‘The opulent new version of the seasonal classic, launched spectacularly by the San Francisco Ballet, is every parent’s dream of a holiday treat. It looks scrumptious, tastes delicious, offers substantial nourishment and won’t cause cavities.’
- San Francisco Examiner
On November 18, just in time for the holiday season, Opus Arte presents the 2007 San Francisco Ballet production of Tchaikovsky’s beloved holiday favorite, Nutcracker. Recorded live at the War Memorial Opera House on December 19 and 20, 2007, the production features choreography by SF Ballet artistic director Helgi Tomasson, scenic design by Tony Award-winner Michael Yeargan, costume design by Tony Award-winner Martin Pakledinaz, lighting design by James F. Ingalls, and projections by Wendall K. Harrington. PBS stations across the country will air this production on December 17 on “Great Performances”.
This visually-stunning all-new production of Nutcracker is set in early-20th-century San Francisco and includes more than 200 colorful characters, larger-than-life scenery, and magical surprises that will mesmerize and delight adults and children alike. Each breath-taking scene from the Waltz of the Flowers to the Snowflake Waltz is a reminder that this adored ballet offers a nostalgic musical journey while transcending all generations. Bonus features include an illustrated synopsis and cast gallery, interviews with Tomasson, Yeargan and Pakledinaz and a documentary on the 1915 World’s Fair.
As America’s oldest professional ballet company, San Francisco Ballet has enjoyed a long and rich tradition of artistic “firsts” since its founding in 1933, including performing the first American productions of Swan Lake and Nutcracker, as well as the first 20th-century American Coppélia. San Francisco Ballet is one of the three largest ballet companies in the United States. Guided in its early years by American dance pioneers and brothers Lew, Willam and Harold Christensen, San Francisco Ballet currently presents more than 100 performances annually, both locally and internationally. Under the direction of Helgi Tomasson for more than two decades, the Company has achieved an international reputation as one of the preeminent ballet companies in the world. In 2005, San Francisco Ballet won the prestigious Laurence Olivier Award, its first, in the category of “Outstanding Achievement in Dance,” for its 2004 London tour. In 2006, San Francisco Ballet was the first non-European company elected “Company of the Year” in Dance Europe magazine’s annual readers’ poll. This year, San Francisco Ballet celebrates its 75th anniversary.
August 26 brings a new release from Canary Classics, record label of virtuosic violinist Gil Shaham. Three Grammy® award winning musicians have come together for this recording of Tchaikovsky’s beloved Piano Trio in A minor, Op. 50; Yefim Bronfman (piano), Gil Shaham (violin), and Truls Mørk (cello) which was written in 1881-2 in tribute to his friend and great pianist Nicolai Rubinstein. The Piano Trio, which is subtitled ‘In memory of a great friend’, begins with a seventeen-minute first movement in the middle of which we hear a wrenching cello theme that musically personifies Tchaikovsky’s grief at the loss of his friend Nicolai. The second movement consists of a theme and 12 variations. The last variation introduces a new highly-charged theme that undergoes many passionate transformations. The listener prepares to be carried to the end of the Trio by this turbulent finale, only for the piece to return to the reflective and mournful melody of the first movement. The Trio ends in the quiet desolation in which is began.
On July 29, Opus Arte releases Cecilia and Bryn at Glyndebourne, a recital of arias and duets recorded live at Glyndebourne Opera House on April 24, 1999. Cecilia Bartoli and Bryn Terfel open the concert with the first two scenes from Le nozze di Figaro, performing the same roles they sang together to great acclaim at the Metropolitan Opera. Terfel and Bartoli join forces with Myung-Whun Chung and the London Philharmonic Orchestra to perform other opera favorites such as the “Catalog Aria” from Mozart’s Don Giovanni (”Madamina, il catalogo è questo”), “Quanto Amore!” from Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore, and “Pa-pa-pa-pa” from Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte. Some opera rarities like the aria “Al tuo seno fortunato” from Haydn’s opera L’anima del filosofo also are included in the recital.
