Telegraph Quartet

Jeremiah Shaw, cello, Joseph Maile, violin, Eric Chin, violin, Pei-Ling Lin, viola.  

The Telegraph Quartet came once again to play at my alma mater as part of the New Millennium Concert Series. 

They have delved deeper than Schubert and Mozart this time.  The three pieces below are all by Czech composers.

String Quartet No. 10, Opus 51 by Antonin Dvořák (1841-1904).  This is the most conservative of these three selections.

• Allegro ma non troppo
• Dumka:  Andante con moto - Vivace
• Romanza:  Andante con moto
• Finali:  Allegro Assai

Five Pieces for String Quarter by Erwin Schulhoff (1894-1942).  He was a German jew born in Czechoslovakia and died in the holocaust.  I enjoyed this very much.  It might possibly be called a suite, though certainly not in the classical form.

• I. Alla valse Viennese (Allegro)
• II. Alla serenata (Allegretto con moto)
• III. Alla Czeca (Molto allegro)
• IV. Alla tango milonga (Andante)
• V. Alla tarantella (Prestissimo con fuoco)

String Quartet No. 6, Op.35 by Mieczysław Weinberg (1919-1996)  I guess this guy is Polish and was born in Warsaw to a musical family.  When the war broke out, he fled to Minsk in the USSR.  Shostakovitch encouraged him to move to Moscow.

• Allegro semplice
• Presto aggitato
• Allegro con fuoco
• Adagio
• Moderato comodo
• Andante maestoso

The Telegraph Quartet is moving toward twentieth and twenty-first century works.  If they can bring us great style as we heard today, I encourage this.  After all, I'm a long time Kronos Quartet fan.

Rusalka in HD

Conductor:  Mark Elder
Production:  Mary Zimmerman

Rusalka:  Kristine Opolais
Prince:  Brandon Jovanovich
Princess:  Katarina Dalayman
Jezibaba:  Jamie Barton
Gnome:  Eric Owens

Dvorák's Rusalka was live from the Metropolitan Opera on Saturday. Many of the people around me had never seen this opera.  This is my fourth time with all the previous times starring Renée Fleming. 

I was completely won over by the water nymphs at the beginning.  First they danced and then suddenly as if by magic they sang.

In case you thought after her appearance in Nabucco that Jamie Barton was boring, her Jezibaba was evil and fun and completely upstaged everyone else.  Except maybe the water nymphs.

Eric Owens owns the Gnome. He pointed out in his interview that this was his actual Fach while L'Amour is more a baritone role.

This is an excellent role for Kristine.  Someone has to step into Fleming's repertoire.  Her acting is far more intense than Fleming which changes the dramatic intensity of the opera.  Her voice is not really heavy enough for most of the roles she sings, but if she keeps this under control, it should be good for her.

I thought the castle sequence in Act II worked better here than other productions I have seen.  Brandon was the picture of prince charming.  I liked it but don't want to go on and on about it.  The Wagner loving conductor thinks it's one of the great post Wagnerian operas, but for me it's just ok. I tend to think of Dvorák as post Brahms rather than post Wagner.  Wagnerians ignore Brahms.

Matthew Polenzani was an excellent host.

Rusalka

Conductor: Yannick Nézet-Séguin
Production:  Otto Schenk
Set Designer:   Günther Schneider-Siemssen

Cast

Rusalka:  Renée Fleming
Prince:   Piotr Beczala
Princess:  Emily Magee
Jezibaba:  Dolora Zajick
Gnome:  John Relyea
Kitchen Boy:  Julie Boulianne
Gamekeeper:  Vladimir Chmelo
First Sprite:  Jihee Kim
Second Sprite:  Renée Tatum
Third Sprite:  Maya Lahyani
Hunter:  Alexey Lavrov

Yes.  I looked it up and the only live performance of Dvorák's Rusalka I've ever seen, San Francisco Opera 1995, was also in a set designed by Günther Schneider-Siemssen.  It also starred Renée Fleming, she also sang the aria from the top of a tree, and she walked on water in the last act.  I see in the archives that this opera had its first Metropolitan Opera performance in 1993 and was revived with Renée Fleming in 1997.  The Met revived it in 2004, but it hasn't been revived in San Francisco.  So I shouldn't have been surprised when everyone around me said they hadn't seen it.

