Andre-Michel Schub
- Richard Sher
- Neil Shicoff
- Robert Spano
- Cheryl Studer
- Tomas Svoboda
- Carol Vaness
- Stephen Wadsworth
- Stewart Wallace

All of these are edited by academics, and almost all have been approved for print.

Oregon Arts Watch

A big welcome to Oregon Arts Watch, which debuted this week. Under music, you'll see that Brett Campbell has posted stories about the Oregon Symphony, Cappella Romana and other local music organizations.

A few extra thoughts about San Francisco's Ring Cycle

One of the things that I realized after hearing the Ring Cycle in San Francisco was how good the Seattle Opera orchestra is. Even though the orchestra of the San Francisco Opera is one of the best in the land, it stumbled and fumbled here and there during each opera in the Cycle. I have heard the Seattle Opera Orchestra play the Ring operas at a higher level. Perhaps the frequency of the Ring Cycle in Seattle has helped the musicians there to become very familiar with the extreme demands of Wagner's music.

Today's Birthdays

Jacques Offenbach (1819-1880)
Wilfred Pelletier (1896-1982)
Chet Atkins (1924-2001)
Ingrid Haebler (1926)
Eric Dolphy (1928-1964)
Arne Nordheim (1931)
Mickie Most (1938-2003)
Brian Wilson (1942)
Anne Murray (1945)
André Watts (1946)
Lionel Richie (1949)

and

Kurt Schwitters (1887-1948)
Lillian Hellman (1905-1984)
Vikram Seth (1952)

Today's Birthdays

François Rebel (1701-1775)
Johann Wenzel Stamitz (1717-1757)
Carl Zeller (1842-1898)
Alfredo Catalani (1854-1893)
Sergei Taneyev (1856-1915)
Guy Lombardo (1902-1977)
Edwin Gerschefski (1909-1988)
Anneliese Rothenberger (1926)
Elmar Oliveira (1950)
Philippe Manoury 1952)

and

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)
Tobias Wolff (1945)
Salman Rushdie (1947)

Today's Birthdays

Antonio Maria Bononcini (1677-1726)
Ignaz Pleyel (1757-1831)
Sir George Thalben-Ball (1896-1987)
Edward Steuermann (1892-1964)
Manuel Rosenthal (1904-2003)
Paul McCartney (1942)
Hans Vonk (1942-2004)
Anthony Halstead (1945)
Diana Ambache (1948)
Eva Marton (1948)
Peter Donohoe (1953)

and

Geoffrey Hill (1932)
Richard Powers (1957)

Today's Birthdays

Charles Gounod (1818-1893)
Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971)
Hermann Reutter (1900-1985)
Einar Englund (1916-1999)
Galina Ustvolskaya (1919-2006)
Sir Edward Downes (1924)
Christian Ferras (1933-1982)
Gérard Grisey (1946-1998)
Derek Lee Ragin (1958)

and

M. C. Escher (1898-1972)
John Hersey (1914–1993)
Ron Padgett (1942)

Today's Birthdays

Niccolò Vito Piccinni (1728-1800)
Helen Traubel (1899-1972)
Willi Boskovsky (1909-1990)
Sergiu Comissiona (1928-2005)
Lucia Dlugoszewski (1931-2000)
Jerry Hadley (1952-2007)
David Owen Norris (1953)

and

Joyce Carol Oates (1938)

Today's Birthdays

Franz Danzi (1763-1826)
Edvard Grieg (1843-1907)
Ernestine Schumann‑Heink (1861-1936)
Guy Ropartz (1864-1955)
Robert Russell Bennett (1894-1981)
Sir Thomas Armstrong (1898-1994)
Otto Luening (1900-1996)
Geoffrey Parsons (1929-1995)
Waylon Jennings(1937-2002)
Harry Nilsson (1941-1994)
Paul Patterson (1947)
Rafael Wallfisch (1953)
Robert Cohen (1959)

and

Kobayashi Issa (1763-1827)

