But his catalog is deep and not everything in it was one for the ages.  His only full length opera “The Tender Land,” which is currently playing at Glimmerglass Opera in Cooperstown, is a reminder that even the beloved Copland was a fallible human.

Outgoing Glimmerglass general manager Michael MacLeod made an admirable, if economic, decision in resurrecting the piece and casting it entirely with members of the company’s Young American Artist program.  Some 800 singers apply every year for the program, one of more prestigious in the field.  The chosen few – there were 38 this year – usually spend the better part of their summer playing small roles, singing in the chorus, and waiting in the wings as understudies.

This year they were in the spotlight.  Too bad that they didn’t get a better opera to sink their teeth into.

“The Tender Land” (1952) is a troublesome piece primarily because of a thin story and the lousy libretto by Horace Everett (the pen name of Copland’s younger lover Erik Johns).  It goes back and forth from mundane dialogue to attempts at poetry.  The characters often announce their feelings (rather than letting the music communicate them) and certain words just get ground into the ground with repetition (“Will you hire a stranger? Yes, I’ll hire a stranger. Hey, he’ll hire a stranger. Now I’m not a stranger. No, you’re not a stranger”)

The score does up plenty of familiar, comforting Americana, especially in the lush instrumental writing. Glimmerglass’ former music director Stewart Robertson returned to conduct and got a mostly sumptuous sound from the orchestra. Occasionally the singers were covered a bit while some thin passages felt a bit frail and unsure.

Director Tazewell Thompson went for simplicity, an appropriate choice for the homespun theme and single unit set. Too often, though, he just didn’t give the singers enough to do. Some sprightlier tempos from Robertson might have also helped move things along.

On the other hand, at the end of the first act there was so much going on – the women doing chores, the men packing their bags – that it detracted from the brief pleasures of “The Promise of Living,” one of the opera’s two popular choruses.  The other, “Stomp Your Foot,” could have used a real choreographer.

As the lead character Laurie, soprano Lindsay Russell sang beautifully and negotiated the emotional turns about as well as could be expected.  In three short acts she goes being a moody school girl to a jilted women ready to face the world on her own.

Tenor Andrew Stenson as Martin had a sweet romantic voice, but it wasn’t quiet big enough for the house.  His companion Top was played with more gusto by baritone Mark Diamond.  As the grandfather, Joseph Barron hit all the bass notes with plenty of volume, but his authoritative anger was unvaried.  Of the adult characters, mezzo-soprano Stephanie Foley Davis as the mother gave the most believable and well-rounded performance.

I arrived at Glimmerglass hoping for the best from “The Tender Land,” having good memories of production at Bard College’s SummerScape festival in 2005. But that performance was in an even more intimate theatre (about 150 seats as I recall) and of a chamber version arranged by Murray Sidlin, who added some of Copland’s “Old American Songs” into the score.  They added some welcome life to the score and gave the chorus more to do.  Bard’s production standards are also on a higher level than Glimmerglass lately.  The sets for both productions had tall grasses in the background, yet Bard’s stage was a quarter the size and yet had far more interesting structural aspects.

Another kind of Americana is in store next summer at Glimmerglass, during Francesca Zambello’s first summer as the boss. The news that opera star Deborah Voigt will sing the lead in “Annie Get Your Gun” is a huge sign of the company’s new direction. (Read the full announcement of the 2011 season here.)

A piece of American music seldom stays fresh, even surprising, to succeeding generations of audiences. Datedness sets in so quickly, while nostalgia takes a long time to show up.

George Crumb’s “Black Angels” is an exception.

Written almost 40 years ago during the height of the Vietnam War, “Black Angels” is scored for electric string quartet and is subtitled “Thirteen Images from the Dark Land.” The score is structured on theories of numerology and includes references to Schubert’s “Death and the Maiden” and the “Dies Irae” theme from Gregorian chant.

In 1972, Time magazine named the debut LP of “Black Angels” as “Avant Garde Record of the Year.” A CD recording by the Kronos Quartet made it a hit again in 1990. And this weekend, Bang on a Can places it as the centerpiece of a full day at MASS MoCA celebrating the music of George Crumb, who lives in West Virginia and turned 80 last fall.

Composer David Lang, a co-founder of Bang on a Can, will lead a discussion and performance of Crumb’s music in the afternoon. The evening event features performances of “Black Angels” as well as the trio, “Vox Balaenae” (voice of the whale) and a series of madrigals to poems of Federico Garcia Lorca. More than a concert, it will also include live video by Jim Findlay.

A New York City visual artist, filmmaker and performer, Findlay has worked extensively with Bang on a Can on various theatrical happenings and comes to the music of Crumb with a typical sense of wonder and excitement.

“This was music you could blow people’s heads off with,” says Findlay, recalling his first encounter with “Black Angels” during the early ’90s. “It’s classical music, with classical instrumentation and serious intent, but it wasn’t repetitive and had a level of noise and the aggressiveness that I could relate to. This was like rock with violins!”

The new project has allowed Findlay a wider exposure to Crumb’s music and its inherent theatricality. For example, Crumb’s score to “Vox Balaenae” says that the performers should wear masks and perform under blue lighting.

“We’re going take that one step further and make a full stage environment,” says Findlay. He’ll be controlling three video cameras during the performance, but adds that more specifics of the show will be worked out during the week prior to the performance, during Bang on a Can’s annual summer residency in the galleries of MASS MoCA.

Asked whether the war-resistance roots of “Black Angels” might come into play, Findlay turns to a more contemporary struggle.

