Latest on Forbes: James MacMillan In The Countryside

Contemporary Music Festival in Neuberg an der Mürz

…Usually it is chamber music that I seek when I make musical trips into the countryside… partly because Munich – if and when I am based there – is not a terribly good place for chamber music. When based in Vienna, the situation is not quite as dire, if only for the efforts of the Wiener Konzerthaus whose chamber music cycle(s) do all the heavy lifting and whose chamber music venues – the Mozart- and Schubert-Hall – are absolute jewels… acoustically and atmospherically better than the sarcophagus-like Brahms-Saal of the the Musikverein. There’s a bit of contemporary music going on in Vienna, too, but much of that either of the fig-leaf variety (done to satisfy the abstract notion that it should be done, but with little heart behind it) or in the damp prison cell of avant-garde niche-ism (“Wien Modern”, which has thus devolved). I’ve certainly never gone as far for a contemporary music festival as Neuberg an der Mürz – which is located somewhere between Vienna and the end of the world…

->James MacMillan In The Countryside

James MacMillan Leads the NSO

J. MacMillan, The Sacrifice, C. Purves, L. Milne, Welsh National Opera, A. Negus (Chandos, 2010) Vaughan Williams, Complete Symphonies, London Philharmonic, New Philharmonia, A. Boult (Warner, 2012)

This month is all about the Wagner in Washington, but the area's two top orchestras are both offering excellent programs, too. Last night Scottish composer James MacMillan made his debut at the helm of the National Symphony Orchestra. As he did when he conducted the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra in 2008, MacMillan brought some of his own music, which the NSO last played in 2013, when they presented the local premiere of his third piano concerto.

Welsh National Opera gave the 2007 world premiere of MacMillan's second opera, The Sacrifice. The libretto by Michael Symmons Roberts, derived from the Mabinogion, the Welsh national folk epic, tells the story of a woman torn away from her love to be given in a politically advantageous marriage. MacMillan extracted Three Interludes from the opera to make a rather pleasing symphonic work, played here for the first time by the NSO. The large orchestration creates the impression of a tribal world, with violent twists provided by blaring low brass and plenty of percussion. The first movement ("The Parting") opens with a wild clamor of sound, after which a menacing melody rises through the orchestra. The second movement ("Passacaglia") presents the eponymous bass pattern in the pizzicato double basses, where it stays, eventually doubled by low brass. Heavy use of high woodwinds often gives a screeching effect, perhaps to evoke fifes or other folk instruments. The third movement is faster and martial, the low brass and reeds thumping away on a march pattern, ending in a Shostakovich-like finale accompanying the murder of the couple's young son.

Along with Scotland and Wales, the British program included pieces by two English composers, beginning with Elgar's poignant cello concerto. Alisa Weilerstein has played this concerto, so associated with Jacqueline du Pré, in recent years with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and also the NSO, in 2013. Cellist Alban Gerhardt brought an intense, moody approach to the solo part, rising up forcefully on the A string to bring in the full orchestra in the first movement, and with a big pizzicato sound in the transition to the faster section. He played fast and furious in the Allegro molto conclusion to the second movement, with MacMillan carving out enough sonic space and subtlety of color for his soloist's sometimes small sound. Gerhardt's strengths lay in a tender and introspective interpretation, rather than broad strokes, to which this concerto is nicely suited, making the third movement's delicate softness the high point rather than the heady sweep of the finale.

Other Reviews: Anne Midgette, The NSO goes to Britain (Washington Post, May 13)

More performances of the Vaughan Williams symphonies are generally welcome, and MacMillan led the NSO's first performance of the composer's fourth symphony since Leonard Slatkin conducted it in 1999. (The last Vaughan Williams symphony played by the NSO was the 'London' Symphony in 2013.) The fourth is founded on a dissonance, a minor 2nd that opens the first movement with a bracing clash, part of a chromatic motif (F, E, G-flat, F) reportedly drawn from Beethoven's ninth symphony and disturbingly similar to the BACH name motif. MacMillan relished the general loudness of the piece, allowing the gnarled mass of lines to clot upon itself in the first movement, but also coaxed lush string playing and cooing brass accompaniment in the second theme.

The harmonic palette of the second movement sounded not unlike that used by MacMillan in his interludes from The Sacrifice, with a beautiful concluding flute solo over the movement's dying embers. The chromatic theme (and a second quartal theme) runs throughout all four movements, showing the influence of Beethoven as Vaughan Williams transformed it into a dancing scherzo theme in the third movement and a triumphant call in the fugato finale. MacMillan again marshaled the NSO forces impressively in the slightly maniacal fourth movement, with a hint of Shostakovich-style banality, as the chromatic theme was obsessively repeated and altered through many diminutions and augmentations, seething with tension.

This concert repeats tonight and tomorrow, in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall.

Perchance to Stream: Haec Dies Edition

Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to online audio and online video from the week gone by. After clicking to an audio or video stream, you may need to press the "Play" button to start the broadcast. Some of these streams become unavailable after a few days.

• Watch Peter Dijkstra conduct a performance of Bach's St. John Passion, with the Bavarian Radio Chorus and Concerto Köln, recorded at the St. Lawrence Church in Nuremberg. [ARTE]


• Peter Dijkstra conducts Bach's St. Matthew Passion with the Bavarian Radio Chorus, the Regensburger Domspatzen, Concerto Köln, and soloists, recorded in 2013. [BR-Klassik]


• Collegium Vocale Ghent and the Orchestre des Champs-Elysées perform Haydn's Seven Last Words of Christ on the Cross, under Philippe Herreweghe, recorded at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées. [France Musique]


• From the Salzburg Easter Festival, Christian Thielemann conducts the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden and Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks in Beethoven's Missa solemnis. [ORF]


• Listen to a performance of Verdi's Otello, starring José Cura (Otello), Dorothea Röschmann (Desdemona), and Carlos Álvarez (Iago), recorded at the Salzburg Easter Festival with Christian Thielemann conducting the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden. [ORF]


• Philippe Herreweghe conducts the Collegium Vocale Gent, soloists Thomas Hobbs and others, in Bach's St. John Passion< recorded last May in Barcelona. [ORF]


• Two Bach cantatas (BWV 127 and 182) performed by the Academy of Ancient Music directed by Pavlo Beznosiuk, recorded at Milton Court Concert Hall in London. [BBC3]


• The Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, with conductor Hannu Lintu and mezzo-soprano Anne-Sofie von Otter, perform Sibelius's second symphony, a set of Sibelius songs, plus Sebastian Fagerlund's Stonework (2014/15), recorded last December in Helsinki. [ORF]


• The Adelaide Chamber Singers perform Arvo Part's Passio at St. Peter's Cathedral in Adelaide, Australia. [ABC Classic]


• Oliver Knussen leads the BBC Symphony Orchestra and BBC Singers in music by Debussy, Stravinsky, and George Benjamin (Dream of the Song, with countertenor Iestyn Davies, recorded at the Barbican Hall. [BBC3]


