Marin Alsop: Latest News

BSO joins the circus (March, 2010)
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra celebrates the big top with a series of programs

By: Tim Smith of the Baltimore Sun

"As a kid, I always wanted to go to the circus," says Marin Alsop. "I was obsessed with the circus. Maybe that's why I became a conductor."

Alsop, music director of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, gets to relive that obsession with a month of programs, starting this weekend, that celebrate the circus world in one way or another. Although given the marketing tag "BSO Under the Big Top," the venture isn't so much about clowns and acrobats as it is about following a connective thread.

"This really came out of the overall theme of our season, shared traditions and musical roots," Alsop says. "The circus is a tradition with such mass appeal. I wanted to explore how we can all relate to it. The circus emanates from at least the Roman days, which got me thinking about John Corigliano's, 'Circus Maximus.'."

For that 2004 work, to be performed March 19-21, the BSO will be joined by members of the U.S. Army Band and University of Maryland Wind Orchestra. Many of the players will be positioned around the audience.

"What I love about circuses is the weirdness - things in the circus are so distorted and contracted - and the risk-taking, the colors," Alsop says. "I wanted to pick some pieces that are challenging for the orchestra and have their own risk-taking. The Corigliano piece is really shocking. It's definitely the loudest piece ever. The enormous rifle shot at the end could tear the place open."

Sharing that program will be Prokofiev's "Peter and the Wolf" (narrated at some performances by NPR's Scott Simon). "It's got the kind of story where you're walking a line between being frightened and being intrigued," Alsop says. Also on tap is David T. Little's "Screamer" - "It's only a five-minute piece, but wild," Alsop adds. "It's been called a 'three-ring blur for orchestra.'."

The BSO's big-top adventure kicks off this weekend with a kind of Las Vegas-meets-the-circus SuperPops program called "Mysterioso." It features magicians Les Arnold and Dazzle, illusionist Joseph Gabriel and quick-change artists David & Dania. BSO pops conductor, Jack Everly, will be on the podium.

"Mysterioso" was developed in late 2008 at the Indianapolis Symphony, where Everly is also pops conductor. "We did research for a couple of years to find the right mix of performers and music that alludes to illusion and magic," Everly says. "Les Arnold and Dazzle is a father and daughter team, and one of the funniest magical acts I've ever seen. We've also got a wonderful singer, Christina Bianco. It's quite a whimsical program, pure entertainment, with first-rate arrangements. The BSO cleverly thought they would put it under the umbrella of the circus project." Next week, Alsop and the BSO will be joined by the Cirque de la Symphonie ensemble, which will add an aerial dimension. The musical lineup includes colorful ballet scores by Aaron Copland, Francis Poulenc, Erik Satie and Bela Bartok.

"The Cirque performers are not just going to be dangling through the whole program," Alsop says, "but it's all integrated into one big concept."

The final installment, March 25-28, works the puppet world into the picture, via another ballet score, Igor Stravinsky's "Pulcinella," which tells a commedia dell'arte tale that "can be kind of frightening," Alsop says.

The conductor is rounding out that program with a couple of rarely heard, short operas. In Samuel Barber's "A Hand of Bridge," two couples playing cards are absorbed in private thoughts. George Gershwin's "Blue Monday," a precursor of sorts to "Porgy and Bess," deals with dice-rolling, love and jealousy.

Those operas, which will feature members of Washington National Opera's Domingo-Cafritz Young Artist Program, may not seem as readily connected to the overriding circus concept, but Alsop finds the game-playing in each close enough.

"I'm at the point where I can't stretch this theme farther," she says, adding with a laugh, "and it's probably reached that point already."

Alsop to conduct in Eugene next fall (February, 2010)
From registerguard.com and The Register Guard

Appeared in print Feb. 25

Former Eugene Symphony conductor Marin Alsop will return to Eugene in November for a guest performance with the orchestra here.
Her appearance is expected to be one of the highlights of the symphony’s 2010-11 season, which was announced last week by conductor Danail Rachev.
The symphony also has booked violinist Itzhak Perlman for a special performance Jan. 29.

