LA STORIA
Santa Cecilia e il Messaggero: un contenzioso poco edificante
Se anche un'orchestra
è allergica alle critiche...
di Giuseppe Pennisi In Italia esiste ancora il diritto di critica? O sono stati ripristinati i reati di opinione, anche nei casi in cui ci si limita a riportare l'opinione altrui? Quindi, dobbiamo recedere sia dall'Unione europea sia dal Consiglio d'Europa (prima di esserne cacciati)?
È la domanda da porre tanto al ministro Alfano quanto al ministro Frattini (quanto infine al presidente dell'Accademia di Santa Cecilia , agli Accademici tutti ed alla masse artistiche, per di più finanziate in gran misura da Pantalone).
Ecco i fatti nudi e crudi. Il Maestro Alfredo Gasponi, professore di un prestigioso conservatorio e da anni critico musicale de Il Messaggero (di cui è collaboratore non redattore), è stato condannato dalla corte d'appello di Roma a un risarcimento per oltre 500 mila euro, compresi gli interessi, per un servizio uscito nel 1996 sull'Orchestra di Santa Cecilia. Il 9 marzo del 1996 Gasponi ha pubblicato sul quotidiano capitolino un'intervista in cui il noto direttore d'orchestra tedesco Wolfgang Sawallisch si lamenta di problemi intervenuti durante le prove con l'orchestra di Santa Cecilia per la presenza di troppi giovani aggiunti.
Un'intervista condotta con toni tutt'altro che scandalistici, da un giornalista noto per professionalità ed equilibrio e che alle parole del direttore tedesco affianca le repliche affidate alla voce degli stessi musicisti dell'orchestra e a quelle del presidente-a-vita dell'istituzione, Prof. Bruno Cagli. Un occhiello sulla prima pagina del quotidiano - allora diretto da Anselmi - ha una frase mirata ad attirare l'attenzione: «A Santa Cecilia non sanno suonare». Di qui per iniziativa di circa 80 musicisti dell'orchestra parte una querela per diffamazione, che nel suo secondo grado di giudizio condanna Gasponi al pagamento di 500 mila euro di danni.
In quanto collaboratore de Il Messaggero - lo sanno anche i gatti - Gasponi non ha titolo - si perdoni il calambour - a fare alcun titolo. Ciò spetta esclusivamente alla redazione; la prima pagina è poi appannaggio del direttore , dei suoi vice ed al più dei redattori capo. Secondo la sentenza di secondo grado, il pacioso e rubicondo Prof. Gasponi avrebbe confezionato «un articolo volutamente scandalistico», distorcendo «il pensiero» di Sawallisch, nonostante il Maestro tedesco abbia rilasciato una dichiarazione scritta in cui afferma che Gasponi ha riportato fedelmente le sue parole.
Il caso è gravissimo non solo per i 14 anni di processi sostenuti da Gasponi "colpevole" di aver svolto il suo lavoro ma per la ferita alla libertà di stampa . Ora la vicenda giudiziaria è in Cassazione. Occorre, però, chiedersi con quale coraggio la stagione dell'Accademia è stata inaugurata con un vero e proprio inno alla libertà di pensiero quale il rossiniano "Guglielmo Tell" e perché il suo presidente-a-vita è rimasto silente a fronte delle lettere dell'Associazione nazionale dei critici musicali. Il Parco della Musica è diventato o sta diventando un appendice della Corea del Nord? Se questo il caso, invitiamo i romani a dire "No, Grazie" e al presidente-a-vita a trarne le conseguenze.
18 ottobre 2010
lunedì 18 ottobre 2010
domenica 17 ottobre 2010
Verdi patriottico non convince Parma Milano Finanza 16 ottobre
Verdi patriottico non convince Parma
di Giuseppe Pennisi
Fino al 28 ottobre è in corso a Parma il Festival Verdi con tre nuovi allestimenti de Il Trovatore, I Vespri siciliani e Attila, nonché una sintesi di varie opere e altri lavori in un'atmosfera festiva. Attila viene presentato a Busseto con un cast giovane in un allestimento molto tradizionale.
Al Teatro Regio, Il Trovatore e I Vespri siciliani hanno in comune allestimenti minimali: scena unica con pochi elementi essenziali per le differenti scene. Ne Il Trovatore, con la regia di Lorenzo Mariani e le scene di William Orlandi l'approccio funziona anche grazie alla splendida concertazione di Yuri Temirkanov (che svela nuovi aspetti della partitura) e una compagnia di canto che, dopo alcune sostituzioni, alla terza replica risulta ben assestata e assortita. L'opera viene replicata al Regio fino al 28 ottobre e successivamente salpa per La Fenice, Tokyo e Hong-Kong. Ne I Vespri sicilani, opera raramente rappresentata per le difficoltà vocali che comporta, Pier Luigi Pizzi sposta l'azione del 1282 al 1855 con gran sventolio di bandiere e pioggia di tricolori dai palchi. Ma si tratta di espedienti ormai triti che lo stesso Verdi (molto poco partecipe al Risorgimento) avrebbe poco gradito. Non mancano interessanti movimenti delle masse per animare l'azione e dare un afflato stereofonico ai cori. Di mera routine la concertazione di Massimo Zanetti. Tra gli 11 solisti spiccano Leo Nucci e Giacomo Prestìa. Gelida l'accoglienza del pubblico alla prima. È forse utile una riflessione prima di portare lo spettacolo al Festival estivo dello Sferisterio. (riproduzione riservata)
di Giuseppe Pennisi
Fino al 28 ottobre è in corso a Parma il Festival Verdi con tre nuovi allestimenti de Il Trovatore, I Vespri siciliani e Attila, nonché una sintesi di varie opere e altri lavori in un'atmosfera festiva. Attila viene presentato a Busseto con un cast giovane in un allestimento molto tradizionale.
Al Teatro Regio, Il Trovatore e I Vespri siciliani hanno in comune allestimenti minimali: scena unica con pochi elementi essenziali per le differenti scene. Ne Il Trovatore, con la regia di Lorenzo Mariani e le scene di William Orlandi l'approccio funziona anche grazie alla splendida concertazione di Yuri Temirkanov (che svela nuovi aspetti della partitura) e una compagnia di canto che, dopo alcune sostituzioni, alla terza replica risulta ben assestata e assortita. L'opera viene replicata al Regio fino al 28 ottobre e successivamente salpa per La Fenice, Tokyo e Hong-Kong. Ne I Vespri sicilani, opera raramente rappresentata per le difficoltà vocali che comporta, Pier Luigi Pizzi sposta l'azione del 1282 al 1855 con gran sventolio di bandiere e pioggia di tricolori dai palchi. Ma si tratta di espedienti ormai triti che lo stesso Verdi (molto poco partecipe al Risorgimento) avrebbe poco gradito. Non mancano interessanti movimenti delle masse per animare l'azione e dare un afflato stereofonico ai cori. Di mera routine la concertazione di Massimo Zanetti. Tra gli 11 solisti spiccano Leo Nucci e Giacomo Prestìa. Gelida l'accoglienza del pubblico alla prima. È forse utile una riflessione prima di portare lo spettacolo al Festival estivo dello Sferisterio. (riproduzione riservata)
venerdì 15 ottobre 2010
Critico musicale condanatto a maximulta per titolo fatto da altri Il Foglio 16 ottobre
In Italia esiste ancora il diritto di critica? O sono stati ripristinati i reati di opinione , anche nei casi in cui ci si limita a riportare l'opinione altrui? Quindi, dobbiamo recedere sia dall'Unione Europea sia dal Consiglio d'Europa (prima di esserne cacciati)?
E' la domanda da porre tanto al Ministro Alfano quanto al Ministro Frattini (quanto infine al Presidente dell'Accademia di Santa Cecilia , agli Accademici tutti ed alla masse artistiche , per di più finanziate in gran misura da Pantalone).