• Watch Mitsuko Uchida join Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic for Mozart's 22nd piano concerto, plus a performance of Beethoven's ninth symphony, with soloists Genia Kühmeier, Sarah Connolly, Steve Davislim, and Florian Boesch. [ARTE]


• Watch five of Bach's concertos for two or three harpsichords, with soloists Béatrice Martin, Benjamin Alard, and Jean Rondeau, recorded at the Salle Gaveau in Paris with Les Folies Françoise under Patrick Cohën-Akenine. [ARTE]


• René Jacobs conducts a performance of Gassmann's L´Opera seria at the Théâtre de la Monnaie in Brussels. [De Munt]


• Listen to Shostakovich's seventh symphony ("Leningrad") performed by the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra under Mariss Jansons, recorded at the Musikverein in Vienna. [ORF]


• Pianist David Fray joins Riccardo Muti and the Orchestre National de France for Schumann's piano concerto, plus music by Bach and Strauss (Aus Italien). [ARTE (video) | France Musique (audio)]


• Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts the Chamber Orchestra of Europe in three of Mendelssohn's symphonies, recorded at the Philharmonie de Paris. [France Musique]


• Stephen Cleobury conducts the BBC Singers and BBC Concert Orchestra for the Easter at King's Festival in Cambridge, with music by Palestrina, Schubert, and Haydn. [BBC3]


• Vaclav Luks leads Collegium 1704 and soprano Roberta Invernizzi and other soloists in sacred music by Zelenka, including his Miserere and Missa Omnium Sanctorum, recorded in Vienna. [ORF]


• Peter Oundjian conducts the Royal Scottish National Orchestra in music by Szymanowski, James MacMillan, and Berlioz, with violinist Nicola Benedetti. [BBC3]


• Russian pianist Anna Vinnitskaya plays music by Brahms, Schumann, Bach, Debussy, and Prokofiev, recorded in 2014 at the Wiener Konzerthaus. [ORF]


• Sofi Jeannin leads the Choeur and Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France in Haydn's Lord Nelson Mass, plus music by Purcell and Steve Martland. [France Musique]


• Music by Aloÿs Fornerod, Toru Takemitsu, Daniel Schnyder, and Robert Schumann performed by Kazuki Yamada, the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne, and bassonist Daniele Damiano, recorded in Lausanne, Switzerland. [France Musique]

Classical Music Agenda (May 2016)

May is the month of Wagner's Ring Cycle, the first complete one staged by Washington National Opera. Wagner fanatics, like us, will be spending a lot of time in the theater. Here are the Top 10 choices, besides Wagner, for the month of May.

SOLOISTS:
The choice will be difficult on the first day of the month, but we probably fall on the side of the recital by mezzo-soprano Michelle DeYoung and pianist Kevin Murphy (May 1, 2 pm), presented by Vocal Arts D.C. in the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater. Replacing soprano Anna Caterina Antonacci, DeYoung will sing songs by Falla, Elgar, Brahms, Strauss, and Joseph Marx. Later that afternoon is the recital by pianist Murray Perahia (May 1, 4 pm), presented by Washington Performing Arts in the Music Center at Strathmore. Reason No. 1 that I would hate to miss this recital: he will play Beethoven's Hammerklavier sonata.

More fireworks come later in the week with an all-Prokofiev recital by pianist Yefim Bronfman (May 3). This free concert at the Library of Congress will feature the sixth, seventh, and eighth sonatas from a leading Prokofiev interpreter.

Pianist Nelson Freire plays music by Bach (fourth partita), Beethoven (piano sonata op. 111), Shostakovich, and Chopin, in his recital at Shriver Hall in Baltimore (May 8).

The concert by violinist Itzhak Perlman and pianist Emanuel Ax, canceled last September because Perlman had to undergo emergency surgery, will take place this month (May 10), presented by Washington Performing Arts in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall.

ENSEMBLES:
Opera Bel Cantanti will give a rare performance of Mikhail Glinka's opera Ruslan and Ludmila (May 7 to 15) at the Randolph Road Theater in Silver Spring.

James MacMillan takes the podium of the National Symphony Orchestra, leading performances of Elgar's cello concerto, with soloist Alban Gerhardt, Vaughan Williams's fourth symphony, and his own piece The Sacrifice (May 12 to 14), in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall.

Two programs from the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra made the cut, beginning with a concert led by John Adams, pairing his own Harmonielehre with Beethoven's fifth piano concerto with Jeremy Denk as soloist (May 12 in Baltimore; May 15 at Strathmore). John Storgårds takes the podium the following week, leading performances of Holst's The Planets, a new work by Libby Larsen, and Tan Dun's Water Concerto (May 21 at Strathmore; May 20 and 22 in Baltimore).

The talented chamber ensemble Inscape gives two concerts this month. Joined by violinist Miranda Cuckson, they will bring music back to the wonderful Hammer Auditorium at the Corcoran, with music by Douglas Boyce, Nathan Lincoln-DeCusatis, and Paul Moravec (May 8). The following week, in their home base at the Episcopal Church of the Redeemer in Bethesda, they perform a more varied program with music by Bach, Wagner, Robert Moran, Steven Stucky, and Jeremy Podgursky (May 15).

The rest of the May schedule will scroll through the Ionarts sidebar.

Perchance to Stream: Nikolaus Harnoncourt Edition

Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to online audio and online video from the week gone by. After clicking to an audio or video stream, you may need to press the "Play" button to start the broadcast. Some of these streams become unavailable after a few days.

• Marian Rebeka and Juan Diego Flórez star in the production of Gounod's Roméo et Juliette, under conductor Marco Armiliato, recorded at the Wiener Staatsoper. [ORF]


• Watch the production of Handel's Alcina from the Grand Théâtre de Genève, starring Nicole Cabell. [ARTE]


• From the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, Michael Spyres and Patricia Petibon star in a production of Mozart's Mithridate with Le Concert d'Astrée under conductor Emmanuelle Haim. [ARTE]


• Have a listen to Michael William Balfe's opera The Bohemian Girl, in the 1991 Dublin recording with the Radio Telefis Eireann Philharmonic Choir, National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland, and conductor Richard Bonynge, starring Nova Thomas (Arline), Patrick Power (Thaddeus), Jonathan Summers (Graf Arnheim), and others. [ORF]


• Listen to the performance of Verdi's Luisa Miller from the Sydney Opera House, starring soprano Nicole Car. [ABC Classic]


• Igor Levit and Julia Fischer play all the violin sonatas of Beethoven in three concerts at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris. [France Musique]


• Paul Van Nevel and the Huelgas Ensemble perform music by Cipriano de Rore, recorded last November at the Temple de Pentemont. [France Musique]

Read more »

Perchance to Stream: Back from Santa Fe Edition

Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to online audio and online video from the week gone by. After clicking to an audio or video stream, you may need to press the "Play" button to start the broadcast. Some of these streams become unavailable after a few days.

