From Variety:

… “the first musicians union in the country to take a position in the 2020 Democratic primary,” the 7,000-member American Federation of Musicians Local 47 announced Wednesday that it has has endorsed Bernie Sanders for president.

And is that the verdict of you all?

The French violist Christophe Desjardins died today of cancer.

Former principal of the Ensemble Intercontemporain and the Monnaie Opera, he premiered works by Berio, Boulez, Levinas, Rihm, Nunes and Jonathan Harvey.

He taught at Lyon and at Juilliard.

Someone once aptly called him ‘the first gentleman of the viola’.

On March 28, Zurich Opera is putting on a memorial concert to its much-loved maestro Nello Santi, we hear exclusively from Zurich critic Christian Berzins.

The performance of Verdi’s Requiem will be directed by Fabio Luisi.

 

 

 

Message received from Marin Alsop’s orchestra:

The ORF Radio Symphony Orchestra Vienna was meant to tour South Korea and China from March 10th to 21st.

The tour with the Finnish conductor John Storgårds has now been cancelled. The reason for this is the spread of the coronavirus in China, which also has an adverse effect on cultural life in South Korea.

At the beginning of February, the two concerts planned in China were canceled by the organizer, a week later one of the organizers withdrew from Korea. The remaining concerts in Korea can no longer be performed by the orchestra. Orchestra director Christoph Becher: “We are extremely sorry about this, we were all really looking forward to this tour. But of course we have to protect the health of our musicians, that’s the top priority. As things stand today, it is also completely unclear how the flight situation in Asia will develop and when concert life in Korea, which is already suffering from impairments and cancellations, will recover.

 

It’s pianophile Thursday at Slipped Disc:

Melanie Lust, a student at Northwestern University, has found the solution to declining concert attendances. Under the headline ‘Lust: As a matter of urgency, please make classical music sexy again’, Melanie writes:

…Female soloists and conductors tend to face extensive criticism for violations of these codes.

Take Yuja Wang, the Chinese pianist who regularly makes headlines for her outfits: high heels and tight, colorful mini-dresses. Her attire matches her performance style: vibrant, fiery, glittering with personality. And even though she’s won the most prestigious musicianship awards in the industry, critics never seem to tire of calling her “skimpy,” “improper” and “offensive.”

The reality is that there’s no historical or social reason why classical musicians need to wear formal clothes. A uniform doesn’t contribute to a performer’s musicality. If anything, dress codes hinder performances because they don’t allow soloists to fully express their identities. Any attempt to replace formality with personality should be celebrated instead of shunned. Beyond that, Yuja Wang shouldn’t be the only musician to dare enter the realm of self-expression — more soloists and conductors should step up and challenge the norms….

Read on here.

Graphic: Melanie Lust

The Polish pianist has not set foot in the United States since, on 26 April 2009 at Walt Disney Hall, Los Angeles, he swore never to return until America removed its missile defense shield from his country.

The US pianist Zsolt Bognár misses him badly. Zsolt has been listening to an astounding 1994 concert performance of Szymanowski’s Variations on a Polish Theme. He shares his regrets with Slipped Disc:

The night before I played my Suntory Hall debut in 2009, I heard Krystian Zimerman play a recital in the adjacent hall of the same elegant venue. The program included Bach’s c minor Partita, Beethoven’s last sonata, Opus 111, the Brahms Opus 119 set, and a barnstorming performance of Karol Szymanowski’s transcendentally difficult Variations on a Polish Theme—the same work before which, some days earlier in Los Angeles, the pianist hesitated then addressed a message about American missile installations in Poland to a stunned audience. The ensuing performance was tense for audience and performer alike: Mr. Zimerman had announced it would also be his final appearance in the United States.

Meeting him backstage in Tokyo, I found Mr. Zimerman, as I had on many occasions before—from Chicago, to Boston and Cleveland—to be thoughtful and measured in conversation, regal in poise, dress, and manner as he listened. I asked if Los Angeles would indeed be his last appearance in the United States. He replied quickly to the contrary that although he would likely steer clear of major concert circuits, he planned to visit conservatories and universities, and hoped to start a dialogue with students about why he had taken such a stand. To the substantial loss of devoted concertgoers across the country, a prolific musician in his prime would indeed remain entirely vanished from its musical stages ever since.

Krystian Zimerman, a pianist who idolized the similarly elusive Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, surpassed in some capacities the often superhuman craftsmanship with an artistry all his own, combining pianistic sheen with the warmth of Artur Rubinstein and the dramatic narrative of his other idol, Maria Callas. But to assess Zimerman’s art is not as simple as listening to his catalogue of highly-crafted commercial recordings, which range from almost literal and didactic in his early reading of Schumann’s Concerto with Karajan, to pristine and glowing balance in his cycle of Beethoven Concerti in Vienna with Bernstein, and an intimate and improvisatory freedom in his recent album of the last two Schubert Sonatas.