Ecco i fatti nudi e crudi. Il Maestro Alfredo Gasponi, professore di un prestigioso conservatorio e da anni critico musicale de «Il Messaggero» (di cui è collaboratore non redattore), è stato condannato dalla corte d'appello di Roma a un risarcimento per oltre 500 mila euro, compresi gli interessi, per un servizio uscito nel 1996 sull'Orchestra di Santa Cecilia. Il 9 marzo del 1996 Gasponi ha pubblicato sul quotidiano capitolino un'intervista in cui il noto direttore d'orchestra tedesco Wolfgang Sawallisch si lamenta di problemi intervenuti durante le prove con l'orchestra di Santa Cecilia per la presenza di troppi giovani aggiunti. Un'intervista condotta con toni tutt'altro che scandalistici, da un giornalista noto per professionalità ed equilibrio e che alle parole del direttore tedesco affianca le repliche affidate alla voce degli stessi musicisti dell'orchestra e a quelle del Presidente-a-vita dell'istituzione, Prof. Bruno Cagli. Un occhiello sulla prima pagina del quotidiano - allora diretto dal compianto Pietro Calabresi - ha una frase mirata ad attirare l'attenzione: «A Santa Cecilia non sanno suonare». Di qui per iniziativa di circa 80 musicisti dell'orchestra parte una querela per diffamazione, che nel suo secondo grado di giudizio condanna Gasponi al pagamento di 500 mila euro di danni. In quanto collaboratore de «Il Messaggero» - lo sanno anche i gatti- Gasponi non ha titolo - si perdoni il calambour - a fare alcun titolo. Ciò spetta esclusivamente alla redazione; la prima pagina è poi appannaggio del direttore , dei suoi vice ed al più dei redattori capo. Secondo la sentenza di secondo grado, il pacioso e rubicondo Prof. Gasponi avrebbe confezionato «un articolo volutamente scandalistico», distorcendo «il pensiero» di Sawallisch, nonostante il Maestro tedesco abbia rilasciato una dichiarazione scritta in cui afferma che Gasponi ha riportato fedelmente le sue parole.
Il caso è gravissimo non solo per i 14 anni di processi sostenuti da Gasponi "colpevole" di aver svolto il suo lavoro ma per la ferita alla libertà di stampa . Ora la vicenda giudiziaria è in Cassazione. Occorre, però, chiedersi con quale coraggio la stagione dell'Accademia è stata inaugurata con un vero e proprio inno alla libertà di pensiero quale il rossiniano "Guglielmo Tell" e perché il suo Presidente-a-vita è rimasto silente a fronte delle lettere dell'Associazione nazionale dei critici musicali. Il Parco della Musica è diventato o sta diventando un appendice della Corea del Nord? Se questo il caso, invitiamo i romani a dire "No, Grazie" ed al Presidente-a-vita a trarne le conseguenze.
E' la domanda da porre tanto al Ministro Alfano quanto al Ministro Frattini (quanto infine al Presidente dell'Accademia di Santa Cecilia , agli Accademici tutti ed alla masse artistiche , per di più finanziate in gran misura da Pantalone).
Ecco i fatti nudi e crudi. Il Maestro Alfredo Gasponi, professore di un prestigioso conservatorio e da anni critico musicale de «Il Messaggero» (di cui è collaboratore non redattore), è stato condannato dalla corte d'appello di Roma a un risarcimento per oltre 500 mila euro, compresi gli interessi, per un servizio uscito nel 1996 sull'Orchestra di Santa Cecilia. Il 9 marzo del 1996 Gasponi ha pubblicato sul quotidiano capitolino un'intervista in cui il noto direttore d'orchestra tedesco Wolfgang Sawallisch si lamenta di problemi intervenuti durante le prove con l'orchestra di Santa Cecilia per la presenza di troppi giovani aggiunti. Un'intervista condotta con toni tutt'altro che scandalistici, da un giornalista noto per professionalità ed equilibrio e che alle parole del direttore tedesco affianca le repliche affidate alla voce degli stessi musicisti dell'orchestra e a quelle del Presidente-a-vita dell'istituzione, Prof. Bruno Cagli. Un occhiello sulla prima pagina del quotidiano - allora diretto dal compianto Pietro Calabresi - ha una frase mirata ad attirare l'attenzione: «A Santa Cecilia non sanno suonare». Di qui per iniziativa di circa 80 musicisti dell'orchestra parte una querela per diffamazione, che nel suo secondo grado di giudizio condanna Gasponi al pagamento di 500 mila euro di danni. In quanto collaboratore de «Il Messaggero» - lo sanno anche i gatti- Gasponi non ha titolo - si perdoni il calambour - a fare alcun titolo. Ciò spetta esclusivamente alla redazione; la prima pagina è poi appannaggio del direttore , dei suoi vice ed al più dei redattori capo. Secondo la sentenza di secondo grado, il pacioso e rubicondo Prof. Gasponi avrebbe confezionato «un articolo volutamente scandalistico», distorcendo «il pensiero» di Sawallisch, nonostante il Maestro tedesco abbia rilasciato una dichiarazione scritta in cui afferma che Gasponi ha riportato fedelmente le sue parole.
Il caso è gravissimo non solo per i 14 anni di processi sostenuti da Gasponi "colpevole" di aver svolto il suo lavoro ma per la ferita alla libertà di stampa . Ora la vicenda giudiziaria è in Cassazione. Occorre, però, chiedersi con quale coraggio la stagione dell'Accademia è stata inaugurata con un vero e proprio inno alla libertà di pensiero quale il rossiniano "Guglielmo Tell" e perché il suo Presidente-a-vita è rimasto silente a fronte delle lettere dell'Associazione nazionale dei critici musicali. Il Parco della Musica è diventato o sta diventando un appendice della Corea del Nord? Se questo il caso, invitiamo i romani a dire "No, Grazie" ed al Presidente-a-vita a trarne le conseguenze.
giovedì 14 ottobre 2010
First Class, The new Palermo production of the Barber of Seville in Music & Vision September 25
First Class
The new Palermo production of
Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville',
a casual worker in Almodóvar's Seville,
recommended by GIUSEPPE PENNISI
Palermo's 'Teatro Massimo' is a rare bird in Italian lyric opera landscape -- fourteen public-private foundations and nearly thirty 'teatri di tradizione', mostly managed by the local Municipalities. Whilst most of them are struggling to pay their debts and to avoid default (if not bankruptcy), after a difficult period and the rescheduling of a major debt organized with an international bank, over the last five fiscal years, the Teatro Massimo has balanced its accounts (and amortized its rescheduled debt) and reported a small surplus every year. This has required a 30% cut in production cost along with an increase in productivity: in 2010, its calendar provides for 104 performances, excluding the special matinée program for students (thirty-thousand young spectators over the course of the year). This compares with 125 opera performance at La Scala in Milan and only twenty-four at San Carlo in Naples. The reduction in costs and increase in production have been made possible through a network of alliances of major opera houses in Europe and in the USA, as well as by the employment of young but promising singers, thus offering opportunities to the new generation and paying lower cachet than other theatres. Also, whenever possible, the stage production of traditional operas are conceived to attract new audience, even though the number of 'season' subscribers is high and has increased in the last few years. The recovery of the Teatro Massimo is a case study that deserves to be examined by other theatres and also to be taught in performing arts management schools.
Dmitry Korchak as Count Almaviva and Fabio Capitanucci as Figaro in Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
Thus, your reviewer had many reasons to fly to Palermo for the opening night (18 September 2010) of a new production of an old, but always functioning, dog like Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia. The plot, with its brilliantly drawn characters and amusing situations, was a source of the happiest inspiration to Rossini who, at the age of twenty-four, was already a consummate musician, a bigoted thinker but an experienced lover of the thirty-one-year-old mistress of his employer (the impresario Domenico Barabaja) in a very happy-go-lucky ménage à trois. The score overflows with musical gems; their value can be fully appreciated only in the hand of a good conductor, an excellent orchestra and a cast of singers who can deal with virtuoso arias as well as act like top class comedians. The music is imbued with the true spirit of comedy with the enchanting arias revealing most perspicacious musical portraits of all characters. Briefly, the arias are not only melodious, but delicately characterized and subtly humorous. The cunning Figaro is described by a swift allegro vivace, the conceited Bartolo by a pompous andande maestoso, and the peppery Rosina by a scherzo. The various ensembles are equally delightful, as for instance that agitated finale to Act I and the comic entrance of the Count disguised as a music master in Act II. Also, Il Barbiere embraces the full range of comic opera expression, from the rapid chatter of parlato through to the sigh of love to robust jokes.
