As Robert Rappaport has already blogged, the Arizona Public Media site has a new book and author feature up, and you can find it here. Look down on the bottom left of the page, and you’ll find an audio feature that I did last October, an interview with Jennifer Lee Carrell about her Shakespeare-saturated mystery novel Interred with Their Bones. By the way, I also reviewed the book for the Tucson Weekly.
Bad economy means less newspaper advertising means lower page count means I have to cram reviews of two theater productions into a single story in the latest Tucson Weekly. “To say that the main characters in Tell Me on a Sunday and Hedwig and the Angry Inch—both shows that opened here last weekend—are unlucky in love hardly begins to describe their stories. These are two intimate shows of dashed hopes and disillusion.” That’s how the review begins, and you can read the whole thing here.
Written for Fanfare magazine:
DISTLER Harpsichord Concerto; Music for Knight Bluebeard * Huguette Dreyfus (hc); Martin Stephani, cond; German Bach Soloists; Stefan Malzew, cond; New Brandenburg Phil; Katharina Wingen (sop); Stefan Livland (ten) * MUSICAPHON 56860 (hybrid multichannel SACD)
Hugo Distler was a very accessible and important composer of German choral music and organ music from the early 1930s to the early 1940s; war-related despair led him to suicide in 1942, at age 34. His professional positions involved choral conducting and the teaching of that practice, so he had little motivation or opportunity to write purely instrumental music, other than organ works for church use. The Harpsichord Concerto that occupies the first half of this disc suggests that he might have become a compelling though not original voice in midcentury German orchestral music.
Its first movement is a typical example of the period’s Neoclassicism, more motororic and percussive than, say, Frank Martin’s spidery Harpsichord Concerto. The slow movement is particularly redolent of Hindemith in its harmonic structure and melodic intervals. The third, variations on a theme by Samuel Scheidt, begins in a gently piquant style that would later be associated with Rodrigo’s Fantasia para un gentilhombre, but soon reverts to the engaging sewing-machine manner of the first movement.
The string orchestra, as recorded, is large enough to swamp the soloist occasionally, and its tone is unnecessarily harsh at times, especially at the beginning of the second movement. The reason is something found only in the small print: This is a DSD surround-sound remastering of a recording made in 1964, and while there’s no obvious gimmickry going on in the rear channels, the basic sonics remain hampered by the limitations of the original production (not exactly state-of-the-art in its time). That said, this remains a performance of commitment and vitality, though not perfect instrumental balance.
The incidental music for the play Knight Bluebeard comes from a 2002 concert performance, and includes scattered applause at the ends of a couple of internal tracks, plus a small amount of ambient audience noise between numbers. Distler wrote the score for an ill-fated 1940 production of Ludwig Tieck’s happily nonsensical 1797 treatment of Perrault’s Bluebeard tale, and gave the harpsichord a constant role in the proceedings. Partly, that’s because Distler recycled a few bits and pieces of the concerto into the new score, which involves winds as well as strings, plus vocalists in a couple of brief numbers. The movements are of variable interest, but the slow music again shows the greatest debt to Hindemith. The performance is certainly able, but not enough to persuade anyone that this is a neglected masterpiece. Here, the ensemble is recorded in an over-resonant space that slightly dulls the impact of the wide frequency range (at least we get all the overtones of the harpsichord and triangle).
This disc is strongly recommended for the concerto. James Reel
Hello again! I took nearly two weeks off, during which I avoided everything resembling work, including blogging. Now, the first thing I should do is catch you up on my recent contributions to the Tucson Weekly, which I wrote before sequestering myself.
First came a preview of two provocative plays; both opened this past weekend:
Two unrelated guys named Johnson—Kevin and Christopher—will soon open intimate musical-theater shows about very confused, conflicted individuals. One of the characters is a woman. The other is, well, something it would be natural to be confused and conflicted about.
The shows in question are Tell Me on a Sunday and Hedwig and the Angry Inch. I’ll be posting the reviews later this week, but meanwhile you can find the preview here.
A review I do have for your perusal:
In a comedy propelled by Jewish stereotypes, the less ham, the better. James Sherman's Beau Jest is the sort of comedy that could quickly become tiresome if all its stereotypes came forth with full force. It's contrary to what you might expect, but Live Theatre Workshop's production of Beau Jest draws its brightness and energy not from fatiguing flailing and shouting, but from the cast and director's courage to underplay the goofiness and treat the characters like real people.
Read the whole thing here. And then check out my review of an eatery I would never have visited had it not been assigned, the buffet at Desert Diamond Casino:
Are you feeling lucky, punk? You've just blown your nest egg at the Desert Diamond slot machines, and your spouse is gunning for you, and rightly so. But before you skip town, you need one last meal, one that won't suck too many of your few remaining dollars from your pocket. So you thread your way through the aisles of slots and past the blackjack tables, and head to the buffet, to take your chances at coming away with a winning meal. OK, I know that a buffet is the antithesis of "winning meal" in most culinary circles: Leave the wrong kind of food in those trays too long, and it can turn dry or tough, and often, the dishes don't even start off well, because they're prepared to suit the blandest of tastes. But it is possible to get decent food at a buffet or cafeteria.
The details await you here.
