Eve Egoyan 5: reinventing the tone-row

Posted on April 15, 2013 by barczablog

Isn’t that life, in a way: trying to accommodate dissonance
–Ann Southam

In the realm of disco or heavy metal, we’re told to turn up the volume.  I saw something new, though, on the booklet for Eve Egoyan’s CD 5.  The recording of five posthumous pieces by Ann Southam has the following instruction clearly spelled out:

This music is intended to be quiet.
Please adjust your playback level accordingly.

That’s a new one to me.

But oh that doesn’t mean the recording doesn’t reward the listener who turns it up.  Sorry Eve (and Ann), I did try it loud as well.  I submit that it makes more sense to listen as we’re instructed, and sorry if i am disobedient.  I can’t help but think that i was being a sophomoric male, in being loud and disobedient.  The fact is it’s lovely with the piano murmuring quietly rather than booming.  The CD has dynamics but they’re always understated, and within a narrower range, the difference something like what happens when you switch from a larger-than-life player banging out Liszt or Rachmaninoff, to a collaborative pianist accompanying a lieder singer.  This is a recording of wonderful intimacy, showing a respectful treatment of materials from after the composer’s death.  We are hearing something hushed as though we were in the presence of something magical, and if i didn’t know better i’d say it’s reverence for the composer.

That’s a beautiful thing to encounter.

When I looked into the liner notes I saw something rather astonishing that in retrospect makes wonderful sense.  Let me explain my astonishment by quoting the liner notes:

In a 2010 interview, in remarks that we can safely extend to the pieces on this disc, Southam described Returnings I [a very similar piece to what’s on this CD, one of Southam’s last compositions] as the continual asking of “Why?” each time in a slightly different way.  She also spoke of a “red dissonant line” that she literally saw running through the very consonant, repeating patterns in so much of her music – the dissonance created by a 12-tone row.
“Isn’t that life, in a way: trying to accommodate dissonance” she said.

For those of you who know what a tone-row is, you probably have something in your head, corresponding to the dissonance of a composer such as Webern or Kurtag. 

Now of course, this example –or any of the other twelve-tone compositions that come to mind –is nothing like what Southam has accomplished, in her lovely and gentle compositions.  In a nutshell, she’s taken the dissonances that one normally finds in a tone-row, and removed the usual edginess.  Removed?  No that’s wrong.  She’s taken the diamond blade that would usually cut us and suffused it in soft velvet.  Imagine Berg given acid, and –in the latter, reflective part of his trip—making tone rows with the meditative calm of Philip Glass.  Of course this isn’t the usual framework, because there are lots of extra notes, lots of diatonic patterns to accommodate the chromaticism, grounding & calming.  If nirvana is a kind of enlightened peace, this is what it sounds like, an acceptance and even love of dissonance, reinvented and reframed as assonance.

I can’t avoid the gender subtexts.

I have had Southam in the back of my mind for a long time.  I was working on a movement-theatre piece in the 1990s called Dreams of the Goddess when I was also aware of a dance work with a score by Southam called Dancing the Goddess.   I won’t deny I was frustrated and perhaps jealous:

  • Because I was working with students, not professional dancers
  • Because I was ignored and never dreamed anyone would notice me (yes the green-ey’d monster had me in thrall).  No i am not proud of my sentiments.
  • Because the people I invited to see the work (fool that i was and still am) judged the work solely on the competency of our movements (wonderful as our performers were, they were not professional dancers… duh!), and didn’t bother talking to me about what I was trying to do, seemed to have no concept of dramaturgy or music.  Oh well, I suppose I should have been grateful they had even shown up, but I became very uninterested in types of dance that seemed only interested in how well people could move, perhaps as my own over-reaction.  And yes some of you know I am obsessed with the issue of virtuosity.  This is part of that ongoing conversation.

I only mention that because there might also be a feminist subtext here as well, and that, unfortunately, in my single-mindedness, I clearly lost track of Southam, an important composer.  So now, so much later, I want to think about this all over again and hopefully catch up.

Speaking of feminism, I’ve sometimes felt that modernism is a particularly gendered phenomenon, music that follows rational patterns as though music has no reference anymore to feelings or emotions, to cultures & reference points.   It was the soundtrack for a period of music history that was box office poison, because let’s face it: it’s not tuneful or popular, and has never broken through to any sort of mainstream acceptance.  The tone-rows you get from Webern et al struck my ear as a very lonely and essentially male phenomenon, even when the main character onstage –thinking of Berg’s Lulu—might be a woman.  While there are brilliant productions of the opera that are sensitive to the sexual politics of the work (for example the La Monnaie production reviewed here), I am merely speaking of the broad modernist project I saw.  When you’re telling a story of anguish and alienation such as Lulu then by all means, give us the sounds that match those emotions.

Southam’s music is truly another kind of music, a music of reconciliation and accord, rather than brash discord.  I can’t help reading something feminist into this, as though she were attempting to re-boot and reinvent the style, without the angularity and dare i say it maleness that jars you.

I think you’ll find that once you start listening to Egoyan’s CD, you could easily leave it on your player for quite a long time.  It doesn’t invade your sonic space and so easily becomes a comfortable background for your life.

Egoyan launches her CD in concert Friday at 8 pm, at the Glenn Gould Studio.

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Adès contra Parsifal

Posted on April 13, 2013 by barczablog

Ever notice that conversations can reinforce and honour contrary positions? When you sit down with someone over latkes, beers or (name your pleasure), the celebration and enactment of community & indeed, communion, makes the points where you diverge immaterial. You have the affirmation of life in the filling of your tummy, and so what if your brains and your arguments go in different directions?

At least that’s how I feel. You may disagree(!).

I find that the way the media portray ideas, they tend to view debates like football. One side wins and one side loses. When there’s disagreement it must be resolved in a shoot-out or sudden-death overtime. There’s no tolerance for ambiguity, no subtle equivocal position allowed.

I bring this up because I am noticing how many possibilities there are for big ideas in theatre. In the past year I had already tossed out a few thoughts on Regietheater (director’s theatre), where the original text becomes a site of contention, as the audience seem to witness a multi-level conversation, or even a kind of debate, where the text and its encoding (both as a performance and as a series of remmants of a moment in time) collide with the present, both in the audience’s demands and the layers of meaning added by the mise-en-scène.

