Victor Goldberg, piano

Victor Goldberg, piano
Pro Musicis
Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, New York, NY
April 21, 2010

Victor Goldberg is an excellent pianist with a formidable technique, a powerful tone, and a romantic soul (and a distracting habit of tossing his hands way up). Russian-born, he has studied, performed and won competitions in Europe, Israel and America, and is the recipient of the 2008 Pro Musicis International Award.

His Weill Recital Hall concert, rather enigmatically entitled “From the Depths of the Creative Spirit,” showed his pianistic strengths, emotional projection, and stylistic versatility. Except for Domenico Scarlatti’s famous E major Sonata – played with filigree delicacy, crystal-clear runs and elegant leaps – the program featured music of the 19th and 20th centuries. The beginning of Chopin’s B-flat minor Scherzo immediately demonstrated that Goldberg subscribes to a key element of today’s performing style: utmost dynamic contrast. The opening figure’s ominous whisper and the crashing chords following it seemed to skirt the outer limits of the instrument’s sound, a tendency toward extremes that continued throughout the concert. But within these parameters, Mr. Goldberg has a wide range of nuances and colors, which he used with great skill and imagination.

Shostakovich wrote his second Sonata in 1942 during Hitler’s infamous siege of Leningrad that claimed 632,000 lives. One of the victims was Shostakovich’s teacher Leonid Nikolaev, to whose memory the sonata is dedicated. The Shostakovich family had been evacuated from the besieged city, but, though composed in the comparative safety of the countryside, the sonata has an eerie, unsettled quality and a desolate ending; Mr. Goldberg’s intensely expressive performance had a powerful emotional impact.

The program’s highlight was Brahms’ Variations on a Theme by Handel, one of the most daunting masterpieces of the repertoire. Goldberg met its instrumental and musical challenges with masterful technical and tonal command. Combining careful planning with spontaneity, austerity with romantic passion, he made the variations building blocks in an overarching structure, yet he also brought out their individual characters, using the repeats to underline different voices. With the final fugue as a true culmination, it was a most impressive performance. Responding to the audience’s enthusiasm, he played encores by Debussy, Rachmaninov and Tchaikovsky.

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The Madison String Quartet

The Madison String Quartet
Musica de Camara
Museum of the City of New York, NY
April 11, 2010

Founded and directed by Eva de La O, Musica de Camara has been presenting Hispanic musicians for 30 years in concert halls, community centers, churches, libraries and museums—often for audiences with little access to classical music. One of its recent discoveries is the Madison String Quartet, an adventurous, enthusiastic young group dedicated to exploring the Hispanic literature, for whose idiomatic rhythms and colors the players have a natural affinity. The performance, apart from some intonation problems in octaves and unisons, was admirable: secure, well-balanced, expressive, homogeneous in sound, unanimous in spirit.

In a quartet arrangement of Four for Tango by Astor Piazzolla, the players exploited all the resources of their instruments, including harmonics, slides, and knocking on the wood to imitate percussion. Teresa Carreno was born in Venezuela but spent most of her life in France and Germany. One of the first great women pianists and famous as a formidable virtuoso, she was also a conductor, singer and composer. Her String Quartet in B minor was written in the 1870’s during her marriage to the first of her four husbands, the violinist Emile Sauret. A substantial, four-movement work, it is clearly influenced by German romanticism; the Scherzo recalls Mendelssohn, the slow movement sings, the corner movements are fast, intense and turbulent. Its weakness lies in the modulations, that ultimate test of compositional skill. All four parts have demanding solos, which the players negotiated with panache.

The program’s most unusual work, which the Quartet recorded in 2004, was Miguel del Aguila’s Life is a Dream, inspired by Caldéron de la Barca’s play of the same title, La vida es sueno. It opened with three players on stage producing eerie-sounding tremolos with their bows behind the bridge; the first violinist, heard off-stage playing very virtuosic music, eventually joined them. All four musicians took turns reciting portions of Caldéron’s poem while playing; the music built to an intense climax, recapitulated the spooky beginning and faded away. The poetry and the music are arresting enough to stand alone; they did not seem to add anything to each other.