• Listen to the performance of Verdi's Il Trovatore, starring Roberto Alagana (Manrico) and Marie-Nicole Lemieux (Azucena), recorded at the Chorégies d'Orange. [France Musique]


• From the Salzburg Festival, Franz Welser-Möst conducts a performance of Beethoven's Fidelio, starring Jonas Kaufmann and Adrianne Pieczonka. [ORF | RTBF | BR-Klassik]


• Watch the performance of Britten's The Rape of Lucretia from Glyndebourne. [Glyndebourne]


• John Eliot Gardiner conducts Monteverdi's L'Orfeo with the Monteverdi Choir. [BBC Proms]


• Pianist Daniil Trifonov plays a recital of music by Liszt, recorded at La Roque d'Anthéron. [France Musique]


• Listen to the performance of Wagner's Die Walküre from the Bayreuth Festival. [BR-Klassik]


• Listen to the performance of Wagner's Götterdämmerung from the Bayreuth Festival. [Radio Clásica | Act 2 | Act 3]


• Leonardo Garcia Alarcon conducts the RIAS Chamber Choir Berlin and the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra in music by Cherubini, Onslow, and Beethoven. [France Musique]


• Listen to Daniele Rustioni conduct a performance of Rossini's Il Turco in Italia, starring Paolo Bordogna (Don Geronio) and Nino Machaidze (Fiorilla), recorded in Turin this past March. [ORF]


• Le Concert Spirituel and soprano Katherine Watson, under conductor Hervé Niquet, perform the Grands Motets of Rameau. [France Musique]


• Listen to the performance of Verdi's Requiem, with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, the Concert Association of the Chorus of the Deutsche Oper Berlin, soprano Angela Meade, mezzo-soprano Karen Cargill, and other soloists, all conducted by Donald Runnicles. [BBC Proms]

Read more »

Perchance to Stream: School's Out Edition

Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to online audio and online video from the week gone by. After clicking to an audio or video stream, you may need to press the "Play" button to start the broadcast. Some of these streams become unavailable after a few days.

• From the Latvian National Opera in Riga, watch the world premiere of Valentina by Arturs Maskats, in a production directed by Viestur Kairish, conducted by Modestas Pitrenas, and starring Inga Kalna in the title role. [ARTE]


• Mezzo-soprano Sarah Connolly sings arias by Handel at the Göttingen Festival. [ARTE]


• Listen to the world premiere of Edith Canat de Chizy's Voilé, dévoilé with Mireille Delunsch, with Joshua Weilerstein also leading the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France in Chausson's Viviane and Rachmaninov's Symphonic Dances. [France Musique]


• Mezzo-soprano Bernarda Fink and the Academy of Ancient Music, under Rodolfo Richter, perform music by Francesco Maria Veracini, Tarquinio Merula, Antonio Vivaldi, Tomaso Albinoni, and Giovanni Battista Ferrandini at the Musée d'Orsay. [France Musique]


• Esa-Pekka Salonen leads performances of Debussy's La damoiselle élue and Messiaen's Turangalîla Symphony with the Philharmonia Chorus and Orchestra, soprano Sophie Bevan, mezzo-soprano Anna Stéphany, pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard, and Valérie Hartmann-Claverie on the Ondes Martenot. [BBC3]


• Raphaël Pichon leads Ensemble Pygmalion in a performance of Rameau's Dardanus, recorded earlier this month at the Opéra Royal du Château de Versailles, starring Mathias Vidal and Karina Gauvin. [France Musique]


• Il Ballo performs Cavalieri's oratorio La Rappresentatione di Anima e di Corpo at the Festival Sinfonia. [France Musique]


• Watch Salue pour moi le monde, the new ballet by Joëlle Bouvier to music from Wagner's Tristan und Isolde, performed by dancers from the Grand Théâtre de Genève at the Bâtiment des Forces Motrices. [ARTE]


• You can watch (or listen to) the twelve finalists in this year's Queen Elisabeth Competition in Brussels: Tobias Feldmann, William Hagen, Bomsori Kim, Ji Yoon Lee, Ji Young Lim, Fumika Mohri, Thomas Reif, Kenneth Renshaw, Oleksii Semenenko, Stephen Waarts, Xiao Wang, and William Ching-Yi Wei. It is for violinists this year, and the South Korean Ji Young Lim (b. 1995) won. [Concours Reine Elisabeth | RTBF]


• Christoph and Julian Prégardien, joined by harpsichordist Jos van Immerseel and musicians from Anima Eterna Brugge, perform music by Monteverdi and Schubert, at the Salzburger Pfingstfestspiele. [ORF]


• Neeme Järvi conducts the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, in a concert recorded earlier this month in Geneva, with music by Rossini, Frank Martin, Stravinsky, and Ravel. [ORF]


• Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic perform music by Rossini, Sibelius (the violin concerto with Leonidas Kavakos as soloist), and Schumann's third symphony at a concert recorded earlier this month in Athens. [ORF | Part 2]


• Listen to a performance of Mozart's Così fan tutte from the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, starring Juliane Banse (Fiordiligi), Maite Beaumont (Dorabella), Joel Prieto (Ferrando), and Joan Martín-Royo (Guglielmo), conducted by Josep Pons. [Radio Clásica]


• Soprano Barbara Vignudelli, the Choeur de Radio France, and organist Mathias Lecomte perform music by Pierre Villette, Yves Lafargue, and Gabriel Fauré. [France Musique]


• Matthias Pintscher leads the Ensemble Intercontemporain and soprano Yeree Suh in a concert recorded last February at the Philharmonie de Paris. [France Musique]


• Listen to Christoph Eschenbach conduct the Webern Symphonie Orchester in Mendelssohn's Reformations-Symphonie and Bruckner's sixth symphony, recorded in Vienna. [ORF]


• From 2013, a concert recorded at the Eglise Abbatiale de Fontfroide as part of the VIIIème Festival Musique et Histoire pour un Dialogue interculturel, Jordi Savall leads a performance by soloists from La Capella Reial de Catalunya and Hespèrion XXI of music from the age of Erasmus, by Dufay, Josquin, Sermisy, and others. [France Musique]


• Eduardo Portal leads the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in the overture to Smetana's The Bartered Bride, Dvorak's Cello Concerto with Natalie Clein as soloist, and Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade. [BBC3]


• Concentus Musicus Wien, led by violinist Erich Höbarth, perform music by Johann Joseph Fux, Johann Heinrich Schmelzer, Alessandro Poglietti, and others earlier this month at the Internationalen Barocktage Stift Melk. [ORF]


• Listen to a recital of music by Debussy, Respighi, Szymanowski, and Elgar performed by violinist James Ehnes and pianist Andrew Armstrong, recorded at the Wigmore Hall in London. [BBC3]


• Music of Bernstein, Milhaud, and new music by Schnyder and Daugherty, with Kristjan Järvi leading the Orchestre National de France. [France Musique]


• From the Chapel of Trinity College, Cambridge, the Yale Schola Cantorum and Juilliard415, directed by David Hill, perform Beethoven's Mass in C, plus music by Daniel Kellogg, Roderick Williams, and Haydn. [BBC3]


