Night After Night

More, more Mortier.

The rather brilliant and awesomely cultured Elisabeth Vincentelli, my TONY colleague and the voice behind the excellent Determined Dilettante, has just put up a long post on the WNET/Channel 13 SundayArts blog that I reckon a bunch of you will want to read.

The title is "How to sell art to the masses," and the subject is Gérard Mortier -- specifically, his views on building an audience through challenging people, and what he really thinks of some of the more populist ventures his soon-to-be new neighbor on the Lincoln Center plaza has engaged in. The quotes come from a recent hourlong interview on French public radio, which Elisabeth translated herself. One sample:

Interestingly, Mortier credits his Jesuit education in Ghent with his intellectual training, reading Sartre, Camus, Ibsen, Nietsche in 1961. “I loved the dialectic spirit of that education. Everybody had to be intellectually involved. It was always about dialogue and debate. Debate is what makes the world move forward.”

All this, and David Lynch, too. Go, see.

Playlist:

Silvestre Revueltas - Sensemayá; Inocente Carreno - Margaritena; Antonio Estevéz - Mediodia in el Llano; Arturo Márquez - Danzon No. 2; Aldemaro Romero - Suite para cuerdas; Alberto Ginastera - Estancia: Danzas del Ballet; Evencio Castellanos - Santa Cruz de Pacairigua (Suite Sinfoníca); Leonard Bernstein - Mambo - Simón Bolivar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela/Gustavo Dudamel (Deutsche Grammophon download; CD out now in Europe, due for U.S. release July 22)

Morbid Angel - Altars of Madness (Earache)

Opeth - Still Life and The Roundhouse Tapes (Peaceville); Blackwater Park, Deliverance and Damnation (Koch); Ghost Reveries (Roadrunner)

Bolt Thrower - War Master (Earache)

Terrorizer - World Downfall (Earache)

Marduk - Panzer Division Marduk (Regain)

Autopsy - Severed Survival (Peaceville)

Entombed - Left Hand Path (Earache)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - The String Quintets - Griller String Quartet with William Primrose (Vanguard)

Charles Wuorinen - Tashi; Fortune - Group for Contemporary Music; Percussion Quartet - New Jersey Percussion Ensemble (Naxos)

Colin Matthews - Fourth Sonata; Suns Dance; Broken Symmetry - London Sinfonietta/Oliver Knussen (Deutsche Grammophon)

Poul Ruders - Four Compositions; Hans Abrahamsen - Winternacht; Walden - London Sinfonietta/Oliver Knussen (Paula)

Terry Riley - Salome Dances for Peace - Kronos Quartet (Nonesuch)

Michael Tippett - The Mask of Time - Faye Robinson, Sarah Walker, Robert Tear, John Cheek, BBC Singers, BBC Symphony Orchestra and Chorus/Andrew Davis (EMI Classics)

Confessor - Condemned (Earache)

Exhorder - Slaughter in the Vatican and The Law (Roadrunner)

Pestilence - Spheres (Roadrunner/Metal Mind)

Leyla Gencer - Arias & Scenes, Volume 1 (Opera d'Oro)

Giuseppe Verdi - La Battaglia di Legnano - Leyla Gencer, João Gibin, Ugo Savarese, Coro e Orchestra del Teatro Giuseppe Verdi di Trieste/Francesco Molinari-Pradelli (Gala)

Gasparo Spontini - La Vestale - Leyla Gencer, Robleto Merolla, Renato Bruson, Agostino Ferrin, Coro e Orchestra del Teatro Massimo di Palermo/Fernando Previtali (Gala)

Luigi Cherubini - Medea - Leyla Gencer, Daniella Mazzucato, Aldo Bottion, Ruggero Raimondi, Coro e Orchestra del Teatro la Fenice (Gala)

Carlisle Floyd - Susannah - Phyllis Curtin, Norman Treigle, Richard Cassilly, New Orleans Opera Orchestra and Chorus/Knud Andersson (VAI Audio)

John Adams - Nixon in China - Carolann Page, Trudy Ellen Craney, John Duykers, Sanford Sylvan, James Maddalena, Thomas Hammons, Orchestra of St. Luke's/Edo de Waart (Nonesuch)

Ralph Vaughan Williams - Symphonies Nos. 1-9 - Sheila Armstrong, Margaret Price, Norma Burrowes, New Philharmonia Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir/Adrian Boult (EMI Classics)

Salon treatment.

