Jay Harvey Upstage

Stefan Asbury brings the spookiness. It's too bad guest conductor Stefan Asbury didn't shape his remarks from the podium more concisely Friday night, so that he could explain the relevance of Leonard Bernstein's "Serenade after Plato's 'Symposium'" in an Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra program of pieces having a conspicuous fear factor. Rare as it is to open a review with remarks on oral program notes from the Hilbert Circle Theatre podium, I'm doing so not to question the inclusion of "Serenade" in a Halloween concert. But I wish that as an advocate for it, and to set up a context for the beautiful rendition Jennifer Frautschi was about to offer as guest soloist (the program will be repeated at 5:30 today), Asbury had spoken more to the point. All four pieces on a well-chosen program have a narrative informing them, though the one behind Bartok's "Miraculous Mandarin" might pose a challenge to present to children, of whom...

Oboist Joerg Schneider crossed the stage between pieces to inform his colleague and Ensemble 4.1 Ensemble 4.1 engages in continual search to underscore its uniqueness. clarinetist Alexander Glucksmann that the "piano-windtet"'s engagement via the Ensemble Music Society Wednesday night was the group's 125th concert. The German chamber-music group, with its unusual make-up of oboe-bassoon-horn-clarinet-piano, has a 10-year history with a lot of globetrotting experience under its belt, Glucksmann added in remarks to the Indiana History Center audience.  Statistics clearly are a point of pride to Ensemble 4.1, whose name reflects our digitized world where 2.0 signals a twice-as-good 1.0. Here it transparently signals the combination of four wind instrumentalists and one pianist: Thomas Hoppe, familiar as one of the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis ' veteran assistants at the keyboard. He was plying that part of his trade in the same hall just last mon...

Dutch-German harmonica maestro Henrik Meurkens  Inherently unaggressive and seductive in tone, the harmonica can also be a voice of unexpected power in the hands of a player as adept as Henrik Meurkens . Performances of such pieces as "Body and Soul" with a small group on YouTube can incline you to think of this constantly exploring musician as the John Coltrane of the harmonica. That's how much variety of harmony and rhythm he can put into his improvising. His fitness for all contexts is often narrowed to a samba focus, yet appears as navigationally windswept as the sailboat on the cover of "Samba Jazz Odyssey" ( Zoho ). This disc provides a glorious big-band setting for Meurkens' most familiar genre, the samba. Here the soft-focus nature of the harmonica is at home, and Meurkens never seems to run out of ways to make the instrument sing.  Based in Cologne, Germany, the WDR Big Band has long collaborated with eminent soloists, many of them U.S.-based, as ...

The story of the restricted, uncomfortable movement of native Chinese to America proceeds from the Teenage Afong Moy displays exotic chopsticks in the 1830s. unique story of how the first Chinese woman to come to the U.S. got here and what she learned and endured. Afong Moy arrived in this country at 14 in 1834, she tells us repeatedly in "The Chinese Lady," which Indiana Repertory Theatre presents on the Upperstage through Nov. 6.  This unprecedented pioneer presents her story through the kind of nesting-doll approach Lloyd Suh adopts for his 90-minute drama.  By that I mean that IRT patrons are presented with the performances Afong Moy was required to give as an exotic exhibit. Enclosing it, Suh sets down  the historically advancing story as he takes the character from shy teen to senior citizen in her adopted homeland. The tension the play creates is a remarkable achievement. The IRT's mostly white audience is asked to balance the friendly exoticism of the 19th-centur...

Usually trying to project a fresh perspective on theatrical and musical works I've blogged about before, Up jumps spring: Stuart Lewis, Paige Robinson, Kieran King, Marie Kuhns I avoided first reading my review of the last time Dance Kaleidoscope performed David Hochoy's scintillating version of "Carmina Burana." The perennially popular 1937 cantata by Carl Orff brought to modern music 13th-century secular poetry found in the south German monastery of Benediktbeuren. I hope it won't be seen as laziness that I invite readers of this entry to call up my 2014 review ,  especially if they would like to see this show today through Sunday. My attempt eight years ago to detail Hochoy's vision in words I cannot put better now. Orff's style in this work, which he was to pursue from then on after the fierce modernism of his youth, is rhythmically lively, melodically seductive and explicitly aimed toward immediate understanding. Hochoy's vision departs fruitfu...

