Tuesday, March 19, 2024

Today's Birthdays

Francesco Gasparini (1661-1727)
Max Reger (1873-1916)
Elizabeth Maconchy (1907-1994)
Nancy Evans (1915-2000)
Dinu Lipatti (1917-1950)
Robert Muczynski (1929-2010)
Ornette Coleman (1930-2015)
Myung-Wha Chung (1944)
Carolyn Watkinson (1949)
Mathew Rosenblum (1954)

and

Tobias Smollett (1721-1771)
Nikolay Gogol (1809-1852)
Richard Francis Burton (1821-1890)
Philip Roth (1933-2018)

Monday, March 18, 2024

Today's Birthdays

Johann Christoph Vogel (1756-1788)
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908)
Paul Le Flem (1881-1984)
Gian Francesco Malipiero (1882-1973)
Willem van Hoogstraten (1884-1965)
John Kirkpatrick (1905-1991)
Nobuko Imai (1943)
James Conlon (1950)
Jan-Hendrik Rootering (1950)
Courtney Pine (1964)

and

Stéphane Mallarmé (1842-1898)
Wilfred Owen (1893-1918)
Manly Hall (1901-1990)
George Plimpton (1927-2003)
Christa Wolf (1929-2011)
John Updike (1932-2009)

Sunday, March 17, 2024

Today's Birthdays

Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre (1665-1729)
Manuel García II (1805-1906)
Joseph Rheinberger (1839-1901)
Giuseppe Borgatti (1871-1950)
Brian Boydell (1917-2000)
Nat "King" Cole (1917-1965)
John LaMontaine (1920-2013)
Stephen Dodgson (1924-2013)
Betty Allen (1927-2009)
Rudolf Nureyev (1938-1993)
John Lill (1944)
Michael Finnissy (1946)
Patrick Burgan (1960)

and

Edmund Kean (1787-1833)
Frank B. Gilbreth (1911-2001)
Penelope Lively (1933)

Saturday, March 16, 2024

Review: Ehnes, Heyward, and the organ shine with the Oregon Symphony

James Ehnes in rehearsal with the Oregon Symphony under Jonathon Heyward

The Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall has benefited a lot from the acoustical upgrade that was done in the fall of 2020 (see my article in The Oregonian), but if there were still some lingering doubts about the improved sound, they were laid to rest when the organ came in at full blast in the final movement of Saint-Saëns’s “Organ Symphony.” WHUMFP! Up until this weekend’s Oregon Symphony concerts, you could hear the organ, but it never had the requisite grandiose power needed to make that piece memorable. This time, at the concert on March 11, the sound was awesome, and that made all the difference. The audience felt it and followed the finale with a roaring standing ovation.

The enthusiasm also recognized guest conductor Jonathon Heyward, who made his debut on the podium with the orchestra. Heyward is the newly appointed Music Director of the Baltimore Symphony and Lincoln Center’s Summer Orchestra. He is also in his fourth year as Chief Conductor of the Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie. The Oregon Symphony was fortunate to secure Heyward’s services for the concert, which, in addition to the Saint-Saëns, included a terrific Brahms Violin Concerto with Canadian virtoso James Ehnes.

A perennial favorite with Portland audiences, Ehnes conveyed the Brahms marvelously. His immaculate technique made the trickiest passages look effortless, but beyond the technical wizardry, he expressed the bewitching beauty of the slower sections – especially in the long cadenza of the first movement where he threaded the needle with elegant trills. In the brash and rustic third movement, Ehnes produced sounds that delightfully alternated between gliding and skittering, dotted with accented notes.

All in all, it was a masterful performance that generated thunderous applause from all corners of the house. The acclamation brought Ehnes back to center stage several times, and he offered an encore, Eugène Ysaÿe’s Sonata No. 3 ("Ballade"), which he played with such intensity and artistry that it brought down the house again.

Conducting without a baton, Heyward deftly synced up with Ehnes throughout the Saint-Saëns and elicited excellent playing from the orchestra. He eschewed the stick in the Saint-Saëns as well, urging the orchestra with precise gestures that were never overdramatic. The musicians responded with plenty of verve whenever it was required. Douglas Schneider commanded the organ magnificently and the beguiling effect of piano four hands with Sequoia and Chuck Dillard at the keyboard added a crystalline underlayment. The brass choir in the fourth movement helped to amp up the finale, which – with the organ going full tilt – was glorious.

I am guessing that it may be a long time before Heyward returns to the Schnitz, since he is in such high demand, but it should be noted that there is an ongoing connection between Baltimore and Portland. That’s because two former Oregon Symphony musicians are members of the Baltimore Symphony. They are Principal Trombonist Aaron LaVere and Bassist Nina DeCesare

- -

PS. At the concert I sat a couple rows behind Oregon Symphony Creative Chair Gabriel Kahane, his parents, the conductor and pianist Jeffrey Kahane and Martha Kahane. Also in that row was Chamber Music Northwest’s artistic power couple Gloria Chien and Soovin Kim, and super cellist Paul Watkins. Music Director David Danzmayr and his partner, violinist Aromi Park also stopped by. A pretty illustrious group!

Today's Birthdays

Enrico Tamberlik (1820-1889)
Henny Youngman (1906-1998)
Christa Ludwig (1928-2021)
Sir Roger Norrington (1934)
Teresa Berganza (1935-2022)
David Del Tredici (1937-2023)
Claus Peter Flor (1953)

and

James Madison (1751-1836)
Maxim Gorky (1868-1936)
César Vallejo (1892-1938)
Sid Fleischman (1920-2010)
Alice Hoffman (1952)

Friday, March 15, 2024

Deanna Tham advances in La Maestra competition


 According to this posting on Facebook from the La Maestra competition (in Paris). Oregon Symphony Associate Conductor Deanna Tham has made it past the initial round (of 14 candidates) to the semi-finals - seven finalists. Yay!

Today's Birthdays

Charles Dibdin (1745-1814)
Eduard Strauss (1835-1916)
Johan Halvorsen (1864-1935)
Colin McPhee (1900-1964)
Lightnin' Hopkins (1912-1982)
Ben Johnston (1926-2019)
Nicolas Flagello (1928-1994)
Jean Rudolphe Kars (1947)
Isabel Buchanan (1954)
)
and

Richard Ellmann (1918-1987)
Ben Okri (1959)

and from the Composers Datebook:

On this day in 1985, Italian tenor Enrico Caruso, age 22, makes his operatic debut at the Teatro Nuovo in Naples, singing the lead tenor role in Domenico Morelli's comic opera "L'Amico Francesco."

Thursday, March 14, 2024

Today's Birthdays

Georg Philipp Telemann (1681-1767)
Johann Gottlieb Goldberg (1727-1756)
Pierre-Louis Couperin (1755-1789)
Johann Strauss Sr. (1804-1849)
Lawrance Collingwood (1887-1982)
Witold Rudziński (1913-2004)
Quincy Jones (1933)
Phillip Joll (1954)

and

Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
Sylvia Beach (1887-1962)
Max Shulman (1919-1988)
Diane Arbus (1923-1971)

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

Today's Birthdays

Hugo Wolf (1860-1903)
Alec Rowley (1892-1958)
Irène Joachim (1913-2001)
Jane Rhodes (1929-2011)
Alberto Ponce (1935-2019)
Lionel Friend (1945)
Julia Migenes (1949)
Wolfgang Rihm (1952)
Anthony Powers (1953)
Moses Hogan (1957-2003)
Terence Blanchard (1962)

and

Janet Flanner (1892-1978)
George Seferis (1900-1971)