The audience demanded and got an encore: Aldemoro Romero’s Fuga con Pajarillo, Variations on a popular Venezuelan folksong. A fun piece, it began like a Bach Contrapunctus and became an intricate maze of multi-layered rhythms.

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New York Concert Review Round-Up for 2009-10

New York Concert Review Round-Up for 2009-10

Even the best-intentioned reporter cannot cover all the concerts of the New York season. Here are some highlights that got left behind

Two violinists presented spectacular recitals: Joshua Bell with his frequent partner Jeremy Denk, and Augustin Hadelich with the esteemed collaborative artist Rohan De Silva. Hadelich, making his New York debut, played in the Frick Collection’s intimate auditorium; Bell played in Carnegie Hall, whose size hardly suited his program of sonatas by Bach, Saint-Saëns, Schumann and Ravel. But his brilliant technique and glorious, intense tone came through, as did his elegance, romantic ardor, and passionate involvement. Hadelich, winner of the 2006 Indianapolis Violin Competition, is every inch a virtuoso. He reveled in the fireworks of Ysaÿe’s “Ballade” and Saraste’s “Carmen Fantasy,” and filled Prokofiev’s second Sonata with sunshine and charm.

The American String Quartet played Beethoven’s daunting Op. 127 with admirable technical and tonal control, poise and expressiveness. With violist Michael Tree, Brahms’ G major Quintet sounded rich, romantic and exuberant; the Finale had true Gypsy abandon. The Orion Quartet also performed Brahms in G-major (the Sextet, with violist Hsin-Yun Huang and cellist Barbara Mallow), along with Beethoven, Bartók, Mozart and Smetana. Perhaps influenced by the prevailing fashion, they have been over-projecting recently, but their playing is always deeply felt and beautiful.

The Tokyo Quartet continued its Beethoven cycle with a warm, serene performance of Op. 59 No. 2, notable for the seamless continuity of its lines. Formed 20 years ago, the Leipzig Quartet displayed remarkable transparency in Haydn’s “Sunrise” Quartet; wrenching grief in Mendelssohn’s F-minor Quartet; longing and passion in Janácek’s “Intimate Letters.” The Panocha Quartet, founded in 1968 at the Prague Conservatory, is distinguished by its limpid tone, simplicity, and unaffected eloquence. An early Mozart Quartet was lovely; Martinu’s cheerful No. 7 (1947) incorporated both his native Czech and jazzy American idioms. In Dvorák’s great Op. 106, the players relished the luscious melodies and spiky Slavic rhythms while weaving a tapestry of independent voices.

Festival Chamber Music, a rotating group of freelance musicians, presented an unusual program in delightful performances: Milhaud’s humorous Suite for clarinet, violin and piano; Beethoven’s lyrical, exuberant Trio for clarinet, cello and piano Op. 38, transcribed from his Septet; songs by Amy Beach with violin and cello obbligatos, and Schubert’s “Shepherd on the Rock.” Cellist/director Ruth Sommers, violinist Theodore Arm and soprano Amy Cofield Williamson were excellent; pianist Hélène Jeanney and clarinetist Charles Neidich, the program’s busiest participants, captured the music’s diverse moods and styles with soloistic brilliance and collaborative sensitivity.

To celebrate his 85th birthday, Pierre Boulez conducted the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in two concerts featuring Béla Bartók: the Concerto for two pianos and percussion, splendidly performed by Pierre–Laurent Aimard and Tamara Stefanovich, and “Bluebeard’s Castle,” sung with mesmerizing impact (in Hungarian) by Michelle DeYoung and Falk Struckmann. The orchestra’s principal flutist Mathieu Dufour played Marc-André Dalbavie’s Concerto brilliantly; the orchestra showed its virtuosity and wonderful sound in works by Ravel, Boulez, and Stravinsky’s “Firebird.”

