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Meine unsterbliche Geliebte: Who Was Beethoven’s Immortal Beloved?

2005-01-20T09:23:00.000-05:00

It was a wild and wintry night after ONE (1) INCH of snow had fallen, which in the District of Columbia amounts to near-blizzard conditions. Miracle of miracles, there were a few hardy souls who came out to the latest offering of the Benjamin T. Rome School of Music's new film series at Catholic University's Pryzbyla Center. Here is, more or less, what I said by way of an introduction to last night's film.

Available from Amazon:
Immortal Beloved (1994), starring Gary Oldman

British director Bernard Rose (b. 1960) wrote and directed Immortal Beloved for release in 1994, after arriving on the American movie scene by directing Clive Barker's Candyman in 1992. Immortal Beloved appears to have shifted his interest or marketability away from horror movies, which he had also directed in Great Britain, toward historical epics. He has since made a period version of Tolstoy's Anna Karenina (1997) and an unusual adaptation of Tolstoy's Death of Ivan Ilyich, updated to 20th-century Hollywood, called Ivansxtc (2000). However, he is reportedly finishing another horror movie right now, called Man with a Movie Camera.

First, I will mention some scenes in Immortal Beloved that are at least based on factual evidence, beginning with the striking depiction of Beethoven's funeral in Vienna, which was indeed mobbed with crowds. Anton Schindler (played by Jeroen Krabbé), was indeed Beethoven's secretary; in fact, he wrote the first biography of the composer, including a heavily embroidered, really falsified, transcription of the Immortal Beloved letter, which provides the basis for the movie's plot. Beethoven's father was an abusive alcoholic, although no memory of his troubled youth was ever mentioned by Beethoven in connection to his creation of the Ninth Symphony. Napoleon did invade Vienna, and Beethoven, who had originally dedicated the Eroica Symphony to him, scratched Napoleon's name from his handwritten score. Beethoven did indeed live in the home of his friend, the Hungarian countess Marie Erdödy (played in the movie by the ravishing Isabella Rossellini), and he even called her his Beichtvater, or father confessor. It is unlikely that there was any sexual relationship between them, however.

Maynard Solomon, Beethoven Essays (1988; reprint 1990)

Maynard Solomon, Beethoven (1977; 2nd ed. 2001)

Beethoven did spend several years in a protracted legal battle with his sister-in-law Johanna, managing ultimately to gain legal custody of her son, his nephew Karl, at the expense of his compositional productivity for several years. Beethoven's brother Caspar had married Johanna in 1806, and their child was conceived out of wedlock. Karl was born in 1806, and at the time the Immortal Beloved letter was written he would have been 6 years old. Judging from Beethoven's journal entries, Johanna was, as Beethoven biographer Maynard Solomon put it, "the woman whom the real Beethoven despised more than any other." Whatever his motivation, Beethoven did use his celebrity and influence to turn the courts against Johanna, although the tide of popular opinion in Vienna was on her side. Karl was indeed driven to the point of attempted suicide because of his uncle's insane obsession. In the worst parts of this troubled period, rumors circulated in Vienna that Beethoven had lost his mind: he changed lodgings with alarming frequency, his living space was invariably terribly cluttered, and he was actually seen in violent confrontations with street urchins who mocked him. All of these factual details appear in some form in Immortal Beloved, although its central premise is entirely a work of fiction.

Interesting Links:

Misha Donat, Death and the muse (The Guardian, June 12, 2004)

Beethoven's Immortal Beloved, a Web site devoted to "solving the riddle"

Cast your vote for the Immortal Beloved, with the promise that the results will eventually be made public

The Immortal Beloved (Simon Johnston)

Betsy Streisand, Immortal befuddled: The search goes on for Beethoven's great love (U.S. News and World Report, July 24, 2000)

The Immortal Beloved: The Numerous Possibilities (Dominique Prevot)

Janet Maslin, The Music Almost Tells the Tale (review in the New York Times, December 16, 1994)

Although he achieved a remarkable level of celebrity for a composer in his lifetime, Beethoven never married. His biographers have documented a bewildering number of fleeting romantic attachments in his often turbulent life, but none that we might call, to use that dreaded word in our modern language, a relationship. Beethoven felt deeply, we are told, falling in love with a series of women, but each time that one woman appeared about to take a permanent place in his life, he plunged himself single-mindedly into his composition. After about 1810, as Solomon again has documented, his sexual energy was spent mostly in the company of prostitutes.

This pattern holds true for all of the romances in Beethoven's life, with one important exception. Among the papers recovered from the composer's apartment, after his death in 1827, were two especially important documents. The first was the Heiligenstadt Testament, a sort of last will addressed by the composer to his brothers, written years earlier in a moment of despair, when Beethoven realized that his loss of hearing would worsen inevitably until he was completely and irrevocably deaf. The second was a letter the composer had written in pencil, addressed to an unidentified woman as "mein Engel, mein alles, mein Ich . . . meine unsterbliche Geliebte" (which translates as "my angel, my all, my I . . . my immortal beloved"). In what is still the best critical biography of Beethoven, musicologist Maynard Solomon called it the only "unalloyed love letter of [Beethoven's] bachelor existence—an uncontrolled outburst of passionate feeling, exalted in tone, confused in thought, and ridden with conflicting emotions" (Beethoven, p. 159).

Beethoven dated the mysterious letter Monday, July 6, with a post-scriptum added on July 7, but did not specify the year. The tone is familiar and impassioned (he uses the German familiar du), destined for someone who not only knew of the composer’s deep love for her but who shared those feelings. However, nowhere in the text is there any indication of a name. This has not prevented biographers, musicologists, and Beethoven nuts of all stripes and levels of scholarly rigor from proposing solutions to this problem. Some have even forged false evidence to prove their theories, which have all been systematically debunked.

Musicologists generally agree that we may never know the identity of Beethoven's unsterbliche Geliebte with scientific certainty. However, there are plausible theories and implausible ones, and the plot of Bernard Rose's movie is based on one of the latter. I think that Lewis Lockwood spoke for the entire musicological community when he published a very funny review of Immortal Beloved in The Musical Quarterly in 1997 called "Film biography as Travesty: Immortal Beloved and Beethoven" (The Musical Quarterly 81: 190–198). In terms of its historical accuracy, this film has been "pretty much condemned to oblivion" by Beethoven scholars, as he put it. Never one to mince words, Lockwood wrote, "My view is that the pablum this film doles out to the masses is not just of poor quality but should carry a warning to say that it is deleterious to their health." Prof. Lockwood would not be happy with me today, if I did not make it clear to you that, with the exceptions I mentioned at the opening of my presentation, the story we are about to see is, speaking from the learned viewpoint of the music historian, absolute baloney. We should not be surprised: it is the screenwriter/director's job to make an entertaining film, and the historian's to tell the truth. In the broad range of movies about composers, Immortal Beloved probably takes more liberties than Amadeus (1984) but not as many as Ken Russell's many films about composers, such as Lisztomania (1975) or The Music Lovers (1970).

Available from Amazon:
Soundtrack from Immortal Beloved (1994)

The only possible benefit of the whole enterprise, as Lockwood saw it, was that the movie has impelled large numbers of viewers to buy recordings of Beethoven's music and, presumably, to listen to them. As he put it, "the whole film is in some sense a vehicle for Sony performers, who are heard on the soundtrack," and who were featured on a specially issued CD that accompanied the movie's release. I promise not to reveal the film's dénouement, but I will give you the verifiable background from this episode in Beethoven's life, which will hopefully enhance your enjoyment of the movie. For my money, the most credible theory of who was most likely the real Immortal Beloved is that proposed by Maynard Solomon and defended by him and others over the last 30 years. In Solomon's solution, the Immortal Beloved was a married woman named Antonie Brentano.

First, there is the problem of the year of the letter's composition. Solomon cites calendarial research that limits the possible years, in Beethoven's adult life, that the letter could have been dated as it is. That is, July 6 could have fallen on a Monday, as the letter specifies, only in 1795, 1801, 1807, 1812, or 1818. Through a process of elimination, the only year in which Beethoven could have written this letter is 1812, since he refers to being in a specific temporary lodging in the midst of a voyage. Beethoven typically left Vienna for an extended vacation each summer. In 1812, instead of his usual trips to the Viennese suburbs, Beethoven left his adopted city on June 28 or 29 and arrived in Prague on July 1. On Saturday, July 4, he took the coach to the town of Teplitz, on the way to the spa at Karlsbad, the town mentioned in the letter simply as "K." This solves the second problem, that of Beethoven's location at the time of writing the letter. He was in Teplitz.

According to the sequence of events worked out by Solomon, the addressee must have been in contact with Beethoven in the preceding year and probably lived not far from him in Vienna. She should have been in Prague between July 1 and July 4, where Beethoven specifies that he has just seen her. Finally, she must have gone ahead to Karlsbad, where she and Beethoven planned to meet later in the summer and where Beethoven intended to send the letter but apparently never did, and she must not have arrived prior to July 6. The police in Karlsbad at this time recorded the arrival of all visitors to their town, including Antonie Brentano, who arrived at exactly the right time. Newspaper reports also place her in Prague, with her husband and children, in the previous week. Antonie's husband was Beethoven's friend, as was her sister-in-law, Bettina, who arranged Beethoven’s introduction to the German poet Goethe.

Available from Amazon:
Anne Sofie von Otter, Beethoven, Meyerbeer, Spohr Lieder, including Beethoven's An die Geliebte (WoO 140)

Solomon goes on to lay out an impressively thorough case for identifying Antonie Brentano as the Immortal Beloved. A later love interest of Beethoven's, Fanny Giannatasio, wrote in her diary in 1816 that her own possible romance with the composer was overshadowed by Beethoven's continuing love for another woman, whom he had met five years earlier, that is, shortly before our letter was written. Other brief references to a great love, from around this period, in Beethoven's journal mention the initials A. and T., which fit perfectly with Antonie's first name and her nickname, Toni. The manuscript of Beethoven's song An die Geliebte (WoO 140, poem by Josef L. Stoll), dating from 1811, bears an inscription, the handwriting of which Solomon identified as Antonie Brentano's, to the effect that she requested the song from Beethoven. He composed it first with an accompaniment for guitar, an instrument that Antonie was known to play well. Finally, Solomon analyzed two unsigned portraits also found in Beethoven's possession at the time of his death (one shown here) and showed that they match portraits that can verifiably be identified as Antonie Brentano.

Scholars continue to publish articles, some supporting and some disputing Solomon's theory, including a handful in German journals over the last five years. One of these, Klaus Kopitz's 2001 article in Bonner Beethoven-Studien examines newly discovered letters from Antonie Brentano to her sister-in-law Bettina, which "offer the first really precise look at her years in Vienna. They reveal that Beethoven visited her almost daily starting in 1810, and that her husband Franz Brentano did not, as was previously assumed, live in Vienna during those years." Antonie was of a noble Viennese family, and her husband was a banker from Frankfurt. In the time before Beethoven wrote the letter, Antonie's father had died and she had been in Vienna arranging the sale of her childhood home and its art collection. Facing the prospect of leaving her native city for good to return to her husband back in Frankfurt, Solomon surmises, her well-documented worship of Beethoven's music could have turned into love. In 1811 to 1812, when Antonie was ill, she received no visitors except for Beethoven, who improvised at the pianoforte in her apartment for long periods of time. The tone of the letter seems to indicate that Beethoven had decided that the relationship was untenable. By November 1812, Antonie had moved back to Frankfurt with her husband and children. However, in the 1820s, Antonie and her daughter Maximiliane were still clearly on Beethoven's mind. They were the only women to whom Beethoven dedicated compositions in this period: the op. 109 piano sonata, the magisterial Diabelli Variations, and the English edition of the op. 111 piano sonata.

Why Bernard Rose did not dramatize this plausible theory instead of inventing one that is ludicrous is its own mystery. Through the wonder of DVD, I sat listening to Rose's director's commentary on the movie last week, and he speaks there with full awareness of Solomon's theory and of other serious musicological research that he must have read. At the same time, he clings to the belief that his own solution is just as valid, although the Brentano's do not even appear at all in the movie, nor does any of the information described above about this period in Beethoven's life. However, the condemnation of music historians does not mean that we cannot enjoy Immortal Beloved as the beautifully crafted and entertaining movie that it is. With this introduction I hope only to provide, if not a warning label ("deleterious to your health," as Lewis Lockwood would have it), the gentle reminder that this film is a work of fiction, not of history.

Measures Toward Artistic Education

2005-01-04T22:45:00.000-05:00

Marie-Douce Albert, Des mesures pour l'éducation artistique (Le Figaro, January 4)

En 2007, on chantera dans toutes les écoles. Et partout les élèves auront adopté un élément du patrimoine à étudier. Généraliser les chorales d'établissements ainsi que les actions de partenariat avec les monuments classés, voilà, entre autres moyens, comment le gouvernement compte faire entrer un peu plus de culture dans les salles de classes. Hier, au Conseil des ministres, Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres, ministre de la Culture, et François Fillon, en charge de l'Éducation, ont parlé d'une seule voix pour présenter leur politique en matière d'éducation artistique et culturelle.

Alors que le président Jacques Chirac remarquait qu'elle était jusqu'à présent insuffisante et appelait à plus d'ambition, les deux ministres ont présenté leur feuille de route, d'abord devant leurs pairs puis dans l'après-midi, au collège Charles-François-Daubigny d'Auvers-sur-Oise (Val-d'Oise). Ils ont signé là une circulaire commune, texte qui doit être présenté aujourd'hui à ceux qui le mettront en oeuvre, les recteurs d'académie et les directeurs régionaux des affaires culturelles (Drac).

On ne cherchera pas dans le document un bouleversement des emplois du temps. Plus, ou mieux, d'art à l'école ne passera pas par une refonte des enseignements obligatoires. Il s'agit plutôt là de relancer un travail commun des deux tutelles. L'Éducation et la Culture coopèrent depuis vingt ans sur le terrain scolaire mais, de l'avis de certains, le dialogue s'était quelque peu tari ces dernières années.

Alors, pour répondre à l'enjeu défini hier par Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres, qui est de «faire prendre conscience à chaque élève de ses capacités créatrices, en suscitant de nouveaux regards, des échanges, des rencontres avec l'histoire de l'art, avec les créations, dans le cadre des enseignements artistiques dispensés par les professeurs de l'Éducation nationale, mais aussi avec des artistes», il s'agira d'abord de «recentrer l'action de l'État». Mais aussi, surtout, de s'appuyer sur les partenariats. Pour le ministre de la Culture, on tient une des «clés de la réussite» dans une meilleure rencontre entre professeurs et artistes, établissements scolaires et institutions culturelles. Puisque bibliothèques, écoles de musique ou musées se sont multipliés ces vingt dernières années, la volonté est de renforcer leur lien avec écoles, collèges et lycées. Pour mobiliser les structures culturelles, il est d'ailleurs prévu que l'attribution des subventions de fonctionnement soit subordonnée à la production d'actions éducatives. Les services éducatifs de nouvelles institutions comme le futur Musée du quai Branly recevront une aide particulière.

Par ailleurs, puisque les lacunes des enseignants en matière artistique, surtout en premier cycle, ont bien souvent été pointées du doigt, le gouvernement annonce un effort sur les formations. Les Drac passeront des accords avec les IUFM pour mettre en place des «dominantes arts et culture». Quant aux étudiants en école d'art, d'architecture et autres établissements relevant du ministère de la Culture, ils seront encouragés à intervenir dans les classes.

Dans tout ce programme, les fameuses classes à Projet artistique et culturel (PAC), lancées par Jack Lang et qui permettent de mener des actions de longue durée dans les classes, ne sont pas abandonnées. Mais ce dispositif qui avait été critiqué connaîtra une diminution du nombre des projets.

Au ministère de la Culture, où la préservation de la diversité culturelle est une priorité, on insiste enfin sur la volonté de mieux prendre en compte ce qu'on appelle les «nouveaux enjeux de la société». L'ambition est là de développer le sens critique et la conscience des plus jeunes pour qu'ils ne cèdent pas au matraquage des industries culturelles et ne se contentent pas des produits les plus diffusés. L'idée est encore de favoriser la lutte contre le piratage.

When Opera Dreamed of Egypt

2004-12-28T13:16:00.000-05:00

Anne-Marie Romero, Quand l'opéra rêvait d'Egypte (Le Figaro, December 28)

De l'Isis de Lully, en 1677, à l'Akhnaten de Philip Glass, en 1984, en passant par l'inoubliable Aïda de Verdi, pas moins de deux cents créations lyriques – cantates, oratorios, opéras et ballets – ont eu pour thème l'Egypte, dont la moitié exclusivement consacrées à Cléopâtre. C'est dire l'attirance que ce pays et ses mystères, réels ou supposées, ont exercée sur les compositeurs et les librettistes, toujours à la recherche d'un nouvel exotisme ou d'un romantisme déchirant.

«Avec la deuxième collection d'égyptologie après celle du Musée Guimet de Lyon, dit Brigitte Bouret, conservateur du musée et commissaire de l'exposition «L'Egypte et l'Opé ra», il était légitime que nous nous intéressions à ce thème d'une grande richesse d'autant que j'ai pu travailler avec un égyptologue de renom, Michel Dewachter.»

L'Egypte qui attire les compositeurs n'est cependant pas celle des manuels d'histoire, plutôt celle des collectionneurs et des cabinets de curiosités, «une Egypte de pacotille mélangée d'une grande érudition mythologique à travers les textes d'Hérodote et d'Héliodore», explique Mme Bouret. C'est ainsi que certains personnages émergent, comme Isis, symbole éternel de l'épouse et de la mère, ce qui peut aller jusqu'à une assimilation à la Vierge. Lully ouvre le bal avec son Isis, d'après Ovide, mais elle n'aura guère de succès et ne sera jouée qu'une fois. Rameau suivra avec Les Dieux d'Egypte, prétexte à une fête de cour.

Autre héroïne à succès, Cléopâtre. Elle représente l'anti-Isis et instaure le mythe de la femme orientale dangereuse, parée de tous les attraits et de tous les vices. Peu importe les époques. On jouera Cléopâtre dans des costumes d'odalisques du XIXe siècle. Bellini, Massenet, Victor Massé en feront le sujet d'un opéra, Saint-Saëns d'une pièce symphonique, Berlioz d'une cantate. Thaïs, la prostituée repentie et revenue à la foi chrétienne, créée par Anatole France, aura aussi son heure de gloire en inspirant un drame lyrique à Massenet.

Car l'Egypte passe aussi à travers la Bible. Dans ce cas, elle est le méchant, l'ennemi. Une dizaine d'oeuvres traitent du personnage de Joseph, dont la plus célèbre est le Joseph en Egypte de Méhul, créée en 1807 et reprise un siècle plus tard à l'Opéra de Vienne.

Mais la plus belle fusion entre l'Egypte et la musique demeure le dernier chef-d'oeuvre de Mozart, La Flûte enchantée, thème maçonnique dans lequel apparaissent les principaux éléments de cette philosophie – l'air, le feu, le silence, la nuit – avec une nuance de taille toutefois puisque Mozart fait de la Reine de la Nuit un personnage maléfique, alors qu'elle était dans la mythologie égyptienne une étape bienfaisante dans la course du soleil. L'assimilation à l'Egypte fut telle qu'au début du XXe siècle on redonna La Flûte à Paris en l'intitulant Les Mystères d'Isis...

Comment muséographier un tel sujet ? Brigitte Bouret s'en tire fort bien avec des objets significatifs de l'égyptolâtrie qui régna au XIXe et au début du XXe siècle : des jardinières de Gallé représentant Isis en milan femelle, des affiches d'opéra mélangeant avec allégresse temples grecs et obélisques, et surtout d'extraordinaires costumes, d'une loufoquerie totale. On sourit en voyant Pierre Loti déguisé en Osiris pour une soirée costumée ; on s'étonne devant les vêtements gréco-égyptiens de Lully et les innombrables «turqueries» dont on revêtait des héros censés vivre à l'époque pharaonique. Même le grand Mariette Pacha, père de l'égyptologie «sérieuse», dessina pour Aïda des costumes qui sentent un peu le soufre, comme des babouches aux pieds de Radamès !

Mais l'oeuvre la plus marquante de ce mariage égypto-lyrique est tout de même Aïda, commandée à Verdi par les Egyptiens pour célébrer l'ouverture du canal de Suez et qui fut finalement créée pour l'inauguration de l'Opéra du Caire en 1881. Aïda fit un triomphe : 32 rappels ! Et l'air des Trompettes fut même choisi, durant un temps, comme hymne officiel de l'Egypte...

Jusqu'au 6 février 2005, au Musée des Beaux-Arts et d'Archéologie J.-Déchelette, 22, rue Anatole-France, Roanne (42). Tél. : 04.77.23.68.77. Catalogue : 30 €.

Pierre Loti's Tiny Theater

2004-12-28T00:45:00.000-05:00

Esther Moschkowitz, Le tout petit théâtre de Pierre Loti (Le Figaro, December 28)

La première oeuvre de Pierre Loti n'est pas un roman mais un jeu d'enfant : une «légion» de figurines réalisée entre 7 et 12 ans. Plus d'un siècle plus tard, Le Petit Théâtre de Peau d'âne est présenté pour la première fois. Hommage à «l'homme né de l'enfant», selon les mots de Pierre Loti, plus qu'au célèbre écrivain que nous connaissons.

A 7 ans, Pierre Loti rencontre son premier amour, Jeanne de deux ans sa cadette. Un jour, elle lui raconte avec admiration la féerie de Peau d'âne qu'elle avait vu jouer à Paris. Émerveillés, ils décident de la monter à leur tour sur le petit théâtre de marionnettes du garçon. Ils fabriquent alors toutes sortes de personnages inspirés de l'histoire de Perrault : des noyaux de cerise pour les têtes, des allumettes pour les bras, des morceaux de carton pour les jambes. Puis, l'imaginaire finit par excéder le seul univers de Peau d'âne et c'est tout un monde miniature de fées, d'elfes, de gnomes, de princesses, d'exotisme et de monstres qui prend forme. Après que Jeanne se fut lassée, le jeune inventeur continue à fabriquer de féeriques décors, des palais fantastiques et surtout nombre de personnages pour habiter ces lieux enchantés.

Mais, à quinze ans, Pierre Loti range toute son oeuvre dans un coffre qu'il n'ouvrira plus jamais. Pourtant, il espère qu'«un jour futur» des «successeurs inconnus, en furetant au fond des plus mystérieux placards, feront l'étonnante découverte de légions de petits personnages» (Le Roman d'un enfant, P. Loti).

Un inventeur a exhumé ces figurines du grenier de sa maison et leur a créé un décor à la mesure de leur taille et de leur fantaisie : c'est Jean-Michel Othoniel, habilleur de la bouche de métro du Palais-Royal. C'est ainsi que Le Petit Théâtre renaît et s'expose à Rochefort-sur-Mer – ville natale de Pierre Loti – au Théâtre de la Coupe d'or et au foyer du Théâtre du Châtelet.

