Articles in Classical + Opera
Double debut doubles pleasure as Nézet-Séguin and Rotterdam Philharmonic take Chicago bows
Review: It was one of those double-take realizations, the improbable fact that conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the high-profile 39-year-old music director of the Philadelphia Orchestra, had never conducted in Chicago – not with the Chicago Symphony, not at all. That – what shall we call it, oversight? – was corrected in stunning fashion when Nézet-Séguin brought his other orchestra, the Rotterdam Philharmonic, to Orchestra Hall on Feb. 20 with a program of Ravel and Prokofiev that confirmed every good report about the conductor and proved little short of revelatory about the Dutch ensemble.
Balm for a winter weekend, Mozart’s Requiem casts warming glow in hands of Muti and CSO
Review: It was a sad time for Chicago’s musical community, which had lost two respected musicians within days of each other. By astonishing coincidence the scheduled program, dedicated to their memory, included the Requiem by Mozart, whose own life slipped away from him as he wrote it. A bit of the Lacrymosa is the last passage in Mozart’s own hand.
Sex and the single troubadour: Lyric Opera turns heat up in earthy take on Wagner’s ‘Tannhäuser’
Review: It’s a bleak, war-torn world that greets Wagner’s prodigal troubadour in the Lyric Opera’s potent, sensual and yet strikingly unromanticized production of “Tannhäuser.” Typical of a current trend, the Lyric version – created by Covent Garden’s Royal Opera and now seen in Chicago for the first time – brings the story into a timeless present. Though generally dark, this treatment also energizes, and vibrantly colorizes, the prologue’s protracted sex romp at the Venusberg. ★★★★
From ‘Romeo’ to ‘Figaro,’ love rules as Lyric plans eight operas, ‘King and I’ for 2015-16
Report: You know that Valentine’s Day is just around the corner when the romantic couplings planned for the Lyric Opera’s 2015-16 season are the stuff of headlines. The game of love becomes a delicious frenzy when lots of money and a very attractive widow are at stake: Soprano Renée Fleming will be playing her “Merry Widow” title role to the hilt with baritone Thomas Hampson beginning Nov. 14 and into the holiday season. We provide details.
Muti’s mighty Chicago forces wind up Carnegie campaign with impressive reprise of Prokofiev
Review: There was a wild and welcome counter-intuitive energy to the final program that Muti brought to his trilogy of concerts with the Chicago Symphony and Chorus at New York’s 57th Street temple of music, in the wake of a travel-hampering blizzard on the eastern seaboard and another underway in Chicago.
Andrew Patner dies; noted Chicago arts critic was 55
Report: Andrew Patner, critic-at-large at WFMT FM (98.7) and a contributing classical music critic for the Chicago Sun-Times, died Feb. 3 after a brief illness. He was 55 years old. “It is with a profound sense of sadness, sorrow and shock that we must announce that our dear friend and colleague, Andrew Patner, passed away this morning after a very brief battle with a bacterial infection that overwhelmed his body,” Steve Robinson, general manager of WFMT, said in a statement.
Tour is a tour is a tour? Not for CSO and Muti, bettering Paris-Vienna best at Carnegie Hall
Review: Perhaps it’s simply a matter of time zones and surroundings, but the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, playing the same music it had performed in its recent visit to Paris and Vienna, delivered a knockout performance at New York’s Carnegie Hall on Jan. 30 that outshone its best in those European capitals.
As Chicago Symphony unveils 2015-16 season, Muti pushes live streaming, concerts in Cuba
Report: At a Symphony Center press conference, where details of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s 2015-16 season were released, music director Riccardo Muti expressed a three-fold desire to increase connections with Chicago’s many ethnic communities through neighborhood events, press forward with cutting-edge multimedia recordings and live-from-Chicago events that can reach a worldwide internet audience, and widen the CSO’s touring horizons beyond the U.S. and Europe to include newly open Cuba and “all the East, which is the future.”
Tatiana Serjan’s electrifying Tosca sparks supercharged new production at Lyric
Review: ★★★★ Rekindling the fire, even the sense of surprise, in an opera as frequently mounted as Puccini’s “Tosca” is no small trick. But that is precisely the triumph of the new production that opened Jan. 24 at the Lyric Opera of Chicago – a mesmerizing night of music theater imaginatively staged, perceptively conducted and gloriously sung. In her Lyric debut as Tosca, Russian soprano Tatiana Serjan displayed a voice of great beauty, flexibility and power, all marshalled to ringing drama effect.
21-year-old Atlanta Symphony bassoonist wins post as new principal with Chicago Symphony
Report: Keith Buncke was still a Curtis Institute of Music student in February 2014 when he won the principal bassoon job, at 20, with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. Now 21, he has taken a second bounce, and it’s a big one – to become the new principal at the CSO.