• Listen to the May 2 performance of Verdi's Un Ballo in maschera from the Metropolitan Opera, starring Ricardo Tamura (Gustavo), Sondra Radvanovksy (Amelia), Dmitri Hvorostovsky (Renato), Heidi Stober (Oscar), and Dolora Zajick (Ulrika). [ORF]


• From La Folle journée de Nantes, the Sinfonia Varsovia plays music by Mozart, Chopin, and Bach. [France Musique]


• From St Laurence's Church, Ludlow, for the Ludlow English Song Weekend, baritone Roderick Williams and pianist Iain Burnside perform music by Vaughan Williams, Robert Saxton, and Gerald Finzi. [BBC3]


• Enrique Mazzola leads the Orchestre National d'Ile de France at the Philharmonie de Paris in music of Philip Glass and David Bowie. [France Musique]


• The King's Singers perform a concert at the Salle Gaveau in Paris, with music by Thomas Morley, Thomas Weelkes, Claude Debussy, Camille Saint-Saëns, James MacMillan, and more. [France Musique]


• From Vienna in 2002, a concert by William Christie and Les Arts Florissants, with music by Lully and soprano Sophie Daneman, among others. [ORF]


• A 2002 performance of Handel's oratorio Jephtha from Vienna, with Concentus Musicus Wien, Dorothea Röschmann, Bernarda Fink, and Gerald Finley. [ORF]

Perchance to Stream: Christ Is Risen Edition

Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to online audio and online video from the week gone by. After clicking to an audio or video stream, you may need to press the "Play" button to start the broadcast. Some of these streams become unavailable after a few days. Because of the ongoing labor disputes at Radio France, there are still no streams available from France Musique.

• Mikko Franck conducts a performance of Richard Strauss's Elektra at the Wiener Staatsoper, starring Nina Stemme (Elektra), Anna Larsson (Klytämnestra), Ricarda Merbeth (Chrysothemis), and Falk Struckmann (Orest). [ORF]


• Jordi Savall leads a performance of Bach's St. Matthew Passion at the Palau de la Música Catalana in Barcelona, with Le Concert des Nations, La Capella Reial de Catalunya, the Cor Infantil Amics de la Unió, and soloists. [ORF]


• Nikolaus Harnoncourt conducts Bach's St. Matthew Passion with Concentus Musicus Wien, the Arnold Schoenberg Chor, and Vienna Children's Choir, plus soloists Michael Schade, Florian Boesch, Christine Schäfer, Bernarda Fink, Gerald Finley, and others. [RTBF]


• Watch René Jacobs lead a performance of Bach's St. John Passion, with the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, RIAS Kammerchor, and soloists, recorded at the Philharmonie de Paris. [Philharmonie]


• James MacMillan conducts his St Luke Passion at King's College, Cambridge, with the Britten Sinfonia and Voices, Trinity Boys Choir, London, and the Schola Cantorum of the Cardinal Vaughan Memorial School, London. [BBC3]


• Watch Bach's B Minor Mass performed by the English Baroque Soloists, Monteverdi Choir, and soloists under John Eliot Gardiner, recorded at the Philharmonie de Paris. [Philharmonie]


• René Jacobs leads performances of two Bach cantatas, Lass, Fürstin, lass noch einen Strahl, BWV 198, and Lasst uns sorgen, lasst uns wachen, Hercules auf dem Scheidewege, BWV 213, with the Helsinki Baroque Orchestra and soloists Sunhae Im, Benno Schachtner, Julian Prégardien, and Arttu Kataja. [RTBF]


• Listen to the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra and Choir, under Ton Koopman, perform music of Mozart, including the Requiem Mass, with soloists Johannette Zomer, Bogna Bartosz, Jörg Dürmüller, and Klaus Mertens, recorded last November in Geneva. [ORF]


• Pieter Wispelwey plays all six of Bach's unaccompanied cello suites, in a concert recorded at the Wiener Konzerthaus. [ORF]


• From the Salzburg Osterfestspiele, Christian Thielemann leads the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden and violinist Nikolaj Znaider in Shostakovich's first violin concerto, plus Tchaikovsky's sixth symphony, [ORF | Part 2]


• Stephen Cleobury leads a performance of Rossini's Stabat mater, plus music of Haydn and Brahms, with the BBC Concert Orchestra, Philharmonia Chorus, and soloists at King's College, Cambridge. [BBC3]


• Watch Simon Rattle conduct Barbara Hannigan and the London Symphony Orchestra perform music by Stravinsky, Webern, and Berg at the Barbican Center in London. [ARTE]


• Watch the equestrian ballet of Bartabas, set to Mozart's Davide Penitente as performed by Marc Minkowski and the Musiciens du Louvre--Grenoble at the Felsenreitschule in Salzburg. [ARTE]


• Listen to a performance of Halévy's grand opera La Juive, recorded at the Wiener Staatsoper in 1999, starring Neil Shicoff and Soile Isokoski. [RTBF]


• Paul Stanhope leads a concert of Easter music by the Sydney Chamber Choir, recorded at Sydney University, with music by Morales, Lassus, MacMillan, Gesualdo, and others. [ABC Classic]


• From a concert recorded in Melbourne in 2013, Ensemble Gombert performs music from the Eton Choirbook by Browne and Davy. [ABC Classic]


• The Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin performs instrumental music by J.S. Bach, W.F. Bach, C.P.E. Bach, and Johann Christian Bach. [RTBF]


• Riccardo Muti conducts the Vienna Philharmonic at a concert recorded last August at the Salzburg Festival, with Schubert's fourth symphony and Bruckner's sixth symphony. [RTBF]


• From the church of St. Dorothy, Wenceslaus, and Stanislaw, recorded in 2013, a concert by Vox Luminis of Gesualdo's Holy Saturday responsories, plus Scarlatti's Stabat mater. [Radio Clásica]


• Listen to a recital by violinist Vilde Frang and pianist Michail Lifits, with music by Mendelssohn, Fauré, and Prokofiev. [RTBF]


• Andrew Litton leads the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra in the world premiere of Mark Simpson's Israfel, James MacMillan's second piano concerto with Peter Donohoe and soloist, and Rachmaninov's second symphony, recorded in Glasgow. [BBC3]


• Violinist Alina Ibragimova joins the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra for Sibelius's violin concerto, plus music by Mozart and Bartok, recorded last November in Hobart, Australia. [ABC Classic]


• The Artemis Quartet plays the Wiener Konzerthaus, with music by Dvorak, Shostakovich, and Tchaikovsky. [ORF]

Perchance to Stream: O Antiphons Edition

Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to online audio and online video from the week gone by. After clicking to an audio or video stream, you may need to press the "Play" button to start the broadcast. Some of these streams become unavailable after a few days.

