The Chicago Symphony Orchestra recently released its next season, and I believe it is probably the most dynamic and varied season we have seen in recent memory. The season is focusing on the three conductors that make up the universe of excellence at the CSO: Bernard Haitink, who will be leaving us after this season, Riccardo Muti, who will take over in the 2010/2011 season, and Pierre Boulez, the symphony’s conductor emeritus who will be celebrating his 85th birthday. Surrounding these three gentlemen are no less than 23 guest conductors, representing virtually every conductor of note in the world. Combine that with exceptional soloists, new commissions and interesting repertoire choices, I am pretty excited about the new year in Chicago.

First things first. It must be stated that Chicago likes its music on the conservative side. We certainly are no slouch in promoting new music, and the CSO has a whole series of concerts called MusicNOW that are led by the two composers-in-residence, Osvaldo Golijov and Mark-Anthony Turnage, but you won’t find a lot of it on the main stage. It should come as no surprise then that Haitink will be focusing on the Germans in his final stint here, and Muti is presenting his version of the German canon as well. Haitink has always been known as a great interpreter of the Germanic tradition, whether Bruckner, Mahler, Brahms or Beethoven. During the course of his tenure here, he has conducted all of them, and so it is fitting that Haitink’s leadership in Chicago will culminate with a three-week celebration of Haitink and Ludwig van Beethoven. He will conduct all nine symphonies during the course of three weeks, together with the Leonore overtures and Calm Sea & Prosperous Voyage. Muti is here for a short while and will conduct a Bruckner symphony (I’m sure to allay the fears of conservative Chicagoans who question his chops) and four performances of Brahms’ A German Requiem. He had a runaway success with the Verdi Requiem this season, so it seems fitting to continue with the Brahms. Taken together, you can see that the orchestra isn’t breaking new ground with our principal conductors. Fortunately, Boulez and our guests will scratch that itch nicely.

Pierre Boulez will be celebrated in a month-long series of concerts, some led by him, others in honor of him. He will conduct performances of Bartok’s Bluebeard’s Castle and his concerto for two pianos, percussion and orchestra. He will also lead performances of his own composition, Livre pour cordes, as well as a flute concerto by Marc-André Dalbavie. David Robertson will conduct a concert in honor of the composer/conductor, featuring works by composers associated with Boulez: Stravinsky, Berg and Messiaen. The Symphony has also commissioned two new works for the season: James Primosch’s Songs for Adam with baritone Brian Mulligan and Dmitri Yanov-Yanovsky’s Cello Concerto performed by Yo-Yo Ma. In another example of old and new, Passion Week at Orchestra Hall will feature performances of Bach’s St. John Passion with Golijov’s St. Mark Passion, a sensational double-header.

The list of guest conductors is stunning for this season. Here they all are: Roberto Abbado, Semyon Bychkov, Sir Andrew Davis, Christoph von Dohnányi, Charles Dutoit, Sir Mark Elder, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, Paavo Järvi, Vladimir Jurowski, Nicholas Kraemer, Bernard Labadie, Ludovic Morlot, Gianandrea Noseda, Peter Oundjian, Trevor Pinnock, Alexander Polianichko, Carlos Miguel Prieto, David Robertson, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Robert Spano, Markus Stenz, Michael Tilson Thomas, Mitsuko Uchida and John Williams. These conductors are mostly responsible for introducing the symphony to works they have never played, like Harrison Birtwistle’s Night’s Black Bird; Ruth Crawford Seeger’s Andante for Strings; Kaija Saariaho’s Orion; Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending; Ligeti’s Violin Concerto; and Martinů’s Frescoes of Piero della Francesca. Igor Stravinsky is especially well represented, with performances of his Rite of Spring, Dumbarton Oaks Concerto, Concerto for Piano & Wind Instruments, the ballet Agon, and his rarely performed oratorio Oedipus Rex. The ballet and oratorio are both led by Michael Tilson Thomas, and that is truly a highlight for me.

Taken all together, the 2009/2010 season is one of the greatest we have had in recent memory and one of the most interesting and compelling of any orchestra in the United States. Feel free to take a trip to Chicago. Come for the orchestra, stay for the opera. The Lyric Opera has a nice, well-rounded season planned as well.

Erwartung and Blue Beard’s Castle open at the Seattle Opera.  Both are rarely performed, Schoenberg’s monodrama more so than Bartok’s traversal of concealed horrors.

Yuri Bashmet and the Moscow Soloist Chamber Orchestra is in town tomorrow night for a “crossover concerto.”  These classical musicians are joined by Russia’s leading jazz musician Igor Butman.  Many of the composers on the program are familiar names – Rachmaninov, Bach, Tchaikovsky.  What is unknown is how these pieces translate in the versions arranged by by Igor Butman.

