Lifschitz plays Schubert's last three sonatas: at times uneven, but all sublime

Apr. 10 at the National Concert Hall, Konstatin Lifschitz playing Schubert's last piano sonatas: D.958 in C Minor, D.959 in A Major, and D.960 in B-Flat Major. This is a marathon of a program, to be sure, and it comes hot on the heels of Lifschitz's earlier concert on the 8th, in which he played another marathon of Beethoven's last three sonatas. Unfortunately I neglected to hear his Beethoven, but after seeing what everyone had to say about that concert, I decided not to miss his Schubert.

I tried very hard to like the first part of Lifschitz's program, Schubert's C Minor sonata, but as the intermission approached I started to feel rather disappointed with his performance. I don't know if it's owing to him having a bad day, or if it is the piece that is to blame — granted, I don't believe Schubert was writing as his personal best in this sonata: he presents a wealth of material, which is not always fully developed (this is, after all, Schubert, and not Beethoven or Haydn). But the way Lifschitz handled it seemed at times haphazard, lacking a sense of coherency. I was particularly befuddled with the way he treated Schubert's contrapuntal lines in the second movement — completely muddled; in addition, the general lack of structure made the numerous Generalpausen sound as if they were thrown in as afterthoughts, and not contributing to the music as a whole. 

However, whatever problems Lifschitz had in the first piece, they were gone after the intermission. The A Major sonata sounded lusciously unified and tight, with a wonderful palette of tone colors in the outer movements, and a palpitating sense of tension in between the notes of the slow movement. Here is also a musician who appreciates silences, much as what Leopold Mozart says separates the good from the bad. 

Somewhat abnormally, Lifschitz has another intermission before the rightfully famous B-Flat Major sonata. In my opinion, Lifschitz used a bit too much pedal in the third theme section of the first movement — I like to hear the theme played detatched, but that’s just my taste. In any case, my nit picking didn’t detract the least from the sublime atmosphere Lifschitz painted with his excellent palette of colors in the first movement. The second movement, however, saw another one of my dissatisfactions tonight: for all his skill, Lifschitz does not seem to transcend beyond the limitations of the piano (which is, after all, a percussion instrument by its nature), and quite a bit of the slow movement seemed overtly harsh and percussive. My guess is that that kind of touch would sound exactly right on a fortepiano. The final movement is, in my opinion, the best example of how any rondo movement should be played: full of unexpected twists and turns, with each reinstatement of the theme sounding as both a surprise and a relief from the tension built up in between. From the B-Flat Major sonata alone, one can tell that this is definitely a pianist who has thought carefully about his art, and although I daresay that his performance of this piece today was not as magical as I when I heard Pollini play in the Berlin Philharmonie in 2011, it nevertheless is an extremely well-crafted and solid performance, by an artist well in confidence of his supreme artistry. The encore, No.6 of Schubert’s Moments Musicaux, was equally a delight, bringing today’s marathon performance of Schubert’s last piano sonatas to a wonderful close.

Double Yellow Lines: Dance and music at their closest

At first, the stage is dark, oppressively so. A dim light brings the piano’s keyboard into the scene, while the spotlight gradually turns to reveal a figure, clad completely in black. This is dance and music, stripped down to their bare essentials: no frills, no fireworks, no fancy moves; yet the dramatic tension in each note, in each and every move, leaves the air almost palpitating. 

As An Tôn Thất’s  impressionistic music drifts ephemerally, another figure—also dressed in black save for a white shirt—enters, pulling the other back from the invisible fourth wall which he is just about to shatter. Huang Yi’s inventiveness is unbelievable: now the music is no longer “music”, but rather the sounds of a pen on paper, the clinking of a glass, the breaking of pencils, yet his movements would lead one to believe he was being led by an entire symphony of sounds. 

An’s music then takes a classical turn, at times baroque even, as Huang Yi and Hu Jian engage in a pas de deux reminiscent of Norman McLaren’s animation, set to Bach, in Thirty-Two Short Films About Glenn Gould. As the music then returns to its beginning sparse texture, the two parallel lines of Huang Yi and Hu Jian converge on the piano, and as the two alternate their turns and twists on the keyboard, music and movement merge into a single monochrome. An then returns, building the music up into a sonorous symphony of sound, with six hands on the piano. This then fades out, with the piece ending on a song sung by Hu Jian to sparse chords, echoing the beginning. Lights fade out, drawing out a full circle.

Is this piece music or dance? Saying that it is “both” is an understatement, since all the elements melt together into an organic whole, until one cannot be separated from the other. Narrative is absent, nor is it ever needed: as Huang Yi says in his program notes, “Everyone can have a different interpretation… all that I want to convey is in the work.” Yet as I left the theatre, I still had one question in mind: why yellow?

