The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: Prize-winning harpsichordist Joseph Gascho will perform J.S. Bach, C.P.E. Bach, Scarlatti and Rameau this Saturday night
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By Jacob Stockinger
Joseph Gascho will give the Fourth Annual Mark Rosa Harpsichord Recital at 7:30 p.m. this Saturday night, Feb. 24, in the Landmark Auditorium of the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive.
Gascho (below), who won the Jurow International Harpsichord Competition in 2002, will perform works by Johann Sebastian Bach, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Domenico Scarlatti and Jean-Philippe Rameau. (Except for the three-part “Ricercar” from J.S. Bach’s “The Musical Offering” — heard in the YouTube video at the bottom — no specific works have been mentioned.)
The featured instrument is the elegant 18th-century style French double-manual harpsichord made by Mark Rosa in Madison in 1979.
Admission is at the door: $20 for the genera public, $10 for seniors and students.
In 2014, Gascho joined the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre and Dance in 2014 as an assistant professor. Gascho enjoys a multi-faceted career as a solo and collaborative keyboardist, conductor, teacher and recording producer.
Featuring his own transcriptions of Bach, Handel, and Charpentier, his recent debut solo recording was praised in the American Record Guide for “bristling with sparking articulation, subtle but highly effective rubato, and other kinds of musical timing, and an enviable understanding of the various national styles of 17th and 18th century harpsichord music.”
As a student of Webb Wiggins and Arthur Haas, he earned masters and doctoral degrees in harpsichord from the Peabody Conservatory and the University of Maryland, where he also studied orchestral conducting with James Ross.
Recent highlights include performing with the National Symphony at Carnegie Hall, the Mark Morris Dance Group and the Kennedy Center Opera Orchestra, and conducting Mozart’s “Idomeneo” for the Maryland Opera Studio. He has also conducted numerous operas from Monteverdi to Mozart for Opera Vivente.
At the Oberlin Conservatory’s Baroque Performance Institute, Gascho conducts the student orchestra, coaches chamber music, and teaches basso continuo. A strong proponent of technology in the arts, he has used computer-assisted techniques in opera productions, in a recent recording with the ensemble Harmonious Blacksmith and percussionist Glen Velez, and in his continuo classes.
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Classical music: Is Prokofiev more Romantic than modernist? Hear for yourself at the concert Friday night by the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra and violinist Giora Schmidt. Plus, the UW Symphony Orchestra performs a FREE concert Thursday night
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ALERTS: This Thursday night at 7:30 p.m. in Mills Hall, the UW-Madison Symphony Orchestra will perform a FREE concert under the baton of alumnus and guest conductor Mikko Rankin Utevsky, the founder and director of the Madison Area Youth Chamber Orchestra (MAYCO). The program features the Symphony No. 5 by Franz Schubert; “Entr’acte” by Caroline Shaw; and the “Holberg Suite” by Edvard Grieg.
The week’s FREE Friday Noon Musicale at the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive, features guitarist Steve Waugh and flutist Sridhar Bagavathula playing music by Frederic Chopin, Heitor Villa-Lobos, Astor Piazzolla, Francisco Tarrega, Francois Morel and Jerome Kern. The concert runs from 12:15 to 1 p.m.
By Jacob Stockinger
Sometimes the frame helps to define the picture, to reveal or at least reinforce the picture’s meaning.
Such is the case with this Friday night’s appealing and stand-out concert by the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra with conductor Andrew Sewell and Israeli violin soloist Giora Schmidt (below, in a photo by David Getzschman).
The concert is at 7:30 p.m. in The Capitol Theater of the Overture Center, 201 State Street.
Tickets are $15-$80 with student tickets available for $10. For more information about the performers and the program, as well as how to obtain tickets, go to: https://wisconsinchamberorchestra.org/performances/masterworks-ii-3/
The program features the “Petite Symphonie” (Small Symphony) for winds by the Romantic French composer Charles Gounod (below), who is much better known for and more often performed for his operas “Faust” and “Romeo and Juliet.”
Then there is the melodic, popular and often performed Serenade for Strings by the Russian arch-Romantic Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (below). Like so much Tchaikovsky – both his Piano Concerto No. 1 and his Violin Concerto, now staples of the repertoire, were deemed unplayable when first composed – the Serenade can sound less challenging than it really is.
In between comes a modern masterpiece that The Ear is especially fond of: The Violin Concerto No. 2 in G minor by the Soviet composer Sergei Prokofiev (below).
And that is where it gets especially interesting.
Prokofiev is often lumped together with his Russian contemporary Dmitri Shostakovich (below). Both were virtuoso pianists. Both faced hardships from the Soviet dictator Josef Stalin. And while it is true that some of Prokofiev’s music shares a certain spikiness as well as harmonic darkness and dissonance with that of his contemporary, the pairing can be misleading.
To The Ear, much more — maybe even most — of Prokofiev’s music shares a lot more with the late Russian Romantics, including Tchaikovsky and Sergei Rachmaninoff. Roughly and with some exceptions, he sees Prokofiev as modern Russia’s Mozart for his melodic clarity, and Shostakovich as modern Russia’s Beethoven for his harmonic thickness.
The Ear doesn’t know if that same point is intended and was in mind when maestro Andrew Sewell (below) set up the concert, but he suspects it was because Sewell is a canny and intelligent programmer.
But intentional or not, no matter: the point stands.
If a single moment offers proof, The Ear would single out the opening of the slow movement of the Prokofiev concerto.
