BSO/Classical New England — 2024/11/23

 I forgot to post last week  I had attended on Friday afternoon, and it was a good concert: a Mozart piano concerto and Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony, "Pathétique." Catch the replay on Monday evening if you can,

Today we're getting an "encore broadcast" of the concert from last April 6, which WCRB describes as follows:

Saturday, November 23, 2024
8:00pm

The first program in the BSO’s Music for the Senses festival centers on Alexander Scriabin’s Prometheus, Poem of Fire, in which the composer depicts the evolution of human consciousness. Also on the program are Anna Clyne’s Color Field, inspired in part by the vibrancy of the Mark Rothko 1961 painting Orange, Red, Yellow, Richard Wagner’s ecstatic Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan und Isolde, and Franz Liszt’s Prometheus.

Andris Nelsons, conductor
Yefim Bronfman, piano
Tanglewood Festival Chorus

Anna CLYNE Color Field
Richard WAGNER Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde
Franz LISZT Prometheus
Alexander SCRIABIN Prometheus, Poem of Fire, for piano, color organ, chorus, and orchestra

This concert was originally broadcast on April 6, 2024, and is no longer available on demand.

To hear a preview of Scriabin's Prometheus, Poem of Fire with pianist Yefim Bronfman, use the player above, and read the transcript below.

TRANSCRIPT (lightly edited for clarity):

The program notes are linked at the BSO's own performance detail page:

Andris Nelsons, conductor 
Yefim Bronfman, piano 
Anna Gawboy, lighting research
Justin Townsend, lighting designer
Tanglewood Festival Chorus
 James Burton, conductor

Anna CLYNE Color Field 
WAGNER Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde
Intermission
LISZT Prometheus 
SCRIABIN Prometheus, Poem of Fire, for piano, color organ, chorus, and orchestra

This week's performances by the Tanglewood Festival Chorus are supported by the Alan J. and Suzanne W. Dworsky Fund for Voice and Chorus.

A program of color: It opens with Anna Clyne’s Color Field, inspired in part by the vibrancy of a Mark Rothko painting. Followed by Richard Wagner’s ecstatic Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde, and Franz Liszt’s Prometheus. The program closes with Alexander Scriabin’s Prometheus, Poem of Fire. When Alexander Scriabin wrote Prometheus, Poem of Fire, he conceived of a “light organ” that would project colors corresponding to his music. Prometheus premiered in 1911 with future BSO Music Director Serge Koussevitzky, whose 150th birthday year we celebrate in 2024.

I wrote about it at the time (with several typos). Presumably the links to the reviews still work. As you can see, the reviews were hardly raves, but apart from the Wagner (which is a staple on WCRB's regular programming) this is not frequently performed music, so it may be worth listening just to experience something unfamiliar.

I'm guessing that the reason WCRB isn't giving us the live concert is that one of the pieces is accompanied by "lush projections of based on images from [Georgia] O' Keeffe's lifes and work." If I'.m right it's ironic that they decided to replace it with another concert which includes background color changes.

Tanglewood — 2024/07/20-21

 This evening we get Wagner at his most tedious (except for Siegfried's funeral march) and tomorrow we get interesting, beautiful, and popular selections. First, here's WCRB telling us about this evening:

Saturday, July 20, 2024
8:00 PM

Andris Nelsons leads the BSO and an all-star cast, featuring soprano Christine Goerke and tenor Michael Weinius, in the epic conclusion of Wagner’s The Ring of the Nibelung, Act III of Götterdämmerung, or Twilight of the Gods

Boston Symphony Orchestra
Andris Nelsons, conductor
Christine Goerke, soprano (Brünnhilde)
Amanda Majeski, soprano (Gutrune)
Michael Weinius, tenor (Siegfried)
James Rutherford, baritone (Gunther)
David Leigh, bass (Hagen)
Diana Newman, Renée Tatum, Catherine Martin (Rhine maidens)
Neal Ferreira and Alex Richardson, tenors; David Kravitz and Markel Reed, baritones; Erik Tofte and Jared Werlein, bass-baritones; Leo Radosavljevic, bass (Vassals)