“With ‘Vox Balaenae,’ I’m having trouble getting away from the BP disaster,” he says. “I’m creating this black-and-white world and think about oil and water and all the things that are dying. It’s the kind of topicality that in classic art is transferable, but it’s always better when the audience makes that connection themselves. I trust it’s in the music.”

Bang on a Can presents
George Crumb Celebration
Mass MoCA, North Adams, Mass
July 25, 2010

Bang on a Can is dedicated to the forefront of contemporary music but the organization is still respectful of its elders. Concerts have often featured music from way back in the 1980s.

Saturday night’s program at Mass MoCA was practically ancient history with five pieces dating from 1965 through 1971by George Crumb.  The American composer, who turned 80 last fall, helped create the musical avant garde and these works are full of what’s called extended instrumental techniques, like singing into the flute, bowing on the bridge of a double bass, and strumming on the inside of the piano.  Tuned wine goblets and occasional whispers and shouts from the players were also part of the mix.

Over the years such stuff has become rather cliched, especially in the hands of lesser composers.  Yet the whole program was performed with great dignity and professionalism by the 17 musicians. Most appeared to be in the early to mid-20s.

The pieces were mostly trios and quartets, yet there were no set changes nor breaks between pieces.  Jim Findlay organized the staging and from a corner of the stage he created a live video backdrop.  His grainy, black and white images were mostly close ups of various rotating objects. They lent a cool reverence to the proceedings.  The only technical flaw in the night was a persistent noise floor from the amplification system.

The most startling and varied piece was the string quartet “Black Angels.”  Apart from all that the players had to do, including play gongs and wine glasses, the piece also traversed a world of styles, including a couple of hushed but jolting references to early music.  Did Crumb foreshadow postmodernism?

The three female vocalists were especially impressive.  Mezzo Sonya Knussen and soprano Delea Shand soloed in what Crumb called his “Madrigals,” with Spanish poetry by Lorca.  Both singers maintained a dead-on surety of pitch and attractive tone. This was even while delivering some swooping and percussive vocal affects and performing with nontraditional accompaniments.

Also poised and accurate was Amanda DeBoer the soprano in “Lux Aeterna,” which was a surprisingly moving conclusion to the evening. The quintet included two percussionist who got a world of weird rattling sounds from their tympani and other apparatus.  There was also a guitarist and a bass flute player, who both sat on the floor.  The single image on the video was a candle flame.

Originally appeared in the Times Union.

“Nothing that I’m performing is notated. I’m letting the melody of the language guide me through the story,” says Bagby, who will accompany himself on a six-string Celtic harp. “I do all kinds of different things with my voice, sometimes speaking, sometimes singing, sometimes something in between — all the possibilities of the human voice.”

Like many, Bagby first encountered the medieval classic during high school. He grew up in a Chicago suburb and currently lives in Paris. He’s long been known as a respected figure in the early music movement, having founded the influential ensemble Sequentia some 32 years ago.

In 1990, Bagby was approached by the director of a festival in The Netherlands about creating an evening on “Beowulf.” He’s been obsessed with it ever since and has committed to memory a large chunk of the text in Old English.

At Tanglewood, he’ll offer approximately the first third of the epic poem. A translation into modern English will be projected on a screen behind him.

“No two performances are alike,” he says. That’s a statement that lots of musicians like to make and it could actually be said to be true for every performance. But it seems to be especially the case with Bagby’s “Beowulf.”

“It’s hard to practice this piece alone, and I surprise myself in performance all the time,” says Bagby. “I find myself doing something I wasn’t expecting, and I follow it and sometimes it takes me to a very different place.”

Bagby explains that he’s driven as much by the text as by his connection to the harp. He plays a replica of an instrument that dates from the seventh century.

“The tuning of the harp is the most complicated part,” he says. “There are indications of what the historical tunings were, but there were probably hundreds and every player had his own. It’s like the five-string banjo in Appalachian music. There’s no one tuning, and to the outsider it all seems like banjo music. But to those who really know modal mountain music, there are many different flavors.”

Like a modern troubadour, Bagby offers a fresh take on the classic tale in locales across the globe.

“I identify with the character of the storyteller, who keeps repeating variations on something that’s been heard before,” he says. “It’s like favorite bedtime stories, for children who want to hear it over and over gain. There’s comfort in the cadence and in reliving the feeling of when you first heard it.”

Yet “Beowulf” is also a grand adventure with monsters and violence. It can be discomforting to modern audiences.

“We think of being good Christian, hard-working community folk,” say Bagby. “But in the tribal times, our people were trying to kill other tribes and take away their stuff. That’s gang warfare. There were drive-by shootings but with swords.”

BEOWULF
Ozawa Hall, Tanglewood, Lenox Mass
July 21, 2010

“A sharp wit will be able to judge two things: words and work.”

That phrase, or something close to it, whizzed by sometime during the first hour or so of Benjamin Bagby’s “Beowulf.” The Wednesday night show in Tanglewood’s Ozawa Hall wasn’t so much a concert as an act of story telling and performance art.

There were lots of words spoken and sung, intoned, growled and shouted, and all in old English. Translations appeared on a screen above. There was also the more overarching form of the work, consisting of dramatic scenes and spontaneous semblances of songs. It was often difficult to keep up with the words while also appreciating Bagby’s vivid performance.

Bagby is gifted with a beautiful baritone voice and an innate acting ability.  He went seamlessly through a variety of moods and characters. A mouthy drunk was among the most memorable.  Even if we didn’t know the language being used, the slurred speech was obvious and familiar.

