Eugene Onegin: Kuda, kuda...

Letters in the night: Eugene Onegin Act III. Photo © Staatstheater Mainz

Some nineteenth-century critics commented acerbically that Tchaikovsky's adaptation of Pushkin's masterpiece into "lyric scenes" ought not to be called Eugene Onegin at all, but rather Tatiana. Mainz's current run of the piece (trailer here), which I attended on Friday, reminded of the strengths of this position. Johannes Erath's production, stylized and faintly surrealist, offered a meditation on the tragedies of transience (I was unsurprised to find Marcel Proust quoted in the program.) The orchestra, alas, began without distinction and deteriorated from there. The cast boasted some strong characterizations, and some fine singing; the most consistently compelling in both, in my view, was the young soprano Tatjana Charalgina Vida Mikneviciute in the role of Tatiana [Note: Mikneviciute's name is not in the printed Programmheft; digging on the Staatstheater's website revealed that she sang the role in the performance I saw.]

Pushkin wrote about the sensibilities of a world on the point of vanishing, and Johannes Erath chose a moment of societal transition for his production, as well. The costumes of Noëlle Blancpain suggested the self-conscious modernity and self-conscious nostalgia of the early 1960s, and were also used cleverly in characterization (Olga gets neon colors, Tatiana a pillbox hat, Onegin a white dinner jacket, Lensky a Walther PPK.) Generally, the production seemed much more attentive to the text than to the music. The Nurse, who panics about having forgotten what she once knew, is the anguished guardian of gentle traditions, clinging to a silver samovar in the rapidly rattling train where the first scenes are set. Photographic backdrops suggest the inability of the travelers to linger in the landscapes so lushly described by Pushkin. Even the train compartments gradually separate, pulling people together and apart. Assuming increasing centrality during the letter scene is a photo booth: that curious mechanism meant to enshrine moments trivial almost by definition. While the surrealist touches of the production could be claustrophobic or playful, the society portrayed was essentially (and oppressively) ordered, gradually forcing the conformity of all the principals.

Tchaikovsky, Trpčeski, and the NYPhil

Had it not been for the prospect of hearing Simon Trpčeski play Tchaikovsky's second piano concerto, I might have given the Philharmonic's last "summertime classics" concert a miss. As it was, I went, marveled at Trpčeski's performance, and enjoyed the noisy pleasures of the Festival Coronation March and the 1812 Overture. And the selections from Swan Lake turned out not to be the clichéd ones I was half-fearing, but a substantial excerpt selected by conductor Bramwell Tovey. On the whole, a quite successful evening.

The Festival Coronation March, occasional music for that grandest of occasions, the 1853 coronation of Czar Alexander III, is solemn and jubilant by turns, and unmistakably celebrating its own importance as well as that of the occasion. "Look!" say the brass, "are we not splendid?" "Just think of it," urge the strings: "is this not grand?" The New York Philharmonic--almost incongruously, it seemed to me--played it with an air of resolute conviction belonging to that time of sweeping skirts and vast empires. The second piano concerto made a welcome change to the abstract and virtuosic, and was given with no less gusto. (I sometimes forget Tchaikovsky's enthusiasm for noise.) After some opening remarks by Tovey on the piece's structure, they were launched and away, and it seemed that Trpčeski scarcely paused for breath during the first movement. After about five minutes, I found myself quite literally open-mouthed. Trpčeski's facility was astonishing; he not only dispatched credulity-defying runs, but created interesting variations in tone and dynamics while doing so. (At one point, with his hands positioned close together, his left seemed almost perpendicular to the Steinway's keys. Another point of interest to me was that Trpčeski often played from the first knuckle. Extraordinary.) The slow movement offered a welcome opportunity to savor more leisurely--and exquisitely beautiful--phrasing. Hearing how the orchestra and soloist brought together the themes of the concerto in the final movement was to me viscerally exciting.

Russian Romanticism at Carnegie Hall: Gergiev and the Mariinsky do Tchaikovsky

Spring Plowing: Alexsey Venetsianov, 1820s

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, despite or because of the widespread popularity of much of his music, has often been regarded as a composer of more passion than profundity. I confess that I've even wondered from time to time whether my own regard for him wasn't at least partly the result of really, really good emotional manipulation via the seductions of Swan Lake etc. The Mariinsky Orchestra is currently performing a series of concerts at Carnegie Hall, bringing a powerful reminder of Tchaikovsky's skill and creativity with the symphonic form. In Monday night's concert, the pairing of the third and fourth symphonies provided a fascinating journey through the many moods of Romanticism.

