Blog Archive
| February 2012 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | |||
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The Short Version: The Blue Train
Posted at 5:07 PM on February 6, 2012
by ClassicalMPR
(0 Comments)
The men who did the fighting in France — 1914-1918 — may have been glad enough to escape the Continent. But among civilians, the four-year war-quarantine on the British home front created a mania for travel, preferably to hot places.
Lara Downes Goldberg Reimagined CD Giveaway
Posted at 6:00 AM on February 6, 2012
by ClassicalMPR
(0 Comments)
Thirteen new "re-imaginings" of Bach's Goldberg Variations, including works by Jennifer Higdon, Lukas Foss, David del Tredici, William Bolcom, Fred Hersch and Derek Bermel. These brilliant contemporary voices invoke the Goldbergs in broadly different ways, celebrating both the eternal beauty of Bach's music and the musical evolutions of the past 250 years. In this wonderfully imaginative musical journey, Lara interprets brilliant variations that range in mood from lyrical to tempestuous, traveling from neo-romanticism to jazz and back again to a Bachian contrapuntalism.
Classical MPR is thrilled to be able to give away five (5) copies of this new disc. Enter below and be sure to read the rules.
Awesome review in the Times for the Minn Orch
Posted at 9:15 AM on February 2, 2012
by Alison Young
(0 Comments)
Maybe it's like asking Sir Edmund Hilary why he climbed Everest? "Because it is there!"
Vanska recorded Sibelius on the same label a number of years ago in Finland and now he does it again - and was it worth it? Well, The New York Times sure thinks so.
"All of Mr. Vanska's prior experience with the pieces tells eloquently,...beautifully played...everything emerges with wonderful ease."
Way to go!
Brooklyn Rider and Beethoven
Posted at 10:14 AM on February 1, 2012
by Daniel Gilliam
(0 Comments)
Filed under: Ludwig van Beethoven
Brooklyn Rider will be releasing a new recording (date TBD) with Beethoven's String Quartet No. 14, Op. 131, a monumental composition that has been revered by composers, string players and audiences since its completion in 1826. Here's a look inside the recording process:
Learn more about the recording here.
On the Air This Week
Posted at 3:20 PM on January 31, 2012
by Rex Levang
(0 Comments)
Filed under: On the air
Highlights from Feb. 1 to 7
Wednesday, noon: Music with Minnesotans: Writer and director Joan Potter
Thursday, 3 pm hour: Regional Spotlight
Friday, 8 pm: Minnesota Orchestra plays Beethoven and Sibelius
Saturday, 11 am noon: Metropolitan Opera: Donizetti's Anna Bolena
Sunday, 6 am: Pipedreams: Concertos
Sunday, noon: From the Top, from Opelika, Alabama
Sunday, 1 pm: SymphonyCast: Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, with Gil Shaham
Monday, 7 pm: Roll Credits
Monday, 8 pm: Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra: American chamber music, and a string symphony of Mendelssohn
Roll Credits: 01/30/2012
Posted at 2:35 PM on January 31, 2012
by ClassicalMPR
(0 Comments)
Filed under: Programs, Roll Credits
Listen
Playlist:
Rachel Portman - Emma Prague Philharmonic - Silva 6018
Elmer Bernstein - The Great Escape -Royal Philharmonic Pops - Denon 75288
Paul Anka - The Longest Day: March -Cincinnati Pops - Telarc 80175
John Williams - The Adventures of Tintin: selections - Studio Orchestra - Sony 97588
Charles Williams - The Apartment: Main Theme - Boston Pops Orchestra - RCA 60393
Ludovic Bourse - The Artist: selections - Brussels Philharmonic - Sony 97895
Frank Loesser - How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying: I Believe In You - Original Broadway Cast
Miklos Rozsa - Madame Bovary: Waltz - Hollywood Bowl Orchestra - Philips 438685
Mychael Danna - Moneyball: selections - Studio Orchestra
Continue reading "Roll Credits: 01/30/2012"
The Short Version: Self Assessment
Posted at 2:16 PM on January 27, 2012
by ClassicalMPR
(1 Comments)
Filed under: Composers, Ludwig van Beethoven
Any prolific composer could surprise us with how they rank their own works. Perhaps it's as simple and as compelling as "What have I done lately?" This 19th century Titan might have dismissed one of our favorites with, "That's so 1808."