The Russian Chamber Music Foundation of Seattle has their second Winter Nights concert tomorrow.  Borodin’s Quartet No.2 for two violins, viola, and cello along with Rachmaninov’s Sonata for Cello and Piano anchor the program.

What does she command? Your attention. From the very first notes, there’s such authority, such security to Angela Hewitt’s playing that immediately you are riveted to what she is doing. When it’s Bach, as it was Tuesday at Meany Theater in the English Suite No. 6,  it’s also straightway imbued with a sense of rightness. Bach was a master of structure and organization, and this Hewitt brings to the fore at the same time as she is illuminating the richness of Bach’s ideas. She’s a thinker. The pauses in her playing, the phrasing, the dynamics are all a coherent part of a persuasive musical interpretation of Bach’s intention, her playing profound, somber, exciting, at times fiery.

At the same time, there’s an irresistible forward motion to everything she plays. It was there in each work on the program, sometimes dancing, sometimes sedate, sometimes headlong, but always moving.

The first half of the concert was German: Bach, then Beethoven. The second half was French: Faure and Ravel.

Hewitt appropriately brought an early classical approach to Beethoven’s Sonata in F Major, Op. 10, No. 2, written at the end of the 18^th century when the piano was still in its infancy. At the same time, her view demonstrated how far ahead of his time Beethoven was, and it’s amazing to wonder how on earth he could even imagine, let alone get the kinds of effects he did from that instrument at that date.  Hewitt is not a showy fireworks player herself, but the Beethoven under her fingers reveals the drama, the contrasts, the thrilling results in his music when it’s played as she does. There were a few wrong notes here, but none detracted from the overall absorbing performance.

The Faure works she chose are not often heard, the first two of his Valse-Caprices, Op. 30 and Op. 38. Here again, ebb and flow in the music abounded, parts airy and dreamlike, then suddenly with more energy, always alluring, pulling the listener onward.

She finished with Ravel’s “Le Tombeau de Couperin” in a fine performance, as in everything she played illuminating many of its passages.

Her encore was Ravel’s “Pavane pour une infante defunte.”

Philippa Kiraly

Susan Marie Pierson; Courtesy Karen Stucke

There are no airs or temperamental drama about Susan Marie Pierson, the soprano who not only sings every performance of Schoenberg’s “Erwartung” in Seattle Opera’s double bill the next two weeks, but covers for the soprano in Bartok’s “Bluebeard’s Castle” as well.

“When we did this production in Edmonton (Alberta, 2006) I sang both roles,” says Pierson who considers “Erwartung” (“Expectation”) alone to be the equivalent of singing all of Act II of Wagner’s “Gotterdammerung.”

The pairing of these two short works has become a staple among opera companies

“It’s hard to find two one-act operas which fit together as these do in a strange way,” says Pierson, pointing out that this production by Robert Lepage has been around for 14 years, and that the stage director, Francois Racine, and three dancers travel with it. “One is very tonal and Mahleresque, the other is, well, just out there. It’s a very entertaining evening. I will say that the main character in the whole evening is water. We have a rubber stage, and that’s all I’m going to tell you about it!”

Singing “Erwartung” has its challenges. It’s a one-woman monodrama of lyrical, emotional music, but completely atonal as well so that the singer has no reference note from which to find a pitch. “It took me 18 months to learn it for Edmonton,” says Pierson., “but you get to a point with Schoenberg that you have muscle memory and you can always hit the note. There’s a sense of how that pitch feels in the throat and the ear.”

She appreciates that Schoenberg was exact in what he wanted, the tonal colors, the dynamics, “but the biggest challenge is staying with the conductor without staring at him,” because Schoenberg changes meter and tempo constantly.  ”I just try to memorize in my own body the rhythm and the tempo that (conductor) Evan (Rogister) wants to take.”

At one vocal entrance, she says, she is lying flat on her back and it would completely spoil the moment to lift her head and check with his beat.

I ask Pierson who is this woman, who is the character who has no name, no history nothing except the words and emotions of the moment.

For Pierson, “she’s an outsider. I’ve always seen she has a little house outside town, with a garden, and a wall around it. Her lover is from the town. I don’t know if he’s married or unmarried, but he can’t be with her every day, and now it has been three days and he hasn’t shown up. She’s afraid. Is he sick? Does she have a rival? Has he left her? She goes to look for him, and has conversations with the moon, which casts shadows, plays tricks and frightens her. She finds him dead, in a pool of blood. There’s no place for her in the town. Is she a foreigner? Divorced? I don’t know.”

