–The American Symphony Orchestra in collaboration with Marcus Roberts and the Modern Jazz Generation in United We Play, a short film presenting three world premieres of works for strings, jazz instrumentals, and piano composed by Roberts and commissioned by the ASO: America Has the Blues, Seeking Peace, and United We Play. It streams here for free through 21 February 2021.
United We Play was “inspired by the current turbulent times, and the belief that strength comes through adversity—where there is divide, there is also community. The project [presents] a musical, visual, and narrative digital experience that speaks to the future in a positive and hopeful way.”
As musicians, we have learned to depend on and trust one another in order to create something greater than any one of us could create alone. I believe that every time we listen to someone else’s voice we become stronger and better people. Given the current state of the world, I hope that the great musical collaboration we built with the ASO for United We Play will be used as a vehicle to encourage and demonstrate that strength.—Marcus Roberts
—Benjamin Britten’s other Henry James-inspired opera, Owen Wingrave, is part of Grange Park Opera’s interim season and is now being streamed here.
Filmed over five September days, director Stephen Medcalf explains: “A minimal crew maintained distancing in intimate domestic interiors and COVID restrictions required the cast to costume themselves. I’ve given full rein to the satirical, often blackly comic aspects of the opera. Alongside that there are three serious themes: the pressure from society to conform; the courage it takes to stand up for who we really are; the destructive love of family.”
In the words of Henry James: “A piece of ingenuity pure and simple, of cold artistic calculation, an amusette to catch those not easily caught.”
The opera is presented with the kind collaboration of Faber Music and The Britten Estate.
Britten did not own a TV when the work was broadcast on BBC2 on 16 May 1971. However, Decca presented him with a set two years later.
The work is an expression of Britten’s own pacifism, and was partly a response to the Vietnam War.
—Oregon Bach Festival available here: world premiere of An American Mosaic, composed by Richard Danielpour. The commission commemorates segments of the American population that have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Simone Dinnerstein performs the 15 piano miniatures and an array of accompanying Bach works.
–An all-Rihm concert from the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, streaming here. Stanley Dodds conducts this program:
Wolfgang Rihm
Sphäre nach Studie für 6 Instrumentalisten (1993/2002)
Wolfgang Rihm
Stabat Mater für Bariton und Viola
Wolfgang Rihm
Male über Male 2 für Klarinette und 9 Instrumentalisten (2000/2008)
— 11 December Alexandre Bloch conducting the Düsseldorfer Symphoniker in Stravinsky/”Dumbarton Oaks”; Wagner/Siegfried Idyll; Poulenc/Sinfonietta, available here.
—13 December Wagner/Lohengrin at the Staatsoper Berlin here. Cast:
- MUSICAL DIRECTOR
- DIRECTOR
- ASSISTANT DIRECTOR
- Barbora Horáková Joly
- SET DESIGN
- COSTUMES
- Ingo Krügler
- LIGHT
- VIDEODESIGN
- CHORUS MASTER
- DRAMATURGY
- HEINRICH DER VOGLER
- LOHENGRIN
- ELSA OF BRABANT
- FRIEDRICH OF TELRAMUND
- ORTRUD
- THE KING’S HERALD
–14 December Hans Werner Henze/Das verratene Meer at Wiener Staatsoper, streaming here at 19:00 CET.
Musik Hans Werner Henze
Text Hans-Ulrich Treichel nach Yukio Mishima
Musikalische Leitung Simone Young
Inszenierung Jossi Wieler & Sergio Morabito
Bühne und Kostüme Anna Viebrock
Licht Phoenix
Mit Boecker, Skovhus, Lovell, Van Heyningen, Kim, Astakhov, Häßler
Filed under: Hans Werner Henze, Live-Streamed Performance, Marcus Roberts, Wagner, Wolfgang Rihm
MEMETERIA by Thomas May 