Here are reviews I wrote for Fanfare of three recent Handel SACDs. It's hardly unknown Handel, but it does provide some relief from Messiah overload:
HANDEL Water Music; Music for the Royal Fireworks * Jordi Savall, cond; Le Concert des Nations * ALIA VOX 9860 (hybrid multichannel SACD)
HANDEL Water Music; Music for the Royal Fireworks * Federico Guglielmo, cond; L’Arte dell’Arco * CPO 777 312-2 (hybrid multichannel SACD: 66:05)
Jordi Savall’s sometimes rowdy 1993 Handel recording was issued in conventional stereo on Astrée; now Savall has brought it out on his own label, refurbished as an SACD with subtle rear-channel ambiance. Until recently, some Fanfare critics were in the habit of recommending the Savall disc as a prime choice for brave listeners, just as the intense and sui generis wartime performances of German classics by Wilhelm Furtwängler are recommended only but especially to those not faint of heart. Savall hasn’t been mentioned in recent Fanfare reviews, so here’s an opportunity to call his Handel to your attention again. It’s spectacular work, really, with the individual instrumentalists (especially the horns) playing with abundant character. The slow movements are very warm and lyrical, and the fast movements are exceptionally quick, but lilting. All the minuets in the Water Music, for example, are very fast, but they all swing as well. Savall includes a drum that sounds rather like the tambor that often pops up in Rameau’s ballet music, and the field drum is prominent in the Fireworks Music; now, there’s an exuberant performance truly worthy of a spectacle, with great power and pomp in the Overture and the same characteristics found in the Water Music. The recording is realistic and beautiful, even though it’s pre-DSD technology; engineer Pierre Verany was always one of the best.
The new SACD from Federico Guglielmo’s L’Arte dell’Arco would be fully satisfactory heard in isolation, but pales in comparison to the Savall. The two ensembles are about the same size (by the way, both use strings in the Fireworks), but L’Arte dell’Arco is less full-bodied, and the recorded sound has slightly less presence than Savall’s. The fast movements are chipper, but not as strongly accented and individually phrased as Savall’s. Some of the playing is actually a bit swifter than Savall’s, but the phrasing is less pointed and detailed. On the other hand, the approach to most slow movements is even more lyrical than Savall’s. Guglielmo’s horns are a little less secure, and more distantly situated than Savall’s, but his recorder players are given to some fine ornamental flights of fancy. The Fireworks performance is forceful, but there’s no percussion in the Water Music. (The awkwardly translated booklet notes refer to percussion as “cymbals.”) In effect, Guglielmo’s treatment is the song, and Savall’s is the dance.
By the way, in the Water Music, Savall groups the pieces more or less according to the expected three suites, except that he bunches the horn and trumpet items together. Guglielmo, in contrast, redistributes the horn and trumpet movements among the others, in keeping with the order found in editions going back to the 18th century.
Of these two releases, Savall’s is certainly the more gripping performance and benefits from more immediate sonics. For a less in-your-face but still lively and stylish version of this music, a more fully satisfactory SACD than Guglielmo’s would be Perlman’s on Telarc, which I reviewed in Fanfare 26:6. James Reel
HANDEL Water Music; Music for the Royal Fireworks * Hervé Niquet, cond; Le Concert Spirituel * GLOSSA GCDSA 921616 (Hybrid multichannel SACD: 64:45)
This is a multichannel reissue of a 2002 recording Glossa put on the market in standard two-channel format a few years ago (and was apparently never reviewed in Fanfare). Glossa bills this as “first historical version (original instrumentation and tuning),” but also states that the music was transcribed by conductor Hervé Niquet. The point about tuning is salient, and the performance involves 24 newly-built period-style oboes carefully matched to the meantone temperament of the nine trumpets. Consequently, some passages sound a bit out of tune to our well-tempered ears, but that doesn’t excuse some brass intonation that is simply erratic. The 50-some strings are more reliable, but it seems that they could be balanced with the overabundance of other instruments only by keeping them up front and pushing the woodwinds and brass far to the rear. At least that’s the impression left by the recording. The sheer size of the wind forces generalizes their sound to a burr, and the performance consequently sounds less gutsy than Niquet’s tempos and attacks would otherwise produce. In short, the instrumental definition is remarkably mushy by SACD standards.
It’s an ensemble big enough to sink the river barges on which Handel’s Water Music was first performed, but more relevant to the Royal Fireworks Music (played here with strings as well as big wind band). The Water Music trips along smartly, but lacks the level of interpretive detail offered by Jordi Savall (I reviewed the SACD edition of his marvelous account two issues ago). The Fireworks prelude burns at a very fast pace that actually makes more musical sense—the themes cohere better—than at the old ponderous trudge. Even so, Niquet’s performances lack the aplomb of Savall or the debonair grace of Pearlman, and no number of woody oboes and warbling hunting horns can compensate for that. James Reel
Behold! I bring you tidings of Christmas pageants upon the Tucson stage:
Last weekend brought two more Christmas shows to local theaters: one new, and one tried and true. The new one is Joe Marshall's self-explanatory _The Gayest Christmas Pageant Ever!_ The familiar work is the sort of thing that Marshall gently sends up: Borderlands Theater's annual _A Tucson Pastorela_. This is the 13th year for the _Pastorela_, yet it's the freshest holiday script Max Branscomb has produced in a long time.
You’ll find the full review(s) here in the Tucson Weekly.
James Reel's cranky consideration of the fine arts and public radio in Tucson and beyond.