Alsop, now conductor of the Baltimore Symphony, will be here to conduct the symphony’s regular Hult Center concert on Nov. 18.
Tickets for next season are available at 541-682-5000 and on the Web at eugenesymphony.org

Here is a rundown of the complete regular season:

Sept. 23
Leonard Bernstein: Three dance episodes from “On the Town”
Edouard Lalo: Symphonie Espagnole
Modest Mussorgsky: “Pictures at an Exhibition”

Oct. 21
Alexander Borodin: “In the Steppes of Central Asia”
P.I. Tchaikovsky: Piano Concerto No. 1
Igor Stravinsky: “Petrushka”

Nov. 18
Guest conductor: Marin Alsop
Tchaikovsky: “Romeo and Juliet” Overture
Bernstein: Serenade
Johannes Brahms: Symphony No. 2

Dec. 2
Ludwig van Beethoven: “Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage”; Elegaic Song; Symphony No. 9

Jan. 20
Samuel Barber: “Medea’s Meditation and Dance of Vengeance”
Robert Schumann: Symphony No. 3, “Rhenish”
Antonín Dvorák: Cello Concerto

Feb. 17
Guest conductor: Mei-Ann Chen
Dvorák: “Carnival” Overture
Francis Poulenc: Concerto for Two Pianos in D Minor
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov: “Scheherazade”

March 17
Felix Mendelssohn: “The Hebrides”
Claude Debussy: “La Mer”
Brahms: Violin Concerto (soloist Sarah Chang)

April 18
John Harbison: “The Most Often Used Chords”; Flute Concerto
Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 1

May 19
W.A. Mozart: Symphony No. 40
Franz Liszt: “Orpheus”
Richard Strauss: “Death and Transfiguration”

Nixon Revisited (Review of Adams: Nixon in China)
Nixon Revisited Marin Alsop leads a vigorous new recording of John Adams's Nixon in China that affirms the opera's status as a modern classic.

Marin Alsop leads a vigorous new recording of John Adams's Nixon in China that affirms the opera's status as a modern classic.

John Adams's Nixon in China, first heard at Houston Grand Opera in 1987, is now generally regarded as a modern classic. This new recording, the first since the well-thought-of Nonesuch original, was made during performances of James Robinson's staging at Opera Colorado, in 2008. It is a testament to Nixon's enduring status in the canon.

Conductor Marin Alsop's approach — vigorous and transparent — is apparent right out of the gate, as the pulsing A-minor scales begin their cyclical variations . Orchestral clarity is unfailingly impressive. When the Opera Colorado Chorus enters a couple of minutes later , it's clear they have been drilled with the same emphasis on precision. Alsop makes the Colorado Symphony Orchestra sound like a force to be reckoned with — even more vital than the Orchestra of St. Luke's under Edo de Waart in 1987.

Robert Orth, as Nixon, has a robust, well-articulated baritone, with a ruddy coloring not dissimilar to that of the charismatic James Maddalena, whose original Nixon remains an indelible portrait. Orth's Nixon is slightly coarser: he gives his sound a raspy edge when he needs to, and it enhances his characterization without interfering with his remarkably direct delivery. His formidable rendition of Nixon's signature aria, "News has a kind of mystery" , measures up easily to Maddalena's and enables Orth to claim the part as his own.

Marc Heller's Mao Tse-tung suffers by comparison, at least in terms of diction. Heller can be suddenly strong and clear when he dips down into his middle range, but as he gets higher his sound becomes woofy, and he distorts his vowels. The Chairman can be cryptic, but he shouldn't be unintelligible.

Chen-Ye Yuan, as Premier Chou En-lai, has no such problems, and he projects Adams's long-spun melodies with a vibrating baritone of generous size . On the original recording, Sanford Sylvan offers much more sensitivity and introspection, but Yuan makes it clear how this fellow has muscled his way to the top of the Communist Party.

Maria Kanyova gives a vivid presence to Pat Nixon, the one character about whose inner life we know very little historically. Librettist Alice Goodman provided Mrs. Nixon with a lengthy, touching monologue as she slowly realizes that Americans can learn something from the Chinese ; Kanyova sings this movingly and engagingly despite an occasional tendency to land slightly flat on her high notes. Coloratura Tracy Dahl is a brilliant Madame Mao, storming her way through "I am the wife of Mao Tse-tung" . The piece is quite high and potentially shrill, but Dahl is always easy to listen to — thrilling, in fact — all the way up to a high D. As Henry Kissinger, bass-baritone Thomas Hammons, the only cast member on hand from the original recording, is magnificently villainous when Kissinger takes the stage as the sadistic, lecherous landlord's factotum in "The Red Detachment of Women" , the Act II opera within the opera.

Which recording is better? I'm going to hedge on that: both are impressive and provide very enjoyable listening. The real takeaway is that we now have two fine recordings of an important twentieth-century opera to choose from.