Comme pour combler un désir d'enfance, l'artiste plasticien a fait revivre les personnages qu'il met en scène dans un univers de verre d'une finesse remarquable. Kiosque baroque, trône féerique, habitacle de perles de verre, balustrade irisée... trente-deux architectures miniatures sous globes raniment une quarantaine des poupées de Pierre Loti. La transparence du verre, les jeux de lumière, et les lignes de construction, tout en rondeur et comme à la limite de l'équilibre, donnent naissance à un ensemble à la fois grandiose et léger. Le tout repose sur des présentoirs en bois sculptés et laqués, habillés de quatre claustras de tulles d'organdi brodés d'or.

Féerie de Loti ; féerie d'Othoniel. Mais aussi riches rencontres avec trois lycées professionnels qui ont participé à la construction du Petit Théâtre, notamment au travail sur verre, au décor brodé et au mobilier. Ces nombreux partenariats, témoins de la volonté d'allier art contemporain et artisanat, ont permis de fondre toutes ces inspirations en une même installation d'une cohérence inattendue.

Sans oublier la musique. Le foyer du Châtelet organisera avec ce projet sa première exposition dans le cadre des Moments musicaux qui accueilleront des élèves du Conser vatoire. Autour du Petit Théâtre de Peau d'âne, un café turc s'ouvrira dans le Salon des Glaces, clin d'oeil à la maison de Loti à Rochefort, et des broderies et autres richesses rappelleront le conte de Perrault. Un melting-pot artistique qui se distinguera par sa finesse et sa richesse !

Le Petit Théâtre de Peau d'âne de Loti et d'Othoniel se fait passage de l'enfant à l'adulte, du fantastique au tragique, le conte de Perrault dévoilant autant d'imaginaire enjoué qu'il cache des choses monstrueuses. Mais, il est aussi la nébuleuse des inspirations et des rêves de l'écrivain : «Tous les rêves d'habitations enchantées, de luxe étrange que j'ai plus ou moins réalisés plus tard, dans divers coins du monde, ont pris forme, pour la première fois, sur ce Théâtre de Peau d'âne ; au sortir de mon mysticisme des commencements, je pourrais presque dire que toute la chimère de ma vie a été d'abord essayée, mise en action sur cette très petite scène-là» (Le Roman d'un enfant).

Jusqu'au 15 janvier, au Théâtre de la Coupe d'or à Rochefort-sur-Mer (17). Du 7 février au 13 mars, au Théâtre du Châtelet à Paris. Tél. : 01.40.28.28.40.

Un ouvrage édité par la ville de Rochefort et IRO à l'occasion de l'exposition sera disponible mi-janvier 2005.

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Les petites déesses de Suse

2004-12-21T09:15:00.000-05:00

Anne-Marie Romero, Les petites déesses de Suse (Le Figaro, December 21)

Elles sont minuscules, elles tiennent dans la main, depuis les plus primitives, simples silhouettes de terre pincée pour marquer la tête et les bras, jusqu'aux plus sophistiquées, nues, parées de bijoux et coiffées d'extravagants chignons. «Elles», car les hommes ne représentent qu'une infime partie de ces figurines humaines qui totalisent elles-mêmes à peine 1% de tou tes les terres cuites retrouvées dans la Suse antique, capitale d'un mouvant territoire entre Iran et Mésopotamie, appelé Elam.

Annie Philippon, directrice du Musée Fenaille, à Rodez, célèbre pour ses statues-menhirs, ses statues gauloises et son bouleversant Christ en croix de la Renaissance, a choisi de continuer à illustrer ce qui semble être la vocation de son établissement, l'image humaine. Elle a demandé à Annie Caubet, conservateur général du département des Antiquités orientales au Louvre, de monter cette exposition, avec des pièces exclusivement prêtées par le grand musée parisien. D'autres suivront, Chypre, peut-être le Levant.

L'Elam se situe au pied des monts Zagros, à l'orée de la grande plaine mésopotamienne avec laquelle elle a, à plusieurs reprises, partagé son sort. Son art évolue donc, au cours des temps protohistoriques entre celui de Sumer et une inspiration plus lointaine venue de Perse. L'exposition, chronologique, commence avec la création de Suse, vers 4200 avant J.-C. pour s'achever avec la période sassanide puis précède l'arrivée de l'Islam. «Dieu a créé l'Homme en modelant l'argile et l'Homme a tout naturellement fait la même chose pour créer les représentations de ses dieux», dit Mme Philippon, allusion au plus vieux mythe de tout le Proche-Orient. Car, à n'en pas douter, nous nous trouvons, avec ces petits personnages, en présence de divinités ou d'orants. Quoi qu'il en soit, dans un contexte religieux, que confirment les caractères sexuels très marqués de ces divinités de la fécondité. Pres que toujours nues, on a rapporté des pastilles de terre pour marquer les seins, on a incisé le triangle pubien ou on l'a évoqué par de petites cupules en forme de bouclettes. Et de plus récentes, datées du IIe millénaire, sont en forme de violoncelle, avec des cuisses monstrueusement développées, encore un signe traditionnel de la fécondité.

A travers l'exposition, on suit l'évolution de cet art modeste, trouvé dans des contextes funéraires ou près des temples, depuis les premières statues cobras, dont la tête s'avance comme celle du serpent, datées du IVe millénaire, jusqu'aux statuettes hellénistiques, lorsque l'Elam et la Mésopotamie étaient unies sous la même domination des Séleucides, après la conquête d'Alexandre. Très vite, ces statuettes cobras, tout en restant frustes, sans jambes marquées, sont parées d'étonnantes coiffures, de chignons remontés comme ceux des geishas retenus par un bandeau qui laisse passer des boucles autour du visage et alignent de nombreux anneaux d'oreilles qui semblent pincés tout autour du lobe. Dans un premier temps, elles ont un bras le long du corps et l'autre replié sous la poitrine, ce qu'on ne retrouve nulle part ailleurs dans la région. Mais l'art élamite se rapprochera de celui de la Mésopotamie à la fin du IIIe millénaire, sous l'empire unifié de Sargon d'Akkad, après une longue période d'absence totale de représentations. On ignore du reste comment se traduisaient pendant ces longs siècles les rites magico-religieux qui reprennent de plus belle pendant l'empire akkadien. Les statuettes sont alors très semblables à celles de la Mésopotamie, avec un buste en triangle, des mains en ailerons ou jointes et toujours une profusion de bijoux.

C'est alors qu'apparaissent les premières représentations d'hommes. Vêtus du kaunakès, le manteau de franges de laine que l'on retrouve dans toute la Mésopotamie, les yeux largement maquillés, le crâne rasé, ce qui évoque le fameux dieu-lune de Babylone, Sin. A cette époque, les statues sont moulées et souvent remodelées après moulage de manière à les asseoir sur un siège dont on rajoute deux petits pieds à l'arrière. D'autres hommes, musiciens, joueurs de luth, coiffés d'un bonnet pointu, sont de pures merveilles de réalisme miniaturisé.

A la fin du IIe millénaire, l'Elam est une grande puissance qui a repris son autonomie. C'est à cette période qu'est apporté à Suse le «butin mésopotamien», dans lequel les archéologues français du XIXe siècle trouveront le code d'Hammourabi. Les statuettes féminines se multiplient, les mains sous les seins, harnachées d'un baudrier et toujours ornées de quantité de bijoux. Des moules fabriquent en série des couples enlacés sur des lits de vannerie d'à peine 10 cm de long. Peut-être s'agit-il de scènes d'hiérogamie, mariage d'un dieu avec une mortelle ?

Sous les Perses, puis les Parthes et enfin les Sassanides qui règnent jusqu'en 638, apparaît, sur les statuettes, la même magnifique glaçure turquoise qui sera celle de la frise des archers de Suse et de Persépolis. Puis ce sera l'Islam et la fin de toute représentation humaine.

Musée Fenaille, Rodez, jusqu'au 27 mars 2005. Tél. : 05.65.73.84.30.

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Le sourire forcé et critique de Chostakovitch

2004-12-21T01:06:00.000-05:00

Jacques Doucelin, Le sourire forcé et critique de Chostakovitch (Le Figaro, December 21):

Vous n'imaginez tout de même pas Kafka en auteur de vaudevilles désopilants. Et pas davantage Chostakovitch, le grand tragique des compositeurs russes du XXe siècle, écrivant des opérettes coquines. L'auteur de la Lady Macbeth de Mzensk a pourtant composé en 1958 une vraie comédie musicale, Moscou, Quartier des cerises, pendant soviétique de celles de Vicente Minelli outre-Atlantique. Torturé comme il l'était, il a même «regretté» dans une lettre à un ami cette incursion dans la musique légère.

La première française est à l'affiche de l'Opéra de Lyon pour les fêtes de fin d'année dans une production de Macha Makeïeff et Jérôme Deschamps, sous la direction exemplaire d'Alexandre Lazarev, ancien directeur musical du Bolchoï. Si je vous dis qu'on ne rit pas à gorge déployée dans ce Quartier des cerises régenté par un commissaire politique et ses sbires, vous ne serez guère surpris. Mais Chostakovitch, qui connaît toutes les musiques du monde – trop aux dires de certains –, a magnifiquement réussi à distraire le public moscovite contemporain de l'ère Khrouchtchev tout en laissant filtrer à travers ses notes un désenchantement qui n'est pas seulement celui de l'éternelle Russie, mais aussi celui de l'artiste soumis à la dictature tatillonne de médiocres petits chefs.

Tout en riant de leurs propres difficultés, les protagonistes de l'histoire, aux prises avec les tracasseries d'une administration kafkaïenne, nous livrent, à un demi-siècle de distance, un témoignage poignant de leur quotidien. Sous les éclaboussures de Valses à mille temps, de fox-trot déguisés – car plusieurs oukases staliniens ont condamné le jazz ! –, d'allusions plus ou moins appuyées au répertoire russe, de citations cocasses du folklore comme d'airs célèbres d'opéras de Moussorgsky et de Tchaïkowsky, le compositeur laisse entrevoir les malheurs de son temps.

Sous le déguisement du bouffon, Dimitri Chostakovitch reste frère de l'Innocent de Boris Godounov. Mais ce double fond de l'oeuvre serait moins perceptible si la traduction musicale et scénique qui est donnée à Lyon n'était aussi réussie. Avec beaucoup de finesse, les Deschamps évitent soigneusement de faire du Deschiens. Et c'est avec un instinct très sûr qu'ils recréent, par petites touches, la vie en HLM dans l'URSS des années cinquante.

Seules les couleurs vives des vêtements de Macha Makeïeff apportent une note de gaîté continue en caractérisant chaque personnage. Sinon, règne dans cette barre d'immeubles très «cage à lapins», une nostalgie et une grisaille des âmes qui sont la marque d'une époque et d'un système dont le fonctionnement a prouvé aujourd'hui son inefficacité, mais dont Chostakovitch dénonçait alors, mine de rien, toute l'absurdité.

Mais il faut bien rire, même au pays du goulag : soudain, l'orchestre s'emballe et ronfle dans un galop digne d'Offenbach. D'ailleurs, les citations pleuvent comme autant de colifichets ironiques disposés par le compositeur sur un monde dont l'infinie tristesse l'étreint. Les Deschamps régissent au quart de tour, allumant des feux de joie qui embrasent un moment la façade en suggérant ce rêve où se réfugient les hommes et les femmes qui attendent les clefs de leur appartement comme celle d'un bonheur sans cesse différé.

N'est-ce point un cancan qui pointe son nez ? Et voilà la parodie de ballet romantique, déjà dansée par la petite soeur de Yolande Moreau, qui se mue en esquisse de french-cancan. Alexandre Lazarev connaît tous les méandres, toutes les arrière-pensées et les remords de Chostakovitch qu'il sait communiquer à un orchestre merveilleusement réceptif. Les choeurs maison ne sont pas moins admirables et viennent se greffer sans heurts sur une distribution russe pour l'essentiel des protagonistes.

Ceux-ci s'adonnent avec succès à un exercice pourtant particulièrement risqué : faire alterner le chant en russe avec le parlé en français. Quel professionnalisme ! Acteurs, ils sont plus vrais que nature. Chanteurs, ils ont un sens du style inné. Un spectacle collectif qui donne à réfléchir, mais où l'on s'amuse tout de même.

Opéra de Lyon : ce soir et les 23, 28, 30 et 31 décembre à 20 heures, les 26 décembre et 2 janvier à 16 heures. Tél. 04.72.00.45.45 et www.opera-lyon.com

Quai Branly, naissance d'un musée

2004-12-18T01:37:00.000-05:00

Véronique Prat, Quai Branly, naissance d'un musée (Le Figaro Magazine, December 18):

En plein coeur de Paris, l'immense chantier du quai Branly se transforme peu à peu en musée des Arts premiers. Ouverture prévue en 2006. Sans attendre, dès aujourd'hui dans nos pages, visite du chantier et indiscrétions sur le futur musée.

Au beau milieu du chantier du futur musée, encore à ciel ouvert, une oeuvre d'art est déjà installée. C'est un mégalithe sénégalais en forme de lyre, taillé dans une belle pierre volcanique rouge. Lourde de presque 6 tonnes, haute de 2,40 mètres et large de 1,60 mètre, elle accueillera le public à l'entrée du département des Arts africains dès l'ouverture du musée du quai Branly, début 2006. Pour l'instant, à l'abri dans sa caisse de bois, elle a l'honneur d'être la première pièce des vastes collections à trouver sa place. Et pour cause : son poids et sa taille rendaient impossible son passage par les portes ou les fenêtres du bâtiment après son achèvement ! La voilà donc installée au milieu du chantier tandis qu'autour d'elle on continue à construire le toit et les murs. Petite histoire et grands travaux. Un nouveau musée, c'est toujours un événement, grandiose et émouvant à la fois. Les présidents de la République ponctuent volontiers leur septennat de ces grandes réalisations culturelles : Georges Pompidou a voulu le centre qui porte son nom. Valéry Giscard d'Estaing a attaché le sien au musée d'Orsay. François Mitterrand a désiré le Grand Louvre. Et Jacques Chirac ? On connaît son goût pour les arts dits «premiers». Sur le plan muséographique, le fait majeur de son second septennat sera en effet ce musée du quai Branly dévolu aux arts d'Afrique, d'Océanie, d'Asie et des Amériques.

Entre la Seine et la rue de l'Université, sur deux hectares de terrain à l'ombre de la tour Eiffel, le chantier du futur musée avance à pas de géant, mais dans la discrétion la plus totale : on ne visite pas, on ne photographie pas. L'équipe du musée et son président, Stéphane Martin, ont fait une exception pour nous et il faut bien l'avouer : ce que l'on découvre ici étonne et séduit tout à la fois. On le voit en détail avec les prises de vue de notre photographe Jean-Michel Voge, qui jouent avec la lumière et creusent les contrastes comme le feraient des gravures de Piranèse. Mais d'emblée, dès que l'on pénètre sur le chantier, on est saisi par un sentiment d'harmonie : le bâtiment promet de se couler dans le paysage en épousant la courbe de la Seine qui lui fait face et en se dressant, à faible hauteur, entre deux jardins qui évoquent quelque bois sacré. En plein Paris, cette architecture soucieuse d'écologie est une promesse de bien-être.

En exclusivité dans nos pages, soyez les premiers à arpenter le chantier du musée du quai Branly. Quatorze équipes d'architectes étaient en lice pour ce projet. C'est Jean Nouvel qui l'a emporté devant le duo Fanuele-Eisenman et Renzo Piano. «J'ai voulu, dit Nouvel, un bâtiment qui ne soit pas immédiatement visible, qui ne soit pas un objet qui se montre. Côté quai Branly, il est protégé par une paroi de verre sur laquelle jouent les ombres des arbres. Le bâtiment mesure 200 mètres de long et semble émerger d'un jardin féerique. Perché sur des pilotis, il est pourtant pratiquement invisible pour le piéton, enserré qu'il est de part et d'autre dans les masses végétales.» L'édifice est surmonté d'une terrasse d'où l'on voit, à l'ouest, la tour Eiffel et le Trocadéro, en face, le palais de Tokyo, et qui est bordée par des surfaces d'eau infranchissables jouant le rôle de balustrades. L'énumération des essences végétales qui entourent le musée tient de l'inventaire de Prévert mais ne manque pas de poésie : chênes, érables argentés, lianes géantes, vignes de Chine, glycines et clématites sauvages côté nord ; magnolias, cerisiers à écorce cuivrée, clairière d'épineux et bambous côté sud.

Dernier grand terrain constructible situé au coeur de la capitale, le projet du quai Branly devait affronter deux problèmes majeurs : le respect strict de l'urbanisme environnant et la construction d'un musée des Arts dits «premiers» dont l'architecture se devait d'être aussi légère que possible afin de s'effacer devant les objets exposés : «Un musée, confirme Jean Nouvel, est bien sûr essentiel pour participer à l'éveil des sensibilités et à l'approfondissement des connaissances. Mais un musée des Arts et des Civilisations expose des objets qui ont un sens dans des civilisations encore bien vivantes et qui ne doivent donc pas être perçus comme des trophées. Un musée comme celui du quai Branly ne doit pas être simplement un lieu d'informations didactiques, mais aussi un lieu d'émotion.» Un musée, donc, conçu et construit autour de la collection. Tout est là : ce n'est pas l'architecture qui se montre mais les oeuvres.

Cette collection, quelle est-elle ? Autrement dit, que verra-t-on au musée du quai Branly ? Principalement le regroupement des richesses de deux institutions appelées aujourd'hui à d'autres fonctions : celle de l'ancien Musée national des arts d'Afrique et d'Océanie, à la porte Dorée, et celle du laboratoire d'ethnologie du musée de l'Homme. Les histoires de ces deux institutions sont superbes...

Depuis François Ier, l'habitude s'était prise d'envoyer des émissaires dans les lointaines contrées pour y dénicher ces objets étranges et merveilleux que l'on regroupait dans des «cabinets de curiosités». Les explorateurs, les aventuriers, les administrateurs des colonies accumulèrent eux aussi des trésors dont une partie permit la création, en 1931, du musée des Colonies, qui fut l'ancêtre direct du musée des Arts d'Afrique et d'Océanie dont les 25 000 pièces ont été intégralement reversées au musée du quai Branly. Le musée de l'Homme, lui, ouvrit ses portes en 1938, héritier de l'ancien musée du Trocadéro et de ses collections. Il y avait là de véritables trésors, souvent illustres, mais dont beaucoup croupissaient dans de poussiéreuses réserves : ces 250 000 pièces ont elles aussi été transférées au musée du quai Branly.

Tout cela laisse augurer un musée fort riche et fort beau. Au premier étage, une galerie longue de 150 mètres servira de salle d'exposition permanente aux quatre départements qui correspondent aux quatre grandes aires géographiques auxquelles s'intéresse le musée Branly : Afrique, Amériques, Asie et Océanie (successivement, Océanie-Asie, avec un carrefour Insulinde et un carrefour Machreq-Maghreb, Afrique, Amériques, le visiteur pouvant accéder indépendamment à chacune de ces zones). Chacune d'entre elles se dédoublera en un espace d'exposition où l'on pourra privilégier le regard esthétique sur l'oeuvre et un espace d'information où l'on insistera sur la signification de l'objet présenté, son rôle dans la civilisation d'où il est issu, son contexte, son parcours. Délectation d'un côté, didactisme de l'autre. Il y aura encore deux mezzanines, l'une pour des présentations temporaires et thématiques, l'autre pour des expositions dossiers. Tout cela sera articulé autour du «pavillon de musique», sorte de colonne de verre de 16 mètres de diamètre où seront visibles les 9 000 instruments de musique des collections, un ensemble tout à fait exceptionnel. Autre «curiosité» du musée, qui ne manquera pas de surprendre les futurs visiteurs : encastrées dans la façade nord, face à la Seine, des «boîtes» de tailles variables serviront de «niches» d'exposition : chacune sera consacrée à un thème différent comme la divination, le culte des ancêtres ou les formes du pouvoir. Le coût de ce beau projet (y compris le recensement et la restauration des oeuvres d'art) s'élève à 216 millions d'euros. Le musée Branly en chiffres, ce sont encore 2 000 tonnes d'armatures posées, 500 000 boulons, 300 000 objets d'art dans 6 000 mètres carrés de réserve, une médiathèque de 180 000 volumes et 350 000 photographies... «Au-delà, précise Stéphane Martin, le président-directeur général du musée du quai Branly, en charge du projet depuis ses origines, notre institution apportera à tous ceux qui étaient épris de la beauté du Panthéon la découverte d'un art délivré du fardeau de l'histoire, un art, comme le disait Henry Moore "en réponse directe et immédiate à la vie".» D'objets de curiosité qu'ils étaient aux yeux des Occidentaux, les arts premiers sont aujourd'hui entrés dans le patrimoine universel des formes. Il leur restait encore à rencontrer leur public : ce sera la mission du musée du quai Branly.

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The Aviator Takes Off — by Todd Babcock

2004-12-13T14:52:00.000-05:00

This week I had the opportunity to catch Martin Scorsese's soon-to-be-released film The Aviator at Mann's Grauman's Chinese Theatre with a billed Q&A with the director and its star Leonardo DiCaprio afterwards. The film, perfectly positioned for a Christmas release as a heavy Oscar contender, had its premiere only the night before, so I jumped at the opportunity to nab a viewing before any hype sets in (or any MORE hype, if you will). You never know how these invites come your way in this town, as this one came in the form of a friend driving by the star-studded premiere in his car and called me on his cell saying he had two passes for the following afternoon.

He laughed a bit as he invited me, since we had experienced the same serendipity of timing previously with The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King as we accidentally drove through that one's premiere while discussing seeing it on the phone with my brother. ("Accidentally" meaning you look out your car window after a wrong turn in Westwood and wonder if you mistakenly happened upon a parade. Realizing you had driven directly into the opening gala of the year's biggest movie event, you see cop after cop motioning you to turn off the street you are on. Of course, after much laughter, you make the same "wrong turn" again and again and then begin waving as if you were on a Macy's Day Parade float and begin formulating a million con games in your head on how far you can push this to the red carpet.) He didn't miss a beat while pointing out the relative comparison of throngs there for Jude Law (who portrays Errol Flynn in an inspired bit of casting) to those for Orlando Bloom but was hard pressed to peg a clear winner.

I had heard very little in terms of advance news concerning the The Aviator, except for the simple fact that DiCaprio would be portraying Howard Hughes, with Scorsese directing. Those two facts carry hype and expectation alone, and when one positions its release just before Oscar consideration ends in January you can't help but think that Miramax feels pretty confident with their product. (Incidentally, it was such a relief to see a film without commercials and previews running before it. When the Miramax logo silently illuminated the screen and the movie began, you felt the immediate thrill of getting right to what you came there to see. Often, after 20 minutes of distraction I can find myself forgetting what movie we were there to view that day.)