Bagby sat at a piano bench and accompanied himself on a six string harp. The instrument is about two feet tall and rested on his left hip. Its sound was surprisingly limited in both volume and color. But it still did the job of accompanying and punctuating the tale.  Most of the time Bagby plucked the strings in repeating patterns. Only during Beowulf’s battle with the monster Grendel did he let go into broad strums.

The evening covered approximately the first third of the entire Beowulf sage. According to the program, that’s 1,062 lines. Every one of them seemed to appear on the electronic board above the stage. Unlike supertitles in opera, which are often succinct summaries, these felt complete. Sometimes 25 words would fill the screen at a time and then go by in a flash.  Unlike at an opera or a foreign film, the mind also had to evoke an image to flesh out the story.

At the evening’s start, it felt like a lot of tedium was ahead, but Bagby swept us along. The best moments were when the story slipped away and the sole focus was his expressive face and remarkable voice.

When it was all said and done and Bagby rose to exit the stage, it was a wonder that so much power flowed out of such a relatively small man.

Originally appeared in the Times Union.

GLIMMERGLASS OPERA
Cooperstown, New York

PUCCINI: TOSCA
Friday, July 9, 2010 (opening night)

Big changes are underway at Glimmerglass Opera in Cooperstown, with a new general and artistic director waiting in the wings to take over in the fall.  The internationally known stage director Francesca Zambello plans an expanded array of events for next year when the whole enterprise will become known as The Glimmerglass Festival.

Yet the 2010 summer season got underway Friday night with the focus squarely on operatic tradition — in other words, lots of fine singing in a staple of the repertoire, Puccini’s “Tosca.”

Soprano Lise Lindstrom was marvelous in the lead.  She began the second act aria “Vissi d’arte” with a hint of bleating pain in her voice before a gathering strength for an upwards soar into beauty.  There’s some throaty vibrato in her midrange while her top notes are clear and true. Her entire interpretation was always ripe with emotion and immediacy.

Tenor Adam Diegel, as the painter Cavaradossi, had a consistently strong and pleasant sound, a hearty mix of chest and head voice.  Often he seemed to link together phrases into giant, superhuman breaths.  Early in the third act he stepped out of the shadows, both physically and vocally, rallying for a stunning display in “E lucevan le stelle.”

Despite a stout physicality, baritone Lester Lynch was less sturdy as the villainous Scarpia. He was great in the first act, as a kind of high priest setting up the tragic ritual. But when he wasn’t interjecting taunts or barking orders, he paled a bit, especially in the longer solo passages. At points in the second act arguments with Tosca, his sound was almost completely covered.

Music director David Angus had the orchestra in tight form from the opening brass chords and the score ticked along with order and clarity most of the time.  The cellos were mighty sour, though, in the third act.

Donald Eastman’s set for the opening church scene positioned the Virgin Mary on stage right opposite the in-progress painting of a blond Mary Magdalene. It spoke about the opera’s balance of quiet piety and uncontrollable human urges.  For the balance of the night the icons slipped away but the basic structures stayed.  It was all moody and economical, but not obviously cheap either.

Last fall the Met got into trouble with a daring new staging of this classic. Glimmerglass seemed to know better.  After Tosca slays Scarpia, she followed tradition and put candles on either side of his corpse. For a crucifix, she yanked the chain off her neck.

MOZART: THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO
Saturday, July 17, 2010 (opening night)

Everyone wants a wedding to go smoothly, but a good opera needs a few bumps along the way.  Glimmerglass Opera’s new production of “The Marriage of Figaro,” which opened Saturday night, is just too polished and plain.

The director was Leon Major, whose last effort for the company was “Barber of Seville,” a similarly by-the-book production in 2006.  For all the reversals and surprises, romance and pathos packed into these Beaumarchais masterpieces, Major doesn’t seem to get much action on the stage.

Sure, there were still plenty of laughs, like when Cherubino hides out in the parlor, quaking beneath a sheet. But when the carefree boy is told he’ll be joining the army, it doesn’t seem to come as news.  There are lots of other passages, especially in the first two acts, that are more broad than immediate. The big third act arias by the count and countess — nicely sung by bass-baritone Mark Schnaible and soprano Caitlin Lynch, respectively — are of the “sit and sing” variety.

A good wedding also needs the colors of celebration but the stage picture in “Figaro” is drab.  Matthew Pachtman’s costumes were an instant bore. Nearly every performer wears a washed out variation on beige or a tiny floral print.

Set designer Donald Eastman was given a tough task, and presumably little budget, to do the sets for all four of the company’s current productions.  For “Figaro” the walls are a chestnutty wood grain into which the performers mostly disappear.  Jeff Harris’ contributions with lighting were negligible.

The fourth act is traditionally a hide and seek in the night time garden but instead we’re in the barn yard. Rather than peeking out from behind trees, the characters climb up, down and around an ugly old wagon that seems ready to collapse. The fine soprano Lyubov Petrova as Susanna sang an entire aria stretched out at an awkward position on its sloped bench.  And where did the characters find flashlights, by the way, since everything else in the production suggested the 19th century?

Patrick Carfizzi was a hearty and likeable Figaro. But like the rest of the cast, he didn’t seem to let emotions arrive into his voice until after intermission.  Too often, the quality of the singing was all the same, pleasant but not infused with much wonder or excitement, fear or anger.

