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Film and the Arts
Vienna Philharmonic Bestows "The Fairy's Kiss" at Carnegie Hall
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Wednesday, 05 March 2025 15:05
- Written by Jack Angstreich
Photo by Chris Lee
At the outstanding Stern Auditorium on the night of Saturday, March 1st, I had the great pleasure to attend another exceptionally strong concert—the second of three on consecutive days—presented by Carnegie Hall and featuring the extraordinary Vienna Philharmonic under the incomparable direction of the renowned Riccardo Muti.
The event started brilliantly with a marvelous rendition of Alfredo Catalani’s very seldom performed but exquisite Contemplazione from 1878. (The composer is most famous for his opera, La Wally.) Equally fine was a splendid account of Igor Stravinsky’s fabulous Divertimento from his ballet, The Fairy’s Kiss, which is based on songs and piano pieces by Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky and is a setting of the Hans Christian Anderson tale, The Ice Maiden. In his useful notes on the program, Jack Sullivan says the following about the piece: “Commissioned by Ida Rubinstein to mark the 35th anniversary of Tchaikovsky’s death, it premiered in 1928, with choreography byBronislava Nijinska, the younger sister of Vaslav Nijinsky.” About Stravinsky, he adds:
His admiration for Tchaikovsky, whose works he conducted, went back many years; he accepted the offer to compose Le baiser de la fée because “it would give me an opportunity of paying my heartfelt homage to Tchaikovsky’s wonderful talent.”
He goes on to provide some relevant background:
In The Ice Maiden, a child is stolen by sprites during a storm and marked by a fairy with a kiss; years later, she returns in disguise and tricks him into declaring his love for her as he is celebrating his upcoming wedding, then kisses him again and takes him away to her world “beyond time and place.” Stravinsky transformed this story of supernatural kidnapping into a fable about art in which the fairy becomes the artist’s muse: “It suggested an allegory of Tchaikovsky himself,” Stravinsky said. “The fairy’s kiss on the heel of the child is also the muse marking Tchaikovsky at his birth, although the muse did not claim Tchaikovsky at his wedding as she did the young man in the ballet, but rather at the height of his powers.” The fairy’s “mysterious imprint manifests itself in every work of this great artist.”
And further:
In 1934, Stravinskycreated a concert suite (first for violin and piano, then for orchestra) that he called Divertimento, consisting of highlights from the score. Some conductors prefer to create their own version from the various ballet numbers. This concert uses a 1949 revision of the suite.
The initial Sinfonia movement contains many both dramatic and playful elements but also lyrical moments, and the ensuing Danses suisses are exhilarating, even dizzying at times, as well as jubilant. The eccentric if ultimately enchanting Scherzo is ludic too but with passages of almost pure Romanticism and, of all the movements, it has possibly the most pronouncedly fairytale atmosphere, while the concluding, charming Pas de deux is maybe the most forceful—it quotes from Tchaikovsky’s magnificent song, “None but the Lonely Heart.”
The second half of the evening was also terrific: a memorable realization of Franz Schubert’s awesome Symphony in C Major, D. 944, the “Great,” which was completed in 1828. (Felix Mendelssohn conducted its premiere at the Leipzig Gewandhaus in 1839.) About it, Robert Schumann said, “Something beyond sorrow and joy, as these emotions have been portrayed a hundred times in music, lies concealed in this symphony … We are transported to a region where we can never remember to have been before.” The musicologist Alfred Einstein wrote of it: “How direct and simple everything is.” Sullivan records:
An analysis of the work, writes Schumann, is impossible: “One would necessarily have to transcribe the entire symphony to give the faintest notion of its intense originality throughout.”
And he adds that Antonin Dvořák, who found it “astounding” in its “richness and variety of coloring,” criticized it, curiously, for the “the fault of diffuseness”; however, Schumann referred to the symphony’s “heavenly length.”
The initial movement’s Andante introduction begins with a quiet but stirring fanfare that inaugurates a graceful sequence that slowly increases in power; the transition to the main Allegro ma non troppo section is described as “wholly new” by Schumann who explained, “We are landed; we know not how.” The thoroughly captivating and ebullient music that follows—it uncannily anticipates the Mendelssohn of the “Italian” Symphony—has a few solemn measures; the movement finishes grandly.