Carmen at the Komische Oper Berlin is a sexy, sensual affair

For the last night of my stay in Berlin, I went to see Carmen at the Komische Oper Berlin. This was the first time I bought a cheap ticket (€12) to the opera in Europe, and the first time I had to deal with some of the quirks—as it turned out, my seat was so far out in the wings that the view was nonexistent when I was sitting, and so I spent just about the entire three hours standing.

My view of the stage—more of a sliver than a proper view. As it turned out, a substantial part of the action occurred at stage right, so I had to lean precariously over just to get a glimpse.

But what action there was! As purist as I am, I occasionally find these "updated" productions just as entertaining and enjoyable. As befits the Komishe Oper, the production was sung in German, except for two of Carmen's arias: the Habanera ("L'amour est un oiseaux rebelle") and the first number of the second act ("Les tringes des sistres tintaient"), which were sung in French (although the interjections by the choir were in German), and some of the video segments with José, which were in English—more on those later. In this production, Carmen was every bit the femme fatale, all the way down to her costumes, which always emphasized her wonderful figure. Heaven forbid if one day I have to see a Wagnerian soprano—the proverbial "fat lady"—sing this role! In addition, the character playing Manuela (who supplants Lillas Pastia as the innkeeper in this production) also dances extremely lively flamencos in between the acts, to a live guitar accompaniment on-stage, which adds to the highly sensual element. 

Tonight's cast list

The entire opera was cast as sort of a flashback from the perspective of José, who is being interrogated after he has killed Carmen. The interrogation is presented in video segments in between Acts I and II, and Acts III and IV (the intermission was between Acts II and III), and has the tenor playing José speaking in his mother tongue. Regarding the choice of language, an interesting decision was to keep Carmen's aforementioned arias in the original French—the only reason I can think of is that these arias deal with Carmen's highly capricious love ("Si tu ne m'aimes pas, je t'aime"), and of course, French is the language of love!

Helmuth Rilling conducts Bach's St. Matthew Passion

In brief: As a scholar, as a technician, as a chef de l'orchestre, Helmuth Rilling is outstanding. As a musician, he fails miserably.

The first few bars of the first chorus summed the entire three hours up. Although the Taipei Philharmonic is a modern ensemble, Rilling paid immaculate attention to technical details for baroque performance: no vibrato, non-legato, even the choirs' German pronunciation was excellent – better, even, than the alto soloist's. But at what a musical cost! Anyone who knows about period performance will appreciate the fact that baroque musicians didn't have our modern concept of legato, but that does not mean the music should sit flat without any shaping of lines; besides, isn't Bach's mastery of counterpoint supposed to be found in his multi-linear structures? In the end, I felt I could truly appreciate just how impressive Bach's music is, simply because it was still very moving even under such an unmusical baton.

In addition, with all the attention paid to accuracy, Rilling nevertheless fails to notice flaws in the very basics of music. Throughout the entire performance, the orchestra's tuning was off, sometimes resulting in truly cringeworthy clashes between the cello and organ. As a general rule, sharps were all too high, and flats were all too low. Also obvious was the fact that the orchestra's strings had a hurried crash course in baroque playing. It is easy to tell the strings to play senza vibrato, but it's almost impossible to teach them to use only the bow for producing all the different shades and tone colors in one or two weeks, much less so if the conductor in question is not a string player. In the end, the strings sounded flat, dull, and thin throughout, with only superficial details adhering to baroque performance. Add bad intonation to the non-vibrato mix, and we have a disaster waiting to happen.

But, in any case, the audience's reception was fantastic. This was supposed the first Taiwanese performance of the St. Matthew Passion, and judging from the thunderous applause and countless curtain calls, future performances of such masterpieces could just as easy find such an enthusiastic audience. Let's just hope that our ears can be blessed with a performance worthy enough to be called "music".

YogeeTi: Breathtaking, exhilarating, uneven

As part of the 2012 Taiwan International Festival of Arts, YogeeTi has certainly benefited from funding and marketing most artists could only dream of. Much like the earlier production of The Tempest (the subject of a future entry), I was drawn to the show after seeing quite a number of reviews lauding this piece. While it was certainly great fun to watch, as I left the theatre I couldn't help but feel somewhat ambivalent toward what I had just experienced.

