If you're looking for something creative and non-jingoistic for festive listening this July 4th, Daniel Okulitch's album of American art song fits the bill. Sets by four composers comprise the album; Okulitch gives them all with vibrant energy. Ricky Ian Gordon's "Quiet Lives" are beautiful and bleak memorials to solitary living on the fringes of cities, or simply on the edge of events. The twentieth-century poets whose work Gordon sets are black and white, male and female, a cross-section of those who live and love in rented rooms. These haunting pieces are succeeded by Jake Heggie's charming "Of Gods and Cats," set to poetry by Gavin Geoffrey Dillard. Okulitch's handling of the texts complements Heggie's playful settings, solemnly depicting the afternoon activities of a cat, whimsically toying with the image of an innocently mischievous infant God.
After several days of cooler temperatures, New York City is poised to plunge back into baking, exultant heat. Much as I love the summertime, there seems to be, in the city, a disturbingly fine line between weather that is glorious and weather that has you sticking to things and wishing you weren't. To accompany hours of delicious languor, or to sweep through sticky afternoons like a cool breeze, my listening of choice this summer has been French art song. I'm not sure why, but it seems to fit. So here, without further ado, a brief commentary on a selection of discs old and new.
The most recent album I found was Clair De Lune, Natalie Dessay's disc of Debussy songs. Dessay's intelligence and sensitivity are great assets to the interpretation of these vivid, romantic songs. The playing of Philippe Cassard made the piano part always wonderful, and sometimes breathtaking. I was not without reservations, though: the distinctive characteristics of each piece seemed a bit flattened by Dessay's approach. The longer selections on the disc shone: the "Chanson d'Ariel" and "La Demoiselle Elue" (the latter with Karine Deshayes) were highlights. Bonus points to those responsible for the cover design reminiscent of Alphonse Mucha's paintings.
When I was asked if I'd be interested in reviewing a CD with the tantalizing title At the Statue of Venus, my response was, approximately, "Would I!" The album showcases the dynamic soprano Talise Trevigne, who sings the music of Jake Heggie and Glen Roven. It's titled after Heggie's scene for soprano and piano, to a text by Terrence McNally, but also features a song cycle by each of the composers, who play the piano parts of their respective works. To me, both Trevigne's name and voice were new, and the latter was the most exciting discovery of the album, supple and expressive across her range. I found Trevigne to be a very emotionally engaging communicator, using varieties of vocal color, and nuanced phrasing, which drew me into the worlds of unfamiliar music and texts. The album was a pleasure on first and repeated listenings, and is recommended especially to those among you, Gentle Readers, who are lovers of art song or sopranos.
The first cycle on the disc, Heggie's Natural Selection, is exuberant in musical invention and allusion. The trajectory of the cycle is tragicomic, condensing the matter for a Bildungsroman into five songs. The persona journeys from confidence on the threshold of adulthood ("Creation,") through fiercely passionate, though still abstract desire ("Animal Passion," a sly, dark tango,) to feverish discontentment ("Alas! Alack!") to "Indian Summer," the lament of a woman trapped in marriage for lost freedom, which is recovered at last in "Joy Alone." The discordant, jumpy anxiety of "Alas! Alack!" is packed with operatic allusion (what would happen if Tosca fell for Scarpia?) which continues in the ragtime, Bluebeard-referencing "Indian Summer." The voice of the piano, helping to illustrate the narrator's emotional state, reinforces the rightness of where we leave her: the style of the first song has been recovered, altered, but at peace and ready for new journeys.
The Five Boroughs Music Festival is an undertaking to which I'm admittedly partial. With (mostly) young artists, a wide-ranging repertoire, and lots of enthusiasm, their self-appointed mission is to bring creative classical programming to all of NYC. Loud cheers from this outer-borough blogger. Their latest project has been the commissioning of twenty songs, from twenty different composers, celebrating the city's architecture, history, and inhabitants... and even, wryly, its transit system. This has given rise not only to an acclaimed concert series, but also the festival's first recording.
I was a bit apprehensive about the coherence of such a deliberately kaleidoscopic project, but the aural odyssey through so many styles proves to be as oddly hypnotic as watching the pieces of colored glass fall into seemingly inexhaustible combinations. This approach to creating the songbook ensures discoveries for any listener, but also that these discoveries may be different for each. My own tastes inclined towards the rich texts of poets re-focused through their lean, contemporary settings (there is Whitman, of course, but also Auden and, to my delight, Julia Kasdorf for Yotam Haber's "On Leaving Brooklyn.") There are also, though, delights in Lisa Bielawa's "Breakfast in New York," which feels like a compressed song cycle, the setting of conversations overheard in the city's diners.