Bronfman, Muti and CSO sketch chamber music on vast canvas of Brahms’ 2nd Piano Concerto
Review: In broad, round terms, the figure of pianist Yefim Bronfman taking his seat at the keyboard to play Brahms’ Piano Concerto No. 2 in B-flat with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and conductor Riccardo Muti on Jan. 15 immediately brought to mind images of the composer in exactly that posture. When Bronfman’s serene – really beyond sublime – performance had ended, that evocative association only felt confirmed.
American music is lodestar of 2015 Grant Park concert constellation; price is heavenly – free
Preview: It is one of the glories of Chicago’s summer and a thrilling populist tradition, the Grant Park Music Festival at Millennium Park, where the one-size-fits-all lawn price – free! – means that if you’ve got a blanket, your place under the stars is guaranteed. Artistic director Carlos Kalmar reflects on the 2015 season, just announced, which celebrates American greats alongside an appealing mix of symphonic classics. The stage of the Jay Pritzker Pavilion is framed by the signature billowing stainless steel forms of architect Frank Gehry.
At heart of Beethoven’s grandiose ‘Emperor,’ pianist Paul Lewis detects an image of grace
Interview: At the core of Beethoven’s “Emperor” Piano Concerto, says British virtuoso Paul Lewis, dwells a tenderness that belies the work’s outwardly heroic trappings. That lyrical middle chapter, he says, bespeaks the concerto’s true heart. “Liszt called the slow movement of the ‘Emperor’ an angel between two demons,” says Lewis, who plays Beethoven’s last and most exuberant piano concerto with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and conductor Vasily Petrenko in performances Jan. 8-10 at Orchestra Hall.
Cue cameras: Metropolitan Opera Live in HD, come of age, is playing at a cinema near you
Feature review: The Metropolitan Opera is the most international of houses, but there is something quintessentially American about the Saturday afternoon HD cinema broadcasts that are now part of its marketing arsenal. After attending a performance of “Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg” at the Met, I caught the same production, broadcast live to cinemas on Dec. 13, starring German baritone Michael Volle as Hans Sachs, the master shoemaker, cobbler of poems and mender of hearts.
New York Aisle: A tale of two cellists, to say nothing of two thirtysomething conductors
Review: It felt like an affirmation of classical music’s near-term future, the double-header of concerts I heard Dec. 5 at Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall. The experience was redolent of virtuosity, passion and optimism. There were two brilliant cellists: New York native Alisa Weilerstein, playing the Dvořák Concerto with the New York Philharmonic, and Jean-Guihen Queyras, a Frenchman playing Haydn’s effervescent C major Cello Concerto with the Philadelphia Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. Yet no less remarkable were the young conductors.
New York Aisle: Met’s balanced ‘Klinghoffer’ revealed depth of Adams’ controversial opera
Analysis: To sit in the audience at the Metropolitan Opera, where a richly inflected production of John Adams’ 1991 opera “The Death of Klinghoffer” unfolded this fall, was to experience the opera itself coming into focus. “The Death of Klinghoffer” is already a different experience than it was at its Brussels premiere 23 years ago.
‘Porgy and Bess’ at the Lyric Opera: From plenty of nuttin’, a masterpiece rises on Catfish Row
Review: The Lyric Opera’s revival of Gershwin’s “Porgy and Bess” is a thing of beauty not to be missed. More than that, it’s a ringing affirmation of this iconic American stage work as a great opera. Bass-baritone Eric Owens empowers Porgy with a voice larger than life yet scales this poor, crippled, yearning character to the credible proportions of a man. His woman, in a fragile union forged from convenience and necessity, is soprano Adina Aaron’s lithe and sexy Bess, vulnerable and gorgeously voiced. ★★★★★
Vienna Aisle: Comedic Muti leaves ’em laughing, and impressed by Chicago Symphony’s finesse
Interview: Habitués of Chicago’s Orchestra Hall have something in common with audiences in Vienna who heard the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s final European tour concerts last week at the Musikverein. They know the droll, often outrageously funny side of the CSO’s artistically exacting music director, Riccardo Muti. But the conductor was all seriousness when he declared the orchestra’s latest European tour a big success.
Vienna Aisle: Happily in tune with CSO, Muti nixes idea of position at Vienna State Opera
Report: When Riccardo Muti says that the Chicago Symphony Orchestra is one of the greatest orchestras in the world – as he did before 300 adoring guests in an intimate recital space at the famed Musikverein – the Viennese simply take it in stride. Out of politeness and affection alone they would give him that. Muti has been a favorite in the Austrian musical capital for decades. Curiosity about Muti’s Chicago orchestra was high during the CSO’s weeklong visit capping a five-country European tour. So was speculation whether he might be interested in the biggest music directorship in Vienna, suddenly open. But Muti says Chicago’s enough for him.
