It was all I could do to whip together a post about the passing of Harrison Birtwistle last night; but we also lost another major musician yesterday – the reclusive Romanian pianist Radu Lupu.
Lupu is still a frequent presence on classical radio playlists, despite the fact that he hasn’t made a commercial recording since the mid-‘90s. Most of those performances are from his years as a Decca recording artist. Lupu continued to appear in concert, though he shunned publicity, denying interview requests and, when possible, permission for his concerts to be broadcast.
He retired in 2019, after a long period of ill health, during which he frequently wound up canceling his engagements. He was a widely-respected interpreter of the core repertoire, especially fine in music of Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, and Brahms, among others.
Radu Lupu was 76 years-old.
As soloist in Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 19
Joined by Murray Perahia in a superb performance of Schubert’s Fantasia in F minor
From a Carnegie Hall recital in 1994, Schumann’s Fantasy in C
Monday is just about the only day I’m not around a computer, and wouldn’t you know it, it’s also the time that Harrison Birtwistle, ever the contrarian, died.
I know I’ve posted here before about my complicated relationship with this composer. Despite sharing his fascination with Gawain, Punch, the Minotaur, Anubis, Orpheus, King Kong, and any number of other subjects that form the bases for his operas and concert works, I find he’s someone whose music I have only ever moderately warmed up to.
In common with Peter Maxwell Davies, his former colleague of the Manchester School of composition, Birtwistle emerged from a working-class Lancashire background to radically modernize British music. But unlike Max, whose palpable sense of mischief made even his most scandalous works somehow approachable, Birtwistle never cracked a smile, unless perhaps it was at the audience’s expense.
I don’t really need music to be “easy,” necessarily, or even tonal. There are times when I can put on a Birtwistle record and totally go with it. But I don’t know that anything he has written has ever engendered much affection in me. This is not an objective assessment, of course, and perhaps you will react differently.
Interestingly, Birtwistle had a local connection. He attended Princeton University on a Harkness Fellowship, beginning in 1965. There, he completed his opera “Punch and Judy,” which begins with Punch tossing his baby into the fire This commences a murder spree that includes the stabbing of Judy, his wife. All is presented in human form, making it that much more disturbing than when enacted by puppets. The experience proved to be so unpleasant that Benjamin Britten walked out on the premiere.
Perhaps you will find something to latch on to in one of these pieces recommended by The Guardian.
If I had to recommend a place to start, it would be “Earth Dances” from 1986.
There is something primordial in Birtwistle’s work, but it is not someplace I generally choose to live. At least his music has integrity, which I can’t always claim for some contemporary works of an easier-going disposition.
See what you think.
Also, “The Moth Requiem” is a little gentler than most.
Between Passover and Easter, Miklós Rózsa’s biblical epics may still be resounding in our ears. But he composed superb scores in most every genre. Here are two selections from one of my Rózsa favorites, “The Thief of Bagdad” (1940).
“Love of the Princess”
“Market of Basra”
Both performances are from sessions for a complete recording of the work, released in 2017, a collaboration between Prometheus Records and Tadlow Music.
If a genie would have offered to grant me three wishes, a recording of this score would have been one of them.
Maestro. Showman. Magician. Matinee idol. Prima donna. Charlatan. Genius. Superstar.
The multifaceted Leopold Stokowski was born on this date, 140 years ago.
Preserved (or parodied) in all media, he could be as outrageous as he was revelatory. He brought to concert music a glamour and vitality that today it too often lacks. His wild hair and faux middle-European accent, his dove-like hands, his flamboyant experiments in sound, his pursuit of the novel and the cutting edge of technology, made him a celebrity, often to the chagrin of his critics. But the proof is in the pudding, and thankfully his recorded legacy is enormous. There is ample evidence to support all claims.
Stokowski died in 1977 at the age of 95. At 94, he signed his final recording contract, with Columbia Records, which would have kept him busy into his 100th year.
Here’s a documentary filmed when he was 88:
At around the 11:23 mark, he states, “We have a motto in the American symphony orchestra, which is ‘do better.’ And it would be a good motto for life all over the world today, when we are killing instead of loving. Do better, world!”
Well said. Happy birthday, Leopold!
One of my favorite live performances on YouTube, when it shows up (it keeps getting taken down), with Stokowski conducting Debussy at the age of 90.
Bach in Philadelphia in 1927
Conducting Tchaikovsky in the film “Carnegie Hall” (1947)
Shaking hands with Mickey Mouse in “Fantasia” (1940)
Soon all the guests will have left, and all the dishes will be cleaned. Time to pop a couple of malted eggs, or to pour yourself a malt scotch, and to wrap up your Easter in inspiring fashion, with the Symphony No. 4 by the devout Belgian composer Joseph Ryelandt.
Ryelandt’s symphony, completed on the very eve of World War I, concludes with a triumphant statement of the Credo from the Catholic Mass. Then stick around for a Credo setting by the Franco-Flemish composer, of some four centuries earlier, Josquin des Prez.
Enjoy these two spiritual discoveries rooted in the Mass. That’s “Creative Spirit,” this Sunday night at 10:00 EDT, on “The Lost Chord,” on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.
