In the News: New SFS Music Director, Philip Glass, and Jeremy Denk

In the News:

Esa-Pekka Salonen - the Complete Sony Recordings Sony US | UK | DE

Top News surely the announcement that Esa-Pekka Salonen (as had been rumored) will succeed Michael Tilson-Thomas in San Francisco to be the San Francisco Symphony’s 10^th Music Director. It’s a logical appointment. A stellar conductor with a great reputation, interesting repertoire, and a real feel for the American – indeed Californian – way of being an MD… which is to suggest: naturally good at fundraising. For the very little it’s worth: I should have liked to see the slightly less splashy appointment of David Robertson… not so much because I think that would have been better for the SFS but simply because I want Robertson, whom I consider to be one of the most underrated conductors around, to be more in the limelight and with an orchestra of an international reputation to play with. After all, he’s at an age where one might consider that the once steeply ascendant conductor’s career has petered out, lest he pull a Günter Wand-like golden autumn. (Which would be fine, but I want him now.) Anyway, Salonen is certainly the safer choice and every bit as good (and certainly more glam-inducing) for the orchestra. Here’s the official announcement.

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P.Glass, Symphony No.11 D.R.Davies / Bruckner Orch. Linz Orange Mountain Music US | UK | DE

Next up: You must get intimations of mortality when a university names a program after you. Case in point Philip Glass and The New School’s College of Performing Arts, which announced today to engage in a landmark partnership with the Philip Glass Ensemble (PGE) and long-time PGE member, Lisa Bielawa (named inaugural Composer-in-Residence and Chief Curator), around the work of Philip Glas, to form a new learning and creative center. Because Glass’ works have been so neglected, the Philip Glass Institute will offer students, faculty, and the public the opportunity to immerse themselves in the work of Philip Glass, other important artists within his circle, and the work of the iconic Philip Glass Ensemble. Facetiousness aside, this is good news for the PGE, which is Glass’ legacy, and the future of which is thereby secured, independently of its namesake… erm, aliveness. Added the composer himself: “At the new PGI we can prioritize a curriculum which doesn’t require critical approval of any period or style...Young composers need to be true to their voices. ‘Coming up’ can be very independent, and this is what will be guiding our work at The New School.” The whole thing will launch on January 6^th at the New School’s Tishman Auditorium.

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Beethoven / Ligeti, op.111 / Etudes Jeremy Denk Warner US | UK | DE

Combining the topics of San Francisco and schools: Pianist (and once our blogging-colleague) Jeremy Denk has been announced to join the faculty of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. As such, he will lead a piano studio beginning in the 2019-20 academic year, joining piano department instructors at SFCM such as Jon Nakamatsu and Garrick Ohlsson. How gratifying (if envy-inducing) to see Denk’s career – not only as a musician but also as a man of letters – blossom like the dickens: MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, Avery Fisher Prize, and most recently his being elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences… and now a great job. Here’s to you, Jeremy, and hats off. Here’s the official announcement.

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Dip Your Ears, No. 212 (Alice Sara in Wonderland)

#morninglistening to #Grieg w/@BRSO, @esapekkasalonen, @alicesaraott on @dgclassics, title… https://t.co/KqyF65in44 pic.twitter.com/8q7TvPuhmQ

— Jens F. Laurson (@ClassicalCritic) August 25, 2016

Alice Sara Ott’s latest release is titled “Wonderland”, because, well “Alice”, you know, finds herself enchanted in Grieg’s Lyric Pieces. It makes for a catchy play on words and suggests a concept album. Not surprising, because these days, every release from Deutsche Grammophon seems to be a little bit of a cross-over release; chasing the Zeitgeist, but with shoelaces tied together. It fits that Alice Sara Ott writes in the generally lucid liner notes how these Lyric Pieces (what with trolls and elves and speluncean royalty and lepidoptera being depicted) are a ‘Wonderland’ to her.

On the cover she’s is surrounded by what are – I think – paper origami butterflies, a reasonably subtle hint at Grieg’s Sommerfugl (op.43/1) and perhaps Alice Sara Ott’s half-Japanese background. In a PR department’s mind she is probably considered the ‘classical’ answer to her ‘romantic’ contemporary pianist colleague Yuja Wang (born in 1988 & 1987 respectively); sharing an instrument, the technical skill (Ott’s perhaps not quite as furiously prodigious), and beauty – where Ott scores high(er) on classical beauty and dress – even with the occasional skin-tight

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Salonen, Out of Nowhere

E.-P. Salonen, Violin Concerto / Nyx, L. Josefowicz, Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, E.-P. Salonen (Deutsche Grammophon, 2012)

