Elliott Carter, 1908-2012

[Joe Barron]

Well, a couple more and my Amazon reviewer's rank shoots up from 22461 to 22460.

[paulb]

Well, a couple more and my Amazon reviewer's rank shoots up from 22461 to 22460.

I rank near the bottom.
Most of my reviews get the thumbs down
No surprise to the board I'm sure

Elliott Carter, america's greatest composer ever and world's greatest living composer.
Been listening to this cd and just thought I'd express what i feel.
Special mention on Urusla Oppens amazing skills and her musical mind.

[Joe Barron]

Been listening to this cd and just thought I'd express what i feel.
Special mention on Urusla Oppens amazing skills and her musical mind.

Yeah she's terrific. 

[Al Moritz]

Elliott Carter, [...] world's greatest living composer.
Been listening to this cd and just thought I'd express what i feel.

While I understand this sentiment now much better than just a few weeks ago -- I have changed my mind on late Carter (I will post on that another time) -- I strongly urge you again to extensively listen to Ferneyhough and, in particular, to Rihm before you etch this in stone (Stockhausen is now out of the picture for this title, obviously). Wuorinen is no slouch either.

[Joe Barron]

Hi Al! Always nice to see you!

I should listen to more Ferneyhough and Rihm. I should listen to more of everything, really, but in the meantime ...

Juilliard's 2008 Focus Festival ended last night with an extraordinary performance of Carter's forty-minute Symphonia, with James Levine conducting. Extraordinary not only because it was played by a student orchestra, but also because it was so captivating. It would have been impressive to hear anyone play it so well, let alone a Scout troop.  The performance of the first movement, the Partita, was the most exciting I've ever heard, gathering an irresistible momentum as it progressed. Of course, the fact that a large orchestra was playing in a not-so-large hall (the Peter Jay Sharp Theater) surely added to the effect. Nicholas Galls gave a piercing clarinet solo. The Adagio tenebroso was not so much dark as beautiful, and the lightly scored Allegro scorrevole sounded fuller and more "present" than I remember. (And kudos to concertmaster Marta Kretchkovsky for a lovely solo.) A great wind up. (Bruce Hodges and I accosted one of the musicians on the subway, and she said that working with Jimmy was an inspiration. She also said everyone in the orchestra was exhausted.)

The program also included Ives' Three Places in New England, which is becoming one of Levine's signature pieces. I've heard him conduct it several times, and it has always been memorable. The first half ended with Carter's great Cello Concerto, though the performance didn't rise to the same heights as the other works. The fault lay with Dane Johansen, the young hotshot who beat out four other players for the soloist's chair. He gave it everything he had, but you could sense the piece getting away from him. His tone seemed thin, his timing was off in places, and most important of all, he lacked the sense of continuity that Fred Sherry brings to the recording. The concerto came off as a series of virtuosic moments, rather than as an organic, communicative whole.

Still, as you can tell from the verbosity of this review, I'm still buzzing about the Symphonia, even after ten hours sleep. And it's not the coffee talking, either.

Unfortunately, Mr. Carter was not there to hear the ovations. According to Joel Sachs, he was feeling "under the weather" and stayed home. He must have been worn out from all the excitement earlier in the week.

[Joe Barron]

Where are you guys? 

[Catison]

Where are you guys? 

There was some football game on today.  Something about it being the second extra large game...

[karlhenning]

Where are you guys? 

Was at the MFA, Joe.

[bhodges]

Still, as you can tell from the verbosity of this review, I'm still buzzing about the Symphonia, even after ten hours sleep. And it's not the coffee talking, either.

Unfortunately, Mr. Carter was not there to hear the ovations. According to Joel Sachs, he was feeling "under the weather" and stayed home. He must have been worn out from all the excitement earlier in the week.

It was a terrific concert, and I'm still amazed that students were performing these three pieces--further proof of the ever-increasing abilities of young musicians.  Also rather inspiring to see a packed house for Ives and Carter, with much cheering at the end.  A great night. 

