Alban Berg (1885-1935)

[bhodges]

Interesting trailer for new Lulu DVD starring Barbara Hannigan. Not sure about the production - hard to judge from what's shown - but she sounds terrific:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xalf_HMB2U

--Bruce

[ritter]

Interesting trailer for new Lulu DVD starring Barbara Hannigan. Not sure about the production - hard to judge from what's shown - but she sounds terrific:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xalf_HMB2U

--Bruce

Thanks for the link, Brewski!...Hannigan must be superb in the rôle, which I would think should fit her like a glove...

About the production: I haven't seen it, but I did experience a production by Warlikowski here in Madrid of Szymanowsky's King Roger; it had some isolated interesting moments, but quickly degenerated into something bizarre and downright ridiculous. As for his Lulu, friends of mine that saw it in Brussels mentioned that it was apparently inspired, of all things, on the film Black Swan by Aronofsky 

[bhodges]

Thanks for the link, Brewski!...Hannigan must be superb in the rôle, which I would think should fit her like a glove...

About the production: I haven't seen it, but I did experience a production by Warlikowski here in Madrid of Szymanowsky's King Roger; it had some isolated interesting moments, but quickly degenerated into something bizarre and downright ridiculous. As for his Lulu, friends of mine that saw it in Brussels mentioned that it was apparently inspired, of all things, on the film Black Swan by Aronofsky 

Hm...thanks...(about the production)...and well...I'm hoping for the best.   

But totally agree, there's little doubt about Hannigan - from this clip, she sounds superb. To my ears (and again, just based on this clip, and having seen her here in Ligeti and Grisey), she might end up being one of the best Lulu's around.

--Bruce

[Drasko]

Interesting trailer for new Lulu DVD starring Barbara Hannigan. Not sure about the production - hard to judge from what's shown - but she sounds terrific:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xalf_HMB2U

--Bruce

It does seem like very busy production, difficult to tell from trailer whether it works or not.

Nigel seemed undecided:
http://npw-opera-concerts.blogspot.com/2012/10/berg-lulu.html

[jlaurson]

Fresh from Forbes:



SEP 23, 2015
"Wozzeck" Opens Zurich Opera Season
With Uncommon, Resounding Success

...Had I gone to Zurich to see Falstaff (the opera next up on their program) I
would probably have experienced that disappointment. The kind of fluffy high
camp of which I got a glimpse at the dress rehearsal – even when it has Bryn
Terfel as the central character – just isn't my thing. But then again, neither is
Falstaff, really. Alban Berg's Wozzeck meanwhile is rather my thing. Easy,
perhaps, since it's one of the truly great dramatic operas written... so
embarrassingly good, it's hard to make a muck of it. Dense, gripping, and
succinct, Georg Büchner's 1837 drama conveys the nuanced struggle of its
characters across nearly two centuries with ease. As adapted by Berg in 1922
– right between Büchner and us on a timeline – it even allows for a little time-
travel by entering that time just before the outbreak of wide-spread material
prosperity and the ensuing runaway individualism...

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jenslaurson/2015/09/22/wozzeck-opens-zurich-opera-season-with-uncommon-resounding-success/

Wozzeck, Christian Gerhaher
Picture courtesy Zurich Opera, © Monika Rittershaus

[North Star]

Interesting information about Alban Berg, Helene Berg, Hanna Fuchs-Robettin, Lulu, The Lyric Suite and the Violin Concerto

http://dickstrawser.blogspot.fi/2010/05/alban-bergs-lulu-up-close-but-not-too.html

[Leo K.]

Interesting information about Alban Berg, Helene Berg, Hanna Fuchs-Robettin, Lulu, The Lyric Suite and the Violin Concerto

http://dickstrawser.blogspot.fi/2010/05/alban-bergs-lulu-up-close-but-not-too.html

Thank you North Star!

[Leo K.]

Perhaps you're right, at that, Leo:  I only warmed to the Stern/P. Serkin/Abbado recording after 'reconnecting' with the Kammerkonzert via the Zukerman/Barenboim/Boulez account of the piece.

Karl, you are right regarding the Chamber Concerto, I needed to hear a different performance and listened to the Boulez/Tetlaff/Uchida account on Decca. It brought another view of the work and wow it is endlessly fascinating. I even hear connections to Berg's Three Pieces for Orchestra here and there!

