The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: Twenty years ago, The Three Tenors created “popera” and changed the history of opera singing. Did it help or hurt opera? And who was the greatest tenor of the three? Plus, Madison Opera’s FREE Opera in the Park is Saturday night.
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By Jacob Stockinger
This past Wednesday marked the 20th anniversary of The Three Tenors phenomenon -– a blockbuster “crossover” concert (below) that was held outdoors on July 16, 1994 in Dodgers Stadium in Los Angeles to mark the FIFA World Cup final.
The concert, which featured a mix of light, popular and serious music, took something of a drubbing from the serious classical music critics.
But it didn’t matter.
The public loved it –- and then some.
And the public kept on loving it and still does. Which is while you still see it on TV and hear it on radio, even two decades later, and why it has spawned so many imitators.
The event turned opera singing into a rock concert-like stadium event for the masses and the popular media, and brought to singing a huge global audience. Talk about genius in marketing and branding!
The event no doubt also helped pave the way for such mass outdoor concerts as the Madison Opera’s 13th annual FREE “Opera in the Park” (below),” with this year John DeMain conducting soloists plus members of the Madison Symphony Orchestra and the Madison Opera Chorus. It will take place this coming Saturday night, July 26, at 8 p.m. in Garner Park on Madison’s far west side.
Here is a link to the upcoming Madison Opera event, which previews the coming season and which usually attracts more than 10,000 listeners each summer. You can find information about directions, seating, artists and repertoire:
http://madisonopera.org/performances-2013-2014/park/
The 1994 event also dramatically changed the careers of the original Three Tenors -– Luciano Pavarotti, Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras.
It brought all of them – and also conductor Zubin Mehta – unbelievable amounts of money for a one-night stint. And that, in turn, translated into astronomical fees for future individual tours by each of them.
You can relive the 1994 event through a sound sample in the story as well as through a YouTube video, which has almost 3 million hits, at the bottom of The Ear’s favorite aria, by Giacomo Puccini, from the event. It is in a terrifically comprehensive story, filled with lots of facts big and small, that Anastasia Tsioulcas researched and wrote for the outstanding “Deceptive Cadence” blog on NPR or National Public Radio.
Here is a link:
What do you think of The Three Tenors and its impact on the classical music scene and the opera scene? On the culture in general?
Did it help or hurt the cause of great singing and staging serious opera?
And who do you think was the greatest tenor of the three?
The Ear wants to hear.
Classic music: Today is World Cup Sunday. As Argentina and Germany battle to win the soccer championship, here is another installment of the music by the great Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos.
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By Jacob Stockinger
As loyal blog readers already know, The Ear has been using the FIFA World Cup (below) competition in soccer — or football, as the rest of the globe knows the sport – as a fine occasion to explore and to hear the music of Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos.
After all, the World Cup has taken place since June 12 in some dozen stadiums (below) throughout Brazil. And today’s championship match between Argentina and Germany will take place in Rio de Janiero.
And after hearing the music of Villa-Lobos performed by the Cello Choir at the National Summer Cello Institute (below) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, The Ear is more convinced than ever that this great but neglected 20th-century composer deserves a wider hearing and more live performances.
Villa-Lobos (below) attempted an ambitious and ingenious task: To reconcile and incorporate the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and concert hall music in general with the folk songs and folk dances of his native Brazil. Before Astor Piazzolla and his “new tangos,” there was Villa-Lobos and his Bachianas Brasileiras and Choros.
Here are links to the previous installments:
This is the link to the Cello Choir concert of the annual National Summer Cello Institute that is held each summer at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music and that inspired my Villa-Lobos video postings from YouTube.
And here are the links to the first two installments that feature the Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5 and No 1, which both deserve repeated hearings:
And here is the third installment that featured Brazilian pianist Nelson Freire performing the chorale prelude-type opening of the Bachianas Brasilerias No. 3 for solo piano:
Villa-Lobos was championed by none other than the great pianist Arthur Rubinstein, who performed his suite “Prole do bebe”:
And his well-known piece “The Little Train From the Caipira,” from “Bachianas Brasileiras” No. 2, which Walt Disney was attracted to for possible use in a second “Fantasia” film and which imitates the sounds of a rural choo-choo, as played by a youth orchestra in Great Britain:
Now here is a link to Installment No. 4: A beautiful movement from one of his 17 string quartets — this one is No. 5 and is available on YouTube. It once again shows the lyrical songfulness and folk music vigor of Villa-Lobos. It is even more beautiful than the perfect soccer kick or dribble, pass or goal, and it is more long-lasting:
Tags: Argentina, Arthur Rubinstein, Arts, Ástor Piazzolla, Bach, Bachianas Brasileiras, Brazil, Cello, Chamber music, Classical music, Fantasia, FIFA World Cup, folk dances, Folk music, folk songs, Germany, Heitor Villa-Lobos, Jacob Stockinger, Johann Sebastian Bach, Nelson Freire, Piano, soccer, Sport, Sports, tango, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Villa-Lobos, Walt Disney, World Cup, YouTube
Classical music: More World Cup soccer this weekend means more music by Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos. Here is installment No. 3.
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By Jacob Stockinger
It is the second-to-last weekend for the FIFA World Cup of soccer -– or football, as the rest of the world calls the sport –- in Brazil, especially now that Brazil has survived by defeating Colombia and that Germany defeated France.
As I have said before, for The Ear the famed athletic competition has become a great excuse to explore a composer who is also world-class but whose music is too often overlooked.
I am talking about the 20th-century composer Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos. So here is another morsel to whet your appetite, to tease you into listening to — and maybe even playing more of –- the music of Villa-Lobos (below).
Once again you can hear how he incorporates folk music – folk songs, tunes and dance rhythms – into his concert hall music. In this one you can even hear how he tries to bring in Bach to Brazil. It is neo-Classicism at its best.
At the bottom is the gorgeous first movement from the Bachianas Brasileiras No. 4 for solo piano, as played live by Brazilian native Nelson Freire (seen below with Martha Argerich).
It is slowly and deeply moving, Amazonian Bach that I find is haunting and stays with you, making you want to listen to it again and again. It reminds The Ear of a Chorale Prelude by Johann Sebastian Bach (below), especially the ones reworked in piano transcriptions by Ferruccio Busoni; or maybe a Prelude from The Well-Tempered Clavier or an organ work, perhaps the prelude to a toccata; or maybe even a slow movement from one of the French or English Suites or the Partitas; or one of the variations from the “Goldberg” Variations.
Here are links to the Cello Choir concert of the annual Summer National Cello Institute that is held each summer at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music and that gave rise to the Villa-Lobos postings.
And here are the links to the first two installments that feature the Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5 and No 1, which both deserve repeated hearings:
And finally here is the link to the YouTube video with today’s installment of the greatness of Heitor Villa-Lobos music, the neglect of which is yet another sign of how Eurocentric the concert hall programming usually is:
Tags: Arts, athlete, athletic, Bach, Bachianas Brasileiras, Brazil, Busoni, Chorale, chorale prelude, Classical music, Colombia, English Suites, Ferruccio Busoni, FIFA World Cup, football, France, French Suites, Germany, Heitor Villa-Lobos, Jacob Stockinger, Johann Sebastian Bach, Madison Opera, Music, Nelson Freire, organ, Piano, Prelude, soccer, Sport, Sports, transcription, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, World Cup, YouTube
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