Ludwig van Beethoven | The Well-Tempered Ear

Classical music: What concerts or performances in 2019 did you most like, and do you most remember and want to praise?

January 12, 2020
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By Jacob Stockinger

The concert season’s winter intermission will soon draw to a close.

So this is a good time to recall favorite concerts and performances of last year.

But let’s be clear.

This is a not a request to name “The Best Concerts of 2019.”

Calling them the most memorable concerts doesn’t necessarily mean they were the best.

Perfection or “the best” sounds so objective, but can really be quite personal and subjective. So much can depend not only on the music and the performers, but also on your own mood and your taste or preferences.

So please share the concerts or performances that you most liked and enjoyed, the one that most still linger in your mind. And, if you can pin it down, tell us why you liked them so much and why they linger for you.

There are so many excellent groups and concerts, so much fine classical music, in the Madison area that there should be lots of candidates.

Here are several performances or complete concerts that The Ear remembers with special fondness.

The MADISON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA (below, in a photo by Peter Rodgers) held a season-long celebration of the 25th anniversary of John DeMain’s tenure as its music director and conductor. The big event came at the end: Mahler’s massive Symphony No. 8 – the so-called “Symphony of a Thousand” – that brought together the MSO and the MSO Chorus as well as the Madison Youth Choirs and the UW-Madison Choral Union.

It proved an impressive, overwhelming and moving display of coordination and musicianship, a testament to how far DeMain (below, in a photo by Prasad) has brought the orchestra.

(Also memorable on the MSO season were pianist Marc-Andre Hamelin in Ravel’s jazzy Piano Concerto in G Major and UW-Madison pianist Christopher Taylor in the Leonard Bernstein’s “Age of Anxiety” symphony during the MSO tribute to Bernstein, with whom DeMain worked closely.)

The WISCONSIN CHAMBER ORCHESTRA (below, in a photo by Mike Gorski), under its veteran music director Andrew Sewell, continues to test its own limits and surpass them. Particularly impressive was the last concert of the winter season with Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 14 featuring two outstanding soloists: soprano Mary Mackenzie and bass Timothy Jones.

The playing of the difficult score was precise but moving, and the singing blended beautifully. It made one understand why during this season – when the orchestra marks 60 years and maestro Sewell (below, in a photo by Alex Cruz) marks his 20th season — the WCO has deservingly graduated to two performances of each Masterwork concert (one here on Friday nights followed by one in the Milwaukee suburb of Brookfield on Saturday night).

Also memorable was an impressive concert by the mostly amateur but critically acclaimed MIDDLETON COMMUNITY ORCHESTRA. The Ear likes amateur musicians, and for their 10th anniversary concert they really delivered the goods in Dvorak’s famous Symphony No. 9 “From the New World” and, with fabulous guest soloist J.J. Koh (below — principal clarinet of the Madison Symphony Orchestra — in Mozart’s sublime Clarinet Concerto.

But it wasn’t only large-scale works that The Ear remembers.

Three chamber music concerts continue to stand out.

During the summer, the WILLY STREET CHAMBER PLAYERS and guest UW-Madison pianist Christopher Taylor (both below) delivered a performance of Dvorak’s Piano Quintet in A Major that would be hard for any group to match, let alone surpass, for its tightness and energy, its lyricism and drama.

The same goes for the veteran PRO ARTE QUARTET at the UW-Madison, which this fall started its complete cycle of Beethoven’s 16 string quartets in the new Hamel Music Center to celebrate the Beethoven Year in 2020 when we mark the 250th anniversary of the composer’s birth.

The quartet played early, middle and late quartets with complete mastery and subtlety. Treat yourself. Don’t miss the remaining five concerts, which resume in February and take place over the next year at the Hamel center and also at the Chazen Museum of Art, from where they will also be live-streamed.

Finally, The Ear will always remember the wholly unexpected and thoroughly captivating virtuoso accordion playing he heard last summer by Milwaukeean Stas Venglevski (below) at a concert by the BACH DANCING AND DYNAMITE SOCIETY. Venglevski performed music by Johann Sebastian Bach, Igor Stravinsky and Astor Piazzolla in a new and enthralling way.