It has a beautiful melodic line, moving harmonies and a hypnotic clock-like rhythm to a theme-and-variation development that sounds unmistakably modern but accessibly modern in the same way that the never-fail Violin Concerto by the American composer Samuel Barber does.
You can hear the second movement in a YouTube video at the bottom and make up your own mind. It is performed by the way by the great David Oistrakh for whom Prokofiev composed the concerto.
Suffice it to say that The Ear has never heard that movement without the little hairs on the back of his neck standing up, much like happens with the famous 18th Variation in Rachmaninoff’s “Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini” or the opening of the first and second movements of the Barber Violin Concerto.
If you know that music by Prokofiev, you will be happy you hear it again. And if you don’t already know it, you will be forever grateful to have made its acquaintance.
Anyway, The Ear will assume that the programming was deliberate and establishes for the audience a context for the Prokofiev, which is the most important and substantial work on the program.
And Giora Schmidt (below),k who is making his Madison debut, certainly sounds like the kind of virtuoso who will do justice to the work. Just read the critics’ raves on his website:
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Classical music: Madison Opera will stage its first-ever production of Mozart’s “The Abduction from the Seraglio” this Friday night and Sunday afternoon
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By Jacob Stockinger
This weekend, the Madison Opera presents The Abduction from the Seraglio by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart on Friday, Feb. 9, at 8 p.m. and Sunday, Feb. 11, at 2:30 p.m. in the Capitol Theater at the Overture Center for the Arts, 201 State Street.
According to a press release, the opera — below is a mock-up of the locally designed and constructed set — will be sung in German with English used for dialogue and in the translated supertitles above the stage. Running time is about 2-1/2 hours with one intermission.
Tickets are $25-$114 with student and group discounts available. Call the Overture Box Office at (608) 258-4141 or visit www.madisonopera.org
With some of the most virtuosic vocal writing by Mozart (below), the opera is an adventure story of love, danger, humor and humanity.
Set in the 17th-century Ottoman Empire, the opera begins when Belmonte, a Spanish nobleman, arrives at Pasha Selim’s palace to rescue three people who had been captured during a shipwreck: his fiancée, Konstanze, and their servants, Blonde and Pedrillo.
A simple escape proves no easy task, and Mozart’s masterpiece weaves together comedy, quiet reflection and youthful optimism, with a happy ending brought about by an Enlightened ruler.
“Abduction is a simply marvelous opera,” says Kathryn Smith (below, in a photo by James Gill), Madison Opera’s general director who will give free pre-performance talks in the third-floor Wisconsin Studio at 7 p.m. on Friday night and 1:30 p.m. on Sunday afternoon. “It’s the opera with which Mozart started to reinvent opera, with not only the expected arias, but also brilliant ensemble work. The very real humanity of the piece – its funny parts, its moving parts and the universal truth of the ending – is extraordinary.”
The Abduction from the Seraglio (Die Entführung aus dem Serail) was Mozart’s first major success. Written for the National Singspiel in Vienna – a pet project of Emperor Joseph II – it premiered in 1782 and was an immediate hit. (You can hear the familiar and captivating Overture in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Like all singspiels, the opera uses spoken dialogue; indeed, the critical role of Pasha Selim is entirely spoken, perhaps one of the few instances of a major opera character not singing a note. In Madison, the dialogue will be performed in English, with the music sung in German (with projected English translations).
With a libretto by Johann Gottlieb Stephanie the Younger – an unauthorized adaptation of a libretto by Christoph Friedrich Breztner – Abduction was one the first successful German-language operas.
It was immortalized in the film Amadeus, and is famous for a possibly apocryphal story in which Emperor Joseph II criticized the work, saying to Mozart, “Too many notes,” and Mozart responded, “Exactly as many as needed.”
Abduction would go on to become Mozart’s most popular opera during his lifetime, but it has been a comparative rarity in the United States. This is Madison Opera’s first production of the opera in the company’s 57-year history.
“Mozart’s music for Abduction is a delight from start to finish,” says John DeMain (below, in a photo by Prasad), Madison Opera’s artistic director and conductor. “Great – and at times excitingly challenging – arias are enhanced by beautiful duets, trios and quartets. It has always been a favorite opera of mine, and I’m so looking forward to Madison Opera’s first production of this masterpiece with an absolutely knockout cast of great young singers.”
Mozart’s phenomenal vocal writing requires a strong team of five singers, and Madison Opera’s cast features a number of returning favorites.
Amanda Woodbury (below) sings the Spanish noblewoman Konstanze, whose aria “Martern aller Arten” is one of the most challenging arias ever written. Woodbury debuted with Madison Opera as Pamina in The Magic Flute last spring, and has recently sung leading roles for the Metropolitan Opera and Los Angeles Opera.
Tenor David Walton (below) sings Belmonte, Konstanze’s fiancé; he debuted at Opera in the Park this past summer, has sung many leading roles for Minnesota Opera, and sings at the Glimmerglass Festival this summer.
Matt Boehler (below) returns as Osmin, the palace overseer with some devilishly low bass notes. He sang Rocco in Fidelio and Leporello in Don Giovanni for Madison Opera, and more recently has sung with Minnesota Opera, Opera Philadelphia, and the Canadian Opera Company.
Konstanze and Belmonte’s servants, Blonde and Pedrillo, are sung by Ashly Neumann(below top) in her Madison Opera debut and Wisconsin native Eric Neuville (below bottom), who sang Laurie in Little Women for Madison Opera.
Alison Mortiz (below) directs this new production in her debut with Madison Opera. Moritz has directed at opera companies around the United States, including Central City Opera, Tulsa Opera and Tri-Cities Opera.