WAGNER Götterdamerung, Act III

The BSO performance detail page has this to say:

Tanglewood

Koussevitzky Music Shed, Lenox/Stockbridge, MA 

Boston Symphony Orchestra
Andris Nelsons, conductor
John Matsumoto Giampietro, staging coordinator
Christine Goerke, soprano (Brünnhilde)
Amanda Majeski, soprano (Gutrune)
Michael Weinius, tenor (Siegfried) |
James Rutherford, baritone (Gunther)
David Leigh, bass (Hagen) 
Diana Newman, Renée Tatum, and Annie Rosen (Rhine maidens)
Neal Ferreira and Alex Richardson, tenors; David Kravitz and Markel Reed, baritones; Erik Tofte and Jared Werlein, bass-baritones; Leo Radosavljevic, bass (Vassals)

WAGNER Götterdämmerung, Act III

Sung in German with English Supertitles

Please note that there is no intermission in this concert. Duration is about 90 minutes.

Wagner’s Ring Cycle is a masterpiece of art that weaves a fabric of passion, beauty, betrayal, tragedy, and redemption into the tapestry of myth and legend, all set to some of the most stirring, powerful music ever composed.

Join Andris Nelsons, the BSO, and an all-star cast for the peerless conclusion of Wagner’s massive, epic opera Götterdämmerung.

Tonight's concert is generously supported by Rabbis Rachel Hertzman and Rex Perlmeter.

The program note tries to give the whole story of the Ring cycle, which is probably necessary to understand the action of tonight's show. Unfortunately, they don't give the actual text. You'll have to find that for yourself somehow if you want it.

When i say "Wagner at his most tedious," I mean the whole Ring cycle is pretty tedious, but "Siegfried" and "Götterdämmerung" are especially so in my personal opinion — along with "Tristan und Isolde" and "Parsifal." Opinions may vary. Maybe you'll like it. But one evening I was listening to the whole opera and was nearly jolted out of my chair by the beginning of the funeral march. You'll recognize it if you listen.

Then we come to Sunday evening's broadcast of the afternoon concert of the Tanglewood Center Orchestra (not the BSO). Again WCRB gives the outline:

Sunday, July 21, 2024
7:00 PM

Andris Nelsons leads the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra to the stars in Strauss’s Also sprach Zarathustra and on a journey back home to New England through Ives’s Three Places in New England. Emanuel Ax returns to Tanglewood for Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3, a musically complex work that takes the listener through light and shadow, hope and despair.

Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra
Andris Nelsons, conductor
Emanuel Ax, piano

Charles IVES Three Places in New England
Ludwig van BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 3
Richard STRAUSS Also sprach Zarathustra

See also the BSO performance detail page for the links to the program notes (especially the Ives) and this overall description:

Tanglewood

Koussevitzky Music Shed, Lenox/Stockbridge, MA 

Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra 
Andris Nelsons, conductor 
Emanuel Ax, piano

IVES Three Places in New England 
BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 3
Intermission
STRAUSS Also sprach Zarathustra

Emanuel Ax returns to Tanglewood for Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3, a work of intense emotionality and complex musicality that takes the listener through light and shadow, hope and despair.

Andris Nelsons leads the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra to the stars in Strauss’ palatial Also sprach Zarathustra, and on a journey back home to New England through Ives’ textured Three Places in New England, which tells three very different stories of historic events and landmarks throughout the region.

The 2024 Leonard Bernstein Memorial Concert is supported by generous endowments established in perpetuity by Dr. Raymond and Hannah H. Schneider, and Diane H. Lupean

 Ives is kind of "quirky" and maybe not your proverbial cup of metaphorical tea, but I've become fascinated with much of his stuff, and I definitely want to hear the "Three Places in New England" again. With the Beethoven and Strauss, we're in a more familiar musical style. (I could do without the Strauss, but that's just me. Most concert-goers seem to like it.)

So give it all a try, despite my negativity. I'll be listening.