Unfortunately, for various reasons The Ear missed many other concerts – by the Madison Opera and the University Opera among others – that promised to be memorable performances.

But perhaps you can fill him in as we start 2020 concerts next weekend.

What concerts in 2019 did you like most and do you most remember and praise? Why?

The Ear wants to hear.

Posted in Classical music
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Classical music: This Saturday night, Russian pianist Ilya Yakushev returns to the Salon Piano Series at Farley’s House of Pianos to perform popular works by Beethoven, Liszt and Gershwin

January 6, 2020
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By Jacob Stockinger

This coming Saturday night, Jan. 11, at 7:30 p.m., the acclaimed Russian-born pianist Ilya Yakushev (below) will make his fourth recital appearance at the Salon Piano Series.

The concert will be held at Farley’s House of Pianos, 6522 Seybold Road, on Madison’s far west side near West Towne Mall.

Yakushev — who studied in his native St. Petersburg and at the Mannes School of Music in New York City — has also performed several times with the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra.

He never fails to impress with both his virtuosic technique and his insightful interpretations, whether he is playing Russian repertoire by Mussorgsky, Rachmaninoff and Prokofiev or jazzy American classics like Gershwin.

“Yakushev is one of the very best young pianists before the public today,” said the American Record Guide about Yakushev who has also won major international competitions.

For more information about Yakushev, including critics’ reviews, a biography, concert dates and a discography, go to his website: http://www.ilyayakushev.com

The Madison program includes:

Beethoven – Sonata “Pathetique,” Op. 13

Liszt – “Six Consolations” (You can hear the famous Consolation No. 3, often learned by students and played as an encore by concert artists, in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

Gershwin – music from the opera “Porgy and Bess” in an arrangement for solo piano

An artist’s reception will follow the concert.

Tickets are $45 in advance ($10 for students) or $50 at the door. Service fees may apply. Student tickets can only be purchased online and are not available the day of the event.

You can purchase tickets on line at: https://www.brownpapertickets.com/producer/706809

For more information, go to: https://salonpianoseries.org/concerts.html

This concert is supported in part by a grant from the Wisconsin Arts Board with funds from the State of Wisconsin and the National Endowment for the Arts.

The Salon Piano Series is a nonprofit founded to continue the tradition of intimate salon concerts featuring exceptional artists. For more information about the series, including upcoming concerts and how to support it, call (608) 271-2626 or go to: https://salonpianoseries.org.

Posted in Classical music
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Classical music: Weekends are a good time to explore music and listen to it. So today The Ear starts a “2020” series for the new year.

January 4, 2020
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By Jacob Stockinger

It’s a new year and the first weekend of the new year. And The Ear wanted to find some kind of organizing principle to explore recorded music in the coming weeks and months.

Turns out the year 2020 – with its symmetry of numerals and suggestions of excellent vision — held a certain appeal.

So he checked out musical works that were either Op. 20 or No. 20. They could even occur together, like, say, a Prelude that is Op. 20, No. 20.

What he found was more than he expected: Dozens of composers and works that qualify as interesting and of suitable quality.

Some are well known, but many are rarely performed live or are neglected in recordings.

They come from all periods and styles, from early music to contemporary music.

And they come in all kinds of genres from vocal and choral music to chamber music, solo instrumental music and symphonic music.

Some works are short, some are medium and some are long.

For the longer ones, which are often divided up into smaller movements or other sections, it seems better to post the whole piece and let the reader decide how long they want to listen at a time rather than to post one part at a time and limit or force the reader.

Anyway, here is the first installment.

It is a wonderful solo piano piece that is too often overlooked, even though it is by a great composer who wrote it in his prime when he was writing many of his other more popular piano works.

It is the Humoresque, Op. 20, by the German Romantic composer Robert Schumann (below). It lasts about 29 minutes but is divided into other sections.

And the performance, often praised as outstanding or even definitive, is by the Romanian pianist Radu Lupu (below, young and old, the latter by Roberto Serra), the 1966 first prize-winner of the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition who recently retired because of ill health.