The sets and costumes (below) are locally made specifically for this production.
The scenery and lighting are designed by Anshuman Bhatia, also in his Madison Opera debut, with costumes designed by Karen Brown-Larimore. As always, the opera features the Madison Opera Chorus and the Madison Symphony Orchestra.
Madison Opera’s production of The Abduction from the Seraglio is sponsored by Kay and Martin Barrett, Fran Klos, Sally and Mike Miley, and the Wisconsin Arts Board.
Tags: "Amadeus", #LudwigVanBeethoven, #MadisonOpera, #MadisonSymphonyOrchestra, #MetropolitanOpera, #MinnesotaOpera, #OperaInThePark, #TheMet, #UnitedStates, #WolfgangAmadeusMozart, Abduction From the Seraglio, adventure, afternoon, Alison Mortiz, America, aria, Artistic director, Arts, bass, Beethoven, Canada, Canadian Opera Company, Capitol, captivating, cast, character, choral music, chorus, cinema, Classical music, comedy, conductor, construct, danger, debut, design, Devil, dialogue, director, Don Giovanni, duet, Emperor, empire, ending, English, enlightenend, Enlightenment, ensemble, escape, familiar, festival, fiancee, Fidelio, film, Friday, funny, General director, German, Glimmerglass, group, happy', humanity, Humor, intermission, Jacob Stockinger, John DeMain, Kathryn Smith, language, libretto, lighting, Little Women, local, Los Angeles, Los Angeles Opera, Love, low, Madison, Madison Opera, Madison Symphony Orchestra, masterpiece, Metropolitan Opera, Minnesota Opera, movie, Mozart, Music, native, New York City, night, nobleman, noblewoman, notes, opera, Opera Philadelphia, optimism, Orchestra, Ottoman, Ottoman Empire, Overture, Overture Center, People, popular, premiere, press, press release, production, Quartet, quiet, rarity, reflection, rescue, ruler, running time, scenery, servant, set, sets, shipwreck, singer, singspiel, Spanish, spoken, stage, story, Student, success, Sunday, supertitle, surtitle, team, The Magic Flute, the Met, theater, ticket, translation, trio, truth, United States, universal, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Vienna, virtuoso, vocal music, Wisconsin, Wisconsin Arts Board, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, work, writing, young, youthful, YouTube
Classical music: Acclaimed violinist Gil Shaham debuts here this weekend in an all-Russian program with the Madison Symphony Orchestra
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By Jacob Stockinger
This weekend, the Madison Symphony Orchestra (below) performs three concerts that include the long-awaited Madison debut of violin virtuoso Gil Shaham. MSO music director John DeMain will conduct.
The all-Russian program features works by three of the most popular and beloved Russian composers of all time: the Suite from “The Love for Three Oranges” by Sergei Prokofiev; the Symphony No. 3 in A minor by Sergei Rachmaninoff; and the Violin Concerto in D Major by Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky.
The concerts are in Overture Hall at the Overture Center, 201 State Street, on this Friday, Jan. 19, at 7:30 p.m.; Saturday, Jan. 20, at 8 p.m.; and Sunday, Jan. 21, at 2:30 p.m.
(See below for ticket information.).
“Our January concerts feature a number of significant firsts,” says MSO music director John DeMain (below, in a photo by Prasad).
“Most important is the Madison Symphony Orchestra debut of one of the world’s premier violinists, Gil Shaham. We have sought out Mr. Shaham for many seasons, and we are thrilled his international schedule aligned with ours this year. His offer to play the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto led me into creating another one of my all-Russian programs.
“From Prokofiev, we open the concert with MSO’s first performance in nearly 40 years of his Suite from his opera, The Love of Three Oranges. This will also be our first-ever performance of Rachmaninoff’s Third Symphony.”
“The Love for Three Oranges” Suite by Sergei Prokofiev (below) is based on a satirical opera commissioned during the composer’s first visit to the United States in 1918.
“The suite is composed in six parts and follows the story of a prince that is cursed to love three oranges, roaming the Earth searching for them. When he finds the oranges and peels them, each discloses a beautiful princess inside. The first two princesses to emerge die, but the third and most beautiful is saved, and she and the Prince live happily ever after.
“The Violin Concerto by Peter Ilych Tchaikovsky (below) is one of the best-known violin concertos in the repertoire and is considered one of the most technically difficult works ever written for the violin. The concerto was written in 1878 as Tchaikovsky ended his marriage to Antonina Milyukova, a marriage that lasted only three months.”
Declared “the outstanding American violinist of his generation” by Time magazine, Gil Shaham is one of the foremost violinists of our time: his flawless technique combined with his inimitable warmth and generosity of spirit has solidified his renown as an American master.
Grammy Award-winner Shaham (below), also named Musical America’s “Instrumentalist of the Year,” is sought after throughout the world for concerto appearances with leading orchestras and conductors, and regularly gives recitals and appears with ensembles on the world’s great concert stages and at the most prestigious festivals. (You can hear Gil Shaham rehearsing the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto last month in Paris in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
In his Symphony No. 3, Sergei Rachmaninoff’s melodic outline and rhythm characterize what is believed to be his most expressively Russian symphony, particularly in the dance rhythms of the finale.
Composed between 1935 and 1936, this was the last symphony Rachmaninoff (below) would create, with an orchestration more transparent than that of his previous symphonies.
One hour before each performance, Randal Swiggum (below), artistic director of the Elgin Youth Symphony Orchestra and interim director of the Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras (WYSO), will lead a 30-minute Prelude Discussion in Overture Hall to enhance concertgoers’ understanding and listening experience.
