Gathering Note
Notes from the concert hall
Month: October 2010
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By R.M. Campbell The Seattle Symphony Orchestra’s Visiting Orchestra Series may be somewhat diminished this season but its opening gesture Friday night at Benaroya Hall was anything but that. When Kremerata Baltica made its local debut a few years ago, it created a powerful impression for its finesse and technical acuity. Nothing has changed in…
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Michael Francis, a young British conductor who also plays double bass with the London Symphony made his debut with the Seattle Symphony Thursday night. Though he had a small orchestra at his disposal, Francis made up for it with a program that was conceptually sound, challenging for musicians, and rewarding for listeners. Francis’ rise to…
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By Gigi Yellen Muscular. Delicate. Impeccable. Polished. Quick descriptions, all, of performances that deserved a bigger audience Saturday night at Nordstrom Recital Hall, opening the third season of Seattle’s Russian Chamber Music Foundation concerts. Pianist Natalya Ageyeva, artistic director, at the keyboard for two of the three works on the program, anchored the concert with…
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The Vancouver (British Columbia) Symphony lacks the flashiness of the LA Phil or the studiousness of MTT and the SFS, but over the course of their concert Saturday the 23rd, they impressed me with unflagging technique across a program of big, demanding works which included Robert Schumann’s infrequently performed Violin Concerto and Shostakovich’s musical commentary…
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By R.M. Campbell What the Seattle Symphony Orchestra called “An Organ Celebration” Saturday night at Benaroya Hall was planned more than a year ago, in honor of the 10th anniversary of the C B. Fisk organ. The concert would feature two of city’s preeminent organists — Carole Terry and Joseph Adam — along with a…
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By Philippa Kiraly Pergolesi lived only 26 short years at the start of the 18th century. During that time he wrote two enduring masterpieces in totally different genres—the comic opera “La Serva Padrona,” and the beautiful “Stabat Mater,” commissioned by the monastery of San Luigi di Palazzo. Both have been continuously in the repertoire ever…
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Just because I can’t hear Melia Watras perform on the 25th, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t. In case you don’t know, Watras is one of Seattle’s talented crop of violists (a hard instrument to play because of its size.) She teaches at the University of Washington and is 1/4 of the Corigliano Quartet. She’s good. and…
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By Philippa Kiraly If, like me, you don’t really know where the Inca Train went, it was laid out for us at the start of this Seattle Symphony concert by guest conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya. It went north from Peru to Southern Colombia through Ecuador, and south from there through Bolivia and Chile to Northern Argentina.…
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By Philippa Kiraly Violinist Ani Kavafian, pianist Andre-Michel Schub and clarinetist David Shifrin had been friends and musicmakers together for years before they formed the Trio made up of their last names, and the communion betweeen them was clear Wednesday night at the University of Washington’s Meany Hall. Opening the UW International Chamber Music Series…
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By R.M. Campbell Hungarian pianist Andras Schiff, who opened the Seattle Symphony Distinguished Artist Series Monday night at Benaroya Hall, has always gone his own eclectic way, doing an entire program devoted to the tiny piano sonatas of Domenico Scarlatti, for instance, or Bach and Janacek, Schubert, Bartok and Mozart. For his Seattle recital, he…