English Touring Opera are delighted to announce a season of lyric monodramas to tour nationally from October to December. The season features music for solo singer and piano by Argento, Britten, Tippett and Shostakovich with a bold and inventive approach to making opera during social distancing.
This tenth of ten Live from London concerts was in fact a recorded live performance from California. It was no less enjoyable for that, and it was also uplifting to learn that this wasn’t in fact the ‘last’ LfL event that we will be able to enjoy, courtesy of VOCES8 and their fellow vocal ensembles (more below …).
Ever since Wigmore Hall announced their superb series of autumn concerts, all streamed live and available free of charge, I’d been looking forward to this song recital by Ian Bostridge and Imogen Cooper.
The Sixteen continues its exploration of Henry Purcell’s Welcome Songs for Charles II. As with Robert King’s pioneering Purcell series begun over thirty years ago for Hyperion, Harry Christophers is recording two Welcome Songs per disc.
Although Stile Antico’s programme article for their Live from London recital introduced their selection from the many treasures of the English Renaissance in the context of the theological debates and upheavals of the Tudor and Elizabethan years, their performance was more evocative of private chamber music than of public liturgy.
In February this year, Albanian soprano Ermonela Jaho made a highly lauded debut recital at Wigmore Hall - a concert which both celebrated Opera Rara’s 50th anniversary and honoured the career of the Italian soprano Rosina Storchio (1872-1945), the star of verismo who created the title roles in Leoncavallo’s La bohème and Zazà, Mascagni’s Lodoletta and Puccini’s Madama Butterfly.
Evidently, face masks don’t stifle appreciative “Bravo!”s. And, reducing audience numbers doesn’t lower the volume of such acclamations. For, the audience at Wigmore Hall gave soprano Elizabeth Llewellyn and pianist Simon Lepper a greatly deserved warm reception and hearty response following this lunchtime recital of late-Romantic song.
Collapsology. Or, perhaps we should use the French word ‘Collapsologie’ because this is a transdisciplinary idea pretty much advocated by a series of French theorists - and apparently, mostly French theorists. It in essence focuses on the imminent collapse of modern society and all its layers - a series of escalating crises on a global scale: environmental, economic, geopolitical, governmental; the list is extensive.
For this week’s Live from London vocal recital we moved from the home of VOCES8, St Anne and St Agnes in the City of London, to Kings Place, where The Sixteen - who have been associate artists at the venue for some time - presented a programme of music and words bound together by the theme of ‘reflection’.
'Such is your divine Disposation that both you excellently understand, and royally entertaine the Exercise of Musicke.’
Amongst an avalanche of new Mahler recordings appearing at the moment (Das Lied von der Erde seems to be the most favoured, with three) this 1991 Mahler Second from the 2nd Kassel MahlerFest is one of the more interesting releases.
‘And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven … that old serpent … Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.’
If there is one myth, it seems believed by some people today, that probably needs shattering it is that post-war recordings or performances of Wagner operas were always of exceptional quality. This 1949 Hamburg Tristan und Isolde is one of those recordings - though quite who is to blame for its many problems takes quite some unearthing.
There was never any doubt that the fifth of the twelve Met Stars Live in Concert broadcasts was going to be a palpably intense and vivid event, as well as a musically stunning and theatrically enervating experience.
‘Love’ was the theme for this Live from London performance by Apollo5. Given the complexity and diversity of that human emotion, and Apollo5’s reputation for versatility and diverse repertoire, ranging from Renaissance choral music to jazz, from contemporary classical works to popular song, it was no surprise that their programme spanned 500 years and several musical styles.
The Academy of St Martin in the Fields have titled their autumn series of eight concerts - which are taking place at 5pm and 7.30pm on two Saturdays each month at their home venue in Trafalgar Square, and being filmed for streaming the following Thursday - ‘re:connect’.
The London Symphony Orchestra opened their Autumn 2020 season with a homage to Oliver Knussen, who died at the age of 66 in July 2018. The programme traced a national musical lineage through the twentieth century, from Britten to Knussen, on to Mark-Anthony Turnage, and entwining the LSO and Rattle too.
With the Live from London digital vocal festival entering the second half of the series, the festival’s host, VOCES8, returned to their home at St Annes and St Agnes in the City of London to present a sequence of ‘Choral Dances’ - vocal music inspired by dance, embracing diverse genres from the Renaissance madrigal to swing jazz.
Just a few unison string wriggles from the opening of Mozart’s overture to Le nozze di Figaro are enough to make any opera-lover perch on the edge of their seat, in excited anticipation of the drama in music to come, so there could be no other curtain-raiser for this Gala Concert at the Royal Opera House, the latest instalment from ‘their House’ to ‘our houses’.
"Before the ending of the day, creator of all things, we pray that, with your accustomed mercy, you may watch over us."
"Orpheus I am!" - An unusual but very well chosen collection of songs, arias and madrigals from the 17th century, featuring Julian Prégardien and Teatro del mondo. Devised by Andreas Küppers, this collection crosses boundaries demonstrating how Italian, German, French and English contemporaries responded to the legend of Orpheus and Eurydice.