BSO — 2024/04/06

 Tonight the BSO gives a program I don't care much about, but you may find it interesting. Here's the scoop from WCRB's webpage:

Saturday, April 6, 2024
8:00pm

Encore broadcast on Monday, April 15

The first program in the BSO’s Music for the Senses festival centers on Alexander Scriabin’s Prometheus, Poem of Fire, in which the composer depicts the evolution of human consciousness. Also on the program are Anna Clyne’s Color Field, inspired in part by the vibrancy of the Mark Rothko 1961 painting Orange, Red, Yellow, Richard Wagner’s ecstatic Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan und Isolde, and Franz Liszt’s Prometheus.

Andris Nelsons, conductor
Yefim Bronfman, piano
Tanglewood Festival Chorus

Anna CLYNE Color Field
Richard WAGNER Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde
Franz LISZT Prometheus
Alexander SCRIABIN Prometheus, Poem of Fire, for piano, color organ, chorus, and orchestra

To hear a preview of Scriabin's Prometheus, Poem of Fire with pianist Yefim Bronfman, use the player above, and read the transcript below.

TRANSCRIPT (lightly edited for clarity):

Brian McCreath I'm Brian McCreath at Sym

You'll note that apart from the opening piec, it's all pre WWI music.

As always, we get more from the BSO's performance detail page:

Boston Symphony Orchestra

Symphony Hall, Boston, MA 

Andris Nelsons, conductor 
Yefim Bronfman, piano 
Anna Gawboy, lighting research
Justin Townsend, lighting designer
Tanglewood Festival Chorus
 James Burton, conductor

Anna CLYNE Color Field 
WAGNER Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde
Intermission
LISZT Prometheus 
SCRIABIN Prometheus, Poem of Fire, for piano, color organ, chorus, and orchestra

This week's performances by the Tanglewood Festival Chorus are supported by the Alan J. and Suzanne W. Dworsky Fund for Voice and Chorus.

A program of color: It opens with Anna Clyne’s Color Field, inspired in part by the vibrancy of a Mark Rothko painting. Followed by Richard Wagner’s ecstatic Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde, and Franz Liszt’s Prometheus. The program closes with Alexander Scriabin’s Prometheus, Poem of Fire. When Alexander Scriabin wrote Prometheus, Poem of Fire, he conceived of a “light organ” that would project colors corresponding to his music. Prometheuspremiered in 1911 with future BSO Music Director Serge Koussevitzky, whose 150th birthday year we celebrate in 2024.

See the linked program notes for more information about each piece.

The review in the Intelligencer tells about what went on with the colors, but the reviewer was not very pleased with the perforance, especially the Wagner. The Globe was tepid.

I'll probably have a lie-down with the radio on while this plays, and loook forward to hearing the rebroadcast on April 15.

BSO/Classical New England — 2024/02/24

 This eveningwe reeturn with WCRB to that thrilling evening of yesteryear — February 4, 2023, to be exact — for an enocre broadcast of the BSO in excerpts from "Tannhäuser." Further detail is here from WCRB:

Saturday, February 24th, 2024
8:00 PM

In this encore broadcast, Andris Nelsons leads the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Tanglewood Festival Chorus, and a stellar lineup of soloists in highlights from Richard Wagner’s Tannhäuser.

Andris Nelsons, conductor
Amber Wagner, soprano (Elisabeth)
Marina Prudenskaya, mezzo-soprano (Venus)
Klaus Florian Vogt, tenor (Tannhäuser)
Christian Gerhaher, baritone (Wolfram)
Tanglewood Festival Chorus

ALL-WAGNER
Overture and “Venusberg Music” from Tannhäuser
Tannhäuser, Act III

Hear a preview with Andris Nelsons in the audio player above, and read the transcript below:

This concert was originally broadcasted on Feb 4th, 2023 and is no longer available on demand.

TRANSCRIPT:

Brian McCreath I'm Brian McCreath at Symphony Hall with Andris Nelsons, who's back in Boston to lead a concert of excerpts from Tannhäuser, Wagner's opera. Andris, thanks for your time today. I appreciate it.

I posted about it at the time, and I assume the links there are still working.

