Subject
Fwd: ''Darkbloom" is an overture to an opera based on Vladimir
Nabokov's ''Lolita" ..
Nabokov's ''Lolita" ..
From
Date
Body
----- Forwarded message from spklein52@hotmail.com -----
Date: Fri, 25 Mar 2005 18:46:31 -0500
From: "Sandy P. Klein" <spklein52@hotmail.com>
Reply-To: SPKlein52@HotMail.com
Subject: ''Darkbloom" is an overture to an opera based on Vladimir Nabokov's
''Lolita" ..
To: SPKlein52@HotMail.com
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2005/03/25/bso_gives_two_americans_their_due/[1]
BSO gives two Americans their due
Boston Globe - 16 hours ago
... John Harbison's ''Darkbloom" is an overture to an opera based on
VLADIMIR NABOKOV\'S ''Lolita" that he decided not to write, for
obvious reasons, among them the ... [2][3] MUSIC REVIEW
BSO GIVES TWO AMERICANS THEIR DUE
By Richard Dyer, Globe Staff | March 25, 2005
For James Levine's final program in his inaugural season, the Boston
Symphony Orchestra's first American music director arranged to
commission two American composers born a few months apart in the same
year (1938) and who represent complementary but not antagonistic
strains in contemporary music.
John Harbison's ''Darkbloom" is an overture to an opera based on
Vladimir Nabokov's ''Lolita" that he decided not to write, for
obvious reasons, among them the problem of finding a nymphet of the
proper age and appearance who could sing over an operatic orchestra,
and the reluctance of opera houses to get involved with controversial
subject matter that has become even touchier in the decades since the
novel was published.
The music does the job an opera overture is supposed to; it offers a
promise of what's to come by creating a distinctive color, atmosphere,
texture. The music opens with a seductively swaying rhythm, and
melodies associated with the not-exactly guileless heroine and the
not-exactly honest male protagonist. A playful later episode depicts
a tennis game that is not exactly innocent in the eyes of the man who
is observing it, and ends with high, shimmering laughter, or what the
composer calls ''a frail epiphany." Sexy, funny, dangerous -- quite a
lot for 10 minutes to accomplish, but Harbison has the imagination and
the chops to carry it off.
Boston audiences are at a disadvantage when it comes to the
demanding music of Charles Wuorinen. Thirty years ago the composer
stirred up some controversy at Tanglewood in connection with his
Concerto for Electric Violin, and until Levine came along, Wuorinen
had no prominent advocates at the BSO. We might have felt more at
home in the world of his Fourth Piano Concerto last night if we had
heard the earlier three. As it was, the response to the premiere was
cordial and polite, but not more. Perhaps some people felt the way
they felt about Wednesday night's storm -- there was nothing wrong
with it, but it was one too many, and it vanished without leaving
much trace.
Still there were many moments in the piece that compelled attention
and made this listener willing to hear it again -- the chamber-music
quality of Part I, with coloratura elaborations in the piano part;
the rhythmic pulsations of the finale and the opening-out of musical
space at the end before the piece slips quietly out the door. And no
composer could wish stronger witnesses for the defense than pianist
Peter Serkin, Levine, and the BSO.
Serkin also played Stravinsky's concise, precise, and enigmatic
''Movements," in which the pointilistic piano part is set against
instruments and instrumental groups that can sustain. Serkin played
with precision and a prodigious variety of attack, touch, and
dynamics.
Levine's approach to Brahms's Second Symphony was marked by energy,
glorious sound, formal logic, and spontaneous combustion. In this
context you could hear how dissonant Brahms once sounded, how
exploratory his reach; you could understand why he was the least
popular modern composer in the early years of the BSO. A critic
famously proposed a sign above the doors, ''Exit in case of Brahms."
Last night people stayed and cheered.
Links:
------
[1]
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2005/03/25/bso_gives_two_americans_their_due/
[2] http://www.boston.com/
[3] http://www.boston.com/news/globe/
----- End forwarded message -----
Date: Fri, 25 Mar 2005 18:46:31 -0500
From: "Sandy P. Klein" <spklein52@hotmail.com>
Reply-To: SPKlein52@HotMail.com
Subject: ''Darkbloom" is an overture to an opera based on Vladimir Nabokov's
''Lolita" ..
To: SPKlein52@HotMail.com
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2005/03/25/bso_gives_two_americans_their_due/[1]
BSO gives two Americans their due
Boston Globe - 16 hours ago
... John Harbison's ''Darkbloom" is an overture to an opera based on
VLADIMIR NABOKOV\'S ''Lolita" that he decided not to write, for
obvious reasons, among them the ... [2][3] MUSIC REVIEW
BSO GIVES TWO AMERICANS THEIR DUE
By Richard Dyer, Globe Staff | March 25, 2005
For James Levine's final program in his inaugural season, the Boston
Symphony Orchestra's first American music director arranged to
commission two American composers born a few months apart in the same
year (1938) and who represent complementary but not antagonistic
strains in contemporary music.
John Harbison's ''Darkbloom" is an overture to an opera based on
Vladimir Nabokov's ''Lolita" that he decided not to write, for
obvious reasons, among them the problem of finding a nymphet of the
proper age and appearance who could sing over an operatic orchestra,
and the reluctance of opera houses to get involved with controversial
subject matter that has become even touchier in the decades since the
novel was published.
The music does the job an opera overture is supposed to; it offers a
promise of what's to come by creating a distinctive color, atmosphere,
texture. The music opens with a seductively swaying rhythm, and
melodies associated with the not-exactly guileless heroine and the
not-exactly honest male protagonist. A playful later episode depicts
a tennis game that is not exactly innocent in the eyes of the man who
is observing it, and ends with high, shimmering laughter, or what the
composer calls ''a frail epiphany." Sexy, funny, dangerous -- quite a
lot for 10 minutes to accomplish, but Harbison has the imagination and
the chops to carry it off.
Boston audiences are at a disadvantage when it comes to the
demanding music of Charles Wuorinen. Thirty years ago the composer
stirred up some controversy at Tanglewood in connection with his
Concerto for Electric Violin, and until Levine came along, Wuorinen
had no prominent advocates at the BSO. We might have felt more at
home in the world of his Fourth Piano Concerto last night if we had
heard the earlier three. As it was, the response to the premiere was
cordial and polite, but not more. Perhaps some people felt the way
they felt about Wednesday night's storm -- there was nothing wrong
with it, but it was one too many, and it vanished without leaving
much trace.
Still there were many moments in the piece that compelled attention
and made this listener willing to hear it again -- the chamber-music
quality of Part I, with coloratura elaborations in the piano part;
the rhythmic pulsations of the finale and the opening-out of musical
space at the end before the piece slips quietly out the door. And no
composer could wish stronger witnesses for the defense than pianist
Peter Serkin, Levine, and the BSO.
Serkin also played Stravinsky's concise, precise, and enigmatic
''Movements," in which the pointilistic piano part is set against
instruments and instrumental groups that can sustain. Serkin played
with precision and a prodigious variety of attack, touch, and
dynamics.
Levine's approach to Brahms's Second Symphony was marked by energy,
glorious sound, formal logic, and spontaneous combustion. In this
context you could hear how dissonant Brahms once sounded, how
exploratory his reach; you could understand why he was the least
popular modern composer in the early years of the BSO. A critic
famously proposed a sign above the doors, ''Exit in case of Brahms."
Last night people stayed and cheered.
Links:
------
[1]
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/living/articles/2005/03/25/bso_gives_two_americans_their_due/
[2] http://www.boston.com/
[3] http://www.boston.com/news/globe/
----- End forwarded message -----