Contemporary - my/maSCENA

Inaugural concert for the Azrieli Music Project

By Newswire on 16 September 2016 Art Song, Contemporary, Newswire, Orchestral

Premiere of a large-scale work for orchestra, choir and tenor, in addition to compositions by Mahler, Bernstein and Wlad Marhulets Kent Nagano, 4 soloists and the OSM Chorus Montréal, September 16, 2016 – Maestro Kent Nagano is conducting the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal on Wednesday, October 19 at 8 p.m. atMaison symphonique de Montréal in a concert presenting a reflection on tradition, identity and on the universal character of music. Four wonderful soloists – tenor Frédéric Antoun, pianist Serhiy Salov, clarinetist André Moisan and soprano Sharon Azrieli Perez – and the OSM Chorus will join forces with the Orchestra on…

Lebrecht Weekly – Prokofiev: Violin concertos (BIS)

By Norman Lebrecht on 16 September 2016 Contemporary, Lebrecht Weekly, Violin

Two albums of Prokofiev concertos arrive in the same delivery, one piano, the other violin. Both are from pedigree artists, pedigree labels. Which one do I review? Here’s where you run into the problem of having too much music in your head. I cannot listen to the 4th and 5th Prokofiev concertos, or the 7th and 8th sonatas, without hearing Sviatoslav Richter as a parallel soundtrack, allowing others little room for manoeuvre. Likewise the 3rd concerto which I heard Martha Argerich play with Riccardo Muti one Sunday afternoon more than 40 years ago with such effervescence that all else pales…

Cerise Lim Jacobs, Photo: James Daniel

White Snake Walking – Don’t Tread on Her!

By Charles Geyer on 14 September 2016 Concert Reviews, Contemporary, Opera

OPERA REVIEW: The Ouroboros Trilogy (Naga; Madame White Snake; Gilgamesh) INTERVIEW: Cerise Lim Jacobs Caution: There are snakes on this immortal plane! The universe according to librettist/mythmaker Cerise Lim Jacobs is a treacherous, beautiful reptilian playground where serpent-demons shapeshift, meddle with humanity, instigate epic battles and hanker after love. It’s a coil of a cosmos, and we get to tour its every whiplash curve in Jacobs’ magnificent and extravagant new operatic magnum opus, The Ouroboros Trilogy, which debuted in a day-long performance marathon at Boston’s Emerson/Cutler Majestic Theater on Saturday, September 10, 2016 (co-produced by the dauntless and cutting-edge Beth…

Lebrecht Weekly – Michael Nyman: The Man who Mistook His Wife for a Hat (Naxos)

By Norman Lebrecht on 9 September 2016 Contemporary, Lebrecht Weekly, Opera

In the spring of 1985 I saw three opera world premieres in London in as many weeks. There was Busoni’s Doctor Faust in the restored original ending, Birtwistle’s breakthough opera The Mask of Orpheus and last, and smallest, Michael Nyman’s chamber opera on a troubling case history by the neurologist Oliver Sacks. I felt confident at the time that Nyman’s opera would be revived soon and often, but that’s not how it goes. Chamber operas are notoriously hard to get staged, falling as they do between too many institutional stools. All the more reason, then, to welcome a new recording…

The NAC Orchestra and The Glenn Gould Foundation celebrate The Genius of Philip Glass

By Newswire on 6 September 2016 Contemporary, Newswire

Innovative. Influential. Legendary. Philip Glass will be presented with the 11th Glenn Gould Prize on November 26 in Ottawa OTTAWA, Sept. 6, 2016 /CNW/ – On Saturday, November 26, iconic American composer Philip Glass will be awarded The Eleventh Glenn Gould Prize at an exclusive concert in his honour presented by The Glenn Gould Foundation and the National Arts Centre. Conductor Dennis Russell Davies, a life-long proponent of the music of Philip Glass and collaborator on numerous commissions, will lead the NAC Orchestra. The Genius of Philip Glass will include performances by the NAC Orchestra of his symphonic works, including the…

Lebrecht Weekly – Ustvolskaya, Silvestrov & Kancheli: Works for Piano & Orchestra

By Norman Lebrecht on 2 September 2016 Contemporary, Lebrecht Weekly

The late Soviet system created damaging monopolies in the arts as much as they did in state industry. The big brands – Shostakovich, Khachaturian – flourished at the expense of all others. A young composer who wanted to get ahead would offer clever imitations. Others found a voice and kept it largely to themselves. The three composers in this intriguing album each tackled the hegemony from a different aspect. Galina Ustvolskaya, the student closest to Shostakovich (he wanted to marry her), retreated into a form of religious meditation that was all the more unusual for its occasional bursts of fury.…

Giordano Bruno Comes to Dublin in Roger Doyle’s Electronic Opera “Heresy”

By Newswire on 1 September 2016 Contemporary, Newswire, Opera

Heresy is the world premiere and first opera by renowned Irish composer, Roger Doyle. Mr. Doyle, considered “The Godfather of Irish Electronic Music,” speaks of his vast body of compositions as “a celebration of the multiplicity of musical languages and evolving technologies.” Based in Dublin, META PRODUCTIONS was founded in 2013 by Roger Doyle & Eric Fraad. It is committed to exploring new forms of opera for the 21st century & creating works that live within the best traditions of opera & reformulating these in innovative & unique ways. META PRODUCTIONS has assembled a dazzling team of artists for this unique operatic extravaganza:…

Review – Overtures to Bach: Matt Haimovitz (Pentatone Oxingale)

By Kiersten van Vliet on 1 September 2016 Baroque and Early, CD and Book Reviews, Contemporary, Strings

Recently named Pentatone’s Artist of the Season, Matt Haimovitz has never shied from making waves in performance or recording. The Montreal-based cellist has already proven his Bach chops over and over throughout his career, most recently with the 2015 Pentatone release of the Suites based on a copy by Bach’s second wife Anna Magdalena played on period instruments. This new disc explores six new commissions by Haimovitz, each an Overture to the Prelude from each Suite. The structure of Overture followed by Prelude makes the Bach a comment on the future, a kind of sonic time machine. Opening with Phillip…

Review – Alfred Schnittke: Works for Violin and Piano (Quartz)

By Kiersten van Vliet on 1 September 2016 CD and Book Reviews, Chamber Music, Contemporary, Violin

Alfred Schnittke is a name we often shy away from on this side of the Atlantic. His style of unabashed dissonance is not solely reliant on serialism, but rather an understanding of the latent dramatic potential of atonality, an understanding that is made possible by his awareness and appreciation of the music that preceded him. Instead of breaking with the past, Schnittke aimed to show the connections between past and present in his so-called “polystylism”; this is no more evident than in his chamber output for the violin. The two-CD set opens with the late Third Sonata (1994), darkly opulent…

Bozzini Quartet, Photo: Michael Slobodian

La Rentrée Musicale: Contemporary Music

By An-Laurence Higgins on 1 September 2016 Chamber Music, Contemporary, Experimental Jazz, La Scena Spotlight, Orchestral, Scena Jazz

As always, the new season in Montreal offers a rich array of concerts as well as new and contemporary musical experiences. Whether you love digital art or sound installations, instrumental or mixed music, the creative community has concerts and festivals to satisfy everyone. Have your calendars ready! This year the Société de musique contemporaine du Québec (SMCQ) celebrates its 50th season with the kind of programming that has been its hallmark since its foundation. The 2016-17 season begins with a free concert on September 30. Entitled Broadway Boogie-Woogie, it’s a tribute to the Mondrian painting of the same name, which…

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