Pierson sings almost without cease for the full 30 minutes of “Erwartung,” and she paces herself carefully. On the support side she places Sweet Tarts or sour gummy bears in strategic places around the stage (“my costume has no pockets”) and the stage hands know not to remove them or sweep them up. The stage goes briefly dark several times when she can pop one in her mouth and, twice during the show, she has 30-40 seconds when she can rest.  At those moments, a stage hand is ready nearby to give her a quick sip of water.

For the rest, “you’ve got to keep that one small part of your brain trying to be careful and in charge: here’s your five seconds, remember to swallow, don’t go overboard there.”

Pierson grew up listening to opera, began singing early and started voice lessons at 14. She knew by the time she was 11 or 12 that she wanted to be an opera singer. “My first recital was at age 12, and after that it was a question of just putting one step in front of the other.” She won the Pavarotti competition and then sang Amelia with him in “Un Ballo in Maschera” for a PBS telecast, after which her career took off steadily.

Edwin McArthur, Kirsten Flagstad’s accompanist told her “‘You’re going to be a Wagner soprano. Promise me you won’t touch it until you’re 30,’” she says. “And I didn’t.” She has since sung Wagner all over Europe including Brunhilde in “The Ring” over  five years with Finnish National Opera.

Today, she’s a veteran. At 56, she looks and moves years younger, and says that after a performance she’s energized. “I can’t go to sleep for six or seven hours after. My teacher told me, If you feel you could go and sing it again, you’ve done it right.”

Philippa Kiraly

Huw Edwards, music director and conductor of the Portland Columbia Symphony Orchestra has a knack for finding outstanding young artists and displaying their talent on stage. This time, for the PCSO concert on Friday evening, two teens demonstrated artistic abilities way beyond their years. The orchestra played a superb new work by 19-year-old composer Taylor Brizendine, and 17-year-old pianist Rosa Li swept the audience away with her performance of Mendelssohn’s Piano Concerto No. 1. Both pieces were highlights in a concert that featured some fine playing by the orchestra of works by Brahms, Mahler, and Tchaikovsky as well.

Brizedine, who grew up in Oregon but is now studying at the California Institute of the Arts in Los Angeles, has written many pieces which have been performed by such ensembles as the California Institute of the Arts Chamber Orchestra, the Portland Youth Philharmonic chamber music series, and the Oregon Pro Arte Youth Chamber Orchestra. The PCSO commissioned Brizedine to write a piece in honor of Oregon’s 150th birthday, and he responded with the “Hymn of the Earth,” a short work that engaged the audience with a variety of sonic textures.

“Hymn of the Earth” began softly with exposed passages for the harp and xylophone. Other members of the orchestra gradually joined in to create a sense of awakening and a much larger, fuller sound. After a brief, lyrical solo by concertmaster Dawn Carter, the music became more fragmented as if sections of the orchestra were commenting on each other. After a descending bass line got underway, tension seemed to mount. A rebuilding process took place, bolstered by trumpet calls, and the piece ended with flourish with gongs and a feeling of hopefulness.

The audience, which had filled First United Methodist, almost to capacity, appeared thoroughly engaged with Brizedine’s music and gave this piece a solid round of applause. It will be interesting to follow his career as a composer and see how his music progresses.

Next on the program was Mendelssohn’s First Piano Concert with Li as the soloist. Playing the entire piece from memory, Li gave a polished performance with a special attention to detail, especially in the way that she accented some notes even though her fingers were racing up and down the keyboard. Li, a veteran winner of many competitions, negotiated all of the trills and filigree of this difficult work gracefully and made it look as if she were completely at home in front of an orchestra. Wow!

The concert began with Brahms “Academic Festival Overture,” the orchestra played very well with lots of expression. Each section of the orchestra had passages in which its members excelled as an ensemble. The orchestral blend was excellent, the crescendos and decrescendos sounded organic, and the uptempo ending made the entire piece work well as a whole.

In its performance of the “Adagietto” from Mahler’s Symphony No. 5, the orchestra achieved a soft, lush sound that was exquisite most of the time, yet it came under duress here and there because of intonation problems in the strings. Overall, guided by some fine conducting by Edwards, this piece still had plenty of beauty to make it very satisfying to the ears.

The concert ended with Tchaikovsky’s Fantasy-Overture from “Romeo and Juliet.” This piece needed just a little more intensity to heighten the contrasts between the melodic themes and the violent ones. Still, the last part of the piece was heavenly. Kudos to principal horn Jen Harrison, principal trumpet Mike Hankins, and principal timpani Craig Johnston for their outstanding playing.

