What concerts are you looking forward to? (Part II)

[Cosi bel do]

December 4, Salle Pleyel (Paris)
Orchestre de Paris
Riccardo Chailly
Martha Argerich
     
Felix Mendelssohn
    Ruy Blas Overture

Robert Schumann
    Piano Concerto

-------

Sergei Rachmaninov
    Symphony no. 1

Of course, you always expect a great moment when going to hear Martha Argerich. I had never seen her live in Schumann's concerto (her recording with Harnoncourt has been among my very favourites for a long time). And it was, I think, the best performance of her I have attended... Tremendous power, freedom, tension (and Chailly was the man to patch things up when the lady decided for the most abrupt changes in tempo), and an irresistible sens of style and of rythmic exuberance... Everything I could think after this fascinating performance was that only an artist in his (her) prime or in his late years can be so carefree and audacious. A very unique performance, not all perfect but exhilarating.

But this was not all. Frankly, I've never liked the Orchestre de Paris, even if I had already heard better things in the recent seasons, since Paavo Järvi became its musical director (Shostakovich concerts with Rozhdestvensky, for instance). But tonight was a true great orchestral performance. Except slight (mostly unavoidable) mishaps in the concerto, it was an almost perfect orchestral night. The Mendelssohn was precise, full, flowing with dramatic intensity. And the Rachmaninov symphony was so good I wished (vainly, apparently) it was recorded. I don't know who should be thanked first, Järvi for his long term work, or Chailly for his efficient principles (efficient tonight anyway, I didn't think the same thing AT ALL the last time I heard the Gewandhaus Orchestra). So, the symphony was really a magnificent moment of instrumental precision, detail, dynamic range, with a quality of sound (and even of silence) I hadn't heard from a French orchestra for a very long time (even with the Orchestre philharmonique de Radio France). Or maybe ever. This is the first concert of the Orchestre de Paris I really, completely liked, the first that was at the level of the orchestra one could hear on old records under Martinon or Barenboim !

This was also probably the last concert I'll attend in Pleyel. The Philharmonie de Paris opens in little more than a month, and this very dear (and superb) venue will close for an unknown time. And if this spectacular improvement in the quality of the Orchestre de Paris continues, then maybe one of the many challenges associated with this new concert hall will be a success... I haven't planned another Orchestre de Paris concert this season, I might change that...

[Cosi bel do]

A recording is available on the BBC Radio3 website here (click on the picture to start the iPlayer).  I am not sure if there may be licence issues which restrict access outside the UK, I guess the only way to find out is try it.

All three pieces were performed very well.  I hadn't heard the Rott in concert before, but I thought this compared favourably with the recordings that I have.  Only disappointment was to see the hall once again only half full.  Don't know what has got into London audiences lately.  The city seems packed with people, but wherever they're going, it's not to classical concerts, apparently.  The premiere of Shchedrin's new opera last month was even more poorly attended.  You could see the orchestra on that occasion (the Mariinsky) looking around all the empty spaces, as if thinking "We came all this way, for this?? "

It does work and I was even able to download the stream I'll listen to that soon, I hope anyway...

This issue with attendance is a European problem I think. You can't get a 7 years crisis without a few consequences...

[Cosi bel do]

Isn't there a thread for concert announcements ?

[SurprisedByBeauty]

Isn't there a thread for concert announcements ?

Is there? (In any case, I *am* looking forward to those concerts.    )

[Cosi bel do]

It seems to me you're advertising for these concerts more than anything.

Here is the concert announcements section : http://www.good-music-guide.com/community/index.php/board,18.0.html

[SurprisedByBeauty]

It seems to me you're advertising for these concerts more than anything.

Here is the concert announcements section : http://www.good-music-guide.com/community/index.php/board,18.0.html

Fair enough... that's not a perception I would want to feed, even if that wasn't quite my intent. Thanks for the link... where I've opened a preview section for anything of interest that happens in Vienna, should anyone wish to visit it or contribute. (Musikverein isn't half shabby, either, and there's an opera company or two or three in town, I hear. And and and. Not to forget the fabulous Theater an der Wien.