I am realizing now that this conversation –very contentious in some quarters—is really a small part of a bigger tension that we may lose sight of, that shows itself in works that have been adapted multiple times. Over lunch yesterday it was as though I heard a younger version of myself declare its love for Verdi’s Otello, an opera that I once had placed at the very top of the heap. I’d seen Jon Vickers, Louis Quilico and Theresa Zylis-Gara at the Met in Zeffirelli’s production, conducted by a young James Levine, and had in various ways had tried to scale Parnassus by playing the score & hearing singers, enlightening me while deafening me. Having later seen a few productions of Shakespeare’s play, including one where I deconstructed the play in the role of composer, I lost my adoration for what Verdi and Boito had done. Their opera is still fascinating, brilliant in so many ways, yet their Iago is so different from Shakespeare’s. The divergence is substantial, revolving around the nature of good and evil. There’s room in my life for multiple adaptations of this story, as I realize that I’d like to have another look at Rossini’s Otello (which I recall dismissing, when I noticed the uncanny resemblance between the music where the Moor stalks his wife to the music where Elmer Fudd hunts Bugs Bunny in The Bunny of Seville).

Composer Thomas Adès

It’s perhaps a matter of emphasis. While I enjoyed & admire Adès’s Tempest I recall that its emphases are displaced in some of the same ways (albeit with the exactly opposite metaphysical assumptions… but more on that in a moment) from the original play, as to what I observe with Verdi/Boito and Otello. I am in awe of the intelligibility of the libretto, which surely is at least partly the work of Meredith Oakes, a series of short lines that flush iambic pentameter down the toilet. Mark Shulgasser’s libretto –for Lee Hoiby’s Tempest—has much more of a feel for the Shakespearean line: which makes it less intelligible in the theatre.  Recalling what Mallarmé said about Debussy (when Debussy set his “afternoon of the faun”, he said something like “but it’s already music”): poetry is already music.  Why (and how?) would you set iambic pentameter to music?  Oakes made a canny choice, sacrificing a certain sacred cow –Shakespeare’s diction—on the altar of dramatic expediency. And I believe it was the right thing to do. Boito cut the first act of Othello more or less for the same reason: because opera is not the same medium and so compromises are necessary.

I am thinking, too, of the way Oakes / Adès end their Tempest, which seems to sacrifice a key element of the play. As I recall one of the best productions I saw at the Stratford Festival in the 1980s, directed by John Hirsch, music by (?), the masque element of celebratory performance was front and centre in all its delicious redundancy.  I’ve never seen Shulgasser/Hoiby’s opera, but as I recall they do not minimize this element. The lovely ending of the Adès opera we saw at the Met last year has a decidedly ecological slant to it, with a sort of epilogue showing us the natural world of the island after Prospero et al have buggered off back to their homes in the civilized world. If one has no use for the celebratory (and sees nothing transcendent in this) then of course this makes sense, and is surprisingly satisfying, even as it is itself somewhat counter-discursive, an anti-Tempest.

I was playing through some of Parsifal at the piano again this morning, as Toronto eases slowly into spring, after yet another storm. I’m still enjoying the endorphins, the rush I get playing it. I think I’ve found at least part of the nub whereby Adès diverges from some composers & theatre artists, and it’s at the core of that divergence I spoke of in Tempest. Speaking of storms, it doesn’t matter that we have at least two Tempests, as there’s room for all these different views.

In Adès’s book Conversations with Tom Service the composer savages Wagner (and i addressed some reasons why this is at the very least a good career move a few days ago). I am thinking of my lunchtime conversation because there’s surely room for his viewpoint and mine, the same way that there’s room for those of us who go to church and have a powerful experience, and those who are unmoved. Unlike some, I believe God does not punish those who don’t believe, as their unbelief is its own reward. You don’t go to Hell for not believing, as “hell” or “Hell” is a primitive construct that’s nowhere to be found in the Bible, at least not in the variants we see in Medieval drama or in Dante.

Adès tells us very plainly in his book about his metaphysics, and that’s really all I needed to understand his response to Parsifal, and by implication, why his Tempest goes off in the fascinating direction it goes. I pair it in my mind with Boito’s paraphrase of Otello because in each case, one can see just how many possibilities are possible in the magic of adaptation.

In rejecting Wagner he says the following:

I mean, so much of Parsifal is dramatically absurd, which would be fine if the music was aware of the absurdity, but it is as if the music is drugged and we all have to pretend that it’s not entirely ridiculous. And it seems to me that a country that can take something as funny as Kundry seriously, this woman who sleeps for aeons and is only woken up by this horrible chord, a country that can seriously believe in anything like Parsifal without laughing, was bound to get into serious trouble. (Adès 15)

Please don’t accuse me of taking this out of context. Adès goes on quite a bit longer, but always taking huge pot-shots at the mysterious cultural assumptions underlying this, calling Wagner & his music a fungus, that the music works as though someone had drugged you. Sounds like maybe he resents its power? Or is even susceptible at some level? Don’t get me wrong, I am very impressed by much that Adès says, particularly in his understanding of the epistemology of music itself, his understanding of the magic that music has to prolong a moment, even if he seems to reify a great deal, and speak in metaphors from deep inside his head. But it’s okay, because they’re illuminations rather than evasions, whereby we come closer to his process and the music itself.

But the key that unlocks it all –his response to Wagner & his particular paraphrase of Shakespeare—came in a discussion far removed from music:

For some reason I started reading positivist philosophers when I was about fourteen. I can’t remember why. Around the same time I was being introduced to Schenkerian analysis at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and I suppose you might say it was a time when that part of my brain, such as it is, was beginning to function. To try to put the logical positivist idea very simply –I believe it starts from Wittgenstein: there are only two types of statement, types of sentence that you can say, apart from ordering or questioning. Those two types are an observation based on reality, or a tautology. There’s nothing else. And that made me think: ‘What does that leave us?’ If that’s true, there are no relationship, there’s nothing. Everything is simply dead, you put something down on paper and it’s dead. There’s no echo to anything. There’s just a kind of matt surface that soaks everything up. (Adès 65-6)

It seems fitting –in this Easter season particularly– that Adès first name is “Thomas”.  And so no wonder that Adès sees no point in Parsifal and ended Tempest as he did. The celebratory element of music –which is surely a tautology—doesn’t seem to reach him. I played the Good Friday music from Parsifal this morning precisely because it’s redundant & a tautology, to repeat something that’s an affirmation of something permanent.  It’s a curious piece the way I decode it these days (with the help of Girard’s production, as i look forward to the encore next Saturday at this time), sitting on the boundary of a church that affirms and heals, and a church that is itself human, deeply flawed, wounded, and in need of healing. Such transcendent possibilities bounce off a positivist. Yes the music is manipulative, and afterwards maybe I too feel “as though someone had slipped something into my drink” (Adès 60)

I’ll take my chances.