A scene from Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
Michele Mariotti, born thirty years ago in Pesaro (Rossini's birth place), is a new rising star in the Italian conducting firmament. Il Barbiere was the first opera he conducted five years ago, just out of Conservatory; a few months ago his Barbiere was a major hit at La Scala. He knows every note and every trap of the score and shows a true empathy for the orchestra and the singers. On 18 September he offered an almost perfect musical direction. Why 'almost'? The coulisses of Teatro Massimo say that he decided to follow the 'traditional cut' of the last tenor aria Cessa di più resister, so dear to Rockwell Blake and now to Juan Diego Florèz. The aria had been cut for decades before Blake and Florès re-introduced it. There were two reasons for its long absence: firstly, the brilliant but impervious vocalizing (full of high Cs) required, and secondly, dramaturgically, the aria is not essential to the plot, but nearly an interruption of the action. I do not agree with these reasons, especially if the tenor is Dmitry Korchack (nearly as old as Maestro Mariotti) who is perfectly able to sing it, as shown in other recent performances in other theatres.
Ketevan Kemoklidze as Rosina and Dmitry Korchak as Count Almaviva in Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
Rosina is the twenty-eight-year-old Georgian mezzo Ketevan Kemoklidze, who has just won the international Operalia competition. She gave an excellent demonstration of her vocal and acting skills, especially in Una voce poco fà and in the whirlpool ensembles in the second scene of Act I and in Act II; she has a great career ahead if she sticks with this type of vocality.
Nicola Alaimo as Don Bartolo and Fabio Capitanucci as Figaro in Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
Fabio Maria Capitanucci (Figaro) and Nicola Alaimo (Bartolo) have about the same age of the three principals of the cast; with the fifty-year-old Simone Alaimo (Basilio) and the delightful Giovanna Donadini (Berta), completing a first class cast, both vocally and scenically.
A scene from Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
Normally, I deal with the stage direction, sets and costumes before reviewing the musical aspects. For this Barbiere the staging deserves a special mention: Francesco Micheli (thirty-eight years old, and comparatively young on the Italian operatic scene) offers a Barbiere which is not the usual slapstick farce: Seville is seen through the eyes and the painting of Mirò and Cesari Sterbini's libretto through the mind of Pedro Almodóvar. Thus Bartolo, the guardian of Rosina, is also her old lover-protector (as it used to be in the late eighteenth century). The 'ward' has smelled better eros and better sex with the 'young student Lindoro' (the Count of Almavivan in disguise). And Figaro? He is a casual worker in search of a permanent occupation ; meantime, he is a jack-of-all-trades (not only a barber), selling his services to the old power (Bartolo and Basilio) and the new power-to-be (Almaviva and Rosina). We know that he will get a steady job in the employ of the Count who would try to sleep with his wife the very night of their wedding. The Mirò sets are by Angelo Canu, and the costumes by Marja Hoffmann. They are part of the Teatro Massimo permanent staff; sets and costumes were produced in the theatre's workshop. To further heighten the Mirò/Almodóovar atmosphere, sets and costumes are very bright. The principals wore shantung silk costumes: black for the old guard, shocking yellow for Rosina, blue for Almaviva and red for Figaro.
Dmitry Korchak as Count Almaviva, Ketevan Kemoklidze as Rosina and Fabio Capitanucci as Figaro in Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
A budget but high quality production. We want a DVD!
Copyright © 25 September 2010 Giuseppe Pennisi,
Rome, Italy
GIOACCHINO ROSSINI
THE BARBER OF SEVILLE
ITALY
<< M&V home Concert reviews Hallé Orchestra >>
The new Palermo production of
Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville',
a casual worker in Almodóvar's Seville,
recommended by GIUSEPPE PENNISI
Palermo's 'Teatro Massimo' is a rare bird in Italian lyric opera landscape -- fourteen public-private foundations and nearly thirty 'teatri di tradizione', mostly managed by the local Municipalities. Whilst most of them are struggling to pay their debts and to avoid default (if not bankruptcy), after a difficult period and the rescheduling of a major debt organized with an international bank, over the last five fiscal years, the Teatro Massimo has balanced its accounts (and amortized its rescheduled debt) and reported a small surplus every year. This has required a 30% cut in production cost along with an increase in productivity: in 2010, its calendar provides for 104 performances, excluding the special matinée program for students (thirty-thousand young spectators over the course of the year). This compares with 125 opera performance at La Scala in Milan and only twenty-four at San Carlo in Naples. The reduction in costs and increase in production have been made possible through a network of alliances of major opera houses in Europe and in the USA, as well as by the employment of young but promising singers, thus offering opportunities to the new generation and paying lower cachet than other theatres. Also, whenever possible, the stage production of traditional operas are conceived to attract new audience, even though the number of 'season' subscribers is high and has increased in the last few years. The recovery of the Teatro Massimo is a case study that deserves to be examined by other theatres and also to be taught in performing arts management schools.
Dmitry Korchak as Count Almaviva and Fabio Capitanucci as Figaro in Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
Thus, your reviewer had many reasons to fly to Palermo for the opening night (18 September 2010) of a new production of an old, but always functioning, dog like Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia. The plot, with its brilliantly drawn characters and amusing situations, was a source of the happiest inspiration to Rossini who, at the age of twenty-four, was already a consummate musician, a bigoted thinker but an experienced lover of the thirty-one-year-old mistress of his employer (the impresario Domenico Barabaja) in a very happy-go-lucky ménage à trois. The score overflows with musical gems; their value can be fully appreciated only in the hand of a good conductor, an excellent orchestra and a cast of singers who can deal with virtuoso arias as well as act like top class comedians. The music is imbued with the true spirit of comedy with the enchanting arias revealing most perspicacious musical portraits of all characters. Briefly, the arias are not only melodious, but delicately characterized and subtly humorous. The cunning Figaro is described by a swift allegro vivace, the conceited Bartolo by a pompous andande maestoso, and the peppery Rosina by a scherzo. The various ensembles are equally delightful, as for instance that agitated finale to Act I and the comic entrance of the Count disguised as a music master in Act II. Also, Il Barbiere embraces the full range of comic opera expression, from the rapid chatter of parlato through to the sigh of love to robust jokes.
A scene from Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
Michele Mariotti, born thirty years ago in Pesaro (Rossini's birth place), is a new rising star in the Italian conducting firmament. Il Barbiere was the first opera he conducted five years ago, just out of Conservatory; a few months ago his Barbiere was a major hit at La Scala. He knows every note and every trap of the score and shows a true empathy for the orchestra and the singers. On 18 September he offered an almost perfect musical direction. Why 'almost'? The coulisses of Teatro Massimo say that he decided to follow the 'traditional cut' of the last tenor aria Cessa di più resister, so dear to Rockwell Blake and now to Juan Diego Florèz. The aria had been cut for decades before Blake and Florès re-introduced it. There were two reasons for its long absence: firstly, the brilliant but impervious vocalizing (full of high Cs) required, and secondly, dramaturgically, the aria is not essential to the plot, but nearly an interruption of the action. I do not agree with these reasons, especially if the tenor is Dmitry Korchack (nearly as old as Maestro Mariotti) who is perfectly able to sing it, as shown in other recent performances in other theatres.
Ketevan Kemoklidze as Rosina and Dmitry Korchak as Count Almaviva in Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
Rosina is the twenty-eight-year-old Georgian mezzo Ketevan Kemoklidze, who has just won the international Operalia competition. She gave an excellent demonstration of her vocal and acting skills, especially in Una voce poco fà and in the whirlpool ensembles in the second scene of Act I and in Act II; she has a great career ahead if she sticks with this type of vocality.