The most consistent and expressive contribution of the evening came from the orchestra, conducted by music director David Angus.  He’s got them in fine shape and has a reliable hand with pacing.

HANDEL: TOLOMEO
Sunday, July 18, 2010 (opening performance)

During the first bars of Handel’s “Tolomeo,” which opened Sunday afternoon at Glimmerglass Opera, the boyish countertenor Anthony Costanzo is meditating on the currents of his life while gazing at a little fishbowl.  He sings full out to the audience with a beautiful voice ripe with emotion.

Soon a full-sized swordfish floats into the blue lighting above.  The audience’s laugher comes hesitantly but the message is clear: traditional notions of opera staging would be absent for the rest of the afternoon.

The new production marks the U.S. staged debut of “Tolomeo.” Just a few decades ago Handel’s many operas languished. The thinking was that their structures were just too far-removed from modern conventions. But Glimmerglass has contributed regularly to the composer’s revival, offering seven other Handel operas in the past 15 years.

Certainly the composer is an acquired taste in the theater.  Not that his rippling melodies are hard to like, but the constant alternation between recitative and small arias takes some getting used to.

It also calls for creative thinking.  Director Chas Rader-Shieber and the rest of the production team for “Tolomeo” let their imaginations run freely.  There’s lots of whimsy, along with one or two hair-brained ideas. Happily, it’s a long way from the company’s disastrous “L’Orfeo,” which still leaves a bad taste in the mouth after three years.

This is one modern staging that smartly adheres to images and comic notions in the libretto, rather than suggesting its own. Best of all, the talented young cast isn’t hampered from focusing on singing, which they do almost uniformly well.  They keep rather busy, though, managing crazy props and sporting outlandish costumes by Andrea Hood.

Mezzo-soprano Julie Boulianne (last year’s lead in “La Cenerentola”) has a wig that looks like it’s made of red and black kitchen scrubbies. In an aria about morning doves, she lifts a bird off the dinner table and serenades it.

There’s also an aviary theme around Seleuce, played by the fair soprano Joelle Harvey. When she sings about captive love, a large birdcage lowers around her head.

The strapping baritone Steven LaBrie, a member of Glimmerglass’ young artist program, wears a maroon pimp suit with fur lapels.

A regular presence are three hunchbacked supernumeraries in powdered wigs who move large props at geriatric speed.  Sometimes they distract from a nice aria.

Robert Wierzel’s lighting bathes everything in an elegant glow and conductor Christian Curnyn’s orchestra is crisp and efficient.

Originally appeared in the Times Union.

Photos courtesy Glimmerglass Opera.

NEW YORK CITY BALLET
SARATOGA PERFORMING ARTS CENTER

TUESDAY JULY 6, 2010
“All American”
Fancy Free (Robbins/Bernstein)
Red Angels (Dove/Einhorn)
Barber Violin Concerto (Martins/Barber)
Who Cares (Balanchine/Gershwin)

With a roll of the snare drum and a cartwheel by a dancer, the New York City Ballet’s summer season got off to a fast start.  Tuesday night’s program at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center opened with “Fancy Free” the loveable 1944 tale of three sailors in a hurry to have some fun.  Played with ample swagger by Tyler Angle, Joaquin De Luz and Amar Ramasar, they set the bravura tone for the entire night.

Ballet master in chief Peter Martins said in a curtain speech (which has become a hallmark of the Marcia White era) that because it was still, almost, the Fourth of July weekend he had decided to go all-American.

That theme allowed for plenty of diversity.

After the first intermission came “Red Angels,” the seldom seen 1994 creation by Ulysses Dove.  The late choreographer’s roots in modern dance showed through in every angular pose and rippling undulation by the four dancers in red leotards. Tight overhead spotlights kept them from getting lost in the same red lighting that filled the stage.  Richard Einhorn’s score resembled drums and rock guitar, but it all came from an electric violin, played by Cenovia Cummins.

Modern and ballet styles were put in more sharp relief in Peter Martin’s Barber Violin Concerto.  Sara Mearns and Charles Askegard represented proper tradition, while Megan Fairchild and Jared Angle danced barefoot.  Though neither pair began their partnering work very smoothly, the soaring music infused everything with some meaning and purpose.

Despite the title and light Gershwin score, Balanchine’s “Who Cares?” (the finale) allowed for plenty of serious dancing, especially from its three ballerinas. Sterling Hyltin had a deceptive grace and ease, especially in contrast to the more composed, if not pent up, Ana Sophia Scheller, though her fouette turns flowed with easy dispatch.

If there was a star of the night, it was Tiler Peck, who joined the company just five and a half years ago and was named a principal during the fall.  In “Fancy Free,” she acted as the easy-going all-American girl.  During “The Man I Love” in “Who Cares,” she moved with a larger than life confidence yet was still seductive and alluring.  Later she seemed to create her own rhythmic field, projecting the idea of speed or the halting of time without ever falling out of synch with Balanchine’s larger universe.

WEDNESDAY JULY 7, 2010
A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Balanchine/Mendelssohn)

The latest evidence that local ballet lovers are a hearty and dedicated lot came Wednesday night at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center. It was the second night of the New York City Ballet’s two-week run. Despite a sweltering heat wave, a stunning crowd showed up to view Balanchine’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

The audience, numbering 3,150, was more than twice as large as on opening night.  One wonders how many more might have showed up on a more temperate evening.

Perhaps nostalgia was the draw since “Midsummer” was the piece that opened SPAC way back in 1966.  Certainly the company still does well by the piece. Its mix of magic and comedy was in splendid order.

