2. Mozart’s “Missa Solemnis”, Peter Schipka, Choralschola der Wiener Hofburgkapelle, Wiener Sängerknaben and Wiener Staatsoper, at Wiener Hofmusikkapelle (Vienna)
My Instagram clip.

3. Georges Bizet’s “Carmen” at Wiener Staatsoper (Vienna)
My Instagram snapshot.

4. Joe Lovano, Marilyn Crispell and Carmen Castaldi at Wigmore Hall (London)
My review.

5. Franz Schubert’s Messe in C-Dur, Markus Landerer, conductor, at Stephansdom (Vienna)
My Instagram snapshot.

6. Mike, 454, Niontay and El Cousteau at recordBar
My Instagram clip.

7. Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “The Sound of Music” at Volksoper (Vienna)
My Instagram snapshot.

8. Steve Hackett’s “Genesis Revisited” at the Uptown Theater
My Instagram clip.

9. Eddie Moore, Ben Tervort and Jalen Ward at Yardley Hall
My Instagram snapshot.

10. Marvin Gruenbaum, John Blegen, Kent Brauninger and Nils Aardahl at the Market at Meadowbrook
My Instagram clip.

The previous monthly recap is here.

William Brownlee

November 17, 2023

Opera Review: UMKC Conservatory’s Die Zauberflöte at White Recital Hall

William Brownlee

November 17, 2023

Original image of the temple “boys” at curtain call by There Stands the Glass.

Five years ago, I didn’t know the difference between Puccini and Verdi. I discovered I’ve since become an odious opera elitist at White Recital Hall on Thursday, November 16. The alterations made to Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte in a UMKC Conservatory production outraged me. Yet even when condensed, sanitized and slightly dumbed down, Mozart’s genius still shines brightly. The orchestra conducted by Nicholas Perry Clark performed commendably. Among the solid cast, I most enjoyed Angelo Silva as Tamino, the three attendants of the Queen of the Night and the three “boys” of the temple. I paid $25 to sit amid the audience of about 250. The production streams here. My sniveling reservations aside, it’s well worth watching.

William Brownlee

October 23, 2023

Concert Review: Thomas Rosenkranz at White Recital Hall

William Brownlee

October 23, 2023

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.

William Brownlee

January 4, 2022

The Pleasures of Love

William Brownlee

January 4, 2022

Screenshot of The Royal College of Music’s production of “Die Zauberflöte” by There Stands the Glass.

New year, same old virtual Mozart. The Royal College of Music’s recent production of “Die Zauberflöte” is the eighth version of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s opera I’ve watched from home since the onset of the pandemic. I share a few of the reservations expressed by an Opera Today critic about the unconventional interpretation set at a prep school, but like her, I welcome the emphasis on the sexism imposed on Pamina and the Queen of the Night. The Royal College’s relatively modest presentation features strong performances and includes pop culture totems like cell phones and marijuana. My response to Mozart’s music becomes more rapturous with each viewing. An inaugural in-person encounter with “Die Zauberflöte” can’t come soon enough.

William Brownlee

September 7, 2020

Album Review: Bettye LaVette- Blackbirds

William Brownlee

September 7, 2020

Assembling a comprehensive collection of classic soul was one of my primary projects at the onset of the CD era. I built an extensive library of artists ranging from Solomon Burke to Jr. Walker & The All Stars one disc at a time. The endeavor was enormously satisfying. My mind was repeatedly blown by hearing deep tracks by the likes of Ruth Brown, Al Green and Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes for the first time. After all the obvious bases were covered, I began buying compilations of soul rarities. That’s how I first heard the scorching vocals of Bettye LaVette. While much of the material she recorded in the ‘60s and ‘70s sounds thrilling today, her efforts lagged stylistic trends at the time. The many hardships the septuagenarian endured make her late career renaissance all the more rewarding. Blackbirds, a new set of imaginative covers, is as solid as anything LaVette has released. I suspect most of the CD mixes I made during my initial immersion in soul were only half as satisfying as LaVette’s profound new statement.

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The pledge breaks during the premiere broadcast of KCPT’s new Charlie Parker documentary Bird: Not Out of Nowhere were almost as interesting as the program. I assess the film at Plastic Sax.

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Four days after publishing an analysis of various opera presentations, I learned of the existence of “Trollflöjten”, Ingmar Bergman’s freaky adaptation of “The Magic Flute” (“Die Zauberflöte”). I may be an uncultured country bumpkin, but I was on to something when I suggested Kenneth Branagh’s version might be appropriate for children. Bergman’s primary conceit is the depiction of Mozart’s work through the eyes of a little girl seated in a Swedish opera house. For those keeping score at home, I’ve now watched 169 operas in the past 168 days. My second rendition of “Der Rosenkavalier” is on deck.

William Brownlee

August 31, 2020

Rock Me Amadeus

William Brownlee

August 31, 2020

Screenshot of Jeremy Ovenden in the Royal Theatre of Monnaie’s production of “Lucio Silla” by There Stands the Glass.

I often think about Kanye West’s 2013 concert at the Sprint Center. My review of the show for The Kansas City Star went viral because I was obliged to report the arena was only a quarter full, but it was the combination of avant-garde noise from West’s then-current Yeezus album and spectacular visuals including a mountain and ballet troupe that made the night unforgettable.

More than five months into my daily opera immersion (161 operas in the past 161 days!), a little piece of me dies every time I commit to a stale production set in a beige parlor featuring stocky vocalists in period costumes. Thanks in part to West’s spectacular imagination, I now expect the visual component to be as compelling as the music it accentuates at large-scale live performances and in every video production. Thrilling versions of two Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart operas I recently watched attest to the power of unfettered creativity in a form long associated with stasis.

“Lucio Silla,” an examination of a tyrant’s abuse of power, is considered one of Mozart’s least essential operas. Yet an arresting 2017 production mounted by the Royal Theatre of Monnaie forces me to revise my expectations of opera’s possibilities. Without compromising the music of the 250-year-old drama, the Belgian company places the work in a dystopian version of the present. The depictions of bloodlust and sexual violence are so graphic I repeatedly had to turn away. I suspect Mozart would approve of the unflinchingly kinky staging.

But why be constrained by a stage at all? Kenneth Branagh’s delightful cinematic version of “The Magic Flute” (“Die Zauberflöte”) successfully adopts the topsy-turvy tone I associate with the direction of Terry Gilliam. The fanciful 2006 reworking set amid trench warfare in World War I includes an excellent English libretto by Stephen Fry. Aside from scenes of battlefield horror, attempted rape and thwarted suicide, the film is suitable for children. My primary objection concerns Branagh’s suppression of the opera’s Illuminati subplot.

The scarcity of operatic innovations such as these might be part of a global conspiracy. I’m currently working my way through Glyndebourne’s four-hour and 44-minute stream of “Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg.” The stale 2011 production is set in a beige parlor and features stocky vocalists in period costumes. Music criticism is among the themes of Richard Wagner’s opera. In spite of the fusty visuals, I intend to give it a 8.7 rating.

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I observe the centennial of the birth of Charlie Parker by reviewing Champian Fulton’s Birdsong and Pasquale Grasso’s Solo Bird at Plastic Sax.