the traveler's resource guide to festivals & films
a FestivalTravelNetwork.com site
part of Insider Media llc.
Connect with us:
Reviews
Christmas Music--New York Pops Concert and CDs
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Tuesday, 22 December 2015 16:10
- Written by Kevin Filipski
 |
| Brian d'Arcy James and Stephanie J. Block with conductor Steven Reineke and The New York Pops (photo: Richard Termine) |
This month's uncommonly mild weather has made it seem more like late spring rather than the holiday season, so the New York Pops’annual Christmas concerts at Carnegie Hall (December 18 and 19) were a needed antidote.
It’s Christmas Time in the City was a wonderfully festive display of great singing and music-making led by Pops music director Steven Reineke, featuring the orchestra, Broadway veterans Stephanie J. Block and Brian d’Arcy James and the chorus Essential Voices USA.
Although Block’s effusive personality threatened to overwhelm the show, happily she hammed it up only during the “Holiday Hits Medley” when she out-Mariahed Mariah Carey on “All I Want for Christmas Is You.”
Her emotional rendition of Wesley Wheatley and Bill Schermerhorn’s affecting “Yes, Virginia” (in which she mentioned her own newborn daughter) was a highlight, as was her easy rapport with d’Arcy James on their duets “Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!” and “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.”
D'Arcy James also brought his A game, with engagingly unadorned renditions of “The Christmas Song” and “Silver Bells,” but his best moment came with a song he wrote about his hometown of Saginaw, “Michigan Christmas,” which was heartfelt without being the least bit sentimental.
Essential Voices USA dominated from the opening, a rousing “Deck the Halls.” The evening's lone quibble was monstrously over-orchestrated versions of “Angels We Have Heard on High” and “O Holy Night,” whose orchestral swellings all but buried the chorus’ excellent work (and in the latter, Block’s ringing high notes).
But orchestra and singers came together beautifully for a final singalong of sacred carols that sent the satisfied audience out into the uncharacteristically cold night humming, happy and ready for December 25.
Holiday CDs
Ann Hampton Callaway—The Hope of Christmas
(MCG Jazz)
Putting together a disc of all-new Christmas songs is a daring endeavor, so this collaboration of singer Ann Hampton Callaway and lyricist William Schermerhorn scores right off the bat. Schermerhorn's lyrics, spirited or wistful or amusing or romantic in turn, are the perfect complement to Callaway's warm singing on these 12 new tunes.
Callaway herself wrote the music for the hopeful title track and the personal final song, "Fly with the Angels." The whipsmart jazz arrangements, performed by an exemplary ensemble, give this recording a pleasing seasonal vibe.
(Pentatone)
This collection of new Christmas carols by seven American composers spans generations from William Bolcom, John Corigliano and Gordon Getty to Mark Adamo and Jake Heggie, whose song cycle On the Road to Christmas delightfully resurrects old tunes next to new ones that work well within the seasonal tradition.
Also memorable and likely to last are David Garner's Three Carols and Luna Pearl Woolf's How Bright the Darkness; soprano Lisa Delan and baritone Lester Lynch, conductor Dawn Harms and pianist Steven Bailey are the impeccable musicians.
Paul Hindemith—The Long Christmas Dinner
(Bridge)
In his melodious musicalization of Thornton Wilder's one-act drama of Americana, German composer Paul Hindemith created a miniature masterpiece that would turn out to be his last opera (he died in 1963, two years after its premiere), and its musical subtleties mirror those of Wilder's insightful play about one family over a period of nearly a century.
In this, astonishingly the opera's first English-language recording, conductor Leon Botstein leads an ideal reading that captures the work's emotions with gentle understatement.
(Carus)
Although there are motets for unaccompanied choir on this disc—including the four Francis Poulenc motets that are justly famous seasonal works—this recording's highlight is Ottorino Respighi's Lauda, a rarely-heard Christmas cantata of real substance and heightened dramatic power.
It was Respighi's lone sacred composition in a long and distinguished career.
Patty Smyth—Come on December
(Parallel 22)
For her first holiday album (actually more of an EP, since it's only eight songs), Scandal singer Patty Smyth confidently makes her way through five familiar classics and three new tunes, none of which will enter the canon of Christmas classics.
