Welcome to the Weekend and you Saturday Evening Concert. I have another fabulous live performance for you tonight brought to you courtesy of NPR Music with Max Richter in Concert. Max Richter is, according to the bio on his website:
"Hailed as the most influential composer of his generation, electro-acoustic polymath Max Richter defies definition: composer he may be, but he is also pianist, producer, remixer, and collaborator, and beyond argument one of the most prolific of contemporary musical artists.
Inspired equally by Bach, punk rock and ambient electronica, Richter’s sonic world blends a formal classical training (he graduated from the Royal Academy of Music, and was a pupil of renowned composer Luciano Berio) with modern technology. His unique and distinctive brand of heartbroken melodicism bridges the minimalist greats with pioneering electronics and the contemporary digital music production multiverse. Time Out has remarked on the ‘overwhelming emotional power’ of his work, the New Statesman has noted its ‘astonishing depth and beauty’ while Classic FM and Pitchfork have called it ‘stunning’ and The Guardian ‘languorously transcendent’.....
...Signed as an exclusive artist to Deutsche Grammophon, Max Richter’s
projects for 2015 include his new solo album following on from his
bestselling ‘Recomposed: Vivaldi’s Four Seasons’ for which he received
the ECHO Klassik Award in 2013. In 2015 Max will also see the premiere
of Woolf Works his new full length ballet for choreographer Wayne
McGregor and The Royal Ballet at Covent Garden on the life and works of
Virginia Woolf, which The Independent noted ‘looks set to be one of the
most ambitious shows of the year’ and The Guardian forecasted to be ‘one
of the highlights’ of the Opera House Season."
Tonight's performance comes to you live from Le Poisson Rouge, an Art and Performance venue in New York City. Max is on the key boards, the Violin Soloist is Daniel Hope and accompaniment is by the Ensemble LPR under the baton of Tito Munoz. Here is a review of tonight's concert by Producer Tom Huizenga:
Program: Vivaldi: The Four Seasons (Recomposed by Max Richter) Music from Infra
"Can't take another moment of Vivaldi's ubiquitous Four Seasons? Neither
could Max Richter, a London-based composer who deftly blurs the lines
between the classical and electronic worlds. Long ago he loved it the
piece but like some of us, he grew tired of the overplayed warhorse,
which can be found in no fewer than 250 recordings on sites like
ArchivMusic.
So instead of writing off the piece forever, Richter rewrote it. He discarded about three quarters of Vivaldi's original, substituted his own music and tucked in some light electronics for a total Four Seasons makeover. It sounds a little hipper — lighter on its feet in places, darker and more cinematic in others. Still, Richter's remodeled version retains the basic shape, and much of the spirit, of the master's original four violin concertos — each about ten minutes and in three movements, sequenced fast-slow-fast.
Richter recorded his rejiggered Seasons with violin soloist Daniel Hope and together they brought the project to (Le) Poisson Rouge, the Greenwich Village music space, where we had our cameras set up and ready to roll.
In Richter's reimagining, you'll recognize more than a few weather-related signposts like the violin's shivering figures in "Winter" and bolts of thunder in stormy "Summer." Yet in other places the music is heavily disguised. The cheerful birdsong that opens Vivaldi's "Spring" emerges as mere shards of the original, backed by moody pedal points in the electronic low end, lending it a movie music feel. And Vivaldi's violin horn calls in the finale of "Autumn" morph into a comforting minimalist blanket of warm double basses and electronics.
The revamped Vivaldi is about as "classical" as Richter gets. For a taste of his more electronic side, the second half of this concert features selections from Infra, dance music he wrote for London's Royal Ballet, based on T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land. For this music, Richter pares down to just a piano, his laptop and a string quartet, but he weaves in many unusual sounds. Here you'll find a dusty treasure-trove of old shortwave radio signals, industrial rumbles, clicks and pops serving as the underlying bed for Richter's gritty and forlorn soundscapes."
So instead of writing off the piece forever, Richter rewrote it. He discarded about three quarters of Vivaldi's original, substituted his own music and tucked in some light electronics for a total Four Seasons makeover. It sounds a little hipper — lighter on its feet in places, darker and more cinematic in others. Still, Richter's remodeled version retains the basic shape, and much of the spirit, of the master's original four violin concertos — each about ten minutes and in three movements, sequenced fast-slow-fast.
Richter recorded his rejiggered Seasons with violin soloist Daniel Hope and together they brought the project to (Le) Poisson Rouge, the Greenwich Village music space, where we had our cameras set up and ready to roll.
In Richter's reimagining, you'll recognize more than a few weather-related signposts like the violin's shivering figures in "Winter" and bolts of thunder in stormy "Summer." Yet in other places the music is heavily disguised. The cheerful birdsong that opens Vivaldi's "Spring" emerges as mere shards of the original, backed by moody pedal points in the electronic low end, lending it a movie music feel. And Vivaldi's violin horn calls in the finale of "Autumn" morph into a comforting minimalist blanket of warm double basses and electronics.
The revamped Vivaldi is about as "classical" as Richter gets. For a taste of his more electronic side, the second half of this concert features selections from Infra, dance music he wrote for London's Royal Ballet, based on T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land. For this music, Richter pares down to just a piano, his laptop and a string quartet, but he weaves in many unusual sounds. Here you'll find a dusty treasure-trove of old shortwave radio signals, industrial rumbles, clicks and pops serving as the underlying bed for Richter's gritty and forlorn soundscapes."
Also from NPR Music, You may hear the Danish String Quartet performing traditional Danish folk music over on my tumblr. Then there is the collection of Simply Stunning photographs in the post down below and the Hottie of the Day! over on my tumblr for your pruient edification. Thanks for sharing part of your Weekend with me, see you again on Monday for another week of Music, Men & More!. Don't forget to leave a comment or an email with your thoughts on what I should do about the impending censorship deadline coming up on the 23rd. Until next time as always, Enjoy!
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