Today's Birthdays

Simon Mayr (1763-1845)
John McCormack (1884-1945)
Heddle Nash (1894-1961)
Rudolf Kempe (1910-1976)
Stanley Black (1913-2002)
Natalia Gutman (1942)
Lang Lang (1982)

and

Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896)
John Bartlett (1820-1905)
Ernesto (Che) Guevara de la Serna (1928-1967)

Today's Birthdays

Elisabeth Schumann (1888-1952)
Carlos Chavez (1899-1978)
Alan Civil (1929-1989)
Gwynne Howell (1938)
Sarah Connolly (1963)
Alain Trudel (1966)

and

William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)
William S. Burroughs (1914-1997)

Today's Birthdays

Vanni Marcoux (1877-1962)
Leon Goossens (1897-1988)
Maurice Ohana (1913-1992)
Ian Partridge (1938)
Chick Corea (1941)
Oliver Knussen (1952)

and

Egon Schiele (1890-1918)
Anne Frank (1929-1945)

Today's Birthdays

Francesco Antonio Bonporti (1672-1749)
Richard Strauss (1864-1949)
Shelly Manne (1920-1984)
Carlisle Floyd (1926)
Antony Rooley (1944)
Douglas Bostock (1955)
Conrad Tao (1994)

and

Ben Jonson (1572-1637)
William Styron (1925-2006)
Athol Fugard (1932)

Today's Birthdays

Heinrich von Herzogenberg (1843-1900)
Frederick Loewe (1904-1988)
Ralph Kirkpatrick (1911-1984)
Bruno Bartoletti (1925)
Mark-Anthony Turnage (1960)

and

Gustave Courbet (1819-1877)
Saul Bellow (1915-2005)
Maurice Sendak (1928)

Today's Birthdays

Otto Nicolai (1810-1849)
Carl Nielsen (1865-1931)
Cole Porter (1891-1964)
Dame Gracie Fields (1898-1979)
Ingolf Dahl (1912-1970)
Les Paul (1915-2009)
Franco Donatoni (1927-2000)
Charles Wuorinen (1938)
Ileana Cotrubas (1939)

and

George Axelrod (1922-2003)

and from the New Music Box:
On June 9, 1836, the Styrian Musik-Verein sponsored a concert in Vienna devoted to the American landscape-inspired music of emigré composer Anthony Philip Heinrich, the self-described "Beethoven of Kentucky" who is often cited as a precursor to the contemporary American maverick tradition. Although Heinrich claimed that there were not enough musicians available to properly perform his work, which often features up to 40 independent compositional lines, the concert was his greatest success in Europe and the earliest international success of an American-based composer.

Today's Birthdays

Tomaso Albinoni (1671-1750)
Nicolas Dalayrac (1753-1809)
Robert Schumann (1810-1856)
Erwin Schulhoff (1894-1942)
Reginald Kell (1906-1981)
Emanuel Ax (1949)

and

Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959)

and from the New Music Box:
On June 8, 2002, Meet The Composer presented The Works, a 12-hour hour marathon concert of MTC commissioned music from Noon to Midnight at the Southern Theatre in Minneapolis.

Today's Birthdays

Leopold Auer (1845-1930)
George Szell (1897-1970)
Ilse Wolf (1921-1999)
Philippe Entremont (1934)
Neeme Järvi 1937)
Sir Tom Jones (1940)
Jaime Laredo (1941)
Prince (1958)
Roberto Alagna (1963)
Olli Mustonen (1967)

and

Paul Gaugin (1848-1903)
Gwendolyn Brooks (1917-2000)
Nikki Giovanni (1943)
Orham Pamuk (1952)
Louise Erdrich (1954)

and from the New Music Box:
On June 7, 1984, Arthur Weisberg conducted the New York Philharmonic in the world premiere performance of George Crumb's A Haunted Landscape. The performance was part of the Horizons Festival organized by Jacob Druckman. The festival, which featured music ranging from Charles Wuorinen to Diamanda Galas, posited that since 1968 there has been a new romanticism in music.