Smyth—a magnificently controlled singer who has never received the respect and admiration she deserves (compare that to the out-of-control panegyrics that greeted Adele's new album)—makes even the less memorable songs like "Walk with Me" and the title track shine, and she makes standards like "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" and "The Christmas Song" her own.
New Rock Shows—Broadway's 'School of Rock,' Off-Broadway's 'These Paper Bullets!'
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Sunday, 20 December 2015 22:29
- Written by Kevin Filipski
School of Rock
Music by Andrew Lloyd Webber; lyrics by Glenn Slater; book by Julien Fellowes
Directed by Laurence Connor
Opened December 6, 2015
These Paper Bullets!
Songs by Billie Joe Armstrong; written by Rolin Jones
Directed by Jackson Gay
Closes January 10, 2016
 |
| Alex Brightman and Brandon Neiderauer trade guitar licks in School of Rock(photo: Matthew Murphy) |
Like the amusing if innocuous Jack Black movie on which it's based, Andrew Lloyd Webber's new musical School of Rock is a low-brow but rousing crowd-pleaser of the type not usually associated with the Catsand Evita composer. The 2003 movie had a typically eccentric and lively Black as a failed musician who nabs a substitute teacher job intended for his married roommate, teaching what he assumes are stuck-up young brats the virtues of rock (don't ask how he gets the job and keeps it for so long without anyone noticing). The classroom full of precocious and talented kids helped make Black's usual shenanigans less annoying.
The musical mostly follows that blueprint, and why not? Unlike the movie, our hero Dewey (an inspired Alex Brightman, who resembles Black without slavishly imitating him) now has straight-laced principal Rosalie (the impeccable Sierra Boggess, who has quietly become one of our best musical actresses, killing it whether belting out the show's big ballad, "Where Did the Rock Go," or attacking the terrifyingly stratospheric notes of Mozart's Queen of the Night aria) as a love interest, whereas in the movie she was more his comic antagonist. The show also fleshes out the kids' equally difficult relationships with their uncomprehending parents.
Brightman and Boggess are brightly appealing together and apart, Webber's songs and Glenn Slater's lyrics are not particularly original but loudly get the job done—even if the big number, "Stick It to the Man," sounds like an outtake from another schoolkids' musical, Matilda—and Laurence Connor's slickly busy staging gives the whole thing a credibly ramshackle quality.
But it's all nothing without the tremendously talented and professional kids, especially those in the band like standouts Brandon Neiderauer, who plays guitar like a young Hendrix, and Evie Dolan, who plays bass like a young McCartney. Whenever the kids trade zingers with Dewey or talk back to their parents or sing along and joyously jump around in JoAnn M. Hunter's delightful choreography, School of Rock resembles a real musical of rock.
 |
| The Quartos in These Paper Bullets! (photo: Ahron R. Foster) |
Since Shakespeare and the Beatles are Britain's greatest cultural exports, why not mash them together and see what happens? That's the lame idea behind These Paper Bullets!, a paper-thin parody ofMuch Ado About Nothing set in London's swinging '60s as a band called the Quartos makes it big.
Rolin Jones' rollicking but juvenile adaptation of the Bard turns the leads Beatrice and Benedick into Bea—a sweet but sardonic London designer—and Ben—the Quartos' frontman—whose verbal jousting (some lines are adapted or wholly lifted from the original play, sacrilegiously) belies the fact that they're bound to end up together. But Jones hedges his bets by enlarging silly subplots of Scotland Yard investigators infiltrating the band's inner sanctum (Dogberry, etc., in the play) and the bumpy relationship between the Quartos' co-leader Claude and girlfriend Higgy (Claudio and Hero in the play), to the detriment of the entire dreary show.
Even Shakespeare occasionally had trouble making it all cohere, so a far lesser writer like Jones can't hope to cope with such fractious changes of style and tone, and hence his overlong (more than 2-1/2 hours!) attempt at farce falls flat on its face again and again, reduced to snarky asides, audience participation and desperate Fab Four in-jokes (villain Don John becomes Don Best, a nod to pre-Ringo drummer Pete Best). Billie Joe Armstrong's tunes—much like his power-pop efforts on Green Day's recent albums—are energetic in the early Beatles mold but lack the smarts, savvy, staying power and (most of all) originality.
