LAST OF US, THE

The great Cervantes, he taught me the magic and great humanity that poetry and the music of our Golden Century harbor. In the middle of the 16th century appears in Spain the ''cross-strung harp'', as Juan de Bermudo confirms in his work, Declaration of Musical Instruments, year 1555. This appearance is due to the growing music chromatization and the progressive emancipation of the specific instrumental language. Therefore, the harp, diatonic so far, becomes a chromatic instrument in a very original way: adding an order of chromatic strings interwoven or intertwined with the diatonic ones. It turned out to be an extremely practical invention for the spanish Violeros and, apparently, not sued out of the Iberian Peninsula. The famous Tomos, witness the harp's musical intervention in these two fields, sacred and profane. One of the most prolific composers of the Tonos was Juan Hidalgo, a Royal Chapel's musician, Pedro Calderon de la Barca's right hand and, in turn, prominent harp player.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Penderecki: Music for Chamber Orchestra

With a terrific cast including Maria Bengtsson and Katharina Magiera, and under the baton of Sebastian Weigle, OehmsClassics and Opera Frankfurt bring back to live a nearly forgotten jewel of comic opera in the 19th century. After the premiere at the Viennese Karntnertortheater in 1847, Friedrich von Flotow's Martha or The fair at Richmond became for nearly half a century one of the most popular operas in Europe. Full of charming melodies and with a plot as hilarious as racy, the story of bored Lady Harriet Durham and her friend Nancy, who disguised themselves as Martha and Julia and travel to the servant's fair of Richmond, where they actually not only find a job, but also true love, is an enchanting example for the 1850's civic opera and also Friedrich von Flotow's wonderful light hearted music. After "Der Graf von Luxemburg" OehmsClassics is happy to continue the collaboration with Opera Frankfurt with this remarkable recording.

The three-act romantic operetta Das Land des Lachelns (The Land of Smiles) by Franz Lehar was one of Lehar’s later works, and was wildly popular in Vienna and Germany upon its 1929 debut. The title refers to the supposed Chinese custom of smiling, regardless of what is happening in life, with the leading character, Prince Sou-Chong singing a song early in the show titled “Always smiling” which describes this. This production from the Festival Orchester Morbisch, the Ballett der Seefestspiele Morbisch, and the Schor, Statisterie und Kinderstatisterie der Seefestspiele Morbisch is directed by Peter Edelmann, and was recorded at the 2019 festival.

A mythical performance from la Monnaie - Bruxelles.
Parsifal is a strange and enigmatic work. At the end of his life, did Wagner wish to celebrate asceticism, which he himself had never practised? Did he fall upon his knees before the Cross, as claimed by Nietzsche? And what does the secret society of knights based on pure blood signify, desperately waiting for the saviour to regenerate it? What is the true nature of the opposition between the worlds of Klingsor and the Grail? What can Parsifal tell us today? In his artistic will and testament, Wagner condenses his moral idea of the world and returns to the roots of love and religion - to the very heart of art according to him.
With the participation of conductor Hartmut Haenchen who is passionated by the score, Italian stage director Romeo Castellucci proposes an original reading of this brilliant work and explores the essence of Wagnerian ‘Kunstreligion’ in a different light.

“Thanks to the telling contributions of Mr. Castellucci and Mr. Haenchen, the Monnaie’s ‘Parsifal’ casts new light on a difficult opera.” NY TIMES

Parsifal: Andrew Richards
Kundry: Anna Larsson
Gurnemanz: Jan-Hendrik Rootering
Amfortas: Thomas Johannes Mayer
Klingsor: Tómas Tómasson
Titurel: Victor von Halem

Orchestre symphonique de la Monnaie
Hartmut Haenchen

Stage direction: Romeo Castellucci
Choreography: Cindy Van Acker
Set & costume designs, lighting: Romeo Castellucci
Dramaturgy: Piersandra di Matteo
Recording: La Monnaie / De Munt, Bruxelles - 20/02/2011

R E V I E W:
WAGNER Parsifal • Hartmut Haenchen, cond; Andrew Richards (Parsifal); Anna Larsson (Kundry); Jan-Hendrick Rootering (Gurnemanz); Thomas Johannes Mayer (Amfortas); Tómas Tómasson (Klingsor); Victor von Halem (Titurel); O symphonique de la Monnaie; Ch de la Monnaie; Ch de jeunes de la Monnaie • BELAIR (DVD: 239:00) Live: Brussels 2/20/2011

The Parisian daily Le Monde called this 2011 Le Monnaie production “un Parsifal hallucinaire.” That’s putting it mildly. Wagner’s operas have long inspired “extreme” treatments and this is one of the most extreme I’ve encountered. Some of it works, some of it doesn’t. It’s not for the faint of heart. And I wouldn’t want to be without it.