Here is a link to a detailed biography of the distinguished and somewhat reclusive and enigmatic 74-year-old pianist:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radu_Lupu

Here is YouTube video of Radu Lupu playing the Schumann Humoresque in a live recording from 1983:

Let The Ear know what you think of this piece and this idea for a 2020 series.

A long playlist for future 2020 postings – including works by Bach, Vivaldi, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, Dvorak, Tchaikovsky, Brahms and others — has already been compiled.

But if you have a favorite or suggested “2020” piece, leave word in the comment section.

Posted in Classical music
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Classical music: In 2019 who died? What recordings won prizes? What music had its premiere? Here is a comprehensive and detailed worldwide retrospective from Wikipedia

January 2, 2020
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By Jacob Stockinger

A new year is always a good time to do a review and take a look backward to assess the previous year.

Many local publications – newspapers and magazines — do Best of the Year round-ups.

But The Ear has never seen a more comprehensive list with major news and almost daily entries around the world than he found in Wikipedia, which has retrospectives going back to 2009 and looking forward to 2029.

In short, all the reviws are well worth exploring for the reminders they hold that, as the proverb goes, “Ars longa, vita brevis” or “Art is long, life is short.” (It is usually quoted in Latin translation from the original ancient Greek that was written by Hippocrates.)

There are seven different categories to click on, each with long entries. If you hover the cursor over the names or words that are spelled in blue, you will see more text and often a photograph. The categories are:

EVENTS

NEW WORKS

NEW OPERAS

ALBUMS

DEATHS

MAJOR AWARDS

REFERENCES

There are so many details that you may want to check out just one or two categories at a time over several days.

Here is a link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_in_classical_music

Do you know of someone or something – especially of local importance, such as the death in October of longtime Madison music critic John W. Barker (below, in a photo by Mark Golbach) – that did not make the list? Please leave word in the Comment section.

And here’s hoping that 2020 brings us even more important and memorable new and old music, but less loss.

Posted in Classical music
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Classical music: Happy New Year! The annual New Year’s Day concert in Vienna, popular around the world, airs on Wisconsin public radio and TV this morning and tonight

January 1, 2020
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ALERT 1: What piece of music do you like most to celebrate the New Year? Leave the name and a YouTube link, if possible, in the Comment section.

By Jacob Stockinger

For many music fans, today just wouldn’t be New Year’s Day without the annual concert (below) by the Vienna Philharmonic with a famous guest conductor in Vienna, Austria, that is broadcast nationwide both on radio and television by PBS and NPR. (The concert also goes out to more than 90 countries around the world.)

In Wisconsin, the first hearing comes this morning from 10 a.m. to noon CST on Wisconsin Public Radio.

Then tonight from 8 to 9:30 CST, Wisconsin Public Television – recently rebranded as PBS Wisconsin – will feature a longer version with host Hugh Bonneville (below) of “Downton Abbey” and with choreographed dance interpretations by the Vienna State Ballet that take place in various historical sites in Vienna.

The broadcast will be available to stream tomorrow, Thursday, Jan. 2, on pbs.org/gperf and the PBS Video app.

Here is an overview with a biography of the critically acclaimed, Grammy-winning conductor Andris Nelsons (below), along with some background about the various orchestras he directs – including the Boston Symphony — and the spectacular floral arrangements in the Golden Hall:

https://www.wienerphilharmoniker.at/new-years-concert/new-years-concert-main

And here is a playlist of the waltzes, polkas and marches by the Strauss family and many other composers, including Beethoven since 2020 is the Beethoven Year and will celebrate the 250th anniversary of Beethoven’s birth:

https://www.wienerphilharmoniker.at/concerts/concert-detail/event-id/10034

As always, the performance will conclude with the Radetzky March (heard in the YouTube video at the bottom) with the audience clapping along.

If you are a fan of the event, you might also be pleased to learn the Sony Classical will again be releasing the live recording (below) and DVD very shortly. Every year Sony rushes to get it out and on the market – something made easier, one suspects, by streaming.

Posted in Classical music
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Classical music: Famed radio station WQXR names the best 100 recordings of 2019. Listen to samples of them here

December 28, 2019
2 Comments

By Jacob Stockinger

Did you get a gift card for the holidays?