[Mirror Image]

Karl, you are right regarding the Chamber Concerto, I needed to hear a different performance and listened to the Boulez/Tetlaff/Uchida account on Decca. It brought another view of the work and wow it is endlessly fascinating. I even hear connections to Berg's Three Pieces for Orchestra here and there!

Leo, come back! I struggle a bit with the Chamber Concerto. I've heard it many time before of course, but perhaps I'm listening to the wrong performances? I have not heard the Boulez/Tetzlaff/Uchida performance, so I'll keep my eyes out for that recording (if I can get it for a decent price).

[Mirror Image]

Featured work of the week:

Lyric Suite



Berg's Lyric Suite abounds in secret messages. In purely musical terms, Berg here for the first time employs Schoenberg's 12-tone system, basing some of the third and fifth movements on rows using all 12 notes of the chromatic scale. (And in one row, Berg proudly told Schoenberg, he used not only all available notes, but all available intervals.) Also, the fourth movement carries a quotation from the Lyric Symphony of Zemlinsky, to whom the suite is dedicated. In more personal terms, the music documents the course of Berg's extramarital affair with Hanna Fuchs-Robettin. Not only do the movement titles suggest an all-too-familiar sequence (from jovial through amorous and ecstatic to gloomy and sorrowful), but Berg incorporates his and Fuchs-Robettin's initials into the melodies and ties the metronome markings to numerological associations with their names. The sixth movement's quotation of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde is a clear reference to illicit love.

The first movement, though freely atonal, lives up to its designation of Allegretto gioviale; it's a short, perky piece. Things become quieter and more intimate with the sensuous Andante amoroso, although the mood is still sometimes rather capricious, despite an elegiac interlude at its center. Intensity builds with the Allegro misterioso, which opens with nocturnal insect music, liberally employing pizzicato and other effects. This is, effectively, the work's scherzo movement, and at its center is a Trio estatico -- still keeping a fairly quick tempo, but now using mostly conventional bowing for longer-lined phrases. The scherzo music reappears, running in reverse to the movement's end.

The fourth movement, Adagio appassionato, forms the quartet's emotional center, with something tense and foreboding about much of the music's passion. A thrashing, dissonant climax gives way to a long passage of relative, but not quite settled, repose. The ensuing Presto delirando-Tenebroso alternates frantic music with quiet, dark, tense passages. The concluding Largo desolato maintains these moods at a much slower tempo, the music gradually dying away.

[Article taken from All Music Guide]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What does everyone think of this work? Any favorite performances? For me, it's absolutely mesmerizing. As I mentioned in another thread, it doesn't matter what the arrangement of the work actually is, I love them all just the same. Powerful music.

[Leo K.]

Featured work of the week:

Lyric Suite



Berg's Lyric Suite abounds in secret messages. In purely musical terms, Berg here for the first time employs Schoenberg's 12-tone system, basing some of the third and fifth movements on rows using all 12 notes of the chromatic scale. (And in one row, Berg proudly told Schoenberg, he used not only all available notes, but all available intervals.) Also, the fourth movement carries a quotation from the Lyric Symphony of Zemlinsky, to whom the suite is dedicated. In more personal terms, the music documents the course of Berg's extramarital affair with Hanna Fuchs-Robettin. Not only do the movement titles suggest an all-too-familiar sequence (from jovial through amorous and ecstatic to gloomy and sorrowful), but Berg incorporates his and Fuchs-Robettin's initials into the melodies and ties the metronome markings to numerological associations with their names. The sixth movement's quotation of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde is a clear reference to illicit love.

The first movement, though freely atonal, lives up to its designation of Allegretto gioviale; it's a short, perky piece. Things become quieter and more intimate with the sensuous Andante amoroso, although the mood is still sometimes rather capricious, despite an elegiac interlude at its center. Intensity builds with the Allegro misterioso, which opens with nocturnal insect music, liberally employing pizzicato and other effects. This is, effectively, the work's scherzo movement, and at its center is a Trio estatico -- still keeping a fairly quick tempo, but now using mostly conventional bowing for longer-lined phrases. The scherzo music reappears, running in reverse to the movement's end.