Nicola Alaimo as Don Bartolo and Fabio Capitanucci as Figaro in Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
Fabio Maria Capitanucci (Figaro) and Nicola Alaimo (Bartolo) have about the same age of the three principals of the cast; with the fifty-year-old Simone Alaimo (Basilio) and the delightful Giovanna Donadini (Berta), completing a first class cast, both vocally and scenically.
A scene from Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
Normally, I deal with the stage direction, sets and costumes before reviewing the musical aspects. For this Barbiere the staging deserves a special mention: Francesco Micheli (thirty-eight years old, and comparatively young on the Italian operatic scene) offers a Barbiere which is not the usual slapstick farce: Seville is seen through the eyes and the painting of Mirò and Cesari Sterbini's libretto through the mind of Pedro Almodóvar. Thus Bartolo, the guardian of Rosina, is also her old lover-protector (as it used to be in the late eighteenth century). The 'ward' has smelled better eros and better sex with the 'young student Lindoro' (the Count of Almavivan in disguise). And Figaro? He is a casual worker in search of a permanent occupation ; meantime, he is a jack-of-all-trades (not only a barber), selling his services to the old power (Bartolo and Basilio) and the new power-to-be (Almaviva and Rosina). We know that he will get a steady job in the employ of the Count who would try to sleep with his wife the very night of their wedding. The Mirò sets are by Angelo Canu, and the costumes by Marja Hoffmann. They are part of the Teatro Massimo permanent staff; sets and costumes were produced in the theatre's workshop. To further heighten the Mirò/Almodóovar atmosphere, sets and costumes are very bright. The principals wore shantung silk costumes: black for the old guard, shocking yellow for Rosina, blue for Almaviva and red for Figaro.
Dmitry Korchak as Count Almaviva, Ketevan Kemoklidze as Rosina and Fabio Capitanucci as Figaro in Rossini's 'The Barber of Seville' at Palermo's Teatro Massimo. Photo © 2010 Franco Lannino/Studio Camera
A budget but high quality production. We want a DVD!
Copyright © 25 September 2010 Giuseppe Pennisi,
Rome, Italy
GIOACCHINO ROSSINI
THE BARBER OF SEVILLE
ITALY
<< M&V home Concert reviews Hallé Orchestra >>
“ORPHEE” INAUGUARATES THE 25TH EDITION OF ROMA-EUROPA FESTIVAL Music and Vision September 25
“ORPHEE” INAUGUARATES THE 25TH EDITION OF ROMA-EUROPA FESTIVAL
Giuseppe Pennisi
The RomaEuropa Festival is 25 years old. When it first started, few believed that it would survive that long because the Italian audience had the reputation of being rather conservative and, thus, hardly opened to a festival which tried to marry modern and classical music with ballet and electronics. More surprisingly , the Festival was headed by a not so young former politician – now 92 years old – who after several Ministerial posts had became the head of a major insurance company but has always had the flair for modern paintings and contemporary music. Next to him a young French lady with experience in performing arts organization and a lot of connections in her native country France, Initially, the Festival was mostly an Italian-French affair. It gradually broadened its horizons; e.g. it was the first music initiative to bring to Italy an opera with Peter Sellars ‘ stage direction.
This year , the Festival lasts from September 21st to December 2nd and offers 35 different shows (some with two or three performances). It is financed mostly by local authorities and several private enterprises, including banks and high tech firms. It operates in several theatres and auditorium both in the city centre and in the suburbs. A reason for its success is that it practices a low prices policy and attracts young people.
The 2010 edition was inaugurated with Orphée by José Montalvo and Dominique Hervieu, a modern version of an opéra-ballet with music borrowed from Monteverdi, Gluck and Glass (as far as I could gathered on the September 21st opening night), performed by a cellist and a tiorba player (as well as sang by professional singers) but mixed with recorded modern rhythm. It is a modern Rive Gauche Orphée ; a band of happy-go-lucky youngsters, including the poet and his girl friend-wife, have marvelous time in today’s Paris – huge projections and a Svoboda’s “magic lantern” effects provide the right atmosphere. But Eurydice dies ,just as the myth goes, and her lover travel to hell (a very grey Paris) to bring her back. On the return trip to Paris, the young man turns to make sure she is with him and, of course, she dies again and forever. Back in the Rive Gauche, Orphée joins sexy “boys only” clubs until the Furies eat him alive because they are responsible to punish all crimes against the rules of the society. The one Act “opera-ballet” lasts 75 minutes . A long tour is planned in France, Luxemburg, Belgium and (next January) Italy. No doubt, the dancing is very attractive as well as acrobatic. The singing is entrusted to two sopranos (Sabine Novel, Soanny Fay), a tenor- cellist (Sébastien Obrecht) , two basses (Blaise Kouakou, Merlin Nyakam), a marvelous counter-tenor (Théophile Alexandre). The tiorba player is Folent Marie. An interesting and pleasant approach to the myth which may encourage the audience to go and listen the “real things” by Monteverdi and Gluck.
Just a few words of some of the other items of the Festival. For electronic music and electro-acustics lovers, there Sensoralia and Visual Concert. For those who prefer contemporary “high” music, Kurtag’s Kafka Fragments with Dawn Upshaw under Peter Sellars’ stage direction. For more traditional audience Shostakovic ‘ seldom performed Leningrad mammoth symphony. In short, electronics prevail but there also an eye to the more conservative audience.
Giuseppe Pennisi
The RomaEuropa Festival is 25 years old. When it first started, few believed that it would survive that long because the Italian audience had the reputation of being rather conservative and, thus, hardly opened to a festival which tried to marry modern and classical music with ballet and electronics. More surprisingly , the Festival was headed by a not so young former politician – now 92 years old – who after several Ministerial posts had became the head of a major insurance company but has always had the flair for modern paintings and contemporary music. Next to him a young French lady with experience in performing arts organization and a lot of connections in her native country France, Initially, the Festival was mostly an Italian-French affair. It gradually broadened its horizons; e.g. it was the first music initiative to bring to Italy an opera with Peter Sellars ‘ stage direction.
This year , the Festival lasts from September 21st to December 2nd and offers 35 different shows (some with two or three performances). It is financed mostly by local authorities and several private enterprises, including banks and high tech firms. It operates in several theatres and auditorium both in the city centre and in the suburbs. A reason for its success is that it practices a low prices policy and attracts young people.
The 2010 edition was inaugurated with Orphée by José Montalvo and Dominique Hervieu, a modern version of an opéra-ballet with music borrowed from Monteverdi, Gluck and Glass (as far as I could gathered on the September 21st opening night), performed by a cellist and a tiorba player (as well as sang by professional singers) but mixed with recorded modern rhythm. It is a modern Rive Gauche Orphée ; a band of happy-go-lucky youngsters, including the poet and his girl friend-wife, have marvelous time in today’s Paris – huge projections and a Svoboda’s “magic lantern” effects provide the right atmosphere. But Eurydice dies ,just as the myth goes, and her lover travel to hell (a very grey Paris) to bring her back. On the return trip to Paris, the young man turns to make sure she is with him and, of course, she dies again and forever. Back in the Rive Gauche, Orphée joins sexy “boys only” clubs until the Furies eat him alive because they are responsible to punish all crimes against the rules of the society. The one Act “opera-ballet” lasts 75 minutes . A long tour is planned in France, Luxemburg, Belgium and (next January) Italy. No doubt, the dancing is very attractive as well as acrobatic. The singing is entrusted to two sopranos (Sabine Novel, Soanny Fay), a tenor- cellist (Sébastien Obrecht) , two basses (Blaise Kouakou, Merlin Nyakam), a marvelous counter-tenor (Théophile Alexandre). The tiorba player is Folent Marie. An interesting and pleasant approach to the myth which may encourage the audience to go and listen the “real things” by Monteverdi and Gluck.
Just a few words of some of the other items of the Festival. For electronic music and electro-acustics lovers, there Sensoralia and Visual Concert. For those who prefer contemporary “high” music, Kurtag’s Kafka Fragments with Dawn Upshaw under Peter Sellars’ stage direction. For more traditional audience Shostakovic ‘ seldom performed Leningrad mammoth symphony. In short, electronics prevail but there also an eye to the more conservative audience.