Paul Groves in the Movado Hour at the Baryshnikov Arts Center
The New York Times, May 15, 2008

Art of the recital.

Felicity Lott and Graham Johnson at Zankel Hall
The New York Times, May 12, 2008

Variations.

Steve Reich: 'Daniel Variations'; Variations for Vibes, Pianos and Strings

Los Angeles Master Chorale, conducted by Grant Gershon; London Sinfonietta, conducted by Alan Pierson.

Nonesuch 406780-2; CD.

The New York Times, May 11, 2008

(ArkivMusic; Barnes & Noble)

Meme me.

I've been tagged by my dear friend and colleague Molly Sheridan (of NewMusicBox, Mind the Gap and other worthy endeavors) for the latest blog meme making the rounds. Here are the rules:

1. Pick up the nearest book.
2. Open to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people, and acknowledge who tagged you.

And so:

Erickson is not as well-known as he deserves; during the time when he was recreating the whole concept of college-level music education, ransacking the environment for new sounds for his own musical use, and turning them into music with instruments and gadgets of his own invention, he didn't bother much with playing the establishment game. Now, when he has more time on his hands, he has neither the strength nor the stomach to send out press releases or give TV interviews. Someone needs to rebuild his revolutionary instruments -- which were damaged when the university's music department moved into new quarters -- so as to revive the whole repertory of cool fantasy that they were designed to play.

From So I've Heard: Notes of a Migratory Music Critic by Alan Rich (Amadeus Press, 2006). The excerpt comes from "Erickson: Local Sounds," an LA Weekly column from March 1996.

The "Erickson" in question is Robert Erickson, a composer about whose music I know embarrassingly little. The university Rich mentions is the University of California at San Diego, where Erickson taught. He also exerted a tremendous influence as the music director of KPFA-FM, a free-form radio station operated by the Pacifica Foundation. When Rich wrote this in 1996, Erickson had been bedridden for most of a decade due to lupus; he died just a little more than a year after the column appeared. Compelled by Rich, I've just ordered a copy of Thinking Sound Music, a biography by Charles Shere.

Tough to find bloggers who haven't already been tapped for this exercise, but I'll tag Bruce Hodges, Pete Matthews, Hank Shteamer, Elisabeth Vincentelli and David T. Little.

Playlist:

Judas Priest - Unleashed in the East (Columbia)

Steve Reich - Daniel Variations - Los Angeles Master Chorale/Grant Gershon; Variations for Vibes, Pianos & Strings - London Sinfonietta/Alan Pierson (Nonesuch)

Németh - Film (Mosz)

Robert Erickson - Recent Impressions; Two Songs; High Flyer; Summer Music - Continuum (Naxos)

Messiaenic.

My friend Hank Shteamer -- TONY colleague, math-metal drummer and Dark Forces Swing blogger -- has posted a detailed, insightful and highly entertaining account of the concert that Tashi presented at Town Hall yesterday. The performance was the quartet's first New York appearance in some 30 years.

Hank, as you might know, is a musical polymath but by no means a classical-music specialist. He is, however, exactly the kind of open-minded, open-eared listener that Tashi was originally after back in its heyday, and that Alex Ross set out to court with The Rest Is Noise, which was why I urged him to produce this fine TONY feature on Alex and his book last fall.

Among my favorite bits from Hank's post:

Basically that was a disclaimer because I don't want to be That Guy, i.e., the classical nonenthusiast who goes around raving about Messiaen. But alas, I am Him whether I like it or not.

