For the past several years, I have visited New York to attend
the Metropolitan Opera in early May.
This year, because I am in school, I bought tickets for spring break
instead.
Alexander Borodin (1833-1887) never finished writing his opera, Prince Igor, for which he wrote both the
music and the libretto. Fellow
composers, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908) and Alexander Glazunov
(1865-1936), who was a student of Rimsky-Korsakov, finished the orchestration
and added some music of their own based on Borodin’s intentions and
sketches. It premiered in St. Petersburg
in 1890. The story of Russian Prince
Igor, who took his army to battle the invading Khan, was captured, and later
escaped, was based on a 12th-century epic. The lyrical music expresses the characters’
state of mind. Borodin uses the chorus,
which is integral to the story, to propel and comment on the action. All was beautifully performed by the singers
and orchestra. The music for the
Polotvsian Dance in Act I was made popular in the 1953 musical Kismet’s song, “Stranger in Paradise.” Much of the action took place in a field of large
red poppies, a way to depict the exoticism of the Khan’s eastern land.
The Enchanted Island
is a new opera featuring music of Baroque masters like Handel, Vivaldi, Rameau,
and Purcell and a new libretto written by Jeremy Sams in 2011 based on stories
from Shakespeare’s Tempest and Midsummer Night’s Dream. The music was delightful, and the performers,
who included Plácido Domingo, David Daniels, Susan Graham, and others, clearly
enjoyed both the music and the far-fetched story. The orchestra was smaller than usual and
included a harpsichord.
The harpsichord used at the Metropolitan Opera for The Enchanted Island
Wednesday this week was Ash Wednesday, and I attended 12:05 pm Mass at Church of Our Saviour on Park Avenue. The choir was clearly professional; they sang Gregorio Allegri’s (1582-1652) Miserere mei, Deus, which is a famous setting of Psalm 51 sung during the Distribution of the Ashes at the Midday Mass. From the order of worship about Allegri’s Miserere: ”For centuries, it was sung exclusively at the Vatican, where the score was kept secret. Excommunication was threatened if one exported the score from the Vatican or produced any attempt at publication. A young Mozart dictated the work after hearing it once, whereby creating the first “bootleg” copy. It is highly unlikely that the high C’s are authentic, as they first appeared in an edition published in the 1880’s. These ornamentations, however, have become inseparable with current performance of this masterpiece.”
You can listen to Allegri’s Miserere at 29 minutes 42 seconds:
Even though the quality of the recording is not the best, you
can get a sense for the beauty of the music.
The altar at Church of Our Saviour, New York
