In no particular order, the top ten concerts of 2009 — according to me.
Month: December 2009
Are SSO contract negotiations a canary in the coal mine?
Is the Seattle Symphony heading toward a civic calamity?
The changing economics of the arts industry has left many orchestras on the brink of catastrophe. The Philadelphia Orchestra is the highest profile example. A large deficit, no permanent music director, and general disdain for the musicians is jeopardizing the future of this Big Five orchestra. Other orchestras are suffering too. The future of the Everett Symphony is uncertain, while the Bellevue Philharmonic is still on shaky ground after a leadership brawl last year. And not long ago, the Columbus Symphony, the professional orchestra for Ohio’s largest city, disappeared entirely for a period of time.
Continue reading Are SSO contract negotiations a canary in the coal mine?
A Choral Arts Christmas
On Saturday, December 19th, Choral Arts gave a wonderful Christmas Concert at the Trinity Parish Church in Seattle. Led by Robert Bode, and accompanied by Libby Watrous, the Choral Arts choir sang Christmas songs and carols from multiple cultures. The concert was divided up into four parts: Seeking Sanctuary, Inviting Mystery, Mother and Child, and Love Came Down. Every piece had its strong points, and among the many wonderful carols that were sung, I was very impressed with three in particular.
When the Choral Arts choir sang The Road Home from “Southern Harmony”
, arranged by Stephen Paulus, I was engulfed in the story of the song. I believed them as they sang. The sincerity that they sung with cannot be taught. In order to be that believable when you’re performing you have to perform with true intention, from a meaningful place deep inside yourself that can only be sung out in song. The vocalises before each stanza were especially poignant. The arrangement was also beautiful. The traditional treatment of the harmonies complimented the choir’s timbre. There were no individuals, only the choir as a whole. And, with the delicate pronunciation of the words, the audience wasn’t hit over the head with syllabic singing.
My favorite German piece of the program was Komm, Heil’ger Geist
by Georg Schumann. The intent behind the singing was also wonderful in this piece. That sincerity coupled with the effectiveness of their dynamic contrast and the modulation in the middle of the piece heightened the auditory response and made the performance even more powerful. Right before the modulation the sopranos were singing in octaves with the altos and the effect was heavenly. The sopranos were able to sit on top of the harmony without overpowering the choir, while enhancing the harmonics of the chord. It was an excellent way to lead the audience into the dramatic key change.
Venez, Mes Enfants
, arranged by Donald Patriquin, was also wonderful. The carol itself is very playful and light, and the mood created by the choir with their bubbling voices and delicate pronunciation emulated the phrase, “C’est La Vie.” The call and response section between the men and the women was especially enjoyable. The Choral Arts women had a strong core sound that resonated into the highest arches of the church and the men’s voices were just as powerful. My favorite part of the piece was the ending. The coordinated release at the end of the last verse was breathtaking. It made the silence following the piece all the more deafening. Overall, the performance was fantastic and I would highly recommend seeing them when they come back to Seattle. Their next concert is going to be at St. James Cathedral on Saturday, March 20th at 8PM.
Peter and the Wolf and Saint-Saens’s Christmas Oratorio: an unusual holiday pairing
Adding to the odd mix of pieces, the youthful Christmas Oratorio by Saint-Saens welcomed a leaner audience (many of the families with young children left) after the intermission. Saint-Saens music is remembered and enjoyed because it tends toward the beautiful as opposed to the innovative – not that innovative has to be ugly.
Saint-Saens, at the ripe age of twenty three, wrote the Christmas Oratorio in eleven days. The work’s placid harmonies and swooping melodies radiated from the orchestra and the chamber singers. Solos for soprano (Linda Tsatsanis), mezzo-soprano (Melissa Plagemann), alto (Tessa Studebaker), tenor (Stephen Wall) and bass (Brian Box) were delightfully shaped by the afternoon’s soloists.
I am confident that no other orchestra, choral ensemble, or chamber group performing a holiday concert this year featured a program of Prokofiev, Bozza/Kechley, or Saint-Saens. Like oil and water, these composers and the piece’s chosen for Orchestra Seattle’s holiday concert, don’t mix. This is precisely what Shangrow wants and what OSSCS observers expect. Days after the concert, I am still not sure how I feel about the collective impact of the choices. Making sense of it all, trying to deduce a purpose for the program has been maddening. Making sense of a concert, however, isn’t as important when you have a community orchestra that plays and a chorus that sings as well as OSSCS.
