Short documentary on how Nazis treated Felix Mendelssohn's legacy a potent reminder of 1930s madness

Now that people who were children during the 1930s and early '40s are dying off, it's our last chance to get first-hand accounts of the madness of Nazi Germany. One captivating recent effort is a documentary made by Sheila Hayman and aired by the BBC last year, to mark the 200th anniversary of Felix Mendelssohn's birth.

The 59-minute film is provocatively titled Mendelssohn, the Nazis and Me. Because it is so short, the doc has to cover a lot of ground in a compressed time. Although the parallel is forced, Hayman uses Mendelssohn's -- and most Germans' -- love for Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream as a counterpoint to the vilification of Jewish composers by Hitler's regime. Hayman also uses the themes of identity and transformation as metaphors for the Mendelssohn family's ongoing struggle with religious identity and Felix's desire to reconcile his notable Jewish ancestry with being baptized a Christian.

The story moves briskly back and forth between the 19th and 20th centuries, between Moses Mendelssohn, his grandson Felix and how, along with Jewish people themselves, any culture associated with Jews was marginalized in mid-1930s Germany, then segregated into groups like the Jewish Cultural Association. Non-Jews were not allowed to attend events and certain composers --- Wagner and Bruckner are cited -- could not be performed by Jews, and not listened to by Jews, in case the act of listening "polluted" the music. The next step was the concentration camp, where we get snippets of the propaganda films showing attentive residents of Teresin enjoying a performance of Mendelssohn's oratorio Elijah (presumably before being ushered into the afterlife via gas chamber).

The documentary is rich in 20th century historical detail, thanks to the first-hand accounts from the Nazi era. One has to shake one's head at the depths of Nazi madness -- and remember that, if this could happen once, it could happen again, no matter how ridiculous the prospect seems.

Heyman's treatment of Felix Mendelssohn's history is a bit more sketchy, but there are many other good sources to turn to for that. We get interview time with a couple of scholars, as well as hearing snippets of music that include cellist Steven Isserlis and violinist Daniel Hope.

What would make a DVD such as this one worth buying, rather than viewing once, would be more music. I'm sure Hayman must've captured performances of full pieces of Mendelssohn's in the course of her filming. These performance could easily have been edited into bonus featurettes -- especially given that Isserlis and Hope are such compelling musicians.

Mendelssohn, the Nazis and Me is officially being released on DVD Jan. 26. Click on the image for details.

Coincidentally, Jan. 26 is the day Polish pianist-composer Ignaz Friedman died in 1948 (he was born in 1882). He was one of the great pianists of his day -- one source says he gave about 2,800 concerts around the world -- but some sort of acute nerve irritation forced him to retire in 1943. He managed to get out of Italy, where he had settled, in 1940, thanks to an invitation to do a concert tour in Australia.

Here he is on Cloumbia recordings made in the early 1930s, playing a Song Without Words (available on a Naxos Historical CD) also the Op. 16, No. 2 Scherzo, by Felix Mendelssohn:

Laughter is a fine way to sneak a peek at the magic of a symphony orchestra

The composers may be dead, but not our interest in spreading love of orchestral music to new audiences.

As far as I know, no show has ever overthrown the dominance of Sergei Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf as a children's introduction to the orchestra. Also great is Benjamin Britten's Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra.

Not that people haven't tried to do something else.

Americans have been treated to Garrison Keillor's Young Lutheran take and, more recently, a clever Lemony Snicket-inspired mystery story, The Composer is Dead, by the Beaudelaire orphans' creator Daniel Handler and his composer buddy Nathaniel Stookey. It was commissioned by the San Francisco Symphony, and performed in Toronto two seasons ago.

I love Snicket's call to bows: "Those who want justice should go to the police station. Those who want something a little more interesting, should go to the orchestra."

There's a show running in England currently (live in Liverpool at Philharmonic Hall tonight, fyi) by funnyman Bill Bailey. It's called, appropriately enough, Bill Bailey's Remarkable Guide to the Orchestra. My guess is it's probably more suited to adults than children. Not having seen the show, I wonder how the comedian, who is at his sharpest when he isn't allowed to ramble, manages to sustain this over an evening.

I mention it, because it's being released on DVD and Blu-Ray today in the U.K.

Here is a promotional trailer, made last year at Royal Albert Hall.

