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PIOTR ANDERSZEWSKI
Voyageur Intranquille
Film by Bruno Monsaingeon
Medici Arts 3077938
Duration: 83 Minutes
A captivating look into the mind and the life of one of today's top pianists, constantly touring, performing, recording ... but more importantly, constantly questioning the music and why one becomes a professional world class musician. This film demonstrates very well the paradoxes within the life of a classical musician, and how one needs to be a philosopher, teacher, historian, diplomat, recluse and socialite to convey his personal musical message to the world.
Most of the footage takes place within a small train compartment, made even smaller by the presence of Piotr Anderszewski's grand piano, playing the role of a practice instrument during the concert tour. A tour that takes us on a winter's journey through Poland and Hungary, passing many small towns with picturesque train stations all nestled within some postcard quality snowy landscapes. The major stops are in Budapest and Warsaw, great historical cities as seen through the eyes of Anderszewski himself. Here we are treated to recitals featuring the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and Robert Schumann. There is also some footage of him in a rehearsal of a Brahms Piano Concerto with Dudamel on the podium, a recording session of Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 1, various shots of previous recitals in Paris and other major centres, and many moments of him at home, commenting and pointing out, using musical examples, the beauty and genius within the music of Mozart. But the train compartment is where the most profound moments of this unquiet voyage occur. We see a solitary human being, revealing his most personal and profound views on music in general, but with more of a focus on Bach, Szymanowski, Beethoven and especially Chopin, and why their music endures, and why he himself is constantly thriving for perfection in his interpretation of their works. It is within these moments that we get to see how one's childhood, parents, schooling and musical training, personal struggles and life itself, all take part in shaping and creating a great musician.
This film takes a hard look at what it takes to be a real musician always aiming for perfection, even if the temptation to give it all up is always present. Not only are we passengers on this train trip through a beautiful country, but we are also passengers through a life devoted to making the world a better place by breathing new life and purpose within music's wonders.
Jean-Yves Duperron
LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN
Piano Concertos (Complete)
Daniel Barenboim (Piano & Conductor)
Staatskapelle Berlin
Blu-ray Disc
Medici Arts 2056774
198 minutes
These superb performances of all the Ludwig Van Beethoven Piano Concertos which were recorded live at the Jahrhunderthalle in Bochum, Germany, on May 21-23 2007, as part of the Ruhr Piano Festival, and were previously available on regular DVD, are now as of November 2009 available on Blu-ray Disc.
Daniel Barenboim has always been a champion of Beethoven's music. He has recorded and performed the Piano Sonatas many times, has recorded and performed the Piano Concertos many times as pianist, pianist/conductor, conductor (with Artur Rubinstein at the piano), has given lectures and masterclasses on the subject, so it is fair to say that this, his only video recording of these masterpieces, is quite the musical and historical event. (This concert was captured exactly forty years after his first audio recording of the concertos with Otto Klemperer conducting, an EMI recording still on the market today).
This production directed by Michael Beyer, presents a fine balance between close-ups of Barenboim and panoramic shots of the full orchestra or the concert hall itself which looks like a combination of theatre, football stadium, manufacturing plant and battleship. The variety of angles in which different aspects of the hall are caught, or stunning close-ups of certain instruments, keep the visuals fresh and entertaining. For example, because the piano itself is nestled within the first rows of the orchestra so that Daniel Barenboim is facing the players, when we see a shot of him face on, what we see behind him is a sea of audience members sitting in dozens of ascending rows leading to the top of the hall. The lighting is bright and vibrant, bringing out all the shine and shimmer of the instruments and the varying colors of dress in the audience. The format is 1080i Full HD and is full of detail, and of course the sound is first rate and all 3 hours and some are presented on one disc.
Be it for the interpretations, or for the sound recording, or for the visual aspect, this complete set of these wonderful concertos is a must have in anyone's collection, and you don't even need to travel to Germany to take it all in.
Jean-Yves Duperron
GEORGE CRUMB
"Bad Dog!"
Directed by David Starobin
George Crumb Ensemble
George Crumb (Percussion)
Tony Arnold (Soprano)
Robert Shannon (Piano)
David Starobin (Guitar)
Bridge Records 9312
Duration: 66 Minutes
This DVD is actually Volume 14 of the critical Complete Crumb Edition CDs that Bridge Records have been releasing over the last few years, with Vol. 15 due out later this year (2010). Although this one is a DVD, it is still the fascinating music of George Crumb that takes centre stage in this production. A few interviews and historic still photographs are well interspersed throughout the footage, but the main material on this quintessential American composer is comprised of fresh and incisive performances of some of Crumb's important works. Pieces that reflect his attraction to the spiritual aspects of life and his innovative use of any musical instrument's properties.