Pilgrimages of the Soul Music and Vision 26 settembre
Pilgrimages of the Soul
GIUSEPPE PENNISI visits
Italy's Sagra Musicale Umbra
The Sagra Musicale Umbra is the oldest music Festival in Italy. Its 65th edition has had special features when compared with any other European festival: it was a nine day journey (10-19 September 2010) through an entire region where it combined the beauty of landscape, monuments and arts that have few parallels anywhere. The integration between music, on the one hand, and various forms of visual art, on the other, has been an essential element of the nine days -- with nearly twenty five concerts and lectures.
Traditionally, The Sagra Musicale Umbra is a festival of 'spiritual' music. This does not mean that it is a festival of religious or sacred music. The intention is to offer, in St Francis' region, music dealing with themes that talk to the soul. This 2010 edition is named 'Pilgrimages of the Soul' because the nine days of concerts (at least two every day) are in nine different localities. The 'pilgrimages' are a search in that they do not have a specific point of arrival. Indeed, almost emblematically, they start with two 'unfinished' works: Bruckner's Ninth Symphony and Schubert's Symphony in B minor. Thus, the search itself is 'unfinished'. Also, it is not only a search on a Roman Catholic and/or a Christian path; after a High Mass in Perugia's Cathedral, the first concert was, on 11 September, a musical meetings of several cultures and religions of the Mediterranean Basin in the remarkable setting in the Church of San Bevignate where the early Gothic purity is imbued with the Knights Templar and the Crusades.
The central part of the Sagra was a celebration of Luigi Cherubini on the 250th anniversary of his birth. Past editions of the festival have had a fundamental importance in making Cherubini's music known to the rest of the musical world, after the disappearance of most of his compositions since the second half of the nineteenth century. This year, the Sagra presented a substantial anthology of his most important works. First among them the Requiem in C minor composed in 1816 for the reparative funeral of King Louis XVI; it is one of the scores most revered in the nineteenth century for its dramatic power, in which the ghost of the French Revolution finds expression in the composer's pessimistic dismay as an artist who survived one of the most tragic events of modern history. Also, the Sagra offered the rare and extraordinary Capriccio, forty minutes of virtuoso piano without intermission, a true keyboard madness which combines polyphonic artistry with intimate expressiveness. Composed in 1789, Capriccio is undeniably full of anticipations of the future, even of Romanticism. Finally, the Sagra offered Cherubini's finest string quartet.
The Sagra also paid homage to Giovanni Battista Pergolesi in the three hundredth anniversary of his birth with his well-known Salve Regina and Stabat Mater as well as with a reconstructed Vespro della Beata Vergine edited by the musicologist Malcolm Bruno on the basis of a variety of Pergolesian religious compositions.
A final comment before focusing on the four concerts heard by your reviewer. The Sagra takes place only in two theatres: the seven hundred seat nineteenth century Teatro Morlacchi in Perugia and the small two hundred seat Teatro Cuccineli in Solomeo. Most of the performances are in churches or in museums. This year, for the first time, the Sagra experimented with presentation, by art specialists, of the visual aspects of the places where the different events were held. The experiment was successful because it showed the links between music, on the one hand, and architecture and visual art, on the other.
An innovation of this Sagra was that it did not start with its tradition of many decades -- an opera or a concert in Perugia's Teatro Morlacchi. As mentioned above, the inauguration took place on 11 September -- a date full of meaning. Thus, the first event was a 6pm High Mass co-celebrated by the Archbishop and two priests in the grand San Lorenzo Cathedral, in the real heart of Perugia. As with any High Mass, this was a celebration with singing. The vocal ensemble 'Laurence Feininger' from Trento sang ancient Gregorian compositions discovered in the 'Laurence Feininger' library, one of the largest libraries of Roman Catholic music in the world, mostly music pre-dating the Council of Trent -- thus going back to the first centuries of the previous millennium.
Coro Laurence Feininger. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
On the left side of the Cathedral, the chorus directed by Stefano Gianotti and accompanied by Stefano Rattini at the organ, sang highlights from the Missa in Nativitate Beatae Nariae Virginis and the Credo Regis, two anonymous fourteenth century Gregorian Compositions; the congregation was engrossed.
A few hours later, at 9pm, in the Templar Church of San Bevignate, the first inaugural concert by the intercultural Hespèrion XXI complex, created and conducted by Jordi Savall, took place. The Church has been utilized in a variety of ways over the centuries -- even as storage -- but it had major repair and refurbishing work to bring it back to its ancient splendor. It is not used for religious purposes but for conferences, lectures and concerts. The Templar Church was a meeting point of cultures, but also a point of cultural conflict; there are traces in its frescoes, especially in the materials employed and in the special techniques of manufacturing, full of Arabic and Persian influence. The four performers came from Spain, Morocco and Greece, and employed instruments (oud, moresca, samur, viella, rebab) either dating from several centuries ago or modeled after those of the pertinent periods. Seeing the instruments being played in the Templar Church with its frescoes was a pleasure for the eyes.
Jordi Savall. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
The concert was divided into four sections, and each section included a short program of Jewish Sephardite, Andalusian, Berberian and Arabic music to show their similarities, especially in the use of micro-tonalities. This is quite astonishing because, in a way, micro-tonalities were rediscovered after several centuries in the music for twelve tone row as developed by the Viennese school at the beginning of the twentieth century. In the Sephardite, Andalusian, Berberian and Arabic music played by Hespèrion XXI there was considerable rhythm, but also a spell of Mediterranean melancholy which almost folded each individual piece of music and the entire concert. A fascinating exercise and a pure pleasure for the ears as well as an understanding of the cultural unity of the Mediterranean Basin -- a unity that music shows better than many other forms of artistic expression.
Hespèrion XXI. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
Hespèrion XXI has already produced fifty seven CDs, a few DVDs and also books with CDs. If account is taken of the difficulties of performing now music of several centuries ago, as well as of the many possibilities offered to each musician, it is remarkable how Hespèrion XXI can combine individual creativity and team work in a dynamic synthesis of musical expression, the historical stylistic research and the imagination of the 21st century musicians.
On 12 September 2010, the Sagra offered two events: a piano concert in the Franciscan Museum of Montefalco (a bus ride of nearly one hour from Perugia) at 5pm and a full symphonic concert in the Teatro Morlacchi at 9pm. The piano concert focused on waltzes and nocturnes, mostly by Chopin, but also by Karganoff, Borodin, Tchaikovsky, Weber, Schumann, Bertini, Fauré and Debussy.
Bart van Oort. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
Bart van Oort is internationally known and does not require any introduction. He played for nearly two hours on a 1849 Pleyel piano. A joy of mostly romantic music strikingly contrasting the symphony concert just a few hours later.
David Afkham conducting the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
At the Teatro Morlacchi, the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester conducted by David Afkham performed Hindemith's Mathis der Maler symphony and Bruckner's Sympony No 9 in C minor. David Afkham is twenty eight years old. The average age of the one hundred and ten members of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester is about twenty-three. They dealt with these two most difficult and very different symphonies with skill, talent and enthusiasm.
The Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
In the 1930s, Paul Hindemith was dealing with the drama of the artist's involvement in politics; his writing is very tense and full of undertones. In 1896, Anton Bruckner was preparing himself for death -- a serene death, as he was a rigorous practicing Roman Catholic, with a major late romantic work he never completed. The Teatro Morlacchi is a seven hundred seat wooden structure with three rows of boxes. With the fire of these young performers it became a true music box. The audience, captivated by the performers' enthusiasm, erupted with accolades and standing ovations.