And:

Had this been a rock show, it would've been something akin to All Tomorrow's Parties' Don't Look Back series, i.e., Slint playing Spiderland live or somesuch. In the program notes we're told that Tashi was--in their early '70s heyday--"on the level of Jimi Hendrix in the classical music counterculture." ... Quartet was their signature work then, and if Ross's list is any indication, their recording of it is still the One to Get.

I'm very sorry that I couldn't make it to this concert. Of course, I'm sorrier still that I didn't make it to the Midori concert scheduled for exactly the same time, which I was actually assigned to review -- my excuse being that I was stuck in a derailed subway car.

Advocata nostra.

Mannes Opera Dialogues of the Carmelites at the Hunter Playhouse
The New York Times, May 5, 2008

Thinking and linking.

I've been pondering this blog's purpose and value lately. Don't get me wrong, it's not in danger of disappearing -- but I do sometimes wonder what service it's providing other than being a link dump for my New York Times writing. That was never the intention.

I started thinking about this a month ago -- and see, part of the problem is that it now takes me this long to get around to writing about it! -- when ACD of Sounds & Fury posted his list of the Top 50 Classical Music Blogs for the quarter. ACD's list followed the example of Scott Spiegelberg's lists at Musical Perceptions (the most recent of which is from December), but used a different method of calculation. After ACD's post, Ben at Classical Covert compiled four more lists using still other methodologies.

Night After Night has done pretty well, all things considered: I don't really stick to classical music, and due to an exponentially increased workload, I've been writing original posts far less frequently than I used to. What got stuck in my head after seeing all those polls, though, was not that I was in the Top 10 of all but one; it was that in the one exception -- the one Ben compiled using Google Reader Subscriptions -- I didn't make the list at all. (I'm still puzzling over that one a bit...)

On Tuesday night after the Elliott Carter premiere, I spoke with a prominent arts figure who mentioned that all he'd seen lately was "link, link, link." On Thursday I was privileged to spend some time talking with Derek Bermel's mentees in the New York Youth Symphony's "Making Score" program for composers under 23 years of age. In preparation for my appearance, they'd been assigned to browse my blog all season long. As I prepared to talk to them, I wondered just how much I'd given them to really chew on. Of the terrific, insightful questions they presented, more of them had to do with my wayward career path and Times writing than anything that had appeared on this blog.

All of which has me thinking about what I could do to get this blog back to a level of activity that satisfies me. I'm not sure what the answer is yet, but it's growing difficult to ignore my own dissatisfaction at what I'm achieving. I appreciate everyone who stops by this blog, everyone who's made it a regular destination and everyone who's linked to it; trust me when I say that I hope to make this place worth your while again.

While I've been brooding contemplating, I've started updating the blogroll at last. What today's additions have in common is that it's sort of embarrassing it's taken me this long to add them. Please welcome Marcus Maroney's Sounds Like New, Alex Shapiro's Notes from the Kelp, Scott Spiegelberg's Musical Perceptions, Dial "M" for Musicology, Andrew Patner's The View from Here, Bryant Manning's Mysteries Abysmal, Classical Convert, The Omniscient Mussel and -- last but most assuredly not least -- Classical Pontifications with Professor Heebie McJeebie.

Playlist:

Ludwig van Beethoven - Symphonies Nos. 1 & 3 - Royal Flemish Philharmonic/Philippe Herreweghe (PentaTone)

Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus - Best of Both Worlds Concert (Walt Disney/Hollywood)

Deicide - Deicide (Roadrunner); The Stench of Redemption (Earache)

Guillermo Klein and Los Guachos - Filtros (Sunnyside)

Hello Dolly.

This week's award for creative use of vocabulary goes to one of three gents walking across town together after last night's Dolly Parton show at Radio City Music Hall. "We can keep walking this way with the crowd," said one, "or we can turn left and sort of diaspora away from everyone." All three wore matching powder-blue T-shirts proclaiming their membership in D-CUPS, the Dolly Cultural Understanding and ’Preciation Society.

