Word: conductor
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Levin is an internationally known pianist who has played with Christopher Hogwood, Boston Symphony Orchestra conductor Seiji Ozawa and other famous musicians. A composer as well, he is famous for his "completions" of fragmented Mozart works...
Haitink, who had been conductor of the Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam for more than twenty years, led the BSO in a performance of the Prelude to the First Act of Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nurnburg, the Sibelius Violin Concerto, and Brahms' First Symphony. Kremer joined the orchestra as soloist in the concerto...
began with an indication of the circular evolution of musical audiences. In the halls of the eighteenth century, which catered to aristocrats whose particular interest was not necessarily the music, there was no sense in a conductor or concert master waiting for silence: the orchestra simply played--preferably loudly at first--to quiet the crowd. It is partly for this reason that most symphonies from the classical begin with a forte. When Haitink took the stage, the noise from the crowd of the elderly and well-to-do did not diminish. Thus, he dove straight into the cataclysmic opening bars...
...opera houses in the world, only Bayreuth can mount a new production of the entire Ring in a single week. This summer the program has attracted more than routine interest because it is the one year in seven when a new Ring cycle debuts. In addition, the conductor for the first time is James Levine, the Metropolitan Opera's powerful artistic director and the leading interpreter of Wagner on the international scene ever since Georg Solti largely retired from theatrical work. Levine's partners are Alfred Kirchner, an experienced European opera and theater director, and set and costume designer Rosalie...
...slow. Certainly he chooses rapture rather than excitement. In the Festspielhaus, with its marvelous acoustics, every instrument is audible and clear. Under Levine's baton the music seems translucent, and the melodies play themselves. "It is as if I am standing in front of a treasure chest," the conductor says, "and the idea is to draw it all out where the listener can hear it and feel it and get involved...