Contemporary Classical

Contemporary Classical

Dispatch from the Lincoln Center Festival: Into the Little Hill

Lincoln Center Festival presented last night the North American premiere of George Benjamin’s first opera, Into the Little Hill. Hill tells a version of the “Pied Piper of Hamelin” story, wherein a mysterious stranger drives the rats from an infested town with his beguiling music. When the mayor reneges on his promise to pay him, the stranger kidnaps the mayor’s little daughter. Martin Crimp’s libretto assigns all roles – the stranger, the mayor, the mayor’s wife, the little girl, the crowd, and the narration – to two singers, a soprano (Anu Komsi) and a contralto (Hilary Summers).

Benjamin and Crimp subtitle their work a “lyric tale,” a label that captures well the unusual storytelling. In that the singers switch between first and third-person points of view, and that each singer inhabits four different “roles,” Hill places considerable distance between us and the drama. If the result lacks emotional impact, the work is nonetheless fascinating and satisfyingly odd. Benjamin’s spare, clear music complements the literary high-jinks of the libretto by providing a sophisticated, cerebral setting of what is essentially an innocent fairy tale. While a certain awkwardness does emerge when the little girl sings tenderly about the rats, the apparent mismatch between style and story actually succeeds overall, because the aim of Benjamin and Crimp is less to make us sympathize with the characters on stage than to make us contemplate their fate.

Given the many complexities of the work, the 40-minute running time, though impractical from other points of view, is a smart musical decision. Hill moves steadily and never overwhelms us conceptually or musically. Midway, a haunting bass flute evokes the Piper’s music, and a cimbalom adds a magical touch to many passages throughout. Anu Komsi has about the most extraordinary high register a composer could dream of, and Hilary Summers’s stage presence is as sharp as her voice is dusky. The austere blocking and set design are of a piece with the musical and dramatic conception.

Before the opera, members of the Ensemble Modern performed Benjamin’s Viola, Viola and Three Miniatures. The viola duet of the first work anticipated the vocal duet that is Hill, and the third of the miniatures uncannily foreshadowed – in its long lines and pizzicato – the concluding passages of the opera.

Into the Little Hill receives performances again tonight and tomorrow, and, if you’re around, I’d recommend going.

by David Salvage
Classical Music, Contemporary Classical, Opera

Die Meisterbators

From today’s Deutsche Welle:

Germany’s annual Bayreuth Festival of Wagner operas began on Wednesday with a highly anticipated, make-or-break production by the 29-year-old great-granddaughter of the composer Richard Wagner.

And while the applause after the first two acts of Wagner’s only “comic” opera was friendly, the audience — which included a smorgasbord of German political and social elite — was less amused by the third and final act, which featured a few minutes of full frontal nudity, a bizarre sight of Richard Wagner dancing in his underwear and a bunch of master singers horsing around the stage with oversized penises.

by Jerry Bowles
Contemporary Classical

youtubetude

David Rakowski has gone mildly YouTube crazy over the past few months, and has videos of 29 of his 80  piano etudes.  Most of the performances are by Amy Briggs Dissanayake and Marilyn Nonken.

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His etudes are true “etudes” in the sense that each is an exploration of a specific musical idea.  “Martler,” in the above video, is an etude on hand-crossing; “Taking the Fifths” is on fifths; “Schnozzage” requires the pianist to play with her nose; “Bop It” bops; “12-Step Program” is on chromatic scales and wedges.  And they kick butt.

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(The title of this post, incidentally, is more of a Bob Ceely pun than a Davy Rakowski pun, but the latter studied with the former so I figure I can get away with it.)

by Galen H. Brown
Classical Music, Contemporary Classical

Bonfire of the Vandalists

After we arrived in New York in 1968, my first freelance gig was writing previews of upcoming art exhibitions for Arts Magazine.  For five bucks a review, I would trot around the area that is now Soho, climbing rickety, dangerous stairs to look for the next Jackson Pollock.  Lofts were illegal for living in those days so I learned a lot about fake walls and how to cleverly hide bedrooms and kitchens from prying building inspectors.   

I thought of those days this morning when I read the strange news of the lady who besmirched a bone-dry white Cy Twombly painting on exhibition in France by planting a lipstick-drenched kiss on it.  I remember meeting Twombly in his loft on the Bowery one fall day around 1970.  Twombly was not one of the illegal dwellers; he was well-known even then and living in Rome, as I recall.  I loved his work then; still do, and remember thinking to myself:  if only I had a couple of hundred bucks I bet he would sell me a little drawing.  But, alas, those were lean times and the opportunity passed. 

On the other hand, artists are incredibly generous people and I have many pieces that were given to me during this period, including works by Sol LeWitt, Jasper Johns and Arakawa.  I still regret the Twombly though.

But, I digress.  The topic of the day is music vandalism.  Any famous examples?  Any obscure examples?

by Jerry Bowles
Composers, Concerts, Contemporary Classical

Miller’s Crossing

My copy of the Miller Theater Fall and Spring schedule landed on the window sill via carrier pigeon yesterday. As always, Columbia University’s indispensible new music venue has some humdingers on tap.  The Composer Portrait series this season includes Esa-Pekka Salonen, Wolfgang Rihm, David Sanford, Gerald Barry (in the first large-scale New York exposure for the Irish composer), French spectralist Phillipe Hurel, George Crumb and Peter Lieberson.  Except for Salonen and Rihm, the composers are set for pre-concert discussions, live and in color, so to speak.  Also on the schedule for December 7, 8, 9 and 11 is the New York stage premiere of Elliott Carter’s only opera, What’s Next?