Boulez shared conducting duties with Daniel Barenboim when Carnegie Hall invited the Vienna Philharmonic to open its season with three concerts. The orchestra sounded glorious; intonation and balance were perfect; the playing was rich and homogeneous, yet clear. Except for two Beethoven symphonies, the programs departed from the orchestra’s usual fare with substantial works by Schoenberg, Webern and Boulez. In the first concert, Barenboim’s “Pastoral” Symphony was expansively lyrical; juxtaposing the lush, sensuous finale of Wagner’s “Tristan” with Schoenberg’s Variations demonstrated the birth of a new style from the ashes of the old one. A noisy exodus of disgruntled listeners midway caused Barenboim to announce an encore “for those who stayed” – a fast and furious Johann Strauss Polka.

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Gergiev and Berlioz at Carnegie

Gergiev and Berlioz at Carnegie

Valery Gergiev is a ubiquitous musical presence, seemingly able to conduct operas and concerts on several continents simultaneously. Director of the St. Petersburg Mariinsky Theatre since 1988, he is touring North America with its orchestra, chorus and soloists; they stopped off in New York’s Carnegie Hall for three concerts devoted to two Gergiev specialties by Hector Berlioz: the Dramatic Symphony Romeo et Juliette and the opera Les Troyens. The performances were simply magnificent; no wonder he is among today’s busiest, most sought-after conductors. The chorus, in the grand Russian tradition, is superb; its members can emerge as soloists even without stepping forward. The orchestra is equally fine; the strings have the dark, warm sound of the best European groups, the winds are splendid. Love scenes were enhanced by beguiling clarinet obbligatos; the oboe added mournful poignancy to the tragic moments; mellow horns led the hunt, brilliant trumpets the triumphal marches.

The musicians played their hearts out, and, though positioned on stage level, never overpowered the singers – a remarkable feat. Part of the credit belongs to Berlioz, who, with masterful control, lets the orchestra soar at full strength when the singers rest and instantly subdues it when they enter. The music, like all Berlioz, alternates sophisticated complexity with almost naïve simplicity, and combines epic grandeur, drama and passion with melting lyricism, poetic ardor, and heart-breaking sorrow. But amid all the sound and fury of shrilling piccolos and clashing cymbals, it is the intimate scenes of tender affection that remain in the memory.

Romeo et Juilette is a strange realization of Shakespeare’s play. True to its title and to Berlioz’ conviction that music speaks more eloquently than words, the orchestra carries the action, sets the moods, and evokes the characters’ thoughts and feelings. (The score requires from two to ten harps; the Mariinsky had two.) The chorus, a solo mezzo-soprano and tenor act as narrators and commentators; in the last scene, the solo bass becomes Friar Lawrence and delivers a long exhortation to the warring families to finally make peace. The work is rarely performed in its entirety, as it was here, but the elfin “Queen Mab” Scherzo, depicting Romeo’s dream, is a favorite orchestral bravura piece.

By contrast, Les Troyens is a grand opera with a cast of more than 20 characters; requiring a huge chorus and orchestra and over a dozen vocal soloists, it lasts four hours and was performed in two parts on consecutive evenings. Berlioz wrote his own libretto; the first part recounts the tragic end of the siege of Troy, the second the tragic love story between the Carthagean Queen Dido and the Trojan hero Aeneas. The vocally and dramatically most demanding parts are two mezzo-sopranos as Cassandra in Part I and Dido in Part II; Aeneas, a very high, heroic tenor, appears in both parts. The singers, who included the Romeo soloists, were terrific; all except one sang from memory. In Part I, they remained static, but in Part II they acted and interacted, underlining drama and emotion with gestures and movements.

But the real hero was Gergiev. Using no podium gives him unusual freedom of movement; he walked about, turning and leaning toward the players, leapt up, and swayed to the music. He conducted Part I without baton; for Part II, he brought one out, but mostly kept it in his left hand. His knowledge of the complex scores and control of his massive forces were incredible; he was in close contact with the soloists, though he had his back to them and they hardly looked at him. Guiding and shaping each performance in every detail and as an overarching whole, he held the capacity audiences spellbound until the tumultuous ovations.