Paavo Berglund, 1929-2012: Bravo, Paavo!
Posted at 9:12 AM on January 27, 2012
by John Birge
(0 Comments)
Paavo Berglund died Wednesday, age 82. He was one of Finland's most important conductors. Berglund was internationally known for his Sibelius recordings. He recorded the complete Sibelius symphonies -- three times!
Another great Finnish conductor just embarked on his second cycle of Sibelius Symphony recordings, here in Minnesota. Osmo Vanska's new CD with the Minnesota Orchestra includes Symphonies Nos. 2 and 5. You can hear No. 2 in it's entirety, in its broadcast premiere tonight at 7pm here on Classical MPR. And get a guided tour right now from Julie Amacher's New Classical Tracks.
Meanwhile, in memoriam Paavo Berglund, conducting Sibelius' Symphony No. 5:
The Liberating Invitation from the Artworld
Posted at 1:55 PM on January 26, 2012
by Samuel Kjellberg
Filed under: Concerts, Events, In the media, Musical philosophy, Musician stories, The blog
"With its stylization and its larger-than-life emotions, opera has never been about unbroken narrative or cinematic realism. It is about going in and out of the drama, in and out of realism." (Zachary Woolfe, New York Observer; October 5, 2011)
To bridge the gap, to break through the translucent historical and pedestal'd barrier between the stage and the commonplace, is seen as something of a taboo in the classical world. As an artistic audience, we don't know how to handle incorporation and conversation with the stage world, the world of moral fragility, the world of the dilemma that pries us from any comfortable choice, a world perfect in its scenarios. We like to sit cozy, knowing that these experiences are at a distance, thinking that the stage world couldn't possibly portray our own daily experience and struggle with the world, meaning and purpose... But it does.
By all of this I simply mean the act of breaking character on stage, a small aside or reaction that emerges from within the production and addresses the outside world. Throughout history there has been disdain circling this issue.
Recently, Metropolitan operatic star René Pape, while acting the role of Méphistophélès (the Devil) in Charles Gounod's Faust, broke character by parting with the French language and addressed the audience with an aside in English.
Let me paint the picture: It is Act 4, a scene in Marguerite's garden. She has just sung the famous "Jewel Song" after having received a box covered in jewels, which happened to have been from Faust through Méphistophélès, who is helping Faust gain the love of Marguerite. After Marguerite's aria Faust and Méphistophélès reenter the stage and begin their recitative. Amid one of his French sighs Méphistophélès (played by René Pape) turns to the audience and says, in English, "Diamonds are a girl's best friend." The laughter that followed seemed strained with an underlying current of judgment.
You can see how this would outrage the public, and it did. The concern is duly noted and understandable; classical art should not be tampered with or tarnished. However, allow me to play the part of Méphistophélès's attorney for a moment (Devil's advocate, if I may).
The living aesthetician, Arthur C. Danto, rocked the art world in 1981 with the publication of his book "The Transfiguration of the Commonplace: A Philosophy of Art." The mission, as the subtitle suggests, was to create a philosophy of art, which he thought, up to that point, had been slightly ambiguous and undefined. (Claim to fame: That the history of art is finished. A disturbing statement likened to Nietzsche's "God is dead. And we have killed him".)
His book was a reaction to the history of art, which in the decades previous to its publication brought what some might consider strange artistic developments and freedoms. He philosophically addresses these controversial pieces of art, namely Marcel Duchamp's "Fountain" (a urinal with "R. Mutt 1917" written on it), Andy Warhol's "Brillo Boxes" (a stack of boxes with the logo of the Brillo soap pad brand), among other Avant Garde works.
The pinnacle example is a short, passionate dialogue regarding the statue of a cat that was located in a rotunda on the campus of Columbia University in New York City. For a long time this statue sat there, unmoved, sitting near a staircase. He passed this everyday with little notice. However, one day as Danto walked by he noticed that the statue had been freshly chained to the stair case railing. This provided him a door into the question of where the artworld line is drawn and the ambiguity of the border between art and commonplace.