--Bruce

[(poco) Sforzando]

Fortunately I was able to attend this program after all, which was more than well worth the wait.* The Symphonia was everything Mr. Barron says it was. Levine obviously believes in this piece, and I've heard him conduct it once before in Boston, coupled with a considerably less potent account of Beethoven's Eroica. But I wouldn't say the BSO handled the work any more professionally than these Juilliard students, who go after it fearlessly and seem scarcely to miss a beat; I can't imagine the conservatory students I knew from the late 1960s handling this music with equivalent aplomb. The opening Partita was indeed thrilling, perhaps most of all at the point about 80% through where the brass players intone sonorous unisons in a great climax. In the finale, a friend noted more transparent textures than in the Knussen recording, but it was the great central Adagio tenebroso that was the most impressive part of the performance. For all Carter's brilliance, one rarely associates deeply elegiac emotions with his music, but here that was just the case, and I feel that Levine, with his strongly Romantic temperament, brought out more of that essence than the cooler Oliver Knussen on the recording. But this is a performance that deserves public distribution. (A student was observed in the wings with a camcorder; could anyone with connections possibly persuade Juilliard to make this available?)

As for the Cello Concerto, I was more impressed with young Johansen than Mr. Barron was, but then again, I don't know the Fred Sherry recording well enough to judge. If he had problems, it was mainly in the central slower section requiring higher positions on the A string; here his intonation seemed insecure and this was the weakest part of his performance. But otherwise I cannot fault him. Levine's Ives was strongest in the raucous middle Putnam's Camp movement of the suite. But in the slower outer movements, the many layers of Ives's textures didn't emerge clearly enough; surely the waters of the Housatonic in 1915 hadn't yet turned to the sludge one heard from Levine's interpretation.

--------------
* But Juilliard cannot be entirely congratulated for the way it handled the standby line. I arrived at about 6:30 to see about 15 people ahead of me. At 7 a woman gave us standby numbers and told us to return at 5 before 8. This was fine, as it gave enough time for a quick bite; but when we got back to the door at 7:50 and the crowd had increased substantially, the same woman was yelling at the top of her lungs to all the standby holders to "Get behind the barricades!" as if we were a bunch of cattle or worse. And then it became a mad scramble to find seats, as we were not given actual seat assignments and there was confusion as to where people could or could not sit. C'mon, Juilliard, you could have handled things more professionally than this.

[bhodges]

--------------
* But Juilliard cannot be entirely congratulated for the way it handled the standby line. I arrived at about 6:30 to see about 15 people ahead of me. At 7 a woman gave us standby numbers and told us to return at 5 before 8. This was fine, as it gave enough time for a quick bite; but when we got back to the door at 7:50 and the crowd had increased substantially, the same woman was yelling at the top of her lungs to all the standby holders to "Get behind the barricades!" as if we were a bunch of cattle or worse. And then it became a mad scramble to find seats, as we were not given actual seat assignments and there was confusion as to where people could or could not sit. C'mon, Juilliard, you could have handled things more professionally than this.

That sounds very bad...and this was the first time they have handed out standby numbers, that I can recall.  (Usually there's just a line outside.)  And true, inside they did have more seats "reserved" than usual, which made finding seats more of a challenge than it should be.  Must be a better way...

--Bruce

[Joe Barron]

But in the slower outer movements, the many layers of Ives's textures didn't emerge clearly enough; surely the waters of the Housatonic in 1915 hadn't yet turned to the sludge one heard from Levine's interpretation.

I'd be willing to bet the Housatonic is cleaner today than at the turn of the last century, even if pregnant women still can't eat the fish.

Very insightful review, Sf, though I think I liked the outer movements of Three Places more than you did. I thought the first was especially fine. The piece is a ghost march, and the performance captured that for me — both mysterious and mournful. Beautiful stuff.

