@nyphil Concert 1/15/16

I first subscribed to the New York Philharmonic last season, because Josh Groban was featured at the opening gala.

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.

http://straightarrow372.blogspot.com/2015/12/so-this-happened-joshgroban-nominated.html

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.

I finally got to see Lucia Micarelli @theloosh live

I finally got to see Lucia Micarelli live -- twice actually.  I first found her on YouTube performing with Josh Groban -- but then she never played with him since 2010, when I became a Grobanite.

This made me sad. I really liked the Awake DVD with Josh, Tariqh, and Lucia.  Not only did the music please me, but i loved their diversity.  You don't see too many diverse bands in popular music.

She's been touring with Chris Botti in 2015.  She also a stint with Barbara Streisand with him recently.  I looked at the tour schedule occasionally, but the gigs all seemed to be far from the NYC metro area, where I live.  I tweeted her, asking her to tell me when she got to the NYC metro area, but that never happened.

Then, on FB, I saw a photo of Chris and Lucia with Cicely Tyson.  Now I happen to know that Cicely is playing on Broadway with James Earl Jones in "Gin Game," right now, so I knew Lucia and Chris were in NYC.

I went and searched on the Internet, and found that Chris was doing a residency at the Blue Note Jazz Club -- 28 days, 56 shows -- an insane schedule.  Lucia was listed there with him on the Blue Note Jazz Club website.

I immediately bought a ticket and went on December 21.  Then I went again on New Year's Eve.

She played the 2 opening numbers with him.  Then she came back to do Emmanuel and Aurora/Kashmir.  Then I think she came back for at least two more, one of which was "Time to Say Goodbye," which was not actually the closing number, but was perhaps her last number.

She was just excellent.  That beautiful tone that I've always so admired was very evident.  On New Year's Eve, I took a date.  He fond her tone so unusual that he was convinced that it had been electronically altered.  I told him that I was quite sure that that was not the case, that it was just her extraordinary bowing style that we were hearing.

She wasn't there for the whole residency.  Starting January 2, they brought back Caroline Campbell, who was playing with Chris the last time I saw him prior blog about seeing Chris Botti Caroline is a fine violinist, but just not as extraordinary as Lucia, at least to my ear.

I had seen the videos of Lucia playing in Emmanuel and Aurora/Kashmir many times.  There's something magical about seeing something on the screen that makes it seem especially elusive.  The idea that I might hear these pieces live, just seemed incredible to me -- but there they were doing them -- and they were stellar -- just stellar.

I know she occasionally has done solo shows.  I hope that she does one again soon here in the NYC metro area.  The last one was in Utah, if I understand correctly.

She's still just as slender and beautiful as the photos I've seen of her from before.  She still plays barefoot.  She still has an evening gown that shows a lot of back and leg.

I also found out that she smokes -- and went out for frequent cigarette breaks.  I guess that's not as bad for an instrumentalist as for a vocalist; however I do happen to have seen YouTube videos where Lucia was definitely singing.  She didn't attempt that at this concert; actually they had a couple of other singers with spectacular belts.  The singers did not come on for as many pieces as Lucia. Lucia's singing is low, quiet and bluesy -- not one of those spectacular belts.  It's a sweet voice, but not to the level of her violin.  In any case, she didn't sing at this concert.

I was just absolutely spellbound by Aurora/Kashmir and Emmanuel.  I've seen them so often in video format.  Seeing them live, and just as good as the videos was just astounding, breathtaking, incredible.  Her other performances were equally extraordinary, but did not rivet me quite as much, because I had not been watching them as often.

Now I'm not as consistently overwhelmed with Chris.  Sometimes his pieces are quite loud and agitating, which I don't do well with.  Sometimes he did play other songs with that quiet sweet tone that he used in Emmanuel.  I like that aspect of his playing and find his trumpet tone almost as spell-binding as Lucia's violin. Still, I don't find him as riveting as she -- yet he's the one with a tour that bears his name.

I firmly believe that the fact that he has had a 12 year tour is due to his being self-confident and out there promoting himself.  I suspect that Lucia not having her own tour is a Mars/Venus issue.  Women tend not to have the same self-confidence and bluster as men.  We are sometimes our own worst enemies.

The Blue Note does produce its own records.  I don't think they had the intention of doing a record for this concert, but I wish they would.

I also hope that Lucia will have a solo show in NYC soon.  As I understand it, she's originally from Queens, so I would think NYC would be a logical destination for her.

I also wish she would keep fans better updated with her performance plans.  I don't even see a place on her website where I could add my e-mail address to be kept informed of her tour dates.