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A Quartet of… Cellists

Sometimes certain works are absent from concert programs for several years and then re-discovered by everybody simultaneously. This season may have set a record in duplications of cello sonatas: within a few weeks, Debussy’s was performed three times, and Schubert’s, Faure’s, Poulenc’s, and Prokofiev’s twice each. They were played by two audience favorites – Steven Isserlis and Timothy Eddy (whose recital was reviewed earlier) – and two strikingly talented newcomers and multiple prize winners who were making their New York debuts: Jean-Guihen Queyras and Andreas Brantelid. Moreover, Eddy’s and Brantelid’s programs were almost identical.

For many young performers, nothing seems to be more difficult than to be simple. The “Arpeggione” was the weakest part of both debut recitals; sinking under the weight of fussy tempo changes, overdone phrasing and dynamics, it lost its continuity and pensive introspection. Queyras’ playing, though technically excellent, was rather fussy altogether; his constantly delayed vibrato, fluctuating tempi and other external effects were especially distracting in a Bach Sonata and three Schubert songs not well chosen for transcription. However, in the Debussy and Poulenc Sonatas, his tonal variety and rhythmic flexibility brought out the manifold colors and character changes beautifully. He was greatly abetted by his long-time pianist Alexandre Tharaud.

Brantelid also benefited from playing with a frequent partner, the esteemed veteran pianist Bengt Forsberg. Though generally wonderfully supportive, he sometimes got carried away and played as loudly as if he were alone on the stage. Brantelid is an extraordinary cellist: his technical command, without being flashy, is so natural and secure that one forgets about it; he draws the listener into the music by the sheer power of his own identification with it. He projected Fauré’s elusiveness, Debussy’s quirky rhythms, character changes, and Prokofiev’s melting lyricism and robust earthiness, all with complete authority.

Isserlis played the Poulenc Sonata as part of a very interesting program he shared with violinist Anthony Marwood and composer/pianist Thomas Adès, whose cello and piano piece, Lieux retrouvés (Rediscovered Places) was receiving its U.S. premiere. Isserlis says he has never played anything so difficult, though the rest of the program was no less challenging. It is indeed very demanding; its figurations, diverse rhythms and sound effects, evoking water, mountains, fields and the city, require utmost virtuosity and imagination of the players. Adès, who played throughout the concert, joined Marwood in Janácek’s Violin Sonata; their affinity for his idiosyncratic, prosodic idiom, his fluid tempi and shifting emotions was remarkable. For his own work, Adès had a most persuasive advocate in Isserlis, a splendid cellist and a compelling, versatile, adventurous musician. Their performance of the Poulenc, preceded by arrangements of two sad, slow pieces by Liszt, was brilliant, full of character and contrasts, with natural, poised transitions between lyricism, assertiveness, exuberance, and irony. Finally, the three players gave a fabulous performance of Ravel’s notoriously difficult Piano Trio. Surmounting its instrumental and rhythmic hurdles with incredible ease, they captured its poetic atmosphere, changing moods and kaleidoscopic colors with total identification and unanimity.

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Cello-Piano Duos Prove Popular This Winter

Formed in 1980, the Timothy Eddy/Gilbert Kalish cello-piano duo is another remarkable collaboration. The two players are ubiquitous on the music scene: in addition to giving concerts together, they are active as soloists, chamber musicians and pedagogues. Eddy is the cellist of the Orion Quartet, in residence at Mannes, in whose intimate concert hall the Duo often presents sonata recitals. Their latest concert there—a capacity house on January 25th, 2010—featured many different styles. Classicism: Beethoven’s Variations on a Theme from Mozart’s Magic Flute, played with grace, humor, and inward expressiveness; Romanticism blended with atonality: Ben Weber’s brief Five Pieces, in which three sustained, slow, mournful character sketches are framed by two lively ones; Impressionism: Debussy’s colorful, piquant, ironic Sonata, and Fauré’s Sonata No. 2, elusive and very rarely performed, but obviously loved by these two players. After all this misty evanescence, the vigorous, earthly Prokofiev Sonata brought a sense of relief, as if the clouds had lifted and revealed solid ground under a blue sky. The players, too, seemed more relaxed, unrestrained and free, reveling in its rhythmic vitality and its full-blooded, soaring melodies, totally at one with the music and each other.

