Category Archive: MUSIC
Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg
Stage Design by Helmut Jurgens, Munich 1949
(Richard Wagner) (Met, N.Y., Dec. 2014) Whilst perhaps a German might find an opera of over 6 hours duration a droll concept, only Richard Wagner would turn that concept into reality. Yet in mirific fashion, he succeeds with his most human and entertaining work, a wonderful mix of romance and comedy that does not equate, thanks god, to a ‘romantic comedy’. From the Magisterial overture to the polyphonous redux of the Masters’ motto, we are enthralled and can even look past the score-settling with critics like Eduard Hanslick (the libretto originally had Beckmesser as ‘Hanslich’), with Jews such as Meyerbeer,…
Continue Reading →Eugene Onegin
Painting by Ilya Repin, 1899
Tchaikovsky’s great opera (1879), with a libretto largely lifted from Pushkin’s epic poem, is a snow-filled but overheated saga of frustrated amour. TVC has never seen a live performance and has no plans to visit Russia in order to do so. The 1988 Decca DVD, directed by Peter Weigl with Sir Georg Solti conducting the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, reveals one of the enduring problems with opera as film as opposed to the Opera House. It sounds good and it looks good but, alas, not at the same time. The film treatment, while a little static, soars above the…
Continue Reading →The Flying Dutchman
Charles Temple
(Wagner) (1843) Not the Master’s best, by any means, but still streets ahead of most: strong, muscular, melodious, dramatic, Wagnerian, and able to be staged in most civilizations (Bass x 2, Soprano, Contralto, a couple of tenors). A Mary Celeste story with some soft porn thrown in, it was apparently inspired by both a stormy sea-crossing and Richard’s contempt for Parisians. (TVC team are francophiles but still: Yay!). Add to the inspiration the ghost ship source material that abounded in Wagner’s youth, such as by Marryat and Heine and you can enjoy an immature piece that is still tempestuous, eerie…
Continue Reading →Valentine’s Day
St. Valentine (from 'Picnic at Hanging Rock'
(2015 – ASO) After champagne and real Turkish delight, and the annual re-run of Picnic at Hanging Rock, it was time to head through Adelaide’s February furnace to the Festival Theatre, where Arvo Volmer conducted the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra’s version of a concert, curiously and incongruously entitled “Passionate Tchaikovsky”. We had the Russian composer’s Violin Concerto, with Ilya Gringolts sublime on lead violin, wearing a frock coat straight from Fiddler on the Roof. Written in 1878 to console its creator for the unfortunate and instantly-regretted decision to marry the loopy and self-centred Antonina Milyukova, the piece was not played till…
Continue Reading →Der Freischutz
(By Carl Maria Friedrich Ernst von Weber, premiering in Berlin on 18 June, 1821) It is good news that Melbourne Opera staged this neglected gem not so long ago – bad news that TVC couldn’t get there to see it, and at the Athanaeum what’s more! It was reviewed by Peter Burch in ‘The Australian’. Quite daring when first staged in 1821, as much for the lower class characters as the ghostly theme that enchanted a young Wagner, Weber’s music is accomplished and highly accessible (touches redolent of Beethoven, and even, in overture, AIbioni) with effects used to great advantage, especially in the…
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