Fall music preview
The third of the four “Ring” operas is no one’s favorite Wagner. This talky, testosteronic, lung-punishing endurance test for the protagonist heldentenor can also be a tribulation for the sitzfleisch. A real woman doesn’t appear until you’ve already been on the premises for more than four hours. Does this scare you off? If so, ye fidgeting operatic faint of heart, “Siegfried” is not for you. But patient listeners with ears of iron, active imaginations and behinds of leather get rewarded with some spectacular music and one of the most ecstatic of all love duets. And there’s a dragon. Besides that, Achim Freyer’s production, we are promised, will be the most elaborate of his “Ring” productions so far, which means five potentially glorious hours in the land of phantasmagoria.
Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Sept. 26
Siegfried, right, played by John Treleaven, during a rehearsal of “Siegfried.” (Anne Cusack / Los Angeles Times)
If you’ve attended a concert conducted by the 28-year-old Venezuelan wonder, then you already know why this city is in a tizzy about his debut as music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic this fall. If you have yet to catch Dudamel and have enough curiosity to be reading this, you surely must want to know what all the fuss is about. After Dudamel’s Oct. 8 inaugural gala at Walt Disney Concert Hall (which will have a delayed television broadcast Oct. 21 on PBS and a Nov. 23 DVD release), he has 19 regular subscription concerts this fall. Many have already sold out, but don’t forget that the chorus bench seats behind the orchestra go on sale for $17 two weeks before most concerts. Only the TV cameras and the musicians get better close-ups of the conductor.
Walt Disney Concert Hall, Oct. 8 (Anna Hult/For The Times)
The Philharmonic Society of Orange County is bringing to Costa Mesa a good chunk of an extensive China festival that Carnegie Hall is mounting this fall. China old and new, esoteric and pop, will be covered. Two events stand out as best for a quick immersion. On Oct. 27, the eloquent pipa player, Wu Man, noted for extending her traditional lute from intended Chinese folk purposes to the needs of international avant-garde music, hosts a program exploring a variety of Chinese traditions. On Nov. 3, Lang Lang (pictured) is the host for Chinese and Western chamber music.
Orange County Performing Arts Center, Oct. 11 (Anne Cusack/Los Angeles Times)
Having had a runaway success curating the Minimalist Jukebox festival three seasons ago, John Adams (pictured) this time takes on his adopted state as the focus of his next Los Angeles Philharmonic festival. The West Coast sound isn’t easy to localize given that it includes the beat of the Beats, Central Avenue jazz, the beginning of world music from Henry Cowell, the beginnings of percussion music from Cowell’s pupil John Cage, as well as the Romantic lushness and noir darkness of the Hollywood greats. Terry Riley has something new for the Kronos Quartet to open the festival. Adams’ “City Noir,” which will have its premiere at Dudamel’s gala, will be given a reprise, this time at popular prices. Not to be missed will be the out-there Italian pianist Marino Formenti taking on Lou Harrison’s irresistible Piano Concerto.
Walt Disney Concert Hall, Nov. 21 (Lawrence K. Ho / Los Angeles Times)
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This season, 42-year-old Alan Gilbert becomes the first New York-born music director of the New York Philharmonic. The New York press has been screaming that the nation’s oldest orchestra must catch up with the times, and that is precisely Gilbert’s goal. But he’s got his work cut out for him. The players happened to be quite happy under the veteran Lorin Maazel. The conservative audiences were content with the flashy and great playing under Maazel. Gilbert, a highly capable but charismatically challenged conductor, puts out the challenge from the get-go: He opens his gala Wednesday with a new work by the Modernist Finnish composer Magnus Lindberg, whom he has appointed the New York Philharmonic’s composer in residence. He even has Renée Fleming to sing Messiaen instead of Massenet, although he ends with a crowd-pleaser (Berlioz’s “Symphonie fantastique”). The program can be seen on PBS.
Avery Fisher Hall, New York, Wednesday (Jennifer S. Altman/For The Times)
Dallas Opera daringly has invited the British sometimes-bad boy and politically controversial director Tim Albery to stage Verdi’s “Otello” to open the company’s new home -- the Margo and Bill Winspear Opera House, designed by another Brit, Norman Foster. Albery’s recent Scottish Opera production of Wagner’s “Ring” was updated to Tony Blair’s England and interpreted as a scathing political commentary. Two questions loom: What does Albery have in store for politically conservative Texas society, which will undoubtedly show up in full, bejeweled glory? And does Clifton Forbis (pictured), who struggled through the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s “Tristan Project” four years ago, have the vocal stamina for Verdi’s most dramatic tenor role?
Dallas Opera, Oct. 23 (Lawrence K. Ho/Los Angeles Times)