It's good music, I think, and worth listening to. As I commented then about the story: "The thing is, the opera is fiction using the historical characters of the great medieval poet Wolfram von Eschenbach, Saint Elizabeth of Thuringia (also known as Elizabeth of Hungary), and the poet/minstrel Tannhäuser. There was also a jubilee year in which pilgrims flocked to Rome. But basically, the opera is a pretty good story of sin, love, and redemption." There probably won't be a further rebroadcast on Monday, March 4, since they don't customarily do that with the "encore broadcasts." So listen this evening if you can.

Tanglewood — 2023/07/22

Saturday, July 22nd, 2023
8:00 PM

David Afkham leads the BSO at Tanglewood in Mozart’s Jupiter Symphony and his Piano Concerto No. 25 with soloist Martin Helmchen, as well as Wagner’s Siegfried Idyll.

David Afkham, conductor 
Martin Helmchen, piano

Richard WAGNER Siegfried Idyll
Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART Piano Concerto No. 25 in C, K.503

MOZART Symphony No. 41, Jupiter 

BSO/Classical New England — 2023/05/13

Now that the regular BSO season is ended, WCRB is giving us "encore broadcasts." This evening's is from last July at Tanglewood, as they tell us here:

Saturday, May 13, 2023
8:00 PM

Karina Canellakis returns to the Berkshires to lead the Boston Symphony in Rachmaninoff’s “Symphonic Dances,” and Emanuel Ax is the soloist in Chopin’s dramatic Piano Concerto No. 2.

Karina Canellakis, conductor 
Emanuel Ax, piano

Richard WAGNER Prelude to Lohengrin, Act 1
Frédéric CHOPIN Piano Concerto No. 2
RACHMANINOFF Symphonic Dances

This concert was originally broadcast on July 22, 2022 and is no longer available on demand.

I posted about it at the time, and the BSO performance detail page is still available.

There was no review in the Intelligencer, but the Globe had a review of the whole weekend, and the reviewer liked the show on the 22nd.

Bottom line: it's worth listening to, IMO.

BSO — 2023/02/04

 This evening we get to hear large swaths of Wagner's opera "Tannhäuser." I saw a Metropolitan Opera performance when it was transmitted to theaters several years ago, and I think it's a good show. Here's how WCRB describes the concert:

Saturday, February 4, 2023
8:00 PM

Encore broadcast on Monday, February 13

Andris Nelsons leads the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Tanglewood Festival Chorus, and a stellar lineup of soloists in highlights from Richard Wagner’s Tannhäuser.

Andris Nelsons, conductor
Amber Wagner, soprano (Elisabeth)
Marina Prudenskaya, mezzo-soprano (Venus)
Klaus Florian Vogt, tenor (Tannhäuser)
Christian Gerhaher, baritone (Wolfram)
Tanglewood Festival Chorus

ALL-WAGNER
Overture and “Venusberg Music” from Tannhäuser
Tannhäuser, Act III

To hear a preview with Andris Nelsons, use the player above and read the transcript below.

TRANSCRIPT:

Brian McCreath I'm Brian McCreath at Symphony Hall with Andris Nelsons, who's back in Boston to lead a concert of excerpts

Next we look at the BSO performance detail page, which has links links to the very helpful program notes:

Andris Nelsons and the BSO’s continuing tradition of performing opera in concert brings us excerpts from Richard Wagner’s early opera Tannhäuser, which had its premiere in Dresden in 1845. A German minstrel-knight, Tannhäuser (tenor Klaus Florian Vogt), struggles to reject the world’s sensual pleasures, represented by the "Venusburg Music" of the opera’s Act I. He is redeemed by the pure love of Elisabeth, sung by Amber Wagner, and with the help of the wise minstrel Wolfram, sung by Christian Gerhaher.

Sung in German with English supertitles

This week’s performances by the Tanglewood Festival Chorus are supported by the Alan J. and Suzanne W. Dworsky Fund for Voice and Chorus.