For more background on the music, please read the Program Notes by MSO trombonist and UW-Whitewater professor J. Michael Allsen (below, in photo by Katrin Talbot) at: http://www.allsenmusic.com/NOTES/1718/5.Jan18.html
NOTE: The MSO recommends that concert attendees ARRIVE EARLY for each performance to make sure they have time to pass through Overture Center’s security stations, and so they can experience the pre-concert talk, which is free for all ticket-holders.
TICKET INFORMATION
Single Tickets are $18-$90 each and are on sale http://www.overture.org/events/gil-shaham-plays-tchaikovsky, through the Overture Center Box Office at 201 State Street, or by calling the Box Office at (608) 258-4141.
Groups of 15 or more can save 25% by calling the MSO office at (608) 257-3734.
For more information, visit: https://www.madisonsymphony.org/groups.
Student rush tickets can be purchased in person on the day of the concert at the Overture Center Box Office at 201 State Street. Students must show a valid student ID and can receive up to two $12 or $18 tickets.
More information is at: https://www.madisonsymphony.org/studentrush
Seniors age 62 and up receive 20% savings on advance and day-of-concert ticket purchases in select areas of the hall.
Discounted seats are subject to availability, and discounts may not be combined.
Major funding for the January concerts is provided by the Irving and Dorothy Levy Family Foundation, Inc., Kenneth A. Lattman Foundation, Inc., Marilyn and Jim Ebben, Dr. Stanley and Shirley Inhorn, Kato L. Perlman, and Cyrena and Lee Pondrom. Additional funding provided by James and Joan Johnston, von Briesen & Roper, S.C., and the Wisconsin Arts Board with funds from the State of Wisconsin and the National Endowment for the Arts.
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Classical music: Free percussion, orchestral and wind music is on tap at the UW-Madison this weekend. Plus, the Edgewood Chamber Orchestra performs on Sunday afternoon
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ALERT: This Sunday, at 2:30 p.m. in the St. Joseph Chapel, 1000 Edgewood College Drive, the Edgewood Chamber Orchestra will perform its fall concert. General admission is $5; free with Edgewood College ID.
The program, conducted by Blake Walter (below), features Franz Schubert’s Overture in the Italian Style, Set 1 of Ottorino Respighi’s “Ancient Airs and Dances,” and the Symphony No. 92 by Franz Joseph Haydn.
By Jacob Stockinger
It is another very busy weekend for classical music in Madison, as the past week of preview postings has shown.
But two concerts, with a substantial offering of modern and new music, are especially noteworthy at the UW-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music.
TONIGHT
At 8 p.m. tonight in Mills Hall, UW percussionist Anthony Di Sanza will perform works by the Danish composer Per Norgard and the American composer Elliot Cole. No specific titles were given.
SATURDAY
At 8 p.m. in Mills Hall, the UW Symphony Orchestra (below top), under its new director Chad Hutchinson (below bottom), will perform a free concert, with a pre-concert lecture by Hutchinson at 7:30 p.m.
The program features a contemporary American composer and work, “Dreamtime Ancestors” by Chris Theofanidis (below top) and the Symphony No. 1 “Titan” by Gustav Mahler. (You can hear composer Christopher Theofanidis discuss “Dreamtime Ancestors” in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
It is an impressive ensemble and conductor, which you can read about in The Ear’s review of Hutchinson’s debut:
SUNDAY
At 3 p.m. in Mills Hall, the Wingra Wind Quintet will perform a FREE concert of music by Richard Strauss, Theodor Blumer, Lalo Schifrin, Elliott Carter and Luciano Berio. (Below are two of the newer Wingra members, clarinetist Alicia Lee and oboist Aaron Hill.)
For specific works and more background, go to:
http://www.music.wisc.edu/event/wingra-wind-quintet-2/
Tags: Aaron Hill, air, Alicia Lee, American, ancient, Ancient Airs and Dances, Arts, Blake Walter, blog, Chad Hutchinson, Chamber music, chamber orchestra, Christopher Theofanidis, clarinet, Classical, Classical music, composer, conductor, dance, Danish, debut, Denmark, Dreamtime Ancestors, Edgewood Chamber Orchestra, Edgewood College, Elliot Cole, Elliott Carter, ensemble, Franz Schubert, Haydn, Italian, Jacob Stockinger, Jazz, Lalo Schiffrin, lecture, Luciano Berio, Madison, Mahler, modern, Mozart, Music, New Music, Oboe, Orchestra, Overture, Per Norgard, percussion, percussionist, posting, quintet, recital, Respighi, review, Richard Strauss, style, symphony, Theodor Blumer, Titan, tonight, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, UW Symphony, Viola, Violin, winds, wingra, Wingra Wind Quintet, Wisconsin, YouTube
Classical music: The Madison Opera stages Bizet’s “Carmen” this Friday night and Sunday afternoon
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By Jacob Stockinger
The Madison Opera will perform Georges Bizet’s “Carmen” this Friday night, Nov. 3, at 8 p.m. and Sunday afternoon, Nov. 5, at 2:30 p.m. in Overture Hall at the Overture Center, 201 State Street. (Below is the set from the Lyric Opera of Kansas City that is being used for the production.)
Tickets are $18-$130. (See below for details.)
With some of the most famous music in opera, Bizet’s passionate work is a vivid story of love, jealousy and betrayal.
Set in 19th-century Seville, Spain, the opera follows a gypsy determined to live life on her own terms – whatever her fate may be.