[Cosi bel do]

Fair enough... that's not a perception I would want to feed, even if that wasn't quite my intent. Thanks for the link... where I've opened a preview section for anything of interest that happens in Vienna, should anyone wish to visit it or contribute. (Musikverein isn't half shabby, either, and there's an opera company or two or three in town, I hear. And and and. Not to forget the fabulous Theater an der Wien.

That's a brilliant idea, it's sometimes hard to follow all that happens in Vienna !

[bhodges]

This week, two fascinating piano recitals at Carnegie - just two days apart:

Tuesday 9 December
Daniil Trifonov, Piano

BACH Fantasy and Fugue for Organ in G Minor, BWV 542 (trans. for piano by Franz Liszt, S. 463)
BEETHOVEN Piano Sonata No. 32 in C Minor, Op. 111
LISZT Transcendental Etudes, S. 139

Thursday 11 December
Yuja Wang, Piano

SCHUBERT / LISZT "Liebesbotschaft" from Schwanengesang, D. 957 / S. 560
SCHUBERT / LISZT "Aufenthalt" from Schwanengesang, D. 957 / S. 560
SCHUBERT / LISZT "Der Müller und der Bach" from Die schöne Müllerin, D. 795 / S. 565
SCHUBERT Piano Sonata in A Major, D. 959
SCRIABIN Prelude for the Left Hand, Op. 9, No. 1
SCRIABIN Prelude in F-sharp Minor, Op. 11, No. 8
SCRIABIN Fantasy in B Minor, Op. 28
SCRIABIN Prelude in B-flat Minor, Op. 37, No. 1
SCRIABIN Two Poems, Op. 63
SCRIABIN Piano Sonata No. 9, Op. 68, "Black Mass"
BALAKIREV Islamey

I have now heard Wang perhaps 4 or 5 times - mostly very impressive - but this will be my first encounter with Trifonov.

--Bruce

[EigenUser]

This week, two fascinating piano recitals at Carnegie - just two days apart:

Tuesday 9 December
Daniil Trifonov, Piano

BACH Fantasy and Fugue for Organ in G Minor, BWV 542 (trans. for piano by Franz Liszt, S. 463)
BEETHOVEN Piano Sonata No. 32 in C Minor, Op. 111
LISZT Transcendental Etudes, S. 139

Thursday 11 December
Yuja Wang, Piano

SCHUBERT / LISZT "Liebesbotschaft" from Schwanengesang, D. 957 / S. 560
SCHUBERT / LISZT "Aufenthalt" from Schwanengesang, D. 957 / S. 560
SCHUBERT / LISZT "Der Müller und der Bach" from Die schöne Müllerin, D. 795 / S. 565
SCHUBERT Piano Sonata in A Major, D. 959
SCRIABIN Prelude for the Left Hand, Op. 9, No. 1
SCRIABIN Prelude in F-sharp Minor, Op. 11, No. 8
SCRIABIN Fantasy in B Minor, Op. 28
SCRIABIN Prelude in B-flat Minor, Op. 37, No. 1
SCRIABIN Two Poems, Op. 63
SCRIABIN Piano Sonata No. 9, Op. 68, "Black Mass"
BALAKIREV Islamey

I have now heard Wang perhaps 4 or 5 times - mostly very impressive - but this will be my first encounter with Trifonov.

--Bruce

I just saw Wang play the Ravel (two-handed) PC with the Chinese NCPA orchestra last month in Philadelphia. Not only was she outstanding, but the orchestra was amazing.

[Jaakko Keskinen]

Going to Nutcracker performance today. Wish me luck.

I like listening to ballets but unlike with opera, watching ballet usually makes me bored.

[ritter]

Baritone Christian Gerhaher and pianist Gerold Huber are presenting an all-Mahler program in Madrid's Teatro de la Zarzuela on Sunday Dec. 21. They'll perform the Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, a selection from Des Knaben Wunderhorn, and the Rückert-Lieder...