---

Andris Nelsons, conductor
Amber Wagner, soprano (Elisabeth)
Klaus Florian Vogt, tenor (Tannhäuser)
Christian Gerhaher, baritone (Wolfram)
Marina Prudenskaya, soprano (Venus)
Tanglewood Festival Chorus, James Burton, conductor

ALL-WAGNER program

Overture and Venusberg Music from Tannhäuser (25)

---- Intermission----

Tannhäuser Act III (60)

The reviews are both favorable. The Globe thinks the opening of the overture was too slow. The Intelligencer is similar, but the reviewer garbles the story line.

The thing is, the opera is fiction using the historical characters of the great medieval poet Wolfram von Eschenbach, Saint Elizabeth of Thuringia (also known as Elizabeth of Hungary), and the poet/minstrel Tannhäuser. There was also a jubilee year in which pilgrims flocked to Rome. But basically, the opera is a pretty good story of sin, love, and redemption.

If you'd like to follow along with the libretto, here's a link. http://www.murashev.com/opera/Tannhäuser_libretto_English_German

I recommend listening this evening at 8:00, Boston Time, and on Febreuary 13, also at 8:00.

Tanglewood — 2022/07/22-24

 Friday, July 22, 2022.

Here's WCRB's "just the facts" announcement of what we'll hear via their station this evening from Tanglewood:

Friday, July 22, 2022
8:00 PM

Tonight at 8, Karina Canellakis returns to the Berkshires to lead the Boston Symphony in Rachmaninoff’s “Symphonic Dances,” and Emanuel Ax is the soloist in Chopin’s dramatic Piano Concerto No. 2.

Karina Canellakis, conductor 
Emanuel Ax, piano

Richard WAGNER Prelude to Lohengrin, Act 1
Frédéric CHOPIN Piano Concerto No. 2
RACHMANINOFF Symphonic Dances

The Wagner is kind of thrilling. We had (I still have somewhere) recordings of the Chopin piano concertos Dad liked them. I don't remember this one specifically, but both have some good music in them. The Rachmaninoff is okay, not on my top 100 list, but definitely tolerable. As you'd expect with dances, it's got a strong beat.

For further information, including program notes and performer information, check out the BSO's own performance detail page. 

Saturday, July 23, 2022.

On Saturday, we get the following:

Saturday, July 23, 2022
8:00 PM

Saturday night at 8pm, in a concert by the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, Andris Nelsons leads Gustav Mahler’s meditation on grief and triumph, and soprano Christine Goerke sings a rarely heard work by Berlioz.

Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra 
Andris Nelsons, conductor 
Christine Goerke, soprano 

Hector BERLIOZ The Death of Cleopatra 
Gustav MAHLER Symphony No. 5

You can usually count on Berlioz for good stuff. Mahler can be long winded, but the music is pretty good.

Here's the link to the BSO performance detail page, where you can find what they think about it.

 Sunday, July 24, 2022.

The BSO rounds out the weekend with this concert on Sunday:

Sunday, July 24, 2022
7:00 PM (delayed broadcast of 2:30 PM concert)

Sunday night at 7pm, soprano Latonia Moore sings George Walker’s BSO-commissioned “Lilacs,” and Seong-Jin Cho is the soloist in Brahms’s mighty Piano Concerto No. 2, all led by Andris Nelsons.

Andris Nelsons, conductor
Latonia Moore, soprano
Seong-Jin Cho, piano

William Grant STILL In Memoriam: The Colored Soldiers Who Died for Democracy 
George WALKER Lilacs
Johannes BRAHMS Piano Concerto No. 2

"Everybody" like Brahms better than I do, so don't let me dissuade you from listening, even though I think I'll like the Still piece better. I have no idea about Walker's "Lilacs," but with new compositions "you pays your money (or listens in) and takes your chances." Unfortunately, the performance detail page doesn't seem to have a full program note for "Lilacs."

Remember that the Sunday concert broadcast begins at 7:00, Boston Time, not 8:00 as on Friday and Saturday.