Posted in Books & Literature, Personal ruminations & essays | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

10 Questions for Stephen Costello

Posted on April 10, 2013 by barczablog

The fast-rising young tenor Stephen Costello has firmly established himself as one of the current generation’s most impressive artists.  He came to national attention in 2007 when, at age 26, he debuted at the Met’s season-opening night and was quickly invited to appear again that same season. In 2009, Costello won the prestigious Richard Tucker Award. He subsequently made his debuts at a number of the world’s most important opera houses and music festivals, including London’s Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, the Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Salzburg Festival, and the Vienna State Opera. In 2010 he inaugurated the role of Greenhorn in the Dallas Opera’s acclaimed world-premiere production of Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer’s Moby Dick.

His performances as Cassio in Verdi’s Otello, conducted by Riccardo Muti at the Salzburg Festival, were released on DVD in 2010 (Major/Naxos), and his Covent Garden debut in Linda di Chamounix was released on CD in March 2011 (Opera Rara).

Next week Stephen Costello will headline Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor at the Canadian Opera Company as Edgardo opposite soprano Anna Christy in a revival of David Alden’s ground-breaking English National Opera production.

It was in Lucia that the tenor made his house debut at New York’s Metropolitan Opera back in 2007, when his portrayal of Arturo so impressed Met Music Director James Levine that the young tenor found himself undertaking the opera’s male lead that same season. As Parterre.com reports, thanks to his “youth, sweet timbre, precocious poise, and emotional involvement” as Edgardo, it was Costello who “got the biggest ovation at the end” of the night.

Now the Richard Tucker Award-winner looks forward to reprising the role for all nine of the Canadian Opera Company’s upcoming performances between April 17 and May 24.

I ask Stephen Costello ten questions: five about himself and five more about his portrayal of Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor.

1) Are you more like your father or your mother?

Tenor Stephen Costello (photo: Dario Acosta)

Tenor Stephen Costello (photo: Dario Acosta)

I am not really sure. I am sort of a mix of both I think. I can’t complain I had great parents growing up.

Sure like all families we have had fights and I am sure I have said terrible things at one point, but I love them both very much. They have taught me to be polite and respectful, and never forget who you are and where you have come from. That also keeps me grounded as a person.

2) What is the best thing or worst thing about being a singer?

There are so many great things about being a singer. You get to travel all over the world, work with amazing artists and musicians. You also get to bring music and joy to audiences and people who really need to be entertained and forget about life for a while. These are the things that keep us in the business.

The worst part about being a singer is not seeing family and friends. I spend weeks away from my wife at a time and it is terrible. I have also missed watching my nephew Sean and Godson Patrick grow up. I have missed birthdays and Christmases. In this business you have to be willing to make sacrifices. That is the worst part of being a singer. A lot of people will say rejection, I think that makes you stronger. It is not seeing the ones we love, that’s what gets me.

3) Who do you like to listen to or watch?

I listen to everything and everyone. The more you listen to, the more ideas are in your head. I can watch YouTube for hours. I feel it is important to watch the stars of the past and the stars of today and see what makes them famous or special. I think we learn more as a singer watching others. I have been on a Bruno Mars kick for a while. I think he is so talented. I also love watching movies. Anything with Jimmy Stewart, Tom Hanks, or Johnny Depp, I am There. Would love to meet these guys and pick their brains.

[Is it my imagination or does Stephen Costello resemble the young Tom Hanks? see for yourself]

4) What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

I wish I had the ability to make a decision. I can make decisions on work, but nothing else. It is awful. I will end up trying to decide on lunch or dinner, and then it is too late. I also wish I could fly, but then again who doesn’t.

5) When you’re just relaxing and not working what is your favourite thing to do?

Hangout with friends and go to the movies. If I am not doing that I am getting in touch with family members and planning trips to see them all. I think family is the most important thing in a person’s life.

*******

Tenor Stephen Costello (photo: Dario Acosta)

Tenor Stephen Costello (photo: Dario Acosta)

Five more concerning Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor

1) How does portraying Edgardo challenge you?

Edgardo is a role that I had to grow into. The first time I had sung Edgardo was on stage at the Met and I think I was 25 or 26. I was so young and just hoping not to pass out from nerves. However, I had one of the greatest conductors of all-time leading the way in the pit, Maestro James Levine. Knowing that he believed in me and my ability gave me confidence and security as the night went on. Today having worked with him is something I will always remember and treasure.

Since then I have had a chance to get to know the role better. That happens with every role the more you sing it. It is a role that is not long, but very demanding. I have also had tonsil surgery so I have also had to re-vocalize the role as well.

I feel more comfortable with Edgardo and enjoy singing it very much. It is mostly realizing to not get excited and dramatic too soon. It is easy to get carried away in the wedding scene or the Wolf’s Crag scene, but you have to remember there is a very taxing tomb scene still to come. Pacing is the key to singing Edgardo.

2) What do you love about preparing Edgardo for the Canadian Opera Company production of Lucia.

I love working with this cast. It is a great group of people and never a dull moment. Plus the COC has been such an inviting company. I only wish that the weather was nicer!!!!!!
[The forecast for tomorrow is for a mix of rain & snow, with a wind-chill in the 20s Fahrenheit.  Hopefully it will be warmer by opening night next week]
I also enjoy working with a good friend and mentor Stephen Lord. He has helped me so much in this process. I look forward to working with him more and more.

3) Do you have a favourite moment in the opera?

I love the Wolf’s Crag scene in this production. I get to feel like a stunt man. They throw me around and pour water on my head, it is a lot of fun. Plus it is such a good duet.

4) How do you relate to Edgardo and the story of Lucia di Lammermoor as a modern man?

It is hard for me to relate to Edgardo. I was married into a family that has welcomed me with open arms. I think I relate to his passion for Lucia and his beliefs, but thankfully I have never had to feel his pain.

5) Is there a teacher, singer, actor or an influence that you especially admire?