Parsifal is the first operatic undertaking for the Italian playwright and stage director Romeo Castellucci, well known for his avant-garde tendencies. In the hyperbolic language sometimes employed by men and women devoted to dramaturgy, Castelluci explains his method in the liner notes. “As I approached Parsifal, I tried to forget everything I knew. I put myself in the shoes of someone who knew nothing. I closed my eyes, and I listened once, twenty times, and then a hundred times to the music, this thing. Then I slept. I reworked the whole of Parsifal in a state of amnesia, from the beginning to the end. A work like this needs a vision coming from one’s deepest places … not just an illustrative approach.” OK, that’s a little over the top. But there truly is a dreamlike quality to what you witness here. One remembers images rather than scenes when it’s all over. Act I’s setting is a dense and dark forest in which one can, at first, barely make out the principal singers. (Gurnemanz’s costume covers him from head to toe in leaves, so he fits right in.) Act II is borderline pornographic, as Castelluci dispenses with singing Flowermaidens on stage and, with the vocalists out of sight, has Parsifal tempted by platinum-wigged nude dancers (and, as the credits acknowledge, “Shibari bondage performers” and “contortionists.”) One dancer lies down on a pedestal and aims her external genitalia at the audience for a good 20 minutes. Kundry’s and Amfortas’s act of sexual congress, barely alluded to as a historical event in run-of-the-mill Parsifals, is graphically projected as a hologram. Act III is a complete change of gears, with the chorus joined by a large crowd of non-singing supernumeraries in modern-day dress that, from the Transformation Scene onward, are seen to be slowly striding forward, presumably to a better future world. There are clichés, to be sure—the face paint, Kundry’s application of a few words, graffiti-style, to a blank wall, etc.—and some familiar visual theatrical features are missing: there’s no spear, no non-healing wound, no sign of the Cross when Klingsor’s realm is vanquished. But for contemplative Wagnerians, this will be a very rich experience indeed.

It helps enormously that the musical values are first-rate. Hartmut Haenchen is an experienced and insightful Wagner conductor and, as with his excellent Ring cycle for Etcetera (Fanfare 31:3), he consults the notes of Wagner’s assistants and other artists involved in the first Bayreuth performances. Haenchen definitely eschews the draggy tempos that have become common, but this Parsifal is not the least bit rushed. (For the record, the timing is a half-hour longer than Pierre Boulez’s famously brisk 1970 Bayreuth recording.) Castellucci is not alone in finding Kundry to be the central character in Parsifal—she’s alive and well when the curtain comes down at the close of act III—and Anne Larsson does a terrific job with the wide-ranging dramatic requirements of her role. Jan-Hendrick Rootering is a magisterial Gurnemanz and the American tenor Andrew Richards has a pleasing, well-supported voice well suited to Parsifal. This is Richards’s first Wagner role and, from the sounds of it, Siegmund and Walther, at least, should be on his radar. Thomas Johannes Mayer appears and sounds agonized without scenery chewing. (Remember, he’s got no wound to show off.) Tómas Tómasson is an excellent singer, though perhaps his Klingsor should be a bit less robust to contrast better with the other male characters that still have their “equipment” intact.

Most opera videos released nowadays are carefully planned, with a film director assigned to the project; this video, we are told, is “purely an archive.” No apologies are necessary. The camera work is skillful and editor didn’t feel obliged to always show us who was singing at the moment. (How long can you watch Gurnemanz explaining the back-story, anyway?) The medium was clearly analog film. The sound is good and even though the resolution of Dolby Digital is lower than the stereo PCM option on a DVD, the surround sound program here is sonically very satisfactory. Subtitle choices are English, French, Dutch, and German.

Clearly, this shouldn’t be anyone’s introduction to Parsifal. But for those who want to explore new levels of meaning and emotional power in Wagner’s final work, BelAir’s release deserves the strongest consideration.