To hear Zimerman in concert, however, was immersion in dramatic fervor—an entirely different artist with infinitely more colors and sonorities, rhetoric on an operatic scale, and a sense of moment that even seemed to pick up on the energy and response of the venue and audience. His 2002 Brahms recital in Carnegie Hall specifically outdid itself because of the audience present; the final chords were the culmination of an epic journey fueled with exhilaration of an Olympian runner empowered in the final stretch. In concert, his sound shimmered with a brilliant upper register and gem-like clarity. Bass sonorities were massive, even frightening—benefitting from the incredible Steinways he used from his own collection of nearly a dozen, which he also serviced and voiced himself. Zimerman’s artistry on stage breathed, sighed, and thundered with ever-changing power.

A rare concert recording

Krystian Zimerman’s 1994 Ludwigsburg concert recording of Szymanowski’s Variations on a Polish Theme—a work he never released commercially—not only captures the breathtakingly expanded range of the musician in performance, but is one of the highest pinnacles in the recorded history of the instrument. As a lifelong collector of rare concert recordings, I owned a private copy of this performance since my days as a student; I also recently discovered it from a 2012 upload with comparatively few views given its stature. In it, one witnesses white-hot pianism, nostalgic laments, cathartic declamations, the visionary half-light of early Scriabin, and in the funeral march (from 10:08) there is a crescendo to the most massive and cursed bell-like sonorities imaginable.

The left-hand barrage of octaves at 3:50 is jaw-dropping also for its clarity and momentum. Szymanowski’s wistful rhetoric is present even in the most athletic passages, and in the hands of Zimerman is a revelation of thought and heart. The resignation at 7:30 is reminiscent of Vladimir Sofronitsky, and the ecstatic surges of sound from 13:29 are of vitality unlike any of Zimerman’s commercial recordings. Szymanowski’s piano-writing at 16:10 rivals Liszt’s in Feux Follets, here deployed with beguiling lightness. The fugue from 16:33 is electrifying in its heroic outbursts. The drive to the end from 18:25 is to be heard to be believed.

Krystian Zimerman’s appearances in the United States were already witness to unusual happenings before Los Angeles, with issues ranging from traveling with his own pianos in a climate of heightened border security, to incidents in New York involving the alleged recording of performances by audience members, bringing events to a halt at the request of the performer. On other notable occasions, humanistic and political stands were verbally addressed to the audience regarding specific issues.

photo:DG

The question of the overlap of politics and music is not new, but here it concerns self-exclusion and the absence of a major artist. Sviatoslav Richter said the two issues were inseparable, citing Don Carlo and Tosca as examples. In Hungarian interviews, Richter even declared his artistic duty as musician to be no different than his patriotic duty—a contradiction indeed from a performer who elsewhere proclaimed indifference to politics and worldly matters. Krystian Zimerman’s illustrious compatriot Ignacy Jan Paderewski faced the question as well: he was a pianist-composer whose consummate fame included his becoming Prime Minister of Poland in 1919, signing the Treaty of Versailles to end World War I.

Aside from our lament at the absence of his gripping performances and artistry, the need for art and humanistic vision in today’s world has never been greater—and the strife publicly decried from the stage in Los Angeles is arguably far greater now. The urgency of Krystian Zimerman’s unique art and message is most effective through its presence rather than its absence. It’s time for a return.

(c) Zsolt Bognar

Over a couple of hours yesterday, the New York Philharmonic rolled out a headline-grabbing new season, Juilliard named Adam Meyer as its new Provost, the former LA Phil chief Simon Woods stepped in to rescue Grand Teton, Philadelphia gave details of Yannick’s Beethoven symphony cycle studded with four world premieres*, and Chicago’s Lyric Opera pushed out Sir Andrew Davis’s final season.

Do the PRs at these institutions never pick up a phone to each other to avoid rush-hour traffic on Slipped Disc and Michael Cooper’s desk?

 

*Each symphony will be paired with commissioned works by Composer-in-Residence Gabriela Lena Frank and a diverse group of composers from her Creative Academy of Music—Iman Habibi, Jessica Hunt, and Carlos Simon—who offer new pieces that challenge, inspire, and push boundaries, creating contemporary context and fresh perspectives on the relevance of Beethoven’s legacy today.

The Vienna State Opera has published half-year figures for the 2019/20 season as its outgoing chief, Dominique Meyer, leaves for La Scala.

As of last night, the average occupancy of all seats for opera in the big house was 99.38%.

Beat that, incoming Bogdan.

 

The Times reports this morning:

A tycoon with links to the royal family charged a troubled public company expenses of almost £3 million in 16 months for entertainment, travel and celebrity meetings…

There were meetings with actors including Julia Roberts and royals including Prince Harry and the duchess. There were experiences such as a £4,000 piano lesson from a star musician and a £4,050 private tour of Ground Zero, New York….

The teacher is sadly not named.

 

Slipped Disc is seeking a new piano professor. Ours is not nearly classy enough.