The second movement, marked Andante con moto, has enchanting rhythms too; a slower, more song-like section has an almost religious character—near the end of this, according to Schumann, “a horn call sounds from a distance that seems to have descended from another world. And every other instrument seems to listen, as if some heavenly messenger were hovering through the orchestra.” After a climax, the music again ascends to a more elevated register; the movement closes softly.
The succeeding Scherzo—its tempo is Allegro vivace—whichstrongly recalls the music of Ludwig van Beethoven, has a joyous, pastoral ethos; the Trio section is also exalting and affirmative. The Allegro vivace finale is exuberant, dynamic and propulsive at times, but with gentler interludes; ultimately exultant, it concludes triumphantly. About it, Sullivan reports:
Conductor Felix Weingartner once wrote that this “intoxicating” music evoked in him “the effect as of flight through ether … Nature has denied us this joy, but great works of art give it to us.”
The artists deservedly were enthusiastically applauded.
Schubert & Bruckner With The Vienna Philharmonic
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Tuesday, 04 March 2025 17:08
- Written by Jack Angstreich
Photo by Chris Lee
At the extraordinary Stern Auditorium, on the night of Friday, February 28th, I had the pleasure to attend a superb concert presented by Carnegie Hall, the first of three on consecutive days featuring the stellar Vienna Philharmonic under the incomparable direction of Riccardo Muti, one of the greatest living conductors.
The event started auspiciously with an admirable account of Franz Schubert’s excellent Symphony No. 4 in C Minor, D. 417, the “Tragic,” from 1816. In interesting notes on the program by Jack Sullivan, he records some useful background:
One of the earliest defenders of the symphony in America was H. L. Mencken, whose eloquent 1928 article in The American Mercury perceived—at least in the slow movement—the work’s “tragic” qualities: “Of Schubert’s symphonies, the orchestras play the ‘Unfinished’ incessantly—but never too often!—and the huge C Major now and then, but the ‘Tragic’ only once in a blue moon. Yet the ‘Tragic’ remains one of Schubert’s masterworks, and in its slow movement, at least, it rides to the full height of the ‘Unfinished.’ There are not six such slow movements in the whole range of music. It has an eloquence that has never been surpassed, not even by Beethoven, but there is no rhetoric in it, no heroics, no exhibitionism. It begins quietly and simply, and it passes out in a whisper, but its beauty remains overwhelming.”
The initial movement’s Adagio molto introduction is solemn and strongly recalls the music of the composer’s great and inescapable precursor, Ludwig van Beethoven, while its Allegro vivace main body is graceful and much more energetic, although its ethos is on balance more serious than ebullient. The ensuing Andante is somewhat gentler and more Mozartean in spirit—it acquires a quiet urgency at times and is not without dramatic moments. The Menuetto that follows, marked Allegro vivace, has the vigor of a scherzo but it also contains a more subdued Trio section. The propulsive, Allegro finale has a suspenseful quality although it is also surprisingly playful, building to an affirmative conclusion.
The second half of the evening was even more remarkable: a fully assured realization of Anton Bruckner’s magnificent Symphony No. 7 in E Major, completed in 1883. The Allegro moderato first movement opens softly but majestically; bucolic passages lead to bolder orchestral statements—much of it is very Wagnerian—and it finishes celestially. The succeeding Adagio, which is possibly the most beautiful movement that Bruckner ever composed, is elegiac but transcendent; it too reaches an unearthly close. The Scherzo, which is not without its eccentricities, is forceful with dance-like interludes and considerable forward momentum and ends abruptly; the movement’s Trio is altogether more itenic in character. The Finale is somewhat hushed at its outset but the music rapidly intensifies, although more serene episodes alternate with more passionate ones; it attains a glorious climax.
The artists, deservedly, were enthusiastically applauded.
Shostakovich & More with The New York Philharmonic
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Monday, 03 March 2025 15:48
- Written by Jack Angstreich
Photo by Brandon Patoc
At Lincoln Center’s marvelous David Geffen Hall, on the night of Saturday, February 22nd, I had the great pleasure to attend a superb New York Philharmonic concert—continuing an excellent season—brilliantly led by the extraordinary Finnish conductor Santtu-Matias Rouvali.