Happy (belated) birthday Beethoven
The piece still retained the geniality of the first half’s Serenade and Quintet. Like Bryant, Yablonsky was an assured leader. The Septet is sometimes lead by a conductor, for this performance the musicians turned to Yablonsky for their cues. Yablonsky was also at home in the piece’s violin solos, equaling the vim and vigor of the work. She was helped by balanced, soft edged playing from the winds and horn. DiLorenzo’s playing maintained the same stylishness and plush tone from the beginning of the concert to the end.
With this early Beethoven concert behind them, the SSO will turn its attention to the pinnacle of the composer’s late period – the Ninth Symphony. The annual, end of year performances, of the Ninth attracts large, adoring audiences. On purely musical terms, the Ninth is a stark counterpoint to the smiling air of his early chamber music. The story of Beethoven’s compositional life began with pieces like the Septet and Serenade, but ends, later in the month, with the still unsurpassed Ninth.
In Memorium: Perry Lorenzo
There is no easy way to break this sad news. I will let the the Seattle Opera’s press release speak for itself:
Seattle—Seattle Opera’s General Director Speight Jenkins announced today that Perry Lorenzo, an internationally acclaimed speaker on opera and for almost twenty years Director of Education at Seattle Opera, passed away on December 19. He fought a valiant fight against lung cancer for the past seven months. He was 51.
Dedicated to introducing everyone to opera, Lorenzo lectured widely both here and abroad. He took a fledgling Education program at Seattle Opera and expanded it exponentially, drawing to him a devoted core of speakers and discussing opera in many forums. He worked with students in many communities all over the state as well as in the Seattle area. At Woodinville High School, for example, he was well known as the “Opera Guy.”
Messiah Returns to Benaroya Hall
By R.M. Campbell
The performance of the “Messiah” during the Christmas season is one of the oldest, if not the oldest, traditions of the Seattle Symphony Orchestra. There is nothing unusual in this commitment to Handel’s oratorio. It is a work of pure, seemingly inexhaustible, genius. Although the work was intended as a vehicle to celebrate Easter, it works very well during the holiday season. Moreover, it sells tickets. This weekend the symphony presented five performances at Benaroya Hall. The symphony’s attachment to the “Messiah” is not singular. All sorts of ensembles, if they can muster a small orchestra and chorus and a quartet of vocal soloists, present the piece in some form or another.
Questioning the conductors: Gary Thor Wedow
Gary Thor Wedow sat down with TGN to talk about his run of Messiah performances with the Seattle Symphony this weekend. Wedow is an active early music and opera conductor whose reputation continues to grow. He has conducted both the Seattle Symphony and the Seattle Opera in recent years. This past fall, Wedow led the New York City Opera in a new production of Mozart’s Don Giovanni, which by all accounts, was a bloody, sexualized, and well received production. For those who may not know, the New York City Opera went dark for a year and a half after financial difficulties, leadership turmoil, and eventually a complete renovation of Koch Theater. I confessed to Wedow that if I lived in New York, I would probably prefer the edgier performances and pluckier attitude of City Opera to the neighboring Metropolitan Opera.
Wedow impressed me with his breadth of knowledge and enthusiasm for the Messiah but also for new and contemporary music – an area most might not immediately associate with Wedow. We talked for more than twenty minutes on camera, and at least twenty minutes off camera, slowly shuffling toward Benaroya Hall’s artist’s entrance. It was one of those walking conversations where there is more conversation than actual walking. Just before leaving the hall, I told Wedow how much I appreciate and how much I learn about music when I interview conductors, composers, musicians, and that I have met so many interesting people that I would want to invite them all to dinner. Hyperbole? Perhaps. In Wedow’s case, I might just try to wrangle a dinner out of him next time I am in New York or he is in Seattle.
Alan Gilbert and New York Phil make CONTACT!
By Gigi Yellen
Writing from New York, where an exemplary innovation in music programming launched tonight in a hall you might know as the home of that radio show “Selected Shorts.” The Peter Norton Symphony Space holds about 750 people; looked like at least 600 came out for the launch of “Contact!” a new-music series conceived by New York Philharmonic Music Director Alan Gilbert and curated by the Philharmonic’s composer-in-residence, Magnus Lindberg.
The composers Arlene Sierra, Lei Liang, Marc-André Dalbavie and Arthur Kampela received the commissions for this first pair of concerts in the series. (The concert repeats Dec. 20 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.) Dressed in casual black like the musicians (and all but one of the composers—hang on), Lindberg addressed the audience, introducing each piece by doing a short interview with its composer: a couple of hand-held microphones, a couple of stools stage left, a couple of comfortable minutes.
Continue reading Alan Gilbert and New York Phil make CONTACT!
Gathering Note 