For Danto, the chained cat could have meant one of two things: an attempt to counteract possible burglaries of the statue, or an attempt by the artist to gift some morsel of artworld status into and onto the commonplace. He chose the latter.
Like the chain, the broken character is an invitation to incorporate the audience in the artistic experience, as a way for the actor to connect their own character to the audience as if to say, "Yes, I am here with you. Let us see the world together. Isn't this fascinating?"
Of course, it is easy to say that when an actor breaks character they are breaking the tradition and sanctity of that particular artwork. However, under the Dantonian lens it seems that the breaking of one's character truly is an invitation for involvement, an acceptance between the audience and the artist, a most liberating and inclusive characteristic of art.
Art speaks on behalf of culture, it follows our desires and passions, opening doors, and with such an invitation we as an audience are transcendent up and into the artworld, living, breathing and drinking every morally fragile theme.
Roll Credits: 01/23/2012
Posted at 2:09 PM on January 24, 2012
by ClassicalMPR
(0 Comments)
Filed under: Programs, Roll Credits
Playlist:
Richard Rodgers & Oscar Hammerstein II, arr. Alfred Newman - The King and I Overture
Original Soundtrack Recording
EMI 27351
Jerry Goldsmith - The Generals March
London Symphony
Telarc 80433
Randy Newman - Ragtime
Studio Orchestra
Rhino 78245
Randy Newman - She Loved Me from Toy Story 2
Nonesuch 79689
Jerome Moross - The Big Country
Philharmonia Orchestra
Silva 1048
Irving Berlin - There's No Business Like Show Business
Philips 439 070
Dmitri Tiomkin - Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling
Telarc 80141
John Williams - War Horse: Dartmoor
Original Soundtrack
Sony 97528
Alfred Newman - How the West Was Won
Cincinnati Pops
Telarc 80141
Alfred Newman - Cathy's Theme from Wuthering Heights
National Philharmonic
RCA 184
Max Steiner - Gone with the Wind Main Theme
Boston Pops
Philips 411 037
The Short Version: The Blue Train
Posted at 5:07 PM on February 6, 2012
by ClassicalMPR
(0 Comments)
The men who did the fighting in France — 1914-1918 — may have been glad enough to escape the Continent. But among civilians, the four-year war-quarantine on the British home front created a mania for travel, preferably to hot places.
Lara Downes Goldberg Reimagined CD Giveaway
Posted at 6:00 AM on February 6, 2012
by ClassicalMPR
(0 Comments)
Thirteen new "re-imaginings" of Bach's Goldberg Variations, including works by Jennifer Higdon, Lukas Foss, David del Tredici, William Bolcom, Fred Hersch and Derek Bermel. These brilliant contemporary voices invoke the Goldbergs in broadly different ways, celebrating both the eternal beauty of Bach's music and the musical evolutions of the past 250 years. In this wonderfully imaginative musical journey, Lara interprets brilliant variations that range in mood from lyrical to tempestuous, traveling from neo-romanticism to jazz and back again to a Bachian contrapuntalism.
Classical MPR is thrilled to be able to give away five (5) copies of this new disc. Enter below and be sure to read the rules.
Awesome review in the Times for the Minn Orch
Posted at 9:15 AM on February 2, 2012
by Alison Young
(0 Comments)
Maybe it's like asking Sir Edmund Hilary why he climbed Everest? "Because it is there!"
Vanska recorded Sibelius on the same label a number of years ago in Finland and now he does it again - and was it worth it? Well, The New York Times sure thinks so.
"All of Mr. Vanska's prior experience with the pieces tells eloquently,...beautifully played...everything emerges with wonderful ease."
Way to go!
Brooklyn Rider and Beethoven
Posted at 10:14 AM on February 1, 2012
by Daniel Gilliam
(0 Comments)
Filed under: Ludwig van Beethoven
Brooklyn Rider will be releasing a new recording (date TBD) with Beethoven's String Quartet No. 14, Op. 131, a monumental composition that has been revered by composers, string players and audiences since its completion in 1826. Here's a look inside the recording process:
Learn more about the recording here.