My expectations of Diana Damrau's most recent recital disc were stratospherically high. Damrau is a singer whose technique and musical intelligence I admire, and here she is partnered by none other than Strauss-specialist Christian Thielemann leading the Münchner Philharmoniker. At first listen, I was a little disappointed; the rich detail and intense passion of Strauss's lieder did not come through with the clarity I expected. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say "in the manner I expected," since more, and more attentive listening led to a revision of this judgment. Not all of the songs come through with equal individuality, in my opinion, but Damrau's security of phrasing and excellent diction keep them on a firm footing throughout. With Thielemann and the orchestra I cannot find fault; dynamics and tempi were handled with nuance and insight. Indeed, Damrau and the other musicians seem on this disc to do the reverse of tearing a passion to tatters: subtlety and restraint allow the rich intensity of Strauss's "miniatures," as Damrau calls them, to shine, perhaps differently than the listener expects them to.
It ain't necessarily so. Bryn Terfel is, however, an extraordinarily chameleon-like performer, whose unmistakable timbre is used on his latest CD to evoke a remarkably diverse cast of unsavory characters. I treated myself to Terfel's Bad Boys CD in the holiday mood inspired by the unexpected chance to hear his Scarpia last month; I've been enjoying it as much as I had hoped. What I had not expected was for listening to it to be a feel-good experience. It is impossible for me to hear Terfel's Dulcamara brazenly charming Donizetti's rustici without doing a little dance step around the apartment. "When the Night Wind Howls" from Ruddigore is simply a treat (and I think it would be even if I did not have a sentimental fondness for the piece, which I tried to make my father teach me by rote when I was about seven.) Even in the portentous finale of Don Giovanni--sung by Terfel, Terfel, and Terfel, with the help of good sound engineering and great voice characterization--Leporello draws a chuckle. In Terfel's hands, the Devil--whether from Gounod's Faust or Boito's Mefistofele--is a perfect charmer.
I don't mean to imply a lack of effective characterization in keeping the various villains distinct; in this I think Terfel succeeds remarkably well. Moreover, I was quite impressed, on the whole, with the organization of this musically eclectic album (for complete track listing go here.) A few of the arias do inevitably wrest one into the world of the opera and then drop one unceremoniously out again. "Tre sbirri, una carrozza, presto," purrs Terfel, and I'm in Sant'Andrea. Iago's credo is another such piece for me. I thought the tempo for "Ha! welch ein Augenblick!" fast--shouldn't Pizarro be luxuriating in sadistic pleasure?--but loved the smooth snarl Terfel brought to it. A special treat is Anne Sofie von Otter (no less!) as Mrs. Lovett in "Epiphany" from Sweeney Todd. I'm not really an enthusiast for Sweeney Todd (Really Shameful Confession?) but with their vivid and subtle and intensely human characterization, the scene comes across brilliantly. I'd say I'm getting as much enjoyment out of the CD as those involved in its creation did, but the competition looks stiff:
Now that it's almost Advent, I can listen to Christmas music with a clear conscience. And this year, I decided to start things off with something new: Juan Diego Florez' new album. The commercial inevitability of "the Sacred Music Album" is something Florez jokes about in the liner notes; but he's succeeded brilliantly in putting together an interesting program. Comparative rarities appear alongside familiar favorites, with an original composition thrown in: all of it beautiful music that plays to Florez' strengths.
fits the bill. Sets by four composers comprise the album; Okulitch gives them all with vibrant energy. Ricky Ian Gordon's "Quiet Lives" are beautiful and bleak memorials to solitary living on the fringes of cities, or simply on the edge of events. The twentieth-century poets whose work Gordon sets are black and white, male and female, a cross-section of those who live and love in rented rooms. These haunting pieces are succeeded by Jake Heggie's charming "Of Gods and Cats," set to poetry by Gavin Geoffrey Dillard. Okulitch's handling of the texts complements Heggie's playful settings, solemnly depicting the afternoon activities of a cat, whimsically toying with the image of an innocently mischievous infant God.
, Natalie Dessay's disc of Debussy songs. Dessay's intelligence and sensitivity are great assets to the interpretation of these vivid, romantic songs. The playing of Philippe Cassard made the piano part always wonderful, and sometimes breathtaking. I was not without reservations, though: the distinctive characteristics of each piece seemed a bit flattened by Dessay's approach. The longer selections on the disc shone: the "Chanson d'Ariel" and "La Demoiselle Elue" (the latter with 
showcases the dynamic soprano 
. The commercial inevitability of "the Sacred Music Album" is something Florez jokes about in the liner notes; but he's succeeded brilliantly in putting together an interesting program. Comparative rarities appear alongside familiar favorites, with an original composition thrown in: all of it beautiful music that plays to Florez' strengths.