Parton's fast-paced, two-hour show was everything you would expect from such a consummate professional. Opening with a rowdy "Two Doors Down," she served up old classics ("Jolene," "Coat of Many Colors"), massive hits ("Islands in the Stream," "9 to 5," "I Will Always Love You") and selections from her strong new album, Backwoods Barbie. The title track from that album, she mentioned, was written for a stage musical based on the movie 9 to 5, due to open on Broadway next spring; a sizable contingent of cast and crew members was apparently present.

Parton was in stellar voice, had better moves than most folks half her age, and played solid licks on guitar, fiddle, banjo, harmonica, piano, dulcimer and piano. During a stretch of the second set, most of her backing singers and players took a turn in the spotlight for a solo tune, which in effect allowed Parton to "sit in" with Jerry Lee Lewis, Chuck Berry, the Everly Brothers, Brenda Lee, Aretha Franklin and the Beatles.

A well-rehearsed stage routine included plenty of room for shtick. Dolly cracked wise on politics ("If we do get a woman in the White House, every 28 days those terrorists better run further into the hills"), her looks ("I want to thank you for spending your hard-earned money on me... And I need the money: It takes a lot of money to look this cheap!") and plastic surgery ("If it's droopin’, saggin’ or baggin’ I'm gonna have it nipped, tucked or sucked!") Naturally she told stories of growing up poor in Eastern Tennessee, the second of 12 children born to her parents before they were 40.

Even if you knew she'd said these same lines countless times before, they were still touching. (Bryant Manning reports the same effect here, in an excerpt from a Time Out Chicago interview that also touches on Parton's appreciation of her huge gay following.) And she spoke with a well-deserved pride about her Imagination Library, a literacy charity she founded in honor of her illiterate parents. Originally a local concern in east Tennessee, the program has now spread throughout the state, the country and now Canada and the U.K. Parton isn't necessarily the first superstar who comes to mind when you think of socially active entertainers—but maybe she should be.

Playlist:

The Magic I.D. - Till My Breath Gives Out (Erstpop)

Graham Lambkin/Jason Lescalleet - The Breadwinner (Erstwhile)

Toshimaru Nakamura/English - One Day (Erstwhile)

Nico Muhly - Mothertongue (Bedroom Community/Brassland)

Death - Scream Bloody Gore (Combat)

Kiss - Creatures of the Night (Mercury)

Klaus Schulze - Irrlicht (Revisited)

Terry Riley - The Last Camel in Paris: Théâtre Edouard VII, Paris, 10 November 1978 (Elision Fields)

Bill Frisell - History, Mystery (Nonesuch, due May 13)

Charles Ives - Symphony No. 2; The Gong on the Hook and Ladder; Tone Roads No. 1; Hymn: Largo Cantabile; Hallowe'en; Central Park in the Dark; The Unanswered Question - New York Philharmonic/Leonard Bernstein (Deutsche Grammophon)

Gustav Mahler - Symphony No. 5 - Vienna Philharmonic/Leonard Bernstein (Deutsche Grammophon)

Lee Hoiby - This Is the Rill Speaking - Eastman Opera Theatre/Benton Hess (Albany)

Yoshi Wada - The Appointed Cloud (EM)

Michael Gandolfi - Points of Departure; Themes from a Midsummer Night; Y2K Compliant - Boston Modern Orchestra Project/Gil Rose (BMOP Sound)

Roy Harris - Symphony No. 3; Randall Thompson - Symphony No. 2; David Diamond - Symphony No. 4 - New York Philharmonic/Leonard Bernstein (Sony Classical)

Luigi Cherubini - Medea - Maria Callas, Maria Luisa Nache, Fedora Barbieri, Gino Penno, Orchestra and Chorus of Teatro La Scala, Milan/Leonard Bernstein (EMI Classics)

Alex Shapiro - Notes from the Kelp (Innova)

Yes - 90125 (Elektra/Rhino); Big Generator (Atco)

Fish - 13th Star (Chocolate Frog)

Made Out of Babies - The Spoiler (The End, due June 24)

Four and more.

Charles Neidich and the Juilliard String Quartet at the Peter Jay Sharp Theater
The New York Times, May 1, 2008

For another detailed, illuminating view, read what Bruce Hodges had to say at Monotonous Forest.