I admire my teacher Bill Schuman very much. He has been by my side from the beginning and has believed in me from day one. He has also given me the tool to be in a career and now support my family. I will always be thankful and grateful to him. He is part of our family. I look forward to many more years together.

*******

Stephen Costello opens in Lucia di Lammermoor with the Canadian Opera Company on April 16th at the Four Seasons Centre.  Further info Stephen Costello 4 Credit Dario Acosta

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Topher and “The French Connection”

Posted on April 9, 2013 by barczablog

I couldn’t help understanding Topher Mokrzewski’s concert today at the Richard Bradshaw Auditorium (the intimate concert space in the upper lobby of the Four Seasons Centre) as a goodbye.  As is usual, the introduction told us a bit of the performer’s resume, but we were poignantly reminded that Topher’s moving up in the world.  The collaborative pianist, repetiteur & coach who worked on the COC’s Tristan und Isolde and who was again at the heart of musical matters with Opera Atelier’s Magic Flute that opened a few days ago, will be conductor of the Calgary Opera next season, and conducting a chamber ensemble in Against the Grain Theatre’s upcoming production Figaro’s Wedding, in a few short weeks.

Today? It was a very personal program of solo piano music, interspersing stunning 20th century classical piano masterpieces with jazz transcribed for solo piano.  The first triptych placed Mokrzewski’s paraphrase of Bill Evans’ “Peace Piece” between the first and eleventh of the Vingt regards sur l’enfant Jésus, underlining the jazziness of Messiaen, the classical purity of Evans, and the common ground they share:

  • extended harmonies, perhaps pointing to their common ancestor Debussy
  • exquisite use of the upper octaves of the piano
  • deceptive enharmonic effects

Of course a big part of the connection was Topher’s, not just in leading us to the resemblances, but in the way he executed the pieces.  The dissonances one hears in some readings of the Vingt Regards don’t need to be emphasized, Topher opting to let those extra notes sound quietly, suggesting overtones without blurring the luscious melodic lines.  His reading of the Messiaen is among the gentlest I’ve heard, pedaled just enough, very patiently allowing the bell-tones to sound and decay respectfully in the sonorous space.

It was as though Evans were the Christ Child, inserted between Pere et la Vierge (Father and virgin).

It appears to be a non-sequitur in a program of 20th century music

And if that seems tenuous, I can’t forget that I recently viewed such images at the AGO in their Florentine show, the AGO that employs someone near & dear to Topher.  He’s been so busy he often misses out on the AGO shows, so i am hoping he did manage to get to the Florentine show.  If he saw it then maybe this isn’t such a crazy understanding of the programming. Or maybe I am reading too much into it.

The next three items were the movements of Ravel’s Sonatine.  We were again hearing a composition that might have influenced Evans.  The middle movement ending reminds me of the middle of Gershwin’s three Preludes, a sudden blues note hanging there.  The outer movements offered more extended harmonies, surprise enharmonic shifts, plus a soupcon of Ravel’s neoclassicism.  Topher’s fingers were as pristine & shimmering as the light effects inside the RBA, where we seemed to float inside a crystalline box of light.

Pianist Topher Mokrzewski (photo: Chris Hutcheson)

Pianist Topher Mokrzewski (photo: Chris Hutcheson)

The last four pieces were a back and forth between Poulenc and Evans-via-Topher.  Where the juxtaposition the first time (in that triptych I imagined) mutually reinforced a jazzy mood, the effect was much more explosive this time, with emotions of every sort.

First was Poulenc’s Improvisation #7 in C major, a wonderfully understated piece in a similarly neo-classical place to the Ravel, but instead of flash, Poulenc offers a relaxed and entertaining charisma.  As if in response, Topher made his most exuberant and powerful gestures, in a reading of “On a Clear Day”.   In the RBA, on a clear day you really think you can see forever, or at least as far as Calgary.

But I really was thinking of goodbyes, as the final pair were the darkest of the whole program.  Am I projecting?  Poulenc’s Novelette #3 in E Minor went to a sad place, followed by the exquisite nostalgia of “Some Other Time”, from Topher’s hero Leonard Bernstein (via Evans).

Richard Bradshaw Auditorium (photo: Chris Hutcheson)

Richard Bradshaw Auditorium (photo: Chris Hutcheson)

Where has the time all gone to?
Haven’t done half the things we want to
Oh well, we ll catch up some other time

This day was just a token
Too many words are still unspoken
Oh well, we ll catch up some other time

Just when the fun is startin
Comes the time for partin
But let s just be glad for what we ve had
And what s to come

There s so much more embracin
Still to be done but time is racin
Oh well, we ll catch up some other time

There s so much more embracin
Still to be done but time is racin
Oh well, we ll catch up some other time

I don’t think I’m imagining something retrospective, bittersweet in its awareness that it’s time to move on to other things.  In this day and age one doesn’t need to fear that a musician is leaving: not when a career entails travel all over the globe.  But the relationships will change, as close friends at the COC, Opera Atelier, Against the Grain also move on to other adventures.

The program was remarkable, but that doesn’t nearly capture its magic, the delicacy of touch, the facial expressions, the erudite introductions at the podium… It’s amazing how much he already means to this city, how much he’s done.

I sincerely hope we’ll catch up some other time.

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Ten questions for Eve Egoyan

Posted on April 7, 2013 by barczablog

Eve Egoyan specializes in the performance of new works. Her intense focus, command of the instrument, insightful interpretations and unique programmes welcome audiences into unknown territory, bridging the gap between them and contemporary composers.

“I am passionate about all the pieces I have selected for this recital”, she explains. “Each is written in a unique compositional language that explores the piano in extraordinary ways. I am strengthening ties to composers whose work I have performed in the past and open myself to works by those who are new to me and to my community.“

Eve Egoyan returns to Glenn Gould Studio Friday April 19th to share the sound worlds of five unique composers. This distinctive recital program features Shiraz by the late Claude Vivier, SKRYABIN in itself by Michael Finnissy (Canadian première), and the world première of Ann Southam’s RETURNINGS II.  Egoyan also introduces two European composers to Canadian audiences, as she performs Piani, Latebre by Piers Hellawell (Ireland) and selections from Nocturnes by Taylan Susam (Netherlands).

The event also serves as the launch of “5”, an album comprised of première recordings by the beloved late Canadian composer Ann Southam.

I ask Egoyan ten questions: five about herself and five about her performances & recordings of new repertoire for the piano.