• Franck Villard conducts a performance of Offenbach's La Grande duchesse de Gérolstein, with the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, recorded at the Grand Théâtre de Genève. [France Musique]


• A performance of Verdi's Rigoletto from the Wiener Staatsoper, with Myung-Whun Chung conducting a cast led by Simon Keenlyside, Erin Morley, and Piotr Beczala. [ORF]


• Juan Diego Flórez headlines the opera gala of the Munich Radio Orchestra. [BR-Klassik]


• Andrew Gourlay conducts the Halle Orchestra in Tchaikovsky's score for The Nutcracker. [BBC3]


• From the Temple Church, the BBC Singers perform Handel's Messiah in a version with wind orchestra accompaniment. [BBC3]


• From the Temple Winter Festival, Gallicantus performs masses by Tallis and Rore at the Temple Church in London. [BBC3]


• Polyphony perform festive 20th-century music for Christmas by Tavener, Howells, and Warlock. [BBC3]


• Also at the Temple Winter Festival, Vox Luminis performs late Renaissance and early Baroque music celebrating the birth of Christ. [BBC3]


• Philippe Herreweghe conducts the Radio Filharmonisch Orkest and Groot Omroepkoor, with soprano Christina Landshamer and bass Florian Boesch, in Mendelssohn's settings of Psalm 42, Wie der Hirsch schreit and Schubert's Mass (D. 950), recorded this month in Utrecht. [Avro Klassiek | Part 2]


• The Orchestre National de France, under conductor Daniele Gatti, plays music by Stravinsky (Petrouchka) and Strauss (Don Juan, and the Rosenkavalier Suite), at La Scala in Milan. [France Musique]


• German Baroque music for Christmas, by Schütz, Schein, Scheidt, and Johann Michael Bach, performed by Vox Luminis in the Oratoire du Louvre in Paris. [France Musique]


• Francesco Baroni leads Gambe di Legno in a performance of Pietro Paolo Bencini's Christmas oratorio Gesù nato. [ORF]


• A performance of Telemann's cantata Ino with soprano Dorothea Röschmann, plus Concentus Musicus Wien conducted by Nikolaus Harnoncourt in music of Bach and Handel. [ORF]


• For the 70th birthday of William Christie, listen to his recording of Charpentier's Pastorale sur la naissance de Notre Seigneur Jesus-Christ and Luigi Rossi's L'Orfeo, recorded in Vienna in 1990. [ORF]


• Music by Tallis, Byrd, Weelkes, and others performed by Voces8, recorded at the Regensburg Early Music Festival in 2013. [RTBF]


• The Chamber Orchestra of Europe, conducted by Bernard Haitink, performs Brahms symphonies (nos. 3 and 4) and piano concertos (with Emanuel Ax as soloist) at the Salle Pleyel in Paris, over two concerts. [France Musique | Part 2]


• Charles Dutoit conducts the Zurich Tonhalle Orchestra in music by Stravinsky, Martin, and Saint-Saëns. [RTBF]


• From a concert recorded last September at the Internationalen Brahmsfestes Mürzzuschlag, the Altenberg Trio plays music by Brahms. [ORF]


• Emmanuel Krivine conducts La Chambre Philharmonique in Mendelssohn's fifth symphony ("Reformation") and Beethoven's fifth piano concerto (with Bertrand Chamayou as soloist), recorded at the Cité de la Musique. [France Musique]


• Excerpts of recitals by pianist Beatrice Rana, recorded in Liège and Zdroj (Poland), with music by Bach, Chopin, and Schumann. [RTBF]


• Jean-Claude Casadesus and pianist Adam Laloum perform music by Albéric Magnard, Ravel, and Debussy, with the Orchestre National de Lille. [ORF]


• More Brahms and Dvorak from the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, with conductor Lionel Bringuier and cellist Daniel Müller-Schott. [France Musique]


• Frank Strobel conducts the ORF Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien in Paul Hindemith's score for Arnold Fanck's film Im Kampf mit dem Berge: Eine Alpensymphonie in Bildern, recorded at the Wiener Konzerthaus. [ORF]


• Watch the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse, under conductor Tugan Sokhiev, perform music by Webern and Prokofiev, plus yet another percussion concerto, this time by James MacMillan (with the inevitable Colin Currie). [Medici.tv]


• Nikolaus Harnoncourt leads Concentus Musicus Wien in a performance of Mozart's Haffner-Serenade and "Linz" symphony, recorded last October in Graz. [ORF | Part 2]


• Listen to the Quatuor Varèse perform music by Mozart, Dutilleux, and Webern. [France Musique]


• Jérôme Garcin reads his poetry, interspersed with music by Fauré, Debussy, Duparc, and Bach, in celebration of Jean de La Ville de Mirmont, recorded last month in Soissons. [France Musique]


• Karl Richter conducts the ORTF Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus in Haydn's Creation, recorded in 1970 at the Salle Pleyel in Paris. [France Musique]

Perchance to Stream: End of an Era Edition

Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to online audio and online video from the week gone by. After clicking to an audio or video stream, you may need to press the "Play" button to start the broadcast. Some of these streams become unavailable after a few days.

• Listen to Diana Damrau, Dmitry Korchak, and Nathan Gunn star in a performance of Bizet's Les pêcheurs de perles, with Jean-Christophe Spinosi leading the ORF RSO Wien and Arnold Schoenberg Chor. [ORF]


• Philippe Herreweghe and Collegium Vocale Gent perform Bach's cantata Ich hatte viel Bekümmernis, motet O Jesu Christ, meins Lebens Licht, and Magnificat, recorded last February in Warsaw. [ORF]


• Bernard Labadie conducts the WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln in Mozart's Great C Minor Mass, plus the "Jupiter" symphony. [France Musique]


• Christoph Eschenbach conducts Berlioz's Le Carnaval Romain, Liszt's Mazeppa, and Strauss's Burlesque with Lang Lang as soloists. [RTBF]


• Peter Donohoe is soloist in James MacMillan's third piano concerto ("Mysteries of Light"), with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and conductor Martyn Brabbins, plus music by Sibelius and Shostakovich. [BBC3]


• Listen to the new second string quartet by Adelaide composer Kat McGuffie, performed by the Goldner Quartet in Melbourne. [ABC Classic]


• Soprano Erin Wall joins the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus for Poulenc's Stabat mater and excerpts from Prokofiev's music for Romeo and Juliet, conducted by James Gaffigan. [RTBF]


• Watch David Zinman conduct the Orchestre de Paris and cellist Gautier Capuçon in music by Hector Berlioz, Benjamin Britten, and Robert Schumann at the Salle Pleyel. [Cité de la Musique LIVE]


• Andris Nelsons conducts the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra in music of Tchaikovsky, joined by cellist Daniel Müller-Schott. [France Musique]


• Music by Rameau, Lully, Telemann, and Mendelssohn with the SWR Symphony Orchestra Stuttgart, conducted by Roger Norrington. [RTBF]


• At the Wigmore Hall, the Prince Consort sings ensemble songs by Robert Schumann. [BBC3]


• From the Utrecht Early Music Festival, Christina Pluhar leads her ensemble L'Arpeggiata in sacred music by Antonio Bertali (1605-1669) and Giovanni Felice Sances (1600-1679). [France Musique]

• Violinist Luc Héry joins the Orchestre National de France and conductor Daniele Gatti, for music by Ravel, Saint-Saëns, and Strauss. [France Musique]


