This Week in Classical Music: February 8, 2021.  Berg and Cavalli.  Last week we posted, for the first time, a political statement.  We’re not going to turn Classical Connect into a Culture Warrior but will comment on the Culture Wars when facts – the outrageous ones – call for it.  Today, however, we’d like to point out the gross hypocrisy   that the Met Opera perpetrated while hiring a Chief Diversity Officer: the Met is the only major organization currently not paying their orchestra musicians any salary due to Covid; the orchestra is on a verge of complete collapse.  In the meantime, we can safely assume that Ms. Marcia Lynn Sells, the new CDO, whose prior position was the Dean of Students at Harvard Law School, is not going to donate her services to the Met but will received a handsome C-level salary.  And one other thing: the Met Opera is not the only “Metropolitan” organization that has hired a Chief Diversity Officer: the Met Museum did the same 2 ½ months ago, we guess so that Rembrandt is properly curated with diversity in mind.

Back to the music, though.  Alban Berg was born this week, on February 9^th of 1885.  A student of Arnold Schoenberg, he was, without a doubt, one of the most important composers of the 20^th century, especially considering his operas, Wozzeck and Lulu.  Two years ago, when we wrote about Berg, we even posted five minutes from Lulu, which clearly is one of the most difficult operas.  Nonetheless, the emotional intensity and lyricism of Berg’s music are spellbinding.  Here’s another entry about Berg, from 2017.  Speaking of modern operas: it’s worth looking up an interesting recently released Russian animation called The Nose or the Conspiracy of Mavericks.  It is, very generally, about the great Russian writer Nikolai Gogol working on a short story, Nos (The Nose), Dmitry Shostakovich writing an opera based on the story and the famous director Vsevolod Meyerhold attempting to stage it.  Most of the musical score of this full-length animation is from Shostakovich’s opera.

Francesco Cavalli was also born this week, on February 14^th of 1602.  He stood at the beginning of opera: his first one, Le nozze di Teti e di Peleo, was composed in 1639 and was only the third opera to be performed in Teatro San Cassiano, the very first opera house to be built for the public and inaugurated in 1637.  In the following 27 years Teatro San Cassiano staged 15 more operas, 14 of which were composed by Cavalli.  La Didone was Cavalli’s third opera, composed and staged at San Cassiano in 1641.  Here’s the marvelous Frederica von Stade is singing the beautiful L'alma fiacca svanì, Cassandra’s Lamentation, from Act I.  The Scottish Chamber Orchestra is conducted by Raymond Leppard.  And a bit more about Teatro San Cassiano: it had a long and glorious history, but in 1805 the theater was closed by the occupying French and in 1812 the building demolished.  Almost 200 years later, the British entrepreneur Paul Atkin decided to rebuild the famous theater according to the archival documents as close to the original as possible, and to create there a center for the research and staging of historically informed Baroque opera.  Nothing is easy in bureaucratic Italy, especially in Venice; the project has been moving forward, slowly, since 2015 and we wish it the best.  The Financial Times has a good article on the project, worth checking out.

This Week in Classical Music: February 1, 2021.  Nota Bene.  Of the great composers, only Felix Mendelssohn was born this week.  We also celebrate the genius of Palestrina around this time: he died on February 2^nd of 1594 and, according to some sources, only one day before his 69^th birthday.  Of the composers not as famous, Alessandro Marcello was born on this day in 1673.  We’ve written about all of them on a number of occasions, so instead we intended to focus on the interpreters, highly talented in their own right if not as creative.  Two phenomenal violinists were born on the same day: Fritz Kreisler on February 2^nd of 1875 and Jascha Heifetz in 1901.  