1) Are you more like your father or your mother?

I think I am more like my father. Both my parents are painters. My father’s work has gone through many phases in his life and he has worked in a variety of mediums. He also is inherently musical. Though he never studied an instrument, he has no hesitation picking one up and figuring out a tune.

2) What is the best thing / worst thing about being a pianist?

I love exploring sound through the piano – it is right there, an extremely accessible instrument. The best thing about being a pianist is listening to the piano’s range of colour and feeling enveloped by it.

3) Who do you like to listen to or watch?

I like to listen to a variety of music. I tend to listen to contemporary music mostly live, at concerts. At home, I listen to recordings of jazz and world music as well as sharing standard classical repertoire with my daughter.

4) What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

I wish I could speak many languages fluently. I wish I had an impeccable memory of everything I have read. I wish my work could have some clear political impact, had a voice. I feel that my art form, without words, cannot help change the world.

5) When you’re just relaxing and not working what is your favourite thing to do?

Going for long walks.

*******

Five more about Eve Egoyan’s performances & recordings of new repertoire.

1) What are the challenges you face with unfamiliar repertoire (aka “new music”) on the piano? (and please speak of the pieces)

  • Ann Southam (Canada) RETURNINGS II (2010)
    RETURNINGS II is a piece from my new disc “5”, works by Ann Southam discovered after her death, posthumous works. What fills our ears and draws us in towards the music is in the weave: the magnetic pull of the constant drone of a fifth in the lower voices; the unfolding of a dissonant row in the middle voices; and the colouring of warm harmonic chords on top.
  • Piers Hellawell (Ireland) Piani, Latebre (2010)
    This piece explores layered textures and hiding-places buried within larger phrases of the music.
  • Michael Finnissy (England) SKRYABIN in itself (2000-2008)
    This piece is a personal statement by the composer whose love of Skryabin’s music goes back many years. He says that “on some levels it permeates my ‘harmonic vocabulary’, which is to say that it has deeply coloured the overall sound of all my music”.
  • Taylan Susam (Netherlands) selections from Nocturnes (2009-)
    am interspersing these shorter works amongst the works on the first half of my programme. They are slowly descending linear works from the top to the bottom of the piano, each note heard for itself, focusing the listener to experience the details of register at the piano.
  • Claude Vivier (Canada) Shiraz (1977)
    Shiraz is a piece that explores range at the piano in extraordinarily dense ways within a particularly tightly woven music language.

The obvious challenge is an exciting one for me: hearing a work for the first time and eventually sharing it. I unravel a new work through practice then unveil it in performance. In these performances, a first hearing is an open space, a place without preconception, shared with my audience. I also really enjoy programming in a curatorial manner, mixing up the idea of programming, placing works in contexts where they are revealed in interesting ways. On this particular concert I will be playing the Nocturnes between pieces on the first half which will echo the form of the longest piece on the programme by Michael Finnissy which is in itself  the second half of the concert.

2) What do you love about  the repertoire you’re playing ?

I have met four of the composers on the programme. There is something in this, knowing the voice, eyes, presence of the creator of the music. I spend hours entering their world. Each piece on my programme addresses the piano in a unique way.

3) Do you have a favourite moment in the program?

I look forward to feeling the progress of the programme during the concert. I experience my concerts not only piece by piece but by overall effect. I have a sense of how it will be shared but never know what will be communicated most strongly until the concert happens.

4) How do you feel about the relevancy of music, particularly the music you play, as a modern citizen?

I perform contemporary music because I want to remain close to the creative source, my peers. I also play music by women, as a woman. There were very, very few women composers until recently. It is important for me to be part the possible equality that we have now. I also want to be part of keeping the art of composition alive, as a sophisticated creative medium, as well as keep my instrument, the piano, relevant, modern. I want to keep hearing what my peers find in it, keep exploring its vast sound world.

5) Is there a teacher or an influence you’d care to name that you especially admire?

Many of my teachers were wonderful influences however I never studied interpretation of new music with any of them. As a student, I studied the interpretation of standard concert repertoire. I admire and am inspired by the composers whose work I play.

******

Eve Egoyan Recital/CD Launch
“5” is available online and in stores as of April 30th.

www.eveegoyan.com

www.centrediscs.ca

Posted in Interviews | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

Fatal infidelity

Posted on April 7, 2013 by barczablog

When people meet and become interested in one another, they decide they want to be near one another.  Their growing rapport leads to growing closeness. And they make promises, some in words, others of a more legal sort.

Later people often break the promises.  The usual consequence is heart-break or upset, possibly reconciled in some way, or leading to the end of the formal ties, legal action, and splitting up.

There’s another kind of relationship, however, where the consequences of love are more intense.  When a human enters into a relationship with an animal, the disparities of financial power, of rights, of intelligence mean that for a human, there are none of the legal ramifications when a human changes their mind, compared to what happens with other sorts of marriages that go sour.

You get a kitten or a puppy.  The bonding is like nothing you’ve experienced.

It’s also like nothing the animal has ever experienced.  Their love is genuine because they have no agenda.

When a person brings an animal into their life they may do so ambivalently.  The parents obtaining a pet for a child see the excitement, but the child doesn’t really understand the context, the chores involved.  Hopefully the connection is permanent, with no misgivings, but sometimes people change their minds.

I don’t claim to understand this dynamic.  I only know what i experience de facto.  I live in a part of town where a lot of animals are released by their owners.  I think they believe it’s more humane to set an animal free, as though it were some sort of captive in chains who will happily run into the wild, not struggle (bewildered and confused), starve, freeze, and become prey for bigger nastier creatures, or end up as road-kill.   I can’t assess this one easily, when the dilemma is between alternatives that both bother me, that seem like two sorts of evil. Can I say it’s ‘better’ to take an animal and have it put down cleanly? but that still seems better than condemning them to suffer the way domesticated creatures suffer when released in this kind of misguided compassion.

There is a positive side to this conversation. One sometimes gets the chance to welcome such animals into one’s home. I’m fortunate to have welcomed cats into my house that were born in the wild, cats that were immediately fixed.   Their mother? Unfortunately we couldn’t catch up with her, and don’t believe she’s alive anymore.  But if you do the math, when a single fertile cat is released or born, the population multiplies quickly.

