Classical Music Agenda
(Classical Music Agenda by DCist contributor Charles T. Downey of Ionarts)
Arts blogger Drew McManus, at Adaptistration,
has proclaimed that May is Take
a Friend to Orchestra Month. As Drew envisions it,
this is "your sanctioned excuse to approach a friend
about attending an orchestra concert with you." (All
this week, Drew has been running responses to and
suggestions concerning his idea at Adaptistration.)
To that end, here is your weekly dose of concert
suggestions. If you just can't get enough, there is
more information our regular Classical
Week in Washington, at Ionarts. Get out there,
people, and spread the classical love.
ORCHESTRAS:
>> This Tuesday (May 10 and 8 pm), Daniel Barenboim
comes to Washington with the Chicago Symphony
Orchestra, to play a concert
at the Kennedy Center Concert Hall, sponsored by the
Washington
Performing Arts Society. Barenboim himself will
play the solo piano part in Mozart's Piano
Concerto No. 23 in A Major, K. 488. The program
concludes with Mahler's transcendent Symphony No.
9. Tickets: $125 to $40 (apparently sold out).
>> Another world-famous conductor, Roger Norrington, comes to Washington this weekend to lead the National Symphony Orchestra in a performance of Schubert's Symphony No. 8 ("Unfinished") and the original 1874 version of Bruckner's Symphony No. 4 ("Romantic"). Concerts are scheduled for Thursday, May 12, 7 pm; Friday, May 13, 1:30 pm; and Saturday, May 14, 8 pm, in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall. Tickets: $77 to $20 (with the added benefit of not yet being sold out).
>> Early music groups might not be exactly what Drew had in mind, but they are, technically speaking, orchestras, and there are two of them, both from Germany, scheduled for this week. The Friends of Music Series at Dumbarton Oaks, in Georgetown, hosts Hannover-based Musica Alta Ripa on Monday night (May 9 at 8 pm) in an all-Telemann concert. Tickets may be difficult or impossible to obtain: (202) 339-6436 or, by e-mail (StainsV [at] doaks [dot] org).
>> Possibly easier and definitely free is the concert by the Akademie für Alte Musik from Berlin, who will play a concert at the Library of Congress this Thursday (May 12 at 8 pm). Tickets are probably no longer available from Ticketmaster, but you can stand on line starting at 6:30 pm, to receive an unused ticket. The Coolidge Auditorium is on the ground floor of the Thomas Jefferson Building (entrance from First Street SE).
OPERA:
>> Why not introduce a friend to the opera? The Washington National
Opera has opened its production of Puccini's
classic opera Tosca
and has performances this Friday (May 13 at 7:30 pm)
and next Monday (May 16 at 7 pm) in the Kennedy Center
Opera House. As we discovered
at the dress rehearsal last Wednesday, even 10th
graders went crazy for this opera, which depicts on
stage a torture scene, a cold-blooded murder, an
execution, and a suicide.
>> If Italian verismo is not your cup of tea, you could try Camille Saint-Saëns's Samson et Dalila, which premieres this Saturday (May 14 at 7 pm) and runs in repertory with Tosca for most of this month. Russian superstar mezzo-soprano Olga Borodina sings the female title role. To save some money, students and young professionals (ages 18 to 35) should join the WNO's program Generation O, for the opportunity to purchase reduced price tickets on certain nights.
>> If new opera interests you, Canadian composer Imant Raminsh is premiering a new children's opera, called The Nightingale, this weekend (Saturday, May 14, 7 pm; Sunday, May 15, 2 pm) at Lisner Auditorium. The performance will feature the extraordinary voices of the Children's Chorus of Washington. The libretto is based on the story by Hans Christian Andersen, and the score is described as a choral opera, for children's voices but at a high level. Tickets: $35 to $15.
>> This Saturday (May 14 at 3 pm), there is a different type of premiere, a concert performance of Antonio Sacchini's Œdipe à Colone, by the orchestra and singers of Opera Lafayette at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, in College Park, Md. Premiered in 1786, this opera was Sacchini's last, so beloved by audiences that it was performed every year in Paris for almost fifty years. This is the first contemporary revival of the opera, based on the second play from Sophocles' Oedipus trilogy. Tickets: $45 to $25.
>> If you need free, you can have that kind of opera, too. This Sunday (May 15 at 3 pm), up and coming singers from the Washington National Opera Domingo-Cafritz Young Artist Program will present excerpts from operas based on the plays of William Shakespeare. This free concert will take place in the Renwick Gallery Grand Salon. On the basis of our experience with previous concerts in this series, the singers will wear costumes and the excerpts will be semi-staged. Reservations are required, for which you should call (202) 448-3490.
SACRED MASTERPIECES:
>> Washington has a particularly vibrant tradition of
excellent local choral groups, and the month of May is
crowded with many of the last concerts of their
2004–2005 seasons. This Saturday (May 14 at 8
pm), you could hear the Woodley Ensemble sing a
program called Ave
Maria: Music in Honor of the Virgin Mary, at St.
Columba's Episcopal Church (4201 Albemarle St. NW, Tenleytown).
Tickets: $25. On Sunday (May 15 at 3 pm), the Master
Chorale of Washington presents the world premiere of
Donald McCullough's moving choral work with orchestra,
In
the Shadow of the Holocaust: Songs from the Camps
at the Kennedy Center Concert Hall. Tickets: $53 to
$19. Later that afternoon (May 15 at 4 pm), if you
prefer something more traditional, the Cathedral
Choral Society will present a sacred masterpiece, one
of the greatest pieces of music ever written, Ludwig
van Beethoven's Missa
Solemnis. This concert will take place in one
of the most beautiful architectural settings in the
city, Washington
National Cathedral. Tickets: $55 to $20.
CHAMBER MUSIC:
>> On Tuesday (May 10 at 6:30 pm) Swedish pianist Per
Tengstrand will play a concert at the Residence of
the Ambassador of Sweden. Tickets: $90 (includes a
buffet reception of Swedish food). On Thursday (May 12
at 8 pm), the Emerson
String Quartet plays at Strathmore Hall. Tickets:
$45 to $25. On Friday (May 13 at 8 pm), the Peabody
Trio will conclude their near-complete cycle of
Beethoven trios at the Corcoran Gallery of Art.
Tickets: $60. On Friday and Saturday (May 13 and 14 at
8 pm) pianist Kevin
Kenner, winner of the Chopin International Piano
Competition, will play a concert of Schubert and
Chopin at the Embassy of the Republic of Poland (2460
16th Street NW). Tickets: $50. For something free, you
have to wait until Sunday (May 15 at 6:30 pm), when
the Saint Petersburg String Quartet will play
Mendelssohn, Shostakovich, and Smetana at the National
Gallery of Art. The line starts forming between 5
and 5:30 pm at the north entrance of the West
Building, at Constitution Avenue and Sixth Street NW.