BSO/Classical New England — 2020/03/28

This week's concert is an "encore presentation" of the all-Wagner concert of April 7,  2018. The performance detail page had this to say about it:

Richard Wagner's Tristan und Isolde is a hymn to the intense spirituality that accompanies transcendent earthly love. Musically and operatically innovative, it remains a watershed in the history of music; to hear its music live is an unforgettable experience. Andris Nelsons leads an outstanding cast of singers-including the great German tenor Jonas Kaufmann (taking the role of Tristan for the very first time) and the acclaimed Finnish soprano Camilla Nylund-in Act II of the opera, in which the title characters come together under the spell of a love potion, only to be discovered by King Marke, Tristan's uncle and lord, to whom Isolde is betrothed. The concert opens with one of Wagner's few purely instrumental works still heard today, the Siegfried Idyll, which he composed in 1869 and had performed as a surprise birthday gift for his wife Cosima. The "Siegfried" of the title is the couple's son, born the previous June, though Wagner later incorporated some of the Idyll's music into the third of his Ring operas, Siegfried.

(Some emphasis added.)

The reviews in the Globe and the Intelligencer are mildly unenthusiastic about Nylund and Kaufmann's performances. Still, it's a chance to hear them sing the roles for the first time anywhere.

As I've commented before, I generally find Wagner's writing for singers dull and uninteresting (after "Flying Dutchman, that is), while the orchestral music can be quite enjoyable. So I won't be terribly disappointed to have my brother's phone call from Japan take me away from most of the operatic performance. Based on the reviews, though, it would be good to be through in time to hear King Marke's monologue toward the end. And the Siegfried Idyll, which opens the show is pleasant listening.

You can hear it and decide for yourself by listening to WCRB tonight at 8:00, Boston Time. The usual rebroadcast  — on the second Monday following the concert — won't happen. They're giving a different BSO concert every evening except Sunday for the next three weeks. Check the website for details.

BSO/Classical New England — 2018/12/08

As usual, the Boston Symphony takes December off, and the Boston Pops (with many BSO musicians) performs Holiday Pops concerts. So this week's concert over WCRB is a rebroadcast of the concert given at Tanglewood on Friday, July 13, of this year. I wrote a little bit about it in advance. Here's how the BSO's program detail page described it:

Acclaimed English pianist Paul Lewis, who has given several memorable performances with the BSO in recent seasons, joins the orchestra for Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 27 in B-flat, K.595, the composer's final work in the genre. BSO Assistant Conductor Moritz Gnann, who conducts the performance, also leads the orchestra in Wagner's Siegfried Idyll and Schumann's Symphony No. 3,Rhenish. The symphony's subtitle refers to the mighty Rhine, the river that has inspired so many great works throughout music history, and the piece contains some of Schumann's most colorful and exuberant music, as well as some of his most accomplished writing for full orchestra.

(Some emphasis added.)

The Wagner opens the concert, followed by the Mozart, which has always been a favorite of mine. All three works are worth hearing, IMO, so I encourage you to listen to WCRB this evening at 8:00, Boston time, and enjoy.

WCRB doesn't say that they will give this concert again on December 17, so plan on listening tonight. But they do promise us a rebroadcast of last week's Christmas Oratorio. That will be on December 10 at 8:00. It's also worth hearing.

Tanglewood — 2018/07/06-08, 13-15 —Double Post

The Boston Symphony's Tanglewood season opens this evening, July 6, and runs through August 26 — eight glorious weekends with major concerts* on Friday and Saturday evenings at 8:00 p.m. and Sunday afternoons at 2:30. WCRB broadcasts and streams them all; Friday and Saturday concerts are transmitted virtually live, and the Sunday concerts are given a delayed transmission at 7:00 p.m.

*There are also many other performances given during the week by those who are attending as students or guest artists.

Since I'll be away from my computer late next week, I'll preview this weekend and next in this post. Here goes!


