Hudson-Housatonic Arts - Formerly the Berkshire Review for the Arts. Performances, Exhibitions, Articles, and Interviews about the Arts from the Berkshires and Hudson Valley

Our Time, a Collage of Records from Williams. Photo Brad Wakoff.

Our Time, a Collage of Records from Williams, a 90th Birthday Tribute to Stephen Sondheim (’50) at Williams College – a Review

March 26, 2020March 27, 2020Michael Miller

In considering how to approach this review of Our Time, a Collage of Records from Williams, directed by Omar Sangare, Professor of Theatre, I came to the conclusion that it was imperative to concentrate not only on the title of the production, which seems neutral enough at first glance, but how it was described in the official announcement. As a co-production of the Williams Theatre Department and “Sondheim@90@Williams,” to honor the 90th birthday of Stephen Sondheim as an illustrious member of Williams Class of 1950[1. for which the Williams Music Department also organized a day-and-a-half symposium about the composer and his work], Our Time was presented “in celebration” of this birthday. That final phrase might lead us to expect a revue of Mr. Sondheim’s most-loved tunes with a new, student-generated book encasing them, but Our Time was nothing of the sort.

Happy Birthday, Stephen Sondheim! …from his alma mater, Williams College

March 22, 2020March 22, 2020Michael Miller

Stephen Sondheim turns 90 today. His alma mater, Williams College, chose to honor her renowned alumnus with a musical production entitled Our Time, a Collage of Records from Williams, which brings life at the college between 1946-1950 (when Sondheim was a student there) back to life. This compilation of stories, devised Ilya Khodosh, ’08, and Omar Sangare, has been chosen by current students; who, by research, selected stories to share from the stage. At the end of the show, there is also a story delivered by a video message by Stephen Sondheim, himself.

Only two of the five scheduled performances took place before the spread of the Corona virus necessitated the cancellation of further performances. Happily, they were recorded on video, and Williams can now honor its son and audiences can enjoy this musical reminiscence.

Florent Schmitt’s “Légende” and “Oriane et le Prince d’Amour” with Debussy and Rachmaninoff—the Buffalo Philharmonic under JoAnn Falletta

March 18, 2020March 18, 2020Steven Kruger

There’s something about Buffalo that is forever and wonderfully 1940. The city admittedly went through a difficult patch in the last decades of the century, before emerging today prosperous and half the size it was. From an artistic perspective, though, this may not be all bad. Buffalo escaped most of the Pizza Hut architecture and cereal box skyscrapers which typically afflict American cities. Today, great colonnaded turn-of-the-century hotels, banks and office buildings still reflect iconic dignity and Dreiserian business energy upon a downtown more formal and stylistically unified than most. When it comes to its resident orchestra, the Buffalo Philharmonic similarly avoided an onslaught of concrete, continuing to perform in Kleinhans Music Hall, designed by the Saarinens (father Eliel and son Eero) in 1940 and declared a national landmark in 1989.

Evening all Afternoon: A Chilly Season Warmed by Capital Region Classical at Union College

March 15, 2020March 15, 2020Seth Lachterman

With the dreariest seasons of late fall and winter fading away, those days Wallace Stevens described as being “evening all afternoon,” a few Union offerings I attended were enough to nourish the soul to spring in which a Beethoven’s Semiquincentennial will be celebrated.

Fabien Gabel conducts the San Francisco Symphony in Dukas, Zigman, and Saint-Saëns, with Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Piano, and Jonathan Dimmock, Organ

February 26, 2020February 26, 2020Arts Press

Last weekend the San Francisco Symphony, surely unbeknownst, gave me a Valentine’s Day card masquerading as a pair of tickets! I don’t honestly recall a concert in recent years I’ve enjoyed more than this one. I’ve known and loved Paul Dukas’ ballet score La Peri for more than fifty years without ever hearing it live, and as a dedicated Francophile in music, I am always delighted to hear again Camille Saint-Saëns’ iconic and fascinatingly structured Organ Symphony. Add to this the fact that I grew up in the wilds of Latin America and learned to tango just about when couples abandoned cutting a rug with each other on the dance floor in favor of wriggling in place, and you can imagine how a piano concerto based on Tango would evoke a special warmth and affection in someone like me. So I am writing more as a fan than as a critic this time.

Richard Wagner, I maestri cantori di Norimberga (or, rather Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg), Sung in Italian, Beautifully

February 10, 2020February 10, 2020Arts Press

Ever wanted to hear a Wagner opera performed with smooth singing: little or no barking, effortful huffing, or slow wobbling? Sure, there have been individual singers who have managed the trick, such as Plácido Domingo in Giuseppe Sinopoli’s famous Tannhäuser recording. But I mean the whole cast, from the biggest roles right down to the smallest. Well, here’s your chance: a complete Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg that is a near-constant pleasure to the ears. The only problem is that it’s sung in Italian: hence I maestri cantori di Norimbega. But don’t let that you put you off. Opera houses in many countries have developed their own national traditions of Wagner singing in the vernacular. Opera enthusiasts cherish certain recorded Wagner excerpts sung magnificently in French by soprano Germaine Lubin or tenor Georges Thill.

Ronald Gorevic and Larry Wallach will play Beethoven Violin Sonatas 3, 5, and 10, completing their complete traversal.

February 9, 2020February 9, 2020Larry Wallach

On Sunday February 16, Ronald Gorevic and I will complete our year-long project of performing all ten of the Beethoven Violin Sonatas, which we began last March. It has been a great journey, letting us discover new perspectives on familiar works and familiarize ourselves with works that we had not played before.

It was wonderful to realize that there are no “lesser” works in this canon; the ones that are infrequently played are actually unjustly neglected, but every sonata is great Beethoven, full of his power, intensity, gravity, tenderness, and humor (actually, a surprising amount of humor!).

Bard Music Festival 2019: Korngold and his World (REVISED)

December 16, 2019December 16, 2019Michael Miller

As I return to the Bard Music Festival year after year, I notice that the spaces of Olin Hall and the Fisher Center, become more crowded and sold-out notices appear ever more frequently. I also notice that I’ve seen a good many of the attendees before. There is certainly a minority who are passionately interested in one composer or his historical and cultural context and not in the others, but I am confident in saying that the core of the Bard audience consists of recidivists. Lately the choice of focal composers has shifted from the undisputed pantheon to composers who are interesting because of their cultural position in their own time. Saint-Saëns, Chávez, and Rimsky Korsakov fall into this category. The audience keeps on growing. It’s obvious that we share a broad interest in western art music, but the way in which the individual composers are presented is exploratory, and, given the presence of musicians and musicologists, bound to take a controversial course. I always leave not only knowing something I didn’t know before, but with a profound new insight, and, most important of all, questions to mull over during the months that separate us from the next Bard Festival.