Are you looking how to spend it by either purchasing CDs or subscribing to a streaming service?

Help and guidance are available.

Few names in the airing of classical music carry more prestige than the famed radio station WQXR in New York City.

To check out the radio station’s choice of the best recordings of 2019 is also to see where the worlds of recording and concertizing are heading.

Such trends include rediscovering neglected composers and championing new music as well as women composers, such as Clara Schumann, and composers of color, such as the American composer Florence Price (below), who has often been featured on Wisconsin Public Radio this past year.

But you will also find noteworthy recordings of such classics as Johann Sebastian Bach – and two of his rarely heard cousins instead of his sons – and well as outstanding recordings of symphonies and piano sonatas (below, the set by Igor Levit) for the upcoming Beethoven Year to mark the 250th anniversary of the birth of the composer.

And you will also find names of outstanding performers you may not have heard of — such as the exceptional Chinese pianist Haochen Zhang (below), a Van Cliburn Competition gold medalist whom The Ear would like to see perform here.

Here is a link to 25 picks with commentaries– plus another 75 titles and samples, without commentary, to round out a Top 100.

Happy listening!

https://www.wqxr.org/story/best-classical-recordings-2019/

Posted in Classical music
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Classical music: Artificial Intelligence will complete Beethoven’s 10th Symphony

December 20, 2019
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By Jacob Stockinger

The timing of the announcement and project couldn’t be more perfect as we are now about the enter The Beethoven Year.

2020 will see the 250th anniversary of the birth of Ludwig van Beethoven (below).

And word is that hi tech in the form of AI will come to rescue of art through a powerful computer program.

That is, artificial intelligence will be used to complete the drafts and sketches of an unfinished 10th symphony by Beethoven. (Below is Beethoven’s manuscript for the opening of the iconic Fifth Symphony.)

It will not be the first time. You can hear a well researched if less rigorous and less technological version of Beethoven’s 10th, assembled by Barry Cooper, in the YouTube video at the bottom.

Whether we end up with a piece of music that can be performed or that we want to hear remains to be seen. After all, how many times do you hear — or want to hear — live performances of completed versions of Schubert’s “Unfinished” Symphony or Mahler’s unfinished 10th?

So Beethoven’s 10th may end up being more a curiosity than a work of art.

But at least we may get an idea of where Beethoven was headed after his unconventional and revolutionary Ninth Symphony that influenced so many later composers.

You can learn more about it by going to the homepage of Classical FM, an important British radio station. Here is a link:

https://www.classicfm.com/composers/beethoven/news/computer-completes-unfinished-tenth-symphony/

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Classical music: The successful centennial celebration of the Concert Series at the Wisconsin Union Theater continues this Friday night with a concert by the Kalichstein, Laredo and Robinson piano trio

December 5, 2019
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By Jacob Stockinger

This season marks the centennial of the Concert Series at the Wisconsin Union Theater (below are photos of the Memorial Union and Shannon Hall).

And so far, so good.

The anniversary features a variety of genres, and both individuals and ensembles, during the season-long event. Plus, many of the performers are returning to what The Ear calls “The Carnegie Hall of Madison.”

The anniversary started with a sold-out performance of the a cappella singing group Chanticleer and continued with a close to sold-out house for pianist Emanuel Ax in an all-Beethoven recital.

The first semester winds up this Friday night, Dec. 6, at 7:30 p.m. with the acclaimed piano trio of pianist Joseph Kalichstein, violinist Jaime Laredo and cellist Sharon Robinson (below).

The trio will be returning to Shannon Hall for the third time, this time as part of the new David and Kato Perlman Chamber Music Series.

The program features both the familiar and the unfamiliar.