Friday, July 6, 2018.  On the orchestra's performance detail page we read:

Opening Night at Tanglewood with Lang Lang

Tanglewood 

Koussevitzky Music Shed - Lenox, MA - View Map

The Robert and Jane Mayer Conert

Andris Nelsons and the Boston Symphony Orchestra open their 2018 Tanglewood season with a gala performance featuring global superstar pianist Lang Lang. Opening the concert is the overture to Mozart's The Magic Flute, followed by the composer's Piano Concerto No. 24 in C minor, K.491, featuring Lang Lang. Maestro Nelsons then leads the orchestra in Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 5-a work Bernstein conducted three times at Tanglewood, including for his 70th-birthday weekend in 1988-which displays the composer's trademarks: an endless procession of memorable melodies, masterful and vivid use of the orchestra's full color palette, and a musical language of drama and energy.

(Some emphasis added.)

What's not to like?


Saturday, July 7, 2018,  brings only one work, "On the Town," with music by Bernstein and lyrics by Comden and Green. The Boston Pops, conducted by Keith Lockhart, is joined by the soloists listed on the performance detail page, which gives this synopsis:

Bernstein's On the Town

Tanglewood 

Koussevitzky Music Shed - Lenox, MA - View Map

The Wacks Family Concert in celebration of the marriage of Greg Wacks and Sarah DeArakie  

A collaboration with choreographer Jerome Robbins and the writing team of Betty Comden and Adolph Green, Leonard Bernstein's On the Town-the story of three sailors on shore leave in New York City- arrived on Broadway in December 1944, when he was just twenty-six. Based on his popular ballet collaboration with Robbins, Fancy Free (being performed August 18), it was not only his first musical, it was a first for Comden and Green, who would become Broadway and Hollywood legends in their own right. Hit songs include "New York, New York" and "Some Other Time."

Keith Lockhart leads the Boston Pops in a complete, semi-staged performance of Bernstein's hit musical, directed by Kathleen Marshall with musical director David Chase. The all-star cast includes Tony-Award winning actor Brandon Victor Dixon (Shuffle Along, Hamilton) as Gabey, Christian Dante White (Hello Dolly, The Book of Mormon) as Chip, Andy Karl (Groundhog Day, On the Twentieth Century) as Ozzie, Megan Lawrence (Urinetown, Hair) as Claire, Tony Award-winning actress Andrea Martin (Pippin, Noises Off) as Madame Dilly, Laura Osnes (Cinderella, Bandstand) as Claire, Georgina Pazoguin as Ivy, and Marc Kudisch as Pitkin.

See the performance detail for the rest of the cast as well as the usual links.

It should be fun


Sunday, July 8, 2018.  The performance detail page tells us:

Andris Nelsons conducts Brahms and Shostakovich

Tanglewood 

Koussevitzky Music Shed - Lenox, MA - View Map

Andris Nelsons and the BSO pay a special tribute to Bernstein by replicating the first full program Bernstein ever conducted with the orchestra in November 1944. On the first half of, pianist Rudolf Buchbinder joins the BSO for Brahms's ambitious and sprawling Piano Concerto No. 1. Bringing the concert to a close is Shostakovich's riveting Symphony No. 5, the composer's most accessible, popular, and controversial symphony. Bernstein conducted the work a total of eight times with the BSO, including five performances at Tanglewood.

(Emphasis added.)

The performance detail page also has the usual links to background information. I find it interesting that the Shostakovich symphony was led by Bernstein so early in his career and that he conducted it that often with the BSO — eight times suggests two or three different subscription series.


Now for the second weekend.


Friday, July 13, 2017.  Here's how the BSO performance detail page describes this evening's concert:

Tanglewood in the City - Free Event on Boston Common

Boston Symphony Orchestra 

Boston Common - Boston, MA 

Bring your lawn chair and picnic and head to the Common, Friday, July 13!

The Boston Symphony Orchestra presents "Tanglewood in the City," on a giant screen on Boston Common, featuring Moritz Gnann conducting a program of Wagner, Mozart and Schumann transmitted live from Tanglewood, the BSO's summer home in the Berkshire hills. This event will give music lovers in Boston a chance to experience Tanglewood without having to leave the city. The screen will be positioned near the corner of Beacon and Charles Streets.

The live video transmission of the July 13 concert from Tanglewood is made possible by a generous gift from Virginia Simpson Aisner and James E. Aisner.

