Friday June 8, 2007 SGN.org |
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Volume 35 Issue 23 |
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Friday, Jul 04, 2008
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| Seattle Symphony's love affair with Central Europe | |
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| by Rod Parke -
SGN A&E Writer Once in a while Music Director Gerard Schwarz demonstrates why he is in the position he occupies at the Seattle Symphony, and last week's program of its 'Central Europe Music Festival' was one of those occasions. Indeed, I cannot remember a more rewarding evening at Benaroya Hall. Bohuslav Martinu's emotionally charged 'Double Concerto for Two String Orchestras, Piano and Timpani' got things off to a great start. With the strings of the SSO split, right and left, and the piano snug between the two sides, Martinu's always interesting ideas and superb skills at orchestration projected intense emotions of apprehension and sorrow. The sounds of the piano with the strings were very pleasing, a welcome combination not often enough heard, reminding one of Bloch's 'Concerto Grosso No. 1.' The punctuation by tympani was eloquent and dramatic. How wonderful to hear such a moving performance of a work that almost no one in the audience had ever heard before! An unusually long intermission allowed the stage to be set for the semi-staged, concert version of Bartok's only opera, 'Bluebeard's Castle.' When I heard that Dale Chihuly had been commissioned to provide six new works for this production, I thought back to his contribution years ago to Seattle Opera's production of 'Pelleas et Melisande.' In that opera, Chihuly's pieces were designed to look like glass but were actually plastic blow-ups. While generally effective, they could not begin to approach the beauty of real glass art. There was no such limitation this time. But before we get to how the glass pieces looked, one needs to know the visual context. When we returned from intermission, we found seven huge, black monoliths lined up about eight feet from the lip of the stage. These monsters (about 12 feet tall by 7 feet wide) separated us from the orchestra, which could be glimpsed in the narrow passages between the monoliths. They were an impressive sight by themselves, establishing in their dark dominance of the stage a slightly ominous mood even before the lights dimmed. Adding to the mood throughout the Bartok was very well designed and executed lighting and abstract projections. These were amazingly effective considering they were projected onto the proscenium arch of the stage as well as upon the black monsters. As the two singers cautiously came into sight, they appeared almost as though they were entering a dark cave. The rest of the stage was darkened so that the orchestra had to use lights on their music stands. The color around the players changed as the lighting and projections modified to support the action. The "set" was designed by Dale Chihuly, while Sharon Ott directed the action. Somehow it all worked extremely well. As Judith lovingly got Bluebeard to give her the keys to each of the seven doors, tension built both through the music and through the progression from each glass piece to the next. The first was quite strikingly beautiful, yet each managed to top the preceding piece. They were revealed by Judith, who, as she opened each "door," rotated it on its axis, showing us a black, triangular platform upon which stood the glass. These many-pieced works glowed with amazing colors, even more intense than most of Chihuly's works because they seemed illuminated from within. Their images were reflected by the black mirror-walls behind them. Absolutely stunning! There isn't time to go into the richness of Bartok's spellbinding music, except to say that the SSO did itself proud. Occasionally Schwarz allowed the climaxes to drown out Bluebeard's singing, but overall the sound was thrilling. Soprano Sally Burgess and bass-baritone Charles Robert Austin acted and sang with great expression and considerable vocal beauty. This was one of those experiences that made us wish that it had been videotaped and preserved for a much larger audience, just as KCTS (channel 9) did with, among others, SSO's superb performance of Shostakovich's 'Symphony No. 8." Reviewer Rod Parke can be reached at rmp62@columbia.edu. |
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