 The Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra opened its 2022-23 season Saturday with a work by an African- Kenny Broberg forged a clear path through Schumann. American composer. Let me make clear at the start that I think the diversity push in American classical music is a positive thing, and not because the evidence is great that a lot of masterpieces are being uncovered or more widely exposed as a result. Jessie Montgomery 's "Banner" does not seem to be in that class. Unfamiliar music should be publicly aired if the artists — and, in the case of orchestras, conductors — really believe in it and can get their assisting musicians  to perform it as if they did too. Listeners should expect that some questions about choices, and even a few duds, will emerge. If you scan orchestra histories and program books, you'll find many pieces that faded into dusty neglect, and perhaps never had a place in what is taken as the standard repertoire. That doesn't mean they didn't dese...

Sometimes an enduring statement in musical history stands out from its surroundings for a variety of reasons. These questions may arise in retrospect: Does it fill some kind of unmet need that perhaps wasn't immediately evident when the ink was hardly dry on the score? Or does it indicate without delay that it may be making a bid for immortality, not by "going for the gold" with a grandiose claim, but simply because it is uniquely appealing? The Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra opened its Classical Series Friday night with four works that make distinctive claims on audience attention. The Hilbert Circle Theatre concert (repeated Saturday afternoon) featured one new work that was omitted in the weekend preview Thursday morning. Its special standing had a lot to do with the music that inspired it. Beethoven's 7th symphony has a famous slow movement that was so impressive from the start that the audience practically demanded to hear it again at its premiere. Making power...

For the New Jersey residents I once knew well, "the Shore" always had the saltwater aura of real life. But I was just  a summer visitor to my cousins and their parents, so my view was distorted by the larger-than-life reality of summering somewhere along the Garden State's Atlantic coast.  I learned less about their Bergen County lives that shaped their home and school existence for most of the year. The Shore was the respite from all that, and it presented the illusion of meaning more, thanks to the leisure industry and the upscale amenities available to some. For young people, it could be hanging-out paradise. In "Rita From Across the Street," the promise of something more for year-round as well as seasonal residents holds out the fragility and transitory quality of human connections. The economy is based on pleasure, cheap in some senses, overpriced in others. Shore life is embedded in Lou Harry , the creator and director of this play, set in Wildwood, his ho...

It's not surprising that new music for classical saxophone would find ways to fold in the influence of other music for that instrument while honoring the obvious wealth of expressiveness and technical aplomb Julian Velasco boosts contemporary profile of classical sax. common in the classical tradition. Julian Velasco applied his wide experience in premiering new saxophone music to win the first Emerging Artist Competition,  established to celebrate Cedille Records ' 30th anniversary. The Chicago label set the competition to reward musicians in the metropolitan area with a debut recording. Velasco, a 27-year-old Evanston resident, sounds like an obvious choice based on "As We Are," released by Cedille in August. The program highlights Velasco's artistry on soprano, alto, and tenor saxophones and his thorough compatibility in music with either piano or electronic accompaniment.  The composition leading off the recording and inspiring its title is a good example of ...

King John in meltdown mode If we heard his name in school, it was as the monarch from whom English nobles wrung a few limited rights in the Magna Carta, a document taken to be the narrow opening through which eventually poured the liberties our forebears came to enjoy as the foundation of modern democracy. Apart from that, his troubled reign could hardly count as a landmark in the progress of Western civilization. Nor does he figure as a human-rights hero. King John represented the Plantagenet family that eventually lost the crown to the Tudors, to whose eminence through Queen Elizabeth I the playwright owed his success. As free an artist as we like to imagine Shakespeare to be, like most who rely on patronage he had to trim his sails accordingly. The Stuart line barely got to enjoy his genius first hand before he retired to Stratford and a relatively early death.  "The Life and Death of King John" is thus one of the history plays in which a dim view of the royal past prevail...

