Gathering Note

By R.M. Campbell

If ever there were a symphony program designed to please, it was Thursday night at Benaroya Hall with the Seattle Symphony Orchestra playing Gershwin and Tchaikovsky. Predictably audiences will love it.

A third work was performed, in its Seattle premiere — Cindy McTee’s “Double Play.” Born in Tacoma and educated at Pacific Lutheran University as well as Yale University and University of Iowa, McTee will not be upsetting any apple carts with this piece, composed in two sections but played as one Thursday. It was premiered last year by the Detroit Symphony of which Leonard Slatkin, SSO guest conductor for the night, is the music director. The work is tonally appealing, well-crafted and oiled, making no attempt to be in fashion musically but also making no attempt to go backward in time and spirit. She has plenty of ideas which she has assembled into a coherent whole.
Continue reading Popular program at Benaroya

By R.M. Campbell

Yevgeny Sudin made his Seattle debut at Meany Hall two years ago. I wasn’t there but by all accounts the concert was a huge success. The Russian pianist returned Wednesday night, offering Haydn, Shostakovich, Chopin, Liszt and Ravel. It was a glorious way to end the 2010-2011 President’s Piano Series.

Although he was born in Russia — St. Petersburg — in 1980 and received his early training there, he has not been a resident since he was 10. At first, he lived in Berlin, then London since 1997, where he studied at the Royal Academy of Music. His teachers include all sorts of exalted names like Murray Perahia, Claude Frank, Leon Fleisher and Stephen Hough. Traces of their influence can be heard in his playing today.

Sudbin enjoys a formidable technique. That is an understatement. He can seemingly do anything he chooses with confidence and panache. One connoisseur Wednesday made the astute observation that he has control over everything. He considers the score, working on the details then the whole — seamless and coherent. He knows what he wants. The result is astonishing, amazing really. Unlike many of his Russian colleagues, Sudbin is not flamboyant. He is a virtuoso of the first order, but that said his bravura never seems to say, “Look at me.” Rather, it demonstrates ownership. He possesses a big tone which he can modulate at will and knows how to play softly when the need arises. His double fortes never seem forced. Sudbin likes fast tempos, and undoubtedly there were those who would object. I didn’t. They could be thrilling.
Continue reading Sudbin closes UW piano series Wednesday

By Philippa Kiraly

When Early Music Guild, Seattle Theatre Group, and Spectrum Dance Theater collaborate on a production, you know it’s going to bring in a lot of expertise in various fields and strong characters who will need to work together. When you add in Stephen Stubbs of Pacific Musicworks, Arne Zaslove, doyen of Commedia del’Arte teaching in Seattle, and Theodore Deacon, whose hallmark is enlightening, inventive theater, you get a fascinating mix. What did they come up with in their production of two early Baroque masterpieces, Orazio Vecchi’s “L’Amfiparnaso,” from 1594, and Monteverdi’s “Il Ballo delle Ingrate” from 1607?

These two works can’t really be described as opera, but in the words of the program notes, as “curious and entertaining side trips…on the way to opera.”
Continue reading A Day on the Town, A Night in Hell

By Philippa Kiraly

The concert title sounded beguiling, and the performance lived up to it. The third concert in Mostly Nordic’s annual series at the Nordic Heritage Museum featured an Icelandic flutist with music by a half dozen Icelandic composers (plus some Prokofiev, the “Mostly” part of the series name), but it also included some of that country’s history and arts development.

I hadn’t known that Western instruments found their way to Iceland only in the 19th century, with the first brass band formed as late as 1876 and a symphony orchestra in 1925, while indigenous composing only got going in the 20th century. The arts now flourish there.
Continue reading Mostly Nordic: floating in the Blue Lagoon

Reading through the reviews of Thursday’s performance of the Mother Goose Suite I am struck by how varied the reviews are.

Sumi Hahn, in the Seattle Times said:

“Ravel’s “Mother Goose” Suite was a fairy princess, draped in gossamer and haloed in radiance. The Seattle Symphony players were exquisite on this series of miniatures, playing with lucidity and utter cohesion, as tightly woven as silk. The burst of sound sparkles that concluded this reverie sounded exactly like a shower of pixie dust — if you could hear pixie dust shimmer and then fade.”

RM Campbell on this site remarked:

“Ravel’s “Mother Goose” Suite opened the evening. This is a charming bit of music, sometimes quirky, sometimes witty, sometimes touching. Mickelthwate captured all those qualities. He revealed his sensitivity to Ravel’s intentions and musical ambitions with a reading that oozed style and goodwill. With its five tales, the suite possesses immense imagination and individuality. Mickelthwate managed to establish the character of each section with accuracy and quickness and subtlety. The orchestra responded in kind.”

Melinda Bargreen heard things differently:

“The results were interesting, to say the least. The first half of the evening was plagued by ensemble problems; the opening Ravel “Mother Goose” Suite had some lovely moments, but also passages where, for example, the first and second violins were so unsynchronized that parallel thirds sounded like syncopations.”

Was the concert exquisite as Hahn states or plagues by ensemble problems?

By R.M. Campbell

With a German guest conductor and the superb violinist Leila Josefowicz as the soloist, the Seattle Symphony Orchestra was in fine fettle Thursday night at Benaroya Hall.

Alexander Mickelthwate exuded youth and energy on the podium. But he was more than that. He had insight, depth and stylistic range. Josefowicz is known in Seattle not only for her virtuosity but her musical aplomb, seamless phrases and soaring sound.

Ravel’s “Mother Goose” Suite opened the evening. This is a charming bit of music, sometimes quirky, sometimes witty, sometimes touching. Mickelthwate captured all those qualities. He revealed his sensitivity to Ravel’s intentions and musical ambitions with a reading that oozed style and goodwill. With its five tales, the suite possesses immense imagination and individuality. Mickelthwate managed to establish the character of each section with accuracy and quickness and subtlety. The orchestra responded in kind.
Continue reading Mickelthwate succeeds as last minute replacement for Maestro Wigglesworth