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Classical music: This summer the Token Creek Festival goes online. The music starts TODAY at 4 p.m. Concerts run daily through Sept. 15 and remain up for this month

September 2, 2020
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By Jacob Stockinger

The annual Token Creek Chamber Music Festival normally occurs in the final weeks of summer, just before Labor Day, in the welcoming rustic comfort of the beautifully converted barn (below) located on the rural farm property of composer John Harbison and violinist Rose Mary Harbison.

With its normal concert season canceled due to Covid-19, the festival is pleased to announce an alternative for the summer almost ended.

Slightly later than usual, “MUSIC FROM THE BARN” is a two-week virtual season, a retrospective of concert compilations from 30 years of performances.

The topical programs will be released daily over the period Sept. 1–15 at 4 p.m. (CDT), and will remain posted and available to “attendees” throughout the month. From anywhere in the world, you can revisit whole programs or individual pieces.

The goal of the series has been to achieve the broadest possible representation of repertoire and artists who have graced the Token Creek stage since the series began in 1989.

To festival-goers, it will come as no surprise that the virtual season emphasizes music of Bach, Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven, vocal music, works by artistic director John Harbison and his colleagues, and, of course, jazz.

In addition to the welcoming beauty of the barn and festival grounds, with sparkling creek and abundant gardens and woods, and the convivial intermissions at every concert, one of the features most beloved by audiences is the concert introduction by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer, MacArthur “Genius Grant” recipient and MIT professor John Harbison (below) that begins each program. Happily, these remain a feature of the virtual season as well.

Season Schedule

Tues., Sept. 1: Welcome and introduction from the artistic directors (below and in the link to the YouTube video at the bottom)

TODAY, Wed., Sept. 2: Founders Recital

Thurs., Sept. 3: Haydn Piano Trios

Fri., Sept. 4: Bach I: Concertos

Sat., Sept. 5: A Vocal Recital (I)

Sun., Sept. 6: Beethoven

Mon., Sept. 7: Contemporaries

Tues., Sept. 8: Early Modernists

Wed., Sept. 9: A Vocal Recital (II): Schubert and Schumann

Thurs., Sept. 10: Jazz 2003-2019

Fri., Sept. 11: Neo-classicists: Pizzetti, Martinu, Stravinsky

Sat., Sept. 12: Schoenberg and His Circle

Sun., Sept. 13: Mozart

Tues., Sept. 14: John Harbison: Other Worlds

Wed., Sept. 15: Bach II: Preludes, Fugues, Arias, Sonatas

Programs will be posted on Token Creek’s YouTube Channel, accessible from the festival website (https://tokencreekfestival.org), which will also host concert details: works, artists, program notes and other information.

All concerts are FREE and open to the browsing public.

In addition to the virtual concert season, the Token Creek Festival is pleased to release two new CDs.

A Life in Concert (below) features music written for Rose Mary Harbison by John Harbison, and performances of diverse music by the two of them. It includes the world premiere recordings of Harbison’s Violin Sonata No. 1 and Crane Sightings: Eclogue for Violin and Strings, inspired by frequent encounters with a pair of sandhill cranes at the Wisconsin farm.

Wicked Wit, Ingenious Imagination (below) offers four piano trios by Haydn, a beloved genre the festival has been surveying regularly since 2000. CDs will be available at the festival website by mid-September.

For more information, go to: https://tokencreekfestival.org

https://tokencreekfestival.org/2020-virtual-season/welcome/#

Posted in Classical music
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Classical music: Acclaimed local soprano Sarah Brailey explains why performing artists and presenters need help during the COVID-19 pandemic

March 23, 2020
2 Comments

By Jacob Stockinger

Sarah Brailey (below) is worried.

And with good reason.

Chances are good that you have seen the local soprano or heard her sing.

She is the artistic director of the Handel Aria Competition, which she herself won in 2015. (In the YouTube video at the bottom, you can hear Brailey sing the aria “Will the Sun Forget to Streak” from Handel’s oratorio “Solomon,” with the Trinity Baroque Orchestra under conductor Julian Wachner, in the St. Paul Chapel in New York City.)

Brailey is a co-founder of and participant in the monthly free Just Bach concerts here. In addition, while pursuing graduate studies at the UW-Madison, she is a concert artist with a budding international career. For more about her, including a rave review from The New York Times and sample videos, go to: https://sarahbrailey.com

But right now the Wisconsin native is especially concerned about the lasting impact that the Coronavirus pandemic will have on her own career as well as on the careers of others like her and on the well-being of arts presenters.