FANFARE: Andrew Quint

Forsyth, M.: Canadian Composers Portraits

Richard Wagner 
DER RING DES NIBELUNGEN
(Highlights)

Wotan / Der Wanderer – Juha Uusitalo
Loge – John Daszak
Alberich – Franz-Josef Kapellmann
Fasolt / Hunding – Matti Salminen
Fafner – Stephen Milling
Fricka – Anna Larsson
Erda / Schwertleite – Christa Mayer
Siegmund – Peter Seiffert
Sieglinde – Petra-Maria Schnitzer
Brünnhilde – Jennifer Wilson
Siegfried – Lance Ryan
Mime – Gerhard Siegel
Waltraute / Erda – Catherine Wyn-Rogers

Valencia Regional Government Choir (Cor de la Generalitat Valenciana) Valencian Community Orchestra (Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana) Zubin Mehta, conductor

La Fura del Baus, staging
Carlus Padrissa, stage director

Recorded live from the Palau de les Arts "Reina Sofia", Valencia, Spain, 2007-2009.

Special budget-priced DVD
100 minutes of the most stunning visual and musical highlights of this production by La Fura dels Baus, including two new documentaries about Franc Aleu and Carlus Padrissa.

Bonus:
- Portraits of Carlus Pardissa and Franc Aleu

Picture format: NTSC 16:9
Sound format: DTS 5.1 (highlights) / PCM Stereo (bonus)
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Subtitles: German, French, English, Spanish (highlights) / English (bonus)
Running time: 100 mins (highlights) + 30 mins (bonus)
No. of DVDs: 1

R E V I E W:

It might seem I am about to trash this issue but I am actually very impressed by the Valencia Ring so do please read on.

The DVD menu and title sequence is accompanied by music, which is to be deplored. Please can we have silence in these places on concert and opera videos. No one wants to hear the same truncated chunks over and over again whilst trying to work through the labyrinth to get DTS5.1 instead of stereo and subtitles in the right language. The sound is only in PCM stereo anyway on this section just to add to the confusion. The transitions between sections are handled by simple fade-outs; disruptive if you know the music well but what else can one do in The Ring? The length of pauses is variable from almost nothing to several seconds. Though the extracts are in dramatic order there is no indication of where you are in the operas nor is there any hint that one has changed opera, just randomly timed fades in and out. The worst example is the end of Act 1 of The Valkyrie which stops barely a couple of seconds before a chunk of Act 2. I suspect the tea-boy was in charge of post production. I am relieved to say all is well apart from these technical blots and since the music and production are so entertaining, and the sound and picture is so good, one can forgive Unitel these flaws. Do keep the booklet to hand whilst viewing and don't even bother with this DVD if you don't have another complete recording in your collection because you will get hopelessly lost without a plot summary.

Most opera productions are characterised by their appearance rather than by the performance. It is almost impossible to ignore what you are seeing and it often clashes with what you are hearing. To my knowledge only Bruckner managed to get through The Ring without noticing that there were costumes and scenery involved! The Valencia production is no different. It is dominated by huge video projections throughout and the DVD production often takes advantage of these to add its own layers of image for dramatic effect. Stage lighting is extremely dramatic which enhances the startling images still more. If you like to see people standing and singing against a plain background à la Bayreuth 1960s then you will hate it because this one really grasps the technical challenge and goes with it. The singing is of uniformly high quality and the conducting of Zubin Mehta is fine so long as you do not expect Solti's fierce drive. The orchestra are excellent and even get a scene for themselves in the prelude to Act 3 of Siegfried. Since you will only buy this to check if it is to be love or hate so far as you are concerned before either ignoring it forever, or ordering the entire cycle on Blu-ray, these are some of the delights in store.