Justin Kirk and Nicole Parker might have made a droll couple as Ben and Bea with more pointedly funny material; at least Kirk and his band mates—James Barry (Pedro), Lucas Papaelias (Balth) and the best of the bunch, Bryan Fenkart (Claude)—play the faux-Beatles songs with infectious enthusiasm. In fact, everyone onstage in Jackson Gay's colorful but repetitive staging (on Michael Yeargan's clever turntable set) is equally animated, but little of that good cheer infects the audience. These Paper Bullets! ends up shooting blanks.
School of Rock
Winter Garden Theatre, 50th Street and Broadway, New York, NY
schoolofrockthemusical.com
These Paper Bullets!
Atlantic Theater Company, 336 West 20th Street, New York, NY
atlantictheater.org
Chamber Orchestra of New York Shines in Inaugural Concert of the Season
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Friday, 18 December 2015 01:14
- Written by Jack Angstreich
Di Wu
On the evening of Saturday, December 12th, the superb musicians of the Chamber Orchestra of New York performed their exciting inaugural concert of the season at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall (881 7th Ave) under the expert direction of Salvatore Di Vittorio. On the basis of this appearance, my first time hearing this ensemble, I can say that these players can rival that of any other young professionals orchestra I’ve heard.
The delightful program open with an accomplished account of George Gershwin’s lovely Lullaby, originally scored for string quartet, with a melody derived from an aria in the composer’s first opera, Blue Monday. This was followed by a sterling performance of the world premiere of the impressive Three Variations on a Gregorian Theme by the promising Emiliano Imondi, this year’s winner of the Respighi Prize. The first half of the evening closed with a marvelous rendition of the Peter Tchaikovsky masterpiece, the unutterably beautiful Serenade for strings — the high-point of the program.
The extraordinary second half of the concert featured an excellent version of Dmitri Shostakovich’s wonderful first Piano Concerto, scored for strings and solo trumpet — ably played here by Thomas Boulton. The brilliant piano soloist, Di Wu, gave a triumphant performance and concluded an immensely pleasurable evening with a dazzling encore, a virtuosic arrangement of Gershwin’s classic song, “I Got Rhythm”.
December '15 Digital Week III
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Thursday, 17 December 2015 20:36
- Written by Kevin Filipski
Blu-rays of the Week
Extant—Complete 2nd Season
(Paramount/CBS)
The second season of this sci-fi series about humans, aliens and humaniches (human-like robots), filled with an unholy mix of intrigue and sentimentality, remains distant, respectable, occasionally exciting if rarely gripping.
Even though Halle Berry's star presence gives it a glossy sheen, the rest of the cast—led by Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Grace Gummer, Meryl Streep's even less talented actress daughter—is only passable which, along with convoluted storylines, leads to diminishing dramatic returns by series' end. It all looks pretty spectacular in hi-def; extras include featurettes and a gag reel.
(Arthaus Musik)
Two decades ago, Polish composer Henryk Gorecki's Symphony of Sorrowful Songs surprisingly caught on with the public to become one of the best-selling classical CDs ever: its languid and slow music, coupled with Dawn Upshaw's emotive singing, made it resonate even with those who don't listen to serious music.
Too bad, then, that Tony Palmer's 1993 documentary isn't up to his usual standard; there's an illuminating Gorecki interview and a vivid performance of the symphony by Upshaw, London Sinfonietta and conductor David Zinman, but Palmer crassly rubs our noses in what inspired the work by showing superfluous footage of piles of dead Holocaust victims and equally emaciated starving Africans. The early '90s video looks merely adequate, as is the stereo sound.
Jaco
(MVD/Iron Horse)
One of the most influential bass players of his time, Jaco Pastorius had a meteoric rise and troubling fall that are the focus of this wrenching documentary by Paul Marchand and Stephen Kijak, who tell the musical story of the man who reinvented the bass guitar in the fusion band Weather Report among other collaborations before his untimely death in 1986 at age 35. We hear from Jaco's friends and colleagues, all admirers and many of them bassists (Bootsy Collins, Sting, Flea, Geddy Lee, Metallica's Robert Trujillo, the film's co-producer), while others like Joni Mitchell talk of how his musicianship affected their own performances.
