The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: This Friday brings a FREE concert at noon of cello and violin sonatas by Beethoven. At night, the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra explores rarely heard works and composers plus the “Jupiter” Symphony by Mozart
4 Comments
PLEASE HELP THE EAR. IF YOU LIKE A CERTAIN BLOG POST, SPREAD THE WORD. FORWARD A LINK TO IT OR, SHARE IT or TAG IT (not just “Like” it) ON FACEBOOK. Performers can use the extra exposure to draw potential audience members to an event. And you might even attract new readers and subscribers to the blog.
ALERT: This Friday’s FREE Noon Musicale at the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive, features the Mosaic Chamber Players performing a one-hour, all-Beethoven concert in honor of the Beethoven Year, which celebrates the 250th anniversary of the composer’s birth.
The program is: Cello Sonata, Op. 5, No. 1; and two violin sonatas, Op. 12, No. 3, and Op. 30, No. 2. For more information, go to: http://www.mosaicchamberplayers.com
By Jacob Stockinger
Can you tell the difference between the real Mozart and the “Swedish Mozart”?
You’ll have the chance to find out this Friday night, Feb. 21, if you go to the concert by the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra (below, in a photo by Mike Gorski) at 7:30 p.m. in the Capitol Theater of the Overture Center.
That is when you can hear the Symphony in C-Sharp Minor, VB 140, by Joseph Martin Kraus (1756-1791, below), an 18th-century German-born, short-lived composer who, as an exact contemporary of Mozart, spent most of his career at the court in Stockholm, Sweden, and became known as the “Swedish Mozart.”
(You can hear the opening movement of the Kraus symphony, played by Concerto Koln, in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
Here is more about Kraus (below): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Martin_Kraus
The Kraus symphony opens the WCO concert.
Then for the purpose of comparison, the concert closes with Mozart’s “Jupiter” Symphony No. 41 in C Major, K. 551. It is often cited as Mozart’s most accomplished work in the symphonic form, and is renowned for its melodies and harmonies, and for the masterful, even spectacular, counterpoint in the last movement.
But that kind of discovery and approach to programming is not unusual for WCO maestro Andrew Sewell (below, in a photo by Alex Cruz), who has a penchant for exposing audiences to rarely heard works and composers as well as to well-known masterpieces.
For this concert, Sewell will be helped by the return of guest violin virtuoso Giora Schmidt (below in a photo by David Getzschman), who has been acclaimed for his technique, tone, lyricism and riveting interpretations. He played the Violin Concerto No. 2 in G Minor by Sergei Prokofiev with the WCO in 2018.
Schmidt will solo in two rarely heard works for violin and orchestra: the 16-minute Violin Concerto, Op. 48, by the Russian composer Dmitry Kabalevsky (1904-1987); and the 8-minute Romance by the Norwegian composer Johan Svendsen (1840-1911).
For more about Kabalevsky (below), go to: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dmitry_Kabalevsky
For more about Svendsen (below), who was a conductor and violinist as well as a composer, go to: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johan_Svendsen
To purchase tickets ($10-$77) and to read a detailed biography of soloist Schmidt and find out more about the concert, go to: https://wisconsinchamberorchestra.org/performances/masterworks-ii-5/
Tags: #18thCentury, #All-Beethoven, #AndrewSewell, #BeethovenYear, #BlogPost, #BlogPosting, #CapitolTheater, #CelloSonata, #ConcertoKoln, #CourtMusic, #DmitryKabalevsky, #FacebookPost, #FacebookPosting, #FirstUnitarianSocietyofMadison, #GioraSchmidt, #GuestArtist, #HomeWebsite, #JacobStockinger, #JohanSvendsen, #JosephMartinKraus, #JupiterSymphony, #LudwigVanBeethoven, #MosaicChamberPlayers, #MusicalInterpretation, #NoonMusicale, #NorwegianComposer, #OvertureCenter, #PianoAccompaniment, #PianoAccompanist, #SergeiProkofiev, #SwedishMozart, #TheEar, #ViolinRomance, #ViolinSonata, #Wikipediabiography, #Wikipediaentry, #WisconsinChamberOrchestra, #WolfgangAmadeusMozart, #YouTubevideo, 18th century, 2018, accompany, accomplished, Andrew Sewell, anniversary, Arts, audience, Beethoven, biography, birth, blog, born, Capitol Theater, career, celebrate, cellist, Cello, century, chance, close, comparison, composer, Concert, concerto, Concerto Koln, conductor, contemporary, counterpoint, court, difference, discovery, Dmitry Kabalevsky, exact, exposing, Facebook, First Unitarian Society of Madison, form, forward, free, Friday, German, Germany, Giora Schmidt, guest, guest artist, harmony, honor, hour, information, interpretation, Jacob Stockinger, Johan Svendsen, Joseph Martin Kraus, Jupiter Symphony, Kochel, Kraus, like, link, Ludwig van Beethoven, lyrical, Madison, Maestro, masterpiece, melody, Mosaic Chamber Players, movement, Mozart, Music, musical, Noon Musicale, Norway, Norwegian, online, Orchestra, Overture Center, penchant, performer, Piano, play, post, posting, program, purpose, rare, real, Romance, Sergei Prokofiev, Sewell, share, short, short-lived, solo, soloist, Sonata, Stockholm, Sweden, Swedish, Swedish Mozart, symphonic, symphony, tag, technique, tell, The Ear, tickets, tone, United States, Violin, violinist, virtuoso, WCO, Website, well-known, Wikipedia, Wisconsin, Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, work, YouTube
Classical music: Con Vivo closes its chamber music season with satisfying performances of string duos, violin romances and a clarinet quintet in a new, more intimate space
Leave a Comment
By Jacob Stockinger
Here is a special posting, a review written by frequent guest critic and writer for this blog, John W. Barker. Barker (below) is an emeritus professor of Medieval history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He also is a well-known classical music critic who writes for Isthmus and the American Record Guide, and who hosts an early music show once a month on Sunday morning on WORT 89.9 FM. For years, he served on the Board of Advisors for the Madison Early Music Festival and frequently gives pre-concert lectures in Madison. He also took the performance photos.
