Concert Highlights: An Educated Guess
We have about three months to go in the music season and I'll give you my sense of the highlights. This is subjective, of course. But then, so many things are.
Start with Carnegie Hall, mother of all concert halls. And when I say "Carnegie Hall," I mean to include the little halls in the building, too: Weill and Zankel.
On March 30, the Met Chamber Ensemble will play Gunther Schuller's Grand Concerto for Percussion and Keyboards. Should be interesting. On April 4, Joseph Kaiser, a promising young tenor, will sing a recital. On April 14, Anne-Sophie Mutter will play all three Brahms violin sonatas, with the pianist Lambert Orkis. Why do they do this? Why are violinists always programming all three Brahms sonatas? It's a baneful trend, which cannot end too soon.
But if Ms. Mutter plays well she will be a highlight indeed.
On April 24, the pianist Leif Ove Andsnes will play four of the composers he plays best: Bach, Schubert, Grieg, and Debussy. The next night, Bryn Terfel, the Welsh bass-baritone, will give a recital; he will be partnered by the excellent accompanist Malcolm Martineau. The next night, April 26, Jean-Yves Thibaudet will play the Franck Piano Quintet with the Takαcs Quartet. (Follow that?)
On May 1, Jessye Norman will sing a recital could be surpassingly wonderful; could be something else. On May 6, Christoph Eschenbach will conduct the Philadelphia Orchestra in Mahler's Eighth Symphony. He has scheduled some top-drawer singers, including Christine Brewer, Stephanie Blythe, and the too-little-heard Charlotte Hellekant. On May 10, Dame Felicity Lott ("Flott") will sing a recital with her regular pianist, Graham Johnson. Their recital in February 2006 was a highlight of that season; I wouldn't expect much worse.
On May 18, Valery Gergiev conducts the Met Orchestra in an all-Mussorgsky program that includes Renι Pape singing the "Songs and Dances of Death." And on June 11, Lorin Maazel brings his New York Philharmonic down from Lincoln Center to play his arrangement of Wagner's "Ring" a "Ring" without words. Sticking with the New York Philharmonic, Kurt Masur will conduct them, and a roster of singers, in Bach's "St. Matthew Passion." That starts tonight. Starting April 3, Sir Colin Davis will conduct music he conducts consummately: a Vaughan Williams symphony (the Fourth). Starting on April 9, Lang Lang is a guest, and he will play Tan Dun's new piano concerto. Starting on April 23, another pianist, Martha Argerich, will play one of the few concertos she now plays: Beethoven's C-major. (That's if she shows she is a notorious canceler.)
And May 7 will bring something a little different: a musical, "Camelot." Should be fun.
Starting on June 4, Mr. Maazel does Mahler's last symphony No. 9. Starting on June 12, he will conduct an opera (in concert): Puccini's "Tosca." The singers are little known; the conducting will be the main thing, regardless. And, on June 20 and 21, Mr. Maazel will close the season with Bruckner's Eighth.
Let's move over to Great Performers. Are there any? Yes or at least very good ones. On March 26, Joyce DiDonato, the sparkler from Kansas, will sing a recital at the Rose Theater. On March 30, the pianist Piotr Anderszewski will play a Beethoven concerto the one Ms. Argerich is scheduled to play with the Swedish Chamber Orchestra. That is also in the Rose Theater. In the Walter Reade Theater, on April 6, the excellent young clarinetist Julian Bliss will play. He is not yet 20. And he will be accompanied by a top-notch pianist, Brad Moore. Later that afternoon, a more experienced clarinetist, David Shifrin, will play the key role in Brahms's Clarinet Quintet. His four partners will be the Emerson String Quartet. And that is in the Rose Theater.
On March 21, "The Seven Last Words," by Haydn, will be played by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center. That is a masterwork, and not very often heard. On April 13, under CMS auspices, the Orion String Quartet will celebrate its 20th anniversary. Their program will be all-Beethoven.
And let's wind up at the Metropolitan Museum. On April 4, Andrius Zlabys will play a recital. He is a very talented and bright young pianist, from Lithuania. On April 6, the Beaux Arts Trio, with its octogenarian pianist Menahem Pressler, will bid farewell. That could be a bittersweet occasion. And on April 12, Hilary Hahn, the superb young violinist, will do something a little funky. She'll play a recital, which is not so funky but she'll do so in the company of Josh Ritter, a singer-songwriter (and pianist). Hmm ...