Brailey (below, in photo by Miranda Loud) sent The Ear the following essay:

By Sarah Brailey

This is a scary time for everyone, but particularly for anyone who works as an independent contractor.

I am a freelance classical soprano based in Madison. I maintain a very active performing career, traveling all over the globe, and I am also a doctoral student at the UW-Madison Mead Witter School of Music.

When COVID-19 hit the United States, presenting organizations on the east and west coasts started canceling concerts to comply with social distancing recommendations.

I initially thought I was lucky to be living in the middle of the country where our lesser population density might save us. Plus, I am a Teaching Assistant at the UW right now, so I will still be getting my stipend — although teaching virtual voice lessons will be its own special challenge!

But many of my colleagues are not so lucky and are facing bankruptcy. If the government doesn’t include independent contractors in its relief packages, a lot of people are going to be insolvent.

And I myself am not immune. As the seriousness of the situation became clear, all my concerts in the next two months soon disappeared one by one.

While not being able to perform is emotionally devastating, these cancellations are also financially devastating.

There exists a clause in every standard performance contract called “force majeure” (superior force), which is idiomatically referred to as, “an act of God.” This clause excuses a party from not honoring its contractual obligations that becomes impossible or impracticable, due to an event or effect that the parties could not have anticipated or controlled.

This can come in handy for a presenter if there is, say, a blizzard that necessitates the cancellation of a concert. (This happened to me a few seasons ago with the Boston Symphony.) If the presenter will not make any money on ticket sales, they are not then further injured by having to pay the musicians for the canceled concert. (Below, Brailey sings Samuel Barber’s “Knoxville: Summer of 1915” with the Colorado Symphony.)

The ramifications of this pandemic are unprecedented. Every freelance musician I know is suddenly out of work. The current conventions put all of the upfront financial burden on the artists. We are paid in one lump sum at the end of a project. We do not get a fee for the countless hours of preparation.

We often book travel and lodging on our own dime, and are not reimbursed until the end of the gig. We pay for our own health insurance, and we cannot file for unemployment because our work is paid via IRS Form 1099 and not W2s. The abrupt work stoppage caused by this pandemic means insolvency – or even bankruptcy — for many artists. (Below, Brailey sings Handel’s “Messiah” at the famed Trinity Church on Wall Street in New York City.)

Many institutions — and, unfortunately, many of the bigger players like The Metropolitan Opera — are invoking force majeure without much regard for how their artists are struggling.

My colleague, tenor Zach Finkelstein, is covering this in great detail on his blog The Middle Class Artist, as is Alex Ross, the prize-winning music critic for The New Yorker. Read his piece on force majeure here.

However, there are also thankfully some good stories to tell. The Bach Society of Minnesota reimbursed all my travel expenses and is paying 75 percent of my fee, as is the Lyra Baroque Orchestra.

I am helping Zach keep track of the organizations that are helping their artists in this time of need. (Read about them here. Madison Opera is on the list.)

The arts are not just cultural enrichment; they are an essential part of our economy. In 2017, the industry contributed $877.8 billion, or 4.5 percent, to U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and employed over 5 million workers. We cannot afford to let this industry disappear. I fear that many individual artists and arts organizations will not recover from this. (Below, Brailey sings Johann Sebastian Bach’s “Magnificat” at the Bucknell Bach Festival.)

While we wait out this storm, I implore you to donate to a Madison arts organization. Here is a short list of recommendations along with some national relief funds for artists.

Local Arts Organizations

Madison Bach Musicians

Handel Aria Competition

Madison Early Music Festival

Madison Opera

Madison Youth Choirs

List of National Relief Funds

Posted in Classical music
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Classical music: The timing and political climate could not be more relevant for seeing the Madison Opera’s production of “Fellow Travelers” this Friday night and Sunday afternoon

February 6, 2020
3 Comments

By Jacob Stockinger

You might recall from a previous blog posting that this weekend, the Madison Opera will present its production of the 2016 opera “Fellow Travelers.”

(A preview from the Minnesota Opera’s production, which featured the same sets and many of the same singers at the Madison Opera’s production, can be seen in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

Performances are this Friday night, Feb. 7, at 8 p.m. and Sunday afternoon, Feb. 9, at 2:30 p.m. in the Capitol Theater of the Overture Center.