• The Clemencic Consort performs sacred music by Giacomo Carissimi, recorded earlier this month at the Wiener Musikverein. [ORF]


• Semyon Bychkov and pianist Kirill Gerstein join the Vienna Philharmonic for music by Glinka, Tchaikovsky, and Shostakovich. [ORF]


• A program of contemporary music by Clara Iannotta, Gérard Grisey, Joanna Bailie, and Mauro Lanza, performed last month in the Eglise Saint-Merri in Paris by the Ensemble soundinitiative, conducted by Leonhard Garms. [France Musique]


• Valery Gergiev conducts the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra in Janacek's Taras Bulba, Miaskovsky's fourth symphony, and Prokofiev's first violin concerto, with Lisa Batiashvili as soloist, recorded in September in Rotterdam. [ORF]


• John Storgards conducts the BBC Philharmonic in music by Tchaikovsky, plus Nielsen's flute concerto. [BBC3]


• Listen to a recital by violinist Lidia Baich and pianist Matthias Fletzberger, with music by Joseph Marx, Kreisler, Strauss, and the performers. [ORF]


• Lisa Batiashvili plays Brahms with the NDR Sinfonieorchester and conductor Thomas Hengelbrock, recorded in September in Hamburg. [ORF]


• The BBC Symphony Orchestra and Singers perform music by Respighi, Brett Dean, and Strauss. [BBC3]


• More archived Strauss recordings from the Orchestre philharmonique de Radio France and Marek Janowski. [France Musique]


• The Borodin Quartet with clarinetist Michael Collins perform music by Borodin, Schubert, and Mozart. [BBC3]


• Popular French songs by Offenbach, Serge Gainsbourg, and others, performed by the Choeur de Radio France. [France Musique]


• Listen to the classic recording of Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi, starring Edita Gruberová (Giulietta) and Agnes Baltsa (Romeo), with Riccardo Muti conducting at Covent Garden in 1984. [ORF]

Briefly Noted: Tarik O'Regan

T. O'Regan Acallam na Senórach (An Irish Colloquy), National Chamber Choir of Ireland, S. French, P. Hillier (Harmonia Mundi, 2011)

British composer Tarik O'Regan's family is a decidedly contemporary mixture of North African and Irish heritage. Like the Scottish composer James MacMillan, O'Regan's music occasionally trades on folk music elements that seem Celtic, but in his hour-long Acallam na Senórach, a setting of parts of the 12th-century Middle-Irish poem that is part of the Fenian Cycle, he doubles down on the Irish. In the poem, St. Patrick travels around Ireland, hearing the tales told by two veteran Irish warriors. O'Regan made a selection from the tales, using some original texts in Middle Irish, but with most of the text in English translation. The musical style of the piece is a far cry from the contrapuntal and multi-textual complexity of Scattered Rhymes. This is a more austere score, with lots of meditative homophony (sung with clarity by the National Chamber Choir of Ireland) and an evocative accompaniment by guitar (played by Stewart French), which O'Regan thought of as a tribute to the other side of his family, meant to sound like an Irish instrument that might have been related to a Middle Eastern one. This may not be a great work or anything, but O'Regan is a composer worth getting to know, not least because Paul Hillier and other conductors have championed him.

In Brief: Polar Vortex Edition

Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to online audio, online video, and other good things in Blogville and Beyond. (After clicking to an audio or video stream, press the "Play" button to start the broadcast.) Some of these streams become unavailable after a few days.

• James Conlon conducts Verdi's I due Foscari at the Theater an der Wien, with a cast starring Placido Domingo (Francesco Foscari), Arturo Chacón-Cruz (Jacopo Foscari), and Davinia Rodriguez (Lucrezia Contarini). [ORF]


• The Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, with soprano Johannette Zomer, perform cantatas and other music by Johann Sebastian Bach. [ORF]


• Listen to the world premiere of Isis and Osiris by Jacques Lenot, recorded on January 13 at Ircam. [France Musique]


• John Taverner's Western Wynde Mass, with Andrew Carwood leading the BBC Singers at St Paul's Knightsbridge. [BBC3]


• Watch members of Les Arts Florissants, led by Paul Agnew, perform the sixth book of Claudio Monteverdi's madrigals. [Cité de la Musique Live]


• From a concert recorded last summer at the Stadtkirche in Ruhland, chamber music performed by the Vienna Piano Trio and friends. [RTBF]


• The world premiere of the new viola concerto by James MacMillan, with Vladimir Jurowski conducting soloist Lawrence Power and the London Philharmonic. [BBC3]

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In Brief: Veterans Day Edition

Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to online audio, online video, and other good things in Blogville and Beyond. (After clicking to an audio or video stream, press the "Play" button to start the broadcast.) Some of these streams become unavailable after a few days.

• Watch pianist Wu Han, tenor Christoph Prégardien, the Quatuor Ebène, and bass player Benjamin Berlioz join Menahem Pressler for a concert to celebrate the veteran pianist's 90th birthday -- also embedded at right. [Cité de la Musique Live]


• Listen to a recording of Strauss's Der Rosenkavalier from the Vienna State Opera, recorded last month, starring Renée Fleming, Sophie Koch, and Peter Rose and with Adam Fischer at the podium. [RTBF]


• Mariss Jansons leads the Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam for the organization's 125th anniversary, with the premiere of Louis Andriessen's Mysteriën and Strauss's Ein Heldenleben. [RTBF]


• Pianist Daniil Trifonov plays a recital in the Auditorium du Louvre, with music by Debussy, Chopin, and Robert Schumann, recorded last month. [France Musique]


• Keyboard concertos by J. S. Bach, with Martha Argerich and friends, recorded in the Salle Pleyel in Paris. [Part 1 | Part 2]

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In Brief: Cold Snap Edition

Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to online audio, online video, and other good things in Blogville and Beyond. (After clicking to an audio or video stream, press the "Play" button to start the broadcast.) Some of these streams become unavailable after a few days.

• Watch the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne perform several of Bach's keyboard concertos, featuring as soloists Martha Argerich and her various proteges and friends, including Nicholas Angelich, Frank Braley, David Fray, Gabriela Montero, and others. [Part 1 | Part 2]


• Cellist Marie-Elisabeth Hecker and pianist Martin Helmchen perform all of the cello sonatas of Ludwig van Beethoven, in two concerts recorded in the Auditorium du Musée du Louvre. [Part 1 | Part 2]


• Music of Bach with the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin and soprano Johannette Zomer. [RTBF]


• Watch a rare staging of Gaspare Spontini's opera La Vestale, with Jérémie Rhorer conducting Le Cercle de l'Harmonie in a new production by Eric Lacascade at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées. [Medici.tv]


• Christopher Hogwood leads the Academy of Ancient Music at the Barbican Hall in London, in a performance of Handel's Imeneo, starring Rebecca Bottone, Vittorio Prato, Lucy Crowe, David Daniels, and Stephan Loges, recorded last May. [ORF]

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national symphony ORCHESTRA in World Premiere

With the superficial season-opening festivities out of the way, the National Symphony Orchestra opened its season properly with its first subscription program last night. Two good programming trends from Christoph Eschenbach's first three seasons continued into his first: presenting pieces for their NSO debuts, and playing new contemporary works. Here, a Haydn symphony never before played by the NSO was paired with a world premiere, followed unfortunately by something far too familiar, the Saint-Saëns "Organ-Symphony." Again.

