The Medieval Women’s Choir presents songs of praise and peace from medieval Italy. Director Margriet Tindemans talks about the music:
Continue reading Preview: Medieval Women’s Choir Transports You to 14th Century Italy
Month: May 2009
Rajan Krishnaswami and Mark Salman talk about their upcoming Simple Measures recital
Cascade Symphony: an Edmonds secret
The Cascade Symphony is one of Edmonds’s best kept secrets. For almost 50 years – 47 to be exact – this north Puget Sound orchestra has presented orchestral concerts to the Edmonds, Shoreline, and Lynwood communities. The orchestra is led by Seattle Symphony veteran Michael Miropolsky. Since starting this blog a number of years ago, I have heard a number of community orchestras. Most of them playing perfectly acceptable concerts even if they are a little rough around the edges. What sets community orchestras apart are intangible factors that aren’t always readily visible.
During my first Cascade Symphony concert I could sense how special the orchestra is to musicians and to the north Puget Sound crowd. There were two notable events. First, the Cascade Symphony’s last concert of the year was ambushed by steady rain. The rain didn’t dissuade the crowd and a steady stream of people made their way into the Edmonds Performing Arts Center. By the time I had arrived, a full thirty minutes before the concert started, most of the floor seating was filled and the only reasonably good seats left were in the balcony. Even the balcony was filling up.
Portland Opera’s Rigoletto heightens melodrama
The combo of Mark Rucker and Sarah Colburn added an extra layer of emotion that made the Portland Opera production of Verdi’s “Rigoletto” a dynamic and satisfying experience on opening night (Friday, May 8). Rucker, in the title role as the hunch-backed jester, blustered, cried, and raged magnificently, and Colburn completely embodied his love-smitten, totally sincere daughter, Gilda.
Colburn’s beautiful soprano tone blended purity, conviction, vulnerability, and energy in intoxicating amounts. Her “Caro nome” (“Sweet name”) aria at the end of the first act was riveting. Another highlight came at the very end of the opera when the ethereal father/daughter duet “Ah, ch’io taccia! (“Let me be silent!”) took the audience to new heights before plunging it into darkness with the death of Gilda in the arms of a utterly devastated Rigoletto.
Continue reading Portland Opera’s Rigoletto heightens melodrama
Online classical store gets a reboot
The Wall Street Journal reports Classical Archives, a site devoted exclusively to selling classical music downloads, is launching with a new look and better functionality. As a fan of classical downloads, I am always put off by the cumbersome search mechanisms iTunes and others use.
I am not sure Classical Archive’s has done any better. I am a label snob, and there doesn’t seem to be a way to search for composers and works on a particular label. The menu system is a little antiquated feeling and the “advanced search” isn’t all that advanced with the limited number of fields it makes available.
In the side bar of the article, there is a quote from an Arkiv Music representative which made me perk up. Before Arkiv lauched a download service they believed that classical music fans would never download music. Turns out, they will!.
Until recently the company hadn’t sold downloads, believing classical fans would stay loyal to CDs. However, when ArkivMusic recently began a trial offer of some releases in digital form, downloads accounted for about 20% of sales. “I was surprised by that number, surprised enough to put more effort into it,” says ArkivMusic president Eric Feidner.
Mendelssohn’s “Elijah” is high drama
We don’t hear Mendelssohn’s “Elijah” that often, more’s the pity, but listening to Seattle Pro Musica’s performance of it at St. James Friday night, the reason is clear. It’s a great work, but it’s an expansive work which takes a first class choir and two and a half hours. It’s too long for a regular symphony performance, and needs a big chorus, at least a full chamber orchestra, four soloists and several first rate solo choir members. It also needs a dynamic conductor to make the most of Mendelssohn’s dramatic score.
Luckily for us, Seattle Pro Musica fills the bill. Conductor Karen P. Thomas has the kind of sweeping vision to see the work as a whole and that it is, as the Handel oratorios are, an unstaged opera.
AmaTzigane!
I understand why someone might be afraid to take a chance on the current run of Seattle Symphony concerts. The program is eclectic and unfamiliar. Even if people are put off by the unfamiliar pieces on the program, they certainly would embrace the performances — especially the solo performances in the first half — which on Thursday night can only be described as amatzigane.
Composer John Paul talks about writing new music for rediscovered silent film
Composer John Paul, who heads the music department at Marylhurst University, has written a score for the silent film “City Girl,” which will be shown at the Oregon Sesquicentennial Film Festival. The festival will show 10 films in ten days and ” John Paul’s score will accompany “City Girl” at 7 pm on May 8 at the James Ivory Theater, Villa Maria, on the campus of Marylhurst University. Tickets are $10.
I talked with John Paul a couple of weeks ago about this intriguing project.
Continue reading Composer John Paul talks about writing new music for rediscovered silent film
Off the shelf
David Zinman, Zurich Tonhalle Orchestra; Gustav Mahler Symphony No. 5 (RCA) ***
The current release in the Tonhalle’s Mahler cycle is curious. On the one hand, it is a no-nonsense performance of perhaps Mahler’s most popular symphony. There is tension and drama but its not overdone. The SACD recording quality is splendid. But, on the other hand, the disc lacks the punch of other recordings of this symphony. When I first heard this disc, I didn’t like it at all. Then again, I was comparing it to my preferred recording by John Barbirolli who takes an expansive, romantic approach to the piece. After repeated hearings, the transparency, and fluid sound of the orchestra grew on me. This recording is easily better than the recent release of the same symphony by Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony and it is a recording Mahler fans will want to hear even if it ultimately won’t rank as one of the best.
Is “Figaro” the perfect opera?
In his informative essay, Speight Jenkins calls “The Marriage of Figaro” “the perfect opera…The opera has, in six of its eight arias, as famous solo pieces as exist as well as many brilliant ensembles. Its story is involving but can be understood, and the music unfailingly illuminates and expands the text.” While the perfection of Mozart’s design for “Figaro” can be debated, the second cast line up assembled for the Seattle Opera’s current performance of “The Marriage of Figaro” is up to the task of breathing life into this “perfect opera.”
Gathering Note 