Inflammable Means Flammable?

Figure 1: Calm down, sir, you're going to give yourself skin failure.

Kalmar channels wit and anger of Shostakovich
Bryant Manning, Chicago Sun-Times, 8/5/2010

Is the Shostakovich transitive? That is: is just the anger his, or the wit as well?

After a month of excellent guest conductors having seized the riches of the Grant Park Orchestra, principal conductor Carlos Kalmar returned in top form to the Pritzker pavilion Wednesday night.

After a month of...having seized? Man, the tense wars in Chicago must be worse than they say! The guest conductors siezed the riches...for a month, but now that's over? Where are the riches now? Do the erstwhile guest artists still have them? Will they ever give them back?

But this isn't about that.

The Uruguay-Austrian maestro was back for one of the season's most impressive concerts, which, at least during this summer season, might as well be repeated over and over again.

What? Why? Saying "might as well" makes it sound like you're grudgingly resigned to the possibility.

This isn't about that, either.

Yet Wednesday's offering truly showed the municipally funded, free outdoor concert at its best,

I am in favor of such endeavors; I hold them in esteem.

...where festival administrators paid tribute to Millennium Park's founders with a first-class program featuring the incomparable violinist Christian Tetzlaff.

Incomparable!

[but soon...]

While Tetzlaff is not the most lyrical violinist around, his playing can sing and serenade without the usual slick array of pretty notes.

Okay.

First, I don't know what that means. He didn't play any notes? Or just not any pretty ones? Perhaps it suggests that he played them, but not in the "usual array"? Did he, I don't know, change their order at random?

Second...well, look.

This "incomparable" performer isn't "the most lyrical violinist around"?

Even if "incomparable" means something metaphrorical, less like "not able to be compared to anything" and more like "benchmark by which all others are compared," how is he not the most anything?

Anything good, anyway. I suppose he could be both "incomparable" and "not the shittiest violinist around."

I am forced, then, to conclude one of two things:

Either Mr. Manning is not a fan of flashy, over-emotive performance styles, preferring instead an intellectual (and/or, apparently, quasi-improvisatory) approach; or "incomparable" doesn't mean what he thinks it means.

Figure 2: Thinly disguised oblique meta-reference

24

24 preludes, each one coupled with a fugue of similar key (24 in all), equals 24 “prelude and fugues.” Got it?

[...] to understand Feltsman's curt but good-spirited onstage persona is to understand his worship of Bach and particularly the Well-Tempered Clavier, from which he played in entirety its First Book.

The first book (WTC I, as some call it) has exactly 24 preludes and 24 fugues. It’s just that each prelude is coupled, paired, hooked up with a fugue, which as we just saw, equals 24 “prelude and fugues,” a pair for each key (24 pairs).

The C Minor Prelude fluttered by in a blur, and from the outset, this set of 48 preludes and fugues seemed like a race to the finish.

Er...

Okay. If you add the 24 preludes to the 24 fugues, yes, you get 48 preludes and fugues. I’m just not sure if you're trying to refer to 24 “prelude and fugues.” 24, because each prelude is coupled with its own fugue.

See, when one speaks of 48 “prelude and fugues,” I assume they are referring to both WTC I and WTC II, each consisting of 24 “prelude and fugues.” Combined there are 48 “prelude and fugues.” However, there are 96 preludes and fugues. Got it? I'm lost. Maybe you're right.
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This is Dirty

Even if Jesus was the visiting soloist, I don’t think he would have received a more “glowing” (wink, wink) review. I mean, it’s only a fucking concert, for Simon Morely and David Friend’s sakes!

Israeli violinist Vadim Gluzman, who makes his home in Chicago, almost pleads with you to watch him.

Let me guess, he takes off an item of clothing after each phrase. No. No. That would be more like a dare.

During extended measures of rest, he sways with eyes closed to the orchestra as he ponders re-entry.

I was close. And the rest of you should get your minds out of the gutter.

When he arrives at a fermata, he bends back like Jimmy Page holding out a pulsating sustain on a Telecaster.

Envious, anyone? (Empiricus, get your mind out of the gutter.)















(Not a Telecaster. Photo by Richard E. Aaron/rockpix.com)

[He] attacked the challenging concerto not from the standpoint of a virtuoso but of a probing artist.

Ah. Artists probe, virtuosos...play their instruments well. Why do I feel like I’m watching a scrambled TV channel?

I know! Because imagery is a bitch and, when done poorly, I can read it like this.

Coming soon: Artists who quote this stuff on their resumes, then probe like Jimmy Page after pondering re-entry.
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Free Fertilizer if You Bring a Friend!

Just here for discussion.

Since I’m a cynic when it comes to greatest-hits shows, Bryant Manning addresses me directly:

Even if you're a cynic about a greatest-hits show, any initiative to bulk up classical audiences wins every time.

Who wins what, now? The initiative wins...? The performing organization wins, what, more audience? The audience wins...more of the same?

Seems to me that the only thing anyone wins from a greatest-hits show is a first-class ticket to Civil War Reenactment Land. To put it another way, whatever success a greatest-hits show may have (gains more audience, more money, etc.), the only thing that I see it winning is a self-perpetuating cycle of specialized programming geared toward those who devour greatest-hits. In other, other words, the performing organization becomes pigeonholed into an endless dependence on pandering to the lowest common denominator (That’s where the most profit is! Heh, heh). Thus, progress, newness, freshness, sustainability is lost.

Yes, I oversimplified. Okay? I don’t need dozens of scathing emails reiterating something I already know, like last time (such as “but that new money in turn commissions new works.” Pffft. Hardly.). Anyway, you know who you are. But I don’t think I’m that far off the mark.

As time progresses, and I’m told that it will, those greatest-hits will become distanced from relevance (How relevant is Monteverdi, these days?). They will become antiques, items of nostalgia, even more so than they already are (Gregorian Chant anyone?). Recycling them in an endless loop is like watching a Civil War reenactment. They’d be interesting in the way a fifteen-year-old, stained, sticky-paged, public school history textbook is interesting.

Okay, I’m becoming a little verklempt. Discuss among yourselves...
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