It starts with the rarely heard Canonic Etudes by Robert Schumann. Then it continues with two of the most popular piano trios in the repertoire: the Piano Trio No. 1 in D Minor by Felix Mendelssohn and the “Archduke” Trio in B-Flat Major, Op. 97, by Ludwig van Beethoven. (You can hear the trio play the slow movement and finale of the “Archduke” Trio in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

Tickets are $10 to $50. For more information, go to: https://union.wisc.edu/events-and-activities/event-calendar/event/kalichstein-laredo-robinson-trio/

The trio will also give a FREE and PUBLIC one-hour master class TODAY – Thursday, Dec. 5 — at 1:30 p.m. in the Collins Recital Hall of the new Hamel Music Center, 740 University Ave.

Such an activity is not unusual. Not only are the members of the trio active performers, they are also devoted to teaching and music education.

For more information about that side of the trio, read: https://union.wisc.edu/visit/wisconsin-union-theater/the-green-room/kalichstein-laredo-robinson-trio-shapes-future-performers/

And to learn more about the history of the trio, which recently celebrated its 40th anniversary, here is a link to its home website: http://www.kalichstein-laredo-robinson-trio.com

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Classical music: Here are the classical music nominees for the 2020 Grammy Awards. They make a useful holiday gift guide and highlight the trend toward more diversity

November 29, 2019
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By Jacob Stockinger

Today is Black Friday followed by Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday — all with special deals and sales.

With that in mind, here is a list of the recently announced nominees in classical music for the 2020 Grammy Awards.

Although it is a self-serving list for a competition sponsored by The Industry, it can also be good way to find holiday gifts to give to others or to receive for yourself.

The list can be useful for spotting trends and finding new releases you may not have heard of.

For example, this year seems especially good for new music or recent works and contemporary composers. You won’t find any Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms, Dvorak, Tchaikovsky or Mahler although you will find Berlioz, Schumann, Wagner, Bruckner, Berg, Rachmaninoff and Copland.

Another favorite seems to be the rediscovery of older composers such as Mieczyslaw Weinberg (1919-1996, below) whose centennial has become an occasion for bringing his neglected works to the forefront.

You can also see that like the Oscars, the Grammys seem to be paying more attention to women composers and conductors, artists of color and crossovers or mixed and hybrid genres.

For complete lists of all 84 categories, go to this site and click on the categories that interest you: https://www.grammy.com/grammys/news/2020-grammy-awards-complete-nominees-list

The 62nd annual Grammy Awards will be presented on Sunday, Jan. 26, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles and will be broadcast live on CBS television.

Best Engineered Album, Classical
An Engineer’s Award. (Artist names appear in parentheses.)

AEQUA – ANNA THORVALDSDÓTTIR
Daniel Shores, engineer; Daniel Shores, mastering engineer (International Contemporary Ensemble)
BRUCKNER: SYMPHONY NO. 9
Mark Donahue, engineer; Mark Donahue, mastering engineer (Manfred Honeck and Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra)
RACHMANINOFF – HERMITAGE PIANO TRIO
Keith O. Johnson & Sean Royce Martin, engineers; Keith O. Johnson, mastering engineer (Hermitage Piano Trio)
RILEY: SUN RINGS
Leslie Ann Jones, engineer; Robert C. Ludwig, mastering engineer (Kronos Quartet)
WOLFE: FIRE IN MY MOUTH
Bob Hanlon & Lawrence Rock, engineers; Ian Good & Lawrence Rock, mastering engineers (Jaap Van Zweden, Francisco J. Núñez, Donald Nally, The Crossing, Young People’s Chorus Of NY City & New York Philharmonic)

Producer Of The Year, Classical
A Producer’s Award. (Artist names appear in parentheses.)

