CONCERT

Carnegie Hall
Angélique Kidjo and Friends: Remain in Light

Trailer for this performance...

"Three-time Grammy winner Angélique Kidjo returns to Carnegie Hall with an all-star band and some very special guests for the debut performance of her reimagined take on the Talking Heads’ classic 1980 album, Remain in Light. Kidjo takes unforgettable songs such as “Crosseyed and Painless,” “Once in a Lifetime,” and “Born Under Punches (The Heat Goes On),” reinterpreting them with electrifying rhythms, African guitars, and layered backing vocals."

"Three-time Grammy Award winner Angélique Kidjo is one of the greatest artists in international music today, a creative force with 13 albums to her name. TIMEmagazine has called her "Africa's premier diva," the BBC has included her in its list of Africa's 50 most iconic figures, and The Guardian listed her as one of 2011's 100 most inspiring women in the world. She is also the first woman included in Forbes' list of the Most Powerful Celebrities in Africa. Kidjo is the recipient of the prestigious 2015 Crystal Award given by the World Economic Forum and the 2016 Amnesty International Ambassador of Conscience Award.

As a performer, Kidjo's striking voice, stage presence, and fluency in multiple cultures and languages have won respect from her peers and expanded her following across borders. She has cross-pollinated the West African traditions of her childhood in Benin with elements of American R&B, funk, and jazz, as well as influences from Europe and Latin America.

Kidjo's newest project is a reinterpretation of Talking Heads' classic 1980 album, Remain in Light, produced by Jeff Bhasker. After its premiere performance at Carnegie Hall, she will take the musical extravaganza to concert halls and festivals across the globe, including the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival.

Her star-studded Djin Djin won a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary World Music Album in 2008; Õÿö was nominated for the same award in 2011. Her 12th album,Eve, was released to critical acclaim in 2014, earning Kidjo a second Grammy Award. Her historic, orchestral album Sings with the Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg won another Grammy for Best World Music Album in 2016. She has gone on to perform this genre-bending work with several international orchestras and symphonies, including the Bruckner Orchester Linz, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, and Philharmonie de Paris.

Along with her own wide-ranging catalogue, Kidjo has collaborated with virtually every major artist of the era, including Bono, Peter Gabriel, John Legend, Gilberto Gil, Alicia Keys, Dave Matthews, Philip Glass, Ziggy Marley, Henri Salvador, Herbie Hancock, Roy Hargrove, Dr. John, Cassandra Wilson, Vampire Weekend's Rostam Batmanglij, the San Francisco Symphony, and many others. In addition, her remarkable memoir, Spirit Rising: My Life, My Music, was published by HarperCollins in 2014 to universal acclaim.

A committed international activist, Kidjo has advocated on behalf of children as both a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador and an Oxfam Global Ambassador. Her own Batonga Foundation is dedicated to the empowerment of young women and girls in Africa through secondary school and higher education.

Kidjo and her four-piece band are known worldwide as a truly unique and always dynamic live act, their high-energy set recently captured in a spectacular installment of PBS's Austin City Limits. Last year, Kidjo performed Bob Marley's "Redemption Song" at the dedication ceremony of the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, DC. She returned to the National Mall in January 2017 to co-headline the historic Women's March on Washington, performing a stunning rendition of Sam Cooke's "A Change Is Gonna Come" for the half-million people in attendance."

LINCOLN CENTER

David Geffen Hall
New York Philharmonic

Schoenberg - A Survivor from Warsaw

Beethoven - Symphony No. 9
Alan Gilbert - Conductor
Gabriel Ebert - Narrator
Camilla Tilling - Soprano
Daniela Mack - Mezzo-Soprano
Joseph Kaiser - Tenor
Eric Owens - Bass-Baritone
Westminster Symphonic Choir, - Joe Miller, director

"Alan Gilbert conducts Beethoven’s grand Ninth Symphony, with its iconic finale, “Ode to Joy.” This symphonic celebration of universal brotherhood transports us from anguish to joy, conflict to harmony. It’s perfectly paired with Schoenberg’s powerful A Survivor from Warsaw, as both works explore, in Alan Gilbert’s words, “the triumph of faith and the indomitable nature of the human spirit.”

LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN (1770-1827)
Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, “Choral” (1824)

Writing about a cultural icon like Beethoven’s last symphony is a little like tackling a discussion about the pyramids. The work is so familiar, so monumental, so awe-inspiring that words seem irrelevant and puny. Then try to imagine what it was like at the premiere of the Ninth in Vienna on May 7, 1824. For those in attendance it must have been a shock. Though he was almost completely deaf, Beethoven provided the tempo at the beginning of each movement (but orchestra, soloists, and chorus followed the beat provided by Michael Umlauf, music director of the Imperial Theater). Beethoven had already pushed the boundaries of the symphonic genre, starting with the “Eroica,” freighting it with deep meaning and emotion never heard before; but no one had ever included vocal soloists or choral writing in a symphony. When the performance was over, reports George Marek in his Beethoven biography, it was the alto soloist Caroline Unger who “plucked [the composer] by the sleeve and gently turned him around toward the audience. When he saw what was going on, he bowed, and when the audience realized that he had heard nothing of their previous expression of enthusiasm, they redoubled it. He had to bow again and again.” Beethoven hadn’t composed a symphony for a decade, and now this transcendent work stood apart from what had gone before. And yet it still embodies the ideals we associate with his music, expressed more grandly and more beautifully than ever: the triumph over adversity, the journey from anguish to joy, from conflict to harmony, epitomized in Schiller’s “Ode to Joy,” the text Beethoven set in the final movement (and which seems to have supplanted the more customary subtitle of the Ninth, “Choral”). Its poetry rings out in exultation, celebrating a world united in brotherhood and friendship—in the awe-inspiring presence of a loving Father who dwells beyond the stars—while the music’s nobility, majesty, optimism, and euphoric harmonies enfold us in a sublime embrace.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/04/arts/music/review-alan-gilbert-new-york-philharmonic-beethoven-ninth-symphony-schoenberg-survivor-from-warsaw.html?_r=0

Review: An ‘Ode to Joy’ Troubled by Holocaust Memories

Alan Gilbert’s tenure as music director of the New York Philharmonic culminates next month with a “Concert for Unity” that will involve musicians from around the world, including Iran and Israel, China and Cuba. But the theme of unity, and its brutal opposite, also defined the first of Mr. Gilbert’s farewell programs on Wednesday night at David Geffen Hall.

The main work was Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. But Mr. Gilbert opened the concert with Schoenberg’s “A Survivor From Warsaw,” a shattering piece for narrator, male chorus and orchestra with a text drawn from the report of a Jew in Nazi-occupied Warsaw en route to extermination. “All men are brothers,” the chorus sings in Beethoven’s setting of Schiller’s idealistic “Ode to Joy” in the finale of the Ninth Symphony. Schoenberg’s “Survivor” says, “We all on the ground who could not stand up were then beaten over the head.”

Schoenberg’s piece, composed in 1947 and last played by the Philharmonic in 1974, lasts just under nine minutes, while Beethoven’s symphony is more than an hour. But in this pairing the works had comparable power, especially since they were performed without a break. That Schoenberg employs his 12-tone technique in this score is the least important thing to know about it. Sounding searing under Mr. Gilbert, the music is anguished, vehement and sometimes delicately poignant.

The narrator delivers the text, written by the composer in English and German, in Sprechstimme, halfway between speaking and singing, and the Tony-winning actor Gabriel Ebert gave a riveting account, enunciating the words with chilling crispness. A male chorus enters at the end, as the narrator describes Jewish prisoners singing a Hebrew prayer as they are marched to the gas chambers. In this performance, the men of the impressive Westminster Symphonic Choir marched down the aisles of the hall, then stood there, in the midst of the audience, to sing that prayer with stentorian fervor.

At the end, the hall went dark. When the lights came back on, Mr. Gilbert immediately began the Beethoven symphony.

For all his innovations at the Philharmonic, the most common complaint about Mr. Gilbert concerns a lack of excitement in his conducting of certain standard repertory works. His Ninth, for many, may well be a case in point. Other conductors have brought more intensity to the music. But I appreciated the clarity Mr. Gilbert drew from this fraught score. Inner details came through vividly, especially intricate tangles of counterpoint during teeming episodes of the first movement. The scherzo had lithe energy, if less mystery and suspense. The great adagio had flowing lyricism and breadth.

The excellent Westminster choir, directed by Joe Miller, sounded youthful and robust during the choral finale. And the performance had a strong quartet of vocal soloists: the soprano Camilla Tilling, the mezzo-soprano Daniela Mack, the tenor Joseph Kaiser and the bass-baritone Eric Owens.

