I haven't really considered myself a classical music fan. In fact, classical music often gives me narcolepsy.
Still, I do feel like the New York Philharmonic is special. They're amongst the best at what they do -- orchestral music. When I was a kid, growing up in Wisconsin, I used to watch them on TV, with Leonard Bernstein. We had an orchestra in Madison, Wisconsin as well, but somehow I never even considered that it could be as important as the New York Philharmonic.
So I resubscribed. I went for matinee performances, because I hoped that I would be less likely to get narcolepsy earlier in the day.
So far this strategy seems to be going well. I haven't fallen asleep. On the other hand, I've been to two concerts that might have been atypical. One was Handel's Messiah, which I know very well, and the other was last Friday.
This last concert was
Respighi
Church Windows
Magnus Lindberg
Violin Concerto No. 2 (U.S. Premiere—New York Philharmonic Co-Commission with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Berlin Philharmonic, and Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra)
Stravinsky
The Rite of Spring
The program notes for the Stravinsky piece were fascinating. Apparently, the first time it was played in invoked a riot amongst the audience with proponents and opponents of the music going at each other. That made me particularly curious about it.
It was definitely an interesting piece with lots of unexpected musical twists, including quite a few chords that were jarring. Still, we're used to this stuff now, and the largely elderly audience at the matinee listened quite peacefully.
The part I liked best was the Lindberg. This was part of a series of 3 performances of the world premiere of this concerto, by the living composer Magnus Lindberg. I tried looking for him on twitter. Apparently this is a very common name on twitter, so I didn't succeed in finding him.
Still, the style reminded me of the parts of Josh Groban's music that I like best. I included some links in this blog about that sort of music: quiet, beautiful, but with unexpected chords and chord progressions. I have often felt that calling Josh Groban classical/pop crossover is misleading. I would rather hear him called new music/pop crossover. I think that's more accurate.
I have to conclude that my preference is for what's called "modern classical."
Anyway, I'm sort of hoping now that Josh will write a song, collaborating with Magnust Lindberg.
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