On a break from her shift at the cigarette factory, Carmen tosses a flower at a corporal named Don José, who ignores her advances. Only after Carmen is arrested and placed in José’s custody does he begin to fall for her, breaking the law and abandoning his hometown sweetheart.
What follows is a torrid love affair of passion, agonizing rage, and fanatical desire that will change their lives forever.
“Carmen is the reason I run an opera company,” says Kathryn Smith, Madison Opera’s general director (below, in a photo by James Gill). “I fell in love with opera as a teenager in the children’s chorus of a ‘Carmen’ production, as its incredible score and intense story hooked me immediately – not to mention the sheer excitement of having principal artists, chorus, children’s chorus, dancers, and orchestra all come together to create this astonishing world. I am so delighted to produce ‘Carmen’ in Madison, with this spectacular cast and production team.”
At the premiere of “Carmen” in Paris on March 3, 1875, audiences were shocked at its characters’ apparent lack of morality and virtue, and critics derided Bizet’s music. (You can hear the ever-popular Toreador Song in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Three months after the opera’s premiere, Bizet died of heart disease. He was only 36 years old and would never know that his “flop” of an opera would become a global sensation over the next two centuries.
“Carmen was the first opera I saw as a young teenager,” remembers Madison Opera’s artistic director John DeMain (below, in a photo by Prasad). “It should be everyone’s first opera. It is the perfect blend of musical theater and grand opera, with thrilling choruses, great tunes from start to finish, and a compelling story of ill-fated love. And then there is Carmen herself, one of the most alluring characters of all time. I love conducting this great opera, which is so gorgeously orchestrated.”
Madison Opera’s cast features both returning artists and debuts. Making her debut in the title role is Aleks Romano (below), a rising young singer whom Opera News recently praised for her “attractively smoky mezzo-soprano.”
Acclaimed tenor Sean Panikkar (below) makes his role debut as Don José. He debuted with Madison Opera at Opera in the Park 2014, but this is his first mainstage appearance with the company.
Also returning to Madison Opera are Cecilia Violetta López (below top) as José’s hometown sweetheart Micaëla and Corey Crider (below bottom) as the toreador Escamillo. López debuted at this past summer’s Opera in the Park; Crider sang the title role in “Sweeney Todd” with Madison Opera in 2015.
Thomas Forde (below), who most recently sang Luther/Crespel in Madison Opera’s “The Tales of Hoffman,” returns to play José’s commanding officer, Zuniga.
Studio artists Anna Polum and Megan Le Romero play Carmen’s friends Frasquita and Mercedes. Studio Artist Benjamin Liupaogo and Wisconsin native Erik Earl Larson play the smugglers, Remendado and Dancaïre. Rounding out the cast is Charles Eaton in his debut as Morales. (Many have ties to the opera program at the UW-Madison.)
Directing this traditional staging is E. Loren Meeker (below) in her first production for Madison Opera. Meeker has directed at opera companies around the United States, including Lyric Opera of Chicago, Washington National Opera, the Glimmerglass Festival and Wolf Trap Opera.
“A piece like Carmen captures our imagination and begs to be re-told over the centuries because the characters speak to the deepest and most honest parts of human nature,” says Meeker. “Today we grapple with love, lust, jealousy, morality, honor, and freedom just as much as people did when this opera premiered in 1875.
“At Madison Opera we have a brilliant cast who is willing to unravel the mystery of these characters with me scene by scene – making each choice onstage new, fresh, and true to the characters and arch of the story.
“Bringing this vivid world to life set to some of the most rich and well known music in the operatic canon, plus the fun of working with dancers, a fight director, the Madison Youth Choir, and a large adult chorus challenges me and inspires me all at the same time. The energy created in the performance, the brilliant music sung by such amazing artists, makes this classic opera worth seeing again and again and again.”
Carmen is a truly grand opera and features the Madison Opera Chorus, led by chorusmaster Anthony Cao (below); members of the Madison Youth Choirs; the Madison Symphony Orchestra; and dancers from Tania Tandias Flamenco and Spanish Dance.
For more information about the cast, go to:
http://www.madisonopera.org/performances-2017-2018/carmen/cast/
For informative and entertaining Q&As with the cast members, go to the Madison Opera’s Blogspot:
http://madisonopera.blogspot.com
For tickets, call the Overture Center box office at (608) 258-4141 or go to:
http://www.overture.org/events/madison-opera
Tags: advances, affair, agony, America, arrest, arrested, artist, Artistic director, Arts, astonishing, audience, betrayal, Bizet, blog, box office, Carmen, cast, century, character, children, Choir, choral music, chorus, cigarette, city, Classical music, command, commanding officer, compelling, composer, corporal, critic, custody, dance, dancer, death, debut, desire, die, director, Disease, E. Loren Meeker, factory, fanatic, fanatical, fate, festival, film scores, Flamenco, flop, flower, forever, freedom, general, General director, Glimmerglass, global, globe, great, gypsy, heart, heart disease, hometown, honor, immorality, intense, Jacob Stockinger, jealousy, John DeMain, Kansas, Kansas Lyric Opera, Kathryn Smith, law, live, love affair, lust, lyric, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Madison, Madison Opera, Madison Opera Chorus, Madison Symphony Orchestra, Madison Youth Choirs, Mezzo-soprano, morality, Music, Musical theater, officer, opera, Opera in the Park, Orchestra, Overture Center, Paris, Passion, passionate, premiere, production, Q&A, rage, role, score, sensation, set, Seville, shock, singer, song, Spain, Spanish, spectacular, stage, story, struggle, Sweeney Todd, sweetheart, symphony, Tales of Hoffmann, Tania Tandias, team, teenager, tenor, theater, thrill, thrilling, ticket, title, Toreador song, torrid, tune, U.S., United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, virtue, vivid, vocal music, Washington National Opera, Wisconsin, Wolftrap Opera, Youth, YouTube
Classical music: New faculty conductor Chad Hutchinson makes an impressive and promising debut with the UW Symphony Orchestra
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By Jacob Stockinger
Last Saturday night, Chad Hutchinson (below), the new faculty conductor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music, made an impressive and promising debut with the UW Symphony Orchestra.