Copyright © 26 September 2010 Giuseppe Pennisi,
Rome, Italy
ITALY
ANTON BRUCKNER
FRANZ SCHUBERT
PAUL HINDEMITH
FRYDERYCK CHOPIN
ALEXANDER BORODIN
PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY
CARL MARIA VON WEBER
ROBERT SCHUMANN
GABRIEL FAURE
CLAUDE DEBUSSY
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GIUSEPPE PENNISI visits
Italy's Sagra Musicale Umbra
The Sagra Musicale Umbra is the oldest music Festival in Italy. Its 65th edition has had special features when compared with any other European festival: it was a nine day journey (10-19 September 2010) through an entire region where it combined the beauty of landscape, monuments and arts that have few parallels anywhere. The integration between music, on the one hand, and various forms of visual art, on the other, has been an essential element of the nine days -- with nearly twenty five concerts and lectures.
Traditionally, The Sagra Musicale Umbra is a festival of 'spiritual' music. This does not mean that it is a festival of religious or sacred music. The intention is to offer, in St Francis' region, music dealing with themes that talk to the soul. This 2010 edition is named 'Pilgrimages of the Soul' because the nine days of concerts (at least two every day) are in nine different localities. The 'pilgrimages' are a search in that they do not have a specific point of arrival. Indeed, almost emblematically, they start with two 'unfinished' works: Bruckner's Ninth Symphony and Schubert's Symphony in B minor. Thus, the search itself is 'unfinished'. Also, it is not only a search on a Roman Catholic and/or a Christian path; after a High Mass in Perugia's Cathedral, the first concert was, on 11 September, a musical meetings of several cultures and religions of the Mediterranean Basin in the remarkable setting in the Church of San Bevignate where the early Gothic purity is imbued with the Knights Templar and the Crusades.
The central part of the Sagra was a celebration of Luigi Cherubini on the 250th anniversary of his birth. Past editions of the festival have had a fundamental importance in making Cherubini's music known to the rest of the musical world, after the disappearance of most of his compositions since the second half of the nineteenth century. This year, the Sagra presented a substantial anthology of his most important works. First among them the Requiem in C minor composed in 1816 for the reparative funeral of King Louis XVI; it is one of the scores most revered in the nineteenth century for its dramatic power, in which the ghost of the French Revolution finds expression in the composer's pessimistic dismay as an artist who survived one of the most tragic events of modern history. Also, the Sagra offered the rare and extraordinary Capriccio, forty minutes of virtuoso piano without intermission, a true keyboard madness which combines polyphonic artistry with intimate expressiveness. Composed in 1789, Capriccio is undeniably full of anticipations of the future, even of Romanticism. Finally, the Sagra offered Cherubini's finest string quartet.
The Sagra also paid homage to Giovanni Battista Pergolesi in the three hundredth anniversary of his birth with his well-known Salve Regina and Stabat Mater as well as with a reconstructed Vespro della Beata Vergine edited by the musicologist Malcolm Bruno on the basis of a variety of Pergolesian religious compositions.
A final comment before focusing on the four concerts heard by your reviewer. The Sagra takes place only in two theatres: the seven hundred seat nineteenth century Teatro Morlacchi in Perugia and the small two hundred seat Teatro Cuccineli in Solomeo. Most of the performances are in churches or in museums. This year, for the first time, the Sagra experimented with presentation, by art specialists, of the visual aspects of the places where the different events were held. The experiment was successful because it showed the links between music, on the one hand, and architecture and visual art, on the other.
An innovation of this Sagra was that it did not start with its tradition of many decades -- an opera or a concert in Perugia's Teatro Morlacchi. As mentioned above, the inauguration took place on 11 September -- a date full of meaning. Thus, the first event was a 6pm High Mass co-celebrated by the Archbishop and two priests in the grand San Lorenzo Cathedral, in the real heart of Perugia. As with any High Mass, this was a celebration with singing. The vocal ensemble 'Laurence Feininger' from Trento sang ancient Gregorian compositions discovered in the 'Laurence Feininger' library, one of the largest libraries of Roman Catholic music in the world, mostly music pre-dating the Council of Trent -- thus going back to the first centuries of the previous millennium.
Coro Laurence Feininger. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
On the left side of the Cathedral, the chorus directed by Stefano Gianotti and accompanied by Stefano Rattini at the organ, sang highlights from the Missa in Nativitate Beatae Nariae Virginis and the Credo Regis, two anonymous fourteenth century Gregorian Compositions; the congregation was engrossed.
A few hours later, at 9pm, in the Templar Church of San Bevignate, the first inaugural concert by the intercultural Hespèrion XXI complex, created and conducted by Jordi Savall, took place. The Church has been utilized in a variety of ways over the centuries -- even as storage -- but it had major repair and refurbishing work to bring it back to its ancient splendor. It is not used for religious purposes but for conferences, lectures and concerts. The Templar Church was a meeting point of cultures, but also a point of cultural conflict; there are traces in its frescoes, especially in the materials employed and in the special techniques of manufacturing, full of Arabic and Persian influence. The four performers came from Spain, Morocco and Greece, and employed instruments (oud, moresca, samur, viella, rebab) either dating from several centuries ago or modeled after those of the pertinent periods. Seeing the instruments being played in the Templar Church with its frescoes was a pleasure for the eyes.
Jordi Savall. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
The concert was divided into four sections, and each section included a short program of Jewish Sephardite, Andalusian, Berberian and Arabic music to show their similarities, especially in the use of micro-tonalities. This is quite astonishing because, in a way, micro-tonalities were rediscovered after several centuries in the music for twelve tone row as developed by the Viennese school at the beginning of the twentieth century. In the Sephardite, Andalusian, Berberian and Arabic music played by Hespèrion XXI there was considerable rhythm, but also a spell of Mediterranean melancholy which almost folded each individual piece of music and the entire concert. A fascinating exercise and a pure pleasure for the ears as well as an understanding of the cultural unity of the Mediterranean Basin -- a unity that music shows better than many other forms of artistic expression.
Hespèrion XXI. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
Hespèrion XXI has already produced fifty seven CDs, a few DVDs and also books with CDs. If account is taken of the difficulties of performing now music of several centuries ago, as well as of the many possibilities offered to each musician, it is remarkable how Hespèrion XXI can combine individual creativity and team work in a dynamic synthesis of musical expression, the historical stylistic research and the imagination of the 21st century musicians.
On 12 September 2010, the Sagra offered two events: a piano concert in the Franciscan Museum of Montefalco (a bus ride of nearly one hour from Perugia) at 5pm and a full symphonic concert in the Teatro Morlacchi at 9pm. The piano concert focused on waltzes and nocturnes, mostly by Chopin, but also by Karganoff, Borodin, Tchaikovsky, Weber, Schumann, Bertini, Fauré and Debussy.
Bart van Oort. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
Bart van Oort is internationally known and does not require any introduction. He played for nearly two hours on a 1849 Pleyel piano. A joy of mostly romantic music strikingly contrasting the symphony concert just a few hours later.
David Afkham conducting the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
At the Teatro Morlacchi, the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester conducted by David Afkham performed Hindemith's Mathis der Maler symphony and Bruckner's Sympony No 9 in C minor. David Afkham is twenty eight years old. The average age of the one hundred and ten members of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester is about twenty-three. They dealt with these two most difficult and very different symphonies with skill, talent and enthusiasm.
The Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester. Photo © 2010 Adriano Scognamillo
In the 1930s, Paul Hindemith was dealing with the drama of the artist's involvement in politics; his writing is very tense and full of undertones. In 1896, Anton Bruckner was preparing himself for death -- a serene death, as he was a rigorous practicing Roman Catholic, with a major late romantic work he never completed. The Teatro Morlacchi is a seven hundred seat wooden structure with three rows of boxes. With the fire of these young performers it became a true music box. The audience, captivated by the performers' enthusiasm, erupted with accolades and standing ovations.
Copyright © 26 September 2010 Giuseppe Pennisi,
Rome, Italy
ITALY
ANTON BRUCKNER
FRANZ SCHUBERT
PAUL HINDEMITH
FRYDERYCK CHOPIN
ALEXANDER BORODIN
PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY
CARL MARIA VON WEBER
ROBERT SCHUMANN
GABRIEL FAURE
CLAUDE DEBUSSY
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An Ecstatic Success Music and Vision September 4
An Ecstatic Success
GIUSEPPE PENNISI visits
the Sagra Musicale Malatestiana
In Italy, and not only in Italy, Rimini is generally known as a beach resort on the Adriatic Coast. It is very crowded with happy-go-lucky youngsters during the summer months. In the autumn, it is one of the preferred spots for the retired; prices are lower, the climate is mild, the sky and sea are blue and there are many bridge clubs.
