The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: What music would you play to honor and mourn the dead, wounded and traumatized victims of the gay night club shooting in Orlando, Florida?
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By Jacob Stockinger
It has been a week now.
A very long, hard and emotional week.
The Ear has heard some classical music dedicated to the victims — 49 killed, some 50 wounded and countless traumatized — of the mass shooting at Pulse, a gay night club in Orlando, Florida, that took place one week ago. (Below is a vigil in support of the LGBT community.)
Others might choose a standard like the famous “Adagio for Strings” by Samuel Barber. It is undeniably moving and perfectly appropriate.
But so far the piece that most moved The Ear, unexpectedly, was a familiar one that aired on Wisconsin Public Radio: the “Nimrod” variation from the “Enigma Variations” by Sir Edward Elgar.
The Ear hears tenderness, gentleness and even love in the music. But in it he also hears strength, resilience and pride as well as sorrow, acceptance and resignation.
Plus, he likes the idea of enigma that is attached to it, given all the issues and questions — terrorism, Islamic radicalization and extremism, homophobia, self-hatred, hate crimes, gun control, protests, mass grieving — that still surround the incident and remain to be solved.
You can listen to the piece of music in the YouTube video at the bottom that features conductor Daniel Barenboim conducting the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. It has more than 3 million hits.
But The Ear is also sure that there is a great deal of other music that would suit the purpose. They include:
The passions, oratorios and cantatas by Johann Sebastian Bach.
The Requiems of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Johannes Brahms, Giuseppe Verdi and Gabriel Faure.
The symphonies of Ludwig van Beethoven, Robert Schumann, Johannes Brahms, Peter Tchaikovsky and Antonin Dvorak.
The string quartets, piano trios, duo sonatas and other chamber music by Joseph Haydn and Franz Schubert as well as the solo piano music of Chopin, Schumann and so many others.
The masses of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert.
The songs of Schubert and arias and choruses from all kinds of operas, but especially those of Giacomo Puccini.
And on and on.
Leave your personal choice, with a YouTube link if possible, and your reason for choosing it in the COMMENT section.
The Ear wants to hear.
Tags: Adagio for Strings, arias, Arts, Bach, Barber, Baroque, Beethoven, Brahms, cantatas, Cello, Chamber music, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Chopin, choral music, choruses, Classical music, conductor, Daniel Barenboim, Early music, Elgar, enigma, Enigma Variations, Faure, Florida, Franz Schubert, gay, Giacomo Puccini, grieving, gun, gun control, hate crime, homophobia, Islam, Islamist, Jacob Stockinger, Johann Sebastian Bach, Johannes Brahms, lesbian, LGBT, Ludwig van Beethoven, mass, masses, Mozart, Music, Nimrod, opera, oratorio, Orlando, Passion, Piano, Piano Trio, protest, Quartet, radicalization, Requiem, Robert Schumann, self-hatred, shooting, Sonata, song, String quartet, Tchaikovsky, terrorism, trio, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Verdi, Viola, Violin, vocal music, wisconsin public radio, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, YouTube
Classical music: Meet Marin Alsop, the pioneering American maestra who will conduct the closing concert of the BBC British Proms concerts this Saturday night.
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By Jacob Stockinger
If you listen regularly to NPR, or National Public Radio, you will often hear stories featuring the American conductor Marin Alsop (below) and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra she leads on Saturday mornings. That is when Scott Simon interviews her about her latest projects for Weekend Edition.
And you may know Alsop’s name as a student and protégée of the legendary Leonard Bernstein and as the music director and conductor of the Sao Paulo Symphony Orchestra in Brazil.
You might also know that Alsop thinks classical music has become elitist and so she works hard for educational programs and community outreach.
But you may not know that in 2013 Alsop was the first woman chosen to conduct the mammoth closing night of the popular Proms concerts (below) in London’s Royal Albert Hall for the BBC in England. (You can hear the rousing and popular speech she gave then in a YouTube video at the bottom. And be sure to read some of the sexist and homophobic reader comments.)
This Saturday night she returns to the United Kingdom to conduct the closing concert of this summer’s Proms, which will have a huge audience of over 40 million listeners worldwide via TV, radio and the Internet.
Here is a link to the portal for listening to the concert:
Thanks to a story and a Q&A interview in The Economist, here is a chance to meet Marin Alsop and learn more about this impressive musician:
http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2015/08/bbc-proms
Tags: America, Arts, Baltimore, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, BBC, Brazil, choral music, Classical music, Compact Disc, concerto, Conducting, England, Europe, homophobia, homophobic, Internet, Jacob Stockinger, Leonard Bernstein, London, Marin Alsop, Music, Music director, National Public Radio, NPR, Orchestra, Proms, Radio, Royal Albert Hall, Sao Paulo, Scott Simon, Sexism, sexist, Television, The Proms, TV, UK, United Kingdom, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, web, YouTube
Classical music: Court victories favoring same-sex marriage equality and an extended Valentine’s Day weekend add up to a magical and loving mix for musical partners, including opera star Patricia Racette, who comes out as a lesbian.
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ALERT: If you are undecided about going to this afternoon’s concert at 2:30 p.m. in Overture Hall by the Madison Symphony Orchestra with Norwegian trumpet soloist Tine Thing Helseth (below), here are links to positive reviews by John W. Barker for Isthmus and by Greg Hettmansberger for Madison Magazine’s blog “Classically Speaking”:
http://www.thedailypage.com/daily/article.php?article=42078&sid=4d977189e5be9d039af0d641c547219f
By Jacob Stockinger
Well, when a holiday falls on a Friday – like Valentine’s Day this year — one can be forgiven for prolonging it over the weekend, don’t you think?
But it seems a good chance to blend two recent stories and trend lines that are increasingly coming together.