I must admit here, in advance, that I, like many others, was very skeptical in the casting of DiCaprio as Howard Hughes. While having no real specific knowledge of Hughes outside of his legend, I resisted the DiCaprio choice simply based on his boyishness. The problems with icons (Hughes, that is, not Leo) is that while you may not know anything of them personally you have somehow formed an idea or image of them mentally in your head. I'll admit it's not fair, but when I think of a 40s-era mogul who goes toe-to-toe with Katherine Hepburn, Leo doesn't jump to mind. "Trust Marty" is the mantra that guides your steerage, and I must say that he doesn't let you down.

The film begins quietly after a retro logo of The AVIATOR fades into a study where a mother is washing her son's body lovingly while he stands nude in a metal washtub. She is teaching him to spell the word "quarantine" letter by letter. Anyone familiar with the tales of Hughes's obsession with women (the mother is aglow with youthful beauty) and germ phobia will be wriggling in their seat in Freudian zeal at the dead-on set-up this scene creates for the rest of the film. The quiet, eloquent scene serves as the calm before the storm as we jump cut to years later to see Hughes in the form of DiCaprio (with striking flat black hair) manically trying to orchestrate the filming of his Hollywood juggernaut Hell's Angels on an airfield buzzing with noise and confusion. DiCaprio hits the ground running with a Howard that is clearly possessed with a drive and passion that has the rev and motion of one of his airplanes. One clearly gets the idea that to get in the way of his idealism is to be chopped up in his propeller as he will motor on past.

This is young Howard, the clear-headed multitasker, who only knows what he wants and will not stop until he gets it, no matter the cost (both mentally and financially). There is no avoiding the boyish quality that washes over any depiction that DiCaprio inhabits, and this is where the "Trust Marty" mantra screams the loudest. Fastening himself to a slight Texan accent, a small mustache, and searing confidence, DiCaprio doesn't attempt to ease into Howard but rather to blaze him forward with no apologies. This is the right move as any skepticism of his portrayal is put on the backburner: you are immediately caught up in his passion and goals and latch onto his very clear quest to get his movie made. While I must admit that as Howard ages in the film through its thoroughly diverting episodes and during his various seductions of women (or them seducing him), I could never shake the impression of DiCaprio as still the ambitious boy.

Yet, I found no distraction from that fact during my enjoyment of the film, but more as an afterthought. Immersed in purpose, DiCaprio is all ahead as the film never lags or misses the beat. Like any good storyteller, both actor and director keep the motor running throughout so you are focused on the various prizes and never mind what you thought something might be. Scorsese is nothing if not thorough, and his collaboration with DiCaprio cannot simply be viewed as a cloying grab for a seat-filling face. I am sure the director took into account the nature of his star's persona ("Trust Marty, trust Marty...") and used the overgrown boy notion to heart with his toy airplanes, mother complex, and insistence that he gets whatever he wants. (It must be noted here in a trace of irony that it was actually DiCaprio that brought this project to Scorsese after a ten-year period of his own obsession. During the Q&A DiCaprio revealed it was actually a project he was developing with director Michael Mann (Collateral, The Insider) before bringing Scorsese on board. This was also the case with Catch Me If You Can, where the actor hired Spielberg and Hanks after he had already been developing the material. Now remind me why I was skeptical of this "kid" portraying an epic mogul?)

As I learned during my recent viewing the documentary Broadway: The Golden Age on DVD, there are many accounts of the magic of seeing new productions on that historic strip. I must say that Hollywood has few locations that still generate a sense of awe based on its past, but Grauman's Chinese can still generate an inner buzz while seeing a film for its first time onscreen. Recently restored in the form of a mega-complex at Hollywood and Highland (upwards of 200 million, I believe, as the new home to the Oscar ceremony), this locale can turn many a new release into an event with lines curling down the block, because of its auditorium that seemingly can accommodate a small nation. This energy is only heightened when one views an old Hollywood perfectly captured in The Aviator idealized with multiple premieres of Hughes's films playing at that exact locale.

Scorsese has always had a gift for recreation and detail, from his legendary soundstages for Gangs of New York (which he lovingly destroyed in a decadent grand guignol end sequence) to his historic period detail in The Age of Innocence. Set free from the Big Apple, Marty luxuriates in recreating The Coconut Grove in all its idealistic splendor. I took particular delight in his using of the Wainwright family as big band crooners: father and son (Loudon and Rufus, respectively) rip up the stage in piece after piece as Hollywood icons such as Louis B. Mayer, Errol Flynn (Law), and Ava Gardner (a stunning Kate Beckinsale) make the rounds on the floor.

For me, the pièce de résistance came in the form of the Hell's Angels filming sequences. In an absurd bit of obsession and bravado, Hughes informs Mayer that he is seeking two additional Panavision cameras in order to catch the sequence in the fashion he deems appropriate. When asked condescendingly by Mayer how many cameras he has now Hughes replies bluntly, "Twenty-four." This joke perfectly demonstrates early on the grandiosity of Howard's vision and also the mindset of a man who's accustomed to getting what he wants when he wants it in order to get things "right." (And we all thought the Wachowski's were the first to pull this trick off.) The sequence when Hughes, after demanding that his crew find someone who can control the weather, takes to the air is simply awesome. Gorgeously photographed by cinematographer Robert Richardson (pen your Oscar ballot now, folks), this sequence with its classical score and whirling first-person view of hundreds of planes whirling about, as Hughes frantically attempts to capture every swoop and dive of his biplanes, will have your heart pounding. I have never been a fan of digital effects (I couldn't SIT through Van Helsing at home, no matter how many drinks), but one must marvel at the fusion of camera, actor, blue screen, and CGI in a whirling spectacle all around you. The Chinese's sound system had my seat rumbling as the screen bowed at its edges trying to keep the images from spiraling off into the house.

Along with the epic quality of the storytelling come performances that rise to the occasion. Most notable of these is Cate Blanchett's portrayal of Katherine Hepburn, which must be seen as an unenviable task at the outset. While Hughes's persona is more clouded in mystery, there isn't a person on the planet that doesn't have Hepburn's specific speech cadence imprinted in their memory. Blanchett attacks the role with a symbiotic approach by creating the actress with the same snap and verve of early film roles and then easing off at poignant moments to see the vulnerable outsider who feels she has a bond with Howard because of their idiosyncracies. The result is a performance that at first feels a bit broad and stylized (seemingly commenting on the character) but then settles in with the viewer and pays off more and more as the film goes on. One finds comfort in Kate's grandness, and you begin to see that her strident edge is simply a shield to keep her going. In a particularly hilarious moment, Hughes tells Hepburn to "stop acting" in the middle of an argument and Blanchett riffs back with the retort "I'm not acting!," all the while revealing that indeed, to her own shame, she has trouble telling the difference. In this very same sequence my favorite line in the film (with due honors to screenwriter Josh Logan and longtime Scorsese collaborator Jay Cocks) came in the form of Howard diminishing his time with Hepburn by declaring, "You're a movie star. Nothing more." A sentiment not heard often this day and age where celebrity is held as an end in itself. The damage was extra harmful from a man who had ideas that changed the world and a woman whom he was banishing simply to an image that she didn't feel comfortable in.

While the film regales with many divergent episodes ranging from Howard's manic reclusiveness, where he lived in his own screening room ranting at the screen and meditating on how his lunch would be delivered (DiCaprio did much research on the nature of OCD), to his Senate hearings conducted by Owen Brewster (played deliciously by Alan Alda) it has the loose structure of going from one plane design to another. Each one either getting bigger or faster than the last. It's remarkable to note that the director has a notorious dread of flying, and yet the aerial sequences do not suffer a bit from his lack of experience. As DiCaprio noted when asking Scorsese if he was interested in a film framed around aviation the director responded, "Well, I didn't know anything about boxing when I did Raging Bull so I don't see it as a problem." (Another anecdote: when he was approached by Ellen Burstyn to direct Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore she asked if he knew anything about women; he then said, "No, but I'd like to learn.") To the contrary, each plane sequence is riveting and builds on the last to its breaking point, where a particularly gruesome crash sequence will have you bracing your seat in the same way Jaws had you pulling your feet up off the floor of the theater.

After the film's completion, the crowd was introduced to two of the actors, John C. Reilly and Alan Alda (as Howard's righthand man, Noah Dietrich, and Senator Ralph Owen Brewster, respectively). Scorsese, it seems, couldn't make the session and Leo was running late. So be it, as Reilly and Alda could have filled the entire day with great stories and perceptions from their widely ranging experiences from the set of this film and many others these two prolific actors have worked on. (Particularly amusing were both of their retelling of their Woody Allen stories. Alda stated that Woody hadn't even spoken to him on a film set until their third where after a particularly difficult take Allen came over and stated, "That really stunk," and Alda wished he would go back to being silent again. Reilly recalled that he met the director in a dark room for a casting meeting. He entered the room talking, and before he could set his hat down next to him he was being ushered out the door. He laughs as he tells the story because he got the job regardless.)

Soon enough, DiCaprio was ushered into the theater to much applause. With his long, blond hair slicked back and a slight beard he apologized for being late (interviews went late) and stated he was very glad to be there. Of all the questions that were asked and insights each actor gave from his particular experience with this director and others it was most remarkable to see three such diverse actors in age, look, and style, each answering questions with such a symbiotic relationship. One would think that veteran TV and movie star Alda, edging seventy, Reilly, a Chicago-trained theater and film actor almost forty, and DiCaprio, the "It Boy" of the last ten years now turning thirty would have vastly divergent approaches to the craft. Yet, whenever the actors were asked to discuss their process, all three managed, in their own language, to answer in the form of it being about the story. While all three make their specific choices based on what their character wants in that particular moment on that particular day, they all came back to the unifying theme of the story they want to tell.

Reilly stated that he isn't even aware of his craft anymore, that it is mostly intuitive, and that makes it difficult for him to discuss in practical terms. He stated that any potential conflict with a director is circumvented by going back to the basics of the story they are trying to tell so they are on the same page as it were. Alda said that he never trained and that his learning was all "on set" and that other actors simply were his guide. His approach is figuring out what that character wants in the story and then figuring out "why he deserves it." You could practically hear the actor licking his lips over this notion, and from his interpretation of Brewster in the film you can see his incredulousness wash over him beat after beat when he doesn't get Hughes to break. DiCaprio, it seems, is a bit of a hybrid. Like Alda, he has been on sets from a very young age and learned from the greats like Lasse Halstrom, Johnny Depp, and Robert DeNiro, to name a few early associations. Yet DiCaprio also revealed his extensive training (indeed he has been cited as being in Brando's eccentric acting classes among others) and that one of his favorite instructors had given him the advice to annotate his script with the letters NAN and AN. NAN for "no acting needed" and AN for "acting needed." The "no acting needed" meant that the actor's own life and experiences were enough to carry him in that moment and there would be no need to create anything outside of himself. Yet his main throughline was always the story he was telling and what the scene was giving about Howard that particular day that was different from any other.

Kate Beckinsale was recently quoted in the press for saying, "If you are bad in a film the blame is usually shared. If you are bad in a Scorsese film . . . well, that probably means you're just bad." The forward trajectory of the director, his story, and his willing actors have spared any and all of them of this fate. The Aviator blows right through its three-hour running time in no time flat . . . a feat Howard would surely be proud of.

A Tame Version of a Steamy Opera

2004-12-02T09:59:00.000-05:00

George Loomis, A tame version of a steamy opera (International Herald Tribune, December 1)

MOSCOW — After years of post-Soviet stagnation, the Bolshoi Theater has made notable progress in upgrading the theatrical and musical standards of its opera productions under the general director Anatoli Iksanov and its music director Alexander Vedernikov, even importing international producers on the order of Francesca Zambello and Peter Konwitschny.

Much of the interesting dramatic work is centered in the company's New Stage, which opened two years ago. In the venerable main theater, ties to tradition remain stronger, as one was reminded by its new production of Shostakovich's "Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District."

This should have been an exhilarating experience - the final step in the post-Soviet rehabilitation of Shostakovich's expressionistic masterwork in its original form (as opposed to the toned-down 1962 revision). It was at the Bolshoi, after all, that Stalin attended a performance in 1936, disliked what he saw and heard, and caused the opera to disappear from the Russian stage. Alas, the competent but bland staging by the Georgian director Temur Chkheidze manages to take the edge off this steamy tale of a provincial merchant's wife who seeks relief from boredom through sexual fulfillment and murder.

In the big lovemaking scene of Act 1, when Ekaterina yields to one of her husband's workmen, Chkheidze might as well have been doing the work of a Soviet censor. A critic of the first American production famously called the music of this scene "pornophony." But Chkheidze deflected attention from the lovers by having men appear with flashlights as if searching for them. Meanwhile, Ekaterina and Sergei carry on behind a bed. You needed a synopsis to know what they were doing - an ironic state of affairs given all the gratuitous sex in opera productions nowadays.

Yuri Gegeshidze's sets, all in wood and dimly lit by Vladimir Lukasevich, make for a ramshackle representation of the prosperous Izmailov family home, which is entered by climbing a ladder. The set serves throughout, but in the final convict scene, after Ekaterina and Sergei are charged with her husband's murder, a pedestrian bridge appears - just the place, one might think, for Ekaterina to do away with Sonyetka, the young convict for whom Sergei abandons Ekaterina. Perhaps it proved too dangerous in rehearsals, for when the moment comes Ekaterina simply pushes Sonyetka off a lower platform, then jumps off, Tosca-like, herself.

Tatiana Smirnova was in fine, rich voice and alert musicality, but in the absence of stronger direction her Ekaterina appeared more downtrodden than feisty. Similarly, Valery Gilmanov relied almost exclusively on his huge, black bass voice to characterize Ekaterina's odious father-in-law, Boris. Roman Muravitsky sang Sergei with a burly tenor. Zoltan Pesko, an experienced opera conductor who is music director of Lisbon's San Carlos Theater, enforced exemplary musical standards in his Bolshoi debut.

Tchaikovsky's "The Queen of Spades," presented by the Mariinsky Theater in Moscow's Tchaikovsky Hall, didn't provide any theatrical breakthroughs either, but then less was expected to, even though it was billed as a staged production. Valery Gergiev has recently created Moscow opportunities for his St. Petersburg-based troupe, among them the Moscow Easter Festival and an exchange program with the Bolshoi. His newest venture is to present concerts and operas on an occasional basis in Tchaikovsky Hall.

Given the venue, Alexei Stepanyuk's staging was understandably minimalist but had the singers engaging with each other tellingly. The action took place with few props on a large square surface that changed colors - green served, appropriately, for the final gambling scene - against black surroundings, with rectangular illuminated openings in back and fuzzy projections of St. Petersburg above. Traditional 18th-century costumes from an old Mariinsky production served until the final act, when the male chorus, probably for practical reasons, wore black tie without jackets. Though perhaps unwittingly, it made for an effective change.

Vladimir Galusin's portrayal of the obsessed gambler Hermann is justly celebrated, but his powerful approach can make the character seem overly crazed. Here his strong tenor functioned admirably within a disciplined performance that aptly reached its climax in Hermann's final song of resignation. Olga Guryakova, in iridescent voice, was an outstanding Lisa, delicately expressive and impassioned as needed.

The orchestra was arranged in concert format, but as if playing toward the stage instead of the audience. Gergiev thus faced the audience, though he often turned to cue the singers. Viewed from this perspective, you could see that his unorthodox technique stems from his willingness to modify the beat pattern, or to suspend it, when he wants to communicate musical points. It's one reason his interpretations are so interesting.

Femme Fatale

2004-12-02T09:57:00.000-05:00

Raymond Stults, Femme Fatale (Context: The Moscow Times, November 26)

After decades of censorship, "Lady Macbeth" returns to the Bolshoi as, the theater hopes, Shostakovich meant it to be.

For its first new production of the current season last Friday, the Bolshoi Theater brought to its main stage Dmitry Shostakovich's opera "Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District," in a performance of the highest order. Unhappily, the musical excellence was offset by a staging that misfired at many critical moments.

Of the 20 solo parts in "Lady Macbeth," not one was filled with a voice less than adequate, but Tatyana Anisimova as Katerina Ismailova (the Lady Macbeth of the title) and Vadim Zaplechny as Katerina's lover, Sergei, soared above the rest in the central roles. Based in Kiev, but enlisted last season by the Bolshoi for the title part in Giacomo Puccini's "Turandot," Anisimova has just the sort of voice that Katerina requires -- a firm, bright, superbly controlled dramatic soprano. Added to that, she brings to the part the very qualities that the composer, who regarded the homicidal Katerina as a true heroine, would probably have admired -- passion, dignity and grace.

Zaplechny, making his Bolshoi debut, has long ranked among the Helikon Opera's finest singing actors. Indeed, it is somewhat surprising that the Bolshoi took so much time to discover him, as it has not boasted a dramatic tenor with a voice of equal quality -- much less with Zaplechny's acting abilities -- for more than a decade. As those who have seen and heard him at the Helikon could readily have predicted, Zaplechny sang Sergei with clarity from top to bottom and played the part with utter conviction.

In the pit, conductor Zoltan Pesko, a well-seasoned veteran of the European operatic circuit, provided Shostakovich's marvelous score with authoritative leadership and drew playing of a richness and accuracy the orchestra rarely displays.

As for the staging, the best that can be said for it is that the director, Timur Chkheidze, succeeded in creating an array of sharply defined characters. What he failed to do, more often than not, was bring those characters together in meaningful fashion. The obvious comparison is Dmitry Bertman's production of "Lady Macbeth" at the Helikon, which garnered no less than four Golden Mask awards in 2001. At almost every crucial point, Bertman found a solution far more in keeping with the music and the libretto that Shostakovich wrote in collaboration with poet Alexander Preis.

Take, for instance, the attempted gang-rape of the servant girl Aksinya in the opera's second scene. Helikon's staging left not the slightest doubt as to what was happening. At the Bolshoi, it all looked like harmless fun. Beyond that, neither the murders of the elder Ismailov and his son, Zinovy, nor the lovemaking of Katerina and Sergei came across on the Bolshoi stage with anything approaching the conviction Bertman brought to them. The intertwined scenes of the third act -- the lovers' wedding banquet, the discovery of Zinovy's body, the comical dance of the police patrol and the eventual arrest of Katerina and Sergei -- seemed little more than a stately parade of events. The Helikon, meanwhile, gave full rein to their inherent absurdity.

To frame the Bolshoi production, designer Yury Gegeshidze created a rustic wooden set, with wide slats at the rear and balconies on either side. This worked well enough as the Ismailov family home. But the trouble came in the final scene, when the action moved to the banks of the Volga River and the slats were replaced with a raised gangway and long staircase. Though the resemblance was doubtless unintentional, the slow march of the prisoners across the gangway and down to the stage looked like a parody of the Entrance of the Shades in the ballet "La Bayadere," while their crowding as they set off along the same route in reverse brought rush hour on a Moscow Metro escalator to mind.

Doing real damage to the drama, the gangway also served as the place from which Katerina threw herself and Sergei's other lover, Sonyetka, into the waters of the Volga. Carried off at a distance, in perfunctory fashion and half-hidden by a crowd of fellow prisoners, the opera's climactic moment probably escaped anyone who just then happened to blink.

Despite the drawbacks of its staging, the Bolshoi's "Lady Macbeth" -- which next appears in January -- is well worth a visit for its musical virtues. Be warned, however, that those virtues may be fully apparent only on evenings when Anisimova, Zaplechny and Pesko are all on hand. The alternate singers and conductors announced by the Bolshoi seem unlikely, based on past performances, to come close to matching them.

Find God in Music — by Jens F. Laurson

2004-08-17T23:56:00.000-05:00

Robert R. Reilly

Robert Reilly's Surprised by Beauty: A Listener's Guide to the Recovery of Modern Music has been with me since its publication. It is one of the most heavily bookmarked, annotated books I have, and much cherished. In the interest of full disclosure, I readily admit that I had the immense pleasure of getting to know its author and critiqued this book twice; once preemptively, before its publication, and again in a tome of a letter, unsent, still. This book is not perfect, and it is probably not first-order brilliant either, but it is beautiful! I treasure it as much as I treasure much of the music that I have since enjoyed because of this book.

Surprised by Beauty is highly spiritual. Stephen Hough, the wonderful pianist who records for Hyperion (interviewed in the book), says on the jacket cover:

Robert Reilly has the unusual and delightful ability to infect the reader with insatiable curiosity about the composers he champions. Names that often were unknown, and sometimes unpronounceable, suddenly seem totally fascinating and worthy of discovery at the earliest opportunity. Yet beyond this level of exploration is his personal vision of music as something profoundly spiritual, expressive of what is best and most enriching in human life and having the possibility of leading us to encounter God Himself.

That is a good introduction to Surprised by Beauty. The opening quote of the book is from Max Picard: "[In] sound itself, there is a readiness to be ordered by the spirit, and this is seen at its most sublime in music." The love for music never ceases to impress, and as knowledgeable a man as Mr. Reilly is always a pleasure to have along for instruction. Before I delve at some length into examples I (dis)agree with in this book, let me summarize.

If you want loving introductions to the music of John Adams ("The Search for a Larger Harmony"), George Antheil ("Bad Boy Made Good"), Malcolm Arnold ("English Enigma"), Gerald Finzi ("Imitations of Immortality"), Stephen Gerber ("Keeping America Real"), Morton Gould ("Maestro of Americana"), Roy Harris ("Singing to America"), Vagn Holmboe ("The Music of Metaphysics"), László Lajtha ("Music from a Secret Room"), Gian Francesco Malipiero ("Beyond Italian Opera"), Frank Martin ("Guide to the Liturgical Year"), William Mathias ("Musical Incantations"), Carl Nielsen ("Music is Life"), Einojuhani Rautavaara ("New Northern Light"), Albert Roussel ("The Freedom of Personal Vision"), Edmund Rubbra ("On the Road to Emmaus"), Harald Saeverud ("A Norwegian Original"), Aulis Sallinen ("Scandinavian Consolation"), Peter Schickele ("Schickele Unmixed"), Franz Schmidt ("Setting the Apocalypse"), Alexander Tcherepnin ("From Russia With Love"), Eduard Tubin ("In From the Cold"), Geirr Tveitt ("The Music in the Waterfall"), Mieczyslaw Vainberg ("Light in the Dark"), Peteris Vasks ("Another New Northern Light"), as well as Duruflé, Elgar, Janáček, Martinů, Poulenc, Shostakovich, Sibelius, Vaughan-Williams, and Villa-Lobos—you have picked up the right book.

These are the composers dealt with in little chapters, ordered alphabetically and cobbled together from reviews and pieces written in different magazines. Nonetheless, there is a coherent line through the work, culminating in a few interviews with composers such as Robert Craft, David Diamond, Gian Carlo Menotti, Einojuhani Rautavaara, George Rochberg, and Carl Rütti.

Just for John Cage, Mr. Reilly has no kind words ("Apostle of Noise"). And the specter haunting some chapters, not to be rescued until Robert Craft takes up his cause, is Arnold Schoenberg. In fact, Schoenberg so rubs Mr. Reilly the wrong way that he elicits the book's strongest (and perhaps most contentious) statement from him: Ugliness is the aesthetic analogue to evil. When he discusses Moses und Aron and comes to the conclusion that Schoenberg couldn't finish that opera because he hadn't discovered Jesus in his life, I almost choked on my single malt. (To be fair, he is making a metaphysical point of negotiable validity here...)