[ritter]

Baritone Christian Gerhaher and pianist Gerold Huber are presenting an all-Mahler program in Madrid's Teatro de la Zarzuela on Sunday Dec. 21. They'll perform the Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, a selection from Des Knaben Wunderhorn, and the Rückert-Lieder...

I'm just back home from Gerhaher's all-Mahler recital, and it was extraordinary!!!  At the intermission, they announced through the PA system that instead of the Rückerts, Gerhaher would perform the Kindertotenlieder...This was a bit of a letdown, initially (I'm very partial to Ich bin der Welt...) but, boy, was I mistaken...Gerhaher's Kindertotenlieder were superb, and the highlight of a great concert (as was his only encore, a very poignant Urlicht)... this man is a lieder singer of the highest calibre... (and Gerold Huber on the piano was a first-rate accompanist)...

[kishnevi]

I'm just back home from Gerhaher's all-Mahler recital, and it was extraordinary!!!  At the intermission, they announced through the PA system that instead of the Rückerts, Gerhaher would perform the Kindertotenlieder...This was a bit of a letdown, initially (I'm very partial to Ich bin der Welt...) but, boy, was I mistaken...Gerhaher's Kindertotenlieder were superb, and the highlight of a great concert (as was his only encore, a very poignant Urlicht)... this man is a lieder singer of the highest calibre... (and Gerold Huber on the piano was a first-rate accompanist)...

I expected little less. Do you have his Mahler CDs? Spread out between Arte Nova and Sony; do not know what part of it is in the Gerhaher box set.

The only recording of his that left me unenthused was his Wolf CD, and I think tge composer may be at fault there.

[Brian]

I have a Gerhaher Schumann album and it is stunning. My father and I had tickets to see him do "Des Knaben Wunderhorn" with the London Philharmonic and Vladimir Jurowski in 2011, but unfortunately he fell ill and was replaced by the perfectly-fine Hanno Müller-Brachmann.

[Archaic Torso of Apollo]

Man, I hope I can make it to this one. January 25, and it's a bit of a trek down to Hyde Park:

University of Chicago Presents
Pacifica Quartet
Puccini: Crisantemi
Carter: Quartet No.1
Beethoven: Quartet Op. 59 No. 1 ("Razumovsky")

[Obradovic]

21 JAN, Athens Megaron

RICHARD WAGNER: Tristan und Isolde (from the Greek National Opera)

Worried about my persistent coughing...

[Fagotterdämmerung]

  I wound up getting tickets to the local new music festival:

  http://www.vancouversymphony.ca/festivals/14NMF/

  Some composers I like, some I don't, some I'm curious about, some I know not at all.

  A toast to expanded horizons.

[Brian]

Ringing in my 26th birthday this August with my first-ever live Weird Al Yankovic concert!

[Karl Henning]

Party!

[Fagotterdämmerung]

  As a follow-up, the new music festival was something of a mixed bag.

  The highlight for me was Birtwistle's Night's Black Bird. I've enjoyed his music before but it was always a bit boisterous for me: this one is all atmosphere. "Darkest music ever written for piccolo" said the conductor, and as ludicrous as that sounds, he was right.

  Claude Vivier was programmed a lot into these concerts, and I'm not sold on his output, personally. Which is strange, as stylistically, it's everything I should like - lots of Boulez-ian, mid-period Messiaen-esque noises, colorful ( and very French ) orchestration style, and the pace rarely drags in his works - but I end up feeling much of it is aimless. Orion was the strongest and one I think is worth seeing more of on concert programs.

  Though all of the newer Canadian composers were good in the sense of knowing how to write music and orchestrate, nothing really caught me.

   Kelly-Marie Murphy's stood out as having the most potential, but I wound up either wanting it to show more restraint and indulge in fewer film music cliches... or alternately just give in to that side of the work entirely and play with it more in an eccentric vein. The strongest of her works was the Violin Concerto, a premier.

   Jocelyn Morlock also had a number of works premiered. I did not like her style, but one caught my attention: the second movement of Theft, titled "Insomnia". It is a perfect musical portrait of that phenomena.