Attentive readers will recall that my last pick for the Top 25 concerts of this season was the National Symphony Orchestra's program slated for the first weekend of June. Along with symphonies by Haydn and Schumann, Leila Josefowicz was going to give the world premiere of a new violin concerto by Sean Shepherd. About five months ago it became apparent that Shepherd was not going to finish this commission in time, and the new concerto was postponed, replaced by Esa-Pekka Salonen's relatively new violin concerto, as noted in my June concert picks. Josefowicz reportedly offered to play a few options from her repertory instead of the Shepherd piece, and Christoph Eschenbach and the NSO wisely chose Salonen's violin concerto, one of the best new pieces of recent years, heard at the Friday performance. A little bird tells me that the Shepherd concerto, when finally completed, will get an NSO performance, not next season obviously but soon thereafter.

At some point along the way Salonen's violin concerto has lost its subtitle, "Out of Nowhere," referring to the way that the solo part begins in media res. The constant stream of notes, accompanied by celesta, glockenspiel, and vibraphone, gives the impression of a pixie flitting about spraying fairy dust everywhere, with Josefowicz's harmonic notes somehow imitating the metallic sounds around her. A marvelous part for contrabass clarinet reinforces the entrance of the bass instruments on long notes (marked "stagger breath"), sounding like a tidal surge but given the first movement's title ("Mirage") may refer to the visual waves produced by extreme heat. The first inner movement ("Pulse I") is framed by sections of artificial harmonics in the solo part, showcasing Josefowicz's impeccable E string technique, through which she produced a perfectly tuned sound that could cut through any texture but never be harsh.

In both the pulse movements, playful rhythmic patterns became the focus, with the timpani in "Pulse I" pounding on the beat and then, through a sleight of hand, off the beat, for example. Wooden percussion and brass provided the impulse in "Pulse II," eliciting more wooden, hollow sounds from Josefowicz's tremolos. Salonen uses the orchestra for subtle, coloristic purposes for much of the piece until, at the end of the third movement, the ensemble goes on a wild rampage, with the solo shrieking along in crazy glissandi. ("Something very Californian about this," Salonen noted, laconically, in his composer's note.) The composer's affecting farewell to his former band, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, is heard in the fourth movement ("Adieu"), with the most tender, introspective music of the concerto, including a rising scalar motif, almost like a jet slowly taking off from LAX. Salonen, for his part that "this is not a specific farewell to anything in particular," although later he admitted that "it is not a coincidence that the last movement is called 'Adieu'."

Other Reviews: Anne Midgette, A maverick soloist offers a classic new work (Washington Post, June 3)

Eschenbach, who was laser-focused while conducting the Salonen, returned to his over-expressive gestural mode in both of the more familiar symphonies. Schumann's fourth symphony had a welcome return, not played by the NSO since 2003. (The program notes, for some reason, were on the topic of the second symphony.) The differentiation of sound through attention to balances seemed to show careful reflection, but Eschenbach could not seem to settle on one tempo, shifting the speed in different sections of the first movement, for example. Schumann's heavier re-orchestration, in the revised version of the symphony played here, gives a lugubrious quality to the slow introductions of first and last movements. The composer still made missteps, like giving the slow movement's main theme to the solo cello and oboe together, a combination that is not easy to keep in tune, although Nurit Bar-Josef was in excellent form in the solo triplets of the B section. The famous scherzo was the high point, set at just the right tempo and beautifully shaped, with some oozing rubato in the trio section, while the warlike finale, with its martial dotted rhythms, was heroic.

Sadly, Haydn's Symphony No. 104, the last of the series of twelve for the London visit, where he was when he composed it, seemed like an afterthought at the start of the concert. Eschenbach took the greatest number of liberties, often seeming to work against the score's best interests, stretching out the slow introduction of the first movement and then pushing the fast section to the edge, not seeming to have convinced the musicians of what he wanted to do. The second movement felt over-mannered, every articulation exaggerated but without the necessary precision in attacks or in the ends of sounds. The trio of the third movement had the best results, with a relaxed tempo and approach to dynamics producing an elegant sound, while the finale was spirited but not really witty.

This concert repeats this evening, in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall.

Notes from the 2014 Salzburg Festival ( 11 ) Philharmonia Orchestra 2 • Esa-Pekka Salonen

Berg • Strauss • Ravel • Esa-Pekka Salonen • Lawrence Power • Max Hornung

Power-ful, Wonderful, Versatile

ABOVE AND BELOW PICTURES (DETAILS) COURTESY SALZBURG FESTIVAL, © SILVIA LELLI. CLICK FOR THE WHOLE PICTURE.