The fourth movement, Adagio appassionato, forms the quartet's emotional center, with something tense and foreboding about much of the music's passion. A thrashing, dissonant climax gives way to a long passage of relative, but not quite settled, repose. The ensuing Presto delirando-Tenebroso alternates frantic music with quiet, dark, tense passages. The concluding Largo desolato maintains these moods at a much slower tempo, the music gradually dying away.

[Article taken from All Music Guide]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What does everyone think of this work? Any favorite performances? For me, it's absolutely mesmerizing. As I mentioned in another thread, it doesn't matter what the arrangement of the work actually is, I love them all just the same. Powerful music.

Hi John, sorry for the late return greeting! I'm glad you posted about the Lyric Suite as I acquired the new Emerson Quartet recording:



I'm only at the 3rd mov. and I'm already loving it, despite some of the phrasing (in the 1st mov.) because I've been imprinted by my usual stand-by recording - the Laselle Quartet's account. All the same, this is a magnificent recording and I LOVE the sound quality!

[Mirror Image]

Hi John, sorry for the late return greeting! I'm glad you posted about the Lyric Suite as I acquired the new Emerson Quartet recording:



I'm only at the 3rd mov. and I'm already loving it, despite some of the phrasing (in the 1st mov.) because I've been imprinted by my usual stand-by recording - the Laselle Quartet's account. All the same, this is a magnificent recording and I LOVE the sound quality!

Hey, Leo! Good to hear about that Fleming/Emerson SQ recording. I have had three recent influxes of Lyric Suite performances come my way: the Schoenberg SQ, Kronos SQ (featuring Dawn Upshaw), and Ensemble Resonanz (featuring Jean-Guihen Queyras). I've got quite a bit of catching up to do!

[EigenUser]

I've really been into the Berg sonata recently and I am trying to learn some of it on piano. I unearthed some various transcriptions of the piece.

Piano solo (original): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqE5By_69OY
Full orchestra (arr. by Verbey): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whknueubbn4
String orchestra (arr. by van Klaveren): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMCCWmHrEfw
String sextet (arr. by Müller): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17uPhYnDG38
Guitar duet (arr. by Callison): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkJT6SKOCgk
Guitar solo (arr. by Dejour): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUo-Z_H9qPA
15-piece chamber ensemble (arr. by Sansó): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tggRYvx6SNg

The one for string orchestra is probably my favorite (aside from the original piano solo). It really works well.

[Scion7]

Always a very good composer.

Piano Sonata No.1  !

[vers la flamme]

Great composer, who wrote criminally too few works... I have yet to hear all of Lulu, I should probably fix that soon. Wozzeck is great, but I'm just not an opera guy. I think the best thing he ever did, probably, was the Violin Concerto "To the Memory of an Angel", though his greatest legacy is probably his contribution to the world of opera.

By the way, this is probably the greatest recording of the op.1 sonata on record:

[flash=200,200
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCICZPuJ5TM[/flash]

... though Gould's early recording is damn good too!

[Carlo Gesualdo]

Alban Berg Lyric suite for me, this is what got me into his music and Zemlinsky by the way trough Naxos excellent CD

[vers la flamme]

Alban Berg Lyric suite for me, this is what got me into his music and Zemlinsky by the way trough Naxos excellent CD

This one?

[asin] B00006GO40[/asin]

[Mirror Image]

This one?

[asin] B00006GO40[/asin]

No, this one probably:

[asin]B0020MSTJA[/asin]

[Irons]

Great composer, who wrote criminally too few works... I have yet to hear all of Lulu, I should probably fix that soon. Wozzeck is great, but I'm just not an opera guy. I think the best thing he ever did, probably, was the Violin Concerto "To the Memory of an Angel", though his greatest legacy is probably his contribution to the world of opera.

By the way, this is probably the greatest recording of the op.1 sonata on record:

[flash=200,200
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCICZPuJ5TM[/flash]

... though Gould's early recording is damn good too!

Thanks for link. Never thought of Berg in context with the Blues but oddly here I did.

[vandermolen]

Interesting trailer for new Lulu DVD starring Barbara Hannigan. Not sure about the production - hard to judge from what's shown - but she sounds terrific:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xalf_HMB2U

--Bruce

She does have a terrific voice I must say. I have seen Lulu live but it is not a work which especially appeals to me.