Few music lovers are aware that Rimini is also the location of one the most interesting music festivals, called 'Sagra Musicale Malatestiana' after the Malatesta family which in the Renaissance ruled the city and the surrounding areas and built some interesting monuments. The 'Sagra Musicale' is at its 61st edition; it is financed nearly entirely by local sponsors; in 2010 it lasts from 4 August to well into the autumn. It is divided into four parts: four Bach concerts in precious Renaissance Churches, six symphony concerts entrusted to internationally known orchestras, each with a local sponsor (Leipzig Gewandhausorchester, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra Filarmonica della Scala, Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, Bayerisches Staatsorchester) under very well-known conductors (Riccardo Chailly, Constantinos Carydis, Semyon Bychkov, Ion Marin, Kent Nagano), seven concerts by young conductors where, this year, on his anniversary, Schumann is juxtaposed to modern composers and, finally, a section for seventeenth century 'theme' music.
For the last few years, between the Bach and the symphony section, a real jewel: the world première of 'chamber opera' in a small theatre built within the ruins of an Augustinian monastery. The 'chamber opera' is normally made up from music not originally intended for dramatic action on stage, and the production has a very low budget. For the last four years, the experiment has been successful.
This review focuses on the chamber opera and the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester concert. Nonetheless, mention should be made of the very good Bach concerts (especially that conducted, on 20 August, by Antonio Greco and devoted to chorales and organ preludes -- the chorus and consort were directed by Costanzo Porta) because in Italy, Bach is not as frequently performed as in Germany or as in the Anglo-Saxon world.
A J S Bach performance by the Costanzo Porta Consort at Sagra Musicale Malatestiana. Photo © 2010 Viterbo Fotocine
After the airy and religious, indeed celestial, atmosphere of the Bach concert, the chamber opera brought us down to the saddest aspects of the Short Century, the twentieth century: the wars, the concentration camps and Auschwitz. This review is based on the 2 September 2010 performance.
It is a most original chamber opera: a ballad by Rainer Maria Rilke, Die Weise von Liebe und Tod des Cornets Christoph Rilke ('The Song of Love and Death by the soldier Christoph Rilke') as set to music by Viktor Ullmann and Frank Martin, separately, and without either composer knowing that the other was working on the same subject.
The first draft of Rilke's ballad had been written in 1899, but when published in its final version in 1912, it was a major editorial success with over 200,000 copies sold in 1922 and 500,000 when reprinted in 1934. It deals with an ancestor of Rainer Maria Rilke, young Christoph who had died in 1666 in Hungary in a battle against the Turks. Christoph's body had never been retrieved and his aristocratic title and lands had been inherited by his brother. However, the 1666 battle is only a pretext for Rilke's deeper reflection on precocious death, initiation to death through love and sex, erotic pulses as ancestral force, and the role of the hero as an emblematic representation of his people and their future generations. The dates of the ballad's success (1922; 1934) are indicative of its meaning in a Europe just coming out of World War I and about to enter World War II.
Hans Flieschmann in the Martin/Ullmann chamber opera at Sagra Musicale Malatestiana. Photo © 2010 Viterbo Fotocine
Obviously, the ballad attracted the interest of musicians; there are versions by Kurt Weill, Paul von Klenau and Kasimir von Pászthory. Those by the Swiss Roman Catholic composer Frank Martin and the Austrian Jew Viktor Ullmann were composed around 1943-44 when World War II was about to end but its destructions and sufferings were an open wound. Both Martin and Ullmann had been influenced by Schoenberg's twelve tone row system, but had a strong sense for melody and 'programmed' music. They worked on Rilke's text under vastly different conditions. Martin was in neutral Switzerland where he set to music the entire ballad for a piano and a mezzo. Ullmann was in the Theresienstadt 'model' concentration camp set up by the Nazis for artists -- mostly a propaganda showpiece. There he set to piano music only part of the text, to be played a professional actor. In Theresienstadt, performances of the work in progress were made until, in Autumn 1944, due to the turn of military events, the Germans saw that there was no longer any need to have a showpiece. First the pianist, then the actor and finally Viktor Ullmann and his wife were transferred to Auschwitz to be gassed.
Brigitte Ravenel in the Martin/Ullmann chamber opera at Sagra Musicale Malatestiana. Photo © 2010 Viterbo Fotocine
How to make a chamber opera on the basis of this material? Denis Krief (stage director and also author of the costumes and the lighting) proved, once more, to have a brilliant idea. In the theater carved in the ruins of the Monastery, Martin's Ballad is performed by a virtuoso pianist (Francesco Libetta) and mezzo (Brigitte Ravenel) well known for her baroque performances all over Continental Europe but equally at easy with nearly an a hour of declamato sliding into arioso with hard ascension to acute tonalities followed by more gentle descending to low tonalities. On a movie screen over the piano, the audience can read the text in Italian. On another screen, sections of war films of the 1930s and 1940s are cast (eg La Kermesse Héroique, J'accuse). Brigitte Ravenel is in a World War I uniform; two young extras are seen, back stage, for the love scene. There is no interruption: from Martin the audience is brought directly to Ullmann. The text is the same but not complete; as mentioned, it was left in progress by the Auschwitz gas chamber. The voice is not a mezzo, but a male actor (Hans Flieschmann). On the screen, we see World War II images, including footage of Nazi documentary. In short, ninety minutes of full tension. Certainly, it is not a 'light' Summer performance, but an emotional experience difficult to forget both musically and dramatically. The audience appreciated it.
Riccardo Chailly. Photo © 2010 Fabiana Rossi
From the darkness at the top of the stairs ('Die Weise von Liebe und Tod des Cornets Christoph Rilke'), the Sagra moved on to Schumann's pure and transparent romanticism in the 3 September concert. It was the inaugural concert of the six major symphonic events: Riccardo Chailly conducted the most ancient European symphonic complex, the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester, with a soloist, the piano enfant prodige Kit Armstrong. He is now seventeen years old but has been in a successful professional career since 2005 and has already composed several piano sonatas, three string quartets, and a full-length symphony.
Briefly, this was a full Schumann concert for the second centenary of the composer's birth. The first part of the program included : the Concerto for Piano and Orchestra concert Op 54 and the Konzertstück for four horns and orchestra Op 86; the second part was fully taken up by the Symphony No 1 Op 38 (Frühling) in the version with Gustav Mahler's orchestral revision. The three compositions are representative of Schumann's revolution in romanticism: drama is replaced by a serene Spring atmosphere where the ecstasy of love -- in particular conjugal love -- is due to the very close relationship between Robert Schumann and his wife Clara.
Kit Armstrong with Riccardo Chailly and members of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra at Sagra Musicale Malatestiana. Photo © 2010 Fabiana Rossi
In the Piano Concerto, the audience's attention was obviously pointed to the young soloist, already famous internationally but not as well known in Italy on the basis of live performance. Kit Armstrong was, at the same time, generous and ironic in his dialogue with the orchestra. So tiny and with a smiling face, he was a counterpoint to Chailly's large, high posture. Enjoyable, in short, also for the eyes.
The four horn soloists with Riccardo Chailly and members of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra playing Schumann's 'Konzertstück' at Sagra Musicale Malatestiana. Photo © 2010 Fabiana Rossi
The Konzertstück for four horns and orchestra is a pure short divertissement where the virtuoso ability of the soloists stood out. The first symphony is too well known as an innovative Romantic manifesto (for Germany in around 1840) to require any presentation. Chailly and the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester offered a highly melodic interpretation, not only in the Larghetto but also in final allegro animato e grazioso. An ecstatic success with standing ovations saluted the concert.
