Concert Review: Nick Luby and Susan Zhang at Meadowbrook Park

Original image by There Stands the Glass.

I don’t believe I’d heard a Meredith Monk composition performed in the Kansas City area until Thursday, May 9. An unexpectedly daring concert at Meadowbrook Park surprised me. Unpromisingly billed as The Concert Truck, I’d supposed the Midwest Trust Center-sponsored piano duo of Nick Luby and Susan Zhang would present land-locked cruise ship pabulum.

Yet rather than covers of Billy Joel and Journey, the tandem’s impeccable setlist included compositions by Samuel Barber, Maurice Ravel, Béla Bartok, Meredith Monk, John Adams, William Grant Still and George Gershwin. Only “Rhapsody in Blue” seemed like a compromise. My date said Gershwin’s piece is still “trying to decide what it wants to be,” the most incisive commentary I’ve encountered during the composition’s centenary.

The informal setting negated a proper assessment of the quality of the playing. Distortion in the amplified sound, percussive thwacking from nearby pickleball courts and the shrieks of happy children muddled what may very well have been an otherwise impeccable performance.

Concert Review: Thomas Rosenkranz at White Recital Hall

Original image by There Stands the Glass.

Everything you might care to know about my current state of mind is encapsulated by my steadfast commitment to attending Thomas Rosenkranz’s recital at White Recital Hall on Friday, October 20. (The recital streams here.)

The rare opportunity to hear a complete performance of Olivier Messiaen’s Vingt Regards sur l’Enfant-Jésus appealed to me more than attending concurrent concerts by Travis Scott or the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra.

Friends and loved ones declined to join me when upon learning they were being asked to endure two hours of challenging solo piano at the free concert presented by the UMKC Conservatory. The translated title of Messiaen’s work- Twenty Contemplations of the Infant Jésus- was a nonstarter for at least one person.

The piece is best experienced alone anyway. Upon selecting a seat allowing me to watch Rosenkranz’s frenetic fingering, I placed my phone on the floor and didn’t once turn around to check on the responses of the approximately 100 people in the auditorium.

Transfixed, my mind only wandered to consider how curious the composition must have seemed to listeners at its premiere in 1945. It still sounds otherworldly. Allusions range from Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to George Gershwin. Messiaen also seems to have anticipated the innovations of Philip Glass and Cecil Taylor.

Yet musicological musings are a secondary consideration. During one segment I sensed the incomprehensible magnificence of God from a proximate vantage point I hadn’t previously experienced. Three days later, I’m still trembling.

Concert Review: The Kinnor Philharmonic at White Theatre

Original image by There Stands the Glass.

The Kinnor Philharmonic’s annual New Year’s Day concerts have long struck me as an ideal way to begin a new year. Somehow, I hadn’t managed to attend until yesterday.  By happy chance, a generous gentleman gave me a ticket as I stood in line to purchase a seat at White Theatre.

The music director and conductor Christopher Kelts told the audience of about 400 that the Fiesta Simcha! concert consisted of the “Jewish and Jewish-adjacent” music of Spain, Portugal and Brazil. While I was familiar with George Gershwin’s “Cuban Overture” and the work of Arturo Márquez, Ladino selections including the contemporary composer Ofer Ben-Amots’ “Songs from the Pomegranate Garden” were new to me.

An unfortunate mix causing guest vocalist Hazzan Tahl Ben-Yehuda to drown out the approximately 40 musicians didn’t prevent me from enjoying almost every moment.  It didn’t hurt that Kelts’s approach to conducting invites comparison to Jackie Gleason.  B'ezrat HaShem, I’ll return in 12 months.

Concert Review: Anthony Roth Constanzo at the Folly Theater

Original image by There Stands the Glass.

Anthony Roth Costanzo censured himself at the Folly Theater on Saturday, December 18, after explaining that he and pianist Bryan Wagorn “met when we were nobodies.”  After surveying the largely empty house, the countertenor exclaimed “we’re still nobodies!”

In truth, Constanzo is one of the world’s biggest opera stars.  His celebrated turn in the title role of Philip Glass’ Akhnaten is among his prominent achievements.  Yet he attracted what appeared to be less than 300 people in his Kansas City debut.  

I took advantage of Midwestern indifference by purchasing a discounted front row seat to the concert on Cyber Monday.  Positioned just 20 feet from the unamplified countertenor, I considered reaching for the earplugs I always carry with me.  

The diminutive Costanzo applied startling heft to his piercing instrument.  He and Wagorn repeatedly paused during a gorgeous reading of a Hector Berlioz song cycle to permit echoes of Costanzo’s powerful voice in the piano’s soundboard to reverberate.

A revealing interpretation of George Gershwin’s “The Man I Love” allowed me to hear the standard in an entirely new way.  A pair of compositions he recently commissioned in his position as the current Artist-In-Residence of The New York Philharmonic were no less engaging.

Costanzo admitted his feelings are hurt when he’s asked if he’d prefer to have a “real voice.”  He demonstrated his facility with voices of all types during a fascinating master class at Grant Recital Hall the next day.   Even in the unglamorous setting, Costanzo shone like a certifiable celebrity.

The Alleged King of Jazz

I’m not particularly interested in condemning the overt racism and shameless cultural appropriation displayed throughout the 1930 film King of Jazz. The preposterous title of the Paul Whiteman vehicle exposes the absurdly disgraceful premise. Needless to say, little in the vaudevillian revue has aged well. Yet King of Jazz offers extremely instructive insights into the popular culture of 90 years ago. I learned a great deal when I watched it for the first time this week. The most essential segment- a visually lavish rendition of “Rhapsody in Blue”- begins with Whiteman’s terribly offensive introduction of George Gershwin’s composition at the 51:38 mark of the embedded video.