Here is a link to more background and details about American history, the production, the cast and tickets.

https://welltempered.wordpress.com/2020/01/14/classical-music-background-discussions-lectures-and-documentaries-lead-up-to-madison-operas-production-of-the-new-lgbtq-themed-opera-fellow-travelers-on-feb-7-and-9/

Today, all The Ear wants to do is to point out how timely this story about the “Lavender Scare” of purging and punishing gays during the Red Scare, anti-Communist witch hunt of McCarthyism in the late 1940s and 1950s.

The opera’s story is about a young man (below) who supports Republican Sen. Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin and then finds himself romantically and sexually attracted to another man who works in the State Department, one of McCarthy’s favorite targets.

He then has to deal with hypocrisy, with the contradictions between his personal life and his political beliefs as he goes from being victimizer to victim.

The political climate for such a work exploring fear and prejudice couldn’t be more relevant .

A lot of the credit for that can go directly to President Donald Trump (below), the master of “Fake News.”

Trump is a right-wing fear-monger and name-smearer, constantly raging against “radical left-wing Democrats.” He has even called Sen. Bernie Sanders — a Democratic candidate for president — a “Communist,” even though Sanders describes himself as a democratic Socialist along the lines of Western European socialists.

It is also no secret that in addition to such unfair and insulting name-calling, Trump and his homophobic supporters – including Vice President Mike Pence and Christian Fundamentalists – are looking to roll back the civil rights and human rights of people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer.

And they want to do so even at a time when an openly gay man who is married, Pete Buttigieg, is running for president and seems to have just won the Iowa caucuses.

Moreover, there is a direct link between McCarthyism and the homophobia of the Liar-in-Chief.

Remember that McCarthy’ lawyer was a closeted and self-hating gay man named Roy Cohn (below right, with McCarthy). There is some evidence that McCarthy himself was secretly homosexual too.

After the humiliating end of the Army-McCarthy hearings and the premature death of McCarthy, Cohn went into private practice in New York City.

And that is where Cohn became the lawyer – and a role model of thuggish public behavior — for a young real estate developer named Donald Trump (below left, with Roy Cohn).

Such partisan times as the present seem to call for and inspire didactic art – better called “message art.” The Ear hasn’t seen the opera yet, so he can’t say how well it fits the bill.

But at first glance, the opera sure seems to fit the times we live in and the personalities of many of those who determine such a disturbing political and social climate. As The Nation magazine put it, “Trumpism is the New McCarthyism.”

In short, the opera’s plot seems both pertinent and realistic, one that could take place in today’s Washington, D.C.

The Ear is anxious to find out more and to make up his own mind, including about the music to be sung by the cast and played by the Madison Symphony Orchestra under conductor John DeMain.

He also hopes many of you will see the opera, and then leave your reactions and comments here, be they positive or negative.

The Ear wants to hear.

Posted in Classical music
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Classical music: This Saturday night, pianist Emanuel Ax returns to the Wisconsin Union Theater in an all-Beethoven recital, and also is in a FREE and PUBLIC Q&A that afternoon. That same night, UW-Madison professor Alicia Lee gives a free clarinet recital

November 1, 2019
1 Comment

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By Jacob Stockinger

This Saturday night, Nov. 2, brings two separate but noteworthy recitals by Grammy-winning pianist Emanuel Ax and by UW-Madison clarinetist Alicia Lee.

Here are details:

EMANUEL AX

Emanuel Ax and Madison go way back.

Since 1974, the Wisconsin Union Theater has often seen Emanuel Ax (below, in a photo by Lisa-Marie Mazzucco) perform both as a soloist and a chamber musician with the legendary violinist Nathan Milstein and the superstar cellist Yo-Yo Ma, who is also a close friend. (Ax has also performed with the Franz Liszt Chamber Orchestra at the old Civic Center and with the Madison Symphony Orchestra in the Overture Center.)

This Saturday night, Nov. 2, Emanuel Ax returns again to help celebrate the centennial of the Union Theater’s Concert Series and to help kick off the Beethoven Year in 2020, which marks the 250th anniversary of the composer’s birth.

The concert is at 7:30 p.m. in Shannon Hall with a pre-concert lecture, given by Andrea Fowler, a UW-Madison graduate student in musicology. Her lecture is at 6 p.m. in the Memorial Union’s Play Circle.

