Browsing: Classical

Herbert von Karajan was one of the most renowned conductors of his generation, but he started his career as a pianist and returned to the keyboard from time to time in later years. He was especially fond of playing harpsichord in performances of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos. With two younger colleagues – Christoph Eschenbach and Justus Frantz – he also made a specialty of Mozart’s Concerto for Three Pianos and Orchestra. In this performance recorded in 1971 Eschenbach took the first part, Frantz the second and Karajan the third. At the time both Eschenbach and Frantz had major careers as soloists…

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Paul E. Robinson Vivaldi: Concerto in C major for Recorder, Strings and Continuo RV 444 Vivaldi: Concerto in C major for Recorder, Strings and Continuo RV 443 Mahler: Symphony No. 6 in A minor Erik Bosgraaf, recorder Dallas Symphony Orchestra/Jaap van Zweden Meyerson Symphony Center Dallas, Texas March 1, 2013 It was an interesting weekend. On Friday night, I heard the Dallas Symphony under its music director Jaap van Zweden performing Mahler’s massive Sixth Symphony at the Meyerson SymphonyCenter in preparation for its European tour. The next day I drove 250 miles down I-45 to hear a concert performance of…

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by Paul E. Robinson   From left to right: Mark Ivanir, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Christopher Walken, Catherine Keener A Late Quartet Director: Yaron Zilberman Cast: Philip Seymour Hoffman/Christopher Walken/Catherine Keener/Mark Ivanir Music: Beethoven: String Quartet Op. 131   Moonrise Kingdom Director: Wes Anderson Cast: Bruce Willis/Bill Murray/Ed Norton/Frances McDormand Music: Britten: Noyes’ Flood/Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra/Songs for Friday Afternoons/A Midsummer Night’s Dream (excerpts)   Films about classical music composers and performers are nearly always risible in the extreme. Think Song Without End (1960) with Dirk Bogarde as Liszt or Humoresque (1946) with John Garfield as an unlikely virtuoso…

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by Paul E. RobinsonOlga Guryakova, sopranoIan Bostridge, tenorDietrich Henschel, baritoneChildren’s Chorus of Greater DallasDallas Symphony ChorusDallas Symphony OrchestraJaap Van Zweden, conductorPaul Phillips, conductor (chamber orchestra)Myerson Symphony CentreDallas, TexasNovember 9, 2012By the late 1930s Germany, out to build its empire, had taken over Austria and Czechoslovakia. By September 1, 1939, when Germany attacked Poland, it had become clear to the rest of the world that Germany would not be satisfied until it had conquered the whole of Europe and the Soviet Union, just as Japan was on a track to crush China and the whole of Asia. There is not much…

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by Paul RobinsonLisa Milne, Leonore (Fidelio)Robert Dean Smith, FlorestanRobert Bork, PizarroArthur Woodley, RoccoSimona Saturova, MarzellineMarcel Reijans, JacquinoDetlef Roth, Don FernandoDallas Symphony Chorus (Joshua Habermann, director)Dallas Symphony Orchestra/Jaap van Zweden, conductorMeyerson Symphony CenterDallas, TexasMay 13, 2012On the face of it, opera “in concert” is a near impossibility. Opera is an art form that combines live theatre and music, with sets, costumes and the whole nine yards; to present it in concert form is to eliminate most of what makes it what it is; on the other hand, the music alone in many operas is so magnificent that the elimination of a full theatrical presentation can easily be justified, and in…

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by Paul E. RobinsonMozart: The Magic Flute Austin Lyric Opera (ALO)Director: James MarvelConductor: Richard BuckleyThe Long Center Austin, TexasSaturday November 5, 2011Congratulations are in order for the Austin Lyric Opera on the occasion of its 25th Anniversary. The organization also deserves enormous credit for dealing quickly and apparently effectively with a serious financial crisis that came to a boil last spring. Changes since then have included the resignation of General Director Kevin Patterson, the listing of ALO’s office building for sale, and major program cuts to the 2011-2012 season. Kevin Smith was appointed interim General Director and principal conductor Richard…

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Par Julie Berardino Le très attendu Festival Opéra de Québec se déroulera cet été (du 25 juillet au 6 août) à Québec avec une version modeste du Rossignol et autres fables de Stravinsky et de la Flûte enchantée de Mozart. Tel que prévu, Robert Lepage, originaire de Québec, sera à l’honneur dans la production qu’offre sa compagnie Ex Machina de l’opéra de Stravinsky, qui fut créée par le Canadian Opera Company et a récemment complété une tournée à New York. La production amène chanteurs et marionnettiste à évoluer dans un grand bassin d’eau sur scène (salle Louis-Fréchette du Grand Théâtre de Québec)…

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by Paul E. RobinsonThe Beethoven Ninth Symphony is one of the most overplayed pieces in orchestral literature, but it sells tickets by the bushel and managers seldom go wrong, even when programming it season after season. To call it “overplayed” is not to say that it isn’t a great work or that it doesn’t bring out the best in conductors and orchestras; indeed it is and indeed it does. These facts took me back to Dallas recently to hear Jaap van Zweden and the Dallas Symphony (DSO) engage with the Ninth in the Meyerson Symphony Center.Van Zweden recorded all the…

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Beethoven: Gods, Heroes, and MenThe Creatures of Prometheus/Symphony No. 3 “Eroica”Orchestre symphonique de Montréal/Kent NaganoAnalekta AN2 9838 (73 min 51 s)****It is a sign of the times that the MSO has no major label willing to produce its CDs. Many fine orchestras are in the same situation and several of them – San Francisco Symphony, London Symphony, London Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, Toronto Symphony, etc. – have taken to producing their own recordings. Fortunately, the Canadian record company Analekta, with the help of the Department of Canadian Heritage, has been putting together several MSO projects. The latest venture, like the first…

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by Giuseppe PennisiMusic is the best medicine to cure cancer according to Maestro Claudio Abbado. Doctors removed much of his stomach and he can only eat small amounts at a time.“I found a new life, without a stomach,” he states. “I think differently. My senses are different.” His music-making has also changed: “I hear more lines now; I hear sounds I never heard before.”Unfortunately, the therapy has weakened him: it’s now a special occasion when Maestro Abbado conducts. At 77, Abbado has mostly turned away from the kind of grand institutions he once led — La Scala, the Vienna State…

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