I recently had the pleasure & privilege of seeing an animal rescuer, showing some of his creatures to a group of children.  The occasion was educational for the kids, and a way to turn this heroic undertaking (which in his case isn’t puppies and kittens, but snakes, turtles, and a host of other creatures) into something far more positive. (click for further information on animal rescue especially if you have a pet that needs to find a place!)

I only wish people would recognize that when they bring an animal into their home, the animal doesn’t understand anything as temporary. Their love is unconditional, a lesson we could take to heart.

Posted in Animals, domestic & wild, Personal ruminations & essays | Tagged | Leave a comment

Adès Conversations

Posted on April 7, 2013 by barczablog

I am thinking a lot about the nature of criticism.  On a recent trip I sat on the airplane reading a fascinating book that’s called Conversations with Tom Service.  How fascinating could such a book be?

Ah but it’s a book BY Thomas Adès, the composer of The Tempest and Powder her Face  as well as lots of other compositions .  As with so much about this book, it feels totally backwards.

Adès is now famous, but didn’t do the obvious –referencing himself in the title—so we have a kind of ass-backwards suggestion,  as if the composer is saying  ‘oh I am not important’.

Yeah right.

This is a remarkably clever exercise in some respects, a wonderfully suggestive book that makes me feel alive and alert, even as I want to rail against much of what I read .  There’s a great deal in the book to stimulate you, even if it’s sometimes a stimulus comparable to a buzzing mosquito in your tent.  Sure, I hear the little bugger, buzz buzz buzz and it means I can’t sleep even if I want to smack it so hard that it’s off to meet its maker.  I am simultaneously irritated by this book and fascinated by the questions raised.  Often I want to say ‘yes good question to raise’ even as I completely reject the direction taken in the conversation by Adès, and while we’re at it, profoundly irritated by the aptly named Tom Service, whose questions never seem very challenging, but always sycophantic, supportive and at his, yes, service.   S-s-s…

The book is full of brilliant quotes even as I disagree with much of what I read.  As a rhetorical exercise this is a very good book.

I already had heard that Adès dissed Wagner, so I tried to come in with an open mind.  Several  of the things said about Wagner sound right.  But I am pretty sure that while Adès says he plays Liszt’s transcription of the Liebestod –and there are lots of us who do so—that Adès does not know Wagner from having listened to him, or not knowing him as a devoted fan.  The comments he makes suggest someone who has skimmed rather than really experienced Wagner.  So I can’t really be bothered with the arguments because they are superficial.  Sorry Mr A.

Adès is wonderfully ambitious at times in what he’s addressing.  And then when he speaks, it’s as though he’s understood that we need to climb to the top of the tower, and he’s blind, totally blind.  But thank you TA for asking us to climb to the top even if you forgot to put on your glasses.

It’s curious that the biggest target in Adès’s sights –Richard Wagner—arguably pursued the very same pathway.  As a young composer Wagner wrote pamphlets attacking the status quo, proposing reform even before there was any evidence he knew how to achieve such reforms.  So Wagner became an issue, a cause celebre, even though in some respects he was at odds with the status quo, and a total pain in the butt.   So I am simultaneously impressed with Adès’ approach even if I disagree with what he actually says.   At this point, is Adès perhaps at the same point as Wagner in the 1830s, having made a splash but with operas that haven’t stood the test of time…?

Adès disses Mahler and while dissing Wagner throws Parsifal onto the same scrap-heap where he already threw Tristan und Isolde.   Some really important issues come up, even as I loathe the conclusions he draws.  The word ‘enactment’ comes up, one I think that’s fundamental in the realm of opera.  How—having mentioned enactment—could he miss the point with Parsifal?  I don’t want to be inconsistent, because of course TA loves Les Troyens, an opera I adore, even as he disses Wagner & Verdi.

I am reminded of that old adage ‘there’s no such thing as bad publicity’.  Attacking Wagner as though you are his peer is a no-lose proposition, and as a self-promotional strategy pretty good actually.  If you hate what he said about Wagner, suddenly one becomes energized about Adès in opposition.  And of course, if you hate Wagner, you’re going to eat it up.

I’m a weirdo of course.  I had encountered Hoiby’s music for The Tempest and so i innocently wondered ‘who is this Adès dude and why isn’t it Hoiby’s Tempest being presented at the Met?’  I would have liked to see a discussion of the relative merits of the two adaptations, although from what i have seen, Adès’ version is remarkable, and the better of the two.  If Hoiby’s adaptation is shown to be poorer of the two, surely he benefits from being part of a conversation that is otherwise a monologue, Adès up in the stratosphere with Wagner & Mahler, rather than down in the trenches with Hoiby.

And so I speak out of two sides of my mouth.  I am consuming the book, reading it at a fast pace even as I rail, at much of what they discuss.   What IS criticism anyway?  Is this a conversation at all?

I will keep wondering.  And so i won’t deny that i like Adès book, even as i find myself arguing with it, railing against it.

Posted in Books & Literature, Reviews | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

10 Questions for Nina Lee Aquino

Posted on April 6, 2013 by barczablog

Nina Lee Aquino is in demand, as director, dramaturge and playwright.  She was a founding member of fu-Gen Asian Canadian Theatre, where she just finished directing their production of Lauren Yee’s Ching Chong Chinaman (review).  Aquino has recently been the Artistic Director of Cahoots Theatre Company and is currently co-Artistic Director of Factory Theatre.

Tarragon Theatre is her next stop, for a play called carried away on the crest of a wave, a new play from David Yee that begins previews April 16th, a play described this way on Tarragon’s site:

A singular, cataclysmic event–the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami–illustrates the interconnectedness of all things. From an escort in Thailand to a Catholic priest in India to a housewife in Utah, this play asks, “what happens when the events that tie us together are the same that tear us apart?”

I ask Nina Lee Aquino ten questions: five about her, and five about her next project, carried away on the crest of a wave.

1) Are you more like your father or your mother?

Nina and DadMy father.  I think I’m more like my father.

He seems to have a never ending patience with people.  Especially with difficult people.

He is quick to trust.

He has an uncanny ability to creatively troubleshoot problems.

He has one of the strongest senses of loyalty I know.

He has a swagger with the things that he’s so confident with.

He has the gift of being able to navigate through things…and people.

When he gets hurt, it’s a deep-cut kind of pain…one you don’t feel right way until you recognize it and it’s too late. And once you hurt him, he’s not going to allow himself to go through that again.

He is incredibly stubborn yet easily adaptable to whatever environment you throw him in.