Let me say it right away. As a lover of modern music—with a much higher tolerance for the unnecessarily absurd (Concerto for two cheese-graters, jet engine, electric toothbrush, and chromatic garbage disposal? Bring it on!)—I have ~~grid (grinded?)~~ ground my teeth many a time. A more conservative reader than me would find himself nodding along throughout the book. Either way, it is a veritable treasure trove. After every chapter, there is a little section discussing the merit of important works of that composer in different editions. This is immensely helpful in choosing where to start the musical discovery tour. I will make it my on-and-off project to track down every title on epinions and link to it at the bottom of this review.

"All Music is Equal"

In a chapter on Peter Schickele (whose program structured my Saturdays until it was, unfortunately, taken off WETA—as, for lack of funding, no new programs are produced of Schickele Mix) Robert R. Reilly (RRR) notes his objection to Schickele Mix's mantra that "all music is created equal," which he continues to expose as nonsense by asking the highly rhetorical questions: "Is all poetry equal? Is a bottle of Thunderbird equal to a 1987 Caymus Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon? Is 'Who Let the Dogs Out?' on the same plane as a Mozart aria?"

Perhaps there is a kinder way to treat Schickele's statement. The proposition is that music ought to be qualitatively judged not by genre, but by where it stands within its genre. "All music is created equal" is not, to play with analogies, to say "all apples are created equal"—which is indeed nonsense; just look at the innate superiority of the Granny Smith!—but instead "that all FRUIT is created equal." Thus the question of whether strawberries were on the same plane as watermelons seems as silly as it probably deserves to be. One ought not to compare Mozart to Wagner or Wagner to Cage or Cage to Ligeti, and so forth, much less Mozart to Snoop Dogg or Diana Krall or Led Zeppelin. It would be not so much "unfair" (though, perhaps, that too!) but again: silly. The enjoyment gifted to us by—or garnered from—Mozart cannot be the same as that which we derive from Wagner or Ligeti or Duke Ellington. It may be equal for some in intensity, but it is not the same.

"All music is created equal" is not tantamount to saying that all music is the same (or even of equal quality). Hence, the same measure of beauty is grossly inadequate. Perhaps the joy from Cage's music can never be as intense as the joy from Mozart's pieces. This may be true for most listeners—and it is true for many reasons, intent not being the least among them—alas, they have value on their own grounds, if only in my opinion. In part I think that this way of thinking of music might be reflected by the actual quote with which Schickele Mix used to open, namely that it was a show dedicated to the proposition that "all musicS ARE created equal!"

In RRR’s discussion on Nielsen he makes a comment along these lines: "This makes a dramatic, but not musical point." Unfortunately, he continues calling it a "miscalculation." Quite frankly, I do not understand why. Is music not supposed to be about more than merely music? L'Art pour l'art? I find nothing wrong with that; indeed, I may well expect it from art to make a point that is not part of its essence. If that were the case, art would become a warped meta-communication about art; a chain of self-referential statements. If applied to films, this would mean that there would be no good cinema aside from 8 ½ or State and Main. I specifically want art to make statements. Afterwards, I may judge the statement to have been transmitted successfully or not, or perhaps so much at the cost of the art itself, that I do not value it for much besides the statement. Perhaps a piece of music is less a movie under such circumstances, but rather a documentary. But I will listen with great interest to such documentaries, even if they are titled String Quartet for the End of Time.

Robert R. Reilly, Surprised by Beauty

These are just two of some of the qualms and reflections that occurred for me when reading the book. They happen to be qualms rather than delight, but that is, if anything, coincidence. For example, I enjoyed this sentence: "Anyone who enjoys Britten's music of this kind should likewise appreciate Mathias's" (p. 144). Indeed telling of the nonchalance with which he treats the breadth of his appreciation of modern music, while I imagine the greater part of his initial readership to wince even at the very idea of Britten, assuming that they know him or his work. I remember now a gentleman who introduced him and RRR's then-still-absent book mentioning Mahler's songs as though he had bitten into a lemon. "...should likewise appreciate Mathias's..."

His passion for Janáček's string quartets is so palpable that not having a copy at home must seem half a crime. His championing of Saeverrud (my initial reaction, too, was: Who???) is passionate and sophisticated. A book, in short, that will get much and repeated bedside reading and the occasional study: a charming companion through 20th-century classical music with amiably strong, if not always agreeable, opinions.

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Nun Spared — by Jens F. Laurson

2004-08-06T19:57:00.000-05:00

Thursday evening I was told of a production of Dialogues des Carmélites, Poulenc's most dramatic and successful of his three operas. While I had the dubious pleasure to watch La Bohème on Friday, instead of enjoying Poulenc, I had another chance on Sunday, which I fortunately took. On such short notice, I didn't delve into the opera at home but merely tickled my Poulenc fancy with some of his concerti, songs, and music for solo piano, all of which is fresh and delightful, harmless sometimes, but never banal. The piano, organ, or harpsichord concertos, in particular, are a must-have for any music lover.

Francis Poulenc

When I arrived at Lisner Auditorium with minutes to spare, a bit of a ticket-managing disaster awaited me. Faced with many latecomers who couldn't find their tickets at will-call, the charming and helpful staff ran about like chickens with their heads cut off. (Premonitions of what was to come?) I stood, half-forgotten, half-lost next to the commotion until Opera International’s Producer-Director Muriel Hom literally and kindly took me by my hand and guided me past the imposing doorman to a seat of my liking.

I was hardly seated when the short prelude to The Dialogues began, and I had no chance to worry too much about the opera's presentation in English, rather than its original French. Setting the tone for Poulenc's sweet, melodic, but undeniably modern, sometimes neoclassical music, Edward Roberts conducted his 37-piece band with immediately audible aplomb towards the charm and wit that can be expected from Poulenc's work. The sound of the orchestra that spilled out of the small pit—harp, timpani, percussion, and a few brass elements stuck out or seated outside of it—was pleasant and if not terribly refined, adequate in the best sense.

The revealed set (from the Calgary Opera Association) is sparse and old fashioned-traditional, the costumes "realistic," say, even more old-fashioned and rather quaint. The character of the drama of The Dialogues, based on a real story and retold by Poulenc based on the German novella Die letzte am Schaffott (The Last One on the Scaffold) by Gertrud von le Fort and a film script by George Bernanos, is self-contained and can handle this sort of stage direction like a good play can.

The singing, so much could be said from scene 1 alone, was fairly impressive. Erich Parce's baritone was strong and supple but never forced. The costume he donned as Marquis de la Force befit his archaic air perfectly, and his acting made it work. While good things can be said about Jingma Fan's singing (he was the Marquis's son, Blanche's brother), his acting was not of the same natural and self-assured, mature quality. His movements and postures seemed more contrived, and he did not manage to turn his costume into a natural, rather than silly, part of his character. Yi-Cherng Lin's short appearance in the role of the lackey Thierry, however, made clear just how much worse acting could be, still. Age seems to have most to do with this all-too-rare ability among opera singers, which leads me to believe that acting is not nearly emphasized enough (or well enough) in the training of the new generation of opera singers. Jessica Swink as Blanche, looking good despite her costume (which was just a little too much with pink hat and ribbons), featured a clear and amiably fragile tone that became powerful in higher notes, amid some perhaps unnecessary vibrato.

The prelude to Scene 2 meanwhile shows Poulenc's play with brass and woodwinds in give and take, while puckishly plucked strings and harp play with each other in the background. Then a more somber, back-and-forth waving tone enters as we see the convent with the Prioress, Madame de Croissy (superbly sung by Kyle Engler). The minimal set—chair, a wooden panel of separation (confession booth-like), the two characters of the Prioress and Blanche well lit—started to shed its old- fashioned skin a bit for minimal realism. The costume for Blanche was still old-fashioned but less silly, while a nun's costume has of course a timelessly sleek appeal. Gently ends this scene, over the flute's last tone as the characters move off stage.

The interlude between Scenes 2 and 3 is another charming work with subtle brass over strings, only that this time the responsible section of the orchestra, seemingly assembled for the purpose of this performance, had some audible difficulties with the execution.

That the performance was in English was far less of an obstacle for me than I had thought it might be. One of the reasons is probably my relative ignorance of French, in which I would not have understood much. Instead, the language was an integral part in keeping the audience firmly within the dramatic element of the opera. It also gave the opera an amusing Brittenish flavor with its now less mellifluous, more stilted quality. The choice of language was in the end a valuable tradeoff between the skills of the participants (for many of whom French would have been more of a challenge), the involvement of the audience, and the slight loss of melodic quality with which the original language imbues Poulenc's music. Seeing Mozart's Trollflöjten, courtesy of Ingmar Bergman, is at any rate a more disconcerting experience.

A lovely dialogue between the novices in the convent, Sister Blanche and Sister Constance, dominates Scene 3, dominated by a large bench and table and all the ingredients for a Dutch still life on it. And, of course, those very tastefully clad nuns. The attractive soprano Jane-Anne Tucker (Constance) does not have the strongest, but an appropriate and wonderfully agile voice, just about not too shrill and aptly fidgety. She sang impressively all night, more so even considering that she is an amateur singer (in the best sense), busy with two young children.

Scene 4 could have done without the gothic gate that stood rather unmotivated in the back. The bed, spartan nightstand, and two chairs seemed enough. What followed was Sister Superior (Madame de Crossy) dying stylishly over the course of the next 15 minutes, with the highest artistic merit. To see the audience prematurely robbed of the strong performance of Kyle Engler (an equally fine singer and actress) was a shame. Mother Marie of the Incarnation was more than capable support with her plain face suiting the role visibly very well. Her singing, on the lighter side, was backed up with such fine acting that her performance, too, was pure enjoyment. The cell phone ringing during the conversation between Mother superior (still alive then) and Blanche was an unfortunate distraction.

The story sags a bit during the later parts of Act I, with Mother Superior's vision of a ravaged, abandoned convent being a dramatic interruption. The scene in which she, dead now, is carried off, interrupted by the rings of the unmercifully regular bell from the orchestra pit (and a quickly quenched cell phone), was theatrical and moving; all done behind the semitransparent curtain that opened again for Scene 5. The arch remained in the chapel scene and made more sense behind the semicircle of large candles placed around the Mother Superior's body. Scene 6, in front of the curtain, was moving and witty at once with its contemplations of death by Sister Constance.

Jane-Anne Tucker and Jessica Swink

In Scene 7 the new Mother Superior, Hai-bo Bai, showed that her predecessor had far and away the superior diction. Swallowed syllables and odd intonations made her English near incomprehensible, Sutherland-style, without the trills, though. Her voice certainly was piercing and clean enough to fill her role in most other aspects, though piano parts sometimes slipped into the inaudible under the orchestral accompaniment... to no discernable fault on conductor Robert's part, however. The church window projections on the back curtain and the larger than life faux-naïve Jesus on the cross were again perfectly adequate stage sets.

After the introduction before the curtain, Scene 1 was the same as Scene 2 of Act I was. The Chevalier de la Force, Jingma Fan, now seemed a little restricted and nasal in higher vocal altitudes. The continuing interludes kept reminding me of the sea interludes in Peter Grimes (though far shorter and slighter) or even the knee plays from Einstein on the Beach. The Chaplain of the Convent, Patrick Toomey, was fine but on the wobbly side; the new Mother Superior, Madame Lidoine, remained incomprehensible while Jessica Swink's Sister Blanche got better and better. Paul McIlvaine, 1st Commissioner, was convincing in manner and, despite his role, sympathetic. Mother Marie's voice was still small but strong, and if she lacked bombast she more than made up for it with her ability to portray fragile, stoic strength. The short second act ends with the vow of martyrdom, setting the stage for one of the most hair-raising operatic finales.

Act III opens as the nuns are forced to leave the convent in plain clothes (looking cluttered and so much less appealing than in a Carmelite's uniform). Scene 2, same as Act I, Scene 1, takes place at the library of the Marquis de la Force, alas torn up and savaged. Blanche who had—unbeknownst to me but according to the synopsis—run away after the taking of the vow is asked by Mother Marie to join the convent again. Blanche, experiencing the upheavals of the French Revolution all too vividly (her father had met the device prescribed by Dr. Guillotin in 1789 as the most humane form of capital punishment; she also got slapped by her former servants!), declines.

Available from Amazon:

Francis Poulenc, Dialogues des Carmélites, Pierre Dervaux, Denise Duval, Régine Crespin

Scene 3 has the nuns in prison after a lovely, wailing oboe melody in the interlude. Blanche is still AWOL while the order is condemned to death for unlawful assemblage. Mother Superior mumbled; Mother Marie, absent, wished to join her sisters in their hour of agony and death. Scene 5 finally is the famous, chilling, and so very effective scene in which, one by one, singing their Salve Regina, the nuns, dressed in white (which is historically correct) are led to the scaffold off stage, with the grating swooosh-clunk of the falling blade decimating the choir one by one. The guillotine rhythmically and greedily claims one singing nun after another, accompanied by the chilling sound effect that had some audience members gasp silently. Sister Constance is the last left, hesitates, sees Blanche, and meets, singing still, her fate. After Constance's song is cut short, Blanche continues up the plank to meet the same fate in unquestioning devotion to her vow of martyrdom.

In his review in the Washington Post, Tim Page was right to claim that this naïve portrayal of religious fanaticism, no matter how nobly inspired, and the religious pervasiveness over the republican and enlightenment ideas that had been a kernel of the revolution can be difficult to take at the same value than, say, before September 11, 2001. That I did not think of this connection while following the opera probably speaks to the performance's success in grabbing my attention. I was, especially after the Puccini horror at Wolf Trap, just delighted by this production, one of the most charming opera performances that I have seen in Washington—and that with a shoestring budget and a troupe that seemed rather randomly thrown together. The applause, partisan perhaps, spotty, generous but short, was more than deserved. This 10-year-old foundation, Opera International, with their now 10th production in Washington pulled a feat off that I would not have believed possible. If they continue in this fashion, especially if they delve into a bit more out of the way repertoire rather than doing the hackneyed "classics" like they did in the past, they will be an attraction to opera neophytes and veterans alike, a distinction very few companies have.

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Mischa Maisky at the National Gallery

2004-06-09T23:06:00.000-05:00

On Sunday, June 6, the 2499th concert of the William Nelson Cromwell and F. Lammot Belin Concert Series at the National Gallery of Art, which is concluding its 62nd season this month, featured Latvian-born cellist Mischa Maisky (shown at right) playing three of the Suites for Unaccompanied Cello by J. S. Bach. Two Ionarts critics were there and heard somewhat different things.

Can You Dance To It?
by Charles T. Downey

Having arrived at the National Gallery, without a reserved seat like some lucky critics who were also there, it became clear that it might be difficult to get a seat for this concert. I staked out a place to stand along the far wall of the West Garden Court, with that rarest of all things here, an unobstructed view, between two of the massive columns, of the performer's bench. Since I was alone, I did not dare to leave my spot, which other concertgoers were already eyeing covetously, to get an extra chair. Shortly before the concert began, one of the ushers—merciless martinets who patrol the hall with a critical eye—saw that my placement did not conform with their approved seating plan. Fortunately, another spectator decided to give up her extra chair, because she was able to move closer to her friend in another section, and the seating gods decided magnanimously to allow me to stay. This was lucky indeed because, as I discovered at the concert's end, about 50 people without seats had been forced to listen to an echo of the concert from "the lobby," the sculpture hall that leads into the West Garden Court.

Mr. Maisky is one of those superstar performers, in the tradition of 19th-century virtuosi like Liszt and Paganini. This reputation is certainly deserved, but what leaves me cold in this sort of player is the trappings that come with the fame. On a superficial level, this would be those trademark silk blouses, "That 70s Show" flaired trousers, and Mafioso gold neckchains, which made Mr. Maisky look like Yanni with a cello and an afro, or an extra for Saturday Night Fever. That aside, the real problem with the superstar performer is the temptation to make big bucks by releasing one of those very popular recordings with crossover appeal, to which Mr. Maisky has succombed (Cellissimo and Meditation, for example) as has just about every performer of the same exalted level. I have no problem with performers making a profit from their appeal to more mainstream audiences, but you are what you eat, or in this case the danger is that your playing may begin to resemble what you play. It is not simply that this performance was un-Baroque in character, which it most certainly was. The excessive and often grotesque rubato applied by Mr. Maisky destroyed the rhythmic vitality of some of the dance movements, and this changed the focus of the performance from the intricacies of Bach's late Baroque stylized refashioning of the concept of the suite to the individuality of a superstar player. I find the former fascinating, and I could care less about the latter.

The tone was set by the first four movements of the first suite Mr. Maisky played, BWV 1007. There is some justification for Mr. Maisky's personalized style in the prelude movements to the suites. These movements fit into a genre of instrumental music dating back to the Renaissance—identified by titles like praeludium, intonazio, intonation, toccata—in which a solo instrumentalist improvised a flashy piece to set the tone (and often a tonal or modal center) for a choral piece or set of dance movements that followed. Ironically, of the three preludes Mr. Maisky played in this concert, that of the third suite, BWV 1009, which seemed to have been most clearly composed in the style of a toccata, was played in the least improvisatory and most rhythmically regular way. The prelude of the first suite was played dizzyingly fast but without any perceptible regular pulse, as was that of the fifth suite. The latter piece is one of Bach's transformations of the French ouverture, the sort of instrumental music that composers around Europe admired in the work of Lully, who was known for keeping the players in his orchestra in strict rhythmic unity by pounding a cane on the floor. It was a form that fascinated Bach, since it appears in various guises in his instrumental works, such as the "Sinfonia" of the second keyboard partita and the sixteenth variation of the Goldberg Variations.

However, other than an optional first-movement prelude, the suite is a series of pieces intended to accompany specific types of dancing. While the concert's program notes (from Columbia Artists, which manages Mr. Maisky's appearances) acknowledge the dance-oriented "genesis of the suite form," they go on to state the following:

The resulting dance movements in Bach's suites bear little resemblance to the simple eighteenth-century dance tunes that were actually used to accompany dancers.

While it is true that Bach probably never intended for anyone to dance to any of the movements from his cello suites, the uniformity of the dance movements of Bach's instrumental suites (as well as those of other composers) indicates that we would be justified in believing that Bach at least still had in mind the steps and movements of the dances in question. (On this topic, you should read Tim Janof, Baroque Dance and the Bach Cello Suites, about his experience of having a Baroque dance specialist, Anna Mansbridge, actually try to dance while he played the suites.) Now, real dance music may not have much to recommend it as serious music, but the main function that it provides—and this is just as true for the Minuet as for the techno music that pulses in dance clubs today—is a unifying rhythmic certainty. In fact, the social function of dance steps that one can recognize and participate in, and thereby be in harmony with one's society, was just as important for the Allemande, named for an unspecified German girl, in the Baroque era as it was for the Macarena, named for a Spanish girl, in Europe and America at the end of the 20th century.

For me, the best moments of the program were the movements where Mr. Maisky played with a dancelike rhythmic regularity. In the first suite, this happened first in the two Menuetts and especially in the dynamic, concluding Gigue (the most jig-like of the three he played). By contrast, Mr. Maisky played the Courante of this suite so fast that the sixteenth notes blurred together meaninglessly, but then he had to slow down to leap down to the bass notes, requiring a manipulation of tempo that destroyed any sense of a dance. The Sarabande's tempo was so irregular that the final note of each section, which should be a half-note, I think (the emphasis in the triple-meter sarabande was on beat 2), was held for a different length each time, and for a full two beats only the last time. In the third suite, played second, the Allemande was graceful and stately, the Courante was much more regular and therefore exciting to hear than in the first suite, and I really felt like getting up to dance to the two Bourrées, which were delightful. Only the Gigue disappointed, with a handful of squeaks or mistuned notes and a rushed character that felt unnatural.

Speaking of the "few scratches and squeaks," these things happen, but the accumulation of such imperfections over three suites gave me pause. The worst of the night came at the end of the otherwise bouncy and not at all "rigorous" (as the program notes put it) Courante of the fifth suite. This may be the most mysterious of the six suites, and Mr. Maisky's performance emphasized the recondite character of the Sarabande and the directionless second Gavotte especially. However, with almost no pause, he launched himself into the dashing Gigue, which he chose to play with full repeats of both sections. It was one of the most exciting moments of the evening. After much encouragement from the crowd, Mr. Maisky was coaxed to play another Sarabande, which as I recollect it, was from the second Suite, BWV 1008, in D minor, whose somber first measures I took for a gamba piece by Marin Marais. It was the most satisfying sarabande of the concert.

Available at Amazon:

J. S. Bach, Unaccompanied Suites for Cello, with Pierre Fournier (1977)

Knight in Shining Cello
by Jens F. Laurson

After three weeks of summer lull at the National Gallery of Art's Sunday Concerts, this perfectly beautiful Sunday eager listeners started lining up at the Gallery's West Garden Court entrance more than two hours before the concert was to begin. By 6:30, no one without a reserved seat was admitted into the building anymore. The reason for this excitement had a name: Mischa Maisky, one of the foremost active cellists of our times, was to be heard in what is the most exciting music for solo cello, the unaccompanied suites by Johann Sebastian Bach.

With his gray-white curly mane and goatee, heavy round gold chains, and appropriately exotic clothing, he was the first artist I have seen at the NGA concerts who was slightly larger than life. A ruffled, untucked light steel-blue shirt and black satin trousers framed this entrance, giving him an air that was half Numidian warrior-king, half Gandalf the Grey with his beautiful, petite Domenico Montagnana cello in front of him. Of course, the excitement about hearing the fiendishly difficult Bach suites, nos. 1, 3, and 5 (out of six), did its share as well.

Little needs to be said about Mr. Maisky himself. A household name in classical music, a student of Mstislav Rostropovich and Gregor Piatigorsky, a friend of and frequent collaborator with Gideon Kremer and Martha Argerich, his discography contains several outstanding examples of his craft. Anecdotal evidence has it that Mischa Maisky recently rerecorded the Bach suites because he didn't recognize his own versions when they were played in a record store he was in.

With concentration and an always lyrical element, Maisky started energetically into Suite No. 1, in G major, BWV 1007. Given the amount of cellists who have tackled these works on disc since Pablo Casals's path-breaking efforts (he had been the first artist to perform as well as record these pieces in their entirety), it is easy to forget just how difficult they are to play, and more so from memory. Or as a professor of mine once told his (philosophy) students: "Only when you know just how difficult it is to play just one note on the piano exactly right can you even begin to have an idea how difficult it is to play the unaccompanied cello suites by Bach." The brio and sure-fingeredness (barely a pitch off) with which Maisky bowed Bach from the cello, especially towards the end of Suite No. 1, in the Gigue, was spellbinding.

