Concert Review: The Man of Steel

Marc-André Hamelin at the 92nd Street Y.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Marc-André Hamelin. Photo by Fran Kaufman © 2013 Marc-André Hamelin.com 

There's nothing conventional about Marc-André Hamelin. The Canadian-born pianist is an authentic virtuoso. His recitals combine fierce technical chops with in-depth explorations of the dark corners of the catalogue. For piano cognonscenti, they are nearly sacred events.

On Wednesday night at the 92nd St. Y's Kaufman Auditorium, Mr. Hamelin  started with the G Minor Organ Fantasia and Fugue of Johann Sebastian Bach. Playing a transcription by Theodor Szántó, Mr. Hamelin hammered out the chords, lending a thunderous weight to Bach's musical ideas. The fugue emerged from this turmoil, putting the work's ideas back in order before revealing the cosmic concepts written into Bach's figured bass.

The Sonatina Seconda by Ferruccio Busoni is that composer pushing the envelope with a leaden bump of pianistic complexity. Mr. Hamelin seemed to relish the bleak colors called forth in this music, grim, almost atonal fragments that coalesce into a dark, coherent whole. Playing with muscle and drive, he made the sound of the Steinway like a crack of thunder in the intimate space of Kaufmann Concert Hall.

2013-2014 Preview: The New Jersey Symphony Orchestra

The Garden State's oldest orchestra announces its schedule.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Jacques Lacombe conducts the NJSO.
Photo by Fred Stucker © 2013 The New Jersey Symphony Orchestra.

When one thinks of large scale symphonic programs in the New York area, first thoughts are of the New York Philharmonic or perhaps the yearly visits from great orchestras at Lincoln Center or Carnegie Hall. But just across the Hudson River, following a short ride on NJ Transit or the PATH train is the New Jersey Performing Arts Center's Prudential Hall, a comfortable, acoustically splendid venue that is the regular home of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra.

The NJSO has offered concerts since 1922 (though its roots go back to the founding of the Eintracht Singing and Orchestra Society in Newark in 1846. Like its home city of Newark, the NJSO has experienced something of a resurgence in recent years under music director Jacques Lacombe.

For the coming year, Mr. Lacombe has planned  an innovative season-long schedule that combines bold programming with familiar classics. Each subscription concert is presented at NJPAC's Prudential Hall, a state-of-the-art facility that is only a short walk from Newark's Penn Station. (And yes, the streets are well-lit.)

This year's schedule includes a fourth series in the orchestra's popular Winter Festival and a celebration of the 150th birthday of German composer Richard Strauss.

Opera Review: Purple Reign

Pretty Yende rocks Le Comte Ory.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Pretty Yende (center) stars with Juan Diego Flórez (with beard) in Rossini's Le Comte Ory.
Photo by Marty Sohl © 2013 The Metropolitan Opera. 

The Metropolitan Opera season is a marathon. As such, there are always has cancellations due to injury, illness or personal and music differences. So when the company announced that the untried South African soprano Pretty Yende would be stepping in for Nino Machaidze as Countess Adele in all performances of the company's revival of Rossini's Le Comte Ory, audience members held their breath.

Opera Review: Trunk Music

The Met rolls out its "Vegas" Rigoletto.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Diana Damrau and Željko Lučić in the final scene from Michael Mayer's new Rigoletto.
Photo by Ken Howard © 2013 The Metropolitan Opera.

When you think about it, certain operas allow a fluidity of time and place. Giuseppe Verdi's Rigoletto has always been one of these. In setting the banned Victor Hugo play Le Roi s'amuse, Verdi and his librettist Francesco Maria Piave moved the story from France to 16th century Mantua. (That Italian region's noble family, the House of Gonzaga, had long died out, and wouldn't sue.) The libertine King Francois I became a safely anonymous Duke, and the opera was allowed to go forward.