Bailey is pretty nimble on a keyboard. Here's an old sketch of his, about the influence of Cockney music on classical composers:

Review: Antonio Vivaldi is a musical man for all seasons, but leaves are turning on Nigel Kennedy's blockbuster album

Here are two very different takes on Vivaldi -- one new, one 20 years old. I'll start with the old one, because it's a biggie:

NIGEL KENNEDY & THE ENGLISH CHAMBER ORCHESTRA

Vivaldi, The Four Seasons, 20th Anniversary Edition CD & DVD (EMI)

*** (Out of 4)

If you're 35 or older, chances are pretty good that you've heard at least snippets of Nigel Kennedy's recording of The Four Seasons, an undyingly popular four-violin-concerto suite by Baroque-era mastermind Antonio Vivaldi (1678-1741). Released in 1989, Kennedy's recording with the English Chamber Orchestra has sold more than 3 million copies. It was everywhere. It made Vivaldi a star again. It also made Kennedy into a star -- something he took way too personally (but that's another story).

To celebrate its 20th anniversary, EMI has re-released that album with a companion DVD (from a 1990 TV special), where Kennedy introduces each concerto before playing it. (Click on the album image for details)

If you've never bought your own copy of The Four Seasons, this is a fine place to start, but you can do better. Kennedy's playing is fiery, assured. He goes for dramatic emphasis wherever he can. The little orchestra sounds nice. But, two decades on, after just about every modern-instrument string orchestra has adopted some of the spikier bowing techniques from period-instrument groups, parts of this recording are sounding dated, lacking a larger-scale bounce and the sonic texture that the best period-instrument players can muster. 

If you want to support local talent, you can't go wrong with Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra's 1992 recording. If you want extra-spicy period instruments, there's Il giardino armonico's version, of the same vintage.

My favourite modern-instrument recording is a three-year-old effort by with Cho-Liang Lin and New York ensemble Sejong. It's more engaging than Kennedy's, there's more listening, including the amazingly dramatic "Storm at Sea" Violin Concerto, and, because it's from budget label Naxos, it's cheaper.

Here's Kennedy playing the "Allegro" from "Winter," which has some of the recording's finest work:

BENOIT LOISELLE & VINCENT BOUCHER

Vivaldi, Sonate e concerti (ATMA Classique)

*** (out of 4)

Two great Québécois soloists -- cellist Bernard Loiselle and organist Vincent Boucher -- team up for a satisfying selection of seven popular works adapted for organ and cello (Vivaldi didn't write for this specific combination). There are two of the Cello Sonatas, two keyboard concertos, the opening movement to his setting of the Stabat Mater and "Domine Deus" from the Gloria. (Click on the album image for details.)

Loiselle's velvet-wrapped cello playing is an expressive and technical treat, while Boucher gets some very nice sounds out of a grand tracker organ built by Karl Wilhelm for St. Matthias Church in Westmount, one of Montreal's many musical treasures. (I frequently sang with the men-and-boys choir in that Anglican church while I was a student at McGill.)

The two performers are a beautiful match. My only reservation about this otherwise excellent album is the sound balance between the organ and cello. It often sounds as if they were recorded on two separate tracks, even though they probably weren't. It's the challenge of miking two very different kinds of instruments in a large, acoustically live space.

New HMV digital shopping site notable for poverty of its classical music selections

There is only one bricks-and-mortar store in all of downtown Toronto that specializes in classical music recordings. There are many specialists on the Web, but any further opportunity to increase the visibility, availability and variety of classical music for sale is welcome.

So I was curious when HMV, which has a reasonable-sized classical music department at its main store, announced a beta version of a new web-based shopping site today.

I clicked on the classical button and the first four featured albums that popped up included 99 Perfectly Relaxing Songs, a compilation worthy of your favourite transatlantic flight, and All is Wild, All is Silent by Balmorhea, which is neat, experimentalish pop. The other two were favourite choral anthems from Trinity College, Cambridge, and the recent recording from the original, medieval Carmina Burana collection by Millenarium.

The next four included the cast album of Avenue Q and 40 Most Beautiful Classical Anthems as well as Shining Silver Skies by a group called Ashram.

I reached  No. 13 before a recent, notable, mainstream classical album came up on the top list: young French pianist David Fray's J.S. Bach outing from last fall. No more classical until No. 28, a compilation album by violinist Joshua Bell.