The event started fabulously with a dazzling account of three delightful selections from the orchestral Suite drawn from Dmitri Shostakovich’s Moscow, Cheryomushki, describedin the fine notes for the program by Christopher H. Gibbs—who is “James H. Ottaway Jr. Professor of Music at Bard College and the co-author, with Richard Taruskin, of The Oxford History of Western Music, College Edition—as “an operetta about perennial hous-ing shortages in the Soviet capital.” He adds:
It takes place in the so-called Bird Cherry Tree district, southwest of Moscow, where the government's response to the crisis was to construct high-rise apartment complexes. The satirical operetta tells the story of a group of prospective young tenants seeking places in the newly subsidized housing and of their skirmishes with corrupt bureaucrats.
Shostakovich composed the three-act work in 1957–58 to a libretto by the popular humorists Vladimir Mass and Mikhaíl Chervinsky, and it was premiered in January 1959 at the Moscow Operetta Theatre.
He says further that, “In 1997 Andrew Cornall, a producer and record executive then at Decca, crafted a four-movement suite, of which we hear the first three tonight.” In an article for Soviet Music, Shostakovich wrote:
The composition of an operetta is something new for me. Moscow, Cheryomushki is my first and, I hope, not my last experience in this appealing genre. I worked on it with great enthusiasm and lively interest. I think that what should result from our collaborative efforts. ... should be a cheery, upbeat show. ... There is lyricism in it, and “gags,” assorted interludes, dances, and even an entire ballet scene. Parodistic elements are suggested at times in the musical design, the quotation of popular motives from the not-too-distant past, and even from several songs by Soviet authors.
The initial selection, A Spin through Moscow, is effervescent even in its quieter moments, while the second, the exquisite Waltz, is exceedingly charming, with a more romantic character. Finally, Dances, which begins with a polka, is humorous, irrepressible and buoyant.
An outstanding soloist, Seong-Jin Cho, then entered the stage for an amazing performance of Sergei Prokofiev’s terrific Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor, Op. 16. In his Soviet Diary of 1927, the composer recorded that, “The charges of surface brilliance and certain ‘soccer-player' tendencies in the First Concerto induced me to strive for greater depth in the Second.” The Andantino introduction to the first movement is moody, slightly eccentric and somewhat mysterious; the music becomes more agitated in the highly virtuosic Allegretto section—it features an astonishing cadenza and ends softly. The very brief Scherzo that follows, marked Vivace, is breathless, propulsive and playful in spirit. The ensuing, forceful Intermezzo—its tempo is Allegro moderato—has an almost sinister quality for much of its length, with some reflective passages, but is nonetheless seductive in its rhythms and closes gently, if abruptly. The Finale, marked Allegro tempestoso, is turbulent but dazzling, although again with subdued, meditative interludes; it builds in intensity to a stunning, sudden conclusion. Enthusiastic applause elicited an enchanting encore from Cho: the wonderful second—Menuet—movement of Maurice Ravel’s Sonatine.
The second half of the evening was also memorable: an awesome realization of Shostakovich’s seldom played, powerful, and allusive Symphony No. 15 in A major, Op. 141, from 1971, his last. The opening Allegretto—which jokingly quotes from the famous overture from the opera, William Tell—is quirky, ludic, bustling and energetic; it finishes unexpectedly. Gibbs says about the composer: “He stated that the first movement ‘describes childhood — just a toyshop, with a cloudless sky above,’ and recalled that Rossini's overture was one of his earliest musical memories.” The succeeding, unusual , lugubrious Adagio begins with a brass chorale and continues, according to Gibbs, “with a series of 12-note melodies for solo cello”; it acquires increasing urgency but with subdued episodes and ends in a hushed manner. Next, the short, Allegretto scherzo is burlesque in sensibility—it too closes surprisingly. Gibbs reports that:
The finale opens with the “Fate” brass quotation from Wagner's Ring alternating with a solo timpani pattern from Siegfried's Funeral March in Götterdämmerung.
This segues into a three-note string pizzicato associated with the “in memorial” section of Shostakovich's own Symphony No. 11, and then to the violins playing the first three notes of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde [ . . . . ]
A very beautiful waltz references Mikhail Glinka’s song, “Do not tempt me needlessly.” Much of the movement is quite solemn and it grows more imposing as it progresses but ends almost ethereally, recalling according to Gibbs, “the conclusion of his suppressed Fourth Symphony.”
The artists deservedly received a standing ovation.
February '25 Digital Week III
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Wednesday, 26 February 2025 19:44
- Written by Kevin Filipski