Europa Galante founder Fabio Biondi in action Some fascinating indications of Italianate flair showed up in the first piece in Europa Galante 's concert Thursday night at the Palladium . Soloist-founder Fabio Biondi varied the two-note tag at the end of the leading phrase of the Presto finale of J.S. Bach's Violin Concerto in G minor. The tag is literally an echo, and at first Biondi played it that way. Eighteenth-century music was fond of echo effects, and Bach often used them in cantatas so that the echoed phrase reinforced the meaning of the sung text preceding it. But the tag can also be rendered as emphatic punctuation, matching the ensemble's manner. It's very assertive music, and the reinforcement helps. There's room also to ornament those two notes, and Biondi did that as well toward the end. All told, appealing variety in one little detail. The modest-sized audience at the Center for the Performing Arts showplace was to find out after intermission how much ...

 One of Ana Nelson' s pieces on her debut disc, "Bridges," seems to illuminate the path she's followed, from Ana Nelson imparts flow and nimbleness to both her instruments. a student of classical music into a young professional with a jazz focus. The disc's third track, "LCB," opens with an etude-like theme, simple but appealing, that flowers against a repeated-note pattern as the music becomes intense. The prevalence of even notes throughout suggests study and a desire to build upon basics. Her turn from classical music to jazz seems to have been smooth (listen on her website to her pristine account of the second of Stravinsky's Three Pieces for Clarinet Solo). Her  legitimate tone on alto saxophone and clarinet alike is thoroughly evident in "Bridges." When she gets a little wild in her solos, the firmly centered tone persists. In this disc of all originals, Nelson gives notice of her compositional skills as well. The pieces support her a...

It's a nice project that Rob Dixon has headed to make a partial survey, now recorded and  publicly available, to celebrate some of the current musical achievements of central Indiana. "From the 317" helped introduce the Indy Jazz Fest Saturday afternoon at Garfield Park. The band was headed by saxophonist Dixon and guest star Derrick Gardner , a trumpeter of excellent stamina and a canny sense of just what to contribute when. The redoubtable drummer Richard "Sleepy" Floyd laid out the basic pulse and the energy associated with the heavy groove that's useful in both funk and hip-hop contexts. Brandon Meeks, an equally wide-ranging and inventive bassist, provided mainstay status in the rhythm section, which was filled out by keyboardists Reggie Bishop and Kevin Anker. Joining Gardner and Dixon in the front line was guitarist Charlie Ballantine.  Rusty Redenbacher  (center) at the microphone, with star horns Gardner and Dixon to his right. The guest stars give...

Indianapolis jazz fans who may remember long-ago visits by Astral Project  to the Jazz Kitchen know the Kaeshammer's rootsy piano is well-known in Canada. kind of groove to expect from drummer Johnny Vidacovich and his irrepressibly bouncy chat with the audience. A little bit of the talk and a lot of the groove help create the relaxed atmosphere of "The Warehouse Sessions," a new recording ( Linus Entertainment ) under the direction of Michael Kaeshammer, an eminent member of the Canadian jazz community. Kaeshammer's boogie-woogie-informed style at the piano leads the way in perfect rapport with Vidacovich and the steady pulse of bassist David Piltch through nine tunes. They are all likely to make instant connections with listeners who may want a respite from complexity in the enduring trio format of piano-bass-drums. They get down to hard-digging relatability with "You Got It in Your Soulness," a piece from Les McCann's 1969 hit album "Swiss Mov...

You may expect to have  "Seasons of Love" as a daylong ear worm if you catch "Tick, Tick...Boom!" at Phoenix Theatre before the end of the month. The hit song from "Rent," the musical through which Jonathan Larson achieved wide fame, much of it posthumous, has a precursor phrase or two in the earlier show. Semi-autobiographical to a wrenching degree, the '"Rent" predecessor opens the Phoenix season in a well-designed production with a splendidly compatible three-person cast under the direction of Emily Ristine Holloway. "Seasons of Love" is of course rooted in our perceptions of time— how we mark it, how we attempt to speed it up or slow it down, and just what we make of certain milestones. Time is of the essence, a capacity audience was reminded on opening night Friday. Jon, from whose viewpoint the story of "Tick" is told, dreads his 30th birthday, which he is about to reach without fulfilling a self-imposed goal of suc...