THEATER

The John Golden Theater
A Doll's House, Part 2

"A wildly inventive new American play that picks up after Henrik Ibsen's most cherished work concludes, A Doll's Life, Part 2 boasts an all-star cast that features three-time Emmy Award-winner and three-time Tony Award-nominee Laurie Metcalf, Academy Award-winner Chris Cooper, Tony Award-winner Jayne Houdyshell and two-time Tony Award-nominee Condola Rashad.

SYNOPSIS: In the final scene of Ibsen's 1879 ground-breaking masterwork, Nora Helmer makes the shocking decision to leave her husband and children, and begin a life on her own. This climactic event — when Nora slams the door on everything in her life — instantly propelled world drama into the modern age. In A Doll’s House, Part 2,many years have passed since Nora’s exit. Now, there’s a knock on that same door. Nora has returned. But why? And what will it mean for those she left behind?"

RECITAL

Merkin Hall
Tuesday Matinée

Aeolus Quartet

Works by Haydn, Schumann, Copland and Missy Mazzoli

Great players with a great sound.

They spent two years in Austin, Texas!

"The Aeolus Quartet is committed to presenting time-seasoned masterworks and new cutting-edge works to widely diverse audiences with equal freshness, dedication and fervor. Violinists Nicholas Tavani and Rachel Shapiro, violist Gregory Luce, and cellist Alan Richardson formed the Aeolus Quartet in 2008 at the Cleveland Institute of Music. Since its inception, the all-American quartet has been awarded prizes at nearly every major competition in the United States and performed across the globe with showings “worthy of a major-league quartet” (Dallas Morning News). The Cleveland Plain Dealer writes, “A rich and warm tone combined with precise ensemble playing (that managed also to come across as fluid and natural), and an impressive musical intelligence guided every technical and dramatic turn.”

A video of the performers...

LINCOLN CENTER

David Geffen Hall
New York Philharmonic

Courtney Lewis - Conductor
Jonathan Biss - Piano

Berlioz - Selections from Romeo and Juliet
Timo Andres - Piano Concerto No. 3, The blind Banister
Beethoven - Piano Concerto No. 2
Elgar - In the South (Alassio)

The Philharmonic and Jonathan Biss perform Beethoven’s dramatic Second Piano Concerto and Timo Andres’s new piano concerto, part of a project creating new concertos inspired by each of Beethoven’s five. The Blind Banister is “a captivating work … that goes from haunting and hopeful to an eventual explosion of energy” (St. Paul Pioneer Press). Plus Elgar’s evocative In the South (Alassio).

Courtney Lewis on Elgar’s “In the South (Alassio)”...

RECITAL



Merkin Hall
Young Concert Artists

Oliver Stankiewicz - Oboe

"Oboist Olivier Stankiewicz was a revelation. He demonstrated astounding technique, rich sound, and extraordianry artistry." (ResMusica)

Schumann - Romanzen, Op. 94
Martinû - Three Romanian Folk Songs
Wolpe - Sonata for oboe and piano, C.91, Op. 31
Silvestrini - Three Etudes on Impressionist Paintings
Tonia Ko (YCA Composer-in-Residence) - Premiere
Dutilleux - Sonata for oboe and piano

"Extraordinary 25-year-old French oboist, Winner of the 2015 YCA Auditions both in New York and Leipzig, and First Prize at the 2012 International Oboe Competition of Japan ... Principal Oboe with the London Symphony Orchestra and Professor at the Royal College of Music ... Numerous concerto appearances include the Gunma Symphony in Japan, the Monte-Carlo Philharmonic, Tonhalle Zurich, and Ensemble Firians in France ... Named "2013 Classical Revelation" by the French Association Adami, Confirming his place among the most gifted artists of his generation."

WOW! This young man is good!

An interview with the artist...

THEATER

Pearl Theater
Vanity Fair

Adapted by Kate Hamill (Sense & Sensibility) from William Thackeray’s masterpiece, Vanity Fairexposes a society that cares more for good birth and good manners than for skill. But Becky Sharp, poor, plain, and devilishly clever, is determined to defy the odds through risky romantic entanglements, shady business practices, and social climbing at any cost; she won’t stop until the world lies at her feet.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/vanity-fair-review-becky-sharp-takes-the-stage-1491252935

‘Vanity Fair’ Review: Becky Sharp Takes the Stage

This adaptation of Thackeray’s novel is a masterpiece of creative compression.

