Category: Uncategorized

  • Stripping away Rococo excess—The Music of Monsigny-The Libretto of Sedaine.

    Stripping away Rococo excess—The Music of Monsigny-The Libretto of Sedaine.

    Saturday, February 5th 230 AM Last week I made a few notes about Ange-Jacques Gabriel, the architect of the opera house at Versailles. Gabriel had mastered one style (the voluptuous Rococo of Louis XV) and created a new one (the opulent classicism of Louis XVI). Towards the end of his career he rejected the sinuous…

  • Opening Night at Versailles

    Saturday, February 4th at 8 PM Traditions and customs differ. In France, at the Opera de Versailles the orchestra is not allowed to enter the pit, to warm up on their instruments, until 5 minutes before the curtain rises. In America we all mosey into our places, run a few scales, play a difficult excerpt,…

  • The Little Theater of the Queen

    Saturday, February 4, 2012 Of course you remember the Andy Hardy movies, or scenes from The Little Rascals in which a group of energetic, talented (Judy Garland) or bumbling (Alfalfa), amateur performers exclaimed, let’s “Put on a show”. The old barn flashes across their minds and soon the cows are out and the piano is…

  • Taking our place at Versailles

    Saturday, February 4, 2012 3 AM Sitting in my hotel room, unable to sleep, and aware that something magnificent has happened for all of the musicians of Opera Lafayette this afternoon. We performers love what we do. We cherish the music we play, written by great geniuses and offering so much wealth for the spirit,…

  • Stripping away the Rococo Excesses-The opera of Ange-Jacques Gabriel

    When the architect Ange-Jacques Gabriel was given the project of building an opera house for the Palace of Versailles, he accepted with trepidation. The plan for a Royal Opera has been in the minds of the courtiers for almost a century yet circumstances worked to stunt each effort to build it. The price of war…

  • The Recording Sessions

    Monday January 23, 2012 We all arrived at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center on the campus of the University of Maryland at 1 PM after a day off, our first in a week. We were all feeling good about our performance at the Kennedy Center and came to the recording session having spent a…

  • Three Theaters

    Friday, January 20, 2012 7 PM The Atlas Performing Arts Center The presence of an art center is a known catalyst for the renaissance of a neighborhood on the down and outs. It attracts peaceful, benign folks (artists, families) ; it fertilizes parallel businesses like restaurants, and when well considered, it serves the community, from…

  • Into the Pit

    January 19, 2012 For the chamber musician (and the orchestra of Opera Lafayette consists of chamber musicians), the pit is a torturous music chamber, an uncomfortable dream come true. After two days of preparing the score of Monsigny’s Le Roi et le fermier with instruments and singers in a large rehearsal room at the Atlas…

  • First rehearsal

    January 17, 2012 at 2 PM The Atlas Performing Arts Center We are about to play the music. This is the first rehearsal. We are in our places and tuned up. Loretta O’Sullivan makes sure her cello strings are exact with the harpsichord’s—A, D, G and C. She hands that A to the violins who…

  • All Aboard

    January 17, 2012 On the train from New York to Washington DC In the 16 years I have worked with Opera Lafayette I have, with few exception, driven from my home in New York to Washington DC. This is a repeated pilgrimage, three or four times a year, and certain stops along the way are…