I was fortunate to be able to sit down with Maestra Falletta this weekend.  Falletta has been in Seattle this past week for a series of three concerts with the Seattle Symphony.  The concerts have been a compelling mix of the seldom heard, a dark showpiece, and a deeply moving requiem by the understated Gabriel Faure.  The chamber version of Gabriel Faure’s Requiem has closed out each of the concerts.  The chamber version, scored for chorus, one violin, minimal violas, cellos, and basses, horns, harp, and organ is the austere predecessor of the more popular version for full orchestra and chorus.  With only one violin, the color of the instrumental writing is much darker.  The violas, led by Arie Schachter, create a lugubrious foundation that is both sad and comforting.  The first half was marked by a full-throttle performance of Ravel’s La Valse and Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No.1.

During my conversation with Falletta, I couldn’t help but walk away feeling like she is a musician possessed by great joy in not only making music, but helping people genuinely value, feel, and experience serious music.  We talked about her impressions of the Seattle Symphony, what considerations go into concert programs, the importance of the Buffalo Philharmonic as a professional orchestra in a city decimated by the collapse of the steel and manufacturing industry in the United States, and how music is innate to our existence as people.  Toward the end of the interview, we also chatted briefly about her Grammy Award winning recording of Mr. Tambourine Man: Seven Poems of Bob Dylan.

You can watch the video after the jump.

Gerard Schwarz
Growth in Seattle,
But leaves uncertain future.
Now 25 years.

Kurt Masur
Sacked from New York Phil,
Made a new life in Paris.
The wall has fallen.

James Gaffigan
Thomas is mentor.
Is this San Francisco treat
The next star maestro?

Vassily Sinaisky
Obsessive Russian,
Who could manage time better.
Electrifying.

Robert Spano
Sometime Georgia peach.
Helping Alberich steal gold.
Is Seattle next?

The idea that a musical performance must be full of fireworks and usually loud to be satisfying– think of your average rock concert, or even the Seattle Symphony’s program last week—is negated in the person of violinist Hilary Hahn.

There is nothing flamboyant about Hahn, her demeanor, her dress, her playing style. She walks out on stage and she plays. Simple as that. Even her acceptance of applause is low-key.

Yet you don’t forget her performance.

Thursday’s recital at Benaroya Hall with pianist Valentina Lisitsa is a perfect example. First, the program was unusual, artfully designed with pieces many would never have heard before. She juxtaposed sonatas by Ysaye and Ives, none commonly heard and requiring careful listening( the Ives in particular), and followed up with Brahms’ Hungarian dances and Bartok’s Romanian ones, mostly familiar and colorful.

Both the Ysaye sonatas, Nos. 4 and 6 from 1924, are for unaccompanied violin and are filled with double stopping, that is, playing on two strings at once so you can have harmony or a duet on one instrument. Ysaye wrote each in homage to an important violinist whose characteristics come through strongly, thus No. 4 is flavored with techniques of Fritz Kreisler and No. 6 is steeped in the Spain of Manuel Quiroga, relatively unknown to us.

The Ives’ sonatas, Nos 1, 2, and 4 are with piano, but they too employ considerable double stopping. What was so striking about these performances was Hahn’s approach. It would be so easy to make these into “Look at my incredible technique and listen to me striking sparks from the music!” performances.

They do need incredible technique, but you wouldn’t know it from Hahn. She just played them, unearthing the music and its emotions, often playing very softly but with infinite expressivity. She used her vibrato as an ornament, not something which begins at the first note and continues unchanged until the end of the piece. Sometimes she used almost none, and she varied it at other times so that it colored the notes and added to the expression but she never let it be taken for granted. This was particularly notable in another Ysaye piece, the gentle “Reve d’enfant.”

Also, through this entire concert, Hahn never made a scratchy sound. Her bow moved smoothly or fast, articulated or legato, and and there was never a hiatus as she switched from up- to downbow. All we heard was the lovely tone she produced, though there was nothing mushy about it.

In a total switch or gears, her Brahms and Bartok had one itching to get up and dance to her full, lively playing.

Although attention was glued to Hahn, her accompanist Lisitsa (or, as one teacher used to put it, her collaborative pianist, a much more correct appellation for those who accompany singers and instumentalists) is a very fine player in her own right with a substantial career. Despite the piano lid being at full height, she matched Hahn in intensity and volume so that the two played as interweaving instruments, two equal halves of a duet.