The ambitious program that Hutchinson put together says a lot about his priorities and instincts, and about his confidence in himself and the abilities of his student players, who performed superbly.
The varied works came from the early 19th century, the mid-19th century, the early 20th century and the 21st century. And it seemed that each piece in the ambitious program was chosen to put the spotlight on a different section – percussion, brass, strings and winds.
Curiously, The Ear found the most successful pieces were the most traditional ones.
The Prelude to the opera “Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg” by Richard Wagner received the right mix of horn pomp and string zest. It made The Ear realize again how much more he prefers Wagner’s instrumental music to his vocal music. Let’s hear more Wagner preludes, since we are unlikely to hear more Wagner operas.
The orchestral transcription by Leopold Stokowski (below) of the piano prelude “The Sunken Cathedral” by Claude Debussy was the least successful work of the night. This is the second overblown and bombastic Stokowski transcription that The Ear has heard performed live in a month.
Clearly, Stokowski’s aesthetic was Bigger is Better. This particular transcription strips away the mystery, sensuality and subtlety, the watery softness, of the original. It works more as an etude for orchestra than as an authentic expression of Impressionism. The Ear’s objections are to the transcription, not to the performance, which was well voiced, precise and tightly controlled.
“Mothership” by the popular American composer Mason Bates (below), who wrote the recent successful opera based on the life of the late Apple guru Steve Jobs, proved an interesting foray into contemporary music culture. It was also the Madison premiere of the 2011 work.
The electronic music in the pulsating and highly atmospheric score, including the computer-generated disco dance beat, highlighted the percussion section and the UW’s new Electro-Acoustic Research Space (EARS), which collaborated with the symphony orchestra.
The dramatic work, a novelty that is pop-infused and resembles music by John Adams a little too closely, has its pleasing and engaging moments. But overall it seems a triumph of style over substance. (You can judge for yourself from the performance with Michael Tilson Thomas in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
That said, Hutchinson nonetheless held the complex and coordinated score together, and the young audience seemed to take to the new music — a major achievement in itself.
Expect to hear many more contemporary works from Hutchinson, who says he is an unabashed champion of new music. He will include other living composers in many other concerts, including the next one on Nov. 4 and then again on Feb. 22.
To these ears, the most impressive performance came in the Symphony No. 3 “Eroica” by Ludwig van Beethoven. In its day, the difficult and long work proved revolutionary and perplexing. More recently, more than 100 conductors named it the best symphony ever written. You can’t get more establishment than that.
Yet despite being so mainstream, the “Eroica” remains a difficult and challenging work, both technically and interpretively. And this performance succeeded on both counts. That is no small feat for a new conductor and his young students to pull off in the first six weeks of school.
Especially impressive was Hutchinson’s choice to skip any pause between the third movement and the finale. It worked dramatically to maintain momentum. Such exciting attacks should be a more common practice in performing symphonies and concertos as well as chamber music.
Hutchinson seems a congenial and humorous concert hall host. His pre-concert talk (below), which he is slated to do at all performances, was helpful and informative, even if he repeated some major points when he introduced the actual performances. Hutchinson, intent on expanding the audience for classical music, is worth listening to.
Hutchinson may not possess an especially graceful or fluid podium presence that is pleasing to watch, but he gets results. Certainly both the student players and the large audience (below) seemed pleased and excited by these performances.
In the end, the concert provided plenty of reasons to look forward to hearing more from Chad Hutchinson and seeing how he develops and leaves his mark on programming and performing at the UW.
Were you there as either a performer or an audience member?
What did you think of the concert and of Chad Hutchinson’s debut?
The Ear wants to hear.
Tags: 19th century, 20th-century, 21st century, aesthetic, African American, air, Apple, arrangament, Arts, attack, audience, Beat, Beethoven, brass, Cello, century, Chamber music, champion, Classical music, composer, computer, concert hall, concerto, conduct, conductor, contemporary, control, culture, Debussy, debut, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, disco, egg, electronic, Electronic music, Eroica Symphony, esthetic, etude, excitement, exciting, expression, faculty, fance, finale, guru, hi tech, Horn, host, Impressionism, Impressionist, impressive, instrument, instrumental, interpretation, Jacob Stockinger, lecture, live, living, Ludwig van Beethoven, Madison, Mason Bates, Mead Witter School of Music, Michael Tilson Thomas, Mothership, movement, Music, musical, mystery, New Music, novel, opera, operatic, Orchestra, original, percussion, performer, Piano, podium, pomp, Prelude, premiere, professor, program, programming, promising, revolution, revolutionary, Richard Wagner, school, soufflé, Steve Jobs, Stokowski, string, strings, subtlety, symphony, talk, technology, The Sunken Cathedral, transcription, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, UW Symphony Orchestra, Viola, Violin, vocal, vocal music, water, winds, YouTube, zest
Classical music: What composers and what pieces give you shelter and sanctuary during troubled times?