The centerpiece of the evening was the world premiere of a new multimedia work by Roger Reynolds, george WASHINGTON, a sort of environmental soundtrack for a three-narrator text cobbled together from the letters and journals of the first American president. The commission came from the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association, who specified the subject, with the NSO joining in the commission and providing the first performances. Reynolds tries to take the listener into Washington's world, with a harpsichord piece of the sort he liked to hear his step-granddaugher play, tracks of bird song and other noises recorded at Mount Vernon, and some video imagery of Washington's home, recorded through all four seasons, which was displayed on three large screens over the stage, each divided into panels as if one is looking through large-paned windows. The recorded sounds are sent around the room through surround-sound speakers, requiring the three actors to be amplified. It was a relief, at least, that a work by Reynolds was not grating or vexing, but it was one of the more dull and monotonous experiences, at over twenty minutes, in recent memory.

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In Brief: Red or Green Edition

Here is your regular Sunday selection of links to online audio, online video, and other good things in Blogville and Beyond. (After clicking to an audio or video stream, press the "Play" button to start the broadcast.) Now you know what to do with your Sunday.

• In case you missed the live streams of the Ring cycle from Bayreuth, you can listen to the performance of the first two operas, conducted by Kirill Petrenko, from France Musique -- audio only, so no need to worry about that dog of a production. [Das Rheingold | Die Walküre]


• One of the highlights of the Salzburg Festival (read the review by our own Jens Laurson): Manfred Honeck leads a performance of Jeanne d'Arc by Walter Braunfels, with Juliane Banse, Bryan Hymel, Pavol Breslik, and others with the ORF Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien. [ORF]


• Music of Beethoven and Wagner from the Aix-en-Provence Festival, with bass René Pape joining the Orchestre de Paris and conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen. [France Musique]


• From the MAfestivals 2013 in Bruges, René Jacobs conducts Handel's Orlando, with Bejun Mehta, Sophie Karthäuser, Sunhae Im, Kristina Hammarström, and others. [ORF]


• From the Proms, violinist Vadim Repin and conductor Donald Runnicles join the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra for James MacMillan's Violin Concerto, plus music by Johann Strauss II and Beethoven. [Part 1 | Part 2]

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NSO Ends Season with a Modern Bang

W. Lutosławski, Concerto for Orchestra (inter alia), Polish Radio National Symphony Orchestra, W. Lutosławski (EMI)

The regular season of the National Symphony Orchestra came to a memorable close last night in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall. Before heading off for summer shits and giggles at Wolf Trap, the ensemble brought back Witold Lutosławski's virtuosic Concerto for Orchestra, not heard from the NSO since 1998, pairing it with the one-night-only local premiere of the new piano concerto by James MacMillan, Mysteries of Light, completed in 2008 and premiered by the Minnesota Orchestra in 2011. It was daring programming that rewarded the hard-working musicians, who gave one of their finer performances of the season.

It was a rare enough thing to have heard one Lutosławski piece performed this month, but two is pretty much unheard of around these parts. Where the later Trois poèmes d'Henri Michaux is experimental and just downright weird -- a good weird, but still -- the earlier Concerto for Orchestra is sheer delight, in harmonic adventure, melodic appeal, rhythmic complexity, and most of all, orchestrational variety. The word tour de force truly applies. Most of the melodic material comes from a collection of Polish folk songs, treated in a fragmented, repetitive, motivic way. Stasis is one of the piece's hallmarks, with an F# pedal in the opening of the first movement later pinged by the celesta in a section for woodwinds and high strings. The second movement's rushing runs were stunningly fast but with pleasing subtlety, down to the enigmatic coda in the double basses and percussion. The passacaglia of the third movement began suavely, shot through with bluesy touches, the many orchestral colors and metric shifts preventing the relentless triple meter from becoming monotonous.

This was the NSO debut of conductor Krzysztof Urbanski, who took over the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra after Mario Venzago's contract was not renewed. He had a clear beat and a no-nonsense way of helping the musicians shape the music, rarely seeming at odds with them. He did have a regrettable tendency to use his cue hand to give showy gestures, like little finger flicks for trills or grace notes here and there, which were meant only for the audience's benefit. Still, he coaxed some murky pianissimi from the musicians in the second movement of the first suite from Grieg's music for Peer Gynt, "Åse's death." The strings, in particular, had a unified and pretty sound in this piece, leading a manic dance in "In the Hall of the Mountain King."

Other Reviews: Anne Midgette, Polish conductor, Kennedy Center organ impress as NSO closes season (Washington Post, June 21) Robert Reilly, Second Opinion: NSO with Tough MacMillan Nuts, Lutosławski Excitement (Ionarts, June 21)

MacMillan's new piano concerto struck me in much the same way as his second piano concerto did, its five movements, each representing one of the Luminous Mysteries added to the Rosary by Pope John Paul II in 2002, forming a multistylistic melange. MacMillan's Catholic devotion was on display in the quotation of Gregorian chant, most prominently the incipit of the Ave Maria chant, heard in increasingly dissonant settings, often hammered out like a motto (some of the rest of the chant is heard later). At the keyboard, Jean-Yves Thibaudet handled the often frenetic solo part with aplomb, a sort of commentary, sometimes urgent and sometimes reflective, on the mishmash of sounds from the orchestra. Each mystery had odd touches: the brass fanfare and trombone chorale of "Miraculum in Cana," the piano's atonal bird songs (a tribute to another Catholic modernist, Olivier Messiaen) against lush low string strings in "Proclamatio Regni Dei," a hymn tune that rose above multimetric chaos in "Transfiguratio Domini Nostri." It would be hard to meditate to this music while praying the Rosary, which was not MacMillan's goal, but it made for fun and diverting listening.

The evening was capped by only the second "Postlude" recital on the new Kennedy Center Concert Hall Organ this season, a series that the NSO hopes to broaden next season. At the console was Russell J. Weismann, whom I know from my time singing in the choir at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, who charmed in both his spoken introductions to the pieces and how he played them. He brought out the instrument's many colors, including the rather awful "Filene" stop, the only set of pipes that was kept from the old instrument that this organ replaced. The brief recital concluded with a trashy showpiece, Dudley Buck's Concert Variations on the Star-Spangled Banner, which was everything I dreaded it would be. If you were wondering if the American national anthem's melody could be made into a fugue, wonder no longer.

This concert repeats tonight and tomorrow night, with Saint-Saëns's fifth piano concerto unfortunately replacing the MacMillan piece and no organ recital.

Second Opinion: NSO with Tough MacMillan Nuts, Lutosławski Excitement

Many thanks to Robert R. Reilly for this review from The Kennedy Center.

Thursday night, at the Kennedy Center,the National Symphony Orchestra welcomed Polish conductor Krzysztof Urbanski in a program of Edvard Grieg, James MacMillan, and Witold Lutosławski.