On the Air This Week
Posted at 3:20 PM on January 31, 2012
by Rex Levang
(0 Comments)
Filed under: On the air
Highlights from Feb. 1 to 7
Wednesday, noon: Music with Minnesotans: Writer and director Joan Potter
Thursday, 3 pm hour: Regional Spotlight
Friday, 8 pm: Minnesota Orchestra plays Beethoven and Sibelius
Saturday, 11 am noon: Metropolitan Opera: Donizetti's Anna Bolena
Sunday, 6 am: Pipedreams: Concertos
Sunday, noon: From the Top, from Opelika, Alabama
Sunday, 1 pm: SymphonyCast: Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, with Gil Shaham
Monday, 7 pm: Roll Credits
Monday, 8 pm: Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra: American chamber music, and a string symphony of Mendelssohn
Roll Credits: 01/30/2012
Posted at 2:35 PM on January 31, 2012
by ClassicalMPR
(0 Comments)
Filed under: Programs, Roll Credits
Listen
Playlist:
Rachel Portman - Emma Prague Philharmonic - Silva 6018
Elmer Bernstein - The Great Escape -Royal Philharmonic Pops - Denon 75288
Paul Anka - The Longest Day: March -Cincinnati Pops - Telarc 80175
John Williams - The Adventures of Tintin: selections - Studio Orchestra - Sony 97588
Charles Williams - The Apartment: Main Theme - Boston Pops Orchestra - RCA 60393
Ludovic Bourse - The Artist: selections - Brussels Philharmonic - Sony 97895
Frank Loesser - How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying: I Believe In You - Original Broadway Cast
Miklos Rozsa - Madame Bovary: Waltz - Hollywood Bowl Orchestra - Philips 438685
Mychael Danna - Moneyball: selections - Studio Orchestra
The Short Version: Self Assessment
Posted at 2:16 PM on January 27, 2012
by ClassicalMPR
(1 Comments)
Filed under: Composers, Ludwig van Beethoven
Any prolific composer could surprise us with how they rank their own works. Perhaps it's as simple and as compelling as "What have I done lately?" This 19th century Titan might have dismissed one of our favorites with, "That's so 1808."
Paavo Berglund, 1929-2012: Bravo, Paavo!
Posted at 9:12 AM on January 27, 2012
by John Birge
(0 Comments)
Paavo Berglund died Wednesday, age 82. He was one of Finland's most important conductors. Berglund was internationally known for his Sibelius recordings. He recorded the complete Sibelius symphonies -- three times!
Another great Finnish conductor just embarked on his second cycle of Sibelius Symphony recordings, here in Minnesota. Osmo Vanska's new CD with the Minnesota Orchestra includes Symphonies Nos. 2 and 5. You can hear No. 2 in it's entirety, in its broadcast premiere tonight at 7pm here on Classical MPR. And get a guided tour right now from Julie Amacher's New Classical Tracks.
Meanwhile, in memoriam Paavo Berglund, conducting Sibelius' Symphony No. 5:
The Liberating Invitation from the Artworld
Posted at 1:55 PM on January 26, 2012
by Samuel Kjellberg
Filed under: Concerts, Events, In the media, Musical philosophy, Musician stories, The blog
"With its stylization and its larger-than-life emotions, opera has never been about unbroken narrative or cinematic realism. It is about going in and out of the drama, in and out of realism." (Zachary Woolfe, New York Observer; October 5, 2011)
To bridge the gap, to break through the translucent historical and pedestal'd barrier between the stage and the commonplace, is seen as something of a taboo in the classical world. As an artistic audience, we don't know how to handle incorporation and conversation with the stage world, the world of moral fragility, the world of the dilemma that pries us from any comfortable choice, a world perfect in its scenarios. We like to sit cozy, knowing that these experiences are at a distance, thinking that the stage world couldn't possibly portray our own daily experience and struggle with the world, meaning and purpose... But it does.
By all of this I simply mean the act of breaking character on stage, a small aside or reaction that emerges from within the production and addresses the outside world. Throughout history there has been disdain circling this issue.