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Diana Damrau’s Versatility includes Acrobatics

January 23, 2010 at Carnegie Hall, New York, NY

The German soprano Diana Damrau recently sang eight songs by Richard Strauss, and Zerbinetta’s aria from his opera “Ariadne auf Naxos” with the MET Orchestra under James Levine. Her voice is ravishingly beautiful, with enough power to cut through and sail above the orchestra, clearly showing her operatic roots, yet capable of drawing listeners into the soft, intimate songs with a wonderfully floating quality. But it was her coloratura that left the audience gasping in disbelief. Her last song, “Amor” – unfamiliar for good reason – was a tour de force of trills, roulades and other acrobatics. The aria, one of the most spectacular display pieces in all opera, was dazzling; she acted it out with humorous, ironic gestures and facial expressions, tossing off the fireworks with incredible brilliance. It brought the house down, so she repeated the last section; but this time, she stood cheek to cheek with Levine, one foot on his podium, both mugging with gleeful abandon and having a wonderful time.

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Rira Lim, pianist

Rira Lim, piano
Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, New York, New York
October 25, 2009

Born in South Korea, Rira Lim began playing the piano at age four, and at age 14 made her orchestral debut in her native Gwangju. After graduating from Yonsei University in Seoul, she continued her studies at the University of Texas, earning Master and Doctor degrees. She has performed in solo and chamber music in Asia and Europe, and won prizes in several international competitions.

For this recital. Ms. Lim chose an ambitious, unusual program. Even the apparently conventional opening selection was presented in an unfamiliar form: three Scarlatti Sonatas in a “transcription” for piano by Granados, with octaves, thirds, sixths, and “modern” harmonies added to make them more effective and appealing to pianists. More Granados than Scarlatti, they immediately heralded Ms. Lim’s virtuosity and wide dynamic range. Her tone was flawed only by some harshness at full volume, and a tendency to underplay her left hand; she seemed more comfortable with big chords than singing legato lines.

Barber called his Nocturne “Homage to John Fields,” but, as if reflected in a distorting mirror, its romanticism is obscured by atonal and chromatic dissonances. In Barber’s last piano piece, Ballade, written for the Van Cliburn Competition, Ms. Lim moved easily between the different moods, tempos and dynamics.

Malipiero’s four Preludi autumnali, written in 1914, are impressionistic pieces tinged with the somberness of the onset of war. The first two are all florid embellishment, the third is mournful, the fourth is sardonic and agitated. Ms. Lim brought out all these contrasting characteristics admirably.

The program’s piéce de resistance was Liszt’s Sonata, one of the repertoire’s most formidable works. In four continuous movements, it demands not only utmost virtuosity, but utmost physical and mental endurance. The slender young pianist negotiated its crashing chords, fortissimo double octave passages, cascading runs and arpeggios with untiring energy, and still had enough strength left to reward a standing ovation with a hefty encore by William Bolcom.

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Minsoo Sohn, Piano

Minsoo Sohn, pianist
Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, New York, NY
October 8, 2009

Minsoo Sohn is a pianistic phenomenon and a musical enigma. Born in Korea, he studied with Russell Sherman at the New England Conservatory, and established a brilliant career after winning an astounding number of international competitions, including Canada’s 2006 Honen Competition, which sponsored this New York debut.

Sohn’s program presaged his musical seriousness and stunning technique: Beethoven’s “Diabelli” Variations, considered one of his greatest but most intractable masterpieces, and four “Fantasies” by Liszt on vocal works of Beethoven, Schubert and Mozart. And as though there were not enough original piano music to choose from, the encores  were transcriptions of orchestral pieces by Bizet, Gluck and Mendelssohn.