A sad story of a father, husband and artist who burned out instead of fading away gives Jaco its extra emotional kick. The film looks decent on Blu; a full disc of extras features many additional interviews.
(Weinstein Co/Anchor Bay)
In this entertaining dramatization of the adventures of one of the first European explorers to reach the East, the 13th century Italian finds himself amidst clashes of the political, personal, cultural and even sexual kind during his stay in China.
Whether much of the drama, out in the open or behind closed doors, is based on fact is problematic, but it's done with as much fidelity to the characters and their era as is possible. The 10-episode first season looks ravishing on Blu-ray; extras are a documentary, featurettes, deleted scenes and a gag reel.
Speedy
(Criterion)
Not as well-known, Harold Lloyd nevertheless equaled Buster Keaton with brilliantly orchestrated, high-flying stunt work that made his films something special; even if 1928's Speedy isn't up to Keaton's Sherlock Jr. or Lloyd's own romps Safety Last and The Freshman, it still has his characteristic physical comedy in hilarious abundance.
The latest in the Criterion Collection's excellent Lloyd releases has another luminous hi-def restoration and transfer, while extras include composer Carl Davis' musical score, commentary, featurette, archival footage of Babe Ruth, video essay, Lloyd's home movies and short Bumping into Broadway.
Georges Enescu—Complete Works for Solo Piano
(Hanssler Classic)
Romanian composer Georges Enescu was a prodigy rather like Mozart, and his large-scale orchestral works—namely his symphonies and his lone opera Oedipe—are the best examples of his heroic but in many ways tragic style. His solo piano works are not as well known (he actually made his name as a virtuoso violinist), which makes this three-CD set of the complete extant works a godsend.
Fellow Romanian Raluca Stirbat's affinity for Enescu's highly original music is obvious on these substantial works, especially in the two sonatas, which alternate between intimacy and muscularity, all while making the case for Enescu as a composer of genius in whatever genre he worked.
Carl Nielsen—Maskarade
(Dacapo)
Denmark's Carl Nielsen is, thanks to his powerful symphonies, thought of as a rather dour Scandinavian composer (his best-known opera, the dramatic if erratic Saul and David, also makes that point). But Maskarade is an amusing but darkly comic romp with a lot of memorable music to go with it, right from its delectable Overture, one of Nielsen's most popular concert pieces.
This excellent recording, by the stalwart Danish National Symphony Orchestra and Choir under Michael Schonwandt's baton, makes a great impression and brings up the question: why won't anyone put it on a New York stage? (The Bronx Opera Company performed it back in 1983.).
(Capriccio)
One of the great Russian composers, Alfred Schnittke’s eclecticism served him well when writing scores for some of the renowned directors of his time: his ease at moving from classical pastiche to dissonant modernism enabled him to create music that worked perfectly for films as disparate as the satirical Adventures of a Dentist, the animated Rikki-Tikki-Tavi and the hauntingly tragic The Ascent.
The four discs that make up this first-rate boxed set amount to excerpts from 10 different scores, which doesn't include everything he did for the cinema (he composed 17 scores in all), but conductor Fran Strobel, who ably leads the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, has chosen well, and the music stands on its own, unaccompanied by visual images.
Will Todd—Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
(Signum Classics)
Creating a successful opera aimed at children can't be the easiest thing in the world, but composer Will Todd (and librettist Maggie Gottlieb) has managed it with his streamlined but effective adaptation of Lewis Carroll’s classic fantasy books.
Tunefully engaging, Todd’s work combines wit and charm in equal measure, even finding sonic equivalents for Carroll’s lyrical flights of literary fancy, along with beguiling melodies, all played soaringly by an ensemble of 11 players under conductor Matthew Waldren, and sung beautifully by a first-rate cast, led by Fflur Wyn as Alice.
More Articles...
Newsletter Sign Up
Upcoming Events
No Calendar Events Found or Calendar not set to Public.