Also in July, Opus Arte presents Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake performed by the Paris Opera Ballet and Orchestra in December 2005. Tchaikovsky’s first ballet, Swan Lake was composed at the request of the Bolshoi Ballet in 1875. Its premiere was a great disappointment and in 1877 it was removed from the Bolshoi repertoire. It was not until eighteen years later that Swan Lake was resurrected to great glory by French choreographer Marius Petipa, who also convinced the reluctant Tchaikovsky to compose two additional ballets before his death in 1893: Sleeping Beauty and Nutcracker. Petipa’s Swan Lake revival, which secured the ballet’s place in the standard repertoire of almost every ballet troupe in the world, finally occurred on January 27, 1895 at the Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg.
This production of Swan Lake, choreographed by Rudolf Nureyev, premiered with the Paris Opera Ballet in 1984. Nureyev stayed faithful to Petipa’s production, however, he offers a much more personal and intimate vision of the ballet, with what some might say is an almost autobiographical aspect to the development of the story and its characters. Nureyev’s interpretative resolutions are well-suited to Tchaikovsky’s compositional style giving the work the power to assume its true tragic structure.
Guitarist Friedemann Wuttke has performed compositions from all periods of music in his concerts and recordings; from the earliest guitar arrangements through Classical and modern contemporary works. Wuttke’s newest album 20th Century Guitar, features some of the most beloved guitar composers of our time including Ulrich Wedlich, Leo Brouwer, and Carlo Domeniconi.
Stuttgart guitarist and composer Ulrich Wedlich’s Sonata für Gitarre conjures a meditative state in the listener. Its music appears to hover in the gray area between a popular and serious guitar work. Cuban-born and self-taught composer Leo Brouwer is perhaps the most important representative of 20th Century Guitar music on the recording. His Concerto Elegiaco for Guitar and Orchestra gives the impression of a large, lush, Romantic era orchestra. In reality, the piece is scored for strings and 2 percussionists; one playing kettle drums, the other playing a drum, tom tom, marimba, and glockenspiel. Domeniconi’s Koyunbaba for Guitar (named for a saint-like hermit who lived in the South of Turkey) uses solely the guitar to create a magical sea adventure for the listener with sounds that fashion a world that seems to extend beyond human horizons.
Since 1992, Friedemann Wuttke has exclusively pursued his concert and recording career. He appears regularly at international music events and festivals and participates in numerous radio and television recordings. Wuttke has traveled the world as a concert guitarist and has performed with many important ensembles and orchestras.
Cello Fiesta! Kremerata Baltica, Marie-Elisabeth Hecker, Giorgi Kharadze
Compositions by Haydn, Tchaikovsky, Vaja Azarashvili, Ginastera, and Chick Corea
“Recommended” By Gidon Kremer
Cello Fiesta! is a unique recording by the orchestra-in-residence of the Kronberg Academy, Kremerata Baltica, and two Kronberg Academy Cello Masters: Marie-Elisabeth Hecker and Giorgi Kharadze. Hecker (Winner of the 2005 International Rostropovich Cello Competition) and Kharadze (Winner of the International Pablo Caslas Cello Competition) perform repertoire from three centuries while incorporating a range of musical colors and historical styles. Gidon Kremer, founder of the Kremerata Baltica, has compared Hecker and Kharadze to the likes of the great cellist Pablo Casals and has also said that they are “musicians who will secure the future of the new generation of cellists”.
The recording opens with Haydn’s Concerto for Cello and Orchestra in C major, followed by the inspired Pezzo Capriccioso in B minor, which was composed by Tchaikovsky in less than one week. These pieces pave the way for a variety of pieces from the 20th century, including the single movement Concerto for Cello and Orchestra by the revered Georgian composer Vaja Azarashvili. Written for his good friend Pablo Casals, Argentinian Ginastera’s Glosses sobre temes de Pau Casals (Op 46) is colorful and provocative. Chick Corea’s La Fiesta, arranged for 2 celli, strings and percussion, appropriately serves as the finale of the recording.
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