Copyright © 4 September 2010 Giuseppe Pennisi,
Rome, Italy
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GIUSEPPE PENNISI visits
the Sagra Musicale Malatestiana
In Italy, and not only in Italy, Rimini is generally known as a beach resort on the Adriatic Coast. It is very crowded with happy-go-lucky youngsters during the summer months. In the autumn, it is one of the preferred spots for the retired; prices are lower, the climate is mild, the sky and sea are blue and there are many bridge clubs.
Few music lovers are aware that Rimini is also the location of one the most interesting music festivals, called 'Sagra Musicale Malatestiana' after the Malatesta family which in the Renaissance ruled the city and the surrounding areas and built some interesting monuments. The 'Sagra Musicale' is at its 61st edition; it is financed nearly entirely by local sponsors; in 2010 it lasts from 4 August to well into the autumn. It is divided into four parts: four Bach concerts in precious Renaissance Churches, six symphony concerts entrusted to internationally known orchestras, each with a local sponsor (Leipzig Gewandhausorchester, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra Filarmonica della Scala, Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, Bayerisches Staatsorchester) under very well-known conductors (Riccardo Chailly, Constantinos Carydis, Semyon Bychkov, Ion Marin, Kent Nagano), seven concerts by young conductors where, this year, on his anniversary, Schumann is juxtaposed to modern composers and, finally, a section for seventeenth century 'theme' music.
For the last few years, between the Bach and the symphony section, a real jewel: the world première of 'chamber opera' in a small theatre built within the ruins of an Augustinian monastery. The 'chamber opera' is normally made up from music not originally intended for dramatic action on stage, and the production has a very low budget. For the last four years, the experiment has been successful.
This review focuses on the chamber opera and the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester concert. Nonetheless, mention should be made of the very good Bach concerts (especially that conducted, on 20 August, by Antonio Greco and devoted to chorales and organ preludes -- the chorus and consort were directed by Costanzo Porta) because in Italy, Bach is not as frequently performed as in Germany or as in the Anglo-Saxon world.
A J S Bach performance by the Costanzo Porta Consort at Sagra Musicale Malatestiana. Photo © 2010 Viterbo Fotocine
After the airy and religious, indeed celestial, atmosphere of the Bach concert, the chamber opera brought us down to the saddest aspects of the Short Century, the twentieth century: the wars, the concentration camps and Auschwitz. This review is based on the 2 September 2010 performance.
It is a most original chamber opera: a ballad by Rainer Maria Rilke, Die Weise von Liebe und Tod des Cornets Christoph Rilke ('The Song of Love and Death by the soldier Christoph Rilke') as set to music by Viktor Ullmann and Frank Martin, separately, and without either composer knowing that the other was working on the same subject.
The first draft of Rilke's ballad had been written in 1899, but when published in its final version in 1912, it was a major editorial success with over 200,000 copies sold in 1922 and 500,000 when reprinted in 1934. It deals with an ancestor of Rainer Maria Rilke, young Christoph who had died in 1666 in Hungary in a battle against the Turks. Christoph's body had never been retrieved and his aristocratic title and lands had been inherited by his brother. However, the 1666 battle is only a pretext for Rilke's deeper reflection on precocious death, initiation to death through love and sex, erotic pulses as ancestral force, and the role of the hero as an emblematic representation of his people and their future generations. The dates of the ballad's success (1922; 1934) are indicative of its meaning in a Europe just coming out of World War I and about to enter World War II.
Hans Flieschmann in the Martin/Ullmann chamber opera at Sagra Musicale Malatestiana. Photo © 2010 Viterbo Fotocine
Obviously, the ballad attracted the interest of musicians; there are versions by Kurt Weill, Paul von Klenau and Kasimir von Pászthory. Those by the Swiss Roman Catholic composer Frank Martin and the Austrian Jew Viktor Ullmann were composed around 1943-44 when World War II was about to end but its destructions and sufferings were an open wound. Both Martin and Ullmann had been influenced by Schoenberg's twelve tone row system, but had a strong sense for melody and 'programmed' music. They worked on Rilke's text under vastly different conditions. Martin was in neutral Switzerland where he set to music the entire ballad for a piano and a mezzo. Ullmann was in the Theresienstadt 'model' concentration camp set up by the Nazis for artists -- mostly a propaganda showpiece. There he set to piano music only part of the text, to be played a professional actor. In Theresienstadt, performances of the work in progress were made until, in Autumn 1944, due to the turn of military events, the Germans saw that there was no longer any need to have a showpiece. First the pianist, then the actor and finally Viktor Ullmann and his wife were transferred to Auschwitz to be gassed.
Brigitte Ravenel in the Martin/Ullmann chamber opera at Sagra Musicale Malatestiana. Photo © 2010 Viterbo Fotocine
How to make a chamber opera on the basis of this material? Denis Krief (stage director and also author of the costumes and the lighting) proved, once more, to have a brilliant idea. In the theater carved in the ruins of the Monastery, Martin's Ballad is performed by a virtuoso pianist (Francesco Libetta) and mezzo (Brigitte Ravenel) well known for her baroque performances all over Continental Europe but equally at easy with nearly an a hour of declamato sliding into arioso with hard ascension to acute tonalities followed by more gentle descending to low tonalities. On a movie screen over the piano, the audience can read the text in Italian. On another screen, sections of war films of the 1930s and 1940s are cast (eg La Kermesse Héroique, J'accuse). Brigitte Ravenel is in a World War I uniform; two young extras are seen, back stage, for the love scene. There is no interruption: from Martin the audience is brought directly to Ullmann. The text is the same but not complete; as mentioned, it was left in progress by the Auschwitz gas chamber. The voice is not a mezzo, but a male actor (Hans Flieschmann). On the screen, we see World War II images, including footage of Nazi documentary. In short, ninety minutes of full tension. Certainly, it is not a 'light' Summer performance, but an emotional experience difficult to forget both musically and dramatically. The audience appreciated it.
Riccardo Chailly. Photo © 2010 Fabiana Rossi
From the darkness at the top of the stairs ('Die Weise von Liebe und Tod des Cornets Christoph Rilke'), the Sagra moved on to Schumann's pure and transparent romanticism in the 3 September concert. It was the inaugural concert of the six major symphonic events: Riccardo Chailly conducted the most ancient European symphonic complex, the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester, with a soloist, the piano enfant prodige Kit Armstrong. He is now seventeen years old but has been in a successful professional career since 2005 and has already composed several piano sonatas, three string quartets, and a full-length symphony.
Briefly, this was a full Schumann concert for the second centenary of the composer's birth. The first part of the program included : the Concerto for Piano and Orchestra concert Op 54 and the Konzertstück for four horns and orchestra Op 86; the second part was fully taken up by the Symphony No 1 Op 38 (Frühling) in the version with Gustav Mahler's orchestral revision. The three compositions are representative of Schumann's revolution in romanticism: drama is replaced by a serene Spring atmosphere where the ecstasy of love -- in particular conjugal love -- is due to the very close relationship between Robert Schumann and his wife Clara.
Kit Armstrong with Riccardo Chailly and members of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra at Sagra Musicale Malatestiana. Photo © 2010 Fabiana Rossi
In the Piano Concerto, the audience's attention was obviously pointed to the young soloist, already famous internationally but not as well known in Italy on the basis of live performance. Kit Armstrong was, at the same time, generous and ironic in his dialogue with the orchestra. So tiny and with a smiling face, he was a counterpoint to Chailly's large, high posture. Enjoyable, in short, also for the eyes.
The four horn soloists with Riccardo Chailly and members of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra playing Schumann's 'Konzertstück' at Sagra Musicale Malatestiana. Photo © 2010 Fabiana Rossi
The Konzertstück for four horns and orchestra is a pure short divertissement where the virtuoso ability of the soloists stood out. The first symphony is too well known as an innovative Romantic manifesto (for Germany in around 1840) to require any presentation. Chailly and the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester offered a highly melodic interpretation, not only in the Larghetto but also in final allegro animato e grazioso. An ecstatic success with standing ovations saluted the concert.
Copyright © 4 September 2010 Giuseppe Pennisi,
Rome, Italy
<< M&V home Concert reviews Ben Bloor >>
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