That's very, very sad.

I've been siding with those people who are convinced that electronic playlists are going to bring new people to classical music through the simple joys of exploring the possibilities on the Web. Clearly, HMV's pathetic selection of featured albums is clearly not going to be any help in the matter.

Turin production of original, four-act Edgar not a satisfying Puccini opera experience

Here is my opera DVD review of the week, which didn't make it into today's Star:

Giacomo Puccini, Edgar 

(ArtHaus Musik)

** (out of 4)

Even the greatest talents can get a blast of the sophomore curse. 

Giacomo Puccini wrote his first opera for a competition, while he was still a conservatory student in Milan. Le Villi was a success, opening doors for him at La Scala. But the premiere of Edgar, his second opera, written in 1889 with the same librettist (Ferdinando Fontana), was a disaster. 

The four-act melodrama about a man torn between a pure village maiden and a rowdy gypsy who appears to have raced right off the set of Carmen is loaded with mood and scene changes that go nowhere. There are few memorable arias -- and none have made it into the standard solo repertoire. All we have is Puccini’s typically luxuriant and emotionally evocative musical accompaniment. 

The composer chopped down the opera to three acts and tinkered with it several times over nearly 10 years before giving up. So why would anyone want to revive the original version? 

This 2008 Turin production, although a treat to the eyes and ears, proves that some works of art are best left at the bottom of a pile of dusty archives (where Puccini’s original score had been found the year before). The plot lurches around with such abandon that no director can smooth over its progress. It’s a waste of fine tenor José Cura in the title role. 

There are no extras – which is too bad in the case of a historically (if not aesthetically) significant production.

Here's a satisfying aria from Edgar, thanks to the legendary Leontyne Price: "Addio, mio dolce amor," from a 1971 recording:

William Walton's 107th

 

Today would have been the 107th birthday of English composer William Walton, who died in 1983.

His violin, viola and cellos concertos have earned a permanent place in the repertoire. His movie soundtracks for Laurence Olivier’s post-World War II Shakespeare films (which earned him two Oscar nominations) will always be around. Guitar students love the Bagatelles he wrote for Julian Breem. But the rest of his considerable output of chamber, symphonic, choral, theatre, ballet and sacred music is slowly disappearing under a layer of dust.

With lights turned out but video screen glowing, my Earth Hour activity last night was watching Tony Palmer’s 1980 film biography of Walton, At the Haunted End of the Day. (The title comes from a truly haunting aria sung by Cressida in his 1954 opera Troilus and Cressida.)

Walton was not a flamboyant or controversial man. He was someone who, in the classic British sense, got on with what he had to do. Palmer says his is the only full-length interview ever recorded with Walton. Even so we learn little about what may have been going on inside Walton’s head.

As with most of Palmer's DVD reissues, there is no full-length performance of any one work included on the disc, so one has to go looking elsewhere.

Walton’s Oldham, Lancashire boyhood, lucky admission to Oxford’s Christ Church Cathedral choir and precocious talent for composition make a great beginning.

Walton had no knack for mastering piano or violin at school. “So I had to find a way to make myself interesting, or risk being sent back to Oldham. So I tried composing,” he recalls.

His years at Oxford placed him amidst people who would later help kick start his career. The most prominent were Sacheverell (Sacha) Sitwell and his poet sister Edith, who eased his entry into the clique of London’s bright young things in the 1920s.

But the documentary’s 95-minute march forward can’t pause, and must plod on. What we do begin to see forming is a morose, self-absorbed personality.

One of the film’s unintentional laughs comes when Walton laments the onset of World War II: “It was a shame, because I had just bought a house in Belgravia, and it was bombed flat.”

We catch excerpts of the major musical highlights -- including Belshazzar’s Feast, conducted by a very young Simon Rattle.

When Palmer asks the composer what he is looking forward to next, the old man shrugs slightly. “I don’t know. Death, I suppose.”

Fortunately, enough of his music does live on to perhaps inspire future musicians. Don’t miss an opportunity to give it a listen.

There’s an excellent resource site (that hasn’t been updated for a couple of years) at www.williamwalton.net

 

Given that it’s his birthday, and that it’s a Sunday, let’s celebrate with William Walton’s extravagant setting of Te Deum (We Praise Thee, O God) for Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation (as performed ata memorial service for Laurence Olivier in Westminster Abbey, in 1989):