Heading the cast was Maria Kowroski as a mercurial Titania.  Upon her first grand entrance, she and Oberon have a quarrel that’s mostly played out in mime.  Her first real dancing comes with a cavalier, played by Charles Askegard.  Though Kowroski’s extensions were as straight and long as the horizon, she was stiff and cold.  But just a short while later in a segment danced with her retinue of 12 ladies, this Titania was as flowing and curvaceous as her clamshell throne.

In the human/animal pas de deux with Bottom, portrayed by Henry Seth, Kowroski had a fine mix of tenderness and exactness. Nevertheless, the donkey’s mugs toward the audience always steal the attention.

Kowroski could be at least half a foot taller than Joaquin de Luz, but his regal Oberon had stature to spare. It came not just from his thrust chin and trademark profile.  He threw back his shoulders to stride across the stage and during one jump after another he executed beats with clarity and force.

Adam Hendrickson had plenty of jumps as well, but his usually contained a silly kind of mid-air jog.  When he was more earthbound, he still moved at quiet a pace, mostly making mischief or escaping Oberon’s wrath.

The second act’s divertissements are anchored by one long pas de deux and Wendy Whelan was a studied but sweeping line of smooth elegance.

The adorable fairies and fireflies that darted around through both acts were played by children enrolled at the School of American Ballet.

Maybe the heat did have one ill effect on the night. Facal Karoui’s orchestra seemed to be going through the motions during the overture. Throughout the second act, the strings and brass suffered intonation problems.

SATURDAY JULY 10, 2010
THE BALLET GALA
Namouna (Ratmansky/Lalo)
Estancia (Wheeldon/Ginastera)

The two large scale works on Saturday night’s New York City Ballet Gala at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center may have been unfamiliar, but they were plenty easy to like.  Alexei Ratmansky’s “Namouna” and Christopher Wheeldon’s “Estancia” were cherry picked from the spring season at Lincoln Center, which featured five other premieres.

A brief video about architect Santiago Calatrava’s involvement as designer came after intermission and made one long to see the grander sets and more abstract dances.  Considerations of economics and portability surely went into the selections of the pieces by Ratmansky and Wheeldon, both of whom are becoming familiar names to upstate audiences.

“Namouna” was an hour-long romp set to a lively score by Edouard Lalo.  The buoyant and fresh faced Robert Fairchild was its center piece, wearing a sailor’s top with white knee-length pants. Otherwise Marc Happel’s costumes were a mix of old fashioned bathing suits and caps, pleated flapper dresses and shiny space-age leotards.

It wouldn’t have come as a surprise if the men in the corps had strapped on jet packs.  Daniel Ulbricht and two female partners wore bronze and floated in and out of the proceedings like a dirigible.  Jenifer Ringer made smoking a cigarette almost sexy.

It was as much fun applying some narrative ideas to the random bits as it was trying to catch the many references to other dances and slices of cultural lore.  “Swan Lake” was evoked with the endless opening procession of ballerinas from stage left and the cigarette chorus brought to mind “Carmen.”  A stage full of women doing unison abdominal contractions felt like a class in the Martha Graham technique.

In her lofty arched solo Sara Mearns could have been Norma Desmond.  But in Wendy Whelan’s typically poised and controlled pas de deux with Fairchild, she was nothing other than the perfect Wendy Whelan.

With little set up Wheeldon’s “Estancia” deposits the city slicker Tyler Angle amidst country folk and live stock on an Argentinean ranch.  Tiler Peck was more of a pretty girl than a tomboy and gets won over soon enough.  Andrew Veyette leads a herd of four fillies. They stomp and strut about, wearing heavy brown costumes and manes that resemble overgrown Mohawks.

It was all a little earthbound and muted, thanks in part to a color palette set by Calatrava’s painted backdrop.  But the festive conclusion features the horses in stagecoach formation and bright bandanas tossed in the air.

Originally appeared in the Times Union.

All photos: Paul Kolnik, New York City Ballet

Arenas died of AIDS in 1990 at age 47 and the epidemic still seems potent material for musical exploration.  Just two years ago the Fort Worth Opera mounted the operatic version of “Angels in America.”   But AIDS is almost a minor topic in the new three hour-long work.  Freedom — artistic and sexual — is the more dominate theme.

From his bed Arenas pleads for his two muses, played by sopranos in glittery ball gowns and beehive hairdos, to take him back to his youth.  Soon he’s cavorting on the beaches of Cuba and we follow his entanglement in revolutionary politics, pursuit of love and companionship, and achievement of international fame with the overseas publication of his visionary writing.

The young baritone Wes Mason played Arenas with remarkable vocal stamina and  physical dexterity to give a vivid portrait of the character’s playful creativity and steely constitution.  The singing quality of the mostly young supporting cast, though, was very uneven.   Bass-baritone Seth Mease Carico played the revolutionary officer Victor with terrific strength and clarity and Jesus Garcia, as a fellow writer, was suitable though a bit anonymous.  Tenor Jonathan Blalock, as one of Arenas’s lovers, sang with a reedy, disembodied voice and soprano Janice Hall’s one scene as the mother was just unpleasant.   A hearty chorus of about 30 was dispatched as a militant band in the first half and disco revelers near the end.