By John W. Barker
The season’s closing concert by the Con Vivo! chamber ensemble (below) took on an extra degree of novelty.
Usually the group has performed in the main sanctuary of the First Congregational United Church of Christ. But the acoustics there are variable and not always ideal for small ensembles.
This time, the performers moved to the chapel, a much smaller room in the building complex. With a high ceiling but modest space, this venue has a much more appropriate quality for chamber music. It’s a trifle hard, but not reverberant — a good place for intimacy and directness of sound. This should become one base of choice for the ensemble now.
The program was split interestingly between two different musical realms.
The first half consisted of duos. At the core was a set of six brief pieces drawn from the 44 Duos by Bela Bartok, published as his Op. 104. Written for two violins, but adaptable to other string instruments, they were delivered here by violist Janse Vincent and cellist Maggie Darby Townsend (below), in charming fashion.
Framing them were two violin romances, each written with orchestral accompaniment that was rendered on the piano by Dan Lyons. One was the Romance No. 2 in F Major, Op. 50, by Ludwig van Beethoven played by Kathryn Taylor (below).
The other — which in fact originally began life as a movement of a string quartet — was the Romance in F minor, Op. 11, by Antonin Dvorak. This was played by Olga Pomolova (below). It is no disrespect to the other players to note that her performance was outstanding for rich tone and strong feeling. (You can hear Dvorak’s lovely Romance in its orchestral version in the YouTube video at the bottom.)
A different world was drawn upon after the intermission, one for larger-scale chamber writing. This was the wonderful Quintet in B minor, Op. 115, for Clarinet and Strings. In this work, clarinetist Robert Taylor joined the four string players.
This is a mellow late work from Brahms, full of his artful denseness of textures, yet finely sensitive to balances. It is remarkable how the clarinet is constantly shifted between blending with the strings and standing apart from them. The performance was worthy of the challenges, full of spirit yet carefully controlled at all times — a performance that allowed the listener to ponder, and savor.
The sum total was a very satisfying concert, and one that suggested experiences with this chapel chamber should continue to be explored.
Tags: #AmericanRecordGuide, #AntoninDvorak, #BelaBartok, #CelloMusic, #ClarinetMusic, #ClarinetQuintet, #ConVivo, #FirstCongregationalUnitedChurchofChrist, #IsthmusNewspaper, #JohannesBrahms, #JohnW.Barker, #LudwigVanBeethoven, #MadisonEarlyMusicFestival, #MadisonSymphonyOrchestra, #MedievalHistory, #OrchestralAccompaniment, #StringDuos, #StringInstruments, #UniversityofWisconsin, #UniversityofWisconsin-Madison, #ViolaandCello, #ViolaMusic, #ViolinMusic, #ViolinRomance, #WisconsinChamberOrchestra, #WORT-FM89.9, accompaniment, acoustics, American Record Guide, Arts, balance, Beethoven, blend, blog, cellist, Cello, Chamber music, clarinet, clarinetist, Classical music, composer, Con Vivo, critic, duo, Dvorak, Early music, earlymusic, feeling, First Congregational United Church of Christ, History, intermission, Isthmus, Jacob Stockinger, Johannes Brahms, John W. Barker, Ludwig van Beethoven, Madison, Madison Symphony Orchestra, morning, Music, orchestral, photo, Pianist, Piano, professor, Radio, review, Romance, scale, Sunday, tone, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Viola, Violin, violinist, Wisconsin, Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, work, WORT-FM 89.9, YouTube
Recent Comments
The Well-Tempered Ear 