Sakamoto and Noto's deceptively simple s packs the Metropolitan Museum's Rogers Auditorium

By Joseph Pfender, 31 May 2013

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Reviewed at Metropolitan Museum of Art, Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium, New York City on 29 May 2013

Various, s

Ryuichi Sakamoto, Piano

Alva Noto, Electronics

Concertos – for violin and for orchestra – from the Hallé

Peter Connors, 22nd March

Viktoria Mullova is a superb soloist in Brahms' Violin Concerto, while an orchestra full of soloists play Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra with Kahchun Wong presiding.

*****

Kristiina Poska makes an exciting return to conduct the RSNO

Simon Thompson, 20th March

Kristiina Poska directs the RSNO in gripping Tchaikovsky and Pärt, but words and music only occasionally match in Elena Langer's new song cycle.

***11

Chopin and Franck reframed with elegance and insight in Dublin

Andrew Larkin, 20th March

In Dublin, Jean-Luc Tingaud and Louis Lortie bring clarity and purpose to two composers often ill at ease with the orchestra.

****1

Guitars, electronics and ancient treatises: the JACK Quartet at 92NY

Kurt Gottschalk, 20th March

At 92NY, the JACK Quartet performs four new works developed in their JACK Studio, including a commissioned premiere from the electrifying Tristan Perich.

****1

Shared language and living history: Zubin Mehta and the Vienna Phil

Chanda VanderHart, 19th March

Zubin Mehta, Pinchas Zukerman and the Vienna Philharmonic meet in repertoire they know intimately, illuminating it through mutual understanding.

*****

Jaap van Zweden and the Seoul Philharmonic’s measured Mahler 6

SangKwon Lee, 19th March

That last movement proves the evening’s true point of reckoning in the Seoul Philharmonic's performance of Mahler’s Sixth Symphony at Lotte Concert Hall.

****1

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Joseph Pfender

Joseph Pfender, a PhD student in musicology at NYU, has active research interests in electroacoustic and multimedia performance, perceptual agency, music and folklore, and theorizing orchestration. He has presented work in conjunction with the Metropolitan Opera, and in Athens, Greece.