As might be expected of a spectacular young virtuoso, Sohn was most impressive in the Liszt “Fantasies.” Bravura showpieces loosely based on popular themes by classical composers, they bristle with every imaginable – and some unimaginable – instrumental challenges, all of which Sohn surmounted with breath-taking ease. His fingers flew across the keyboard; he shook long octave passages out of his sleeve; his tone went from whispers to rafter-shaking, though sometimes steely power. His affinity for the style – its phrasing, melodic contours, confident virtuosity – was complete. Yet, despite its expressiveness, his playing had a curiously detached quality; he seemed to be presenting rather than experiencing the music. This was even more apparent in the Beethoven Variations, which range from sublime serenity to parodistic humor. Though every tempo, phrasing and dynamic marking was meticulously observed, indeed often considerably exaggerated, the playing lacked what the great violinist/teacher Carl Flesch called “the inner impulse” that lets the performer enter the composer’s emotional world. Moreover, unlike most interpreters, Sohn inserted long pauses between variations; this may have facilitated bringing out their mood and character changes, but broke their continuity and cumulative impact.

The sell-out audience responded with concentrated attention and enthusiastic ovations.

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2009 CONCERT SEASON

If there is a general complaint about manyof today’s performers, it is that they reverse the ancient dictum “Nothing to excess” by doingeverything to excess. Tempi keep getting faster, dynamics louder and softer, contrasts more vio­lent; brass and percussion dominate the orches­tral texture and ruin the balance. Nevertheless, there was much to enjoy and admire in this sea­son’s concerts, which honored the anniversaries of Mendelssohn’s birth and Haydn’s death, and also prominently featured Mahler and Brahms; here are some highlights and celebrations.

The year’s biggest news was the passing ofthe baton from Lorin Maazel to Alan Gilbert at the New York Philharmonic. Amid a flurry off are well concerts, Maazel conducted one of his favorite works: Britten’s War Requiem. Despite the excellent performance, the impact of the music seemed to have diminished over the years, but the poetry and the aching memories of the work’s creation are still deeply affecting.

For his tenure’s grand finale, Maazel led amemorable performance of Mahler’s Eighth Symphony. Its monumental length had coher­ence, its massive score remarkable transparency; there was time to savor the lyrical moments and echoes of other works. It was a triumphant farewell, rewarded by an outpouring of respectand appreciation.

The Philharmonic’s Opening Gala included the Premiere of “EXPO,” commissioned from Magnus Lindberg, the Orchestra’s Resident Composer, and an elusive, impressionist cycle of love ­songs by Messiaen, which the wonderful soprano Renée Fleming had learned for the occasion. It was the most ambitious Gala pro­gram ever devised, and immediately demonstrat­ed the adventurousness of Gilbert’s ideas and his ability to carry them out.

The Philadelphia Orchestra under Christoph Eschenbach gave Mahler’s SeventhSymphony a splendid performance, distin­guished by its combination of sweep and atten­tion to detail, its unusual clarity, and especiallits meticulous balance between sections and within the orchestral texture.