As encore, after the audience brought the pair back several times, they played Paganini’s “Cantabile.” Hahn changed styles completely to one that was lush, full of vibrato, late romantic playing. Again, it was gorgeous. What a treat, and what a pleasure to see such a big audience enthusastically appreciating a concert which wasn’t spectacular, wasn’t loud, wasn’t flashy in any way, and contained many young people including children.

Philippa Kiraly

It has been a while since I attended an all Mozart concert.  The last time, probably, was back in 1997.  It was a different time then.  I was new to classical music and enchanted by everything I heard.  Even at that last all Mozart concert, the Posthorn Serenade melted into whatever else was on the program.  All of it was enjoyable, but none of it was terribly memorable.  So, when I settled into my seat for last weekend’s Orchestra Seattle concert I was skeptical it could work.  For all of Mozart’s genius, too much Mozart is not always a good thing by my ears.  Sameness can hold back a concert, especially in the case of Mozart.

Orchestra Seattle overcame this hurdle easily.  What Shangrow did in his program which impressed me most of all was how he utilized the pieces on the program.  The traditional overture, concerto, symphony structure was scraped for the Adagio and Fugue, the Piano Concerto No.22, the Sinfonia Concertante for Violin and Viola, and the Solemn Vespers.  This unorthodox lineup of pieces was ever changing and never boring.  Two concertos, a small, charmer of a piece, and the vespers kept my ears occupied.

Judith Cohen, one of Seattle’s most versatile pianists, joined the orchestra for the piano concerto and Duo Patterson, a husband and wife team, came out after intermission to help with the sinfonia concertante.  Of the two pieces, the piano concerto came off the best.  Cohen won me over with her unceasing focus and measured playing.  There wasn’t a lot of razzle-dazzle in her approach.  Her focus was unwavering as her fingers which helped immensely in the complicated rondo finale.

The Sinfonia Concertante, didn’t fare as well.  Duo Patterson seemed too eager and Orchestra Seattle seemed unsure of how they wanted to play.  The team scratched and clawed their way through the piece with gusto, but at the expense of the piece’s moodiness; chattiness is eschewed.   Orchestra Seattle seemed to fall victim to Duo Patterson’s Shenanigans.  Normally, Shangrow’s band is the model of steadiness.  But for this piece, they lost their identity, and poise.  Would they match the soloists or would they do their own thing?  Turns out, a little of both.  At times, the orchestra sacrificed its poise to match Duo Patterson’s intensity without much success.  When Orchestra Seattle retreated into comfortable territory, they were overwhelmed by the Pattersons.

To close the concert, Shangrow chose Mozart’s Vesperae Solennes de Confessore.  The combined forces of the Seattle Chamber Singers and Orchestra Seattle generated a heart-felt rendition.  The forces: soloists, orchestra, and chorus were balanced.  Playing was solid.  After a schizophrenic sinfonia concertante, this piece reminded me why OSSCS is one of my favorite Seattle orchestras.

I am always surprised at how popular all Mozart concerts are.  Sunday’s OSSCS performance was no exception.  An usher came in right before the performance and announced that they had run out of program notes because there were more people than expected.  The allure, of course, is Mozart’s genius.  Mozart’s music is just plain enjoyable.  It doesn’t matter what it is.  Sometimes though, an all Mozart concert can be like just eating cake for dinner.  Shangrow sidestepped this saccharine effect with a program drawing on the composer’s entire body of work and not hewing to tried and true concert structure.

Zach Carstensen

Murray Perahia is less known for his Beethoven recordings than his lauded foray into the world of JS Bach.  Judging by the pianist’s recent recording of Beethoven’s Op. 14, 26, and 28 piano sonatas, shows Perahia as one of the finest Beethoven interpreters playing today.  These sonatas are not the most well-known of Beethoven’s cycle.  This shouldn’t dissuade people from investigating this disk however.  Perahia’s playing is enough of a reason to give this album from Sony a go.

Perahia’s treatment of the sonatas on this disk is illuminating.  Perahia’s recording of Bach’s Goldberg Variations achieved similar results.  On that disk, Perahia remained true to the music.  There were no gratuitous indulgences, but Perahia still drew out the innate drama in Bach’s music.

On this recording, he does the same thing.  Perahia’s deft touch, his sense of structure, and his musicality ooze from each of the sonatas.  But Perahia’s playing is also ravishingly textured.  The Op.28 sonata is an absorbing listen.  The sonata’s character is meticulously formed and then articulated in breath stealing fashion by Perahia.

The Beethoven sonata field is crowded with sets and single disks.  Few are played with as much affect and sensitivity as this recent disc by Murray Perahia.