The program centers on the first three piano sonatas, Op. 2, by Beethoven (below) plus two rarely heard sets of theme-and-variations. In addition, he will start the performance with the popular “Für Elise” Bagatelle known to so many piano students, their parents and the public. (You can hear “Für Elise” and see a graphic depiction of it in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

Tickets run from $15 for UW-Madison students to $70. For more information about tickets, Emanuel Ax, the program, sample reviews and links to Ax’s website, go to:

https://union.wisc.edu/events-and-activities/event-calendar/event/emanuel-ax/

NOTE: This time, there will also be a special event as part of his appearance.

On Saturday afternoon from 1 to 2 p.m. in Collins Recital Hall at the new Hamel Music Center, 740 University Ave., Ax will participate in a FREE and public Q&A.

Here is a publicity blurb about that event: “Join us for a Q&A with Grammy Award-winning pianist Emanuel Ax. Now is your chance to ask how he selects repertoire, what his practice schedule is like, if he has any pre-recital rituals, or whatever you would like to know!”

“This event is intended for UW-Madison students and UW campus community, however the Madison community is welcome.”

For more information about the Q&A, go to: https://union.wisc.edu/events-and-activities/event-calendar/event/q-and-a-with-emanuel-ax/

ALICIA LEE

At 8 p.m. in Collins Recital Hall, UW-Madison clarinetist Alicia Lee (below), who also plays in the UW Wingra Wind Quintet, will give a FREE recital of chamber music.

The program includes music by Robert Schumann, Bela Bartok, Isang Yun, Eugene Bozza and Shulamit Ran.

Two faculty colleagues will join Lee: pianist Christopher Taylor and violinist Soh-Hyun Park Altino.

For more information about the event, go to: https://www.music.wisc.edu/event/alicia-lee-faculty-clarinet/

For an extensive biography of Alicia Lee, go to: https://www.music.wisc.edu/alicia-lee/

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Classical music: Soprano Sarah Brailey and nine UW-Madison cellists team up for the FREE concert of songs at Grace Presents this Saturday at noon

September 20, 2019
1 Comment

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By Jacob Stockinger

This Saturday, Sept. 21, at noon, a FREE one-hour program in the Grace Presents series will feature soprano Sarah Brailey (below) in “My Loyal Heart,” a recital of songs by Arvo Pärt, John Tavener, Guillaume de Machaut, Dmitri Shostakovich and Heitor Villa-Lobos.

The concert is at Grace Episcopal Church (below), located downtown on the Capitol Square at 116 West Washington Avenue.

Brailey is an acclaimed professional singer who often tours and who is doing graduate work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music.

Brailey will be joined by friends and colleagues. They include UW baritone Paul Rowe and members of the UW Madison Cello Ensemble, featuring nine local Madison cellists who include Grace Presents program coordinator James Waldo. (Below is a summer cello choir at the UW-Madison from several years ago.)

The works will be sung in Russian, Portuguese, and both modern and medieval French.

Here is an introduction from Waldo:

“It is often said that the cello is the instrument most like the human voice.

“My Loyal Heart,” devotes an entire program to music for soprano Sarah Brailey and cello from the 14th century to the 20th century.

“It opens with Arvo Pärt’s L’abbé Agathon about the legend of Father Agathon from the 4th century book “The Desert Fathers,” followed by a new arrangement by Brailey for soprano and cello trio of Guillaume de Machaut’s elegant love song Se quanque amours puet donner.

“This intimately ardent piece is followed by a more tragic love story, that of Shakespeare’s Ophelia, in the opening movement of Dmitri Shostakovich’s Seven Romances on Poems by Alexander Blok.

“The program continues in Russian with Sir John Tavener’s powerful and darkly spiritual Akhmatova Songs with poetry by Russian-Soviet Modernist poet, Anna Akhmatova.

“The concert concludes with the hauntingly beautiful and famous first movement and the playful concluding dance of Bachianas Brasileiras (Brazilian Bach Suites) No.5 for soprano and eight cellos by Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos. (You can hear the Villa-Lobos aria in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

“Text and translations will be provided.

“This program will not be performed anywhere else in Madison.”