Perspiration or dictates of style (or both) had Maisky, after generous applause, come out in a new shirt—similar in style, but canary yellow. A fine backdrop at any rate for Suite No. 3, in C major, BWV 1009, with its tension-laden and fast-paced opening Prelude. While not creating as explicitly the impression of two instruments being at work, as do Bach's sonatas and partitas for solo violin, Suite No. 3, too, makes one wonder how one bow and five fingers can do all that work. Along with increased efforts of physical expenditure, Mr. Maisky's sweating became a good indicator of the intensity of the performance before Suite No. 3 fell into its more lyrical tone with the Sarabande. Mischa Maisky did not just play this movement slow, he played it with such pressing gravity that the long notes burst with tension, stretched, and held until the very point of breaking, before the first Bourrée gave the suite a spring back into its step. The fast, scurrying Gigue, the last movement of the suite, left no listener unmoved. Harmonically more interesting, it is an apt climax, broodingly wild in Maisky's hands, rather than "cheerful" as the program notes felt about it.

Suite No. 5, in C minor, BWV 1011, was given in a black outfit, Issey Miyake like the other ones, a shirt with pointedly extended shoulders and bell-bottom light trousers, faintly reminiscent of a bat. The first note of the suite burst onto the scene like a shot as Mr. Maisky, now starting to resemble more a semi-sane, semi-evil, and musically obsessed count of a fake eastern European fiefdom, continued with his
idiosyncratic but still perfectly coherent and self-explanatory account of this Mt. Parnassus of the cello œuvre.

This was all-out Bach, with none of the noble patrician understatement of a Pierre Fournier, but an emphasis on every rhythmic and contrapuntal element, an exaggeration of the music, but never to its detriment. In fact, Mischa Maisky's playing added several dimensions to the performance. Free-wheeling, emotionally charged, verifiably un-Baroque, this was not a recreation of Bach but a distillation of his flavor. "Bach," Charles Bukowski said in one of his poems, "is the most difficult composer to play badly because he made so few spiritual mistakes." Perhaps that is the reason why Bach's music lends itself to such interpretation with ease. Instead of becoming too much for the musical palate, the renditions of Bach by the likes of Edwin Fischer, Glenn Gould, or Mischa Maisky are exciting and—although on occasion controversial—ultimately tasteful. They may all not be the first choice for everyday Bach listening, but their absence would mean that no one would want to listen to Bach every day in the first place. It is a great gain in understanding and enjoyment of any and all Bach, or indeed music, that is incurred from these insights.

Bach already has an undisputed place in the 21st century, but after Mr. Maisky was finished with him, it became almost painfully obvious how much of a presence JSB has or ought to have in our times. The double-stop-filled first Gavotte of Suite No. 5 was just one example of "Bach—the urgently contemporary." Astounding interpretation on top of genius made almost 300-year-old music come alive, perhaps ironically in a museum of all places. Neither the visible and at some points audible exhaustion of Mr. Maisky, nor a few scratches and squeaks could deter from that impression.

Enthusiastic applause and four curtain calls (a National Gallery Record?) convinced the artists to give an encore, and so he played the Sarabande from BWV 1008. Heavy vibrato gave the slow movement its intensity and tension all over again, made it so biting and electrifying that, to me, it felt like Wagner for solo voice. (Though I wish not to do injustice to either composer, or incur either composer's fans' wrath.) What a highlight just one Sunday before the 2,500th concert at the Gallery. Words fail. A joy!

Available at Amazon:

J. S. Bach, Unaccompanied Suites for Cello, with Pablo Casals (1936–39)

J. S. Bach, Unaccompanied Suites for Cello, with Mischa Maisky (1985)

J. S. Bach, Unaccompanied Suites for Cello, with Mischa Maisky (2000)

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Mr. Smith Plays in Washington — by Jens F. Laurson

2004-06-06T08:29:00.000-05:00

Edward MacDowell's Sonata no. 3 ("Norse"), from 1899, opened a program with pianist Joseph Smith at the National Gallery of Art, on May 23, that was held in honor of the exhibition American Masters from Bingham to Eakins: The John Wilmerding Collection. A collection of eight American composers with works spanning the first 60 years of the 20th century (1899–1960) paralleled the collection in roughly the time span it covers, though the music is a good deal younger than are the paintings.

The 105-year-young MacDowell sonata, meanwhile, has aged very well. To be played in three movements—Impressively; at times with impetuous vigor, Mournfully, yet with great tenderness, and With much character and fire—it is just one of many examples of MacDowell's outstanding writing for the piano. I suppose that the emotions could have been brought out more vividly than Mr. Smith did, and his pedaling could have been more judicious, given that the acoustics of the West Garden Court already provide a perpetual "pedal down," but that grumbling aside, the piece was remarkably well played. More impeccable than enthusiastic perhaps, but enjoyably throughout.

Joseph Smith, whom my favorite newspaper, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, called a “richly sensitive interpreter,” also wrote the remarks on the music of that evening upon which Stephen Ackert based his program notes. This is not terribly surprising since Joseph Smith writes regularly for publications such as Piano Today and Piano (UK).

In editing music, such as Four Early Twentieth-Century Piano Suites by Black Composers (G. Schirmer), he also brought back to light From the Southland, the 1907 series of suites by Harry T. Burleigh, which was the piece to follow the strongly American, rolling Harold Arlen 1960 Bonbon and Ode (which, due to a mistake in the program was billed as Bonbon Ode, which was but the beginning of confusion for my fallible ears). Bonbon has a generous southern drawl and is entirely cherishable. The joy it gave Mr. Smith to play was evident, and the music is lighthearted and charming in the best sense, with plenty of rhythm and jostling even at its graver moments. Given my confusion about the dual nature of the piece, I thought for some time, though, that given that it was an Ode to the Bonbon it really was, it was surprisingly long and substantial. Not aware of my error until closer examination of the program notes, I pondered just how many licks it would take to get to the center of it.

Burleigh's suite (nos. 2, The Frolic, and 6, A New Hiding-Place), with titles that could have leapt from the diary of a puppy dog, was a surprising, strangely modern type of frolicking that came so utterly unexpected with its sounds and rhythms that it took the better part of the first work to "get with it" and appreciate the rambunctious nature. Given how odd I thought the Burleigh, entirely unknown to me, was, it only got odder. Confusion settled firmly in when Mr. Smith chose to play Aaron Copland's 1930 Piano Variations without a break. Telling and embarrassingly in equal parts, I listened to the Copland, just heard a fortnight earlier by Mme. Schein in her energetic performance at the NGA (see my review on May 12), with Burleigh on my mind. While I then thought that the Piano Variations (championed by Mme. Schein as they were) were a "beautiful (medium-thorny) piece," "impossible to dismiss [...] as a flashy intellectual exercise by some modernist composer," this time I very much felt like dismissing them. My notes, still under the mistaken impression of hearing oddly familiar Burleigh works, yielded the following: "For the sonorities it offered, it lacked rhythm (!) and the bird that would have made it work, had it been Debussy. The Hiding-Place was perhaps even less satisfying. It seems that several audience members sought a new hiding-place themselves after hearing it." But even when I caught on to my deception my opinion was oddly differing from just fourteen days before: "Copland, who doesn't deserve to be represented by that turgid piece was perhaps best served if people thought it not to be his."

The explanations for this difference in hearing are likely to be manifold. Mood and disposition when listening to a given piece are hugely important, as the conductor Günter Wand never tired of pointing out. The difference in expectations, too, has much to do with it – and finally, it must also have had something to do with Mr. Smith’s playing which could not have been more contrasting to Mme. Schein’s. While the latter utilized all the piece's energy and emphasized its vertical elements, Mr. Smith played much more subtly, underscoring its (few) horizontal lines. To some, the latter approach was more rewarding and delightful, but I found it (evidently) rather lacking.

After the intermission, Scott Joplin's Bethena: A Concert Waltz (1905), with its reminiscences of The Entertainer, was cute and easy on the ears, refreshing without any false claims of being more substantial than it is. (Not very.) Billy Strayhorn followed with another waltz, his 1933 Valse, from his pre-jazz, high-school times. A beautifully melancholic piece, this juvenile work was easily as enjoyable, if not more so.

The next course, Charles Tomlinson Griffes's 1918 Sonata was more of a full meal again. It sounded as though it could only have been written in America, displaying a musical naîveté that never even knew there had been a war. It is difficult to imagine that 1918 Europe could have brought forth such an upward-moving, gently and sometimes wildly affirmative and positive piece of music. In the hands of Mr. Smith, this became one continuous moment of musical enjoyment, even if the pedal-heavy approach still muddled some passages unnecessarily.

Appropriately, Washington, D.C., native Ethelbert Nevin finished the night off, even more appropriately with a piece that depicted a June night in Washington. Given the 90-some degrees and high humidity, that 23rd of May was not even the eight days away from a June night as the calendar would insist. Nevin inoculated himself and his music (very lovely music) against criticism by stating that "while I am doing nothing great, I am doing the best I can, and I'm going to leave a stream of sunshine, if it is possible." A charmingly humble (not modest) and accurate way to describe his sweet and unpretentious music, as Joseph Smith points out in his commentary.

A little old-fashioned, but most endearing and lovely to hear. Quite exactly like the performer himself.

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Stars and Strings, cont. — by Jens Laurson

2004-04-18T13:11:00.000-05:00

Among the papers in Schoenberg's estate, a note was found that proclaimed: "A great man lives in this country—a composer. He has solved the problem of how to stay true to oneself and still learn. He reacts to neglect with disdain. He needs neither accept nor reject (snub) criticism. His name is Ives." That was of course very true, not the least because Ives had a well-run insurance agency and was a millionaire for most of his life. Not only did he not have to care about criticism, he didn't even write music in the last 35 years of his life. It was his first string quartet that was the sandwiched "modern" piece on the program: not really modern, as it is some 110 years old, originating from Charles Ives's student years at Yale. (Was it just me, or did the cello suddenly sound full and round? Am I going insane or are/were my tin ears playing tricks on me?)

American hymns and Bach peek through the first movement quite a bit. This came as no surprise after reading the always-excellent program notes by Tomás C. Hernandez, who tells us in them that the first movement, composed independently from all the other movements, started out as an organ fugue for a counterpoint class. (Indeed, all four movements may have started out as works for organ.) Ives, a devout Puritan, studied under the arch-conservative Horatio Parker, whose influence comes through in these four movement-pieces. There is apparently a dispute as to whether the first movement even belongs to the string quartet and not rather to the Fourth Symphony for which it was appropriated. Alas, it is an interesting and fine piece of music, and I was glad to hear it from the Leipzig Quartet, even if it violated Ives's intentions.

Quoting from all these sources that I am not familiar with, I may have missed a good part of the wit of the quartet, but it holds its own as "pure music" just as well. Perhaps a bit on the easy side, but that is quite fine. There were musical ellipses, a little Viennese flavored jest, a tiny Mozart allusion, and just a hint of "care-me-not" thorns present in that music that bobs back and forth between venturing into denser sounds and its straightforward musical quotations. Towards the last third it got very entertaining, indeed. Splendid, even. The audience, more often used to far thornier beasts at this part of a concert (think Hoiby or Babbitt) was likely grateful, as the reasonably excited applause afterwards showed. Ives is familiar territory to the Leipzig String Quartet. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reviewed their fine recording of both of Ives's string quartets as well as other, smaller works for string quartet and piano, just last year, as part of their very extensive and impressive discography with the audiophile label MD&G.

Little needs to be said about the Brahms Clarinet Quintet. It's one of the most beautiful pieces of chamber music ever composed, and hearing it twice within weeks (just recently at the National Academy of Sciences with the Debussy String Quartet) does not detract one iota from that. Ricardo Morales joined the Leipzig String Quartet that night. The playing was perhaps a little less lyrical than it had been in the French/Russian hands, but technically, as was the entire evening, beyond reproach. Best just to sit back and enjoy with a smile. Enjoy as I did, it must be said that the Brahms was evidently not their strength, and the Quintet did at times come across as routine and even somewhat tedious. Shy of the luscious thing it can be, but with plenty of merit, still. Most everyone else seemed not to have shared my opinion about the Brahms being lackluster, and the enthusiastic applause elicited an encore.

It took a while for the encore to get under way, because the notes could not be procured by Mr. Morales, whose nice tone on the instrument was better communicated in the third movement of Mozart's Clarinet Quintet, coincidentally the same encore that the Debussy String Quartet gave. It was much softer, consoling, indeed. Those members of the audience who had left early deserved to miss it, those who innocently thought they could beat the line at the loo were to be pitied. An extraordinarily long pause after the end of the piece was a refreshing antidote to the tyranny of overzealous clappers and permanent standing ovations. That alone deserved standing ovations.

Charles Ives, Musik für Streichquartett, Leipziger Streichquartett, Steffen Schleiermacher, Yeon-Hee Kwak	Emerson String Quartet, Ives string quartets
Leipziger Streichquartett, Mendelssohn, vol.4, String Octet and Quartet (1823)	Leipziger Streichquartett, Brahms Quintet and Quartet

Other recordings by the Leipzig String Quartet from Amazon:

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Some Thoughts on the Washington Opera, cont. — by Jens F. Laurson

2004-04-14T10:27:00.000-05:00

But what got a loud "What?" out of me upon first reading the review was this: "Placido Domingo is not only a great singer but a great actor as well [...]" Huh? Plácido Domingo's "acting"—if one can call it that—is painful to watch. It is extraordinarily bad. If he does not sing, it exhausts itself in empty gestures, slow-motion miming. Theatrical plunk and open-ended, purposeless limb extension is all there is. Surely, he's not alone in that in the opera world, but to call him a great actor is almost insultingly off the mark. (For a truly great actor/singer, albeit in a different repertoire, see Bryn Terfel live some time!) Domingo's singing, on a happier note, is still remarkable, if on its way out. The strain that Tim Page heard was audible at the dress rehearsal already. The role of Siegmund is about as far as Domingo's voice can make it on stage. His pronunciation has improved over the years (judging from recordings) but is barely adequate and would hardly garner much approval from a German-speaking audience.

He performed with Anja Kampe, as Sieglinde, who gave her company debut and a good one at that. I bemoaned her diction though, and the German native she is, it was a shame that I had the utmost trouble understanding her words. Her singing was warm for the most part. It was a well-delivered, solid performance, though probably not "the next Glenn Gould" when it comes to "North-American-debut-made-in-Washington-fame" for Beltway residents to be proud of.

On Alan Held, Mr. Page and I can happily agree. Page's writing that his "acting and singing are lithe and plausible" I can only second. In fact, over the course of four hours, I appreciated and liked Mr. Held more and more. In the end I was convinced to have seen and heard a wonderful bass and a good and very potent(ial) Wotan. A singer with subtlety as part of his repertoire, with great pronunciation and diction (I could understand virtually every word he phrased), Alan Held left me with my most favorable impression of that night.

Next to Held was his wife, or rather, Wotan's wife, Fricka. Fricka is to the Gods in Der Ring what Yoko Ono was to the Beatles. She seems irrational and bitter, vengeful even, but is actually the calm focus point of the world of the gods: the last instance of morality, without which the world order of the gods would only have crumbled earlier. The singer behind this figure was Elena Zaremba. I had never imagined her as a Fricka but have liked her very much ever since seeing her as Carmen in Munich. (She was also the saving grace as a vocally enticing Ulrica in an otherwise rather dreadful 2002 Washington Opera Un Ballo in Maschera.) Her Fricka was downright outstanding. She held back across the board at the dress rehearsal, but part of the impression she left is also her singing Wagner, rather than yelling it. Not exactly sotto voce, but not too far away from it either, she never forces her voice to be bigger than it actually is. Her performance gave the production a value on a psychological level that came despite, rather than because, of the direction.

Linda Watson—uninjured still at that point—was pale. She didn't really sing at the rehearsal, so I reserve my judgment on her vocal ability. But acting, pronunciation, and surefootedness could all be improved upon, it seemed. Kurt Rydl as Hunding neither impressed nor disappointed me. He was well regarded with applause from the sparse crowd though.

The Valkyries were simply dreadful. Vulgar, pointless, affectedly juvenile in pathetic outfits (more of that later), and vocally a mixed bag, I shall refrain from inflicting pain by naming them. Aside, I need reserve my poison for Francesca Zambello, Peter J. Davison, and Anita Yavich, the three culprits guilty of direction, sets, and costumes, respectively. In his description in the Post ("Matrix-Night at the local S&M bar—you've seen it all if you've ever been to the opera in Germany"), Mr. Page is dead on. The conclusion, however, is different from mine. First, not only was the staging miles (rather, decades) away from being even slightly novel, it was an old idea badly rehashed. If you've wondered how three or four stereotypes (about Wagner, Valkyries, Wagner stagings, etc.) superimposed onto each other might look, you would have had your chance to get the satisfactory answer courtesy of Brünnhilde, Waltraute, Gerhilde, Helmwige, Schwertleite, Ortlinde, Siegrune, Grimgerde, and Rossweisse.

But in order to balance the bit of insight in one part of the Post out, Dan Via, "special to The Washington Post," gets his say about it also. "[Anita] Yavich's costumes draw inspiration from modern manifestations of these impulses: industrial structures such as oil derricks, bridges, and scaffolding." Ah-hum. Mme. Yavich is quoted: "I thought it would be a great metaphor for how we try to control everything, but at the same time, nature is completely uncontrollable. . . . If you say yes to a Valkyrie, that means you will die and follow them," Yavich explains. "What do these women have to look like to make these guys want to go? I think they have to look very attractive but, at the same time, look very strong." Admirable thoughts. Just one small detail would be the fact that if the Valkyries pick you up, you are already dead.

The whole Valkyrie ordeal, where the shortcomings of the production were most obvious, was utterly unenjoyable. To present the ultraconservative Washington audience as modern that which was dusty in the 80s—and then badly done on top of it—was a coup that somehow failed to excite me. And just why did the scenery look so familiar? Ah, yes, of course: it was the Fidelio staging regurgitated in black! Responsible then: Zambello, Davison, and Yavich. (It needs to be said that it worked much better in Fidelio, which was a reasonably fine production.) Every element in Fidelio had its copied part in Die Walküre, just a bit darker and more crooked. The industrial stagedrop, the flat extension of the stage with cut-outs—be it Florestan's cell or Brünnhilde's fiery resting place—it was entirely devoid of new ideas.

Wagner, Der Ring des Nibelungen, conducted by Karl Böhm at Bayreuth (1966–67)
Available at Amazon

It would have been just another performance at the Washington Opera, and not a particularly good one, had not Fricka, alias Elena, and Wotan, alias Alan, held it together. Both added something to already rather good singing and rescued otherwise sordid acting. The Post concludes, "Get a ticket immediately" (?!). Is this perhaps necessary encouragement so that the Washington audience would not pass on the last performance at the inept DAR Constitution Hall and instead hold out for the return to the Kennedy center? I'd say: save up for a trip to Munich, Berlin, or (if you have eight years' worth of patience) Bayreuth to see how it's really done. Don't expect much from future Wagner performances in this town. Immediate Karl Böhm antidote recommended.

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Monsieur Ibrahim et les Fleurs du Coran, cont.

2004-03-27T09:47:00.000-05:00

Fortunately, Omar Sharif did not die of shame, allowing him to read Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt's adaptation of his own play, Monsieur Ibrahim et les Fleurs du Coran (Mr. Ibrahim and the Flowers of the Koran). The main attraction of the movie is its setting in the Rue Bleue area of Paris in the 1960s, where a Jewish teenager named Moïse, nicknamed Momo (played by newcomer Pierre Boulanger), living under the oppressive control of his depressed father, finds a breath of fresh air in Monsieur Ibrahim, the Turkish grocer who owns the shop across the street. Momo's other release is found in visits to the local prostitutes (who are as permanent in their location on the street as the buildings), the first of which is the focus of the opening sequence, showing the 13-year-old cracking open his piggy bank, changing the coins for notes at Monsieur Ibrahim's grocery, and rehearsing his opening lines in the mirror.

Momo's father has a collection of valuable books, which he insists be kept in darkness, and obsessively controls the household money. As he begins to steal from Monsieur Ibrahim's grocery, to cut corners on his food budget, the old man takes the boy under his wing, turning a blind eye to his shoplifting and even advising him to give his father cat food and call it pâté. (Momo's father loses his job and abandons his son, leaving only a note and a pile of money: he is subsequently found, after having committed suicide under a train in Marseilles.) All of this should be very depressing, but we follow Momo's voyage into Monsieur Ibrahim's view of the world. In a hilarious sequence lampooning the French bureaucracy (a series of sour-faced fonctionnaires say "Non," one after another), Monsieur Ibrahim is finally able to adopt Momo legally.

The area of Paris around the Rue Bleue, at the boundaries of the 9th, 10th, and 2nd arrondissements, is near some of the dicier parts of the city, the Grands Boulevards, the Gare du Nord, and the Gare de l'Est. One of the most touching sequences in the movie is when Monsieur Ibrahim and Momo take a walk through Paris together: they stroll along the quais of the Seine and have a drink at a café. For Momo, "living in Paris" would be like a dream, he says; what he means is that the distance between this "real Paris" (where wealthy people live and tourists wander) and the Rue Bleue is too great. Fulfilling a long-held dream, Monsieur Ibrahim buys a red convertible sportscar, and they set off for his village back in Turkey. This road-trip sequence is beautiful and rich in evocative power, especially as the characters cross the Dardanelles on a ferry, listening to the call of the muezzin from the minarets of Istanbul, and as they drive east through Turkey, visiting Orthodox, Catholic, and Muslim shrines and seeing a Dervish ceremony.

The movie's main attraction for me, of course, was the chance to look at a recreation of 1960s Paris, accomplished mostly through the careful placement of old cars and a soundtrack of that era's pop music in France. Listening to the radio is Momo's great solace and, simultaneously, a way to annoy his father. All in all, Monsieur Ibrahim is a fun and poignant tribute to that hopeful and turbulent time.

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Der Ring from New York, cont.

2004-03-25T09:34:00.000-05:00

Fortunately, the second scene is saved by the mercurial character of Loge, whose entrance in Das Rheingold is accompanied by the shifty leitmotif that is one of best signatures in the Ring cycle. Tenor Philip Langridge gave a great performance in this role, the lying trickster of the gods, who manages to stave off the death of the gods (which would be assured by the absence of Freia) by relating the story of the theft of the Rhinegold and the creation of the ring of power. With lust for the gold, the giants carry off Freia and allow Wotan 12 hours to come up with it as a ransom for her. The orchestra weaves its transitional tapestry again, as the scene descends into Nibelheim where Mime and the other Nibelungs do Alberich's bidding in the third scene. Both entering and leaving Nibelheim, the orchestral fabric is interrupted by a short rhythmic section of music that calls for 18 tuned anvils. This sounded great on the radio, in spite of the challenges inherent in making this work in a live performance. As Alberich Richard Paul Fink gave what was, I think, the best performance of this remarkable cast. He had power, consistency, and great variation of color and tone.