BLANTON ALSPAUGH
Artifacts – The Music Of Michael McGlynn (Charles Bruffy & Kansas City Chorale)
• Berlioz: Symphonie Fantastique; Fantaisie Sur La Tempête De Shakespeare (Andrew Davis & Toronto Symphony Orchestra)
• Copland: Billy The Kid; Grohg (Leonard Slatkin & Detroit Symphony Orchestra)
• Duruflé: Complete Choral Works (Robert Simpson & Houston Chamber Choir)
• Glass: Symphony No. 5 (Julian Wachner, The Choir Of Trinity Wall Street, Trinity Youth Chorus, Downtown Voices & Novus NY)
• Sander: The Divine Liturgy Of St. John Chrysostom (Peter Jermihov & PaTRAM Institute Singers)
• Smith, K.: Canticle (Craig Hella Johnson & Cincinnati Vocal Arts Ensemble)
• Visions Take Flight (Mei-Ann Chen & ROCO)
JAMES GINSBURG (below)
Project W – Works By Diverse Women Composers (Mei-Ann Chen and Chicago Sinfonietta)
• Silenced Voices (Black Oak Ensemble)
• 20th Century Harpsichord Concertos (Jory Vinikour, Scott Speck and Chicago Philharmonic)
• Twentieth Century Oboe Sonatas (Alex Klein and Phillip Bush)
• Winged Creatures & Other Works For Flute, Clarinet, And Orchestra (Anthony McGill, Demarre McGill, Allen Tinkham and Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra)
MARINA A. LEDIN, VICTOR LEDIN
Bates: Children Of Adam; Vaughan Williams: Dona Nobis Pacem (Steven Smith, Erin R. Freeman, Richmond Symphony & Chorus)
• The Orchestral Organ (Jan Kraybill)
• The Poetry Of Places (Nadia Shpachenko)
• Rachmaninoff – Hermitage Piano Trio (Hermitage Piano Trio)
MORTEN LINDBERG
Himmelborgen (Elisabeth Holte, Kare Nordstoga & Uranienborg Vokalensemble)
• Kleiberg: Do You Believe In Heather? (Various Artists)
• Ljos (Fauna Vokalkvintett)
• LUX (Anita Brevik, Trondheimsolistene & Nidarosdomens Jentekor)
• Trachea (Tone Bianca Sparre Dahl & Schola Cantorum)
• Veneliti (Hakon Daniel Nystedt & Oslo Kammerkor)
DIRK SOBOTKA
Bruckner: Symphony No. 9 (Manfred Honeck & Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra)

75. Best Orchestral Performance Award to the Conductor and to the Orchestra.

BRUCKNER: SYMPHONY NO. 9
Manfred Honeck, conductor (Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra)
COPLAND: BILLY THE KID; GROHG
Leonard Slatkin, conductor (Detroit Symphony Orchestra)
NORMAN: SUSTAIN
Gustavo Dudamel, conductor (Los Angeles Philharmonic)
TRANSATLANTIC
Louis Langrée, conductor (Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra)
WEINBERG: SYMPHONIES NOS. 2 and 21
Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla, conductor (City Of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra & Kremerata Baltica)

Best Opera Recording
Award to the Conductor, Album Producer(s) and Principal Soloists.

BENJAMIN: LESSONS IN LOVE & VIOLENCE
George Benjamin, conductor; Stéphane Degout, Barbara Hannigan, Peter Hoare & Gyula Orendt; James Whitbourn, producer (Orchestra Of The Royal Opera House)
BERG: WOZZECK
Marc Albrecht, conductor; Christopher Maltman & Eva-Maria Westbroek; François Roussillon, producer (Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra; Chorus Of Dutch National Opera)
CHARPENTIER: LES ARTS FLORISSANTS; LES PLAISIRS DE VERSAILLES
Paul O’Dette & Stephen Stubbs, conductors; Jesse Blumberg, Teresa Wakim & Virginia Warnken; Renate Wolter-Seevers, producer (Boston Early Music Festival Chamber Ensemble; Boston Early Music Festival Vocal Ensemble)
PICKER: FANTASTIC MR. FOX
Gil Rose, conductor; John Brancy, Andrew Craig Brown, Gabriel Preisser, Krista River & Edwin Vega; Gil Rose, producer (Boston Modern Orchestra Project; Boston Children’s Chorus)
WAGNER: LOHENGRIN
Christian Thielemann, conductor; Piotr Beczała, Anja Harteros, Tomasz Konieczny, Waltraud Meier & Georg Zeppenfeld; Eckhard Glauche, producer (Festspielorchester Bayreuth; Festspielchor Bayreuth)

Best Choral Performance
Award to the Conductor, and to the Choral Director and/or Chorus Master where applicable and to the Choral Organization/Ensemble.