Anything exciting happening in your town this fall?  Give us a good reason to get out of bed tomorrow.

by Jerry Bowles
Chamber Music, Click Picks, Contemporary Classical

Notes from the Other Underground…

A quick addendum to my recent “click pick” visit to the Eastern Front:

My good and long-time i-friend Rudy Carrera pointed me in the direction of the young Russian composer Dmitry Subochev (b.1981), who’s posted a couple frenetically fun (and challenging) Moscow performances on video at YouTube. Cheglakov and His Shadow was made in collaboration with Subochev’s fellow composer and cellist Dmitry Cheglakov:

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As well, Subochev teams up with Tatiana Mikheeva to terrorize the inside of a piano in Pandora’s Box:

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Whether as something integral or as optional accompaniment, my very really grand prediction is that video will become ever-more essential to both performers and composers, and not just in the “big” places. Bone up now or chew the dust at the back of the pack…

by Steve Layton
Classical Music, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, Music Events, New York

The Issue is Money

Over the past couple of years, ISSUE Project Room has become one of the hot spots for contemporary music in the city and earned a well-deserved reputation for presenting new and artistically challenging work. It has outgrown its funky silo on the Gowanus Canal and has just launched a $350,000 capital campaign with the goal of expanding its programs and moving to a larger, more centrally-located home.

As often happens, though, a great opportunity has come along and the group needs to raise a bundle of cash by July 24 to take advantage of it.  ISSUE is one of two finalists for the right to move into a new, rent free space in one of the most beautiful buildings in downtown Brooklyn.  But, says founder and artistic director Suzanne Fiol, it must demonstrate the financial capability to develop the space if it is to secure the lease.

An anonymous donor has made a $25,000, one -for- two matching grant to be met by August 10, which means that for every dollar the group raises between now and then, it will get an an additional 50 cents.  It has already raised $10,000 and Fiol says her goal is to raise another $25,000 this week.

“The reason of the urgency is that we’re meeting with the property’s developers on July 24,” Fiol says. ‘It is crucial to our success that we have this money in hand in time for this meeting. Nothing could better help ISSUE in making its case to the property’s developers than to be able to walk into the meeting saying we have met the match.  Successfully closing this first phase of the campaign before the deadline will inspire large  donors, corporations and foundations.”

Here’s how to give:

To make a donation on line, go to http://www.nyfa.org and click “For Donors.” Be  sure to earmark your donation for the Issue Project Room.  To make a donation by check, make your check payable to the New York Foundation for the Arts . Write ISSUE Project Room in the memo line, and mail your check to: ISSUE Project Room 232 Third Street, Brooklyn N.Y. 11215.  ISSUE Project Room is under the fiscal sponsorship of the New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA), and all donations are tax deductible.

If you want to know more about ISSUE or have ideas about how to help, you can contact Fiol at 718-812-1129, or write to
suzanne@issueprojectroom.org.

by Jerry Bowles
CDs, Classical Music, Contemporary Classical, Orchestral, Violin

Marvin Does Hovhaness

Marvin Rosen’s Classical Discoveries program is a  special one this week involving, as it does, several members of the S21 community.  Marvin’s doing the first radio broadcast of OgreOgress’s world premiere recording of Alan Hovhaness’s Janabar, a 37-minute Sinfonia Concertante for Piano, Trumpet, Violin & Strings.  The recording features Christina Fong on violin, Paul Hersey on piano, and Michael Bowman on trumpet, with the Slovak Philharmonic, conducted by Rastislav Stur.

The piece is scheduled for Wednesday, July 18th during the 10am EST hour. The program, from Princeton, NJ, can be heard locally on 103.3 FM  or online.  Lots of details about the new recording here.

Also scheduled is the one hour Symphony No. 6, for chorus and orchestra by the Latvian composer, Imants Kalniņš in a recording produced by the Latvian National Symphony Orchestra. That piece will air beginning at around 8:00 am EST.
 
Marvin is also doing a series of special summer programs of avant-garde music titled Classical Discoveries goes Avant-Garde, which is devoted to more modern works than one normally hears on his Wednesday morning Classical Discoveries program.  Classical Discoveries Goes Avant-Garde can be heard every Friday from 11:00 am until 3:00 pm on WPRB.

by Jerry Bowles
Contemporary Classical

Happy Birthday to the Blog

Blogging as a substitute for productive behavior has just turned 10 years old, according to today’s Wall Street Journal.  To which we say a hearty “Mazeltov” and welcome into the S21 fold composer Judith Shatin who is spending a Semester at Sea and sharing her adventures with us.  We’re also delighted to welcome back Alan Thiesen, who has returned after spending a “brutal” year in post-doctoral studies. 

Our amigo Marco Antonio Mazzini reports that his Musical Marathon for clarinetists competition is closed for new entries.  You can now listen to the submissions (all different versions of a piece called Convalecencia) and vote for your favorite. Go hither and do thusly.  

The energetic Marco Antonio has just launched a new clarinet series on YouTube called Try This at Home. It’s not modern music…but nonetheless good fun.

by Jerry Bowles