But as we were about to write about these great musicians, it occurred to us that we cannot.   As much as we love them, we simply cannot when we see what is happening around us.  We believe in the utmost importance of music, but we cannot ignore what is happening outside, in the real world.  What we see is the attack on the freedom of speech, the most fundamental aspect of our society.  And this is an attack on our personal freedom as well.  What started with assaults on individuals (shaming and canceling) has now grown into attacks on established media companies and inconvenient social media sites: a literary agent was fired because she used them.  Not even for the content of the messages she posted there but for the fact that she used them – not that the former would be much better.  Journalists who are prime beneficiaries of the freedom of speech now advocate regulations and censorship.  And if you think that freedom of speech is unrelated to freedom of musical expressions, think again.  Soviet Union and Nazi Germany are prime examples: in 1930 the Soviet Union cancelled all “bourgeois” music which covered most of what was composed in the 20^th century; the Nazis banned all Jewish music – and what is most frightening, people supported these decisions.  And now Metropolitan Opera hires a Diversity Officer – actually, the title is Chief Diversity Officer, so we can assume that there will be other diversity officers within the organization.  According to the Met, her role would be to “develop new diversity initiatives” and help in “dismantling racial inequalities within the institution.”  We are well aware that in the past the Met, like so many other institutions, was racist – the great Marian Anderson was allowed to perform on its stage only in 1955, when she was 58.  But that was 66 years ago.  Is the role of the Chief Diversity Officer to find a new Leontine Price or a Jessye Norman, who were the greatest American singers to ever perform on Met’s stage?  What about Shirley Verrett, Kathleen Battle, Lawrence Brownlee and tens of other wonderful black singer who graced the Met with their art during the last 40 years?  During that time the Met had its share of scandals involving singers both white (Angela Gheorghiu) and black (Kathleen Battle) but we never heard any complaints about the company being racist.  Did it suddenly turn racist in the last six months?

The role of a Chief Diversity Officer reminds us of the Soviet Union.  There, every musical organization, from the Bolshoi Theater to a chamber orchestra, had to have a Party organization, at the head of which stood its Secretary.  His or her role was to ensure that only the appropriate music is being played, that Party members are duly promoted, and the unreliable ones wouldn’t be sent on a cherished concert tour in the West.  Do we really want to live in a new cultural Soviet Union?

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This Week in Classical Music: January 25, 2021.  Calendar Quirks.  Why couldn’t Fate be more even-handed?  She, the Greek goddess of Time, is responsible for our lives, the moments we are born and die, so why couldn’t she spread geniuses more evenly?  Take 52 of them – and there have been  at least that many since the time of Josquin – and just deliver them once a week!  But no, she’s capricious or doesn’t pay enough attention to these things.  So, four days after Mozart’s birth on January 27^th she gives us Schubert!  And even that is not enough for her: just next to them she places two important composers of the 20^th century: the Polish Witold Lutoslawski and Luigi Nono, an Italian.  And then Édouard Lalo of the Symphonie espagnole fame and John Tavener, the Brit made popular by his minimalist Orthodox music. Clearly, she wasn’t done with this week, as, for good measure, she placed two great pianists, Arthur Rubinstein and John Ogdon within it too.  And she seems to be keen on the cello because Jacqueline du Pré and Lynn Harrell, who unfortunately left us last year, were also born this week.  And just to top it off, she decided that Wilhelm Furtwängler, one of the greatest conductors of the 20^th century, should also be born this week.

There is not much we could say about this cornucopia, but we can play some music.  Here is one pair: the 1961 recording of Arthur Rubinstein playing Mozart’s Piano Concerto no. 20 with Alfred Wallenstein conducting the RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra. And here is another: Wilhelm Furtwängler conducts Schubert’s "Unfinished" symphony.  The recording, with Furtwängler’s Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, was made live in 1953. We would’ve loved to play Franz Schubert's Piano Sonata in C minor, D.958 in John Ogdon’s performance – we know that he made that recording in 1972 – but we don’t have access to it.  We’d love to share it with you some day.