Wotan and Loge eventually trick Alberich and steal everything: all of the gold and treasure the Nibelungs have amassed for him, the Tarnhelm (which makes its wearer invisible), and the ring, upon which Alberich places his curse. Back in the upper world, the gods come back together as the giants return looking for their ransom. The giants insist that the treasure has to be piled up so that it covers Freia, in order that they may forget her beauty and release her. The treasure covers most of her, but they insist that the Tarnhelm be added to cover her hair, and the ring, now on Wotan's finger, must cover her eye. With his usual shortsightedness (he has only one eye, after all), Wotan refuses to yield the ring, but the mysterious goddess Erda rises up from the earth and, with the Rhine music leitmotif recast in a minor key accompanying her singing, warns Wotan that he must yield the ring. This must be a difficult role, sung by contralto Elena Zaremba, appearing only at the end of the opera in what is a crucial and dramatic scene. Ms. Zaremba has a dark voice that seemed a little forced on the radio, almost cracking at some points and undermined by a sometimes wild vibrato.

Of course, Wotan does yield the ring. The giants quarrel over how to divide their treasure, and Fafner slays his brother Fasolt to claim everything for himself. Freia is returned, and with her the eternal youth of the gods. Donner, god of thunder, swings his hammer and a bridge of clouds forms, over which the gods enter their new fortress in the sky, Valhalla. While I would have enjoyed seeing the production at the Met (I have yet to see the Ring cycle staged: see my post on August 12, 2003, Bayreuth, Anyone?), I was quite glad to be able to listen to this admirable performance on the radio.

Tune in for the rest of the Ring cycle broadcasts: Die Walküre on April 3, Siegfried on April 17, and Götterdämmerung on April 23.

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English Mermaid Stranded in Washington, cont. — by Jens Laurson

2004-03-21T00:25:00.000-05:00

A little informational talk between the Schumann and a selection of seven songs from Hugo Wolf’s "Italienische[m] Liederbuch" gave the audience some pertinent information regarding the first two songs, "Auch kleine Dinge" (Little things, too) and "Mein Liebster ist so klein" (My dearest is so small)—namely that Wolf was a mere five feet tall. In that light, the songs shone brighter and obviously more humorously. Le botiglie etc. bla bla bla.

A word or two on Eugene Asti, who had stepped in for Julius Drake at relatively short notice, is more than in order. He is a delightfully competent accompanist who worked out the emotions of the songs as much as can be reasonably expected. But most admirably, he played awfully well without ever being obtrusive or overly timid. Sophie Daneman's most noticeable organ—her voice, that is (were she quiet, it might be a different matter)—doesn't need a pianist's kind consideration anyway.

Reynaldo Hahn's song "A Chloris"—substituted for the scheduled "Dans la nuit," the score of which could not be produced by the performers, who consequently fell in love with the tribute to the beauty of Chloris's eyes—is stolen entirely from all sorts of composers. Moreover, it is heart-rending, beautiful, stunning. It sounds like the lovechild of a Händel opera and Glenn Gould playing Bach (add a spice of Beethoven). I should be surprised if Hahn did not succeed in bedding Chloris, if such were his intentions. Two Gounod songs also convinced me with sheer beauty of composition and execution.

Separated from her seven-month-old boy, either pining for the toddler or the telepathic powers of music must have been the reason for two sets of children songs in this program. The apology of Mme. Daneman in her explanation, however, was wholly unnecessary. The Schumann and especially the Poulenc, in his La courte paille (The short straw), are very worthy and fully recital-competent compositions that add their wit (musical and otherwise) to an atmosphere that can use every bit of it.

Noel Coward, of course, is a wonderful way to end a concert. The beat in "A Room with a View"—nod to Eugene Asti—and Sophie Daneman cooing the audience with her ample charm had the audience eating out of the palm of her hand. "If Love Were All" and "Chase Me, Charlie” made sure that I'll be looking for a record with more of this man's work. Especially since I best remember him (unfortunately, that is) from his role as an over-the-top prison king in the dreadful original The Italian Job. Ian Bostridge's acclaimed account of Coward songs on EMI will likely be the first choice. Up two notches from Rodgers and Hammerstein but two steps away from standard classical repertoire, it is work fully deserving of Daneman's blooming voice that suddenly seemed to use the West Garden Court and all the resonance to its advantage. Way to go out.

But, of course, that wasn't quite all. Most amusingly and oddly appetizing was the (I think) Coward song about the lonesome oyster—an oyster's taste of high society (and vice versa). That set the mood for what is one of the best ways to conclude these Sunday concerts. Having experienced both gustative and musical stimuli, Utopia on U Street is a great way to enjoy one's après-concert over drinks, live jazz, and food. Wayne Walentz and Pam Bricker plus their percussionist were responsible for good music and a splendid ending to the night.

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Music in Proust, cont.

2004-03-20T09:41:00.000-05:00

Also in the fifth book, another fascination with the power of music is expressed in the conversation between the narrator and Albertine about the calls of merchants in the streets of his neighborhood.

It is the magic charm of the old aristocratic quarter that they are at the same time plebeian. Just as, sometimes, cathedrals used to have them within a stone's throw of their porches (which have even preserved the name, like the porch of Rouen styled the Booksellers', because these latter used to expose their merchandise in the open air against its walls), so various minor trades, but peripatetic, used to pass in front of the noble Hôtel de Guermantes, and made one think at times of the ecclesiastical France of long ago. For the appeal which they launched at the little houses on either side had, with rare exceptions, nothing of a song. It differed from song as much as the declamation—barely colored by imperceptible modulations—of Boris Godounov and Pelléas; but on the other hand recalled the psalmody of a priest chanting his office of which these street scenes are but the good-humored, secular, and yet half-liturgical counterpart. . . . Several of the foodstuffs cried in the street, which personally I detested, were greatly to Albertine's liking, so much so that Françoise used to send her young footman out to buy them, slightly humiliated perhaps at finding himself mingled with the plebeian crowd. Very distinct in this peaceful quarter (where the noise was no longer a cause of lamentation to Françoise and had become a source of pleasure to myself), there came to me, each with its different modulation, recitatives declaimed by those humble folk as they would be in the music—so entirely popular—of Boris, where an initial intonation is barely altered by the inflexion of one note which rests upon another, the music of the crowd which is more a language than a music. It was "ah! le bigorneau, deux sous le bigorneau" [hey! sea snails, 2 sous a sea snail], which brought people running to the cornets in which were sold those horrid little molluscs, which, if Albertine had not been there, would have disgusted me, just as the snails disgusted me which I heard cried for sale at the same hour. Here again it was the barely lyrical declamation of Moussorgsky that the vendor reminded me, but not of it alone. For after having almost 'spoken': "Les escargots, ils sont frais, ils sont beaux" [Snails, they're fresh and beautiful], it was with the vague melancholy of Maeterlinck, transposed into music by Debussy, that the snail vendor, in one of those pathetic finales in which the composer of Pelléas shows his kinship with Rameau: "If vanquished I must be, is it for thee to be my vanquisher?" added with a singsong melancholy: "On les vend six sous la douzaine. . . ." [Get them for 6 sous a dozen]

This contemplation of hawkers' cries in the streets of Paris is far too lengthy to cite in its entirety, but another great passage from it underscores the medieval plainchant quality of their cries.

It was true that the fantasy, the spirit of each vendor or vendress frequently introduced variations into the words of all these chants that I used to hear from my bed. And yet a ritual suspension interposing a silence in the middle of a word, especially when it was repeated a second time, constantly reminded me of some old church. In his little cart drawn by a she-ass which he stopped in front of each house before entering the courtyard, the old-clothes man, brandishing a whip, intoned: "Habits, marchand d'habits, ha . . . bits" [Clothing, seller of clothing, clo . . . thing] with the same pause between the final syllables as if he had been intoning in plainchant: "Per omnia saecula saeculo . . . rum" [For ever and e . . . ver] or "requiescat in pa . . . ce" [May he rest in peace] albeit he had no reason to believe in the immortality of his clothes, nor did he offer them as cerements for the supreme repose in peace. And similarly, as the motives were beginning, even at this early hour, to become confused, a vegetable woman, pushing her little hand-cart, was using for her litany the Gregorian division: "A la tendresse, à la verduresse, / Artichauts tendres et beaux, / Arti . . . chauts" [For tenderness and greenness, / Tender and pretty artichokes, / Arti . . . chokes].

In the United States, the best example of the music of vendors' cries is probably the calls of hot dog or beer sellers at hockey or baseball games (e.g., "Getcha cold bee-eer, cold beer"), which have often fascinated me. The similarity Proust sees between his urban music and Gregorian chant is interesting, too, because there are examples of polyphony in the Middle Ages and Renaissance that use this sort of melody as the basis for composition. I have a memory of a piece that was in the Norton Anthology of Music when I was an undergraduate music major. Since this was in the late 1980s and several editions ago, I haven't been able to find any precise information on it yet. What I recall was that it used a fruit vendor's call, quite similar to what Proust describes in this section of his novel, as a cantus firmus: something like "Fraises nouvelles, mûres fraîches" (Wild strawberries, fresh blackberries). If I can locate this piece, I'll fill you in. This section of Proust's book is quite beautiful to read.

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The Battle of Algiers, cont.

2004-03-19T13:36:00.000-05:00

In an article (The Pentagon's Film Festival: A primer for The Battle of Algiers, August 27, 2003) for Slate, Charles Paul Freund gave a long and thoughtful response to this news. He answers a series of self-posed questions, including these thoughts in response to this one, "What does any of this have to do with Baghdad?":

Terror. The Mideast learned the efficacy of insurgent terror from Algeria. The PLO, Hamas, and other groups are indebted to the Algerian strategy of so-called "people's war." Its lessons are now apparent in Iraq, too. Yet the film treats the Algiers terror campaign as a failure: its later bombings and shootings are made to appear increasingly desperate and strategically pointless. "Wars aren't won with terrorism," says one key revolutionary. "Neither wars nor revolutions." But that depends at least in part on how the other side reacts to terror, whether the other side is France in Algeria or the United States in Iraq. Wars may not be won with terror, but they can be lost by reacting ineffectively to it.

Now, thanks to an article (Pontecorvo and the rebirth of 'Battle of Algiers', March 17) by Elisabetta Povoledo in the International Herald Tribune, you can learn something about what the film's director thinks about all this attention:

When Gillo Pontecorvo heard that the Pentagon had organized a screening of his 1965 film "The Battle of Algiers" for a group of military and civilian experts last summer, he said he found it a "little strange." If anything, he conceded, his movie about the bloody uprisings that led to Algeria's eventual independence from France in 1962 was useful to "give an idea of the horror of the situation," not necessarily to teach Guerrilla Warfare 101 to a roomful of strategists pondering the current war in Iraq.

"I don't think that any film can teach anything," Pontecorvo said. "I think that the most that 'The Battle of Algiers' can do is teach how to make cinema, not war." The Pentagon viewing—to which participants were invited via a flier declaring, "How to win a battle against terrorism and lose the war of ideas"—came a few months before the re-release of the film in a new 35mm print. "Perhaps the reason they've dusted it off is Iraq," Pontecorvo said in an interview in his Rome apartment. "But action and love always work in the movies. They never get old and this is above all an action film."

To be sure, the movie shows some things that are horrible to watch, but it does so in an objective and unbiased way, creating the same sense of revulsion for the torture of Algerian informants by the French army as for the terrorists murdering civilians by placing bombs in crowded restaurants. When it was first released, of course, The Battle of Algiers was banned in France, a place where the collective guilt for national atrocities is assuaged only by denial of their existence. However, the tactics used by the French army in Algeria have been the subject of national debate in France for the past several years. In 2000, a group of intellectuals made a national call for a full investigation and public disclosure of the torture practiced in Algeria.

The following year, an 83-year-old French Army general, Paul Aussaresses, broke the code of silence and published a book, Services spéciaux, Algérie 1955–1957 (that's a link to amazon.fr; here it is, translated into English), about his experiences in Algeria as the Army's Coordinator of Information Services, where he served under General Massu, the cold-hearted leader of the French crackdown depicted as General Mathieu in The Battle of Algiers. (Sadly, Aussaresses is not a whistleblower interested in bringing the Army's crimes to light: he apparently describes his involvement in the "torture, summary execution of suspects sometimes disguised as suicides, and massacre of civilians" with pride in having acted as any dedicated soldier would.) You can find out a lot more about this issue, if you read French, at La torture pendant la guerre d'Algérie, from the Association Internationale des Droits de l'Homme in Geneva.

Not to harp on the same string (see post on March 15, about the Academy missing out on the chance to recognize The Triplets of Belleville and Destino), but this film was nominated for an Oscar in 1966 as Best Foreign Language Film. It didn't win.

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Millennium Wagner Opera Company, cont.

2004-03-18T14:39:00.000-05:00

The program began with mezzo soprano Joci Patrice Houston's rendition of two of Richard Wagner's Wesendonck-Lieder, called by Carol Berger in her program notes "the emotional and musico-thematic blueprints for the music drama Tristan und Isolde." Im Treibhaus (In the hothouse) is related to the third act of Tristan, and its long introduction and postlude, played by pianist Stephen Hargreaves, are studies of longing extended harmony. Träume (Dreams) led directly into the music in Act 2 of Tristan it is thought to have inspired, the love duet "O sink hernieder, Nacht der Liebe" (Come down here, night of love; see the German text with English translation of Act II) with soprano Anne Wright Coffman as Isolde. The tenor for the evening was a surprise: Hans Aschenbach (an American who has been singing in Europe for the past several years), it was announced, had agreed to replace the scheduled singer because of his admiration for the goals of the Millenium Wagner Opera Company.

Next, Ms. Houston descended from the stage to sing her warning song from the watchtower, "Einsam wachend in der Nacht" (Alone watching in the night), most of which she sang from various points in the central aisle between the halves of the seated audience. The Tristan story, of course, is as old as the hills (at Tristan and Isolt, a number of versions of this story, both text and images, have been catalogued by the The Camelot Project at the University of Rochester), but Wagner's transformation of it is surely the most powerful. The first half of the concert concluded, not with a scene from Strauss's Die Frau ohne Schatten as in the program, but with an excerpt of the third act, first scene, of Tristan, "Isolde kommt! Isolde naht!" (Isolde is coming! Isolde approaches!). Mr. Aschenbach's singing is powerful, and his acting was dramatic and insistent, which made for an exciting performance to experience.

Between the two Tristan excerpts, however, were some more songs: two of the Vier Letzte Lieder of Richard Strauss (Beim Schlafengehen [While going to sleep], by Hermann Hesse, and Im Abendrot [In twilight], by Josef von Eichendorff) and three of the Liebeslieder, op. 52 (no. 7, no. 13, and no. 17). The latter's juxtaposition with his own music would probably have made Wagner gag, but I found the combination charming.

After a brief pause, Ms. Coffman and Ms. Houston sang the Evening Prayer ("Abends will ich schlafen gehn" [Evenings when I go to sleep]) from the end of the second scene of Humperdinck's Hänsel und Gretel. This beautiful duet between the two children has a cloying but ultimately pleasing text about the 14 guardian angels who protect sleeping children. It was a welcome light alternative to the more serious Wagner selections. This was followed by something even lighter, the comic terzett ("So muss allein ich bleiben" [So I must remain alone]) from the first act of Johann Strauss's Die Fledermaus (The Bat), with its very catchy refrain.

The final piece on the program was the Act I dialogue between Siegmund (Mr. Aschenbach) and Sieglinde (Ms. Coffman) from Die Walküre: "Winterstürme" and "Du bist der Lenz" (found in the third scene). After much applause from the audience, Ms. Berger introduced three encores. First, Ms. Houston sang the Marienlied (Song of Mary, from 1910) of Joseph Marx, a lush song that required all of the big sound of Ms. Houston's voice. Second, Ms. Coffman sang Richard Strauss's orchestral song Zueignung (Dedication), with its refrain of "Habe Dank" (Be thankful). Finally, Mr. Aschenbach sang an excerpt from the final scene of Wagner's Parsifal: "Nur eine Waffe taugt" (One weapon alone will serve), from Act III. Ms. Berger introduced it with the comment about the spear in this scene, which caused the wound, is now transformed into a tool of healing. In the present climate of international confrontation, we can only hope that the spirit of mutual understanding will prevail over the insanity of violence.

This was a well-conceived program of beautiful vocal music, and the three singers featured show that the Millennium Wagner Opera Company is on its feet. If you like Wagner or you just like to hear emotionally charged singing, you should join me in hoping for the company's success. All kinds of support would be welcomed by them, I can assure you. If you are in the Washington area and want the chance to hear a longer version of this program, the same singers will perform this coming Saturday evening (March 20, 7:30 pm), at St. George's Church in Arlington (915 N. Oakland St., which is a short walk from the Virginia Square Metro stop). They will then give a concert the following weekend (Saturday, March 27, at 8 pm) in the Crystal Room at the Union League Club in Chicago (65 West Jackson Blvd., which is downtown). Master classes with the three singers and Ms. Berger are also being offered. See the Millennium Wagner Opera Company Web site for details.

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What's the Beef with The Passion?, cont. — by Jens Laurson

2004-03-17T00:27:00.000-05:00

As a German atheist, I find the idea of salvation by the cross to be one of the most pervasive lies and/or misunderstandings in the history of modern man. To anti-Semitism and Holocaust deniers I react no less sensitively than Abe Foxman. But what has Mel Gibson's disturbing father got do with The Passion? Or, for that matter, must we see this film through the mind of Mel Gibson's rather orthodox Catholicism that includes the rejection of Vatican II, one of the few things that I find positive about the Catholic Church?

I came away with a very different picture of The Passion than Hitchens, Krauthammer, Sullivan, and Co. The depiction of the Passion has some inherent difficulties, Gibson or not, and even the Gospel itself can be a divisive issue. But is this really what springs to mind when seeing the film? I find it hard to believe that people would leave the theater any more anti-Semitic than they had or had not been before seeing this film. As Christopher Hitchens points out in his article ("Schlock, Yes; Awe, No; Fascism, Probably," in Slate), an inscription of the Lovingway United Pentecostal Church in Denver that read "Jews Killed the Lord Jesus" was posted before the movie even opened. Such despicable attitudes are present in the murky waters of some unfortunate people's brains, but The Passion does not cause them. And if the film were to elicit such a public show of disgrace, the reaction of the public should rein it in. We need not attribute the word fascism to the film to that end.

The polarizing figure of Gibson aside, the fact that Gibson would not allow critics to see the film ahead of its opening provoked the ire of many journalists, who were consequently hurt in their professional egos (The Nation's Stuart Klawans all but admits so much). Beyond that, is the actual film anti-Semitic? I don't think it is. While it would be disingenuous and stupid to claim that the film can't be anti-Semitic because Jesus and his followers were Jews themselves, the film does not visibly go out of its way to portray Jews per se as particularly malevolent. There are characters who are portrayed with all of Hollywood's skills available as evil and vengeful and many of them happen to be Jews, but that alone does not make this picture anti-Semitic.

In "Mel Gibson's blood libel" (in the Washington Post) Charles Krauthammer is right to point out the history of interpretation of the Passion, that it is one including utmost horror and thus cannot be considered in splendid isolation. For many Christians and non-Christians, Vatican II is the "disclaimer" of sorts for the story of the Passion. Mel Gibson's rejection of Vatican II, for whatever reason (there might be other ones involved than his desire to attribute the death of Jesus to the Jews for all eternity) is unfortunate in this light, but The Passion itself does not come with a disclaimer one way or the other. The context we give the Passion is that which we provide ourselves. That is the reason why it is important to know history and the Bible well when seeing this movie. Everyone who doesn't will fail to understand the film altogether.

Gibson's "singular act of interreligious aggression" can't be whitewashed with the "Leni Riefenstahl defense" (all Krauthammer) of having had other intensions? Oh, boy . . . the crux is that Krauthammer thinks it is impossible to have an artistic vision and not impose one's personal interpretation at the same time. This is a problem that many, Christian and non-Christian, viewers or non-viewers alike have mentioned to me: "We don't want Mel Gibson's version of the Passion stuck in our head." To the degree that the four Gospels, told as one, lend themselves to interpretation, one of the single most positive surprises to me was the fact that in telling the story Gibson succeeds remarkably in making it a very matter-of-fact account of the 14 stations. Why ten minutes of sadistic flogging and not "zero, as in Luke?" I suppose that's the focus on the suffering, more of which later. But it is hardly to drill home the point about what bastards the Jews were—or the Romans, who do all the flogging.

Retelling or Propaganda? When I mentioned that I found the film rather unremarkable, I meant mostly that the story of the Passion is not particularly new to me, as a European. From Johann Sebastian Bach's Passions to Grünewald's altarpiece (see Ionarts posts on February 29 and March 5) to the sullied history of the Oberammergau Passion play to more harmless little Passion plays and school, I have been surrounded with this story often enough. I don't know the exact effects of the Oberammergau staging and its contribution to the Holocaust, but growing up long after World War II, the last thing I took away from these depictions was a particular hatred for anyone. Indeed, Gibson's account, save for the graphic nature of it, corresponded surprisingly well with the naively benign picture I had about the Passion from childhood on. German though I am, I would object to the claim that I must have grown up amidst rabid Jew-haters and that I was nurtured with propaganda fostering "interreligious aggression."

Mel Gibson either did not try or did not succeed in making this his story; it is the story of Christ. Whatever his personal beliefs, untimely as they are to me, I believe he tried to make a depiction of the Passion as faithfully as he could, being a religious man, and as good a movie as he could, being an artist. That's what he does. Movies. Tricky as this may be, I believe he succeeded. This is not The Lord of the Rings or Erin Brockovich, where a director imposes his view of a book or story onto a subsequent film. It is not Moses in The Ten Commandments with Charlton Heston. This is a director making moving pictures out of a moving account of Jesus with the means that he knows from his trade.

But Chris Lehmann, writing for The Revealer ("Picturing the Passion"), makes the point that it is precisely not "a faithful, realistic account of the [...] the greatest story ever told, [but] Gibson's loudest command ever barked." Am I one of the unthinking victims of his insidious Leni Riefenstahl propaganda flick? Sorry, I don't get it. Am I naturally inoculated against the message or too ignorant to discern it? Sure, there were a few moments in which I thought that Gibson the director had taken over from Gibson the "faithful" storyteller. Especially when the cloth, which Veronica holds after cleaning Jesus' face with it, looks suspiciously like the Holy Shroud of Turin. Or when Jesus gets thrown over the cliff only to dangle in front of Judas. Where was that again in the Bible? But neither that nor the italicized Latin nor all the beautiful tall people nor Satan's four cameos really justify the claim that the film is trying to "bend it" or "stretch it" whenever "it comes to the Jews" (Krauthammer) or to whatever else. The link that Krauthammer draws between Satan and the Jews among which he (Satan, not Krauthammer) moves in two of those four appearances—concluding cynically with "a perfect match: Satan's own people"—is pugnacious, or at least silly.

All Suffering, No Love? Another frightfully ill-perceived criticism comes up surprisingly often. Somehow, the claim is that The Passion of the Christ is too much about the suffering and not enough about "the message" of Christ. Kenneth Turan from the LA Times complains that the film "fosters a one-dimensional view of Jesus, reducing his entire life and world-transforming teachings to his sufferings, to the notion that he was exclusively someone who was willing to absorb unspeakable punishment for our sins." Smarty-pants David Denby from The New Yorker, too, finds that "Gibson is so thoroughly fixated on the scourging and crushing of Christ, and so meagerly involved in the spiritual meanings of the final hours, that he falls in danger of altering Jesus' message of love into one of hate."