BOYLE: VOYAGES
Donald Nally, conductor (The Crossing)
DURUFLÉ: COMPLETE CHORAL WORKS
Robert Simpson, conductor (Ken Cowan; Houston Chamber Choir)
THE HOPE OF LOVING
Craig Hella Johnson, conductor (Conspirare)
SANDER: THE DIVINE LITURGY OF ST. JOHN CHRYSOSTOM
Peter Jermihov, conductor (Evan Bravos, Vadim Gan, Kevin Keys, Glenn Miller & Daniel Shirley; PaTRAM Institute Singers)
SMITH, K.: THE ARC IN THE SKY
Donald Nally, conductor (The Crossing)

Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance
For new recordings of works with chamber or small ensemble (twenty-four or fewer members, not including the conductor). One Award to the ensemble and one Award to the conductor, if applicable.

CERRONE: THE PIECES THAT FALL TO EARTH
Christopher Rountree and Wild Up
FREEDOM & FAITH
PUBLIQuartet
PERPETULUM
Third Coast Percussion
RACHMANINOFF – HERMITAGE PIANO TRIO
Hermitage Piano Trio
SHAW: ORANGE
Attacca Quartet

79. Best Classical Instrumental Solo Award to the Instrumental Soloist(s) and to the Conductor when applicable.

THE BERLIN RECITAL
Yuja Wang
HIGDON: HARP CONCERTO
Yolanda Kondonassis; Ward Stare, conductor (The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra)
MARSALIS: VIOLIN CONCERTO; FIDDLE DANCE SUITE
Nicola Benedetti; Cristian Măcelaru, conductor (Philadelphia Orchestra)
THE ORCHESTRAL ORGAN
Jan Kraybill
TORKE: SKY, CONCERTO FOR VIOLIN
Tessa Lark; David Alan Miller, conductor (Albany Symphony)

80. Best Classical Solo Vocal Album Award to: Vocalist(s), Collaborative Artist(s) (Ex: pianists, conductors, chamber groups) Producer(s), Recording Engineers/Mixers with 51% or more playing time of new material.

THE EDGE OF SILENCE – WORKS FOR VOICE BY GYÖRGY KURTÁG
Susan Narucki (Donald Berman, Curtis Macomber, Kathryn Schulmeister & Nicholas Tolle)
HIMMELSMUSIK
Philippe Jaroussky & Céline Scheen; Christina Pluhar, conductor; L’Arpeggiata, ensemble (Jesús Rodil & Dingle Yandell)
SCHUMANN: LIEDERKREIS OP. 24, KERNER-LIEDER OP. 35
Matthias Goerne; Leif Ove Andsnes, accompanist
SONGPLAY
Joyce DiDonato; Chuck Israels, Jimmy Madison, Charlie Porter and Craig Terry, accompanists (Steve Barnett and Lautaro Greco)
A TE, O CARA
Stephen Costello; Constantine Orbelian, conductor (Kaunas City Symphony Orchestra)

Best Classical Compendium
Award to the Artist(s) and to the Album Producer(s) and Engineer(s) of over 51% playing time of the album, if other than the artist.

AMERICAN ORIGINALS 1918
John Morris Russell, conductor; Elaine Martone, producer
LESHNOFF: SYMPHONY NO. 4 ‘HEICHALOS’; GUITAR CONCERTO; STARBURST
Giancarlo Guerrero, conductor; Tim Handley, producer
MELTZER: SONGS AND STRUCTURES
Paul Appleby & Natalia Katyukova; Silas Brown & Harold Meltzer, producers
THE POETRY OF PLACES
Nadia Shpachenko; Marina A. Ledin & Victor Ledin, producers
SAARIAHO: TRUE FIRE; TRANS; CIEL D’HIVER
Hannu Lintu, conductor; Laura Heikinheimo, producer

Best Contemporary Classical Composition
A Composer’s Award. (For a contemporary classical composition composed within the last 25 years, and released for the first time during the Eligibility Year.) Award to the librettist, if applicable.

