American opera has experienced some notable upheaval over the past several months, first with the closing of the New York City Opera late last year, then with the announcement that the 49-year-old San Diego Opera will cease operations at the end of this season. Nonetheless, it would be a mistake to call New York a “one-opera town”, as newer and smaller opera companies are flourishing in the Big Apple.
As part of Bachtrack’s Contemporary Music Month, Meg Wilhoite takes a look at the question of gender equality in the world of new music, in light of the recent debate sparked by conductor Vasily Petrenko.
The 1960s and 70s are famous for breakthrough developments in rock music, but the story was really no different for the field of art music during those decades. The advent of electronics seems to have instilled in composers a fresh thirst for sound-exploration and conceptual writing.
It’s a rainy night and a little girl’s recorded voice sings out “it’s ice cream time”, triggering an outburst from sax quartet and electric guitar, a sort of warped chorale loosely based on her melody.Thus began sax quartet PRISM’s Roulette debut, and the New York première of Nick Didkovsky’s Ice Cream Time on Sunday night.
The word Götterdämmerung contextually translated becomes “twilight of the gods”, and Thursday night’s story at the Met was indeed full of endings: the conclusion of the saga of the ring and the end of several lives, human and god alike.
Possessor of an impeccable touch, pianist Kathleen Supové is one of those compelling performers who truly communicates her unique personality through her playing, as she did at Thursday night’s performance at Roulette in Brooklyn.
“Wheel: mechanical, circular motion. The brake was invented later.”Enno Poppe’s words about Rad (“Wheel”), the first piece on his Composer Portraits concert at Miller Theatre on Saturday night, express well the experience of listening to it.
Dreams and anxieties, religious and otherwise, were the dominant themes at Thursday night’s New York Philharmonic performance. The concert program worked backwards in time, starting with Phantasmata by composer-in-residence Christopher Rouse (completed in 1985), followed by Ernest Bloch’s Schelomo (1916), and finishing with Brahms’ Symphony no. 1 (published in 1877).
Born in Argentina to Eastern European Jewish parents, composer Osvaldo Golijov certainly brings many cultural influences to the musical table, influences that shone through in the three works of his performed at Zankel Hall on Monday night.
There is a certain style of composition with which I’ve crossed paths sporadically over the past ten years that I’ve never been able to pin a label on. My first exposure to this style came in the form of Morton Feldman’s music, particularly his late pieces, followed by German composer Peter Ablinger and even some composers in my own acquaintance here in New York City.
Dutch composer Simeon ten Holt passed away last November, and groups all over have been honoring his memory by performing what is perhaps his most well known composition, Canto Ostinato.