Now I am only a non-believer, but isn't the suffering precisely the point? The quibble that there is no focus on the message and doing of Christ—say, a juicy quote from the Sermon on the Mount—but only this assemblage of carnage misses the point spectacularly! If you are looking for Hippie-Jesus with a smile and a bumper-sticker quality quote on love and peace on his lips you might want to try your corner bookstore's esoteric section. Don't look for it in Catholic thought, though—and don't look for it in this film.

The very message of Jesus was his suffering, was his sacrifice. Every doing and saying of Jesus makes sense only in light of his crucifixion, his willingness to die for our sins. It may sound pretty stupid to Krauthammer and me, but that's the belief. And if and only if you understand that can you look beyond the film as Gibson's "personal obsessions" and "a sickening death trip" (Denby). Focusing on a part and making it the whole is, perhaps singularly, appropriate when it comes to the Passion. That's why people unfamiliar with the story should not see this movie, and by "not unfamiliar" I mean "very familiar"! Not because there is something to hide from anyone else, but simply because it won't make sense otherwise. It would then indeed be nothing but an oddly spiritual gore-fest. But if understood rightly, it ought to be the feel-good movie of the year.

Amen. Unfortunately, the apparent inappropriateness of expressing strong, "outdated," and politically incorrect faith in public rubs many people the wrong way. Take that, Mel Gibson's personality, the hurt ego of journalists, the hype, and the incredible ignorance that many reviewers brought to the subject matter and apparently you get the loathing response that is still being poured out over this venture. I don't suppose that the criticism is any more anti-Catholic than the film is anti-Semitic, but it's surprising and pathetic in both of the meanings of the word.

All the more interesting, it becomes what professional movie critics have to say. Calm and a no-nonsense approach come from Roger Ebert ("Ebert & Roeper") and Richard Roeper (Chicago Sun-Times): "It's the only religious film I've seen, with the exception of The Gospel According to Matthew by Pasolini, that really seems to deal directly with what happened instead of with [...] cleaned-up, postcard versions of it," says the former. The latter concludes, "Mel Gibson's [Passion] does not preach that anyone—past, present, and future—must bear sole responsibility for the death of Jesus Christ. [...] It is not a work of hate. It is a powerful and important film, helmed by someone with a sincere heart and a warrior's sense of justice. It is [...] ultimately a message of redemption and hope."

Ultimately, it is not a film for a thumbs up or down; I don't give the Bible a thumbs up or down. But many of the overblown attacks on this film deserve a big thumbs down. Try again: this time perhaps with more love, less hate.

The Triplets of Belleville, cont.

2004-03-15T19:28:00.000-05:00

I'm not going to give away too much of the plot, but the abandoning cyclists are taken prisoner by the French mafia and transported by ship to a big city called Belleville. In some ways, this place is obviously an American city, with a grotesquely fat Statue of Liberty in its harbor and residents who eat hamburgers and look like they have been lifted directly from a Botero painting (see post on January 8). In his interview, here is what Chomet had to say about it:

The first thing we see of Belleville in the movie is the Château Frontenac in Québec City. We made numerous references to Québec City and Montreal, in trying to imagine how those cities would have looked if they developed in the way New York had. When Québec became independent, money was invested in Toronto instead, which is an English-speaking metropolis. The bridge that appears in the film is the Jacques Cartier Bridge, which is also surrounded by typical Québecois buildings. The Statue of Liberty image is a reference to the American way of life and to the incredible number of obese people you see in American cities. That is something that has always struck me.

In one of the most beautiful sequences in the movie, the grandmother, who has followed Champion throughout the race, chases the boat carrying him to Belleville on a pedalboat, which she rents from a flamboyantly gay man in a cabin on a beach (his mannerisms and the beefcake pinups in his cabin give him away). In one of the funnier jokes in the movie, which made me laugh out loud in the theater (but no one else), is that we learn she has rented a pedalboat when we see the boat owner in front of his cabin, on the front of which reads in huge letters the word "PÉDALOS." This is a pun on the French slang word pédale or p.d., meaning "fag." The music that accompanies the storm-tossed journey of the little pedalboat is the Kyrie movement of Mozart's C Minor Mass, one of the two important themes in the movie. The other is first heard near the film's beginning, when the grandmother and Champion watch a wonderful animation of Glenn Gould playing the C minor prelude from the first book of the Well-Tempered Clavier, a most memorable performance which made the piano sound like a harpsichord. Both of these pieces of music are heard at various points in the movie, often transformed under different guises. This music was much more satisfying than the new songs composed for the movie, with their whimsical performances on household appliances.

The movie's main characters were animated by different teams of artists, and they have incredibly individual looks. The grandmother with her uneven legs wears one huge elevator shoe to even out her pace. The grandson is a caricature of the cyclist's body, all muscle and little else, with an enormous Gallic nose. The Mafiosi have perfectly square shoulders and look like walking blocks of stone. And the hilarious sad sack of a dog, who comes into Champion's life as a puppy and grows into a fat adult dog, howls at the Métro train that passes by the house every five minutes. You should go and see the movie to appreciate this for yourself.

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Marcy Rosen & Co. at the Library of Congress (The Bat Strikes Again), cont. — by Jens Laurson

2004-03-12T09:04:00.000-05:00

The quartet starts as a gentle affair executed with impeccable taste. The opening movements (Moderato and Menuetto) were, in my favorite phrase, "perfectly delightful" and never overbearing. Devoid of any pretense and just engaging enough. Indeed, it fit the relatively early Haydn (composed in his mid-thirties) like a glove. Neither Romantic, which they should not be, nor boring, which it can more easily turn into than one would think. With the Adagio, Haydn shows over and over again his absolute mastery of that form, no matter in which genre. From the man who brought us seven adagios on a row in Die sieben letzten Worte unseres Erlösers am Kreuze (The seven last words of our savior on the cross), this is simply a beautiful and beautifully simple warmth-filled movement that should win every listener over. Haydn was lucky to have it performed as the Mendelssohn String Quartet did. The fugal last movement perfectly rounded up the performance. It was lighthearted, quicksilvery almost, quaint certainly. A little energy was lacking, and it was the string quartet's version of the "Dresden china" approach to the music. Polite but not too cool. It may well have been the least favorite piece to play for the four musicians that night, but it was kept together so splendidly that I found it entertaining throughout. Had the day been less nice, had I been less energetic myself, I would possibly have found it less exciting.

Then followed the part I was most excited about, the Washington premiere of William Bolcom's 2002 String Quartet No. 11. Viola and first violin excursions that continually increase in length were interrupted by the second violin and cello pizzicatos. Out of the first motive sprawled ever-longer parts, like sluggish cream that wound curdling spirals through tea (Joyce's words, not mine). A quicker pace entered and left, leading back to the harmonically tame theme and derivations thereof. What came to my mind immediately was, "Haydn for the 21st Century"! It does not have the energy of Shostakovich or Bartók (Beethoven's counterparts), but a lightness that is very enjoyable and reasonably accessible. Allegro con fuoco, the second movement, is understandably more driven and continues to be a cleansing of the musical palate. Notturno is evocative and very, very nice, so far as the listener can find the modernist harmonies "very, very nice" at all. Michael Tippett's string quartets are far more challenging. The concert at the Freer Gallery the day before also comes to mind, with its Whistler "Nocturnes" exhibited above and Chopin Nocturnes played downstairs.

Long but very separate notes that travel up and down the scales are the skeleton of this movement and every instrument gets its take. Sometimes accented with long, soft trills on the first violin or over equally long held vibrato notes on the cello or viola. There is a delicacy the Mendelssohn Quartet allow the music to bring out that continues ever further to the softest notes, the tiniest pizzicatos, all the way to where my pen on paper was louder than the music. Eerie sounds, almost sci-fi-like, are added to the mix just a bit before it fizzles out. Perhaps I was the only one to think so, but this was very, very enticing. Cute in the best way. The Presto scherzando speeds things up, gives familiar figures some "oompf," and bubbles along rapidly. Aroused and angry hornets seem to swarm from the four players at one point, the metallic sci-fi sound makes another short cameo, and a grabbing and fairly melodic burst brings it to its well-deserved end and well-deserved (if perhaps a bit modest) applause.

Excited enough, the Mendelssohn after the Intermission sounds very promising. Despite some neglect, his string quartets are very fine, op. 44, no.3 in E-flat major not the least. But when it came to tending his posthumous reputation, Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy went about things in completely the wrong way. If one lives at a time when a Mozart or Beethoven has long since established definite standards with regard to how a real artist behaves, lives, looks, and finally dies, then it is no good being totally at odds with this Romantic ideal of an artist, at any rate if one wishes to secure a place for oneself among composers who are not only first class but also profound. The above-mentioned ideal demands quite unequivocally of the true artist that he is wild, eccentric, uncouth, poor, ill, neglected, and creative. Genius can only blossom in damp attics, and an early death is definitively an advantage. Only with regard to the latter respect was Mendelssohn in the running, since he died at the age of 38. In all other respects he failed miserably and indeed had to pay the price of having an almost indestructible reputation for being smooth and superficial. He was wealthy, good-looking, of an amiable disposition, and had an unprecedented capacity for hard work. He appears to have been liked by everybody, to have been an excellent husband and father, and to have been little interested in originality for its own sake. Next! (This description of Mendelssohn has in large part been shamelessly plagiarized from Ulrik Spang-Hanssen's wickedly funny liner notes for his recording of Mendelssohn’s complete organ works, on Classico, CLASSCD 193-95.)

This string quartet defies such notions instantly. Perfect music best enjoyed leaning back, with a big smile on one's face. Often gentle, never bland. Almost conspicuously musical and without gimmicks. "The Power of Melody" would be the Hollywood subtitle of "String Quartet op. 44 no. 3: The Movie." A long string quartet, with a first movement lasting well over ten minutes, it sounds unhurried and splendidly flowing. Tonight it seemed much shorter than usual. The music is an unqualified success and makes the four instruments seem like a far larger band. The movements just flew by, and by the time the wonderful Adagio non troppo came about, the audience ate out of the Mendelssohn Quartet’s palm. If it is well played, which is difficult, it is much more satisfying than most Schubert or Schumann. The long, loving, trailing end delivered us into the last movement, Molto allegro con fuoco. Heads started bobbing as its vivacious chasing runs sprinted up the scales. It is one of the very few string quartets where I would have liked a da capo al fine. One more time. Alas, it was the end to a stupendous night with great music superbly played. That the audience could not muster a third curtain call and perhaps an encore brings back my unkind view of the Washington audience at large, but nothing could take away from what had been offered already. Hopefully on more time, some other time.

Once Every Four Years, cont. — by Jens Laurson

2004-03-10T09:12:00.000-05:00

The facial expression of the three musicians did not quite communicate the joy of music making. No doubt unrelated to the piece at hand, theirs were the faces of consternation, struggle, and, for that matter, constipation. Brooding and almost suffering: transfigured, in short. Cellist Matthias Gredler with his polite, schoolboy appearance looked like he was ready to weep just about any moment; Wolfgang Redik, the violinist, contorted his face as though he were ascending heavenwards with a lemon in his mouth; and Stefan Mendl did his own thing on the piano, but in a much more light-spirited way than his fellow trio members. While this might be unfortunate, because facial expressions and gestures communicate the music almost as much as the sound waves, it matters less so in the West Garden Court where only the most dedicated listeners arrive early enough to get seats with a good view. Comparison with the Takács Quartet to which I continue to refer (and will write about) made it more obvious than it otherwise would have been. This arrangement of the Schoenberg piece, a joy to hear and hear live as it is in whichever version, finally falls ultimately short of its string sextet and orchestral versions. Were it not for those editions, though, Schoenberg would have been considered the esteemed author of the most important piano trio of the looming 20th century.

Intermission separated this well-received part of the performance from Schubert's Piano Trio No. 1 in B-flat major, op. 99, D. 898, from 1828, commonly referred to as the "Piano Trio." It dates from the unfathomably productive period of Schubert's last two years, and as virtually every single work from that time, it is an unqualified success. Elmer Booze in his always enjoyable and informative program notes points out that it had been first recognized as the masterpiece it is by Robert Schumann. The famous Mozart scholar Alfred Einstein (I used to tack a hyphenated "not related" to his name, but it turns out that he was a cousin of his more famous physicist namesake) hears all kinds of self-references to Schubert songs in this work. I should not be surprised that the musicologist has finer ears than I. Or perhaps a score to work from. I enjoyed the music, nonetheless. If you thought that Schubert chamber-works would be a dainty affair of nimble niceness and pure pleasantry, you were wrong. Excitement from the first to the last note with plenty of energy to spare was revealed with ease in the outstanding interpretation by this very young trio. At the time of hearing it, I even found the word riveting to be "deserved without qualification." That's difficult to imagine for early-19th-century chamber music even though I was there. But the 16-year-old trio (they must have started playing together in the sandbox) made a wonderful impression on me.

From the beautiful second movement (Andante), with its piano/cello opening that casts a spell over the audience to the wild Scherzo: Allegro, it is captivating music. The Scherzo saw Mr. Redik's bow suffer some major hair loss and the horsehair strands flew like an exclamatory fane through the air, conducting the music in giddy excitement, but always slightly after the fact. All of this is miles away from the beautiful but far less exciting "Rosamunde" string quartet played just last week at the Library of Congress by the Brodsky Quartet (see Ionarts reviews on February 23 and February 27. The crashing finale to the fourth-movement rondo, with its variations of a motif in different keys, made the point once more. And what would a Viennese evening be without dessert! The audience was well rewarded for its applause with the third movement from Antonin Dvořák's Piano Trio in F Minor in honor of the centennial of the composer's death. Composed just 16 years prior to Schoenberg's work, it has a strong and moving character while remaining squarely within the realm of tradition. Truly a great way to end the concert that was one of the innumerable highlights of this season at the National Gallery of Art.

To buy the recordings mentioned in this review at Amazon:

Haydn, Complete Piano Trios, Beaux Arts Trio	Haydn Piano Trios with the Vienna Piano Trio	Schoenberg, Verklärte Nacht, Orchestral Version (Karajan)	Schoenberg, Verklärte Nacht, String Sextet Version (Juilliard Quartet, Trampler, Yo-Yo Ma)
Dvořák, Complete Piano Trios (Beaux Arts Trio)	Dvořák, Piano Trios, Joachim Trio (Naxos, F minor, and "Dumsky")	Schubert Piano Trios (Ashkenazy, Zuckerman, Harrell)

Beethoven Boyled Down, cont. — by Jens Laurson

2004-03-07T18:37:00.000-05:00

Usually introducing every piece with a few words, Emil Chudnovsky made reference to the fact that there was "rather a lot of music" on the program and, hoping that the ensuing Brahms would speak for itself, that the fewer words were said, the better. The way he and Michael Sheppard dove into the Brahms sonata (1888) proved this assumption right from the get-go. Deft and with a perfectly appropriate "take no prisoner" approach! The famous Adagio line was somber rather than wallowing in emotion. No unnecessary lingering on notes was befitting the more energetic reprise of the theme that makes nonsense of an all-too-soft approach the first time around anyway. Un poco presto e con sentimento, the third movement—to its advantage, let be it said—was a good deal sooner presto than it ever got sentimento. The Finale: Presto agitato then was aptly wistful, witty, boasting, and stormy. The bow suffered more, but the sound afforded great effect and entertainment.

Intermission followed enthusiastic applause and gave me time to read up on who that contemporary composer, Benjamin C. S. Boyle, might just be. I already knew that he was in the audience and that he looked audaciously young. The looks weren't deceiving: Mr. Boyle is some very upsettingly 24 years young! Upsetting of course only to me and only because deep within me boils the gall of insane jealousy. But then, I haven't heard his Kreutzer Concert Variations yet: it could still turn out to be pleasingly hackneyed and deliciously atrocious. Unfortunately, I was disappointed. The piece, adapting the Beethoven sonata theme as the first few bars, immediately makes an important point: better well copied than ill created. After the introduction of the famous theme, the piece fits its variations out with a sumptuous, tamely modernist tint. Not terribly novel as a sound but utterly pleasing! Never really too challenging for the crowd, some of whom have already complained about how little of Ludwig van Beethoven was on the program ("Why do they call it the Beethoven Society then?"), it is solidly within the musical vernacular palatable to people who usually "draw the line" at late Beethoven. Yet it is also fresh enough to bring an enjoyable breeze into a program stuffed with warhorses. In some moments it was tempting to ascribe to the Kreutzer Concert Variations an energy not unlike, say, Bela Bartók's 4th String Quartet. (A recent performance of that masterpiece by the Takács Quartet at the Freer Gallery is still fresh in my mind.)

If I hold myself back in enjoying the work unabashedly, it is perhaps because I do not trust it quite yet. I would love to hear more of Mr. Boyle's work to see if substance is a regular part of it. The Washington Times's kind words about Mr. Boyle quoted in the program notes are of little help because the reviewer cannot resist tacking it onto his or her vitriolic antimodernist agenda. Mr. Boyle "seems somehow to have escaped academia's toxic postmodernist flotsam." I can't stand the message, but I love the great use of the word "flotsam"! Boyle's list of teachers, meanwhile, reads like a veritable "who's who" of modern composers. Lukas Foss, David del Tredici, Nicholas Maw, and Christopher Theofanidis, etc., are household names among the hard core of classical music lovers. This short work then, not surprisingly, is rather complementary to the earlier Beethoven. If it finds a few friends besides Emil Israel Chudnovsky, who collaborated with Boyle in the work's creation, I should like to hear it pop up in public performances. Especially for stuffy programs, it is like opening the windows for a few moments. If I am not mistaken, the performance was its premiere. (I should like to make that sound a bit more bombastic: it likely was the World Premiere!)

After this work, it was all downhill for me and pure delight for most of the rest of the audience. Saint-Saëns was a quaint and sweet thereafter with his Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso. Stripped of its orchestral part it dabbles along nicely, with plenty of effects by which Mr. Chudnovsky could show off his impressive skills on the fiddle. After the taxing first half, this was likely a pleasantly relaxing fare. Well, for Mr. Sheppard at any rate. Mr. Chudnosvky might beg to differ after the Sarasate Gypsy Airs and Ravel's Tzigane, even if he played them from memory. About Fritz Kreisler's Viennese Rhapsodic Fantasietta, there isn't much to say other than that it's not particularly Viennese, only moderately rhapsodical, and mostly devoid of fantasy. Ear candy with a sticky aftertaste. Quaint and made to please. The bow lost more hairs. So did I.

Zigeunerweisen—Sarasate's famous violinist's showcase—without the orchestra (who needs it, anyway) was indeed more "Cognac" (Chudnovsky's word) than a mean "Firewater" (my expectation). Splendidly done, for sure, but lacking in that pure testosterone and aggression that I like to hear in this piece. Tonight it was not so much a fierce fireball crashing down but rather a clown having a jolly good time and bumbling about. The crowd, surely, loved it, just as they had loved the Kreisler terribly much. Tzigane finally (still no orchestra but much in need of one) was a little lean and bare. Some 60 bars or so of amiable solo effort on Mr. Chudnovsky's part gave Mr. Sheppard some time to relax before the none-too-challenging piano accompaniment entered the scene. Sheppard got to race around on the keyboard for a bit, and then soon enough this somewhat anticlimactic end piece to a most astounding and fabulous evening was over. The standing ovations and bravos were forthcoming in force. Mine somewhere among them.

Chudnovsky and Sheppard then added an encore to the already full program, appeasing the audience's somewhat relentless applause. I still think that German labor laws likely forbid the amount of work put in by the young artists, but such concerns were not on the mind of anyone else. Any such laws would only have protected my ears from Jenö Hubay's Hejre Kati, op. 32, another gypsy pastiche with familiar tricks and familiar sounds by (judging by this work, at any rate) a justly unfamiliar composer. Alas, it fit the evening and was easy enough on the ears. A cutesy interaction between pianist and violinist (the latter playing an endless trill until the former turned the page for him) sent a collective chuckle through the audience.

So, the concert was great. Everyone with the urge to bother Messrs. Boyle, Chudnovsky, and Sheppard about it had the chance to do so at the reception afterwards. What bothered me, meanwhile, was the miserly reception itself. I know now that the embassy, just host to the event and not the organizer, can't be blamed for a skimpy cheese and coldcut buffet with crackers or the wine, which was somewhere between drinkable (at least a German white) and downright awful (red). "How can anyone possibly be so petty and complain about the less-than-stellar cheese after a great concert," you might ask. True, it seems negligible, but then it somehow is part of the experience. And especially after a great concert, especially at an embassy (no matter what the logistical details), it is not far-fetched to expect something with more thought. It is bad enough that the reception cannot take place in the representative reception hall, because September 11th aftershocks somehow disallow the use of it for the purpose for which it was built. Add cheap cheese and cheaper wine to that small grievance, and you, too, would leave with an unnecessary bad aftertaste. To say that this impression does not or will not stick would be a lie. But hopefully it cannot tarnish the outstanding evening that had been brought to everyone courtesy of the two young artists and the (upsettingly) young composer and the Beethoven Society.

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Lohengrin Sings Schumann, cont. — by Jens Laurson

2004-03-06T00:45:00.000-05:00

Part Two (of three) showcased Beethoven's (1770–1827, Google count 683,000 to 2,960,000) greatest achievement in the Lieder repertoire after the marvelous song Adelaide. Just how difficult it must be to substitute at short notice was shown by Mr. Jelasic in these pieces. Auf dem Hügel sitz' ich, spähend showed some difficulties with the piano accompaniment. Jon Lackey's sound is strangely nasal at times. His pronunciation was rather fine for my picky German ears, but the diction was not at all. It simply takes too much effort to understand any of the words, and the acoustics can only be blamed for so much.

This all sounds terribly negative, and perhaps that is the curse when An die ferne Geliebte is etched into your brain with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau singing it impeccably. But the songs are so good that a good performance is sufficient to make them highly entertaining. It is a joy just to hear them live and have a singer—Dieskau or not—give his all in this traversal that is so much more uplifting than for example Schubert's gloomy Winterreise.

By Es kehret der Maien, my ears have adjusted a bit better to the loudness, and the last of the six songs, Nimm sie hin denn, diese Lieder takes me captive. At home, I cannot supress the urge to ruin this wonderful Lied by singing along and so it was nice to sit through the whole song without my vocal noise distorting what is a perfectly proportioned song. It was certainly worth every bit of applause. And while no one could distinguish if the applause went more towards Mr. Beethoven or Mr. Lackey, it is clear that there and then the performance could not have been done without either. During the intermission I talked to people sitting in different locations in the West Garden Court to get their impression of the balance of singer and piano. Apparently, the back rows got a more evenly distributed sound. A little probing found people perfectly delighted with the balance. In the interest of full disclosure, those audience members also were Mr. Lackey's church choir members.

Just as I was about to scribble down some very lovely things the Washington Post said about Jon Lackey's performance of Dichterliebe, by Robert Schumann (1810–1856, Google count 268,000), Lackey ruined Im wunderschönen Monat Mai (In the wonderfully beautiful month of May) thoroughly. It seemed affected, weak, and narrow in the high registers, too strong in the lower, and erratically accentuated.