After attending the very, very fine Philharmonia concert with Chirstoph Dohnányi, the orchestra’s appearance two days later, Saturday August 9^th, with their other main conductor, Esa-Pekka Salonen, was just about mandatory. Getting in wouldn’t have been a problem in any case: there was Alban Berg on the program and therefore tickets available. Don Quixote, the tone poem-cum-one-and-a-half-concerto (as opposed to “Double”) for cello and viola of Richard Strauss’ isn’t a big pull, either… nor its primary soloist that morning—very fine a musician though he is—Maximilian Hornung.

Sancho and the Sheep

The violist isn’t going to make a difference when it comes to selling tickets, either, but the choice of having a dedicated soloist for the tricky viola part, rather than letting the first violist of the orchestra scrape by (no offense) is huge, can’t have been easy (considering orchestra politicking), and was most warmly welcomed! Getting Lawrence Power, one of the more scrupulously musical string players—never mind violists!—around, sent waves of sweet anticipation through me, the same which could not be said about

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Best Recordings of 2012 (#1 - 10)

Time for a review of classical CDs that were outstanding in 2012. My lists for the previous years: 2011, (2011 – “Almost”), 2010, (2010 – “Almost”), 2009, (2009 – “Almost”), 2008, (2008 - "Almost") 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004.

# 1 - New Release

H.Purcell et al., Dorothee Mields, Lautten Copagney Berlin,
Wolfgang Katschner, Carus 83371

H.Purcell, “Love’s Madness” D.Mields / W.Katschner / Lautten Copagney Berlin Carus

How much is early musicke allowed to rock? Christina Pluhar and L’Arpeggiata do funky things, but the liberties they take receive frowny faces from the purists. Dorothee Mields and the Lautten Copagney don’t need to stray from the score to achieve the same and more. In this medley of songs by Purcell and contemporaries, all about the effects of love, Mields & Co. so dig into their instruments that they bring the house down and blow the cobwebs off decades of well behaved performance practice. Positively addictive and joy-giving, it was days before my CD player yielded to another disc.

# 1 – Reissue

D.Scarlatti, 19 Keyboard Sonatas, Sergei Babayan, Piano Classics 0024

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Best Recordings of 2012 (#10)

Time for a review of classical CDs that were outstanding in 2012. My lists for the previous years: 2011, (2011 – “Almost”), 2010, (2010 – “Almost”), 2009, (2009 – “Almost”), 2008, (2008 - "Almost") 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004.

# 10 - New Release

E-P. Salonen, Violin Concerto, Nyx, Leila Josefowicz, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Finnish RSO, DG 1752102

E-P.Salonen, Violin Concerto, Nyx, L.Josefowicz / E-P.Salonen / Finnish RSO DG

Nyx is an orchestral piece half the way to a clarinet concerto and a truly great work. It’s palpable, image-inducing music, belly music rather than brainy musical theory. It’s music that grabs you by the lapels; possibly lower. It lures, beguiles, makes luxurious use of quiet, brings out militaristic tones. Best: it’s not a second longer than the music it contains. Nyx communicates with American efficiency and candor, yet hints at a hypothetical modern continuation of Debussy; ditto Mahler, just less convoluted. Like all music Nyx benefits greatly from the live experience. But so does Beethoven and even on record it’s easy to hear how this is ingenious music. And Nyx is only supposed to be the filler on this disc which features prominently Salonen's new Violin Concerto, "Out of Nowhere". A partially sparse, partially snappy virtuoso work, played masterly by Leila Josefowicz, it's just about as appealing as Nyx: This is altogether one of the finest, most readily appealing 21st century classical music releases.

# 10 – Reissue

L.v. Beethoven, Piano Sonatas 1 - 32, Paul Badura-Skoda, Gramola

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Ionarts-at-Large: Magic Salonen. Also Brahms, Schumann

To write a solo work for four horns is an audacious way of asking for trouble. As if the spotlight didn’t shine on them enough as it is, exposed, lyrical, and betraying every little mistake, now four of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra’s horn players stood on the front edge of the stage in Munich’s Philharmonic Hall, left of Esa-Pekka Salonen, tackling Schumann’s Konzertstück in F, op.86.

The BRSO is one of the few orchestras with a brass section where Norbert Dausacker’s suggestion that the seven horn players drew lots among them as to who would get to play the concert sounded plausible. (Even if I don’t believe that for a second.) To shift the burden of the Konzertstück’s demands more evenly from first horn Eric Terwilliger, they performed an amalgamated version that trades notes accordingly. Half way through the first movement, the front four were in the zone and Salonen pulled the work through all three movements as if on a string, with nary a slacking moment along the way.

