Iréne Theorin as Brünnhilde with members of the San Francisco Opera Chorus in Wagner’s “Götterdämmerung.” Photo: Cory Weaver/San Francisco Opera
Here’s the final installment of my coverage for Musical America of San Francisco Opera’s extraordinary Ring cycle.
SAN FRANCISCO—If Siegfried highlights Zambello’s ability to tease out vital, three-dimensional characters from a deceptively simple surface, Götterdämmerung shows her clarifying the most complex component of the entire cycle–an installment which introduces an entire generation of characters new to the Ring–with a gripping theatrical momentum. The night/day dichotomy of the Prologue aptly summed up the diametrical viewpoints of this staging…
The conductor Donald Runnicles concluded his tenure with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra on the last day of the 2016 Edinburgh International Festival with a performance of Schoenberg’s epic Gurre-Lieder at Usher Hall.
The gargantuan forces needed bring to mind the festival atmosphere Mahler’s Eighth Symphony also evokes. Here’s a sampling of the reviews:
And so this concert summed up the kind of playing that he and this orchestra have developed together – a rich glow at the heart of the strings and a capacity to turn on a dime and power up almighty sounds.
Runnicles is particularly well known for his interpretations of the core Austro-German Romantic repertoire, so Gurrelieder plays to his strengths. Under his baton Schoenberg’s ripe score yields up its influences. There is Wagner in the love music, of course, but also Bruckner in the solemnity of the Wood-Dove, Beethoven in the nature-painting and, of course, Mahler in the scale and structure. That scale could be pretty overpowering at times, and not just in the final, overwhelming greeting to the sun that ends the work. The sweep and surge of the love music was intoxicating, as was the wall of brass and percussion that accompanied the chorus’ romping as the hellish riders. What was most striking, however, was the way Runnicles repeatedly brought out the delicacy of the orchestration.
[Schoenberg’s] mega-cantata Gurrelieder, was the vehicle chosen to whisk us off on such a glorious journey, driven by the massively-inflated forces of the BBC Scottish Synphony Orchestra, a male-dominated Edinburgh Festival Chorus, five soloists and speaker, all under the towering leadership of maestro Donald Runnicles, and formulated by a musical language gathering up the scraps of Wagner, colouring them with whole-tone harmonic treats from Debussy, sweeping up Mahler in its tracks before opening the gates to teasers of the world-changing Schoenberg-to-come.
Days after confronting actor Michael Weatherly, a huge star for the network, Dushku was written off Bull. An investigation determined the company often protected itself at the expense of victims.
Though best-known for his auteur work, the mastermind of Hamilton and In the Heights says it was his dream to be offered a part in someone else's musical.
The song title from the film The Lion King has been trademarked by Disney since 2003. In recent weeks, Africa media has launched a discussion on whether that's cultural appropriation.
Moonlight director Barry Jenkins returns with a new drama about young lovers in 1970s Harlem whose lives are thrown into turmoil when one of them is falsely accused of a crime.
Many Spider-Men and -Women meet up in this "graphically dazzling, generously imaginative, nakedly optimistic, mercilessly funny" and refreshingly inclusive animated film.
Long on CGI but short on any real inspiration, this adaptation of a fantasy series about giant cities that roam a post-apocalyptic landscape quickly runs out of gas.
Director Barry Jenkins follows up Moonlight with this exquisite film adaptation of James Baldwin's novel about the clash between love and racial injustice.
This uber-violent film about a remorseless serial killer (Matt Dillon) requires an iron stomach, but it's a "thoughtful, honest onscreen meditation on morality and personal culpability."
A tough, wise-beyond-his-years 12-year-old (Zain Al Rafeea) leaves the misery of his home life, only to take on the responsibility of caring for an even younger child.
Award-winning illustrator Tony DiTerlizzi got the idea for his new children's book when his own daughter accidentally dropped a beloved Christmas ornament, and he made up a story to comfort her. W