Aus meinen Tränen sprießen (From my tears sprout forth), one of my favorite songs in this cycle, didn't win me over either. The breakneck-speed Die Rose, die Lilie, die Taube (The rose, the lily, the dove), however, was very nicely done. It is simply too fast to allow for indulgence and emotional emphasis of the kind from which some of the other songs suffered. The deep, dark, and Ur-German Romantic Im Rhein, im heiligen Strome (In the Rhine, in the holy stream) was not badly done at all, but the piano playing was mechanical and clumsily uninspired. Ich grolle nicht (I carry no grudge), an absolute favorite for the punch it packs and the bitter, unrelenting force of admonishment with which it portrays a gargantuan . . . grudge should be packed to the top with suppressed energy to be released at certain points. Solidly done, it is a pleasure to hear, no matter where and when.

I noticed that looking at Mr. Lackey distracts more than it adds to the experience. In fact, when I looked at his contortions, stretching and otherwise grimacing along with the music, I was more critical than when I simply listened to his singing and looked down on my notepad. While the declamatory style of Dieskau or the wonderfully felt and sung Bostridge account fought in my head, I enjoyed the concert despite my constant quibbles. Quibbles that were soon much more annoying to me than the performance's shortcomings themselves. It would be sad if musical snobbery and comparison to recorded standard-bearers should deny me the enjoyment of a concert experience. "Live" adds so much to the enjoyment over the "canned" version in any case that it is always worth going out to see and hear a performance. When it is for free, and of usually outstanding quality as at the National Gallery of Art (or Library of Congress), even better! Now if only a venue could be found for the Gallery that were not so grossly inept for performances!

I trailed with Messrs. Lackey and Jelasic through the rest of the songs and enjoyed myself, almost delighting in a few and finding myself a lot more gently disposed. The warm applause was well deserved for both. Jumping in with only 48 hours or less of notice makes the performance all the more notable. Finally, a look through the program notes unearthed to my amusement a mention of Jon Lackey's "unique blend of Heldentenor and lyric tenor qualities." Now I know why I thought of Lohengrin serenading a distant beloved in a manner that she would actually hear it. One of the quoted critics was right when he mentioned "penetrating power."

The concert turned out to be one of quicksilver spirit, leaving me fresh and ready to go out and about, rather than to home and sleep. In this sense, it had been one of the finest. It was also one of the more forgettable concerts and, in that sense, obviously less impressive. But if unfortunate circumstance and a tad less quality collude to such a program at the Gallery, it is actually a most encouraging sign. It is one of the few places in town that could try to present a bad program and still have it be worthwhile.

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This Man Should Have Known Suffering?, cont. — by Jens Laurson

2004-03-02T10:51:00.000-05:00

Back to the second movement for a bit. The Andante con moto is a wonderful example of the emotional richness that music can bring to us. It is, rather than determinedly playing to a certain mood or suggesting a particular feeling, an amplification of whichever mood you find yourself in. It can be anything from resting, calm, and elated happiness—smiling as the day passes—to a harrowingly sad and overwhelmingly sorrowful movement. Until you listen to it, you may well not even be aware of the mood that is consequently unearthed by this music. LSD is said to function on the user in ways that may seem comparable, though I imagine it expedient to stick with the former over the latter.

You might be tempted to eschew such music during times in which heartbreak (or sorrow) slumbers, but at your own peril! Living, after all, is not about happiness: it is about the whole range of emotions. If heartbreak drags you down, at least let it be to such wonderful music. And equally important, in the third movement Schubert rescues you. The Menuetto and Trio (Allegro Molto) carry the listener off to happier (if need be) times or interrupt the happy complacency. There is, after all, a lively Finale (Molto vivace) to be headed for. And this finale allows neither heavy tears nor idle rest.

Here as elsewhere, music can take even the most mildly perceptive listener on a journey through all of his very own emotions. A thrill not unique to classical music, but likely to be more prevalent in it than many other forms of art. "Why do you listen to classical music?" is a question to which I heard a wonderful, if slightly quipped answer: "For the cheap emotional thrills!" A Schubert symphony, well played and conducted as in this impeccably delightful recording with the masterful late Günter Wand in one of his last concerts, is such a little journey to behold. It is neither as long nor as intimidatingly tense as a symphony by Gustav Mahler. (The latter was famous for stating to his colleague Jean Sibelius that "the symphony must contain the world.") Schubert's 5th contains the village, perhaps.

The recording shines in comparison to others through its unpretentious manner, for which Wand was famous. He does not impose ideology on the music, he lets it be. When listening to his Mozart or Schubert or Brahms, there is a feeling that the music is "just right." Mannerisms and interpretive questions suddenly cease to exist. If the Pope had as much to say about Schubert as he allegedly did not say about The Passion (see Ionarts post on December 26), it might be, "The music is as it was!" This recording in particular is the very last Günter Wand made. The Schubert, which fills half a disc, is coupled with an interview, with a literal translation provided in the booklet. That it accompanies one of the best recordings of Bruckner's Symphony No. 4 can't be a deterrent. The Bruckner—Wand's true specialty—has none of the ease that marks the Schubert, but it is a sublime and profound statement in symphonic terms that more than warrants its own little review. Or perhaps it will just reveal itself. Spiritual enough to do so it certainly is!

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The Britten Are Coming! The Brodsky Quartet Does Washington, cont. — by Jens Laurson

2004-02-27T00:54:00.000-05:00

Allegretto con slancio gets the pulse started right away. Britten achieves this very simply but effectively with one or more instruments playing a driving rhythm in the spiccato style. (Spiccato, saltando, sautillé, or even arpeggio: if a reader knows which exactly the Britten score calls for, I'd be interested in finding out.) The piece charms me reasonably well but leaves me less impressed than I had hoped it would. The Andante calmo starts beautifully with a gray, weeping melody: not so much fresh-cut tears but rather bitter resignation. It culminates in impotent rage before subsiding and letting the first violin whine along to the continuous, monotonous bows of its three companions. It remains enjoyable for these ears, but for several moments I find it distinctly lacking purpose. Towards what seems the end the andante climaxes nicely before pausing only to add a subtle and soft afterthought that gets picked up for another run—handing off to the once again prominent viola and expanding the natural lifespan of this movement by half. The puckish cello guides a similar but shorter rise to the andante's third life before a sustained light note on first violin actually ends it.

Molto vivace, the final movement, trades whimsy among the instruments but turns quickly into a hearty bout. Jacqueline Thomas and her cello raced while her three male colleagues on the smaller instruments performed similar musical patterns. "Carefree" is the word that I conjured immediately. Speed-demon-like pizzicati interspersed with intense and chromatically bent exultations by force of "instrument-scrubbing" ended the piece abruptly and well, leading to generous applause.

Franz Schubert's "Rosamunde" String Quartet in A Minor (D. 804) was next. The opening Allegro ma non troppo was amiably, though not perfectly, played; although very satisfactory, it lasts forever. The Andante finally arrived and left the impression of a children's mobile. Menuetto: Allegretto and Allegro moderato rounded out this half of the program with admirable playing but ultimately remained uninspiring. The word was "nice" or "quaint" in its more negative connotation.

After the break it was Tchaikovsky's String Quartet no. 1 in D major, op. 11, that awaited the audience. A very smooth and gliding beginning was gentle enough but not boring and ready to pick up speed or energy or both along the way. A rather full sound was summoned from the players. In several moments the first violins' uncleanliness bugged me. With little new material or ideas introduced, the piece babbled along just fine until it got a little excited toward the end of the first movement. For the most part it seemed best just to sit back and casually enjoy a (surprisingly?) nice and long string quartet that is amiable but soon exposes itself as one of the lesser works by maestro "Petr Il'ich Chaikovskii" as his name might be spelled more accurately. The Andante cantabile, like its predecessor, starts out most amiably. Mr. Haveron's three-year-old violin (by Polish master violin-builder Zygmuntowicz, who also made the Emerson String Quartet's instruments) sounds lush and thick even through the entirely muted sections of this movement. The five-note theme (made up of three distinct notes) that makes the core of this work is shared among the instruments to intone a lament.

The Scherzo: Allegro non tanto e con fuoco enjoyably worked its way toward the end of the evening. A fine evening for sure, but almost certain not to entail an encore. In brevity lies the soul of wit—the scherzo stayed true to its name. Allegro giusto is the finale's marking. Unlike the sometimes excruciatingly slow Schubert earlier, the Brodsky Quartet went to work on these parts as though they just remembered that their cars were parked in the no-parking zone. They seemed to get more into the piece, and with them went I. The finale is perhaps not quite ravishing, but a consoling finish. A faux ending: soft recapitulation of previously stated material and a very soft line led to a finishing frenzy in highest tempi and reasonably rousing applause.

After the concert, which was fine but ultimately disappointing for lack of energy and excitement, everyone in my company disagreed with each other. Britten was the only good thing; no, it was horrific. The Tchaikovsky was astounding; no, it was pleasant at best. The Schubert was stupendous; no, it put me to sleep. What is true is that the Britten, as nice a piece as I find it to be, is probably not of the same quality as some other modern string quartets. More importantly, it was not played with the passion and excitement that would communicate to a Britten neophyte why and how to like it. The performance of the Brodsky Quartet was good enough to please those who know the work, but miles away from making converts. But not every concert can be conscious-altering and life-changing. Sometimes "good" has got to be "good enough."

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Ysaÿe Something You Don't See!, cont. — by Jens Laurson

2004-02-24T10:56:00.000-05:00

The Menuetto that follows is notably faster (Allegretto) and more animated and doesn't seem to be much of a break with the Adagio—in part because it moves from one movement to the other without pause—but mostly because both are clearly cut from the same cloth or, more appropriately, carved from the same stone. Without an internal metronome I cannot check into overlapping rhythm patterns that might contribute to this noticeable effect. The Finale, Adagio again, then Presto and Adagio once more, is more determined. A self-assuring, assertive cello line introduces it, and violins dance on top of upward figures from the viola and cello. This is as close as a string quartet (particularly its first violin) gets to singing. Chamber music at its finest. Engaging, lovely, charming without a hint of being boring or tiring. For me, that isn't necessarily a given with chamber music from that period, no matter who the composer. The Presto is fun: short, accentuated, and driving strings race for a few seconds until the cello paternalistically calls them back to order with its low upward figure. The others jump back into place, and the Finale continues and ends much as it began.

Following the Haydn, much applause, and tuning, came the Webern. For me, these are the "must-hear" pieces. Given how they are wedged between the Haydn and the Schumann, the same is true for every other listener, alas, I imagine, with a rather different meaning. Webern could probably be better described by someone more erudite than I. I, however, cannot and shan't make much more of an attempt than by saying that Heftig bewegt, the first movement of his Fünf Stücke für Streichquartett (Five Movements for String Quartet), op. 5, is musical entomology for strings, with all its bugs and beetles crawling, jumping, plucking, in both anarchy and spontaneous order.

Sehr langsam stayed true to its name, and the crowd's reaction to it was one of continued unrest. The playing began inaudibly and so it ended. Most sentences describing it would be longer than the thirteen bars it measures.

Sehr bewegt crawls again, with slightly more aggression, lasts a few seconds (roughly thirty) and is supplanted by another Sehr langsam movement. Between squeaking shoes, seat readjustment, and surprisingly little coughing, I could barely hear it from behind my pillar. Towards the end, it contained the gentlest pizzicatos I have heard in a long time. What a contrast to the Takács Quartet's merciless maltreatment of their instruments in Bartók's Fourth String Quartet, experienced just a few days prior at the Freer Gallery!

In zarter Bewegung (In gentle motion) is the fifth and last movement. Gently sweeping, it lets one instrument carry a phrase to another where the other then joins it in emphasizing the phrase. The whole undertaking is the opposite of something like a Bartók or Shostakovich string quartet. It is intensely private (as opposed to personal, which Shostakovich's and Bartók's quartets are, just as much), fragile, gentle, shy even, without any of the brute force, the dynamics, acrobatics, and raw energy of his Slavic colleagues. The piece ends almost whimsically, and the crowd dared not applaud until a good five seconds after the last note, when my semiresolute but enthusiastic first clap broke the spell. Even if confusion was the cause for the silence and not awe, it is very nice to have a piece of music linger in the air rather than applause trampling it immediately. The applause, in any case, didn't exactly trample. Unsurprisingly short and dry, it ceased even before François Salque peaked from behind the curtain for the first time.

Intermission saw quite a few audience members fail to return, as they in turn probably saw Anton Webern making a return onto the program. After all, the first piece after the break threatened to be Sechs Bagatellen für Streichquartett (Six Bagatelles for String Quartet), op. 9. A few seats were now available where before a few dozen listeners had to sit outside the hall. The Bagatelles started with Mäßig and few new friends among the audience members. At one point the movement seemed to shudder in the upper register, and before I can find the words to describe this, I found myself already listening to Leicht bewegt. Once again, some of the softest passages are hard or impossible to hear, which would be less so in a regular chamber concert environment. More so, it would not be as necessary to hear everything if one could only see the players in action. (I think of the beginning of Bruckner’s 5th Symphony live, for example, where you more sense than actually hear that the music is under way.) Of course, in the West Garden Court more than two-thirds of the audience have a partly or wholly obstructed view and can therefore not follow all of the action.

The pieces Ziemlich fließend, Sehr langsam, Äußerst langsam, and Fließend flowed by me almost undetected. The same goes for the applause, which is unfortunate, as the playing was involved and the pieces, thorny as they may be, are very much worth hearing. Especially in such loving executions.

For most, however, it was Schumann to the rescue! The String Quartet no. 3 in A Major, op. 41, to be precise. It clearly exists to console those who had withstood the temptation to leave, and console it does. Less flowing, less natural than the half-century-older Haydn work, it is still very amiable "string-quartetting." Andante espessivo; Allegro molto moderato offers some cello excursions that remind me of Schumann’s String Quintet (Marcy Rosen and "her bat" from the Library of Congress concert come to mind). Extraordinarily quaint, the Assai agitato has similar mechanical, somehow abrupt figures that move forward as though taking a quick step and stopping momentarily before taking the next step. Even when more notes fill some of the gaps, there is neither the smooth progression, nor the beating, rhythmic, and driving quality of a Bartók quartet. The jagged, almost stuttering procession becomes less, or less noticeable. The cello soon strikes upon a lovely melody it keeps for a while and then trades with the other voices. After a milder phase, the piece wakes up and gathers splendid momentum that kicks the whole quartet up a few gears. Tremendously enjoyable, not just quaint.

The Adagio molto, for a few notes, brought back the Haydn second movement. Less singing, it doesn't have the same effect though. Just in time for the Finale: Allegro molto vivace, my mind returned from excursions (a few missed goals playing soccer earlier in the day) to the music. Palpably more energetic, this movement is a great way to be allowed back into the night. A heavy, almost clumsily hefty, and thumping drive eventually subdues short little bits of light melody that, even couched in sweet sound, become rather tiresome rather quickly. Vox Populi has the Schumann declared the favorite, nonetheless.

Nitpicking about Schumann's quartet—inferior to Haydn's as it may be—aside, the playing was as engaged and enthusiastic as one could ask for. The Haydn was a clear winner, and not since the Kodály Quartet had a "mostly Haydn" program to offer at the Library of Congress (see the Ionarts review from November 11, 2003), did I enjoy the late master's chamber works so effortlessly. The Webern was a wonderful way of being acquainted with intimate, elusive pieces that are, for all their similarities, such an incredible contrast to other 20th-century compositions for string quartet. With some very exciting concerts coming up at the National Gallery and great string quartets coming to the Library of Congress, the next months will be an assured continuation of the Washington, D.C., free chamber music bonanza that I so heartily enjoy.

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Brodsky Quartet at the Library of Congress, cont. — by Charles T. Downey

2004-02-23T00:02:00.000-05:00

The audience reacted with enthusiastic applause to this work, which violist Paul Cassidy acknowledged by speaking during the pause before the second piece. As it turns out, this is the first time that the Brodsky Quartet has been to Washington, and they have spent the past few days seeing the sights and appreciating the city. He noted that many great composers were violists (Mozart, Haydn, Schubert), to the chagrin of his fellow players, but then he connected that statement to the piece in question with a personal anecdote. He recounted that in 1843, in Milan, Francesco Guissani had made a viola, which was purchased from its first owner by English violist and composer Frank Bridge, who was Britten's teacher and a frequent recipient of Mrs. Coolidge's commissions. As Mr. Cassidy recounted, Bridge was at the end of his career and feared that he might not see his most famous student again, so he managed to board Britten's ship to the United States before it departed and left the viola on his bed. (Britten, like Bridge, played the viola. See Ross Charnock's article Benjamin Britten, altiste [Benjamin Britten, violist], in the Bulletin des Amis de L'Alto France in 2001.) Later, Peter Pears loaned the violin to Mr. Cassidy for him to play, and that was the viola that Mr. Cassidy played here on Friday night. (The Brodsky Quartet has also recently recorded the other two Britten string quartets, in May 2003.)

The second piece on the program was Franz Schubert's String Quartet in A Minor, D. 804, called the "Rosamunde." The first movement (Allegro ma non troppo) has a melancholy main theme, accompanied in the second violin by what Tomás Hernández identified in the program notes as a motive that "recalls Gretchen am Sprinnrade (Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel) from Goethe's Faust, his breakthrough song dating from 1814." (That song is D. 118, and here is the text in German and English.) I don't know how Schubert was so often able to create accompanying patterns that evoke poetic images so well: think of the sounds of the mill in the opening song (Das Wandern [Wandering]) of his song cycle Die schöne Müllerin, D. 795 (in English, The Fair Miller-Maid), for example. Gretchen's motive really does sound like a spinning wheel, and it does indeed appear in this quartet.

Typical for Schubert, this movement's grandeur went on and on, seeming to repeat endlessly. The quartet's nickname comes from the second movement (Andante), whose main theme comes from the composer's incidental music for a play that failed in the previous year, Helmina von Chézy's Rosamunde, Furstin von Cypern. The third movement (Menuetto: Allegretto) has a strange introduction, quite unminuetlike in my opinion. This opening is derived, I am told, from Schubert's song Die Götter Griechenlands (The gods of Greece), D. 677 (poem by Friedrich Schiller), to the words "Fair world, where art thou?" (here is the song's text, in German and English). The movement then becomes more dancelike, especially in the trio. The fourth movement (Allegro moderato) has a chipper theme, as Schubert optimistically shifts the quartet's tonality to A major for his conclusion. The Brodsky Quartet showed off some of its most technically demanding fast playing here.

For the concert's final piece, the Brodsky Quartet returned to its 2002 CD to play Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky's String Quartet no. 1 in D Major, op. 11. This piece left me somewhat cold, especially the first and last movements which seem to have been dashed off and consist of little more than flashy pyrotechnics. (Indeed, according to Tchaikovsky specialists, the composer produced this quartet in a short amount of time for a special concert he was asked to give.) These virtuosic sections were played admirably by the Brodsky Quartet: the prestissimo coda of the fourth movement rondo, in particular, was blindingly fast. The third movement (Allegro non tanto e con fuoco) is a folksy scherzo and trio that has a pleasing, lilting triple-meter dance feel to it. However, the jewel of this quartet, and really the only reason to play or listen to it is the second movement (Andante cantabile). As Tomás Hernández tells the story in the program notes:

The Quartet made its successful debut at the concert that took place on March 16, 1871. What particularly impressed the audience was the second movement Andante cantabile based on a folk song, "Sidel Vanya," that Tchaikovsky had heard being sung by a peasant outside his window. In December 1876 the Quartet was performed at a concert for the author Leo Tolstoy, in Moscow on a rare visit from his plantation. In his diary the composer recalls: "Perhaps never in my life . . . has my composer's pride been so flattered and moved, as when L. Tolstoy, sitting beside me and listening to the Andante of my first quartet, burst into tears."

As you might expect, anything that made Tolstoy cry is worth ten minutes of your time. The historical importance of folk song in Russian music, indeed in music of most of eastern Europe, is an interesting subject, and this instance of it certainly seemed to move the Russian writer. The song is apparently Ukrainian in origin, and Tchaikovsky likely heard it during a visit to his sister who lived in the country. From what I've been able to find about this song, its text is about a peasant, Vanya, sitting up late at night on his sofa and smoking and drinking, drowning his sorrow and dreaming of a better life. The melody is modal and a little strange, which requires Tchaikovsky to put together some unusual harmonies to accompany it. He also uses a more refined melody of his own composition to contrast with the folk song. This movement was beautifully played, perhaps not as sentimentally as possibly, maybe even with a little distance, but beautifully. There is a reason that this piece has been arranged for orchestra and many other instrumental combinations. Tchaikovsky outdid himself.

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In the Cut (DVD), cont. — by Todd Babcock

2004-02-21T10:04:00.000-05:00

Mark Ruffalo (You Can Count On Me, The Last Castle) has been given outrageously high praise: that he is "the next Brando" and "the future of acting" (I’m not kidding: see this article in The Guardian from last November). What I found brave was not only his unapologetic performance but also that he quite publicly noted that he found it only with Campion's guiding hand. While it would be easy for a young actor to bask in the praise and nod quietly in acknowledgment of his greatness, Ruffalo was quite frank that he didn't think he could do the role and was often coached back into form. The result is a trust in his persona over indicating to the audience that you should like the guy. By all accounts, when we see Detective Malloy on the screen we practically want to scream to "our Meg," Get out of there! It's this space, which Ruffalo allows, that pays off when we are finally allowed into his past.

Campion has said that she wanted to create a piece that was more a throwback to the 70s style of filmmaking, where the character was the story. She has succeeded in this endeavor and, maybe unfortunately, the story of our deranged serial killer seems to take a back seat. While, as an actor, I am more than pleased to forgive this fault and become entranced with the visceral reality that these artists have created, I can see why reviewers and audiences felt a bit left out on a full movie.

In recent years we have been witnessing actors who have achieved a certain iconic status suddenly pare down their personae for something that is perhaps closer to themselves. About Schmidt won Jack Nicholson numerous awards, more for what he didn't do onscreen than what he did. In this year's Lost in Translation, we may see another icon following suit, in that Bill Murray feathered that film with a whisper of what we know he can do. While Meg Ryan is by no means muted or fractional in this movie, it is a far more naked and unpolished performance than I think she's ever given. (The closest is Flesh and Bone, with then-husband Dennis Quaid. One can also see a pre-"Gwynnie" Paltrow in fine form.)

The world of In The Cut shows the mundane, earthly beauty that New York has to offer (it was shot entirely on location). Campion creates a color-saturated filth that is a haze for female survivors (the exquisite Jennifer Jason Leigh) and male hostility (Kevin Bacon in an unbilled role for all you movie-gamers), where poetry literally finds its way through all the cracks. While many don't see their nights off at the cinema or their queue on Netflix as an opportunity for professionals to "attempt" anything (by all means, since we don't pay a plumber to guess how to fix a pipe), I'd argue that these artists make failure far more compelling than most successes.

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