The vocal pieces, performed with character and given a deep emotional range by soprano Tony Arnold demonstrate the composer's ability to blend both words and music to create a powerful emotional image. Apparition for example, based on a text by Walt Whitman about existence and death, full of symbolic and spiritual metaphors about the forces of nature at work within our lives, is elevated by Crumb's resourceful use of the piano to emphasize the text and raise the emotional level of the music. Even the Three Early Songs from the composer's teen years, demonstrate a firm grasp of form and structure and an understanding that the text's underlying emotional character is what really matters.
The strictly instrumental works performed here display even greater emotional and compositional depth. The two pieces called Yoda and Fritzi, from a suite titled Mundus Canis, are musical tributes to some of the composer's dogs. They are played here by David Starobin on guitar and George Crumb on percussion, and display a deep sense of humor and musical imagination. The solo piano work titled Eine Kleine Mitternachtmusik (A Little Midnight Music) or (Ruminations On 'Round Midnight By Thelonious Monk) performed with deep insights by pianist Robert Shannon, is an impressive piece of music delving deep into the composer's mind and his fascination with night music. Taking the main motif from the Thelonious Monk classic as a departure point, it digs deep into the emotional concept of midnight and puts to use rarely seen properties of the piano to accentuate the darkness and solitude of night and even evokes the tolling of bells and the passing of time. Laid out over nine movements, it grabs your attention from start to finish.
Collected here are great examples of Crumb's work all performed by musicians who know the man and his music intimately and reveal the inner workings of his creative mind.
Jean-Yves Duperron
DMITRI SHOSTAKOVICH
Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk
James Conlon (Conductor)
Orchestra & Chorus of the
Maggio Musicale Fiorentino
Lev Dodin (Stage Director)
Recorded live in Florence, 2008 / Arthaus Musik 101388 / Blu-ray DVD
170 min
Two strong versions of this Shostakovich opera have been issued on DVD: from Barcelona (2004 -EMI) and Amsterdam (2006 - Opus Arte). This Florence production is vastly superior to both. Directors in the West have demonstrated a penchant for vulgarity and elevated shock value (as if the adultery and multiple murder of the plot were not shocking enough). The tendency could reflect reaction to the real-life drama of the composer's 1936 denunciation when the opera provided a convenient pretext for Stalinist persecution. Lev Dodin allows the performance to unfold naturally without superfluous embellishment. The result is the most authentic Russian setting since the Lenfilm 1966 on-location, cinematic production of the truncated version (Katerina Izmailova) which featured Galina Vishnevskaya in the title role (available on DVD from Decca). A solid cast of Slavs was assembled in Florence to faithfully depict mannerism as well as language. Jeanne-Michèle Charbonet may not be Vishnevskaya but she gives us a convincing tragic heroine. Sergej Kunaev is suitably rotten as her seducer. The chorus is well drilled and James Conlon demonstrates mastery of the score.
Blu-ray imagery and sound are top-quality. The performance is also available on conventional DVD from Arthaus. Collectors with an interest in Soviet music should not hesitate to acquire this marvelous production.
Stephen Habington
RICHARD WAGNER
Das Rheingold
Zubin Mehta (Conductor)
Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana
Carlus Padrissa (Stage Director)
Recorded in performance at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia,
Valencia, April/May 2007
C Major Blu-ray DVD 700604
194 min - Extra Feature 27 min
And Now for Something Very Different: How to concisely describe this Catalonian entry in ever expanding Ring des Nibelungen stakes? Revolutionized, super-sized, energized, dramaturgized, mechanized, transformerized and digitized could summarize it. Here is Das Rheingold strenuously re-imagined; and all for the sake of realizing the composer's original - and until now impossible - stage directions. In most cases of interpretive controversy, the stage director is the lightning rod for criticism. Carlus Padrissa has been aided and abetted by a cohort of brilliant accomplices: video background creator Franc Aleu, staging and acting coordinator Valentina Carrasco, stage designer Roland Olbeter, lighting director Peter van Praet and costume designer Chu Uroz. During the two years of intensive planning which preceded the first rehearsal, conductor Zubin Mehta contributed ideas which had gestated since 1954 and his student days in Vienna. Mehta knows where to go with the music because he knows where it has been. It was his suggestion to involve La Fura dels Baus which is a daring and agile performance troupe similar to our own Canadian Cirque du Soleil.