Loge has a great little motor scooter with which to run rings around the rest of the cast literally as well as figuratively. The costumes are complicated and often look very heavy which makes the little cranes used on and off through the cycle to carry characters around the stage very understandable. Act 1 of The Valkyrie has a wonderfully effective and very subtle tree which bears careful study. This creation looms over a decidedly stone-age looking Sieglinde and a very tough Siegmund. These two Walsungs look highly dangerous to me and must have posed a serious problem for Hunding. Since we don't see him at all in these extracts we have no idea how he handles them. The Ride of the Valkyries looks fantastic and is well performed against huge and effective video backdrops. Lots of work for the cranes here! The ring of fire which Wotan places around Brunnhilde is a proper inferno as is the fire for Siegfried's forge which looks positively dangerous. Siegfried by the way can sing well but is a patchy actor as seen here. The forge is animated by many stage hands so that Notung appears to be a product of a busy factory rather than one superman. So much for Siegfried facing down Wotan's plans single-handed but since the helpers look like the Nibelung slaves in The Rhinegold it can be seen as logical. I wasn't so taken by Fafner who looks more like an articulated ventilation duct than anything supernatural but some productions even leave him out, such are the challenges of staging this part. Bayreuth once had the entire stage start to writhe, an effect of such impact that all others pall. The prelude to Act 3 of Siegfried has a massive back-projection of snow-covered mountains and eventually of the whole Earth from which Erda emerges in a moment of highly consequent majesty. Siegfried travels down the Rhine on a river of plastic drinks bottles which is utterly bizarre but does actually work - just believe me! The closing scene also manages to be consequent and we see Brunnhilde, on a crane, returning the Ring to the Rhine maidens before disappearing into the conflagration. The producers use lots of gymnasts in this and other scenes to great dramatic effect and the end here is close to awe-inspiring.

The 100 minutes of opera on the DVD is joined by 30 minutes of supporting documentary material. After some preliminary tele-visual nonsense one film describes the way the directorial team worked up their ideas to fulfil Wagner's intentions and sometimes his explicit instructions - now there's a novel idea - to do what the composer says. Others take note! The other film is about the important lighting design. Both are worth one's time.

A superb marketing tool for the entire cycle available on DVD and on Blu-ray. This performance and production is a great success overall and this DVD needs watching just once before you go out and buy the whole thing.

-- Dave Billinge, MusicWeb International

It is a shame that this unhackneyed collection of French music for oboe and piano has been overlooked. The Swiss company Tudor apply their usual exemplary production standards to recording and documentation. Artistic matters are in the hands of two dedicated musicians. Bamberg-born Mayer produces a full-throated quality, but going by the initial Fauré tracks, tends to scout over emotional expression. The Sicilienne could have been touching if the emotional agenda had been painted in. The Pavane feels rushed. The Berceuse is on the other hand quite pleasing with the note production being both curvaceous and penetrating. Wisniewska’s piano sound is rounded; not harsh. The Saint-Saens Sonata seems congealed in the first movement but in the other two is perfectly gracious. There is a gamin cheeky finale with strange echoes of Beethoven’s Fifth. Is Saint-Saens lampooning Beethoven?

Then we are back to Fauré with a sequence of five song transcriptions. Après un rêve is heavy-lidded and weighed down with sleepy contentment. Le secret is suitably grave with the music carrying a faintly melancholy tincture. Au bord de l'eau explores an elusive mood though the faint clicking of the oboe’s key mechanism can be heard and does return you to earth. Clair de lune is a brisk and pleasant stroll of a piece; not ardent. Mayer’s oboe here takes on the opulence of its cousin up the road, the clarinet. There are two Pierné’s represented in this recital Gabriel’s Serenade has an Iberian accent – more Massenet than Ravel. The Pièce sounds rather Tchaikovskian with a surprisingly brusque role for the piano. Fantasie Pastorale is by Paul Pierné. It radiates elysian calm – superbly done by the two players. The Satie pieces are well enough known. Here that sentimentality deficit I mentioned earlier is again in evidence though I did note that Wisniewska’s insight provided emotional contrast – listen to the way she gives face to a simple note cell in Gymnopédie 2. Bozza’s Fantaisie Pastorale is so much more than the shallow display piece I had braced myself for. It surveys stygian Bax territory, moves into showers of fanciful curlicues and culminates in a magically poised and elfin close. Koechlin’s Au Loin is for English horn and piano. It is splendidly ermine-dark and languid. The melodic material might remind some listeners of Bax’s In The Faery Hills.


