Sprightly

Bass Blog Back! Well, I finally heard from all five of my readers. There may be 68,000 odd hits on this page, but to be honest, about 57,995 of those were me obsessively checking to see if the page still existed and if anyone else had viewed it. Thanks to those who inquired about my health, which is no better, but certainly no worse than usual – I simply needed a break. The performances last week of the Bruckner 5th Symphony have a great deal to do with my decision t start blogging again at this time. Letting a Bruckner 5 pass without comment would be like sitting at the breakfast table one sunny morning and watching the Hindenburg silently drift by without at least nudging one’s companion to look up from the newspaper. Fortunately, under the baton of replacement conductor Jaap van Zweden (filling in for the permanently absent Riccardo Chailly) Bruckner’s bloated masterpiece fared better than the similarly tumid German airship. The Dutch violinist turned conductor spent more rehea...

as ye sow… HINDEMITH Overture to Neues vom Tage HINDEMITH Trauermusik FRIEDMAN Sacred Heart: Explosion INTERMISSION BERLIOZ Harold in Italy Leonard Slatkin, conductor Pinchas Zukerman, viola All-Access Chamber Series Eugene Izotov, oboe John Bruce Yeh, clarinet Albert Igolnikov, violin Paul Phillips Jr., violin Robert Swan, viola John Sharp, cello Michael Hovnanian, bass Mozart Oboe Quartet Prokofiev Quintet, Op. 39 Brahms Clarinet Quintet Dvorak Slavonic Dance in E Minor, Op. 72, No. 2 Monday off Tuesday 10-12:30 rehearsal 1:30-3:30 Prokofiev quintet rehearsal Wednesday 10-12:30 1:30-3:30 rehearsals Thursday 10-12:30 rehearsal 8 concert Friday 1:30 concert 3:30-6 Prokofiev quintet rehearsal Saturday 2 All-Access Chamber Series concert 8 concert Sunday 3 concert 7:30 Ars Viva Benefit (Week 38 was last week. I’m now on vacation.) After Sunday the orchestra is on vacation until the Ravinia summer season begins in July. Usually we have our main vacation after Ravinia, in August and Septem...

Oy Vey! DVORÁK Symphony No. 8 INTERMISSION OLIVER Federal Street (Great God, we sing that mighty hand) HATTON Duke Street (O God, beneath thy guiding hand) ROOT Shining Shore TRADITIONAL Good Night, Ladies BISHOP Home, Sweet Home IVES New England Holidays [redacted] Symphony Chorus Michael Tilson Thomas, conductor Monday 2-4:30 Trout Quintet rehearsal Tuesday 10-12:30 rehearsal 12:30-2:30 Prokofiev Quintet rehearsal 7:30 concert (Rameau/Vivaldi) Wednesday 12-2:30 3:30-5:30 rehearsals Thursday 10-12:30 rehearsal 8 concert Friday 9:30-11:30 In-school concerts 1:30 concert 7:30 Trout Quintet concert Saturday 8 concert Sunday 7:30 Ars Viva Benefit rehearsal This week = last week. I’m behind again. We had one of the quirkier podium performances this week. In rehearsals the ratio of talk to useful information conveyed threatened to fall into the red zone. To make matters worse, although more entertaining, the Maestro’s score for the Ives didn’t seem to match the set of parts the players were...

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...

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’.

Aversion to talk is something orchestra musicians have inherited from manual laborers. -Theodor Adorno WAGNER Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde CHIN Rocaná INTERMISSION BERLIOZ Symphonie fantastique Kent Nagano, 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 1 Trout Quintet 7 CBE rehearsal OK, I’m a week behind again. I think the quote from Adorno has something to do with anti intellectualism among musicians, which is apparent enough, but there is also another way to apply it. Nothing wrings a groan from an orchestra with more predictability than when someone emerges from the wings holding a microphone. It makes little difference if it is a manager, trustee, politician, or representative of some women’s auxiliary; all microphone wielders seem to elicit a similar response. The reaction often has little to do with the quality of the remarks on of...

why is this week different from all other weeks? BERIO Ritirata Notturna di Madrid SALONEN Piano Concerto INTERMISSION BEETHOVEN Symphony No. 7 Esa-Pekka Salonen, conductor Yefim Bronfman, piano Monday off Tuesday 10-12:30 1:3-4 rehearsals Wednesday 10-12:30 rehearsal 6:30 concert Thursday 8 concert Friday 1:30 concert Saturday off Sunday off All in all, an enjoyable week in the house of notes. Of course the answer to the question posed above, and no small part of the allure of the week has to be because we get Friday, Saturday, and Sunday evenings off. Salonen is not a very excitable conductor. If you ask me, that’s a big asset when it comes to the Beethoven 7th, which all to easily crosses the line into bacchanalia in the wrong hands. I’m a big fan of period instrument performances anyhow. That aside, I sometimes get the feeling as a modern orchestra, bulked up on Bruckner, Strauss, and Mahler, it is all too easy to go overboard on these late classical/early romantic symphon...