Grieg’s Suite No.1 from Peer Gynt made for a nice curtain raiser and warm-up piece. It also revealed the style of the very young conductor, who only graduated from the Chopin Music Academy in Warsaw in 2007. Mr. Urbanski kept the beat with his baton in his right hand, and did a good deal of expressive sculpting with his left hand—almost as if he was playing it as an instrument. I don’t think this was an affectation and even if it was, it seemed to produce very good results. I was particularly struck by the second movement, Ase’s Death, which is a threnody for strings alone, with all but the double basses playing with mutes. The NSO string section positively glowed with warmth and feeling, down to the final, exquisite pianissimo. In the last movement, In the Hall of the Mountain King, Urbanski showed that he knew how to build a movement with the whole orchestra to an impressive climax.

Other Reviews: Charles Downey, NSO Ends Season with a Modern Bang (21.6.13)

I was very interested to hear MacMillan’s Piano Concerto No.3, which was composed for performing pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet, who premiered the piece with the Minnesota Orchestra in 2011. It has taken some time for me to be won over by this Scottish Catholic composer, but the work that finally did it was his Seven Last Words, an ineffably moving Good Friday meditation. Still, much of his music is difficult, and so were parts of this Concerto. (I would suggest that those who have assimilated the musical and extra-musical language of French composer Olivier Messiaen would not have much of a problem with it. The programmers at the NSO must have known that this was the case [Ed. or simply don’t trust their audience], which is why they have placed Saint-Saëns’ Concerto No. 5 in lieu of the MacMillan, for the remaining two performances of the program. The piece is subtitled The Mysteries of Light. MacMillan said he wished “to revive the ancient practice of writing based on the structure of the rosary”. The Mysteries of Light title is a reference to the Luminous Mysteries of the rosary introduced by Pope John Paul II in 2002. They are, in English: the baptism of Jesus Christ; the miracle in Cana; the proclamation of the reign of God; the Transfiguration of our Lord; and the institution of the Eucharist.The five movements are played continuously.

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Briefly Noted: MacMillan Piano Concerto

J. MacMillan, Piano Concerto No. 2, W. Marshall, BBC Philharmonic, J. MacMillan (Chandos, 2006)

Krzysztof Urbanski is conducting quite a program with the National Symphony Orchestra tonight, combining Grieg's Peer Gynt Suite No. 1, op. 46, and Lutosławski's Concerto for Orchestra. In between will be Jean-Yves Thibaudet playing a piano concerto, either the new third piano concerto by Scottish composer James MacMillan -- tonight only -- or the old Thibaudet standby, one of the Saint-Saëns concertos (no. 5, "Egyptian"). Urbanski is the chief conductor of the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra and, since the peremptory dismissal of Mario Venzago, the music director of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. MacMillan's third piano concerto, premiered in 2011 by Thibaudet and the Minnesota Orchestra, is based on the structure of the Rosary, specifically the Luminous Mysteries added to the meditation of the Rosary by Pope John Paul II.

The third concerto has not been recorded yet, but tonight's local premiere sent me back to have another listen to MacMillan's second piano concerto, in a recording conducted by the composer. This score was expanded from a single-movement work, Cumnock Fair, which remains the first movement of the concerto, to serve as the accompaniment of a choreography by Christopher Wheeldon for New York City Ballet in 2004. The first movement begins with a frenetic orchestral unison, an introduction to a sometimes dissonant fantasy on 18th-century melodies by John French, a friend of Robert Burns who lived in Cumnock, with the piano often reflecting on them nostalgically. The slow movement has an old-fashioned, even schmaltzy quotation of the mad scene from Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor in the middle, which comes back like a nostalgic memory at the end of the third movement. The finale is a high-spirited reel, with all sorts of interesting percussive and harmonic effects laid over the top. It receives a fine if not all that remarkable performance by Wayne Marshall and the BBC Philharmonic on this Chandos disc, which is frankly overshadowed by the same soloist's rendition of MacMillan's hallucinatory organ concerto A Scotch Bestiary, from 2004, which is a wild ride worth your time. Hopefully, it is on Christoph Eschenbach's To-Do list.

The National Symphony Orchestra will play James MacMillan's third piano concerto only this evening (June 20, 7 pm), in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall. Also only tonight is one of the free recitals on the Concert Hall's new organ, just following the concert. This time, Russell J. Weismann, Associate Director of Music at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, where we spent time imprisoned as a chorister, will play the Cortège et Litanie by Marcel Duprè, Herbert Nanney's Sonata in E minor, and Dudley Buck's Concert Variations on the Star-Spangled Banner.

Classical Music Agenda (June 2013)

Summer is at hand, meaning that the pickings get slimmer in the monthly concert agenda for local events. On the other hand, we will also have a summer festival preview coming up, with some of the performances outside of Washington we most want to hear.

Composer James MacMillan

ORCHESTRAS:
Happily the National Symphony Orchestra is extending its season at the Kennedy Center through June, until at the end of the month the summer concerts at Wolf Trap kick in. The June concerts are far from throwaways either, with one of the violinists we most enjoy listening to, Augustin Hadelich, joining the NSO for a concert with conductor Jakub Hrusa (June 6 to 8), where he will play Dvořák's violin concerto. Mezzo-soprano Nadezda Serdyuk joins for a performance of Prokofiev's score for the film Alexander Nevsky.

Other NSO concerts feature contemporary pieces we really want to hear. Principal cellist David Hardy is the soloist for Dutilleux's Tout un monde lointain, with guest conductor Matthew Hall also leading pieces by Ravel and Vaughan Williams (June 13 to 15). Jean-Yves Thibaudet will give just one performance of James MacMillan's third piano concerto ("The Mysteries of Light") in a program also feeaturing Lutoslawski's Concerto for Orchestra (June 20), conducted by Krzysztof Urbanski.

Hear musicians who would like to be the orchesra players of tomorrow, at the series of performances offered by the National Orchestral Institute at the University of Maryland (June 6 to 30). Concerts include free programs of chamber music, featuring members of the faculty or students, and Saturday night concerts by the festival orchestra, highlighted by Mahler's gripping sixth symphony.

If you like your Wagner without singing, check out the National Philharmonic's Wagner 200th Anniversary Celebration concert (June 1, 8 pm), in the Music Center at Strathmore.

Pianist Markus Groh

THE REST:
Happily, the concert series at the National Gallery of Art continues through the month of June, headed up by a concert from the local ensemble Inscape Chamber Orchestra (June 2, 6:30 pm). Tickets: FREE.

Washington Performing Arts Society concludes its season with a recital by pianist Markus Groh (June 1, 2 pm) in the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater.

The Kennedy Center is once again hosting its Ballet Across America week (June 4 to 9), which will feature performances by a selection of talented regional ballet companies from around the United States, in the Kennedy Center Opera House.

The Washington National Opera continues its American Opera Initiative with two performances of Approaching Ali, a new opera by D. J. Sparr (June 8 and 9), in the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater.