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Urban Shocker's Neighbourhood Watch

I think you would have enjoyed today's piano recital every bit as much - if not more - Tony. Certainly one of the best things I've heard this year:

Sergei Saratovsky

Estampes by Debussy, followed by Carnaval by Schumann.

Russian-Canadian pianist Sergei Saratovsky has received acclaim both at home and abroad, being the recipient of an award from Russian President Vladimir Putin recognizing his achievements in music as well as performing in the presence of the Governor General of Canada Michaëlle Jean. Mr. Saratovsky has won numerous competitions, including first place at the Porto International Piano Competition (Portugal, 1999), where he was also the recipient of awards for the interpretation of Debussy and the best performance of a Beethoven Sonata. He received third prize at the International Russian Music Piano Competition (USA, 2003) where he was also awarded the Special Public Prize. In 2004, Mr. Saratovsky won second prize in the Eckhardt-Gramatté National Competition (Canada). In 2006, he received second place in the Missouri Southern International Piano Competition (USA). Mr. Saratovsky was the recipient of an award and recital opportunities from the Vancouver Chopin Society in 2008. Also in 2008, he placed second in the Pacific Piano Competition (Canada), and became a finalist in the Montréal International Musical Competition (Canada) where he also received the award for Best Canadian Artist.

Sergei Saratovsky’s concert engagements have included appearances with the Portugal National Orchestra, the Portugal Chamber Orchestra, Orchestre Métropolitain du Grand Montréal, Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre symphonique de Laval, and regular solo engagements with the State Symphony Orchestra of Karelia in his native Russia. Mr. Saratovsky has performed for audiences in France, Italy, Australia, Portugal, Canada, United States and Russia and has also been the featured artist on radio and television broadcasts aired across Canada, United States, Portugal, Australia, and Russia.

Sergei Saratovsky was born in Karelia, Russia. He received his university training at the Petrozavodsk State Conservatory of Music, graduating with a Bachelor Degree in Piano Performance in 2004. In 2002 Mr. Saratovsky became a resident of Canada. He completed a Masters Degree in Piano Performance with Alexander Tselyakov at Brandon University, where he received the gold medal for academic excellence and graduated with Greatest Distinction in 2006. Mr. Saratovsky is presently a doctoral student at the University of British Columbia where he studies with Canadian pianist Jane Coop.

http://www.sergeisaratovsky.com/home_&_news.html

A younger audience today, too - music students, I assume, and a high school group.
 
I don't know whether you boys have caught that Stuttgart Ballet dancer Jiri Jelenek is jumping across the Atlantic to the National Ballet:

jelinek-ballet-cp-natbal2.jpg


The story can be found here.

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COC online chat this Saturday!

For those in an opera chat mood, the COC's recent production of Madama Butterfly will be broadcast on CBC Radio 2 this coming Saturday at 1 pm. There will be a simulataneous chat going on which can be accessed at coc.ca the day of (instructions will be posted there!) All of the 09-10 season is being broadcast on CBC this year. Hope to chit chat with some of you on Saturday.
 
At last night's TSO concert I sat 5 rows back of the conductor, in dead centre, in orchestra level. This is the first time I've ever been seated in orchestra level, I've always taken mezzanine tickets at prior concerts. What a revelation, the orchestral sound is first-rate in the prime orchestra seating. I'll try to get seated there again.

The concert featured the best interpretation of the Symphony No. 5 by Dmiti Shostakovich that I've ever heard. I've got two recordings of it and I've heard it live perhaps a half dozen times. Guest conductor Stephane Deneve drew things from the score that I've not heard other conductors do. He really raced the orchestra through the frenzy that ends the first movement. A matching passage opens the fourth movement, and this was taken with equally scary speed. The last few bars of the last movement were slowed down to perhaps half of the speed that other conductors use, and this heightened the dramatic impact enormously.

This conductor, I am told, has appeared with the TSO 3 or 4 times before, but this is the first time I've heard his work. He's amazing and I'll go to hear him again if he returns. The players (who were just godly in this work) loved him. They tried to hand a curtain call over to him but he insisted that they rise with him and he bowed as part of the orchestra.

Oh, yes, James Ehnes played Prokofiev's Violin Concerto No. 2 in the first half of the concert. He makes it all seem so easy whilst I get the impression that the composer had a demonic side, this is extremely difficult music to play. After the Prokofiev, Ehnes played two Paganini caprices as encores --- the Shostakovich ruled the night, though.

I recall the last time I heard Shosakovich 5th live (Yannick Nezet-Seguin conducted). The demand that YNS made on the players was to produce a rich and elegant sound, with virtuosity. Deneve, instead, gave us a wonderfully individual reading, with huge interpretive demands on the players. For last night's concert the house was at 100%. I wish I could repeat the whole experience again.

Edit: forgot to mention that Deneve rearranged the orchestra to wonderful effect. Violins across left and right of stage, bases and celli tucked into left side, violas in their usual place. This works so well. I heard an Austrian conductor (Honneck) guesting over the TSO several years ago in Dvorak's 9th, with a similar seating arrangement and I recall being equally impressed at that time.
 
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Thanks, TonyV. Damn, I should've gone to that one - haven't caught Denève yet. Yannick's 5th in 2004 was beyond compare ... but I would have enjoyed the comparison nonetheless.

I'm off for a Dvorak 9th wallow tomorrow night.
 
Urban Shocker said:
Thanks, TonyV. Damn, I should've gone to that one - haven't caught Denève yet. Yannick's 5th in 2004 was beyond compare ... but I would have enjoyed the comparison nonetheless.

I'm off for a Dvorak 9th wallow tomorrow night.
Click to expand...

Same. It's a familiar favourite... which is what I need this week.
 
Tovey's two compositions were pleasant enough. Both seemed to draw heavily on 1950s Hollywood movie soundtrack music, though if the first piece Urban Runway was supposed to be about the rythm and cadence of fashion shows and people flouncing about on the street with shopping bags I would have expected more modern forms to have been woven into it.

I thought the first movement of the Dvorak was a bit rushed and not as well modulated as it could've been, but from the Largo onwards I was happy. Moved forward one row because the enormous man sitting next to me was spilling out everywhere, and there was an ancient queen chattering to his buddy in the row behind. Actually, the old codger was rather sweet - the pair came over and sat next to me in the lobby at intermission before I took off for drinkies-and-walkies. Ran into a friend who used to do dance reviews but now lives with her parents in Vancouver.

Yesterday to One Of A Kind at the CNE. I rather liked Laura Kapp's hand knit sweaters - in fact I'd seen a woman wearing one at the market the week before and wondered who'd made it - and we chatted about her designs for future knits. The art pottery, fired in a 27 foot long Anagama in the backwoods of New Brunswick by a young couple called Clark, also appealed to me - hardly craft, and a breath of fresh air from all the fussily bright ceramics on sale there. Chatted to Lee Clark about the potters we both like - Hans Coper and Peter Voulkos.

Ate as much free food as possible. Hardly any furniture on show, very little men's clothing of any sort, lots of hideous paintings that wouldn't even make it into the Nathan Phillips outdoor show, some decent enough jewellery, some nice loomed rugs, a few other odds and ends ...
 
^ would that I could, too late now, I'm home to stay, tonight. What is the big deal?

After a tumultuous year (with elderly parent issues, note the plural) we are taking off for a couple of weeks, to return shortly before the big holiday.

Earlier today I was home listening to a wonderful recording of Handel's Messiah. Nothing trendy and informed, no period instrument performance, instead I played the old school, slushy, huge, delicious Sir Malcolm Sargent version, full-on. It's fabulous.

So, bring on the season. I wish all of you Neighbourhood Watchers an excellent time, get into the celebrations and be joyous all!!!
 
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