Recently, Metropolitan operatic star René Pape, while acting the role of Méphistophélès (the Devil) in Charles Gounod's Faust, broke character by parting with the French language and addressed the audience with an aside in English.
Let me paint the picture: It is Act 4, a scene in Marguerite's garden. She has just sung the famous "Jewel Song" after having received a box covered in jewels, which happened to have been from Faust through Méphistophélès, who is helping Faust gain the love of Marguerite. After Marguerite's aria Faust and Méphistophélès reenter the stage and begin their recitative. Amid one of his French sighs Méphistophélès (played by René Pape) turns to the audience and says, in English, "Diamonds are a girl's best friend." The laughter that followed seemed strained with an underlying current of judgment.
You can see how this would outrage the public, and it did. The concern is duly noted and understandable; classical art should not be tampered with or tarnished. However, allow me to play the part of Méphistophélès's attorney for a moment (Devil's advocate, if I may).
The living aesthetician, Arthur C. Danto, rocked the art world in 1981 with the publication of his book "The Transfiguration of the Commonplace: A Philosophy of Art." The mission, as the subtitle suggests, was to create a philosophy of art, which he thought, up to that point, had been slightly ambiguous and undefined. (Claim to fame: That the history of art is finished. A disturbing statement likened to Nietzsche's "God is dead. And we have killed him".)
His book was a reaction to the history of art, which in the decades previous to its publication brought what some might consider strange artistic developments and freedoms. He philosophically addresses these controversial pieces of art, namely Marcel Duchamp's "Fountain" (a urinal with "R. Mutt 1917" written on it), Andy Warhol's "Brillo Boxes" (a stack of boxes with the logo of the Brillo soap pad brand), among other Avant Garde works.
The pinnacle example is a short, passionate dialogue regarding the statue of a cat that was located in a rotunda on the campus of Columbia University in New York City. For a long time this statue sat there, unmoved, sitting near a staircase. He passed this everyday with little notice. However, one day as Danto walked by he noticed that the statue had been freshly chained to the stair case railing. This provided him a door into the question of where the artworld line is drawn and the ambiguity of the border between art and commonplace.
For Danto, the chained cat could have meant one of two things: an attempt to counteract possible burglaries of the statue, or an attempt by the artist to gift some morsel of artworld status into and onto the commonplace. He chose the latter.
Like the chain, the broken character is an invitation to incorporate the audience in the artistic experience, as a way for the actor to connect their own character to the audience as if to say, "Yes, I am here with you. Let us see the world together. Isn't this fascinating?"
Of course, it is easy to say that when an actor breaks character they are breaking the tradition and sanctity of that particular artwork. However, under the Dantonian lens it seems that the breaking of one's character truly is an invitation for involvement, an acceptance between the audience and the artist, a most liberating and inclusive characteristic of art.
Art speaks on behalf of culture, it follows our desires and passions, opening doors, and with such an invitation we as an audience are transcendent up and into the artworld, living, breathing and drinking every morally fragile theme.
Roll Credits: 01/23/2012
Posted at 2:09 PM on January 24, 2012
by ClassicalMPR
(0 Comments)
Filed under: Programs, Roll Credits
Playlist:
Richard Rodgers & Oscar Hammerstein II, arr. Alfred Newman - The King and I Overture
Original Soundtrack Recording
EMI 27351
Jerry Goldsmith - The Generals March
London Symphony
Telarc 80433
Randy Newman - Ragtime
Studio Orchestra
Rhino 78245
Randy Newman - She Loved Me from Toy Story 2
Nonesuch 79689
Jerome Moross - The Big Country
Philharmonia Orchestra
Silva 1048
Irving Berlin - There's No Business Like Show Business
Philips 439 070
Dmitri Tiomkin - Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling
Telarc 80141
John Williams - War Horse: Dartmoor
Original Soundtrack
Sony 97528
Alfred Newman - How the West Was Won
Cincinnati Pops
Telarc 80141
Alfred Newman - Cathy's Theme from Wuthering Heights
National Philharmonic
RCA 184
Max Steiner - Gone with the Wind Main Theme
Boston Pops
Philips 411 037
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