He is quite generous.  To a fault even.

He doesn’t get angry much but when he does, it’s almost bottomless.  Same as when he is grieving.  So it takes a while for him to get out of these things.

Calculated ambition.  His drive and determination is always rooted in something.  He doesn’t go about things blindly.

He is quiet  but when you get him at the right moment, at the right time, he has a lot to say.  And so you know he’s been listening intently.

He has an impeccable memory but he can also be blurry on the details.  I don’t know if he does this on purpose.

He can be selfless and selfish at the same time.

He is one of those people that you can get to know in one day…and not know at all even though you’ve known him all his life.

Looking at this list…yeah…I think I am my father’s daughter.

2) What is the best thing / worst thing about being a theatre artist?

Best thing:
I get to change the world in my own way, on my own terms.

Theatre, I think, represents the best of who I am…so being a theatre artist feels like I get to be most myself.

I am part of a unique creative process that encourages discovery, exploration, risk, openness, generosity, failure and action.

Worst thing:
It can be very lonely at times.

3) Who do you like to listen to or watch?

I don’t have any particular favourite bands or singers but can be obsessed with specific songs that I’ll listen to over and over and over again.

And the songs that I like span from cheesy, mind-numbing pop music to ooga booga new age stuff.  Really, my ears are not ashamed.  I’ll like whatever evokes an emotion or memory in me.  I think that’s what makes my ears perk up to begin with.

But certain movie soundtracks are a “must have” for me when I am in a thinking mode of sorts. As I try (my best) to finish this questionnaire, the following music has already played over and over again on my Iphone:  the soundtracks to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Searching for Bobby Fisher, The Art of Getting By, Lars and the Real Girl and The Mission.

And right now, I am determined to finish watching the entire Star Trek: The Next Generation series on Netflix.  Don’t ask me why I need to do this right now but that’s all I want to watch on TV before I go to bed.  Like a ritual almost.  I am currently in season 4.  Captain Picard is my current hero.  So weird.

4) What ability or skill do you wish you had, that you don’t have?

Math skills.  I would trade anything in the universe to be able to understand numbers.  And work with them.  And play with them.

I love numbers.  I love the magic and power they hold.  And all the secrets of the universe.  Sadly,  numbers don’t love me.  I suck at math.  So much.  Except trigonometry.

5) When you’re just relaxing and not working what is your favourite thing to do?

Nowadays, I don’t really have any time to myself.  But when I do, I often find myself clothes and shoe shopping online.  Mind you, I don’t necessarily buy everything I put on my virtual shopping cart but I get immense joy in choosing whatever the hell I want to buy…even if it’s just pretend-buy!

And you can never ever have enough shoes.

*******

Five more about directing carried away on the crest of a wave

1) What are the challenges you face directing carried away on the crest of a wave?

The challenges so far:

The play is epic in scope and it’s set in many different places all over the world.

We have a cast of 7 playing over 15 characters.

The production uses real water.

It’s a world premiere, written by a living, breathing playwright who also happens to be one of my dearest friends in the whole universe.

2) What do you love about  the play ?

Everything about it.  It’s a David Yee play so it’s everything.  He’s my most favourite playwright of all time and will always be my number one collaborator.

Some time ago, someone asked me how I know if I am the right director for a piece.

If I can hear the music in the words…if the notes are so clear in the text — then I know that the script and I belong together.

When I read a David Yee play, I can almost immediately hear the music…even before anything is read out loud.

3) Do you have a favourite moment in the play?

The transitions. Those will always be the most favourite parts of any play that I am working on.

And transitions are always something I look out for when I go see a play.

I don’t know why or what is it about the idea of transitions that fascinate me.  But it does and it’s important to me.

It’s like…how a piano player turns the pages of the music sheet without having to stop playing the piano.

I want my scenes to never stop moving.  And I revel in figuring those moments out.

4) How do you feel about activist drama as a modern artist of the theatre?

I see theatre as a transformative thing.  It’s the kind of theatre I like.  It’s the kind theatre I am attracted to.  It’s the kind of theatre that I do and say yes to.

My kind of theatre has the ability to

change;

move;

shift;

fuck up expectations, turn preconceived notions on its side; quash assumptions

destroy and build;

heal or open wounds (in order to heal);

engage and alienate at the same time;

illuminate, enlighten;

confront;

and strengthen.

5) Is there a teacher or an influence you’d care to name that you especially admire?

Ric Knowles

Ric Knowles.  Everything about directing, I’ve learned from him…in his tiny little class that lasted for half a semester at the University of Guelph.

I feel like I’ve winged everything after that and learned through trial and error.  But the foundation of my directorial process was definitely built in his class.

And mind you, I almost barely passed it…because I didn’t do too well with the essay assignments he gave us and I barely said a word during class but it was the final assignment – which was to direct a scene from a play of our choice – that I realized what I was capable of doing as a director.  I didn’t know how much of what he was sharing with us in his class  — from his methods on working with actors, his philosophy on collaborating with designers and his unrelenting, incessant encouragement to fearlessly use our imagination –  really stuck with me until I started directing my first scene.

So I guess I was really listening to him after all.   Like really listening.

********

carried away on the crest of a wave begins previews April 16th at Tarragon Theatre.  CLICK for more information.

Posted in Interviews | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Coming of Age Stories

Posted on April 5, 2013 by barczablog

With the passage of time, people get older.  The battles that consumed them in their youth are set aside, as they seek stability and begin to contemplate their legacy.  In that gradual coming into focus, frivolity falls by the wayside in favour of meaningful action.

This could be said of Tamino in Mozart’s The Magic Flute,  tenor Colin Ainsworth, who plays Tamino in Opera Atelier’s revival of Mozart’s opera, and also Marshall Pynkoski, artistic director of Opera Atelier & the creative force behind that production.  It’s lovely how uniformly this pattern is being enacted.  And at a time when Toronto seems very conservative to my eye maybe they’re all in the right place at the right time.

At one time Opera Atelier and Pynkoski were the edgy young turks, bringing a brash spirit to historically informed productions of opera.  Often outrageous, never dull, Opera Atelier displayed a sophomoric delight in everything they staged.  They added Mozart operas to their repertoire (that had been mostly baroque masterpieces), always supported by Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra’s warm & gentle sound.