"I am now composing a new symphony, but am taking it steadily, not spending all my time on it, and taking long walks." --Tchaikovsky in a letter to friends, summer of 1875 

In the first half of the concert, the third symphony charmed with a robust, Romantic pastoralism. Although the symphony is sometimes known as the "Polish," the adopted dance forms of its five movements evoked a robust rusticity which (however artificially constructed) did not have the specific national connotations which that title suggests (see this article by R.S. Edgecombe for more context on the use of dance forms such as the waltz in the Romantic symphony.) Thanks to the musicians of the Mariinksy, this seemed full-blooded rather than merely quaint. The dark-hued strings evoked fields ripe for the harvest, and the well-handled woodwind solos the dancing with which the harvest was celebrated. The romanticism I always associate with Tchaikovsky was indeed present, but in the exuberant celebration of nature and those who lived close to it, worlds away from Sturm und Drang. The tempest was to come.

Queen of Spades: Three, Seven, ACE

I have a new object of hero-worship and his name is Andris Nelsons.  I spent much of Friday night on the edge of my seat (which, unbelievably, was in the orchestra section and obtained at student price 15 minutes before curtain.)  The Met's Queen of Spades, in a suitably moody production, romantic and stark by turns, and always stylish, is cast this season without a weak link; each of the principals brought impressive vocal artistry and theatrical intensity to their respective roles.  Pictures from previous runs of Elijah Moshinsky's 1995 production may be found here and here; update: pictures from this run here.  I feel I'd be better able to evaluate it if I were more familiar with the score, or other productions, but it served well to highlight the contrasts between the "normal" world of St. Petersburg and the fateful trajectory of the obsessed Hermann.  I'm not quite sure I understood the device of the picture frame, although it did serve as a dramatic demarcation between Hermann and society in the scene at the ball and elsewhere.  The restricted color scheme also helped keep even the grandest scenes from the merely spectacular (a scenery-applauder was shushed, and my soul rejoiced, but unfortunately they found strength in numbers on two occasions.  Premature applauders were also shushed, twice!  Overheard conversations confirmed the impression that although there were empty seats, those who were there were enthusiasts.)  For a quick synopsis of the opera go here.

Visions of sugar plums: George Balanchine's The Nutcracker

Really Shameful Confession, of grab-the-smelling-salts proportions: I have never been to the ballet in New York City.  I'm sorry.  Another Really Shameful Confession: I have scarcely been to the ballet at all.  My younger sister and I did all but wear out a VHS of Swan Lake, but family excursions to musical performances, when they happened, were mostly to the symphony (with occasional Gilbert & Sullivan.)  College was rural.  Excuses, excuses.  I did see a really exciting performance of Prokoviev's Romeo and Juliet at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in 2005, unabashedly fierce and angular in choreography and musical interpretation alike, if memory is to be trusted.  But that, as far as memory extends, is my only ballet experience besides a Nutcracker when I was seven (I loved the Christmas tree, and the Dance of the Snowflakes, and was fascinated and frightened by Uncle Drosselmeier) and one when I was thirteen (I thought the pas de deux for the Sugar Plum Fairy and her cavalier was the most ravishingly romantic music I had ever heard, and was fascinated and frightened by Uncle Drosselmeier.)  Why, after allowing so many tantalizing offerings to pass unseen, do I inaugurate my New York City Ballet experience with The Greatest Christmas Cliché of Them All?  Well... I did love it when I was seven, and when I was thirteen.  Furthermore, the Beloved Flatmate has never seen The Nutcracker live!  "But the Christmas tree!" I stammered, when I learned this.  "The snowflakes!"  And then I pulled myself together and said that, after all, Tchaikovsky has been unjustly trivialized, and all the musical sparkle and spectacle would be lifeless without the thrillingly dark, ruthless streak that lies within the best fairy tales (in my raised-on-the-Brothers-Grimm opinion.)