This Week in Classical Music: January 18, 2021.  Duparc and Elman.  Last year this week we celebrated Johann Hermann Schein and Farinelli.  Some years ago it was the Russian composer of French descent César Cui and two real Frenchmen, Ernest Chausson and Emmanuel Chabrier (here).  And we’ve written about Henri Dutilleux several times (for example, here, here and here).  All these composers (and the famous castrato) had their birthdays this week.  But, as always, there are several musicians which we, for one reason or another, had left out.  One is the composer Henri Duparc.  Duparc was born in Paris on January 21^st of 1848.  He studied with César Franck, to whom he dedicated several compositions, for example this symphonic poem, Lénore.  Duparc’s best known pieces are his “art songs,” most of which he wrote around 1870.  Here’s Phidylé, sung by Renée Fleming, and here Natalie Dessay sings Supir.  At the age of 37 Duparc developed certain mental problems that at the time were diagnosed as "neurasthenia” and stopped composing.  He was not mad in the usual sense, it is very likely that his problems were of a physical nature: some suggest hyperaesthesia, an extreme sensitivity of the skin.  He moved to the south of France and led a quiet life, and eventually moved to Switzerland.  He took up painting as a hobby and spent time with his family.  But there were more problems to come: around the turn of the century, he started losing his eyesight and soon went completely blind.  Later in his life he destroyed much of his music, leaving only about 40 compositions.  Whatever is left is of a remarkably high quality: listen, for example, to this wonderful song, Chanson triste, performed by Elly Ameling.  Duparc died on February 12^th of 1933 in Mont-de-Marsan, completely blind and partially paralyzed.  He was 85.

One of the most interesting violinists of the 20^th century, Mischa Elman was also born this week, on January 20^th of 1891, in a small town of Talnoye not far from Kyiv.  From 1897 to 1902 he studied the violin in Odessa with the virtuoso violinist and teacher Alexander Fiedemann.  In 1903 he so impressed the visiting Leopold Auer that the famed pedagogue took Mischa to St. Petersburg to study in his class at the capital’s conservatory.  One year later he gave a highly successful concert in Berlin, then premiered in London and in December of 1908, in New York.  By then he had already established himself as one of the greatest violinists of the era.  Elman settled in New York in 1911. 

Elman’s career reached its zenith during the years when recordings were still not widespread and few of them were reissued on CDs.  His playing was “romantic” but he had great taste; his sound was of incomparable beauty.  You can hear it for yourself in this recording from 1959 of Massenet’s Meditation from Thais.  Mischa Elman died in New York on April 5^th of 1967.

his Week in Classical Music: January 11, 2021.  Some history.  The somewhat unexpected fact that one fifth of the 21^st century has already passed moved us to contemplate the place of classical music in our own time, and to compare it to where it was in centuries past.  What was the first fifth of the 19^th century like?  We know that several exceptional composers were born during that short period: Hector Berlioz in 1803, Felix Mendelssohn in 1809, Robert Schumann and Frédéric Chopin in 1810, Franz Liszt one year later, Richard Wagner and Giuseppe Verdi in 1813, Charles Gounod – in 1818.  And who was composing during that time?  Well, Beethoven, of course, and Haydn in the first decade by then getting older and better, also Schubert, Weber, and the Italians, Boccherini, Cherubini and Rossini. 

And what was happening during a similar period of the 20^th century?  The composers that were born during that time are still too close to us, even 100 years later, and their assessments may still change, but here are some names: Aaron Copland, in 1900, William Walton, a Brit, in 1902, Dmitri Shostakovich in 1906, Olivier Messiaen in 1908, Samuel Barber in 1910, John Cage in 1912, Benjamin Britten and Witold Lutosławski in 1913.  Then, two bona fide modernists, Milton Babbit and Bruno Maderno (in 1916 and 1920, respectively) and Leonard Bernstein in 1918.  But the list of composers who were active is even more impressive and rivals that of the 19^th century.  Gustav Mahler, Claude Debussy, Richard Strauss, Arnold Schoenberg, Igor Stravinsky, Béla Bartók, Maurice Ravel, Sergei Rachmaninov – these are just a few of them.  Some of their music was accepted right away, some – much later, and some caused near riots.  But even the rejected music was considered serious and was rejected in all seriousness.  Music critics and lay music lovers were listening; it was understood that new developments in music are an important part of contemporary culture.

