Classic Ross Amico

Category: Daily Dispatch

  • Leon Fleisher at 92 A Brahms Birthday Tribute

    Leon Fleisher at 92 A Brahms Birthday Tribute

    Happy birthday, Leon Fleisher, a great artist and a lovely person, here playing a selection from Brahms’ First Piano Concerto – at the behest of Yo-Yo Ma, no less (follow the link below). Fleisher’s recordings of the Brahms concertos, set down with George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra, over half a century earlier, remain benchmarks.

    Focal dystonia curtailed Fleisher’s career as a pianist not long after. But like a plant trimmed back that soon develops fresh tendrils, he then flourished as a conductor, as a champion of the left-hand piano repertoire (there’s much more to it than Ravel’s famous concerto), and especially as a teacher. He has taught at Baltimore’s Peabody Institute, among other places, and held master classes, since 1959.

    Thanks in part to Botox injections in his right hand, Fleisher has been able to return to performing two-handed repertoire, to some extent, and has continued to make critically acclaimed recordings. And yes, he also still performs recitals.

    Speaking with me in 2014, he expressed gratitude that things developed as they did. If he could do it all over again, he wouldn’t have it any other way.

    Many happy returns, Leon Fleisher, 92 years-old today!

    Impromptu performance of a passage from Brahms:

    Fleisher, the young lion:

    In 2014, in Brahms’ left-hand arrangement of the Bach Chaconne:

  • Hadi Karimi Recreates Composers in 3D

    Hadi Karimi Recreates Composers in 3D

    Have you heard about Hadi Karimi? Karimi is the Iranian computer graphics artist who has been beguiling classical music lovers this summer with his uncannily realistic 3-D recreations of composers long past. These include, so far, Chopin, Schubert, Liszt, and Brahms.

    Karimi earlier applied his skills to images of popular singers and movie actors. But for now, he appears to have embraced the challenges of translating vintage photographs, portraits, and death masks of the 19th century to lifelike, digital busts in living color.

    Here’s an article from June on his portrait of Chopin.

    https://www.thefirstnews.com/article/face-to-face-artist-creates-stunning-3d-portraits-of-chopin-13200

    You can sample the breadth of his 3-D sculptures here:

    https://www.facebook.com/watch/HadiKarimi.Art/

    For more information about Hadi Karimi, visit his website at hadikarimi.com.

  • Isaac Stern A Life in Music

    Isaac Stern A Life in Music

    On the 100th anniversary of his birth, here’s “Isaac Stern, Life’s Virtuoso,” a documentary that aired on PBS’ “American Masters,” back in the year 2000. The narrator is Meryl Streep.

    I believe that’s Franz Waxman at the piano behind the end credits. Stern worked with Waxman on the Joan Crawford-John Garfield melodrama “Humoresque” (for which Waxman arranged his “Carmen Fantasy”). Stern’s hands can be seen in the film whenever Garfield’s character plays.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiqroKOZzpw

    The Istomin-Stern-Rose Trio in music by Franz Schubert:

    Stern plays Bach:

    Stern plays Barber:

    Stern on “The Jack Benny Program”:

    Stern in a photo inscribed to Carnegie Hall, an institution he would save from the wrecking ball ten years later.

  • Morricone Tributes Rome Renames Auditorium

    Morricone Tributes Rome Renames Auditorium

    What was initially planned to mark the 50th anniversary of the release of a film now inadvertently serves as a memorial. Within days of the passing of Ennio Morricone, La-La Land Records has reissued his score to “Two Mules for Sister Sara.”

    It promises to be an especially popular release, since, while not an actual “spaghetti western,” the film shares many of the same trappings with the three Sergio Leone-directed features that made Clint Eastwood an international superstar, and Morricone’s music is very much of a piece. If you ever wondered what a romantic comedy featuring The Man With No Name would be like, this is it. The 2-CD set includes the original soundtrack album and lots of previously unreleased material, including every note of music heard in the film. This expanded release is limited to 3000 copies.

    In other news, it has been announced that the city of Rome will rename the Auditorium Parco della Musica (Music Park Auditorium) in honor of the composer. On July 17, Rome’s city council voted unanimously in favor of the proposal. A selection from Morricone’s score to “Once Upon a Time in America” was performed for the occasion by members of the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia (Orchestra of the National Academy of Saint Cecilia), conducted by the composer’s son, Andrea. The auditorium serves as home base for the group. Morricone has led the orchestra there many times.

    “We want to remember a genius who gave so much to Rome and Italy, linking his name to an international symbol of culture and art,” tweeted the city’s mayor, Virginia Raggi.

    The multifunctional arts complex, designed by Renzo Piano (and yes, that is his real name), was inaugurated in 2002. The auditorium’s halls are dedicated to composer Goffredo Petrassi (who was Morricone’s teacher), conductor Giuseppe Sinopoli, and to Cecilia herself, the patron saint of music.

    Ennio Morricone died on July 6 at the age of 91.

    Morricone celebrates his 90th birthday with the Orchestra and Chorus of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. The music is from “The Mission.”

    Andrea conducts his father’s Concerto for Orchestra:

    Vintage Morricone: “Two Mules for Sister Sara”

    La-La Land Records:

    https://lalalandrecords.com/

  • Leith Stevens’ Lost Piano Concerto

    Leith Stevens’ Lost Piano Concerto

    Hey, I’m the music guy, right?

    In preparing to talk about “The War of the Worlds” on “Roy’s Tie-Dye Sci-Fi Corner” the other day, I was in the process of boning up on Leith Stevens, the film’s composer, when I stumbled across this clip. It’s a piano concerto written for “Night Song” (1948), a movie starring Dana Andrews that somehow had slipped beneath my radar. The music is performed in the film by Arthur Rubinstein, Eugene Ormandy, and the New York Philharmonic.

    What’s that you say? The music is not about to win a Pulitzer? Well Rubinstein and Ormandy aren’t going win any Oscars either! (Actually, they’re not half bad.) Stevens eschews the Rachmaninoff-style movie concerto kitsch then very much in vogue. (I’m looking at you, “Warsaw Concerto.”) The trade-off, unfortunately, is a concerto that quickly faded into oblivion. More’s the pity. All in all, a fascinating document.

    Ah, the good old days, when you could enjoy a cigarette in a stairwell, while dreaming about touching Merle Oberon’s face, on the beach, during a concert…

    From Bosley Crowther’s review in the New York Times: “…The music, the prize concerto—well, that is really the thing which puts ‘Night Song’ in the spotlight as baldfaced and absolute sham. For this scrappy and meaningless jangle by Leith Stevens is good for nothing more than an excuse for filming the fiddles, the drums and the batteries of horns. And if Mr. Rubinstein and Mr. Ormandy can swallow it, along with their pride, they must have pretty strong stomachs.”

    Ouch! Everyone’s a critic.

    Crowther was later drummed out of the Times for doubling down on his hatred of “Bonnie and Clyde” in 1968.

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