This cast was incredible, and the traditional production gave a vivid idea of what the opera was about.  This is probably the best you are going to get from Rusalka.

The role of Rusalka fits Renée Fleming's voice like a glove, and Piotr Beczala is the perfect Prince Usually Charming.  As the foreign princess, Emily Magee stole all the scenes she was in.  Dolora Zajick is just the sort of wacko witch you might just believe in.  Perhaps she could turn you into a human being.

But then why would you want to?  The music, guided by Yannick Nézet-Séguin, is gorgeously romantic.  It's not hard to understand why Renée Fleming loves this opera.  The only weakness lies in the plot.  What makes a human in the witch's description is that they can die and have a soul that lives on after them.  Rusalka doesn't care--she just wants to experience love.  We will assign the resulting foolishness to youth, perhaps.  It's a Czech fairy tale, and fairy tales frequently come out badly.

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Sacramento Opera and Philharmonic

I have tracked down the brochure for next season for the combined Opera and Philharmonic.  We have a lot more details.

August 11, 1:30, the Opera and Philharmonic will combine at Fairy Tale Town in William Land Park for the "Cat and Fiddle Music Festival."  Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf is one of the numbers in this family oriented concert.

Oct 19, 2:00 and 8:00, Community Center Theater, "Here to stay:  the Gershwin Experience" concert with Sylvia McNair, conducted by Michael Morgan.

Nov 22, 8:00, Crest Theater, International Stars of Opera Recital, Ruth Ann Swenson, soprano, Frank Lopardo, tenor, Mark Robson, piano.  This is what was meant by Una Sorpreso Lirico! 

January 11, 8:00, Community Center Theater, Michael Morgan conducts Brahms Variations on a Theme by Haydn, Stravinsky Firebird Suite and Daniel Bernard Roumain Woodbox Concerto.  Here's a short film of DBR playing an electric violin.



Feb 28, 8:00, and March 2, 2:00, CCT, Verdi's Il Trovatore.  Michael Morgan will conduct.  Leonora, Lisa Daltirus; Azucena, Tichina Vaughn; Manrico, Arnold Rawls; Count Di Luna, Marcus Jupither.

March 14, 8:00, The Assembly (1000 K st.), Violinist Rachel Barton Pine and cellist Mike Block will discuss the evolution of music from Bartok to Metalica.  This is a bold undertaking. 

April 5, 8:00, CCT, concert featureing Dvorak, Glazunov and John Williams.  Michael Morgan conducts and Rachel Barton Pine plays the Glazunov violin concerto.

June 21, 1:00 and 3:00; June 22 1:00 at Crocker Art Museum, Family opera to coincide with a Crocker exhibition.  Robert Xavier Rodriquez is the composer and the words "mariachi music" appear in the text.  I think this is just for fun.

I feel this represents a different perspective.

Pretty

Currently appearing at the Metropolitan Opera in Le Comte Ory is this South African soprano, Pretty Yende.  The New York Times says she is from Mpumalanga, while The Huffington Post says she "grew up in Cape Town."  Above she is singing the Song to the Moon from Rusalka.  And below is Come per me, sereno from La Sonnambula.



You can surely guess what I like about her.  She works at La Scala and is completely on top of her Italian style.  So far she is famous for falling flat on her face at the beginning of the first performance of Ory.  Remember, there is no bad publicity.

Cardiff

This woman, Valentina Naforniţă, has recently won the Cardiff singer of the world competition. Yes. She does seem to get it. Buona fortuna.

Here's another.

Rusalka

This should come as no surprise, but productions from Paris seem to focus on sex. That's fine for Alcina with Renée Fleming, Susan Graham and Natalie Dessay, since that's what Alcina is about--sex, not love. Men enchanted in various stages of undress seems quite sensible as well as entertaining. Incidentally, the cast of the House of Opera nude man Alcina is the same as the CD recommended in the New York Times Essential Library--Opera book. The singing on the video is excellent.

This DVD of Dvorak's Rusalka is also from Paris, and recasts the fairy tale into sexual terms. Instead of nude men, we have beds in every scene. As a water sprite Rusalka, it seems, doesn't long for the Prince so much as his bedroom, seen perched at the top of the set.

When the rival appears, the Prince alternates between two identical bedrooms. The story isn't very attractive when told this way. It effectively showcases Renée Fleming in her favorite role.
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