Posted in Classical music
Tags: #AlexanderBlok, #AnnaAkhmatova, #ArvoPärt, #BlogPost, #BlogPosting, #BrazilianComposer, #CapitolSquare, #CelloChoir, #ChristianChurch, #DesertFathers, #DmitriShostakovich, #EnglishLanguage, #EnglishLiterature, #EnglishTranslation, #FacebookPost, #FacebookPosting, #FatherAgathon, #FrenchLanguage, #GraceEpiscopalChurch, #GracePresents, #GraduateStudent, #GuillaumedeMachaut, #HeitorVilla-Lobos, #James Waldo, #JamesWaldo, #JohannSebastianBach, #JohnTavener, #JohnTaverner, #LoveSong, #MeadWitterSchoolofMusic, #MedievalFrench, #ModernFrench, #PaulRowe, #PortugueseLanguage, #ProfessionalMusician, #RussianLanguage, #RussianLitertaure, #SarahBrailey, #SopranoSinger, #SovietMusic, #SovietUnion, #UniversityofWisconsin-Madison, #WilliamShakespeare, #YouTubevideo, Alexander Blok, Anna Akhmatova, Arvo Part, Bach, baritone, blog, Book, Brazil, Brazilian, Capitol Square, cellist, Cello, cello choir, Choir, Christian, Christian church, church, classicalmusic, colleagues, Concert, coordinator, dark, desert, Dmitri Shostakovich, downtown, drama, elegant, England, English, Facebook, father, Father Agathon, France, free, French, French language, friends, Grace Episcopal Church, Grace Presents, graduate student, Guillaume de Machaut, Hamlet, heart, Heitor Villa-Lobos, Johann Sebastian Bach, John Tavener, John Taverner, language, local, love song, loyal, Madison, Mead Witter School of Music, modern, modernist, Music, Ophelia, Paul Rowe, poem, Poetry, Portuguese, post, posting, professional, program, recital, Religion and Spirituality, Romance, Russia, Russian, Sarah Brailey, series, Shakespeare, Shostakovich, singer, soprano, Soviet, spiritual, Suite, summer, text, tour, tragedy, translation, trio, University of Wisconsin–Madison, USSR, UW-Madison, Villa-Lobos, years, YouTube

Classical music: Why does Pavarotti – the man and now the movie – fascinate us?

June 8, 2019
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By Jacob Stockinger

This weekend a lot of people nationwide will go see the movie “Pavarotti,” the documentary by Ron Howard about the legendary Italian tenor who died 12 years ago.

Luciano Pavarotti (below) was and remains a superstar, a major cultural phenomenon, which is why Decca Records is cashing in by releasing not only the soundtrack to the documentary film but also a new 3-CD compilation of Pavarotti’s best singing.

It’s all so curious, especially if you compare Pavarotti’s artistic accomplishments against those of, say, Placido Domingo.

Pavarotti couldn’t read music.

He couldn’t act very convincingly.

The roles he learned were relatively limited in number.

He made major personal and professional missteps.

Yet we remain deeply drawn to Pavarotti.

Why?

It certainly has to do with his extraordinary voice, the tone and power of which could make your neck hairs stand on end, give you goosebumps, bring tears to your eyes and make you sob out loud.

Just listen to his singing of Puccini’s “Nessun dorma,” the crowd-pleasing signature aria from “Turandot” that Pavarotti performed over and over again in concerts, operas and at the famous “Three Tenors” stadium concerts. (You can hear it in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

But there is more to Pavarotti as a cultural phenomenon, much more, that tells us about ourselves and about the appeal of opera in general.

Without question, the best cultural analysis of Luciano Pavarotti that The Ear has ever seen or heard came recently from the critic Zachary Woolfe in The New York Times.

As Woolfe deconstructs “this hulking, sweaty man with stringy hair, a patchy beard and an unforgettable sound,” you learn much about the popular appeal – both high and low — of opera as well as the commercial and artistic appeal of Pavarotti.

Here is a link to Woolfe’s “Critic’s Notebook” analysis, which is well worth reading on its own or either before or after you see the new film.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/03/arts/music/pavarotti-ron-howard.html

And here is the official trailer for the film, with comments from many of his colleagues, which gets mixed reviews:

What do you think of Zachary Woolfe’s analysis of Pavarotti?

Why do you think the singer was so popular?

What is your favorite performance of his?

And if you saw the film, what did you think of it? Do you recommend seeing it?

Classical music: Mozart masterfully melds the emotional and the intellectual, says maestro Gary Thor Wedow, who will conduct two performances of “The Magic Flute” this weekend for the Madison Opera. Here is Part 1 of his two-part interview with The Ear

April 18, 2017
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By Jacob Stockinger

The Madison Opera will stage Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s The Magic Flute this Friday night, April 21 at 8 p.m. and Sunday afternoon, April 23, at 2:30 p.m. in Overture Hall. (Production photos are courtesy of the Arizona Opera, from which the Madison Opera got its sets and costumes.)