-- Rob Barnett, MusicWeb International

A superb new Otello from the Salzburg Easter Festival: “Cura is a commanding Otello with his richly coloured tenor and both fragile delicacy and fiery ardour” (Südwestpresse). “Röschmann as Desdemona guarantees effortless perfection” (Neue Musikzeitung). “Álvarez as Iago would be hard to surpass” (Abendzeitung). This Salzburg production – featuring “a cast worthy of any festival” (Südwestpresse) – is conducted by Christian Thielemann, who displays a command of Verdian tragedy to match his celebrated sovereignty in Wagner. He and his great Dresden Staatskapelle, a consummate opera ensemble, “achieve wonders” (Die Presse), “generating Italian ‘Musikdrama’ with their incandescence and precise nuances” (Abendzeitung). In his fascinating staging, director Vincent Broussard integrates video with set and lighting design to create an idealized visual context for what he calls Otello’s “conflict of ancient and modern, of 2D and 3D”.

“This set is essential” concluded Gramophone of the Ring cycle when this 2008 production was issued complete. Christian Thielemann leads a performance of masterful pacing and burning conviction that features detailed interpretations from many of today’s most experienced interpreters of their complex and glorious roles.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Things will be jolly good at the Morbisch Lake Festival in 2017! With Christel the post mistress and Adam the bird seller, two of the best-known operetta characters will be returning to the lake stage after an absence of nearly twenty years. Petty corruption in positions of authority, comedy of errors and something for the heart – all the classic operetta ingredients come together masterfully in the Vogelhandler. The arias “Grus’ enk Gott, alle miteinander”, “Ich bin die Christel von der Post” and “Schenkt man sich Rosen in Tirol” are very well known to lovers of operetta throughout the world.

Traditional music from Ireland, England and Scotland touches our hearts in a way that is very special and somehow magical. On this album, "Spirit and Pleasure" shows excerpts from the musical world of the 17th & 18th century in Ireland, Scotland and England: old pieces that were only passed down orally, new music in the traditional style, composers who are assigned to the "courtly-bourgeois" music, discovered the charm of these melodies, provided them with basso continuo and variations and published them among others in London, the musical center of England. The album title "Good taste" is derived from the "Treatise of Good Taste in the Art of Music" by Francesco Geminiani.

Latvian composer Pēteris Vasks (b. 1946) is one of the most prominent names among living composers today. This album by the Latvian National Symphony Orchestra conducted by Andris Poga includes the first recording of Vasks’ atmospheric and pastoral Oboe Concerto written for the centenary celebrations of Latvia’s independence in 2018 and performed by one of today’s leading oboists, Albrecht Mayer. The new concerto is coupled with two early orchestral works from the 1980s, Vestijums and Lauda – both musical manifestations from the final years of the Soviet Union when occupied Latvia started its peaceful fight to regain the country’s independence.

REVIEW:

Although he was a septuagenarian when he composed this Oboe Concerto in 2018, on a commission from oboist Albrecht Mayer, the music of composer Pēteris Vasks has continued to evolve. The inclusion here of two of Vasks’ 1980s orchestral works is to the point, for they are clearly works of the same composer as the Oboe Concerto, showing a characteristic departure from Baltic minimalism in a Romantic direction. Yet Vasks’ weaving of Romantic and minimalist has deepened over the years. One feels that the performances here by are unusually committed; the effect is hypnotic. The detailed notes, providing a good deal of context relevant to the development of Vasks’ increasingly influential music, form another attraction.

-- AllMusic.com (James Manheim)

The first true cross cultural fusion of Indian and western music was back in 1957 with John Mayer’s Raga Music for Solo Clarinet and through the sixties, seventies, eighties and nineties his musical output reflected his Indian roots. This release celebrates John Mayer’s orchestral work and sees the further development from his son Jonathan Mayer, including three premiere recordings and one first commercial release. Included in this album is John Mayer’s Second Violin Concerto, originally commissioned for the late Erich Gruenberg in 1978, is it played by Sasha Rozhdestvensky who has a long standing relationship with First Hand Records. Mayer’s Concerto for the Instruments of an Orchestra had its premiere performance in 1976 by The London Philharmonic Orchestra and Bernard Haitink. Jonathan Mayer’s Pranam for sitar, tabla and orchestra is inspired by the Indian dance form Kathak and was premiere in the Czech Republic in 2017, it features the composer on sitar and Shahbaz Hussian on tabla. His Second Sitar Concerto was premiered again in the Czech Republic in 2019 and all works are under the baton of the Indian conductor Debashish Chaudhuri.

Classical Music