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By Jacob Stockinger
A week ago, The Ear went to the inspired all-Mozart program given by the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Pro Arte Quartet with guest cellist Jean-Michel Fonteneau (below center) and guest clarinetist Alicia Lee (below right), who was making her debut as a new UW faculty member.
He expected a fine performance and he was not disappointed. Indeed, he shares the same very positive reactions that critic John W. Barker expressed in his review for this blog. Here is a link to that review:
But something else happened too.
The sublime music of Mozart (below) – especially the Larghetto slow second movement of the late Clarinet Quintet, K. 581, but also the other movements and the String Quartet in G Major, K. 387 -– took The Ear into another world, into a parenthesis in time.
(You can hear a live performance in Japan by Yo-Yo Ma and others in the Larghetto movement, plus the rest of the Clarinet Quintet, in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
For a brief time – perhaps a total of about 80 or 90 minutes – The Ear was totally transported. He temporarily blocked out the political strife in Washington, D.C. and the Trump White House; the government turmoil here in Madison and around the world; and the terrible, deadly natural disasters of floods, hurricanes and wildfires in the U.S. and elsewhere around the globe.
He just let the transcendent music and the performances wash over him, refreshing him with their beauty before he reemerged onto the street and into the painful reality of current events after the concert ended.
So The Ear offers a deeply felt thank you to the performers for planning and playing such a timely and therapeutic program. He needed that more than he knew. And he hopes more such concerts are in store. The times demand such balm, not as escapism but as a reminder of great good things that endure.
So here is The Ear’s question: What other composers and what other pieces or works do you find offer the same kind of sanctuary or shelter?
Leave a COMMENT with a link to a performance on YouTube if possible.
Tags: African-American music, Alicia Lee, America, Arts, Asia, balm, beauty, blog, Campus, Cello, Chamber music, clarinet, Clarinet Quintet, Classical, Classical music, composer, critic, curent events, current, current events, D.C., dead, deadly, debut, Donald Trump, endure, escape, escapism, event, faculty, flood, global, globe, good, good thing, good things, government, great, Hurricane, inspiration, inspired, Jacob Stockinger, Japan, Jean-Michel Fonteneau, John W. Barker, late, live, Madison, Madison Symphony Orchestra, movement, Mozart, Music, natural disaster, New York City, parenthesis, performance, piece, planning, play, political, Politics, positive, President, President Donald Trump, President Trump, Pro Arte Quartet, program, Quartet, quintet, review, sanctuary, shelter, strife, String quartet, sublime, terrible, therapeutic, therapy, time, timely, times, turmoil, U.S., United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, US, video, Viola, Violin, Washington, White House, wildfire, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, work, world, Yo-Yo Ma, YouTube
Classical music: Today is the start of Fall. Here is autumnal music by Richard Strauss. Plus, UW-Madison soprano Jeanette Thompson makes her FREE debut tonight at 7 p.m. in Mills Hall.
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ALERT: UW-Madison faculty soprano Jeanette Thompson gives her FREE debut recital tonight at 7 p.m. in Mills Hall. Guest performers are pianist Thomas Kasdorf and faculty colleague baritone Paul Rowe.
Thompson has put together a concert of some of her favorite love songs, though not always typical of love songs: some of them are about a love that is lost, some of them are about a love desired, and some of them are about a love for God.
These songs include excerpts from Gustav Mahler’s Rückert Lieder and Johannes Brahms’ Volksbuchlieder. In addition to Rückert, they include some of her favorite poets like Charles Baudelaire and Eduard Möricke. She will perform songs by Cole Porter and George Gershwin, and will be joined by baritone Paul Rowe to sing two of the most beautiful “Porgy and Bess” love duets ever written.
Thompson (below) will conclude the concert with some of her favorite spirituals, including her mother’s favorite song, “His Eye is on the Sparrow.“
By Jacob Stockinger
Today is the autumnal equinox, which arrives at 3:02 p.m. CDT. It marks when the day has an equal amount of daylight and night.
It also means that today is the first official day of Fall.
And despite the hot weather right now, Fall is often a great time to start returning to indoor activities.
That makes it a good time for listening to classical music.
There are the usual candidates such as Antonio Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons” and its modern counterpart “Four Seasons of Buenos Aires” by tango master Astor Piazzolla.
If you want to hear other season-appropriate music, YouTube, Spotify, Classical-music.com and other websites have generous compilations. Just Google “classical music for autumn.”
But today The Ear want to feature just one selection to celebrate the season. It is soprano Jessye Norman singing “September” from “Four Last Songs” by Richard Strauss.
What is you favorite music to greet autumn with?
Use the COMMENT section to let us know, along with a link to a video performance if possible.
Tags: activity, art song, Arts, Autumn, autumnal equinox, baritone, Baudelaire, beautiful, beauty, Buenos Aires, Chamber music, choral music, Classic-music.com, Classical music, Cole Porter, Concert, day, daylight, debut, desire, duet, eye, faculty, fall, folk song, Four Last Songs, Four Seasons, Four Seasons of Buenos Aires, free, George Gershwin, God, Google, indoor, Internet, Jacob Stockinger, Jeanette Thompson, Jessye Norman, Johannes Brahms, John Paulson, lieder, light, Love, love duet, love song, Madison, Mahler, Master, Mörike, Mother, Music, New York Times, night, opera, Orchestra, Paul Rowe, Pianist, Piano, Piazzolla, poem, poet, Poetry, Porgy and Bess, recital, Richer Lieder, September, singer, Sonata, song, soprano, sparrow, spiritual, Spotify, symphony, tango, Thomas Kasdorf, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Viola, Violin, Vivaldi, vocal music, Website, YouTube
Classical music: Madison composer Scott Gendel discusses the new piece he wrote to mark the 150th anniversary of the birth of architect Frank Lloyd Wright. It receives its world premiere this coming Sunday afternoon and Monday night in Spring Green
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By Jacob Stockinger
As The Ear posted yesterday, this coming Sunday afternoon and Monday night will see a special commemorative concert at the Hillside Theater of the Taliesin compound in Spring Green.