Orpheus himself is described in the first set, beginning with a song by Robert Johnson (1583-1633), it begins with strong single chords and bold exclamation : "Orpheus, I am, come from the deeps below, to thee, fond man, the plagues of love to show". Dramatic declamation "Ha-a-a-ark ! how they groan who died despairing". Ma, divertirmi lo voglio from a opera from 1683 by Antonio Draghi (1634-1700), with an extended central section where low timbred strings - violas de gamba and theorbos-sing a grave yet sensuous melody, enchanting the beasts of the wild. The pace picks up more brightly as Orpheus moves on. Maurice Greene (1696-1755), who was Master of The King's Music to George II, set Shakespeare for Orpheus with His Lute, the vocal line elegantly decorated, and accompanied by flute and harpsichord. It is followed, aptly, by Greene's successor, William Byrd's Come woeful Orpheus an instrumental piece for violins and violas de gamba. In contrast, a return to a much earlier sensibility, with Als Orpheus schlug seine Instrument, by Gabriel Voigtländer (1596-1643). The vocal line is pure, with minimal accompaniment, each strophe clearly defined - almost a Minnelied ! Voigtländer, who was part of Wallenstein's army in the Thirty Years War, published a well known collection of songs.
Eurydice is introduced by Antri ch' o miei lamenti by Jacapo Peri (1561-1633), first performed at the Pitti Palace. Accompanied by baroque organ and muted strings, it's a stately piece, the vocal line laudatory. Similar orchestration for Nachtklag, from Johann Erasmus Kindermann (1616-1655) to a texts by Martin Orpitz, the "Father of German Poetry" and contemporary of Shakespeare. Kindermann, who came from Nuremberg and would have known of Hans Sachs as well as Orpitz, so his Opitianischer Orpheus from which several,pieces on this recording are taken, sounds like an interesting work which might be worth hearing in greater depth. Jacopo Peri's lively Al fonte, il prato, and Fransceco Rasi's Filia Mia are followed by Claudio Monteverdi's Vi ricorda o boschi ombrosi, from Orfeo, Orpheus's song of love for Eurydice.
But as we know, Eurydice dies on her wedding day. Mournful pipes (flutes) and organ introduce Luigi Rossi's Les pleurs d'Orphée ayant perdu sa femme from Rossi's opera Orphée, a great success at the Palais Royale in 1647. Two airs by Thomas Campion, Break now, my Heart and Oft have I sigh'd , give vocal expression to Orpheus's grief. From Jacopo Peri's opera L'Euridice, Non plango. where the vocal line is at once plangent and dramatic. From Johann Erasmus Kindermann's Opitianischer Orpheus, the air Jetzund kommt die Nacht herbei Orpheus plans to challenge Death itself. An anonymous Passacaglia for lautenwerk (lute-klavier) strings marks Orpheus's entry into the Underworld. Henry Purcell's Charon the peaceful shade invites invokes Charon who ferries the dead over the River Styx. Domenico Belli's Orfeo dolente was one of the most popular operas of its time(1616), and here is represented by Numi d'Abisso. It's followed by an elegant threnody on baroque harp, Toccata secondo by Giovanni Maria Trabaci (1575-1647) and Monteverdi's Qual Honor also from L'Orfeo.
To signify Orpheus's attempt to lead Eurydice out from the Underworld, another instrumental interlude, Prélude 4 from Antoine Francisque (1570-1605)'s Le Trésor d' Orphée, and another song Ach Liebste, lass uns eilen again from Kindermann's Opitanischer Orpheus. More Jacopo Peri (Giote al vcanto mio) and Johan Steffens (1560-16161) Orpheus die Harfen schlug so fein for salterio (hammered dulcimer). Steffans (1560-1616) was North German, and in this context represents the more understated northern baroque aesthetic. Orpheus could not save Eurydice, and had to return to the world alone. But Kindermann and Orpitz have the last word. "Doch wann du wärest gleich da, wo die Sonn aufgehet, und ich im Abende, wo Hesperus entstehet, so scheidet uns doch nichts" (If you could be where the sun rises and I in the evening, when Hesperus rises, we cannot be torn apart) Eventually Orpheus will die too, ripped apart by furies, but until then he plays his lute and is at one with nature. Thus the finale, an anonymous piece The Indian Nightingale, probably English, for almost the whole ensemble - flutes, violins, salterio, baroque harp and harpsichord - exquisitely pure and Spring like, evoking the song of the nightingale, Nature's equivalent of Orpheus and his lute. Lively, fresh performances from Andreas Küppers, and Teatro del mondo, with Julian Prégardien singing in a range of languages and different styles. His voice is youthful,as Orpheus was, and plaintive when needed. It doesn't matter a bit that his English isn't as perfect as his German or Italian. He's charming and has a lucid voice, which is what counts. Georgian England was full of German musicians. In any case,this excellent recording proves that art transcends nationality.
Anne Ozorio