Music Features

Music@Menlo's 12th Season Highlights Dvořák

Music@Menlo's 12th chamber music festival and institute, July 18 through Aug. 9, is called "Around Dvořák," and it will focus — according to festival directors David Finckel and Wu Han — "on the unfolding dynamic at the end of the Romantic era between the Viennese Classical tradition and the passionate nationalist expressions of a generation of Central European composers." Dvořák's connections are further described as:

Despite his humble self-identification as “a simple Bohemian musikant,” Antonín Dvořák in fact possessed a richly complex musical identity, nurtured by the multinational and multiethnic environment of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, where he grew up. With a craftsmanship rooted in the Viennese Classical tradition of Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert, Dvořák further developed his musical style in some of his mature works under the mentorship of Brahms. He likewise turned an eager ear to inspirations from diverse cultures ranging from Russia through his native Czech lands and the British Isles all the way to African American spirituals of the United States.

There will be eight thematically programmed concert programs, four artist-curated Carte Blanche concerts, together featuring 48 world-renowned artists. Composers included in festival programs are Bartók, Dohnányi, Reicha, Janácek, Kodály, Ligeti, Haydn, Beethoven, Hummel, Chopin, Schubert, and Brahms. Also on schedule are rarely performed works by Erwin Schulhoff, Alexander von Zemlinsky, Charles Ives, and George Crumb, among many others.

Have Operatic Mad Scenes Spread to Board Rooms?

Manuela Hoelterhoff has a fascinating article about the present and future of opera in Bloomberg News. It opens with:

Mad scenes help make opera so enjoyable. Think of Lucia di Lammermoor, her nightgown soaked in blood, singing cuckoo duets with a flute.

But it helps if the people running opera houses and music halls are generally sound of mind.

These last few weeks, it’s hard to ignore evidence that not being nuts (or clueless or greedy) is no longer a requirement for top jobs in many aspects of the classical entertainment business.

And goes on to deal with problems, crises, and death rattles at the Met, memories of the recently deceased New York City Opera, the theoretically departed San Diego Opera (see below), and then says this of salaries in music, inviting militantly parsimonious Paul Ryan to do his destructive best:

National Symphony at the Kennedy Center in Washington: Where was everyone when departing KC president Michael Kaiser renewed his pallid friend Christoph Eschenbach’s contract for another two years? Putting on party hats?

Eschenbach, 74, has been paid an astounding $1.93 million. In the U.S., only Chicago’s Riccardo Muti and San Francisco’s Michael Tilson Thomas make more, but they are in a different league entirely. Eschenbach is neither an international star nor a locally venerated cultural leader.

That’s quite a housewarming present for Deborah Rutter, who arrives in September now that Kaiser was nudged out the door.

Let’s see. According to the 2014-15 calendar, Eschenbach is down for 31 performances, which comes to about $62,246.02 per appearance, and yes, I realize he probably rehearses which can be strenuous. An unusual example of a public-private partnership, the Kennedy Center receives federal funding. Paul Ryan, be my guest.

Last month, Hoelterhoff proposed a 10-point reform program for the Met, including some simple creature comforts, and then going for the guts:

Hire a charismatic music director to articulate a vision for the future and excite a new generation. James Levine, here since 1971, has never become a public personality identified with New York. What is wrong with “emeritus”? The Met needs a visible, socially engaged leader to supplement general manager Peter Gelb. We need someone like Gustavo Dudamel in Los Angeles or Riccardo Muti in Chicago. It’s time for a change.