a virtual journal and blog of the classical music scene in Boston
Robert Levin, editor; Bettina A. Norton, executive editor; Lee Eiseman, publisher
Reviews
May 23, 2012
Music on Bloom Paintings at Alpha Gallery
by Stefanie Lubkowski
At Alpha Gallery on Newbury Street, tomorrow night, May 24, at 8 pm., Equilibrium repeats the first program of the Hyman Bloom Project, in which six chamber pieces are performed amid the paintings that inspired the music. This is the review of the first performance, last Thursday, of the ongoing endeavor to bring to light the work of Bloom through collaboration with local composers. [continued]
Stunning Rachmaninoff St. John Liturgy
by Janine Wanée
Having participated in a concert of selections from David Hodgkins’s “All-Night Vigil” a number of years ago, my expectations were high for an inspiring evening of choral music from Coro Allegro, directed by Hodgkins – and I was not disappointed. Coro Allegro’s interpretation last Saturday of Rachmaninoff’s Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom was stunning, a religious expression of “intelligence on fire.” [continued]
Intercontinental Piano Duo
by Marvin J. Ward
For last Sunday’s recital at the Frederick Historical Piano Concerts series, Shuann Chai and Yuan Sheng joined forces in their first duet outing for a program of solo and duo works by the Schumanns and Brahms. The instrument they chose was the 1868 Streicher, identical to the one Brahms owned and made in the same year. [continued]
Loving Tribute to Alain
by Elisa Birdseye
Ensemble St. Germain, directed by flutist Tim Macri, presented a jewel of a concert on May 19, at the Mission Church, Roxbury. Most pieces were by Jehan Alain, but his music surrounded by other French composers not only showed the milieu in which he worked but illuminated his musical style, in a loving tribute. [continued]
May 22, 2012
Sephardic Music from Voice of theTurtle
by Sudeep Agarwala
How to assign cultural identity when elements of personal history and conception of nationality are so mixed? This seemed at the heart of the performance by Voice of the Turtle on Saturday. The three-member ensemble, tackling music from the Sephardic communities of the Jewish diaspora, demonstrated that the cultural heritage of pre-Inquisition Spanish Judaism is very much alive. [continued]
May 21, 2012
Exquisite “To sleep, perchance to dream”
by Susan Miron
Sleep, dreams, and night permeated the texts of Music Sacra’s fascinating choral program Saturday evening at First Church, Congregational, Cambridge. Artistic Director Mary Beekman’s 14 selections combined rarely heard works by famous composers with works of composers obscure to me. Venturing out into choral repertoire past the “Top 10” favorites can produce untold delights, especially if the chorus is Musica Sacra. [continued]
Romantic sans Romanticism by Pianist Licad
by Michael Rocha
Yesterday at the Gardner Museum’s Calderwood Hall, pianist Cecile Licad presented Part II of her Chopin/Liszt piano series as the final offering of the season in the not-quite-new venue (though it still retains that “Eau du New Hall” essence). The strikingly austere environment, coupled with Licad’s analytical approach, resulted in an all-Romantic program largely devoid of the traditional trappings of Romanticism. [continued]
May 20, 2012
Hong’s Missa Lumen: Lorelei’s Anchor
by Rebecca Marchand
In times of turbulence and change, we seem to become more conscious of the past, sometimes recognizing its lessons just a moment too late. But one of art’s most outstanding qualities is that it can be resurrected and given new life. Last night, Lorelei Ensemble’s all-women octet brought a revealing, interpretive program to Brookline, “A Mass: Revolution, Resistance, and Progress.” [continued]
Les Bostonades Lock in Rameau
by David Patterson
Les Bostonades locked in “Pièces de clavecin en concerts” of Rameau. Akiko Sato at a French-styled harpsichord blended in immaculately with Scott Metcalfe’s violin and Emily Walhout’s viola da gamba. All three appeared friendly, precocious, and unpretentious. Programming all five of Rameau’s instrumental gems was straightforward, but the five concerts were not played in the “right” order. [continued]
BMOP: Apollo’s Fire, Minus Dance
by Cashman Kerr Prince
Boston Modern Orchestra Project under Gil Rose presented “Apollo’s Fire” in Jordan Hall Friday night. The four works on the concert took their inspiration from Apollo and the Muses, either explicitly or implicitly; the other link in this program I found to be omnipresent was the idea of dance. I missed seeing the dancing – especially in the Carter and Stravinsky. [continued]
May 18, 2012
Power and Lyricism from Haimovitz’s Cello
by Anthony J. Palmer
With incredibly flawless technique, Haimovitz displayed sheer raw power to sublime lyricism on selections from the Renaissance through contemporary American composers at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum last night. He held the audience spellbound in a program from Domenico Gabrielli, J. S. Bach, to Ned Rorem, Elliott Carter, and an arrangement of a Beatles’ song by Haimovitz’s wife, Luna Pearl Woolf. [continued]
May 15, 2012
Ciconia’s Music, Franco/Flemish Meets Italian
by Virginia Newes
“This isn’t Renaissance, it’s Medieval!” a perplexed audience member exclaimed during a concert of music by Johannes Ciconia given by Exsultemus at the University Lutheran Church, Cambridge, on Saturday. Known for their performances of Renaissance and Baroque repertoire, Exsultemus singers and accompanying instrumentalists reached back this time to around 1400, when Franco-Flemish traditions of learned polyphony encountered Italian traditions of melodious song. [continued]