Today's Birthdays

Aram Khachaturian (1903-1978)
Vincent Persichetti (1915-1987)
Iain Hamilton (1922-2000)
Serge Nigg (1924)
Klaus Tennstedt (1926-1998)
Louis Andriessen (1939)

and

Pierre Corneille (1606-1684)
Alexander Pushkin (1799-1837)
Thomas Mann (1875-1955)
Maxine Kumin (1925)

Today's Birthdays

Arthur Somervell (1863-1937)
Robert Mayer (1879-1985)
Daniel Pinkham (1923-2006)
Peter Schat (1935-2003)
Anna Reynolds (1936)
Martha Argerich (1941)
Bill Hopkins (1943-1981)

and

John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946)
Federico Garcia Lorca (1898-1936)
Alfred Kazin (1915–1998)
David Hare (1947)

Today's Birthdays

Jan Peerce (1904-1984)
Valerie Masterson (1937)
Curtis Mayfield (1942-1999)
Greg Sandow (1943)
Lynne Dawson (1956)

and

Josephine Baker (1906-1975)
Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997)
Larry McMurtry (1936)

Today's Birthdays

Evgeny Mravinsky (1903-1988)
Alan Shulman (1915-2002)
Robert Merrill (1917-2004)
Irwin Bazelon (1922-1995)
Anthony Braxton (1945)
Cecilia Bartoli (1966)

and

Josef Sittard (1846-1903)
Karl Valentin (1882-1948)
Robert Anderson (1917-2009)

Chamberfest Ottawa - later this summer

I'll be reviewing concerts and reporting from Ottawa, Canada later this summer, attending Chamberfest Ottawa from July 29th through August 1st. Because I belong to the MCANA (Music Critics Association of North America), I occasionally get the chance to attend a music festival where the festival picks up the tab for airfare, hotel, and meals. Well, this is one of those wonderful opportunities. It will be my first time to Ottawa, and I am looking forward to it. I'll do most of my reporting in Oregon Music News.

Today's Birthdays

James Cutler Dunn Parker (1828-1916)
Felix Weingartner (1863-1942)
Sir Edward Elgar (1857-1934)
Jozef Cleber (1916-1999)
Marvin Hamlisch (1944)
Mark Elder (1947)
Neil Shicoff (1949)
Michel Dalberto (1955)

and

Thomas Hardy (1840-1928)

and from The New Music Box
On June 2, 1938, Amy Beach begins work on her Piano Trio while in residence at the MacDowell Colony. She finished the composition fifteen days later (June 18th) and published it as her Op. 150. It was to be her last major work.

Today's Birthdays

Georg Muffat (1653-1704)
Mikhail Glinka (1804-1857)
Werner Janssen (1899-1990)
Percy Whitlock (1903-1946)
Nelson Riddle (1921-1985)
Edo de Waart (1941)
Richard Goode (1943)
Frederica von Stade (1945)
Arlene Sierra (1970)

and

Charles Kay Ogden (1889–1957)
Naguib Surur (1932-1978)

and from the New Music Box:
On June 1, 1925, Swiss-American composer Ernest Bloch conducted the premiere of his Concerto Grosso No. 1 for strings and piano in Cleveland. That work was a pivotal composition of neo-classicism and foreshadowed subsequent concertos for orchestra written and premiered in the United States by his student Roger Sessions (Pulitzer Prize 1982) as well as Béla Bartók (1943), Elliott Carter (1970), and Steven Stucky (#1 - Pulitzer Prize Finalist 1989, and #2 - Pulitzer Prize Winner 2005).