Schumann, Reger et al., Piano Concerto, , H.Blomstedt, Dresden StaKap Profil Hänssler E-P.Salonen, Piano Concerto, , Y.Bronfman / E-P.Salonen / LA Phil DG E-P.Salonen, Violin Concerto, Nyx, L.Josefowicz / E-P.Salonen / Finnish RSO DG

It was an apropos overture to an evening that stressed the horn section—albeit different players, with the front four getting a deserved rest. They’re up front in Esa-Pekka Salonen’s Nyx, an orchestral piece half the way to a clarinet concerto that opens with a rising, marimbaphone-supported horn statement: delicately, with underlying agitation, before the entire vast orchestra chimes in homophonously.

Cutting to the chase: Nyx is a great, great work. Without being literal, it’s palpable, image-inducing music, belly music rather than brainy musical theory. It’s music that grabs you by the lapels… possibly lower. It lures, it beguiles, it makes luxurious use of quiet, it brings out militaristic tones, and it’s not a second longer than the music it contains. Nyx communicates with refreshing American efficiency and directness, but sounds really like the modern continuation of Debussy, if there hadn’t been a period of ideological disorientation on contemporary ‘notational music’ in-between. If others hear Ives or Stravinsky in it, I was repeatedly reminded of Mahler. On one level how it wasn’t like Mahler at all… but much more straight forward, less convoluted, less cloying (and I say that as a Mahler aficionado). In another way it felt like the appropriate modern substitute for Mahler, a great symphonic movement that pushed all the right buttons and hit all the right keys. I sat at the edge of my seat, greedily taking it in, and afterwards, I was in no mood to have the impression ruined by the B-flat Brahms Piano Concerto (no offense to Yefim Bronfman) that would follow after intermission.

Alas, I came back, realizing that the sandwich-position of the Salonen piece was the only feasible way to program the work: If you flip the halfs and program Brahms first, the Konzertstück would be exposed as terribly superfluous opening the second half… and you might have a few concert goers trickling home early, ready to stay away from a—heaven help—contemporary piece. Just Salonen in the second half (though its musical content would fully justify that) would have attracted even fewer folk—aside: one doesn’t want to miss out on showing off your own players in the Schumann. The gutsy (=ruinous) programming choice might have been to do Salonen’s own concerto instead of Brahms. The soloist after all, to whom it was dedicated, already has it in his repertoire. But then there would have been 300 enthusiastic music lovers around me in the Gasteig, instead of 2300.

All that said, the Brahms—smothering the sonic Salonen-memory though it did—was quite terrific. The second rank of the BRSO horns showed again the stuff they were made of, and long-time Salonen collaborator Bronfman took such a clean, pleasantly understated way with the work (and a gorgeous slow movement, where first cellist Sebastian Klinger shone, along the way) that it went some way in re-kindling my appreciation for the artist which had cooled over the course of my exposures in D.C. and Baltimore. This was swift artlessness at its best, with the orchestra and conductor ideally suited to match it. Perhaps predictably, the audience appreciated this interpretation more than the creation earlier... which is perhaps as emblematic for the troubles of classical music as was the dead-silence, pockmarked by coughs, after the furious finale of the Brahms Concerto's first movement.

You can hear the concert “on demand” on the BR Klassik website here.

Mahler Festival Leipzig: Salonen - Dresden - Third Symphony

The Gewandhaus in Leipzig is mounting one of the most ambitious, condensed, and interesting Mahler tributes of 2011, having invited nine of the finest orchestras from near and afar to perform all eleven (!) of Mahler’s Symphonies (including Das Lied von der Erde and the Cooke performing version of the Tenth) in 12 days. I missed the opening shot, fired by the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra under their music director and Mahler-maven Riccardo Chailly – my loss, from what audience members unanimously agree on having been an early, hard-to-surpass performance of Mahler’s Second Symphony – but will catch all the rest.

The second concert was handed to the primary Saxonian rivals of the Gewandhaus, the Dresden Staatskapelle, who performed the vast and strange Third Symphony under Esa Pekka Salonen. Salonen – a svelte man, a little smaller in person than one might expect, and with more than a subtle hint of Pierce Brosnan – is ever coolly restrained, gently impatient... at least on the surface. Questions are answered with certainty by short, individual sentences that don’t invite to linger. Like miniature chapters that are opened and closed in under 25 words. He takes deliberate 3, 4, 5 second thinking-pauses before the formulation of each answer. There is that undeniably Finish taciturn element about him, which he acknowledges at a public talk after the performance (the “Mahler Lounge”): “Music is a great way for us Finns to communicate, because speaking is difficult for us. I’ve already used more words tonight than an average Finn would use in a year.”