Cantata Singers: Contemporary Choral & Piano
by Geoffrey Wieting
Cantata Singers, led by David Hoose, and duo-pianists David Kopp and Rodney Lister presented “In Thoughts, Our Dreams” to a Jordan Hall audience last,Kim, Shapero, Lister (who all had or have important ties to greater Boston) had enunciation problems, but the final Copland In the Beginning was ecstatic. [continued]
Magical Debussy on 1877 Érard
by Marvin J. Ward
For her third appearance at the Frederick Collection’s series on Sunday, Hsia-Jung Chang played Debussy, the first half devoted to two earlier suites for piano and the second half to some of his earlier melodies, thus taking the opportunity to introduce soprano Deborah Berioli to the series. Chang felt that an Érard best offered the possibility of creating Debussy’s desired soundscape. [continued]
May 14, 2012
Chameleon’s Emotion from Difficult Pieces
by Leon Golub
The Chameleon Arts Ensemble, with guest artists pianist Sergey Schepkin and soprano Elizabeth Keusch, presented a program entitled “and told in song” yesterday at Goethe-Institut Boston, featuring Enescu, Schumann, and Shostakovich and contemporary works by Robert Sirota and Judith Weir. Both halves of the program ended with overwhelmingly powerful emotion. “Zun mit a regn.” [continued]
BCMS: Delightful, Deeply Felt Playing
by Mark DeVoto
The Boston Chamber Music Society offered a fine program last night that blended classic, romantic, and modern with the familiar and the seldom heard. Ravel’s less popular Sonata for Violin and Cello received an energetic, even fearless performance; Arensky’s Piano Trio, a deeply felt, fine one; and Schubert’s “Trout” was spirited, expressive, in every way delightful. [continued]
May 13, 2012
Sublimity from CMS of Lincoln Center
by Cashman Kerr Prince
This afternoon, the Gardner Museum’s Sunday Concert Series presented the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. Music by Rolla and Schumann showcased four of the musicians in a concert that offered sublime moments of breathtaking beauty. The only sour note was the excessively long delay after the first movement of Rolla’s Duetto Concertante for the late seating of audience members. [continued]
May 12, 2012
Masterworks Chorale Resurrects King David
by David Patterson
Masterworks Chorale brought back more than just memories in its performance of Honegger’s King David., The performance Friday night at Sanders thoroughly reawakened that particular sense of religious fervor of a time gone by. A special kind of applause is due Music Director Steven Karidoyanes for pulling off such an evening. [continued]
Ax Shows Why “Celebrity” Means So Much
by Andrew Sammut
Emanuel Ax’s appearance at the Celebrity Series of Boston last Friday was a reminder that fame and talent, not to mention modesty, don’t have to be mutually exclusive. Ax was lucid, powerful, and above all, moving; in others words all the things that should be celebrated in an artist. [continued]
May 10, 2012
Kinetic Energy, Sonorous Pleasure from Radius
by Zoe Kemmerling
Radius Ensemble presented a comfortable program of old favorites and friendly newer works on May 5th at Longy. The evening progressed in reverse chronological order from a commissioned premiere to Beethoven’s Sextet in E-flat Major op. 81b for horns and strings. The players brought the extroverted, eager-to-please chamber pieces stylishly to life — no high-minded intellectual abstruseness here, just kinetic energy, sonorous pleasure, and fun. [continued]
May 9, 2012
COB Evoked Paris Spring in Boston
by Sudeep Agarwala
An ensemble of roughly 10 performers produced a whirlwind tour of the sound of 20th-century France on Saturday evening in Boston’s First Church. Honegger’s Pastorale d’été seemed at home here, and Debussy and Fauré flourished in the hands of David Feltner’s Chamber Orchestra of Boston. Also impressive were the songs by Giraud, Louiguy and Poulenc, sung by baritone Paul Soper. [continued]
May 8, 2012
“Making a Mess” a Big Job for Cantilena
by Janine Wanée
Although the theme of the concert by Cantilena, a women’s chorale, was “Making a Mess!”, its demands for a volunteer ensemble ironically required musical precision in rhythmic syncopation and entrances as well as harmonic intonation. For a group of women, what is more satisfying than to band together and sing in parts a vivid description of bashing a kitchen appliance? [continued]
Nez’s Mixed-Cultures Opera Gets Mixed Results
by Geoffrey Wieting
Last weekend marked the world premiere by Juventas New Music Ensemble of The Fiddler and the Old Woman of Rumelia by Ketty Nez at the Calderwood Pavilion. I wondered if the libretto, obscure even by opera’s standards, might be rather less so if this diverse ethnic potpourri of the former Ottoman Empire had been narrowed to two or three sources. [continued]
20th c. Music on a 19th c. Érard? A Perfect Fit!
by Marvin J. Ward
On Sunday, for the second of the Frederick Collection’s Spring Season Concerts, the 1877 Érard Extra-grand, popular with many pianists who play in the series, was featured. It is perhaps the most extraordinary piano I have ever heard, and the Blaich-Leverett Piano Duo put together an extraordinary program of duet and solo works dating from 1871 to 1993. [continued]
May 7, 2012
Glück’s Original Orfeo with Modern Touches
by Joel Schwindt
The Boston Baroque production of Glück’s Orfeo ed Euridice at Jordan Hall featured countertenor Owen Willetts as Orpheus, soprano Mary Wilson as Eurydice, and soprano Courtney Huffman as Cupid. Martin Pearlman led the period-instrument orchestra and chorus. The musical and dance performances were a resounding success, though choreographer Gianni di Marco’s mixture of historical and modern dance styles was mystifying. [continued]