Acclaimed English pianist Paul Lewis, who has given several memorable performances with the BSO in recent seasons, joins the orchestra for Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 27 in B-flat, K.595, the composer's final work in the genre. BSO Assistant Conductor Moritz Gnann, who conducts the performance, also leads the orchestra in Wagner's  Siegfried Idyll and Schumann's Symphony No. 3,Rhenish. The symphony's subtitle refers to the mighty Rhine, the river that has inspired so many great works throughout music history, and the piece contains some of Schumann's most colorful and exuberant music, as well as some of his most accomplished writing for full orchestra.

(Some emphasis added.)

So if you're in the Boston area, you not only have the option of listening on WCRB, you can also watch the concert on Boston Common.

The Mozart piano concerto has been a favorite of mine ever since I chose it to play on the new record player a great aunt gave us in the mid 1950's. Even without that sort of connection, though, I think it's a delightful piece. Unfortunately, I won't be around to hear this concert. Maybe I'll listen to the Mozart on my car radio.


Saturday, July 14, 2018,  will be a night at the opera: "La Bohème" by Puccini. Again, the BSO tells us more on the performance detail page:

Andris Nelsons conducts Puccini's La bohème

Tanglewood 

Koussevitzky Music Shed - Lenox, MA - View Map

Semi-staged performance sung in Italian with English supertitles

The Catherine and Paul Buttenwieser Concert

Andris Nelsons, the BSO, and the Tanglewood Festival Chorus-under the direction of Tanglewood Festival Chorus Conductor James Burton -continue their series of opera performances with a concert-staged performance of Puccini's La bohème, directed by Daniel Rigazzi and featuring soprano Kristine Opolais as Mimì, tenor Jonathan Tetelman  as Rodolfo, soprano Susanna Phillips as Musetta, baritone Franco Vassallo as Marcello, baritone Davide Luciano as Schaunard, and bass- baritone Luca Pisaroni as Colline. Perhaps the world's most popular opera, La bohème is an immortal story of love and loss set amidst the charming poverty of bohemian Paris. Though Bernstein never performed the work with the BSO, it was one of his favorite operas and one of the few he recorded.

See the performance detail for the cast. As I type this, there is no link to program notes, so if you're not familiar with the opera you'll need to do your own research for a summary of the action and for the libretto, if you want it. I suppose Ron Della Chiesa will give a summary of the plot before each section of the concert.

I find this opera and "Madama Butterfly" moving, but I don't care much for Puccini's music, so I may skip this one, but the performance detail page is correct in saying that this is among the world's most popular operas. So don't let me discourage you from listening. I was just making conversation.


Sunday, July 15, 2018.  A couple of "warhorses" (or maybe a warhorse and a police horse) precede a less familiar work:

Andris Nelsons conducts Mendelssohn, Beethoven and Bernstein with Yuja Wang

Tanglewood 

Koussevitzky Music Shed - Lenox, MA - View Map

The Nathan and Marilyn Hayward Concert

Pianist Yuja Wang joins Andris Nelsons and the BSO as soloist in Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 1, published before but written after the Piano Concerto No. 2. The work bears the marks of the highly original genius Beethoven would soon become, but is a natural progression from the Classical style of Mozart and Haydn. To begin the program, Maestro Nelsons leads the orchestra in Mendelssohn's elegant and fiery Symphony No. 4, Italian. Boy soprano Rafi Bellamy Plaice and the Tanglewood Festival Chorus joins [sic] the BSO for the concluding work, Bernstein's Chichester Psalms, an uplifting work with Hebrew text, composed for a 1965 music festival at Chichester Cathedral in Sussex, England

(Some emphasis added.)

The above quote is, as you may have guessed from the orchestra's performance detail page, which also has the usual links to background information, except that it doesn't have notes or audio preview for the Bernstein, which I don't recall ever hearing. We're on our own for text and analysis. The wiki article looks pretty good, and there are performance videos and other articles available.

I'm definitely looking forward to hearing this concert on Sunday evening over WCRB. As I've mentioned other times, they have a lot going on in addition to these concert broadcasts,  so check out their web page for other offerings as well.