The Manhattan and Cuban locales were evoked by projections on various scrims, which after a while gave the production a weightless, floating quality.  Riccardo Hernandez was credited with scenic design and Peter Nigrini with projections.  Maybe they intended their imagery to foreshadow Arenas’ troubled life, but the beach scenes always had a heavily clouded sky and overly bluish cast.   The stage of Bass Hall also just felt too big for the piece, with many performers exiting with long dashes into the wings.  The two all male dance numbers by choreographer John de los Santos were acrobatic, choppy, and rigid, while the narrative and Martin’s lush scoring called for sensuality and seduction.

There’s plenty of Latin dance rhythms throughout and overall the opera’s pacing is quick with lots of short scenes that keep things moving. Martin’s orchestration is traditional but sometimes daringly light and understated.  Some pivotal choruses and ensembles were performed a capella.

The composer made his own libretto with assistance from Dolores M. Koch, who was a translator of Arenas’ writings.  Too often they have the characters announcing their feelings rather then trusting the music to communicate the emotions.  But in a rare accomplishment, almost every word is intelligible — a testament to both the singers and Martin’s skill at setting text.  The supertitles, by the way, provided the English lyrics as well as a Spanish translation.

A beautiful tune comes in the first act when Arenas and a lover sing, “Oh, our unhappy island, when will your troubles be done?”  Near the end of the show, the emotional and political themes come together in the line: “My death notice came not from a tyrant but from my lovers.”

The opera itself seems bolder in its handling of gay content than does the production by director David Gately.  When Arenas applies for sanctuary in the U.S., he’s harshly questioned about his sexuality — even asked by an official if he’s a top or a bottom and ordered to swish about to prove he’s a fag.  (As if his hip huggers and loud flowered shirt weren’t enough.) It was an awkward and painful moment to watch but not unbelievable either.

So why did the Fort Worth audience laugh?  There was nothing particularly campy or clownish in Mason’s movement and his face communicated shame.  Giving the audience the benefit of the doubt, perhaps it was a collective discomfort that came out as a chuckle.

Such powerful material in the libretto and score only highlighted the contrast to the staging, which played it safe with gay sensuality.  There were only two male-to-male kisses in the entire production. Both were pecks on Arena’s forehead, more motherly than passionate. And then there were those stiff dance numbers, with the men knocking against each other almost like football players.

It’s difficult categorizing the new disc “Three Fervent Travelers” from the young string trio

Time for Three is made up of violinists Zachary De Pue and Nick Kendall and bassist Ranaan Meyer.  They started improvising together in the halls of the Curtis Institute about eight years ago and have given hundreds of concerts across the country.  In New York’s Capital Region, they’ve appeared several time at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center, most recently with the Philadelphia Orchestra a blue grass-infused concerto written for them by Jennifer Higdon who got to know them in their days at Curtis (and who won the Pulitzer Prize in April).

(8/23/08 Times Union review)

American vernacular styles dominate the new disc, which concludes with two popular cuts: Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” followed by “The Orange Blossom Special.” The remaining selections are all original, with writing credits mostly going to Meyer. Whatever the source material though, everything seems to emerge from a quick-thinking improvisational style.   What’s more, the lively string playing is so rich and sophisticated that there’s no mistaking it for back roads hillbilly music.

“Three Fervent Travelers” is further evidence of a fresh new strain of American classical music that’s already occupied by Mark O’Connor and Daniel Bernard Roumain.  I can’t decide which is more invigorating — the griping quasi-improvised music of these artists or the fact that they’re connecting with audiences.  Just keep it coming.

The massive scale and varied themes of Melville’s classic novel have flummoxed many who’ve tried their hands at creative adaptations.  But Gene Schere’s libretto telescopes the drama to a handful of characters and the opera is a pretty good show, thanks especially to the work of director Leonard Foglia and scenic designer Robert Brill.

Most memorable are the projections which feature stars, maps and compasses, various views of ships large and small, plus lots and lots of water. We never see the whale.  Ropes and metal scaffolding often fill the proscenium and a few too many arias and duets are delivered from precarious heights above the stage as the singers grab tight to the ironwork, holding on for their lives.  The back wall slopes downward into the main playing area like a giant slide.  When ships crash, supernumeraries spill down it as if splashing into the water.

For much of the first act, which runs almost two hours, Heggie’s score surges like the sea with constant rhythmic life.  The music is always pleasant and tuneful and has some imaginative orchestral touches, such as the sound of whale’s spout created by a trumpet blown without a mouthpiece. The second act begins with a lively sea chanty.  But over all the opera floates on a shallow ocean.  There’s never much undercurrent to the orchestral writing nor much counterpoint to be found, even in the vocal parts despite plenty of ensemble numbers.

Star tenor Ben Hepner in the lead role of Captain Ahab deserves credit just for managing that peg leg.  He’s a hulking authoritative presence with a knitted brow, but certainly not any kind of menacing embodiment of evil. One wonders if he’d command so much stage attention if he wasn’t spotlighted all the time.  Musically the role has lots of melismatic lines, which Hepner sings with a rather unvaried mezzo-forte dynamic, until one hushed and arresting duet. That comes midway through the second act with baritone Morgan Smith, who has an attractive emotional and dynamic range and is the best of the supporting cast.

The other characters, always in Ahab’s orbit, are officers and sailors and one cabin boy played with style by the sole female in the cast, soprano Talise Travigne. The cast also includes bass Jonathan Lemalu as Queequeg, a quasi-shamanic figure, and tenor Stephen Costello as the introspective and troubled Greenhorn.  They all get a little stir crazy and seemingly every aria and scene ends with religious exhortation. The all-male environment, combined with the regular references to Christian values, makes the Pequod feel like a monastery on the water.