Much of the hype of this piece has been centered on the fashion design element, and clearly it shows: aside from the exquisite stage design and impressive use of props, the evocative lighting and excellent music all serve to create a terrific ambiance. Yet the actual dancing, however consistently brilliant it was, at times nevertheless seemed to fall flat. After a truly dazzling section where the “weaving” theme is brought into full relief through strings drawn in from the wings, accompanied by the aptly minimalistic score and the interwoven choreography, there follows a longish “showcase” with every dancer doing solos or duos, seemingly just for the sake of it. The pre-show lecture mentioned that Johan Ku caught the attention of Mourad Merzouki with a cocoon-themed exhibition, but the interaction with with cocoon costumes today, looking as if covered with moss or algae, would not have seen out of place if it were used as a filler for a stage production of Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. Also, I failed to detect a coherent flow throughout the piece; sometimes it seemed as if the performance could just about close at the end of any section, without sacrificing anything at all.

Perhaps what I couldn't reconcile the most, though, was the sense of emptiness inside even before the first sound of applause had struck. Impressive, yes; breathtaking, yes; but a sense of connection? After sitting in my seat for more than an hour, I didn't feel I could take away anything from the experience. I was reminded of what Pak Sal said of Jérôme Bel in his interview before returning to Indonesia: his works inevitably invoke controversy, and probably justifiably so; yet this is not done for just shock value, just "for the sake of it", but because he has a strong central concept or message which cannot be conveyed anyway else. Just as I was leaving the theatre, I happened to meet a friend sitting in the row behind me; she said that she fell asleep during the middle, and frankly I don't blame her (especially since this was, after all, a matinee performance).

But in any case, the audience clearly loved today's performance; the entire hall was roaring and cheering like mad throughout the countless curtain calls, and the dancers clearly enjoyed the reception as well. And in the end, that's what matters in performance art, isn't it: never mind there is a profound message to take away, we're here to enjoy ourselves, to have a good time!

今日觀舞心得－北藝大舞蹈系年度展演《男風吹》

看完男風吹的心得：

1. 如果聽到某種音樂就會直覺聯想到某類型的肢體動作，這是特定音樂語彙本身就會指向特定肢體語彙，還是是聆聽／觀賞者的後天調教使然？以下半場的兩支舞為例，我聽到十面埋伏的第一個和絃，腦海裡馬上就會浮現武打招式；聽到Ravel的音樂（即使像左手鋼琴協奏曲這麼陰沉的曲子），第一個印象就是芭蕾舞的線條。但是，像上半場聽到柴可夫斯基的小提琴協奏曲，我並不會特別想到芭蕾，而且說真的，聽到叮叮咚咚的Gamelan，我倒也不會只跟爪哇舞蹈的繁複手部動作聯想起來，甚至如果拿它來配上現代舞倒也不會覺得奇怪。但是，我會有上述最後一點的感受，究竟是因為Gamelan本身的語彙沒有指向特定的肢體語彙？還是只是因為我已經經過John Cage等人的薰陶了？

2. 布拉的舞怎麼都這麼累啊！光在台下看都覺得好累！

3. 舞者的生理時鐘，通常會是有利於午場演出，還是晚場演出？據我觀察，好像大部份音樂家的生理時鐘都調得比較晚，如果是下午表演恐怕會品質不良。

4. 那個......女生穿跳芭蕾穿緊身衣的時候，會覺得駱駝腳趾不雅嗎？

糖果是公的還是母的？我好像回答太認真了…

某：糖果是公的還是母的？

我：這要看你的糖果是哪個語言的。

某：啊？

我：比方說，法文裡的bonbon是陽性的，德文Bonbon可以是陽性或中性的，義大利文的caramella是陰性的…

某：啊？

我：喔，就是很多歐洲語言的名詞會分成陰性或陽性的，所以在使用的時候必須配合名詞的性別來使用正確的冠詞或是形容詞變化。比方說，法文的糖果是陽性的，所以如果說「我吃一顆糖果」就必須要用陽性的冠詞，je mange un bonbon。可是法文的蘋果是陰性的，所以「我吃一顆蘋果」就要用陰性的冠詞，je mange une pomme。而且，這種性別也不是放諸四海皆準的，比方說，中文裡會覺得太陽是陽性的，月亮是陰性的，法文也是這樣，可是德文就是相反過來的，太陽是「母」的，月亮是「公」的。或是比方說像貓，法文的chat是陽性的，德文是陰性的，西班牙文就要看是公貓gato或是母貓gata。而且這種分類方法也不只有歐洲語言才有，比方說同屬閃米語系的阿拉伯文和希伯來文也會把名詞分成陰性和陽性的，印度南方達羅毗荼語系大部份的語言也會這樣分，東非的班圖語系語言還會分出更多的「性別」，像史瓦希利語裡面的名詞就分成十多種類別，每種都要加上不同的字首…………


某：（大哭）糖果是母的因為糖果會生螞蟻啦！！！！！！（哭著跑開）


我：囧