And coming out.
One is the recent various court victories for marriage equality, or same-sex marriage, or gay marriage. Whatever you want to call it, it seems to becoming more and more a legal and social reality with every week that passes.
And those legal victories lead to more and more gays and lesbians coming out, including the star football player and top NFL draft possibility star Michael Sam (below top) and “Juno” actress Ellen Page (below bottom).
Here is a link to a New York Times story about Michael Sam:
And here is a link to a Washington Post story about Ellen Page:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/juno-actress-ellen-page-comes-out-as-gay/2014/02/15/f3327800-9627-11e3-ae45-458927ccedb6_story.html
As for Valentine’s Day, imagine what how rewarding it could be to work cooperatively in the performing arts with your life partner and love.
That is exactly what was documented in a recent story on NPR’s great blog “Deceptive Cadence.”
NPR highlighted various musical couples in classical music who met in a musical setting and fell in love while working, and who now get to work together.
And for good measure, they included the Metropolitan Opera star soprano Patricia Racette (below top, out of costume, and below bottom in the title role of Puccini’s “Tosca”), who openly talks about what a great marriage she has with her female partner. (You can hear Patricia Racette as the title character Cio-Cio-San sing the finale of Puccini’s “Madama Butterfly” at the Metropolitan Opera in a popular YouTube video at the bottom.)
Of course, most of the couples are heterosexual in the story just as they are in real life. And we have seen some of them – tenor Stephen Costello (below top) at the Madison Opera‘s Opera in the Park as well as cellist David Finckel and pianist Wu Han (below bottom) at the Wisconsin Union Theater, in Madison.
But it is both sensitive and brave of NPR, which is always under the gun and budget knife of the self-righteous and nutty right-wing extremists and homophobes, to do the story.
Here is a link:
One can only hope and imagine the chain reaction that is to happen as each coming out brings several more, as bravery and tolerance build, and as the visible becomes visible.
Saint Valentine -– at least my Saint Valentine — would be very pleased.
Tags: Arts, Chamber music, Classical music, David Finckel, Ellen Page, football draft, Friday, gay, Gay Lesbian and Bisexual, gay marriage, Giacomo Puccini, homophobia, Jacob Stockinger, lesbian, Madama Butterfly, Madison Opera, Madison Symphony Orchestra, marriage equality, Metropolitan Opera, National Football League, New York Times, NFL, NFL draft, NPR, opera, Patricia Racette, Puccini, right-wing, Saint Valentine, Same-sex marriage, Stephen Costello, Tine Thing Helseth, Tosca, Valentine's Day, Washington Post, Wisconsin Union Theater, Wu Han, YouTube
Classical music: Is it payback time for Russian musicians at the Winter Olympics in Sochi? Conductor Valery Gergiev is the official maestro of Vladimir Putin’s big show that opens tonight with grand ceremony.
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By Jacob Stockinger
If you have been waiting for the start of the 2014 Winter Olympics (below is the official logo), tonight is the night it all begins for real –- at least officially because some preliminary rounds of sporting events like figure skating and snowboarding have already been held — even amid the terrorist threats, corruption, unfinished construction, dog roundups, authoritarianism and homophobia.
Many of us here in the U.S. will be tuning in at 8 p.m. EST to NBC-TV and streaming the games on-line. Here is a link to a schedule, to background stories and to other links.
For a complete schedule of events, check out:
And tonight is the opening ceremonies, the March of Nations, where all the athletes will march into the main stadium.
Could it also be payback time for Russian superstar musicians?
The maestro of music for the Olympics is the ever busy, often unshaven and always critically acclaimed conductor Valery Gergiev (below), who guest conducts around the world and holds his own podium at the Mariinsky Theatre in St.Petersburg.
But ironically, the maestro is a very close friend and political supporter – as is superstar soprano Anna Netrebko (below), who may or may not show up at Sochi — of the heavy-handed and thuggish Russian President, and former KGB agent, Vladimir Putin. (Below is a photo of Vladimir Putin pinning a state decoration on Valery Gergiev.)
The combination of the two V-Men — Vladimir and Valery — creates certain ironies and some wariness or even dissatisfaction.
Here is a link to a fine story about Gergiev, Putin and the Olympics that aired in NPR. It also has links to some music.
And The New York Times has also published a story about Gergiev that focuses on his role as an ambassador and defender of Russian culture’s rebirth under Putin, whom Gergiev endorsed in the last presidential election (both are below), despite the foreign political fallout.
So, will Anna Netrebko (seen below in the Metropolitan Opera’s production of Tchaikovsky’s opera “Eugene Onegin”), who also endorsed Putin, show up to sing?
Will some of the famous ballet dancers from the famed but beleaguered Bolshoi company in Moscow also perform?
Tune in and see.
But while we wait for the Winter Olympics to reveal themselves and for their many cultural contradictions to surface — and to help warm you up in this cold, cold Midwest winter -– here is some of the best music ever composed for the Olympics or sports events: A YouTube video of Milwaukee-born composer Michel Torke’s “Javelin” written for the 1996 Summer Olympics Games in Atlanta, Georgia:
Tags: 2014 Winter Olympics, Anna Netrebko, Arts, Atlanta, ballet, Bolshoi, Classical music, conductor, corruption, dog, figure skating, gay, Georgia, homophobia, Jacob Stockinger, Javelin, Madison Opera, Mariinsky Theatre, Metropolitan Opera, Michael Torke, Moscow, NBC, NBC-TV, New York Times, Olympics, Russia, Russian culture, Saint Petersburg, snowboarding, Sochi, Sports, Summer Olympics, terrorism, The New York Times, Valery Gergiev, Vladimir Putin, Winter Olympics, YouTube
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