I'd love to talk about why I strongly disagreed with certain aspects of Jeremy Eichler's fine review in Wednesday's New York Times, of the mostly outstanding Peter Mennin concert the Juilliard School of Music presented at Alice Tully Hall on Monday night. (To my mind, Mennin was a much more original and affecting voice than Eichler gives him credit for being -- at least in my limited experience of Mennin's output, which was largely fueled by the awe I experienced in hearing a Columbus Symphony recording of the Eighth and Ninth Symphonies on New World some years back. I still pull that CD out regularly. After this concert, I felt I'd be doing the same if I had a recording of Mennin's seriously rocking String Quartet No. 2, a rigorous neoclassical piece that the Calder Quartet rendered as breakneck athletic drama.)
I'm slightly less inclined to talk about the plodding pageantry of the Met's Aida, which I finally caught tonight. (Salvatore Licitra's Radames was certainly somewhat more alert than his soporific Cavaradossi in spring, at least. But no one seemed especially engaged, or engaging, until Lado Atanelli's dusty looking but manly sounding Amonasro popped out of the clutch of Ethiopian refugees, who otherwise looked like victims of a fairly baked fraternity-sorority Reggae Sunsplash mixer. The orchestra, at least, played beautifully for James Conlon.)
Instead, I'm still trying to figure out how to make this page look as clean and spiffy as I'd like it to. (This look is closer, but not there yet.)
Still, I'm dying to know whose job it was to clean up after the horse that relieved itself on the Met stage during the triumphal scene.
Playlist:
Andrew Imbrie - Requiem*; Piano Concerto No. 3** - Lisa Saffer*, New York Virtuoso Singers*, Alan Feinberg**, Riverside Symphony/George Rothman (Bridge)
George Frideric Handel - Radamisto - Il Complesso Barocco/Alan Curtis (Virgin)
Edmund Rubbra - Improvisation for Violin and Orchestra*; Improvisations on Virginal Pieces by Giles Farnaby; Concerto for Violin and Orchestra* - Krysia Osostowicz*, Ulster Orchestra/Takuo Yuasa (Naxos)
There actually is an excellent recording of that Mennin String Quartet but alas it has yet to be re-issued from LP to CD. Wish I could have been there to hear it live, but alas was hosting what was a musically wonderful gig by Baltimore-based jazz composer/pianist George Spicka but which had zero audience. I thought it was due to the nasty windy rain, but maybe everyone else was at Mennin :(
Posted by: Frank J. Oteri | October 28, 2005 at 11:49 AM
What, you didn't notice DOLORA ZAJICK???? By the time Amonasro shows up, Amneris has had time to show everyone who's boss. Michele Crider is marginally serviceable, but the Aida-Amneris catfight to in the first scene of Act II must have at least wet some part of your body. In any case, La Zajick was the *only* performer to keep this Aida from degenerating into regional opera. And am I the only one to not notice James Conlon's 'brilliance'? I've been to dozens of his Met outings, and not once could I say I've been blown away by the pit. (But that's a blog post for another day ...)
A hearty WELCOME to the blogosphere, by the way. Beware of opera queens. :)
Posted by: Sieglinde | October 31, 2005 at 09:25 AM
Sieglinde, a very warm welcome to you. Yes, I surely did notice Zajick...but, I am a bit ashamed to admit, I was not convinced by her engagement with either the drama or the other players that night. The voice was a marvel, yes, but I just didn't feel any genuine connection between her and the rest of the cast on that particular evening. Maybe that was, as you suggest, because no one (up until the Atanelli entrance that so impressed me) could rise to her level? Heretical, I know, but that's the way it played for me.
Posted by: Steve Smith | October 31, 2005 at 11:43 PM