The large orchestra was conducted by Patrick Summer and played with surety and ease.  The acoustics of the 2,200-seat Winspear Opera House are proving to be a curious, however.  From a seat near the rear of the orchestral level, the sound of the instrumental ensemble seemed capped and distance.  Snatching seats on the fifth row after intermission solved that problem. But most of the theatrical tricks in “Moby Dick” came in the first half and a few too many introspective arias made the second act slow and disappointing, even if Ahab did finally spot that big white whale.

Tchaikovsky Spectacular
Albany Symphony Orchestra, David Alan Miller, conductor
with Joshua Roman, cello
Palace Theatre, Albany, NY
April 23, 2010

Spectacular. Advertising copywriters often use that adjective to describe concerts of Tchaikovsky, especially when his 1812 Overture is performed, with or without real cannons.

The Albany Symphony Orchestra’s “Tchaikovsky Spectacular” Friday night at the Palace Theatre didn’t emphasize booming spectacle.  Instead, it earned the critique of spectacular for the outstanding level of musical execution and deep emotional impact.

The Symphony No. 6 “Pathetique” was a tour de force for massed forces that burst to life in the glittering waltz and climaxed in the striding march. As always, that third movement was so convincing as a grand finale that much of the audience broke into applause. But the heart of the piece was still to come in the wrenching final Adagio.  At its conclusion, when conductor David Alan Miller left the podium, he looked flushed and somber. He was also drenched, though it was hard to tell if it was just from sweat, or maybe a few tears were mixed in to the flow.

For the first time in memory, Miller walked amongst the orchestra, thanking and congratulating his players while the audience cheered.

Through the symphony’s many mood swings, there was a consistent and admirable attention to subtle levels of dynamics and clarity of textures.  To get there must have taken study and discipline in rehearsal, but everything came off fluid and organic.

Equally satisfying yet a world away in sentiment was the light and frothy Rococo Variations, featuring the 26 year-old cellist Joshua Roman. Though a flirtatious presence, with a sly grin and darting, mischievous eyes, he was no mere showboat. Roman’s playing was lean and exacting, yet delivered with an off the cuff ease.  His combination of charming personality and utter musicality should take him far.

The concert opened with a handsome performance of the March Slave followed by the final movement of the Orchestral Suite No. 3. The latter, structured as a series of variations, is a kind of catalog of Tchaikovsky’s trademark gestures and brilliant orchestration techniques. A highlight of the performance was a solo by concertmaster Jill Levy that began with startling muscle and verve before easing into a lyric serenade.

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Jeremy Denk, piano
Union College Concert Series, Schenectady, NY
April 24, 2010

Before he launched into his daring and demanding piano recital Saturday night at Union College, Jeremy Denk revealed his way with words, describing the evening’s program as “beauty and the beast.” It was an apt, if not wholly original title for the juxtaposition of monumental works by Ives and Bach.

The beastliness came first, with Ives’ Piano Sonata No. 1.  Though one of the lesser known works of America’s first musical iconoclast, the 1909 composition still has all of Ives’ trademark elements.  It’s built of rough-hewn planks of sound interspersed with airy spaciousness. Such rarified material clearly appeals to Denk, who gave us the better known and more elegantly structured Second Sonata (“Concord”) in his series debut, back in December 2007.

His performance was a balance of muscle and grace and an undeniable feat.  But after playing some of the piece’s hymn tunes during his opening talk — including “What A Friend We Have In Jesus” — it was a little surprising that Denk didn’t bring them out a bit more in his interpretation.  Instead, the most playful and lyric elements were when Ives puts fragments of ragtime into a jagged loop.

The overall effect brought to mind an expressionist painting, particularly the splashes of Jackson Pollock.  Imagine another artist trying to recreate one of those canvases and you’ll have an idea of the task that Denk laid out for himself.

After intermission came Bach’s Goldberg Variations, beauty personified for a full hour.  Sports analogies aren’t a favorite, yet it felt like Denk went from traversing treacherous mountains and valleys in the Ives to running a long marathon on country roads with the Bach.  Endurance and focus were key.

Once in a while though, you could identify footprints of the same interpreter.  He’d highlight bits of mild dissonance through judicious use of the pedal, or emphasize a strong bass line.  In one of the later variations, he snapped the release of chords for an arresting effect.

Denk raced through many of the variations with dizzying speed and stunning cross-hand technique. He seemed in rapture the whole way through.

ALBANY SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
Troy Savings Bank Music Hall
March 26, 2010

Music director David Alan Miller and the Albany Symphony Orchestra have made a virtue out of performing lots of new little works by emerging composers. Eager for the opportunity, the youngsters gladly take the modest commissions and write under tight deadlines. The results are usually diverting and forgettable.

A substantial new three-year grant from the Mellon Foundation has allowed the ASO to start bringing in some heavier guns. Next year John Corigliano will be on hand twice and this past week John Harbison was in town for the first of two springtime visits.

In Friday night’s program at the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall, titled “John Harbison & Friends,” the 71-year old composer’s Symphony No. 4 stood tall alongside works of Copland and Haydn.  Cast in five moments and lasting about half an hour, it was substantial, rich and assured.

Though prone to thick and dark orchestral textures, Harbison also has a keen dramatic flair.  A heavy sound dominated the opening movement and yet its constant rhythmic pulse skipped around like a child in a meadow. A similar contrast came in the intermezzo, which alternated between gliding strings and light percussion.

The symphony elicited a fine performance especially from the expanded string choir, which was both supple and meaty.  The work is being recorded for release with Harbison’s “Great Gatsby” Suite, coming up in May.