BERMEL: MIGRATION SERIES FOR JAZZ ENSEMBLE & ORCHESTRA
Derek Bermel, composer (Derek Bermel, Ted Nash, David Alan Miller, Juilliard Jazz Orchestra & Albany Symphony Orchestra)
HIGDON: HARP CONCERTO
Jennifer Higdon, composer (Yolanda Kondonassis, Ward Stare & The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra)
MARSALIS: VIOLIN CONCERTO IN D MAJOR
Wynton Marsalis, composer (Nicola Benedetti, Cristian Măcelaru & Philadelphia Orchestra)
NORMAN: SUSTAIN
Andrew Norman, composer (Gustavo Dudamel & Los Angeles Philharmonic)
SHAW: ORANGE
Caroline Shaw, composer (Attacca Quartet)
WOLFE: FIRE IN MY MOUTH
Julia Wolfe, composer (Jaap Van Zweden, Francisco J. Núñez, Donald Nally, The Crossing, Young People’s Chorus Of NY City & New York Philharmonic)

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Classical music: Happy Thanksgiving! What composer, music or performer are you grateful for? Plus, the Pro Arte Quartet repeats the FREE but fantastic opening concert of its complete Beethoven cycle this Sunday afternoon

November 28, 2019
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ALERT: One of the Thanksgiving traditions for music fans is that from 10 a.m. to noon today, Wisconsin Public Radio will again broadcast highlights from this year’s honors concerts by choirs, bands and orchestras from the Wisconsin School Music Association. Music education is something to give thanks for. You can hear middle school and high school student performers from around the state as well as WPR’s usual Thanksgiving offerings of American composers and music, and then special Thanksgiving programs about gratitude.

By Jacob Stockinger

Happy Thanksgiving!

Today – Thursday, Nov. 28, 2019 – is Thanksgiving Day.

It was Sergei Rachmaninoff (below) who once remarked, “Music is enough for a lifetime, but a lifetime is not enough for music.”

How true, how true.

There is such a wealth of composers, works and performers — going back many centuries — that we can be grateful for. In the Comment section, The Ear wants to hear from you about what one you would name — with a YouTube link, if possible.

But this year he has his own choice: the “Sacred Hymn of Thanksgiving” – by Beethoven (below), who used it as a movement in his late String Quartet in A Minor, Op. 132.

You can hear it in the YouTube video at the bottom, where the playing of the four string instruments also gets an interesting and fascinating graphic depiction of its structure.

The composer wrote this sublime and other-worldy music when he recovered from what he thought was a life-threating illness.

But with the Beethoven Year of 2020 fast approaching – along with celebrations of the 250th anniversary of the composer’s birth – The Ear has another reason for his choice.

If you missed last Friday’s superb FREE opening concert of the complete cycle of Beethoven’s 16 string quartets by the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Pro Arte Quartet (below, in the new Collins Recital Hall of the Hamel Music Center), you have a chance to catch a second performance this coming Sunday afternoon, Dec. 1. (Members, below left are David Perry and Suzanne Beia, violins; Sally Chisholm, viola; and Parry Karp, cello.)

From 12:30 to 2 p.m. the Pro Arte will performance the same program – and ultimately the complete cycle of six concerts — for Sunday Afternoon Live at the Chazen. You can attend it in person for FREE in Brittingham Gallery 3 (below) of the museum or you can stream it live.

Here are links to the program and to the streaming portal and the program: https://www.chazen.wisc.edu/index.php?/events-calendar-demo/event/sunday-afternoon-live-at-the-chazen11/

https://c.streamhoster.com/embed/media/O7sBNG/OS1C0ihJsYK/iqf1vBMs3qg_5

And here is a link to the complete schedule of the Beethoven string quartet cycle, done over the next 14 months, by the Pro Arte Quartet, which includes background on the Pro Arte. You’ll notice, by the way, that the Sacred Hymn of Thanksgiving will be performed on the program for next Oct. 2:

https://welltempered.wordpress.com/2019/11/19/classical-music-this-friday-night-nov-22-the-uw-madisons-pro-arte-quartet-starts-its-beethoven-cycle-of-the-complete-16-string-quartets-here-are-the-dates-times-venues-and-programs-for/

Posted in Classical music
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