Sprightly

Bicket’s charge VIVALDI Piccolo Concerto in C Major RAMEAU Suite from Les Boréades INTERMISSION VIVALDI The Four Seasons Harry Bicket, conductor Jennifer Gunn, piccolo Yuan-Qing Yu, violin Monday off Tuesday 10-12:30 rehearsal Wednesday 10-12 1-3:30 rehearsal Thursday 10-12:30 rehearsal 8 concert Friday 8 concert Saturday 8 concert Sunday 3 concert (Beyond the Score) The Vivaldi/Rameau program is repeated on Tuesday the 27th so, yes, we play the Four Seasons five times in a one-week span. It really feels more like seven since by the end of a Beyond the Score concert I feel as if I’ve run through the piece three times in a row. Any so-called baroque music specialist taking the podium at our concert hall is working behind enemy lines. The best ones drop in, stir up as little hostility as possible while accomplishing a limited mission and try to get the heck out unscathed. To that end, Bicket did an admirable job of coaxing an old dog to do a few new tricks. He came across as a fine music...

Here we go again… HAYDN Symphony No. 101 (The Clock) INTERMISSION SHOSTAKOVICH Symphony No. 4 Bernard Haitink, conductor RAVEL Menuet antique LIEBERSON Neruda Songs INTERMISSION MAHLER Symphony No. 1 Kelley O’Connor, mezzo-soprano Bernard Haitink, conductor Monday off Tuesday 7:30 concert (Haydn/Shostakovich) Wednesday travel to New York Thursday 12-2:30 rehearsal 8 concert Friday 11-1:30 rehearsal 8 concert Saturday travel to [the city where we live] Sunday off Yes, we are in New York again, I guess because each of our conductors gets a separate tour. With two music director surrogates, the orchestra is comparable to the child with a pair of elderly doting uncles, each offering a clandestine trip to the corner ice-cream parlor. The child of course would say nothing, aiming a conspiratorial wink at the counter-man, surprised to see him back so soon. So the following will I am sure generate some displeasure, along the lines of the child getting a kick in the shins from a little nephew w...

man of steel HAYDN Symphony No. 101 (The Clock) INTERMISSION SHOSTAKOVICH Symphony No. 4 Bernard Haitink, conductor Monday off Tuesday 10-12:30 rehearsal Wednesday 10-12:30 1:30-3:30 rehearsals Thursday 10-12:30 rehearsal 8 concert Friday 8 concert Saturday 8 concert Sunday 3 concert At the Tuesday rehearsal Haitink made a few gracious remarks about the Muti appointment that were brief, understated and to the point – typical Haitink. Kudos to him as well for keeping the brain numbing aspects of the Shostakovich 4 as in check as can be hoped for. Nevertheless, we have to play the piece six times over the next two weeks, which is damaging enough. Unlike the Mahler 1, which we played twice in less than a year, the Shostakovich 4 was last performed in January of ’06. I suppose that is long ago enough, but it still seems odd to repeat the same symphony so soon when there are more than a dozen others. The run of concerts in ’06 included what has to be the most talked about Beyond the Score p...

The “I hate Mahler 1” post generated quite a few comments and questions. The Neruda Songs were sung by Kelley O’Connor, mezzo-soprano. Sorry, her name didn’t make it into the post. Some hapless bassist probably concocted the description of the Mahler 1 solo as unplayable. Maybe the words ‘by me’ were dropped at some point. As his close relationship with Bottesini is well documented, Mahler obviously had an idea what the bass was capable of playing. Even if Mahler 1 is a masterpiece, I can’t bring myself to enjoy it. It’s not Mahler (or Haitink’s) fault the piece is way over programmed. I’m a big fan of what Haitink does with Mahler, in particular the way he is able to keep vulgarity from creeping into passages where it has no business. BTW, Haitink has always reminded me more of Nikita Khrushchev.

Yesterday’s news couldn’t have been better, as far as I’m concerned. But knowing how things go, the next milestone to look out for is the first time one of the detractors of our former music director refers to his tenure here as ‘the good old days’.

Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds -the Bhagavad-Gita RAVEL Menuet antique LIEBERSON Neruda Songs INTERMISSION MAHLER Symphony No. 1 Bach Week Program Concerto in D Minor for two violins, BWV 1043 Cantata: Non sa che sia dolore , BWV 209 Motet: Singet dem Herrn ein neues Lied , BWV 225 Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 in G, BWV 1048 Richard Webster, conductor Monday off Tuesday 10-12:30 rehearsal 7:30 concert (Wagner, Chin, Berlioz) Wednesday 12-2:30 3:30-6 rehearsals Thursday 10-12:30 rehearsal Friday 10-1 Bach Week rehearsal Saturday 1-3 Bach Week rehearsal Sunday 7:30 Bach Week concert The lack of concerts in my schedule is no mistake. Even though it was not my turn, I volunteered to be on call this week to avoid the Mahler 1st Symphony. Over the years I’ve come to loathe the piece and so take advantage of every opportunity to get out of playing it. Unfortunately for me it is one of those things that comes up at least once a year. If I’m not mistaken, the orchestra played it a...

There is an odd sort of game of tag going round. I had no idea I was ‘in’ with cutting edge types who play games on the internet, but I’ll play along. Rules: 1. Pick up the nearest book. 2. Open to page 123. 3. Find the fifth sentence. 4. Post the next three sentences. 5. Tag five people, and acknowledge who tagged you. Rules 3 and 4 need work. I’m assuming the 5th sentence that begins on page 123, keeping that to myself and posting the next 3, like it says. Originally, I thought I had to choose between a road atlas and a phone book until I discovered the closest book had been carelessly dropped beneath my chair. Introduction to the Sociology of Music, by Theodor Adorno. Such a presentation would require the only wealth denied by the plentiful activity: time to waste. The current objections to musical life are evoked by many of its aspects. They refer to a commercialization which regards the cause it plugs with such high-pressure ...