I suppose one of the most well known “relationship” stories in classical music history is the one concerning the marriage of Robert and Clara Schumann, his illness and death and the role that Johannes Brahms played in Robert’s last years and Clara’s subsequent life. So why not create a song recital programme around that theme using songs by all three composers? That’s what Liz Upchurch and Jane Archibald have done and they presented it in Temerty Theatre on Wednesday evening.
Coming up… music etc
UoT Opera’s annual Student Composer Collective production was presented on Sunday afternoon at CanStage Berkeley Street. This year Michael Patrick Albano’s libretto took three stories from antiquity and presented each twice; essentially in the original and then with a modern twist. The three stories were Antigone, Medea and Helen and five composers were involved in creating the music. Sandra Horst conducted with a seven piece ensemble on stage to one side.
Wednesday’s lunchtime recital in the RBA was given by Jane Archibald and Liz Upchurch. It was a programme of songs by the Schumanns (Robert and Clara) and their protegé Johannes Brahms, in celebration of their relationship which extended well beyond Robert’s premature death.
Sometimes the Canadian Opera Company gets it right and the current production of Janáček’s Cunning Little Vixen is a good example. It’s got all the things that might help boost a flagging audience. It’s not over familiar. Nobody is going to be complaining that they have seen the same old boring production five times already. It’s a brilliant score. The production is intelligent with enough for those who want more than a costume drama while not doing anything to shock the pearl clutchers. It’s well sung; with a goodly quantity of local talent, and the orchestral playing and conducting is exemplary. What more could one ask for? One could I suppose add that it’s an opera one could happily take children to.
My review of the recording of the London Symphony Orchestra’s semi-staged version of Bernstein’s Candide starring Jane Archibald, Sir Thomas Allen, Leonardo Capalbo and Anne-Sophie von Otter, conducted by Marin Alsop, is now up at Opera Canada. It’s a hybrid CD/SACD release with exceptionally good sound quality.
Here’s a quick round up of recent webstreams. The main event is the concert streamed by the COC over the weekend featuring Jane Archibald with the COC Orchestra and Johannes Debus. There’s about forty five minutes of music and it’s predictably classy music making though it’s emotionally taxing to look at an empty Four Seasons centre again. The program includes Mozart. Handel, Strauss, Massenet, Gounod and Bernstein. Arguably it’s a bit predictable but both musical and technical values are high. It’s avaiable free until August 27th via registration at the COC website.
This year the TSO used the Mozart arrangement for Handel’s Messiah (though, naturally enough, with the original English text). I have mixed feelings about it. It’s not hugely different in sound to whichever of Handel’s versions one is used to and it’s definitely not one of those 20th century versions for 100 piece orchestra and massed choirs but I’m hard pressed to see what the point is other than it’s Mozart.
Here’s what’s coming up…
On the 14th at 1.30pm in Walter Hall Jane Archibald and Liz Upchurch are giving a recital under the auspices of the Women’s Musical Club of Toronto (so this isn’t a free concert). The 15th sees the opening of a run of a “play with music” from Theatre Gargantua called The Wager which will run at Theatre Passe Muraille from the 14th (preview) to the 30th. It promises to be a “bold and irreverent investigation into the strange things that people believe”. It’s written by Michael Spence and directed by Jacquie PA Thomas and the cast includes Teiya Kasahara.
The cast of The Wager. Photo:Michael Cooper
The COC’s revival of Robert Lepage’s 2009 production of Stravinsky’s The Nightingale and Other Short Fables, revived by Marilyn Gronsdal, is a delightful mix of witty and clever stagecraft coupled with some fine music making. It’s very much a work of two contrasting halves. The first is a carefully constructed program of shorter Stravinsky vocal and instrumental works; all from the period 1911-1919 and all with a sound world reminiscent of The Firebird or Petrouchka rather than The Rite of Spring or the Dumbarton Oaks Concerto. The full line up was:
operaramblings 