G.Mahler, Symphony No.3, Salonen / LA Phil Sony

Salonen side-steps the question at what point he gets sick of Mahler by pointing out that he has done relatively little Mahler in 2010 and 2011, and got most of the Mahler over and done with the Philharmonia’s ‘Vienna Weeks’ in 2009 (M9 in Vienna 2009, for example... but also M3 with the WPh in Salzburg in 2008). But then in a brief coy moment, he finishes the sentence “…I figured the world will be absolutely saturated with Mahler and I thought I’d try not to add to the pollution.” He will do this Third in Leipzig and Dresden with the Staatskapelle, the Second Symphony in London a year from now, and Number Six in Chicago. “That’s all.”

Maybe there can’t be too much Mahler (“there cannot be too much music… good music at least, that’s for sure”), but Mahler is the one composer, Salonen sighs, that doesn’t need this kind of celebration, because his music is played all the time. “He is perhaps the most popular composer in the repertoire at the moment—in many big metropolitan areas. So in a sense I would rather see lesser known but good, interesting, important composers celebrated... whose music is neglected for whatever reason… so that their music would be lifted into the consciousness of the wider public. Mahler is doing just fine.” (His urgent suggestions for more worthwhile celebrations are Haydn and Lutosławski!)

Eventually the Gewandhaus fills up to three quarters capacity and Mahler’s longest Symphony gets under way. In the powerful beginning, the brass immediately established itself as gorgeous sounding (with a bit of glare)… and almost as immediately as fallible; with individual bloomers dotted throughout the night. The Posthorn solo, at least, went off without a glitch… even if it wasn’t nearly played with the ridiculous perfection or ease that the soloist of the BRSO managed a few months ago. Strings played with great zest and cohesion; the piccolos were overly shrill and the woodwinds had their share of unintentional chaotic moments.

I don’t believe in making the orchestra feel insecure or uncomfortable. I don’t think it helps, at least not in my case.

Salonen, with his clean and calm technique, telegraphing every entry to every musician well in advance, safely guided the orchestra through a tame, not to say listless, second movement. The third movement’s Comodo – Scherzando – Without Haste had, almost inevitably, more zest. Lilli Paasikivi, the alto on “O Mensch-ing” duty that night, provided the first true highlight. Her voice was amazingly present, always close to one’s ears without being loud. The eminently suitable vibrato was wide on held notes, and along with her voice’s color, reed-like and unforced. Her orchestral partner, the cor anglais, meanwhile could not bring himself to really slide through those portamenti, which made the affair a touch more stodgy than it needed to be. On a more superficial note: Paasikivi’s choice of dress—a diagonal cut, one-shoulder cave man’s dream in luscious mastodon-brown—might could have been improved upon.

Salonen is a conductor with a tendency towards beauty and immaculacy, which can sometimes be code for “boring”. Some of the early to middle Riccardo Chailly, Bernard Haitink and, in a different, fussy, micromanaging way, Mariss Jansons (all RCO conductors, strangely) can be lumped in with those who tend to err on the side of refinement over emotion. But Salonen’s aim for beauty and security did not impede on the soaring finale of the Third Symphony. “Exhausting, yes” Salonen said after the concert. “But at the end of the last movement, if you have a fine orchestra, you feel like you’re at the end of your journey and you can just ride a wave. You receive energy, rather than investing it. Usually I feel elevated and keenly alive after conducting the Third.”

If it wasn’t the most elevating experience for the audience, Salonen was probably not at fault. Of the four Mahler Thirds I’ve heard live in relatively short succession (Jansons/RCO in Amsterdam, Jurowski/LPO in London, Jansons/BRSO in Munich, and now this one), none had that sense of apotheosis one hopes for. Vladimir Jurowski managed two superb, gripping movements, but tapered off. Jansons/BRSO offered the most flawless performance imaginable, but never achieved lift-off in the finale. Salonen/Dresden, for all the quibbles, at least went furthest in providing a wave one could ride. Not one moistened by tears, but more than suitable enough to carry one for 22 hours to the Tenth Symphony the next night.

Mahler Festival Leipzig: Märkl - MDR SO - Tenth Symphony
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Nezét-Séguin - BRSO - Seventh Symphony
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Luisi - Concertgebouw - Das Lied von der Erde
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Gergiev - LSO - First Symphony
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Gilbert - NYPhil - Fifth Symphony
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Zinman - Tonhalle Zurich - Sixth Symphony
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Harding - Mahler Chamber Orchestra - Fourth Symphony