Word: tonal
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...instrument for this was color, betokening light. Nice gave him a different light from Paris -- a high, constant effulgence with little gray in it, flooding broadly across sea, city and hills, producing luminous shadows and clear tonal structures. It encouraged Matisse to think of space (in particular, the space of the hotel rooms where he worked overlooking the Promenade des Anglais) as a light-filled box, full of reflections, transparencies and openings. Shutters filter the light, and their bars are echoed in the stripes of awnings or rugs; light is doubled by mirrors that break open the space...
...Louis' own obsession with the ethereal, came out in a curiously attenuated form. But it supported -- and after Louis' death was in turn supported by -- the argument that after Pollock painting had only one way to go. No more figures, organic symbolism or utopian geometry; no more gestural surfaces, tonal structure or cubist layering of space. In future, art would hang onto the spread-out, expansive quality of Pollock's work while refreshing it with a new intensity of color, inspired by Matisse. At the end of the purge you would have a clipped but radiant discourse of pure...
...work is a free-tonal fantasy for the solo instrument, which is set off against an ensemble that includes bongos, gongs, chimes, temple blocks, harp, amplified harpsichord and vibraphone but omits the orchestra's trumpet and violin sections. It is a felicitous concept, but, alas, the composer's rather dogged quality of invention is not up to his orchestration. Despite a sturdy reading from Carol, the concerto lacks the strong stylistic profile that might have made it memorable...
However, a production such as this lives or dies by its musicans--both in the pit and on stage. Michael J. McNulty as Tamino, for instance, was handsome enough for the tenor part, but lacked the tonal quality and voice for the upper-register arias which are necessary to the role. His loud, shrill voice broadcasted well through the intimate Lowell House Dining Hall, but, as a result, the minor idiosyncracies in his less-than-smooth portrayal stuck out as well...
...music. Inheriting a spirited ensemble from his flamboyant predecessor, Leopold Stokowski, Ormandy refined it until the strings turned to silk, the woodwinds to amber, the brass to gold. If Ormandy's interpretations of safe repertory standards such as Beethoven and Brahms symphonies were not always individual, the ravishing tonal beauty of his orchestra was often reward enough. "The Philadelphia sound -- it's me!" Ormandy said proudly, and it was less a boast than a statement of fact...