It will mark the 150th anniversary of the birth of famed architect Frank Lloyd Wright (below).
Here is a link to an overview with more details about the concerts and program:
Certainly the standout piece will be the world premiere of a work for chorus, string quartet and piano, commissioned by Taliesin from Scott Gendel, a Madison-based composer who studied at the UW-Madison.
Gendel recently commented on his work:
“When I first heard about this opportunity to write a musical work in honor of Frank Lloyd Wright’s 150th birthday, I had a lot of grandiose ideas about big architectural music, music that would be huge in sound and concept.
“But when Taliesin Director of Music Effi Casey (below top) took me on a tour of the house and the grounds (below bottom), what struck me more than anything else was the beautiful intimacy of the spaces, the way in which every room was designed to draw you in closer.
“And then when I learned of the Taliesin Community Chorus and their love of singing together to create community, I knew “That Which Is Near” was going to take a different direction than I’d originally thought, and really become a piece about intimacy and connections between people.
““Some Flowers For Frank Lloyd Wright” by Hendrik Theodorus Wijdeveld (below) felt like the perfect text to use for such a piece. It’s stunning in its descriptions of Wright’s work, but also has a charming sweetness about it, the way he’s just offering “some flowers” rather than a huge extravagant gift.
“And so “That Which Is Near” is two things at once: First, it’s a celebration of Frank Lloyd Wright’s incredibly masterful work, and how wonderfully persistent and evergreen that work still is, 150 years after his birth.
“But second, it’s a celebration of the community at Taliesin, and the ways in which the place brings people together and fosters human connection.”
ABOUT SCOTT GENDEL
Here are some impressive biographical details about Gendel (bel0w):
Scott Gendel is a composer, vocal coach, theatrical music director and pianist living in Madison, Wisconsin. As a composer, his music has a wide-ranging scope, but Scott is particularly fond of all things vocal, and of the artistry of the human voice in all its forms. As a performing musician, Scott collaborates on vocal recitals around the country, and is the official pianist and vocal coach for Madison Opera.
Recently, he recorded his piece “At Last” with soprano Camille Zamora and cellist Yo-Yo Ma, as part of “An AIDS Quilt Songbook: Sing For Hope,” a recording released on Naxos Records and GPR, benefiting amfAR, the American Foundation for AIDS Research. (You can hear “At Last” in the YouTube video at there bottom.)
Last year, his song “Advice to Those Like Me, With Hearts Like Kindling” was premiered by soprano Melody Moore in her Carnegie Hall debut recital.
This spring, Gendel’s choral-orchestral oratorio “Barbara Allen,” based on the traditional Appalachian folk song, was premiered by the Santa Clara Chorale and San Jose Chamber Orchestra.
In 2005, the same year he received his doctoral degree from UW-Madison, Gendel was awarded first prize in the ASCAP/Lotte Lehmann Foundation Song Cycle Competition, a juried national award in its inaugural year.
More recently Scott was the second prize winner of the 2016 NATS Art Song Composition Award, and winner of the 2017 Ortus International New Music Competition.
His music is published by Classical Vocal Reprints, ECS Publishing, and the Tuba/Euphonium Press. His art songs have been recorded on Albany Records, GPR Records and Naxos.
Upcoming commissions include the original opera “Super Storm!” for Opera for the Young’s 2018-2019 season, which will be performed in nearly 200 schools around the Midwest; and a song cycle for soprano, cello and piano on the poetry of Emily Dickinson, to be premiered and recorded in her hometown of Amherst, Massachusetts by UW-trained soprano Jamie-Rose Guarrine (below), cellist Karl Knapp and the composer at the piano.
Gendel will also perform some of his art songs with soprano Emily Birsan (below), another UW-Madison graduate who also attended classes and sang at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, at the Friday night concert, Aug. 11, of the Madison New Music Festival.
Go to http://www.scottgendel.com for more information.
Tags: AIDS, Albany Records, American, American Foundation for AIDS Research, Amherst, anniversary, Appalachia, art song, Arts, ASCAP, Barbara Allen, Beethoven, birth, Camille Zamora, Carnegie Hall, Cello, Chamber music, chamber orchestra, choral music, chorus, Classical music, coach, commission, community, composer, conneciton, connection, debut, Effi Casey, Emily Birsan, Emily Dickinson, Euphonium, evergeen, flower, folk, Folk music, folk song, Frank Lloyd Wright, gift, Guarrine, hope, human, human rights, international, Jacob Stockinger, Jamie-Rose Guarrine, link, Lotte Lehman, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Madison New Music Festival, Madison Opera, Massachusetts, Midwest, Music, national, Naxos, Naxos Records, New Music, official, opera, Opera for the Young, Optus International New Music Competition, oratorio, Orchestra, People, Piano, poem, Poetry, prize, quilt, recital, San Jose, San Jose Chamber Orchestra, Santa Clara, Scott Gendel, sesquicentennial, singer, song cycle, soprano, String quartet, Super Storm, sweet, sweetness, Taliesin, Tuba, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Viola, Violin, vocal, vocal music, voice, Wifdeveld, Yo-Yo Ma, YouTube
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