Tagged with 'Jazz'

Big band swing and ballroom dancing from Eastern Europe? What sounds like an unconventional combination, to say the least, comes across as enchantingly natural with Nikolai Kapustin. The Nordic Chamber Orchestra will perform Kapustin's Concerto for violin, piano and string orchestra op. 105 on 29 and 30 August 2024 in Västernorrland, Sweden, under the direction of Gilles Apap. The solo parts at this Swedish premiere will be played by Mona Kontra (piano) and the conductor himself (violin).

Kapustin knows how to fuse romanticism with jazz like no other. Yet he never saw himself as a jazz musician. He wrote down everything that seemed improvised from the outside in order to let it grow with the composition. The result is a unique music that - like Kapustin himself - has only become increasingly well-known since the 2000s. 

Concerto by Nikolai Kapustin: Duke Ellington meets Rachmaninoff

In addition to jazz and blues, Kapustin also makes use of ragtime in this Concerto. Traits of this rousing dance music permeate the work and allow it to oscillate between ecstasy and tender restraint. Sometimes Kapustin can simply be ‘blue’.

He mixes Shostakovich, Rachmaninoff, Schnittke and Prokofiev with the blues. It’s a mix of American-influenced jazz music plus the Russian education. (Frank Dupree, Pianist)

In a word: Kapustin's music is fun and there is still a lot to discover from him. More can be heard on 30 August 2024 in Tokyo, where Kapustin's second piano concerto will be performed, and in October in Sydney and Brisbane, where Nobuyuki Tsujii will perform the 8 Concert Studies.

 

Further Reading:

Nikolai Kapustin: Composer Profile

Concerto for violin, piano and string orchestra: Work Details and Online Score 

Website Music Västernorrland

 

photo: Peter Andersen, background: Adobe Firefly

Schott Music New York has signed a representation agreement with the Wayne Shorter Estate. This will make the concertante and symphonic works of the influential jazz master available for performance by orchestras and ensembles worldwide.

On 13 November the complete original version of George and Ira Gershwin’s classic opera Porgy and Bess will premiere at La Scala in Milan in an evening dedicated to the memory of conductor Nikolaus Harnoncourt, who passed away earlier this year. The production is directed by his brother, Philipp Harnoncourt, and conducted by Alan Gilbert.

The original full-length version of Porgy and Bess more noticeably reveals an influence of the European avant-garde than the more frequently performed 'reduced version' of the opera. In the late 1920s, Gershwin was profoundly impacted when he met the Austrian composer Alban Berg. Gershwin referred to Porgy and Bess as ‘his Wozzeck’, referring to Berg's first opera, and while its more avant-garde passages are often cut, they can be seen to strengthen the dramatic effect of the opera.

Gershwin's Porgy and Bess - And the livin’ is easy…?

Arguably, no other opera has produced so many hits, such as the ever popular Summertime, one of the most recorded songs of all time. Yet the calming lullaby of Summertime at the beginning of Porgy and Bess contrasts starkly with the violent reality of the opera’s setting in Catfish Row, Charleston, South Carolina. In a run-down tenement block dominated by criminals, a crippled beggar, Porgy, attempts to rescue the beautiful Bess from the clutches of her violent lover and the local drug dealer. The opera is based on the novel “Porgy” by Dubose Heyward, who also wrote the libretto.

While the world premiere in 1935 was a success, Porgy and Bess was often criticised for Gershwin's decision to cast African American singers in the main roles. A classically trained musician, Gershwin intended to write a piece that fused traditional form with other musical styles, and shows a great breadth of stylistic diversity. Classical influences, such as a fugue in the opening act, can be heard alongside jazz, ragtime and blues. Gershwin wished Porgy and Bess to be respected as a fully-formed opera, not a Broadway musical, and can therefore be regarded as an attempt to close a stylistic gap that Kurt Weill once described as:

“Metropolitan: the worst example of old fashioned opera on the one side, and musical comedy which tries to be sophisticated and low brow at the same time on the other side. Nothing in between.”

Porgy and Bess will run at La Scala until 23 November, and a production by Sydney Opera will open in Australia on 26 November.

• George Gershwin — Pro­file


• Porgy and Bess — Details


• Tea­tro alla Scala

 

Photo: Lena Obst, Staats­thea­ter Wies­ba­den 2013.