From: Opera News Online, March 2010 , vol 74 , no.9
www.metoperafamily.org

The Times review of Roy Harris Symphonies No. 5 and 6 CD
The Times review of Roy Harris Symphonies No. 5 and 6 CD

By: Geoff Brown

Few works of the American composer Roy Harris reach the craggy splendour of his Third Symphony. He easily gets stuck in a rut, or appears garrulously patriotic. It's easy to spot flaws in Symphonies Nos 5 and 6 - two 1940s effusions splendidly tackled by the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. Easy to spot the beauties, too, such as the Sixth's first movement, or Harris's typically elongated lyrics lines. The Sixth is dedicated to the American Armed Forces; the Fifth to Russia's "heroic and freedom-loving people". Those were the days. (Naxos, out now)

The Daily Telegraph review of Roy Harris Symphonies Nos 5 and 6
The Daily Telegraph review of Roy Harris Symphonies Nos 5 and 6

By: Geoffrey Norris

Harris: Symphonies Nos 5 and 6
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, cond Marin Alsop

These works by Roy Harris identify an idiom owing much to America's landscape and to the folk traditions that were also part of the musical make-up of Harris's contemporary Aaron Copland. The mood of the Sixth Symphony (1944) subtitles Gettysburg", is sombre, all four movements predominantly measured in pace, with, in the third one, a melancholy deriving from the Renaissance, inflections that Harris included in his vocabulary. This symphony inhabits a world of introspective questioning that is scarcely alleviated by the vigorous conflicts of the finale. The determined theme at the start of the Fifth Symphony (1942), dedicated to the "freedom-loving people of our great ally, the Union of Soviet Republic", heralds a work of fierce brooding.

Roy Harris, Symphonies Nos. 5 and 6 Review from Buffalo News
Roy Harris, Symphonies Nos. 5 and 6 Review

Roy Harris, Symphonies Nos. 5 and 6 performed by Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra conducted by Marin Alsop (Naxos). He was born on Lincoln’s birthday and he never seemed to tire of ways to embarrass symphonic music. At first, in the ’30s and earliest ’40s, a wildly idiosyncratic composer who had been a farmer and once drove a milk truck seemed made to order for Depression and wartime America. But here we are, 67 years later, with a very strong 1942 Symphony No. 5 dedicated to “the heroic and freedom-loving people of our great ally, the Union of Soviet Republics,” and we’re in just as much discomfort as he provided in old age with one cranky opinion after another (all of which paled, of course, compared with the semi-rabid anti-Semitism of Carl Ruggles). Roy Harris was far from a “primitive” as some explicators would have it; he was a great and distinctively athletic prairie composer who could inspire others (the contrastingly cosmopolitan William Schuman) but remain inimitable. Alsop’s current efforts to record Harris’ unjustly neglected symphonies are tremendous. ★★★½ (J. S.)

Naxos of America Staff Picks of 2009: Part I
Naxos of America Staff Picks of 2009: Part I

By Sean Hickey, Naxos of America National Sales Manager

I will admit that I was certainly never a fan of Lenny’s most controversial piece. I remember not making heads or tails of it in college, determining that it was slightly more interesting than Andrew Lloyd Webber. The amazing Marin Alsop and the Baltimore Symphony have – to use an obvious pun – made me a convert of this moving piece, a quest for spirituality in the modern world.”

"Alsop is well-grounded in the standard repertoire, but she has real commitment to both American music and new music. There's an excitement about the way she makes music, the way she plans a season, the way she gets involved with the community and tries to make the orchestra integral to the city. She's full of ideas and always examining old habits to see if they might be changed for the better."
- composer, Christopher Rouse

"... a formidable musician and a powerful communicator, a conductor with a vision of what an American Orchestra could be in the 21st Century."
- New York Times

"Few conductors of her generation have made more recordings, and more highly acclaimed ones, than she."
- Boston Globe

"What she has done for audiences can't be measured."
- Rocky Mountain News

"She has shown herself to be conductor who makes a difference."
- Daily Telegraph

"Marin Alsop is a shooting star in the firmament of international conductors."
- Penguin Guide to Compact Discs

"There's no denying the wit and vitality that Alsop - a lively entertainer as well as a powerhouse musician - brings to her performances."
- San Francisco Chronicle

"A life-changing performance. That's how Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 6 struck me Thursday when performed by the Minnesota Orchestra under Marin Alsop. The music became a profound expression of what it is to be human in this difficult world."
- St. Paul Pioneer Press

"Alsop has again packed the houses, and made her orchestra play like there was no tomorrow. No doubt that there will be, if they continue to play like this: with greater flair, firmer ensemble, and a sense of fervour that hasn't been heard for years."
The Times (London)

"... there is no doubt that Alsop has the goods: a compelling vision of how she wants a piece of music to sound and the ability to draw that sound from a group of players... "
- Chicago Sun-Times

"With Alsop and the Baltimore players, the effect was one of total revelation."
- Washington Post

"This was a truly dramatic interpretation ... expansive, decisive, radiating colour, conviction, acumen and musicality in equal measure."
- The Telegraph (London)

"If there were anyone still looking for evidence that Marin Alsop is a thoroughly good thing, this concert... will surely have settled things once and for all... Her appointment is a landmark for the BSO... She has shown herself to be conductor who makes a difference."
- The Daily Telegraph

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