Classical Music

A group of artists who call themselves the Frankfurter Hauptschule is distributing 50,000 counterfeit tickets to the opening night of Bayreuth.  They say they are protesting the German media’s tone-down of Wagner’s anti-Semitism during this year’s anniversary. The tickets contain a web address that notes the tickets are counterfeit, but that Wagner’s anti-Semitism is not. More hier.

Use this picture for referenceUpper Left I wanted the same idea as the original, but instead use music notes for the sun. Didn’t turn out as I hoped. Upper Right Getting closer, but the sun looks more like a Portal without the horizon. Middle Left I didn’t want the horizon, mainly because orchestra hands sitting on s horizon seemed weird to me. So I made the sun smaller, but still didn’t like it. Middle Right I added the horizon, but hated the “For Orchestra” font style. The sun also looked too “razor-y” to me. Bottom Picture Final Version. This pushed the limits of my graphic design skills. I made the sun’s edges smoother, lots of layers, added warmer colors, gaussian blurred the background, added some lighting effects, layer styles, and improved the gradients. Thrilled how it turned out, and learned a lot of tricks for my next cover art! Font: Daft Font by MatreroG

That’s what it says in the press release: CHICAGO—Austrian pianist Rudolf Buchbinder will replace Leif Ove Andsnes as soloist with Music Director Riccardo Muti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on Thursday and Saturday, June 13 and 15 at 8 p.m.; Friday, June 14 at 1:30 p.m.; and Tuesday, June 18 at 7:30 p.m.  Andsnes’ newborn [...]

Wednesday night I heard the San Francisco Symphony's buoyant concert featuring pianist Marc-André Hamelin in Ravel's Concerto for Left Hand & Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue. I joined friends in the center terrace, where I'd never sat before. For me there was too much sound, & the orchestral balances were of course backwards, but I felt like part of the orchestra, & it was fun to watch the conductor. Maestro David Robertson looked happy & smiled a lot, & he was always well ahead of the orchestra.The program opened with Variations for Orchestra by Elliott Carter. The music is complex, & I could not tell where the different variations began & ended. The orchestra's sections often play in opposition to one another, & there are a lot of solos. Maestro Robertson made the piece feel connected & gave it a gradually building momentum. Mr. Hamelin was a well-mannered soloist. His bass chords in the Ravel concerto were big & resonant. He sounded elegant in the Rhapsody in Blue after intermission. The opening clarinet solo was smooth, & I liked the jibing trumpet solos. The audience applauded Mr. Hamelin & the soloists appreciatively. The orchestra played cleanly all evening, & the program ended with a nicely flowing performance of Ravel's La Valse, which Maestro Robertson led without a score. The audience responded enthusiastically.A women in our row ended her cellphone call just as the Ravel concerto started, & then her phone rang during the piece. A cellphone in the side terrace rang as well. My concert companion noticed Lisa Hirsch scurrying along the edge of the stage right before the second half, apparently trying to peek at the cellists' music.§ Robertson Leads Ravel And GershwinSan Francisco Symphony David Robertson, conductorMarc-André Hamelin, pianoElliott CarterVariations for OrchestraRavelPiano Concerto in D major for the Left HandGershwinRhapsody in BlueWed, May 22, 2013 at 8:00pmDavies Symphony Hall

When [name here] took over Golcheski Manor this weekend, she practiced oboe, made reeds, watched RHOA all day & forgot to feed a cat. #oops

Carol Brice (1918-1985) Hazel Singer tells us of the career of Carol Brice (1918-1985), who is profiled at BlackPast.org: Contralto singer Carol Brice was born in Sedalia, North Carolina on April 16, 1918 into a musical family. Eventually she became one of the first African American classical singers with an extensive recording repertoire. Brice trained at Palmer Memorial Institute in Sedalia and then enrolled in Talladega College in Alabama, where she received her Bachelor of Music degree in 1939. She later attended Julliard School of Music between 1939 and 1943 where she trained with Francis Rogers. In 1943 Brice became the first African American musician to win the prestigious Walter W. Naumburg Foundation Award. Carol Brice first attracted public acclaim at the New York World’s Fair in 1939 when she performed in the opera, “The Hot Mikado.” Her next major public performance came in 1941, when she sang at a Washington concert honoring the third inauguration of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Her brother, the pianist Jonathan Brice, was frequently her accompanist at concerts and competitions.

Modest to a fault, the outgoing president of the S.F. Conservatory of Music has much to crow about, having led the Conservatory to a new facility, international prominence, and an inspired focus on music education.

The Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris, having celebrated its 100th anniversary this year, has announced a very attractive season for 2013/14. Staged operas include Spontini's La Vestale, Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmelites and Rossini's Otello, Tancredi and Il Barbiere di Siviglia, plus two further Rossini operas in concert as well as concert performances of opera and oratorio by Bellini, Handel, Donizetti, Vivaldi, Strauss and Beethoven. All complemented by a programme of orchestral and chamber music concerts. La Vestale (15 -28 October) gives us a rare chance to hear Spontini's 1807 in its original French. Spontini's neoclassical style was an important influence on Berlioz. Ermonela Jaho plays the vestal virgin of the title role, Julia, with Andrew Richards as her lover Licinius, and Béatrice Uria-Monzon as La Grande Vestale. Eric Lascade directs and Jérémie Rohrer conducts his own ensemble, Le Cercle de l'Harmonie (see my review of their recent recording of Cherubini's Lodoiska). Gaspare Spontini Another great treat follows in December. Dialogues des Carmelites (10 - 21 December 2013) allows us to hear Poulenc's 1957 opera performed by a very cast which is strongly Francophone: Sophie Koch is Mère Marie, Patricia Petibon is Blanche, Véronique Gens (see my review of her recent recital of French song) is Madame Lidoine, Sandrine Piau is Soeur Constance, Rosalind Plowright is Madame de Croissy, Topi Lehtipuu is Le Chevalier de La Force and Philippe Rouillon is Le Marquis de La Force. Again Jérémie horer conducts, this time the Philharmonia Orchestra, with Olivier Py as director. It is a co-production with Théâtre de la Monnaie, Brussels. The season of staged operas is completed with three by Rossini. Otello (7 - 17 April 2014) with another strong cast, John Osborn as Otello, Edgardo Rocha as Rodrigo and Barry Banks as Iago, but perhaps the greatest interest will be Cecilia Bartoli as Desdemona. Jean-Christophe Spinosi conducts the Ensemble Matheus; Moshe Leiser and Patrice Caurier direct so expect something stylish and perhaps set in the 1950's. It is a co-production with Zurich Opera. Il Barbiere di Siviglia (28, 29 April) has Jean-Claude Malgoire conducting his ensemble, La Grande Ecurie et la Chambre du Roy; Christian Schiaretti and Arnaud Décarsin direct. It is a co-production with Malgoire's Atelier Lyrique de Tourcoing. Finally Tancredi (19 - 27 May), with Marie-Nicole Lemieux in the title role, Patrizia Ciofi as Amenaide, Antonino Siragusa as Argirio (see my review of his recent Rosenblatt Recital) and Sarah Tynan as Roggiero. Enrique Mazzola conducts and Jacques Osinski directs. The performance will be recorded by France Musque. Gioachino Rossini, photographed by Étienne Carjat, 1865 The three staged Rossini operas are complemented by two in concert. L'Italiana in Algeri (10 June 2014) conducted by Sir Roger Norrington with Marie-Nicole Lemieux and Antonino Siragusa; La Scala di Seta (13 June 2014) with Enrique Mazzola conducting and Désirée Rancatore as Giulia Other Opera in concert includes Wagner's Der fliegende Hollander (18 September 2013) with Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducting, Evgeny Nikitin in the title role and Emma Vetter as Senta; Bellini's Norma (15 Novembe 2013) with Carmen Gianattasio in the title role, Sonia Ganassi as Adalgisa and Massimo Giordano as Pollione; Evelino Pido conducts the orchestra of Opera de Lyon; Donizetti's La Favorite returns in concert this time (18 December 2013) with Daniela Barcelona in the title role and Juan-Diego Florez as Fernando, but this time in the 1840 version in Italian, conducted by Jacques Lacombe (see my review of the theatre's recent production of the French version with Alice Coote); Vivaldi's Catone in Utica (10 January 2014) is performed by Alan Curtis and his Il Complesso Barocco with Topi Lehtipuu, Sonia Prina and Ann Hallenberg; Harry Bickett conducts the English Concert in Handel's Theodora (10 February 2014) with Rosemary Jos

Anybody who has read Lewis Crofts' wonderfully imaginative 2008 novel The Pornographer of Vienna will have gleaned a vivid picture of the early life of Egon Schiele. From conception in Trieste, through his early years on the station at Tulln an der Donau, to the trials and tribulations of Vienna (and his eventual death from Spanish flu), Crofts provided essential insight. Although many of the later pictures that accompany that life are readily available, Egon Schiele: The Beginning, now published by Hirmer to coincide with an exhibition in Tulln, opens up the early chapters, offering an intriguing glimpse into the young Schiele's mind.As with any artist's juvenilia, there are the stock life studies and sketches, which don't necessarily associate with later flair and character. Yet the engorged fruit figured in Melonen of 1905 certainly betray the intense scrutiny we know from Schiele's more famous work. And throughout these early pictures, largely undertaken while he was studying at the Gymnasium in Klosterneuburg, there is a rigorous focus.The reproduction of a sketchbook from 1906 offers its own journal of the times: the arrival of a steam train, the face of a first love, the bucolic slowness of Niederösterreich and the new shadowy presence of the motor car. Even within the academy sketches, some generic but well-formed, there are seated and standing male nudes from 1908 which have striking linear intensity. By then, at the age of 18, Schiele was clearly flying. Boats in the Harbour (Trieste), Sonnenblume I and Mutter mit Kind (Madonna) are yet more unfamiliar works made familiar by their characteristically searching quality.These images, telling of a character from Radetsky March stock who changed the very way we view our bodies, are accompanied by a lavishly illustrated bilingual biography by Christian Bauer. Replete with family shots, the plans for the Tulln railway station, the artist's library inventory (written in a railway cargo book) and love letters, this volume is not so much an exhibition catalogue as it is an essential (and previously wanting) chapter in the life of a truly insightful artist. Click here to order a copy.

The Lufthansa Festival of Baroque Music 2013 has just finished (see my review of the opening concert), and it has been confirmed that we can look forward to great celebrations in 2014. Next year will be the 30th anniversary of the festival, which was founded in 1984 by conductor Ivor Bolton and musicologist Tess Knighton. The 2014 festival will be celebrating other anniversaries too; the 300th anniversary of King George I's ascension to the British throne, reflecting a major period in German and British cultural history. Also the 300th anniversary of the birth of C.P.E. Bach as well as 300 years since the foundation stone of St. John's Smith Square was laid. St. John's has been the home of the festival since 1988 and was designed by Thomas Archer (1688 - 1743); it was one of a planned 50 new churches for London and Westminster funded by a tax on coal imports in 1711. The full festival programme will be announced in November 2013, further information from the festival website.