Today's Birthdays

Louise Farrenc (1804-1875)
Billy Mayerl (1902-1959)
Alfred Deller (1912-1979)
Akira Ifukube (1914-2006)
Shirley Verrett (1931)
Peter Yarrow (1938)
Bruce Adolphe (1955)
Marty Ehrlich (1955)

and

Ludwig Tieck (1773-1853)
Walt Whitman (1819-1892)

and from the New Music Box:
On May 31, 1921, emigre composer Edgard Varèse founded the International Composer's Guild in New York City to perform and promote music by contemporary composers.

Today's Birthdays

Benny Goodman (1909-1986)
George London (1920-1985)
Gustav Leonhardt (1928)
Pauline Oliveros (1932)
Zoltan Kocsis (1952)

and from the New Music Box:
On May 30, 1923, 26-year-old composer and conductor Howard Hanson, who would later be one of the founders of the American Music Center, led the world premiere performance of his Nordic Symphony, the first of his seven symphonies and still one of his best-known works, in Rome during his residence as first holder of the American Rome Prize.

Oregon Symphony and Kalmar garner accolades from Ross in The New Yorker

Alex Ross, the classical music critic of the New Yorker magazine, has given the Oregon Symphony and its music director Carlos Kalmar the highest accolades for their performance in the Spring for Music Festival on May 12th. Ross's review appears in the June 6th edition of the magazine, and I've just read it online. Here are a couple of quotes:

"Such a realm seemed to materialize during a Spring for Music concert by the Oregon Symphony-the highlight of the festival and one of the most gripping events of the current season."

"Let's hope that future editions of Spring for Music-the festival will run at least through 2013-spread the news that North America posses dozens of excellent orchestras, and that on a good night any of them can outclass the so-called Big Five. The Oregonians proved the point by thoroughly upstaging the New York Philharmonic, which had played an unremarkable gala program at Carnegie a few nights earlier."

Today's Birthdays

Francesco Fanciulli (1853-1915)
Isaac Albéniz (1860-1909)
Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897-1957)
Iannis Xenakis (1922-2001)
Helmuth Rilling (1933)
Michael Berkeley (1948)
Linda Esther Gray (1948)
Melissa Etheridge (1961)

and

G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936)
Oswald Spengler (1880-1936)
Steven Levitt (1967)

and

from the New Music Box:
On May 29, 1954, the Louisville Orchestra, under the direction of Robert S. Whitney, premiered the Eleventh Symphony of Henry Cowell. The seven-movement work, subtitled "Seven Rituals," was one of the most successful of Cowell's 21 symphonies.

Kalmar receives high praise in Baltimore

The Baltimore Sun's classical music critic, Tim Smith, gives a glowing review of Carlos Kalmar in his recent appearance with the Baltimore Symphony. Guest soloist Karen Gomyo also received high marks for her performance of the Sibelius Violin Concerto.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

Also, just got wind of this very positive review in The Washington Post.

Today's Birthdays

Thomas Arne (1710-1788)
T-Bone Walker (1910-1975)
Nicola Rescigno (1916-2008)
György Ligeti (1923-2006)
John Culshaw (1924-1980)
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (1925)
Richard Van Allan (1935)
Maki Ishii (1936-2003)
Elena Souliotis (1943-2004)
Levon Chilingirian (1948)

and

Thomas Moore (1779-1852)
Oswald Spengler (1880-1936)
Ian Flemming (1908-1964)
May Swenson (1913-1989)

and from the New Music Box:

On May 28, 1957, after several discussions, the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences, Inc. (NARAS) was born at a meeting at Hollywood's legendary Brown Derby Restaurant.

[NARAS sponsors the Grammys.]

Martin Hebert's oboe blog

Martin Hebert, principal oboist of the Oregon Symphony, has just started a blog called A Reed a Day, it concerns the vicissitudes of being an oboe player and the quest to make the perfect reed. Welcome to the blogsphere Martin!