Terry TeachoutApril 3, 2017 4:55 p.m. ET

By
Terry Teachout

New York

“Vanity Fair,” in which William Makepeace Thackeray recorded the adventures of Becky Sharp, who is prepared to do pretty much anything in order to claw her way to the top of Victorian England’s greasy pole of success, isn’t quite so widely read in the U.S. as it used to be. Nevertheless, it remains one of the 19th century’s most enduringly popular novels, and it’s amazing that no one seems to have successfully brought it to the stage until now. Enter Kate Hamill, whose 2014 Bedlam Theatre Company adaptation of “Sense and Sensibility” was a well-deserved success and who has now turned Thackeray’s 1848 “novel without a hero” into a play. I’m suspicious as a rule of stage versions of classic novels, which are in most cases pointless attempts to “repurpose” a beloved book for purposes of profit. But Ms. Hamill’s “Vanity Fair,” which is being performed to coruscatingly brilliant effect by the Pearl Theatre Company, is something else again, a masterpiece of creative compression that is at once arrestingly original and faithful to its source material, and I’ll be flummoxed if it isn’t at least as big a hit as “Sense and Sensibility.”

The plot of “Vanity Fair” is far too labyrinthine to summarize neatly here. Suffice it to say that Becky (played by Ms. Hamill herself) and her best friend Amelia ( Joey Parsons ) seek to stay afloat in a society that has little to offer women with neither wealth nor position. Amelia, being fundamentally good at heart, sticks to the straight and narrow path of virtue, but the amoral, ruthlessly realistic Becky is more inclined to take the advice of one of the various protectors who take an interest in her progress through life: “Never be too good, nor too bad. The world will punish you for both. Try to pace right with the rest of us in the unnoticeable hypocritical middle.” Therein lies the comedy of “Vanity Fair,” a dead-serious romp whose implicit feminism has been given a sharper point by Ms. Hamill (the speech quoted above is by her, not Thackeray).

Ms. Hamill has envisioned “Vanity Fair” as a show performed by “a seedy band of roving actors, putting on a play with minimum effort.” The set, ingeniously designed by Sandra Goldmark, is a rundown theater dressed with the miscellaneous leavings of forgotten productions. In addition to Becky and Amelia, five men ( Zachary Fine, Brad Heberlee, Tom O’Keefe, Debargo Sanyal and Ryan Quinn ) divvy up 17 speaking roles between them, dressing and cross-dressing in full view of the audience and galloping through the evening with gleeful flair. “Vanity Fair” runs for two hours and 45 minutes, but you’d never guess it without recourse to your watch: Even with an intermission, it feels no more than 90 minutes long.

Eric Tucker, the director, is the co-founder of Bedlam Theatre Company, of which Ms. Hamill is also a member. As regular readers of this column will recall, I rank Mr. Tucker alongside David Cromer at the pinnacle of the short list of America’s most imaginative stage directors, and save for the fact that it’s being presented on a proscenium stage, his “Vanity Fair” has all the hallmarks of a Bedlam production. The quick-change shape-shifting of the cast, the outrageous physical comedy of the staging, the startlingly witty use of props: All are Mr. Tucker’s now-familiar trademarks, and all add immeasurably to the show’s impact.

Ms. Hamill’s Becky is a saucy, spunky schemer who, as the Victorians liked to say, is no better than she has to be. As for Ms. Parsons, one of my favorite New York-based actors, she has a genius for endowing seemingly thankless straight-man female parts with a warmth and emotional intensity that make them memorable. Her Amelia put me in mind of Olivia de Havilland, who showed us in “Gone With the Wind” and “The Heiress” that you can be good without being insipid. Of their five superlative colleagues, Mr. Fine has the choicest parts—he doubles as the outrageously worldly stage manager and Matilda Crawley, the flatulent cynic who’ll do anything for Becky but let him marry her son and heir—and plays them with urbane gusto.

It’s a cinch that “Vanity Fair” will soon be taken up by regional theaters across the U.S. I think, however, that it merits a more ambitious fate. Mr. Tucker’s production really ought to transfer to Broadway, where it would appeal to the same audience that kept “The 39 Steps” running for 771 profitable performances. Should any commercial producers read this review, take it from me: “Vanity Fair” is another cash cow waiting to be milked.