Vienna Aisle: Inside reeling mind of Tannhäuser via a bold psychological thriller at the Staatsoper
Review: Serendipity delivered me to the Vienna State Opera on Oct. 30 to take in director Claus Guth’s surprising, indeed completely out of the box and captivating production of Wagner’s “Tannhäuser.” It wasn’t just that the Wiener Staatsoper was in play on a night when the Chicago Symphony Orchestra – the object of my week in Vienna – wasn’t performing one of its four concerts at the Musikverein: The opera at hand was “Tannhäuser,” which the Lyric Opera of Chicago will be mounting later this season and which I had not seen in some time. ★★★★
Paris Aisle: Mid-tour, CSO and Riccardo Muti raise a roof with Tchaikovsky and Schumann
Report: If the Chicago Symphony Orchestra needed an energy infusion halfway into its current European tour, surely that jolt came with its two concerts at Paris’ Salle Pleyel, where music director Riccardo Muti and company enjoyed ripping ovations from capacity audiences. After single-concert stops in Warsaw, Luxembourg and Geneva, the orchestra settled into Paris for two nights, and the Parisians snapped up every ticket to catch the Chicagoans and their celebrated maestro live. Still ahead is a full week of concerts in Vienna to cap the tour.
Lyric’s ‘Capriccio’ embraces ensemble flair, patrician milieu of Strauss’ high-minded lark
Review: To watch Lyric Opera’s “Capriccio” is to put one’s mind inside a blissful dream of wealth and privilege, where the toughest choices facing a glamorous Parisian countess — played by Renée Fleming — concerned which adoring, handsome and talented young man to endow with her philanthropy, and her bed. ★★★★
Dark, funny, musically vibrant ‘Don Giovanni’ raises the curtain on new Lyric Opera season
Review: A more appealing cast could hardly have been assembled for Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” than the vocally resplendent, good-looking singers who inhabit the Lyric Opera of Chicago’s new production and season opener. And for the most part, Mozart’s opera – dramatically dark and musically brilliant — is well served by director Robert Falls’ heated and funny approach to this tale of the world’s most infamous sex addict, whose recklessness and hubris finally bring him all the way down and then some. ★★★★
Muti summons bravura of Tchaikovsky Fourth and elegance of Debussy’s ‘La Mer’ with CSO
Review:The crowd went freaking wild at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s whooping finish to Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony under music director Riccardo Muti on Sept. 25 at Orchestra Hall. And understandably so. What a blazer of a performance. But the greater experience was an utterly magical account of Debussy’s “La Mer.”
Riccardo Muti’s starry Beethoven Ninth opens Chicago Symphony season in cosmic fashion
Review: The cantata Beethoven composed to Friedrich Schiller’s “Ode to Joy” – that is, the grandiose finale to the Ninth Symphony – may be a rousing crowd-pleaser, but it’s also a good deal more. It’s the peroration of a sweeping dialectic on man’s fate, a closely and tumultuously argued essay spun out in wordless majesty for three-quarters of an hour before the first syllable is uttered.Such was the sum and the magnificence of music director Riccardo Muti’s season opening performance of the Ninth Symphony with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on Sept. 18 at Orchestra Hall.
Chicago Opera Theater buffs up neglected jewel in high-tech staging of Bloch’s grand ‘Macbeth’
Review: When Swiss-born Ernest Bloch began to contemplate the creation of his first and only opera, “Macbeth,” he was an untested 25 and would turn 30 before his opus found footing at the Opéra-Comique in Paris. The opera then slipped into oblivion. What is surprising is how staggeringly good Bloch’s result is — for an opera that almost no one knows. ★★★
Chicago Symphony’s new chief is battle tested by long, productive career in orchestra world
Profile: Jeff Alexander may seem a low-profile long-shot for those who were handicapping the search for a new president of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association. But as a closer look at the secret and highly selective search process reveals, Alexander, who heads up the Vancouver Symphony, scored high in two areas deemed paramount: the potential for a simpatico relationship with CSO music director Riccardo Muti, who required passion and knowledge of music first, and a proven track record as an orchestra’s No. 1 decision-maker.
Martha S. Gilmer, longtime Chicago Symphony executive, named CEO of San Diego orchestra
Report: It’s off to San Diego’s warmer clime this fall for Martha S. Gilmer, the veteran executive of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra who now serves as vice-president of artistic planning and audience development. Gilmer becomes CEO of the 104-year-old San Diego Symphony effective Sept. 24.
String trio Time for Three twists classical roots into genre-smashing concerts of discovery
Preview: The term “crossover” just doesn’t seem adequate for the super-eclectic, albeit classically rooted, string trio Time for Three, which makes its debut at Chicago’s City Winery on July 7. A different word is needed for the creative adventures and mash-ups that fire the collective imagination of violinists Nicolas Kendall and Zachary De Pue and bassist Ranaan Meyer. If there’s any road these youthful musical wanderers have not yet taken, it’s only a matter of time. They are stylistically peripatetic — with a vengeance.
Lessons of Riccardo Muti’s Schubert cycle tell as CSO caps season with poetic Mahler First
Review: What Riccardo Muti has brought to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in his first four years as music director was on display June 19 as the orchestra crowned its season with a revelatory pairing of Schubert’s graceful Fifth Symphony and Mahler’s splendorous First.