New-Look Authenticity: The brains trust behind this production rightly deduced that gods don't run around dressed in thrift store remnants. And why should gods be subject to the law of gravity? The result is divine costumes and the most use of a stage's upper atmosphere since Mary Martin soared over Broadway as Peter Pan. There is little use of scenery as such but eight massive projection surfaces (all programmed from a piano keyboard to fully integrate effects with the score) compensate with 3D animation of the finest cinematic quality. In the opening scene the Rhine maidens are immersed in individual, levitating aquariums. Gods are trundled around in elevating platforms to hover over the stage. The demi-god Loge zips around skillfully on a Segway scooter and the giants are giants for a change. Once the sensation of watching the world's grandest puppet show is shaken, the stage action fascinates. Performances of Das Rheingold can be the weak link in a cycle. The entry of the gods into Valhalla may even seem anti-climactic. Here the tension is sustained to the very end and the closing scene is extraordinarily powerful.
Und die musik? Consummate stage craft is all very well but Wagner demands - and in this case gets - superhuman musical and vocal performances. Matti Salminen as Fasolt is luxury casting, indeed while Juha Uusitalo, Franz-Josef Kapellmann and Anna Larsson turn in near benchmark portrayals of Wotan, Alberich and Fricka, respectively. All of the singers are, in fact, superb. Zubin Mehta draws inspired playing from the orchestra. It creates the impression of hearing the performance of a lifetime from this conductor. A sneak peak at the companion release of Die Walküre (review pending) gives every indication of being in the same outstanding category of endeavour as this Das Rheingold. The cycle will be complete in the shops in short order. Don't get left behind.
Blu-ray Rules: Collectors who are so-equipped will be delighted to learn that the surround-sound option includes 7.1 playback. In surround or stereo this recording will give your speakers a rigorous workout. And the awesome quality of the imagery more than justifies the possession of a high-definition television set.
More Mehta from Valencia: The city's spectacular new opera house, the Palau de les Arts 'Reina Sofia', opened in October 2006 with a Royal Command performance of Beethoven's Fidelio. Maestro Mehta was in the pit with Juha Uusitalo (Don Pizarro), Peter Seiffert (Florestan), Waltraud Meier (Leonore) and Matti Salminen (Rocco) on stage. The event was captured on a Medici Arts DVD (2072498).
Stephen Habington
RICHARD WAGNER
Die Walkure
Zubin Mehta (Conductor)
Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana
Carlus Padrissa (Stage Director)
Recorded in performance at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia,
Valencia, April/May 2007
C Major Blu-ray DVD 700804
245 min - Extra Feature 27 min
Fooled by the Gods: Not so long ago, your critic praised to the heavens an audio recording of this opera. The review of Simone Young's 2008 Hamburg production is posted on this site. The point was made that over-reliance on DVD inhibited hearing and fully appreciating the music. The opinion stands but the sublime audio interlude left one quite unprepared for the magnificence of the audio-visual Ring des Nibelungen unfolding from Valencia. The critic was stunned. And the Gods laughed. There is more and yet more of Wagner that can be revealed and this daring production is proof of the overwhelming supremacy of genuine originality. With the concluding chapters of the cycle close at hand, there is every reason to expect it to equal or surpass the great Bayreuth DVD sets of Pierre Boulez (DG) and Daniel Barenboim (Warner).
Stop, Look and Listen: The present Die Walküre builds on the advanced technical stagecraft evident in the Padrissa/Mehta production of Das Rheingold (review posted in the Stained Glass Room on this site). The giant-screen animated backdrops have even greater impact commensurate with the developing plot. Physical interventions by the Fura dels Baus performance troupe ingeniously amplify the drama. One essential element of Padrissa's concept which should be carefully noted by 'modernizers' of the story is the presentation of Hunding and Siegmund as primitives with the latter carrying the creative spark which will flourish as humanity. The coupling of Siegmund and Sieglinde is, in this sense is no more unnatural than the mating of Adam and Eve - the origin of the species, so to speak. Musically this production leaves nothing to be desired. Peter Seiffert and Petra Maria Schnitzer give courageous portrayals of the doomed couple. Salminen is Salminen and Juha Uusitalo continues to turn in a pretty well definitive interpretation of Wotan. The Brünnhilde of Jennifer is an astonishing vocal and dramatic achievement. The late-blooming soprano will personify the role for a generation of Wagnerians. Zubin Mehta's mastery of the score emerges from every bar of the music. The accounts of the Ride of the Valkyries and the Magic Fire Music achieve a primus inter pares status with the closest competition and visually, the staging of these keen scenes is the outright winner (See Valkyries fly!).
The Ring Goes On: Watch for reviews of the Valencia productions of Siegfried and Götterdämerung in coming weeks. Note that the set is also available in conventional DVD format.
Stephen Habington
RICHARD WAGNER
Siegfried
Zubin Mehta (Conductor)
Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana
Carlus Padrissa (Stage Director)
Recorded in performance at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia,
Valencia, June 2008 & 2009
C Major Blu-ray DVD 701004
256 minutes
Siegfried for all Seasons: This staging of the penultimate episode in the cycle maintains the musical excellence and high production values established in the C Major DVDs of Das Rheingold and Die Walküre (see separate reviews on this site). This is Wagner on the creative cutting edge and yet monumentally unique in the lengths to which Padrissa and La Fura dels Baus went to follow the letter of the Master's original stage directions. The tale is uncompromisingly told with clarity and boldness of gesture and decoration.
