Word: chorales
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Musical Levitation. Shaw, 51, long regarded as America's top chorus master, conducted clean, well-balanced though somewhat earthbound readings of the overture to Wagner's Die Meistersinger and Copland's recently revised Canticle of Freedom. The evening's climax-Beethoven's formidable Ninth ("Choral") Symphony-was a feat of musical levitation. The intelligence and spirit of the interpretation, along with the sheer force and clarity of Shaw's baton, lifted the performance above its own technical flaws-some faulty string playing, moments of rhythmic dislocation-to provide music that frequently soared with...
...Opera, Choral & Oratorio...
...most popular orchestra conductor; of cancer; in London. Known equally as a London bon vivant and baton master, Sargent was lionized in British music circles for four decades. Critics respected the 19th century grandeur that characterized all his work and cheered especially the fioriture he summoned in such choral classics as Handel's Messiah. To audiences, he was "Flash Harry," the impeccably groomed courtier of the orchestra stage, raconteur, and international socialite. His own favorite appearances were at cavernous Royal Albert Hall's immensely popular "prom" annuals, where for 20 summers he introduced young Britons to the exciting...
Operatic, Choral & Recital...
...Bayreuth flourished. He was the artistic director; Wolfgang stuck to business management. Mama Winifred stayed away. Wieland's new productions were aimed imaginatively toward new, always controversial, often brilliantly successful dramatic ideals. Instead of the heavily literal, violently brassy, pompous stagings admired by Hitler, in which choral scenes often resembled SS rallies in a Black Forest thicket, Wieland created stark, impressionistic stage pictures with a shaft of light here, a barren rock there. To enhance Bayreuth as a cultural force of worldwide significance, Wieland broke with the old chauvinistic policies toward performers and imported singers and conductors...