HEAR IT - Humanity's Expressive Artists Reveal & Illuminate Truth

Tucson Symphony Orchestra BEETHOVEN'S NINTH José Luis Gomez, conductor Maria Brea, soprano Kelley O’Connor, mezzo-soprano* Richard Trey Smagur, tenor Kelly Markgraf, baritone Tucson Symphony Orchestra Chorus · Marcela Molina, Director PROGRAM Richard Wagner: Prelude to The Mastersingers of Nuremberg Richard Wagner: Wesendonck Lieder* Ludwig van Beethoven: Symphony No. 9, “Choral” Friday, 20 January 2023 Friedrich Schiller After life's most difficult questions and challenges have been asked and directly confronted, we all come together in a blissful bond of global fellowship , the grace of our open embrace of the entire knowable universe, beyond which a loving father–Nature's Creator!–must lie. Rejoice! By northern Sonora Desert standards, it is a cold Friday evening in mid-late January . And despite multiple highly transmissible viruses on the loose, close to 2000, mostly long-in-the-tooth, well-musically and culturally educated ladies and gentlemen are quickly filling the ...

Tucson Symphony Orchestra  Masterworks Series José Luis Gomez, conductor PROGRAM Franz Liszt: The Black Gondola (arr. John Adams) Richard Wagner: Siegfried Idyll Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Symphony No. 40 Nov. 6, 7:30 P.M.,  CFHS Auditorium REVIEW Credit where credit is due. The Tucson Symphony Orchestra , under José Luis Gomez’ direction, is in a real groove of great programming, and he and the players are performing their socks off. Everything has a purpose. We’re not “mixing old and new”, or playing “warhorses” because they’re popular, or playing contemporary music as a wink to post-modernity. Pinnacles of historical European symphonic repertoire have been singled out, like Mozart’s 40th Symphony this weekend, with renditions based on a very studied understanding of how they were performed when written. That means with Mozart, as with Beethoven, substantially faster tempos than most of us are used to. In the case of Mozart’s 40th, the swift tempos end up highlighting, in an u...

Tucson Symphony Orchestra Masterworks Series José Luis Gomez, conductor PROGRAM Franz Liszt: The Black Gondola (arr. John Adams) Richard Wagner: Siegfried Idyll Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Symphony No. 40 Nov. 6, 7:30 P.M., Nov 7, 2:00 P.M., CFHS Auditorium ============== A Few Mozartian Forethoughts... MOZART: SUPERHERO! As a little kid growing up during the so-called "Age of Affluence and Assassinations", I had three heroes: a local basketball player, the world record holder in the mile run, and a Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Mozart composed the 'Rondo Alla Turca' -- the coolest music by far! -- and I was obsessed. I played the Rondo, very badly, and wanted to know everything about Mozart. In 4th grade I went to the big public library in my hometown and checked out three biographies of Mozart. Much was beyond my comprehension, mostly learning that his father, Leopold, was by far the greatest influence on Wolfgang’s life and music, and the fulcrum of all of his activities t...

PROGRAM Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Bassoon Concerto Richard Strauss: Duet-Concertino Johannes Brahms: Symphony No. 3 José Luis Gomez, conductor Martin Kuuskmann, bassoon Dario Brignoli, clarinet 2 & 3 October 2021 Catalina Foothills High School Auditorium ========== All composers, especially a great master at peak of her/his creative powers, will occasionally compose music which rises above their own high standards, reaching beyond their own tendencies. Such as the case with Johannes Brahms Third Symphony. BEETHOVEN'S LONG SHADOW Under the weight of expectations that his compositional career would rival that of Beethoven, Brahms spent 21 years from start to finish, composing his First Symphony. His Second was composed in less than one year. Six years later, then well established as a great musical master, he composed his Third Symphony in one Summer. Known for exploring and delineating the inner life of the human experience, including rather dark moments, his Third Symphony burst...

Savage Sublimity and Sublime Savagery A quick take on Tucson Symphony Orchestra's return to the TCC Music Hall stage. Program FESTIVE OVERTURE, Grant Still, 1944 THE FOUR SEASONS OF BUENOS AIRES, Astor Piazzolla, 1970 SYMPHONY #4, Pyotr Tchaikovsky, 1878 HIGHLIGHT NOTE: Lara St. John is a complete MADWOMAN with a violin and bow in hand. The type of stage performer who goes into a trancelike state of melding with the music through her instrument, she possesses off-the-scale virtuosity and delivers full fire at furious tempi. Both the most savage and sublime passages that a composer could imagine, were sculpted under intense shut-eyed concentration, with complete technical ease. This sublimely crazed virtuoso, Ms. St. John, occasionally glanced out to the audience while performing, toying us slightly with a devil's knowing look of the unknowably advanced and savage artistry she was laying down. Absolutely SPECTACULAR. >>> A recording link of Lara's insane encore...

"As long as the Austrians have their brown beer and little sausages, they will never revolt."   ~ Ludwig van Beethoven Tuscon Symphony Orchestra Classic Series Concert - 6 & 8 December 2019 José Luis Gomez , conductor Sean Chen , piano PROGRAM Estévez : Mediodía en el Llano Saint-Saëns : Piano Concerto No. 2 Beethoven : Symphony No. 5 in C Minor REVOLUTIONARY Ludwig van Beethoven is arguably the single most influential and inspirational composer in Western music history. He set fire to art music as courtly entertainment, in favor of expression of individual and societal struggles and triumphs. He helped ignite the search for new meaning to the most fundamental questions of human existence, during a time of political revolt. Powerfully moved by the Enlightenment principles of reason over dogma, and democracy over oligarchy, Beethoven celebrated the triumph of the French Revolution, initially dedicating his Third Symphony to the Emperor Napo...

Sharon Isbin, Guitar Case Scaglione, Guest Conductor Tucson Symphony Orchestra, 15 November 2019 Case Scaglione, guest conductor Sharon Isbin, guitar Sharon Isbin, Corigliano's Troubadour John Corigliano's 'Troubadour', is a dream-like vision of the hard-working 12th Century musicians and poets, whose stories and songs helped define the meaning and range of Medieval chivalry and courtly love. As a composition, 'Troubadour' is a complete work of art and artifice; a very modern and reflective soundscape is engaged to imagine and to emulate, rather than whimsically imitate, a powerful musical tradition; one which left us almost no notation of the music they wrote and performed. The most striking aspect of 'Troubadour' is the series of delicately assembled ethereal sonorities, including micro-tones and slow, harmonized tone-bending by woodwind instruments, all culled from a chamber-like ensemble of about thirty players. Some of these, ...