Things don’t look so promising today.  Who are the contemporary composers whose music is celebrated?  One trend that’s been recognized by the general public is minimalism; composers who work in the minimalist idiom are if not necessarily celebrated, then clearly accepted.  Steve Reich, Philip Glass, John Adams, Henryk Górecki, Arvo Pärt: their pieces are being performed often.  What about the music beyond this trend?  Charles Wuorinen died less than a year ago, Pierre Boulez exactly five, but their brand of twelve-tone music is as good as dead.  Krzysztof Penderecki also died in March of last year.  His journey was from Webern and Boulez to melody.  He is considered the greatest Polish composer of the last 50 years, but where outside of Poland is his music being played?  And who even talks about it any longer?  Thirty years ago, the New York Times had several classical music critics publishing articles almost daily. Today you’d be hard pressed to find one among the articles on pop.

Even before the pandemic, classical music was suffering from neglect and from lack of money, when CDs disappeared almost overnight and much of it became free on the Web.  Is classical music going the way of kabuki theater?

This Week in Classical Music: January 3, 2021.  Week One.  Happy New Year again!  Hard to imagine that we’re already in 2021 and that 1/5^th of the century is behind us… The first week of the music calendar is always full: first, several very interesting composers, including three Russians: Mily Balakirev of the Mighty Five fame, Nikolai Medtner, whose piano music gained in popularity lately and the ever popular Alexander Scriabin; our personal favorite, the French composer Francis Poulenc; Giovanni Battista Pergolesi, the Italian who lived a tragically short life but left us a tremendous Stabat Mater, and the German Romantic Max Bruch.  One of Bruch’s most popular pieces was the Kol Nidrei, for cello and orchestra, which uses the setting of the eponymous Jewish prayer for the Yom Kippur service.  Even though Bruch had not a drop of Jewish blood in him, the Nazis prohibited his music on the assumption that only a Jew could compose such a piece.

And then there is the remarkable coincidence of three pianists being born on the same day, January 5^{th -}  and not just any pianists but three of the greatest ones to play in the late 20^th – early 21^st century: Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, Alfred Brendel, and Maurizio Pollini.  We wrote about them recently.  And then there is another anniversary of a talented pianist: her name is Clara Haskil.  Haskil was born in Bucharest, Romania, on January 7^th of 1895.  Exceptionally gifted, she entered the Bucharest conservatory at the age of six.   One year later she moved to Vienna where she studied with Richard Robert, a pianist and noted music teacher, among whose students were Rudolf Serkin and George Szell.  At the age of ten Clara went to Paris where she joined Alfred Cortot’s class. At the age of 15 she graduated with the Premier Prix.  She embarked on the career of a piano virtuoso, but soon was hospitalized with severe scoliosis, spending the next four years in a hospital.  She later resumed her career, even though she developed extreme stage fright, touring Europe and playing in New York in 1924.  In 1933 she played Brahms’s Second Piano Concerto with Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra to huge critical acclaim.  But health problems (in addition to several operations on her spine, she had one for a tumor on the optic nerve) combined with the stage fright rarely allowed her to perform;  as a result she was barely known, even in Europe.  In 1941, with Paris occupied by the Nazis, she fled the city and a year later made it to Vevey, Switzerland.  Critical acclaim came to Haskil only in 1949 after a series of concerts in the Netherlands.  In 1951 she played her first concert in London’s Wigmore Hall.  In 1957 she was made, belatedly, a Chevalier of the Legion d'Honneur.  Clara Haskil was a supreme interpreter of the piano music of Mozart; critics said that she played with “profound simplicity.”  Clara Haskil died in Brussels on December 7^th of 1960 after falling on the steps of the Brussels-South railway station.  Here is Clara Haskil playing Mozart’s Piano Concerto no. 24; Igor Markevitch is conducting Orchestre des Concerts Lamoureux.  This recording was made one month before Haskil’s death, in November of 1960.