Voices Tried and True: The cast of the opera is sensational. Juha Uusitalo gives a commanding performance as the Wanderer. The psychological revelation of a God struggling on the path of defeat and destruction creates a new benchmark performance for the small (and perhaps, not-so-small) screen. Gerhard Siegel and Franz-Josef Kapellmann leave nothing to be desired in the key enabling roles of Mime and Alberich, respectively. The Erda of Catherine Wyn-Rogers is unforgettable while Marina Zyatkova's purity of tone as the voice of the wood bird is eerily apt to the dire warnings conveyed to the hero. Above all, the symbiosis of Siegfried and Brünnhilde is a towering achievement. Lance Ryan and Jennifer Wilson turn in epoch-making performances as the central couple. The quality of their voices is exceeded only by a shared, remarkable ability to project the characters. Ryan, a heldentenor of depth and sensitivity, is a believably fearless Siegfried with the moves and conviction to shake the punk stereotype which has become typical of so many revisionist productions. When Brünnhilde arises from her long repose, Jennifer Wilson stands before the audience (and lucky us) as the most desirable woman in the world. The collaboration of Ryan and Wilson would justify the cost of the entire cycle (on Blu-ray or conventional DVD). Of course, the cycle is paying its way quite nicely with ingenious stagecraft and a vivid orchestral performance under a master Wagnerian, Zubin Mehta.
Stephen Habington
RICHARD WAGNER
Götterdämmerung
Zubin Mehta (Conductor)
Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana
Carlus Padrissa (Stage Director)
Recorded in performance at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia,
Valencia, May & June 2008
C Major Blu-ray DVD 701204
309 minutes
Raising the House: Each installment of C Major's Valencia Ring is accompanied by a half-hour documentary film on the production in hand. In places repetitive, the films do reveal much behind the makers' inspiration and means. The role of house intendant Helga Schmidt is given deserving prominence. And what better solution to winning a golden reputation for a new opera company than a successful staging of Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen? When Zubin Mehta was brought on board, he asked for a world-class Wagner orchestra ("Because a Wagner orchestra can play anything"). As these recordings amply demonstrate, Mehta got exactly what he wanted. It was also the conductor's suggestion that the performance troupe, La Fura dels Baus, be engaged to stage the cycle and Schmidt obliged. She provided everything necessary from the best singers to wide screen backdrops in 3D animation. With this Götterdämmerung to conclude the cycle, it can be confidently asserted that the collaboration of performers, production team and Intendant Schmidt yielded the best Ring on film of recent years and secured for the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia a first-rank place among European opera houses.
This Ring's the Thing: Whether in pure audio or on film, it has been a Wagner axiom that sitting through a complete Ring des Nibelungen involved a bit of aging. Not this time. Like Das Rheingold, Die Walküre and Siegfried, the staging of Götterdämmerung is enthralling. Quite aside from the thousands of other musical and dramatic factors that go into interpreting these epic works, the essential criteria for an outstanding performance is the quality of the storytelling. The consummation of characters, plot and themes of morality throughout this cycle attains a rare high level of excellence and originality. This Götterdämmerung is the crowning achievement in a triumphant traversal of music drama's most arduous relay of works. Superbly cast and with Maestro Mehta leaving no leitmotif behind, this cycle is fit to stand alongside the great Bayreuth productions of Boulez/Chereau (DG) and Barenboim/Kupfer (Warner).
Forever Twilight: From levitating Norns, Alberich and Rhinemaidens to the orgy on Brünnhilde's rock, an inverted Siegfried and the final, jaw-dropping immolation scene, this production provides the ultimate in visual spectacle without ever losing the focus of the contrived legend. La Fura dels Baus and Carlus Padrissa even succeed in restoring some of the tale's mystery because the audience is kept in a constant state of aroused curiosity. For the first time in the cycle, structured stage sets are used. Basically a mezzanine platform and stairway, these are fully integrated with the multi-screen video display. The Gibichungs are presented as a society which passed from savagery to decadence without a civilized interval. After an on-stage makeover, Siegfried, shorn of dreadlocks, joins them with alacrity. And the descent into betrayal and mortality unfolds apace. Wagner veteran Matti Salminen takes his third role of the cycle as a suitably diabolical Hagen. Ryan and Wilson as Siegfried and Brünnhilde are again superb and the Gunther-Gutrune tag team are as oily as any on film. The chorus is splendid. This production of Götterdämmerung will entertain and inform novice collectors and Wagner fanatics alike.
Stephen Habington