Here are an introduction and some details, courtesy of the Madison Opera:

Written in the last year of his life, Mozart’s opera is part fairy tale, part adventure story, and is filled with enchantment.

Set in a fairy-tale world of day and night, the opera follows Prince Tamino and the bird-catcher Papageno as they embark on a mission to rescue Pamina, the daughter of the Queen of the Night. Pamina had been kidnapped by Sarastro, the leader of a religious order. But it turns out that exactly who is “good” and who is “evil” is not always what it appears.

Along the way to happily-ever-after, Pamina, Tamino and Papageno face many challenges, but are assisted by a magic flute, magic bells, a trio of guiding spirits and their own clear-eyed sense of right and wrong.

“The Magic Flute has been beloved around the world since its 1791 premiere,” says Kathryn Smith (below in a photo by James Gill), Madison Opera’s general director. “It has been called a fairy tale for both adults and children, with a story that works on many levels, all set to Mozart’s glorious music. I’m so delighted to be sharing it again with Madison, with an incredible cast, director and conductor.”

The opera runs about 2 hours and 45 minutes with one intermission.

Tickets are $18 to $130.

“The Magic Flute” will be sung in German with English supertitles.

For more about the production and cast, go to:

http://www.madisonopera.org/performances-2016-2017/the-magic-flute/

And also go to:

http://www.madisonopera.org/performances-2016-2017/the-magic-flute/cast/

Dan Rigazzi, who has been on the directing staff at the Metropolitan Opera for 10 years, makes his Madison Opera debut with this beautiful production that incorporates some steampunk elements into its fairy-tale setting.

Gary Thor Wedow, a renowned Mozart conductor, makes his mainstage debut with this opera, after having conducted Opera in the Park in 2016 and 2012.

Conductor Wedow (below) recently agreed to do an email Q&A with The Ear:

Could you briefly introduce yourself to readers?

Hello! I’m an American conductor, born in LaPorte, Indiana. A faculty member at The Juilliard School, I spend a lot of time with music of the 18th century — Handel and Mozart and often earlier, like Monteverdi, Purcell and Cavalli. But I conduct everything and grew up in love with the Romantics. I’ve also always done a lot of contemporary music. I love it all.

Mozart’s music sounds so clear and easy or simple, but the reality is quite different, musicians say. What do you strive for and what qualities do you think make for great Mozart playing?

Mozart engages both the brain and the heart. He challenges your intellect with amazing feats of counterpoint, orchestration and structure while tugging at your heart, all the time pulling you along in a deep drama.

Mozart was an Italian melodist with a German contrapuntal, harmonic engine – like an incredible automobile with an Italian slick body and a German motor.

Do you share the view that opera is central to Mozart’s music, even to his solo, chamber and ensemble instrumental music? How so? What is special or unique to Mozart’s operas, and to this opera in particular?

From all accounts, Mozart (below, in his final year) was a huge personality who was full of life and a keen observer of the human condition; his letters are full of astute, often merciless and sometimes loving evaluations of family, colleagues and patrons.

Mozart’s music speaks of the human condition: its passions, loves and hopes— no matter what genre. His music is innately dramatic and primal, going immediately to the most basic and universal human emotions with breathtaking nuance, variety and depth. (You can hear the Overture to “The Magic Flute,” performed by the Metropolitan Opera orchestra under James Levine, in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

Tomorrow: Tricks to conducting Mozart and what to pay special attention to in this production of The Magic Flute.

Posted in Classical music
Tags: adult, adventure, American, Arizona, Arizona Opera, Arts, Baroque, bells, body, Brain, car, cast, Cavalli, Chamber music, children, choral music, Classical music, colleagues, conductor, contemporary music, costumes, counterpoint, Dan Rigazzi, debut, depth, director, email, emotion, enchantment, engine, English, English Baroque Soloists, evil, fairy tale, Family, Gary Thor Wedow, George Frideric Handel, German, good, heart, human condition, Indiana, intellectual, interview, Italian, Jacob Stockinger, James Levine, Juilliard School, kidnapped, letters, Love, Madison Opera, Madison Symphony Orchestra, Metropolitan Opera, mission, Monteverdi, Mozart, Music, New Music, nuance, opera, Opera in the Park, Orchestra, orchestration, Overture Center, premiere, primal, Purcell, rescue, right, Romantic, sets, solo, spirit, steam-punk, steampunk, stream-punk, structure, symphony, the Met, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, variety, vocal music, Wisconsin, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, wrong, YouTube

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