Mostly Mozart paid homage to Mendelssohn with his “Italian” Symphony, played very fast under Yannick Nézet ­Séguin; the Violin Concerto, played brilliantly by the golden ­toned Joshua Bell under Music Director Louis Langré, and the first Piano Trio with the fine Trio con Brio. Haydn was honored with symphonies, piano concertos, and the rarelheard Sinfonia Concertante, played splendidl by concertmistress Krista Bennion ­Feeney, cel­list Ilya Finkelsteyn, oboist Randall Ellis, and bassoonist Marc Goldberg. Brahms’ Variationson a Theme by Haydn were also featured, pre­ceded by an impressive performance by Jon Manasse and Jon Nakamatsu of Brahms’ first Clarinet Sonata, and followed by his Fourth  Symphony. Langré closed the Festival with a lovely performance of Haydn’s “Creation,” sunin English, probably for greater accessibility. The “Creation” and “The Seasons were sung in German by the Monteverdi Choir withthe period instrument group Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique under John Eliot Gardiner. The performances were clear, brisk and enthusiastic, but suffered from all the excesses mentioned above; indeed, the pace was so hectic that Gardiner never even paused between movements, and the balance so lop­sided that the strings and the crucial harmoniesin the inner voices were almost obliterated. All four Brahms symphonies were presentedby the Berlin Philharmonic under Simon Rattle, paired with four works by Schoenberg. The combination was supposedly justified by the series’ opening work, Schoenberg’s misguided, blown­up orchestration of Brahms’ first Piano Quartet ­a transcription some chamber musi­cians dislike. The rest of the programs, however,made up for it. Schoenberg’s mono­drama, “Erwartung” (Expectation) was riveting, with soprano Evelyn Herlitzius as a woman who stumbles through a dark forest searching for her faithless lover, only to find his corpse. Reality ornightmare? No one knows. The orchestra was terrific; the soloists were wonderful, the sound was gorgeous. Rattle, deeply involved, alternated between standing still and erupting into violent action; the players, themselves physically very engaged, responded to his slightest motion. The performances were grandly conceived and exe­cuted, but intonation and attacks were often imperfect; the texture was murky, everything was so loud that the climaxes became deafening. All concerts ended with a joyful noise; the audi­ences loved it. Rattle also conducted the Philadelphia Orchestra and Chorale in Berlioz’ “Damnation of Faust.” With mezzo ­soprano Magdalena Kozena, tenor Gregory Kunde, basses Thomas Quasthoff and Eric Owens, the performance was fabulous and captured both the music’s sim­plicity and sophistication.With the New York Philharmonic under Gilbert, Frank Peter Zimmermann gave Brahms’ Violin Concerto a robust, extroverted performance, very prosaic despite many juicy slides. It was paired – again – with Schoenberg: the symphonic poem “Pelleas et Melisande,” anearly, tonal, romantic work; players and conduc­tor reveled in its luxurious, colorful orchestra­tion. The Zukerman Chamber Players, with Zukerman on viola, opened their series with adelightful, heart­warming mostly Brahms pro­gram. It featured his ingratiating first Sextet and the songs for mezzo ­soprano and viola, sung superbly by Michelle DeYoung with pianist Kevin Murphy, along with songs by Dvorak and  Strauss. The Pacifica Quartet, a young but alreadhighly acclaimed group, has taken over the Guarneri Quartet’s residency at the Metropolitan Museum. This requires self ­confi­dence and courage, but perhaps also more intro­spection than was evident at its opening pro­gram. The players’ involvement seemed physical rather than emotional; the playing was compe­tent but too fast and driven for real expressive­ness; the sound was good but unvaried; the cello was under­ balanced. Their Mozart lacked graceand repose, their Brahms depth and passion; they broke up Janácek’s “Intimate Letters” withlong pauses.The Kalichstein ­Laredo ­Robinson Trio gave both Schubert Trios a solid, expressive perform­ance; the Emerson Quartet’s Schubert was disci­plined and polished, but too extroverted; the American Quartet’s “Death and the Maiden” was brilliant, full of drama and anguished plead­ing. Violinist Christian Tetzlaff performed one of his specialties, Bach’s unaccompanied works, in one day ­a remarkable feat. He has recorded them twice, and, claiming that they tell a contin­uous story, always presents them chronological­ly. His interpretation continues to gain depth and freedom; unfortunately, the fast movements also gain speed: the performance left listeners breathless, though marveling at his technical control, his pure, beautiful tone, his clear struc­ture and counterpoint. Two great pianists performed Beethoven’s last three sonatas. Mitsuko Uchida projected dramatic intensity and expressive lyricism; András Schiff, concluding his Beethoven cycle, displayed his usual beautiful singing tone and perfect legato, and gave pristine clarity to usual­ly blurred, muddy passages. James Levine, Music Director of the Boston Symphony (and the Metropolitan Opera), had tocancel several appearances due to a back opera­tion. At Carnegie Hall’s Opening Night, he was replaced by Daniele Gatti; the program included Chopin’s second Piano Concerto with the incomparable Evgeny Kissin and the premiere of John Williams’ Harp Concerto, written forthe Orchestra’s harpist Ann Hobson Pilot. There were also other unusual offerings. Leon Kirchner’s four string quartets were played splendidly by the Orion Quartet, to whom one isdedicated. Zemlinsky’s Lyric Symphony, per­formed by the New York Philharmonic under Neeme Järvi with soprano Hillevi Martinpelto and baritone Thomas Hampson, was very inter­esting. Set to poems by Rabindranath Tagore, it is romantic, tonal but dissonant; the orchestra­tion is kaleidoscopic, but too heavy for the singers.

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