Twenty-five year old composer Timothy Andres introduced his new piece “Look Around You” as a “double concerto but for only one player.”  Soloist Owen Dalby performed on both violin and viola, though somehow there didn’t seem to be that much difference in sound or character between the two instruments.  For long stretches Andres had the orchestra simply sustain chords. Except for a few exposed figures for violin that brought to mind a country fiddle, the solo writing was busy yet indistinct, something like treading water.

Let it not be said that young composers should be written off.  Copland was 25 when he wrote “Music for the Theatre,” the charming masterwork that opened the program.  The woodwinds and brass delivered with appropriate sass, though there were occasional smudges of the larger ensemble in the trickier rhythmic passages.

Haydn’s Symphony No. 82 “The Bear” arrived at the evening’s conclusion like a cool fresh breeze. During the gently shifting currents of the Allegretto, Harbison’s more forceful play with textures and accents came to mind.

MUSIC OF HELMUT LACHENMANN
Jack Quartet, Signal Ensemble
EMPAC, RPI, Troy
March 27, 2010

The avant garde is alive and well. Helmut Lachenmann came to town to prove it.

On Saturday night at EMPAC, a retrospective concert of music by the 74-year old German composer included a couple of solo works, a string quartet and a nearly half-hour long piece for 24 players. Yet what the evening mostly consisted of was delicate and explosive sounds produced by weird instrumental techniques.

It’s a language that most American composers retreated from about 25 years ago, something like timid Democratic politicians trying to be popular and conservative.  Yet in Europe, liberalism — with music, as well as policy — is no vice.  Interestingly, it was young American musicians who performed the entire concert, always with seriousness and passion.

Most everything the program had in store was revealed in the short opening work, “Pression” from 1969.  Cellist Lauren Radnofsky’s first sounds were of her fingers sliding up and down the strings.  Once her bow was utilized, she held it tight with two hands and dragged it upward toward the neck.

The String Quartet No. 2 (1989), played with delicacy and poise by the Jack Quartet, goes further with all manner of effects, including bowing on the edge of the instruments, tapping the strings with the butt of the bow, and strumming with guitar picks.  In this piece, Lachenmann wasn’t so hyperactive with form. Instead of rapidly jumping from one sound world to the next, he lingered long enough to allow the novelty of an effect to wear off and its acoustic properties to settle in the ear and the mind.  The few times a full-bodied chord arrived, it made one realize what a luxurious bath of sound typical concerts really are.

The composer himself performed “Ein Kinderspiel,” a set of seven character pieces for piano. Like the children’s pieces of Bartok, these were intimate distillations of a mature style, sprinkled with syncopated rhythms and playful tone painting.

After intermission Bradley Lubman led the Signal Ensemble in “…Zwei Gefuhle,” which had the composer reciting a bit of da Vinci’s journal over the rumblings and bursting sounds of a large ensemble.  By this point, things felt pretty over wrought, especially when the musicians started having verbal outbursts.

One couldn’t help but keep an eye on the grand piano. Shortly into the piece, there was one player toiling at the keyboard but another with a firm grip on the lid – suggesting it wound be slammed down at any moment.  Instead, it was rapidly swung opened and closed, causing huge waves of sound.

BROOKLYN RIDER
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Union College, Schenectady

The statistics aren’t available, but it’s probably a fair estimate that the Debussy String Quartet has been performed at least a dozen times in the 38-year history of the Union College Concert Series.  It’s also no exaggeration to say that it never sounded the way it did Sunday afternoon when it was performed by the ensemble known as Brooklyn Rider.

The young male players, who are regulars with Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble, attacked the music with an urgency and gusto, not the reverent embrace that French impressionism usually gets.  Yet it wasn’t really the performance that made Debussy’s 1893 piece seem so new and fresh. The context within the concert is what did the trick.

Instead of highlighting the novelty of a familiar work by playing it at the end of a historical progression, the Brooklyn Rider went backward in time.  Everything else on the program was written in the last decade, except a John Cage piece from 1948.

First up was “Achille’s Heel” by 31-year old Colin Jacobsen, one of the Brooklyn Rider’s violinists.  It was a young musician’s stream of consciousness, an amalgam of country, blue grass, rock and jazz with lots of flashy string licks.

“…al niente” (to nothing) by Uzbekistan composer Dmitri Yanov-Yanovsky had a bit more going on than its title implies.  Like cracks in a picture window, a pervasive haze of sound was splintered over and again by harsh jagged lines from the solo strings.

The program note for Italian composer Giovanni Sollima’s “Federico II” suggested it would evoke the medieval court of the Italian ruler.  But the music actually occupied similar ground to Jacobsen’s piece.  There was the same steady pulse, though with a bit more melody from folk-like tunes.

After intermission came Cage’s piano work “In a Landscape,” in a beautiful arrangement by Justin Messina. The players passed back and forth short melodic runs for a lush and tuneful meditation.

Each piece in this odd batch settled comfortably into its own groove. Call it “solid state” music, if you like. It would be easy to say that rock and minimalism fostered the Brooklyn Rider’s taste for such fare. But then, along came the Debussy, which worked the same way.  And Debussy got the idea from Indonesian gamelan music.

The faithful and discerning Union College audience acknowledged the music and fine players with enthusiasm. There was even a holler or two for the encore, Jacobsen’s lively arrangement of a Persian folk song called “Ascending Birds.”

Reviews originally appeared in the Times Union.