Kalmar in Baltimore this week

Carlos Kalmar has seemed to conduct the Baltimore Symphony at least once every season for the past several seasons. This weekend he is conducting a concert that features violinist Karen Gomyo in the Sibelius Violin Concerto. Here's the program for this weekend's concert series:

Mahler (arr. Britten) - What the Wild Flowers Tell Me
Sibelius - Violin Concerto
Walton - Symphony No. 1

Today's Birthdays

Jacques Halévy (1799-1862)
Joseph Joachim Raff (1822-1882)
Claude Champagne (1891-1965)
Ernst Wallfisch (1920-1979)
Thea Musgrave (1928)
Donald Keats (1929)
Elizabeth Harwood (1938-1990)
James Wood (1953)

and

Wild Bill Hickok (1837-1876)
Isadora Duncan (1877-1927)
Dashiell Hammett (1894-1961)
Rachel Carson (1907-1964)
John Cheever (1912-1982)
John Barth (1930)
Linda Pastan (1932)

2011 ASCAP Concert Music Awards

From the New Music Box: The 12th annual ASCAP Concert Music Awards took place on May 24, 2011 at Merkin Concert Hall in New York City. Composer, conductor and radio host Bill McGlauchlin served as the host for the invitation-only event which recognized the achievements of ASCAP's 2011 Concert Music Honorees and showcased the winners of the 2011 ASCAP Foundation Morton Gould Young Composer Awards.

The 2011 honorees are:

- Zhou Long, winner of the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Music
- George Manahan, Music Director of New York City Opera and the American Composers Orchestra
- Le Poisson Rouge - David Handler and Justin Kantor, Co-Founders
- Music Publishers Association - Lauren Keiser, President
- Face The Music - Jennifer Undercofler, Founder, Artistic Director, and Conductor

Today's Birthdays

Al Jolson (1886-1950)
Eugene Goossens (1893-1962)
Vlado Perlemuter (1904-2002)
François‑Louis Deschamps (1919-2004)
Peggy Lee (1920-2002)
Joseph Horovitz (1926)
Miles Davis (1926)
Teresa Stratas (1938)
William Bolcom (1938)
Howard Goodall (1958)
Armando Bayolo (1973)

and

Aleksandr Pushkin (1799-1837)
Dorothea Lange (1895-1965)
Alan Hollinghurst (1954)

and from the New Music Box:
On May 26, 1953, Aaron Copland appeared before the Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Today's Birthdays

Thomas "Blind Tom" Bethune (1849 - 1908)
Miles Davis (1926-1991)
Beverly Sills (1929-2007)
Franco Bonisolli (1937-2003)

and

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)
Theodore Roethke (1908-1963)
Raymond Carver (1938-1988)

and from the New Music Box:
On May 25, 1977, the American half of the Gian Carlo Menotti's "Festival of Two Worlds"—Spoleto USA—opens in Charleston, South Carolina. The Spoleto Festival Brass Quintet played at the opening ceremonies at noon that day.

Today's Birthdays

Paul Paray (1886-1979)
Joan Hammond (1912-1986)
Hans‑Martin Linde (1930)
Maurice André (1933)
Bob Dylan (1941)
Konrad Boehmer (1941)
Fiona Kimm (1952)
Paul McCreesh (1960)

and

William Trevor (1928)
Joseph Brodsky (1940-1996)
Declan Kiberd (1951)

and from the New Music Box:
On May 24, 1939, then 30-year-old composer Elliott Carter (b. 1908) had his first major performance of his music in New York. The work was the ballet Pocahontas composed in a populist style far different from the music for which Carter would later become internationally known and revered.

Today's Birthdays

Andrea Luchesi (1741-1801)
Edmund Rubbra (1901-1986)
Artie Shaw (1910-2004)
Jean Françaix (1912-1997)
Alicia de Larrocha (1923)
Robert Moog (1934-2005)
Joel Feigin (1951)

and

Jane Kenyon (1947-1995)