And so, as the years continue to go by, I wonder whether it’s them (changing) or it’s me (aging).  All of us have changed.   I could be wrong, but I suspect Opera Atelier will inherit the disaffected deserters (of whom I have met a few), disillusioned by the high percentage of Regietheater (or “director’s theatre”, productions that overlay so much interpretation that the original work may be hard to discern) from the COC.  While I hope those I spoke of are the exception, it all works to Opera Atelier’s advantage, as they’re no longer radicals, having found the mainstream (or it has found them by default). 

Ainsworth’s Tamino has a wonderful vocal heft to it even though Ainsworth still looks the callow youth onstage.   (and no signs that he or anyone else was holding their voice in reserve for opening night on Saturday).  I saw the same remarkable combination of skills –great voice, physique and acting ability—on display in Against the Grain’s production of The Diary of One Who Disappeared by Leoš Janáček roughly a month ago.  The voice seems effortless, direct, powerful, and seems bigger than ever.

Pynkoski made a pre-show cautionary announcement about the language of the libretto, which indeed drew some astonished responses from the high-school students sitting near me at the dress rehearsal, unprepared for the politically incorrect lingo.

The production is solid from top to bottom, well sung by soloists & chorus, and gorgeously played by Tafelmusik Orchestra, in a tight reading from conductor David Fallis that is above all intelligible, and very musical.

Baritone Olivier LaQuerre (Photo by Helen Tansey)

Olivier LaQuerre’s charming & sensitive Papageno received the lion’s share of the adoration from the wooting masses of teenagers in attendance, although Ambur Braid’s larger than life Queen of the Night, and Carla Huhtanen as Papagena / First Lady were also favourites.  Aaron Ferguson was one of the most dynamic Monostatos’ imaginable, with LaQuerre exploiting the vaudevillian element of the text.  And Pynkoski turned as he so often does to Curtis Sullivan, as the role of the Speaker is expanded to become the straight man dogging Papageno on his initiation in the second act.

The sense that the company and its artistic director have come of age begins with Pynkoski’s marvelous program note, where he addresses the whole question of revivals, and how we are thereby transformed.

Together.

~~~~~~~

Opera Atelier’s revival of The Magic Flute opens Saturday night at the Elgin Theatre, running until the following weekend.   For details and ticket information, please click.

POSTSCRIPT….

I realize — the morning after– that i allude to something without explaining myself, namely the program note. Last night during intermission i had just read this when a friend accosted me, and i had to literally compose myself, as i’d been very moved by what i had read. Follow this link and go to “Message from the Co-Artistic Directors”

Posted in Reviews | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Late Mozart 2: caveats

Posted on April 4, 2013 by barczablog

Mozart censored? Operas did sometimes have to clear hurdles in the century of their creation, but actually I was thinking about the censure of a modern audience.

Opera Atelier’s production ot The Magic Flute opens this weekend at the Elgin Theatre. Click picture for more info.

And so I continue to ramble about late Mozart, inspired by a happy convergence in Toronto musical scheduling of the three great works of his last year, namely his Requiem, La Clemenza di Tito and The Magic Flute (opening this weekend at the Elgin Theatre).  Going back to last summer, when I was consumed with Beethoven’s piano sonatas due to my fascination with Stewart Goodyear’s epic marathon (suddenly on my mind again because i’ve heard that he’s going to do it again in June, in New Jersey), I’ve sought to connect the musical dots, to seek ways whereby a series of events could be like a journey, however tenuous the metaphor.  This is easier with the big guys –Beethoven, Mozart, Wagner—than with the more obscure voices, the ‘itinerary’ a matter of serendipitous choice by the powers that be.  With the influential composers one doesn’t have to look hard to see connections, because minor composers’ work is like footnotes to the great ones.  Poulenc and Parsifal (playing on my PC right now) have a few things in common beside their first initial, even if the segue isn’t an obvious one.

The first part concerned “the Good”.  At times in Magic Flute the whole story seems to slam on the brakes, stopping to illustrate something about the nature of good, the nature of life.  And Clemenza di Tito is one big moral lesson, seeking to reassure us that we can trust the absolute monarch (at least a good one like Titus).  Questions of morality and its signification seemed to be central to both of the operas.

I want to add some caveats: the fine print, if you will, in the legal document.  Not all is sweetness and light, but you knew that.  A moral lesson would be dull indeed without some transgression.  Clemenza di Tito? Never mind those splendid examples of good behaviour.  The pair of colourful characters who make the story happen colour outside the lines, namely Vitellia and Sesto.

The most interesting characters in Magic Flute?  Not Prince Tamino nor Princess Pamina.  Not Sarastro, the wise priest overseeing the temple of wisdom.  Speaking of wisdom, Mozart & Schikaneder realized that such solemnity needs the fun of someone breaking the rules, which is why the librettist created such a fun role for himself: Papageno.

And so we come to the first caveat.  If you’re one of the chosen you will likely find happiness.  Tamino and Pamina are of a special class.  Papageno? He’s not up to the challenge, so he can’t make it to the very pinnacle of enlightenment; but a simpler and earthier happiness (less about silence and denial, and more about indulging in the pleasures of life) is available to him.

And then there are two other characters, on the outside looking in.  Indeed, that’s precisely how we see them in their last entrance near the end of the opera, as outsiders trying to gain access to a place reserved only for the initiated.  These two are the sticking point, the deal-breakers you can’t introduce to your in-laws (as much as you love the Prince & Princess) who would embarrass you.  Or maybe they’d lure you away from seminary and get you to run away to join the circus.  

For both of these operas, the good can’t be understood without the transgressors.  Tito needs Vitellia and Sesto, just as Sarastro only comes into focus with the help of the Queen of the Night and Monostatos.  If these characters are bad (and i am not about to say that they are), it’s a fun & flamboyant badness that makes for the most exquisite moments in each opera.

There’s an additional caveat or two, particularly when we imagine Magic Flute for a modern audience.  I spoke of a kind of modern censorship, thinking of how Diane Paulus’s version at the COC a few years ago dodged the political objections in the text as written.  Sarastro & his brethren valorize a kind of wisdom that they associate with manhood, while being so outspoken against women as to seem decidedly misogynistic.  And then there’s Monostatos, whose race is presented as though his colour were somehow a moral issue.

It’s curious that an opera so concerned with being virtuous should be so transgressive according to our modern understanding of good.  In the fourth dimension (time) morality is so relative as to be called into question. Do we know what good is? Perhaps we get some idea, in staring at all these options.

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