As for the Cello Concerto, I didn't dislike it, but it didn't leave me in the introspective, awe-struck mood I had after Ma and Sherry's perfromances. It's a very personal thing. 

I passed on reading the Times review today. It was written by Bernard Holland. Ugh. 

[(poco) Sforzando]

Very insightful review, Sf, though I think I liked the outer movements of Three Places more than you did. I thought the first was especially fine. The piece is a ghost march, and the performance captured that for me — both mysterious and mournful. Beautiful stuff.

...

I passed on reading the Times review today. It was written by Bernard Holland. Ugh. 

Not so much dislike as a few reservations, JB. Holland's review was appreciative, and I don't think you'd react negatively if it appeared here pseudonymously.

[Joe Barron]

Holland's review was appreciative, and I don't think you'd react negatively if it appeared here pseudonymously.

Yeah, but it doesn't. 

[Mark G. Simon]

Here's the essence of it.

According to Boulez, Carter's music sounds "American". Holland agrees:

"There are the reserves of psychic energy: the impulsiveness and aggression, the hard work achieved through high sophistication, the absence of neurosis. He has the American knack for making complex constructions work.

Ives did things no European would have ever done because there was no European around to tell him he couldn't. There is an element of Mr. Carter in Ives's music but also a world of difference. Mr. Carter is an original, but he is no eccentric".

[Joe Barron]

There is an element of Mr. Carter in Ives's music but also a world of difference. 

How can there be an element of Mr. Carter in Ives's music? Ives never heard a note of Carter. I was also put off the by Holland's lede, which describes the other night's program as a "big mouthful" of Carter's music. What an ugly expression. It does appear, though, that years after deriding Carter's devotees as elitsts preaching to the great unwashed, Mr. Holland has come to appreciate the composer's achievment somewhat. He has also bitten off a big mouthful. I won't say of what. 

[Mark G. Simon]

Holland often writes as if he's been given five minutes to come up with 200 words.

Here he's actually projecting history backwards, like the person who listens to Mozart's C minor Piano Concerto and remarks that "there's a lot of Beethoven in it". He knows that Ives never heard any of Carter's mature works, and what he means to say is the two composers have something in common. Actually there's a lot of Ives in Carter, for Carter's poly-tempo constructions are just a formalized version of Ives' two marching bands coming together.

[(poco) Sforzando]

How can there be an element of Mr. Carter in Ives's music? Ives never heard a note of Carter. I was also put off the by Holland's lede, which describes the other night's program as a "big mouthful" of Carter's music. What an ugly expression. It does appear, though, that years after deriding Carter's devotees as elitsts preaching to the great unwashed, Mr. Holland has come to appreciate the composer's achievment somewhat. He has also bitten off a big mouthful. I won't say of what. 

The generous explanation is that he is thinking in the same terms as Harold Bloom does in The Anxiety of Influence, where in discussing artistic influence Bloom speaks of the later poet (though composer will work as well) seeming to have written the work of the earlier poet. Bloom calls this apophrades, or the return of the dead. More likely, though, Holland is just being imprecise.

And ok, so he's not so great at metaphor either.

[(poco) Sforzando]

Here he's actually projecting history backwards, like the person who listens to Mozart's C minor Piano Concerto and remarks that "there's a lot of Beethoven in it".

Perfect example of Bloom's point: "the uncanny effect is that the new poem's achievement makes it seem to us, not as though the precursor were writing it, but as though the later poet himself had written the precursor's characteristic work."

[Joe Barron]

Actually there's a lot of Ives in Carter, for Carter's poly-tempo constructions are just a formalized version of Ives' two marching bands coming together.

I agree with this, though I think I might have hestiated before including the word "just." 

Perfect example of Bloom's point: "the uncanny effect is that the new poem's achievement makes it seem to us, not as though the precursor were writing it, but as though the later poet himself had written the precursor's characteristic work."

Although I have certainly heard Mozart's influence on Beethoven, it has never occurred to me that Beethoven wrote Mozart's most characteristic work, not even "as though."