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You are here: Home » 2012 Tanglewood reviews

2012 Tanglewood reviews

Wynton Marsalis Quintet Christian McBride Trio at Tanglewood

August 20, 2012 Article by Dave Read

Wynton Marsalis Quintet and Christian McBride Trio performed one set each in Ozawa Hall at Tanglewood and then assembled for a mashup that looked to be as much fun for the musicians to do as it was exciting for the audience to see and hear. If there were an equal number of musicians and instruments, we would’ve called it a jam session, but with only one bass, one piano, and one drum kit on stage but two musicians for each, their playing was more in concert than what you’d expect to hear during a typical jam session.

Wynton Marsalis and drummer Ali Jackson, Jr, Ozawa Hall Tanglewood , Aug. 20, 2012; photo:Hilary Scott.
Wynton Marsalis and drummer Ali Jackson, Jr, Ozawa Hall Tanglewood , Aug. 20, 2012; photo:Hilary Scott.
Built around Cherokee, it was called by Wynton Marsalis after he recounted an episode from his early days on the road, when the legendary Pearl Bailey surprised him with a gift and told him to do likewise once he’s a headliner. Declaring that the chance to imrovise with other musicians is a jazz musician’s best gift, he invited McBride, pianist Christian Sands, and drummer Ulysses Owens, Jr. to join himself and pianist Dan Nimmer, bassist Carlos Henriquez, saxophonist Walter Blanding and drummer Ali Jackson, Jr. for the rousing finale.

Marsalis said that it requires good manners and being a good listener to be a good musician – so that you know when to play high or low, when to play loud or soft. He didn’t say anything about being a good dancer, but the several transitions between Christian McBride and Carlos Henriquez were so smooth that they coud’ve been choreographed.

essential element of jazz

Wynton Marsalis performs with his quintet, Ozawa Hall Tanglewood , Aug.20, 2012; photo:Hilary Scott.
Wynton Marsalis performs with his quintet, Ozawa Hall Tanglewood , Aug.20, 2012; photo:Hilary Scott.
Tonight’s performance put jazz in perspective in a way that made its European antecedent seem a bit stiff, at the very least. Beyond the equal parts of artistry to be found in the compositional and instrumental components of both European and jazz music, the latter has it all over the former by virtue of its allowance for improvisation, which cedes back to the musician some of the responsibility (credit and/blame) otherwise held by the composer alone.

Wynton Marsalis + Tanglewood

THe 50 year old Marsalis has a long history with Tanglewood; at 17, he was the youngest student admitted to the Tanglewood Music Center, (before enrolling at Julliard), and in 1995 he had the use of the still un-opened Ozawa Hall for the production of Marsalis on Music, an educational series along the lines of Leonard Bernstein’s Young People’s Concerts, which featured Seiji Ozawa, Yo-Yo Ma, and Tanglewood Music Center students.

One of the most exciting concerts we’ve attended was the one in 1999 at the Koussevitsky Music Shed when Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra shared the stage with Seiji Ozawa and the Boston Symphony Orchestra for a program that alternated between Peer Gynt Suite being played by the BSO and the Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn arrangement being played by the LCJO.

Former young lion Christian McBride

Christian McBride, 40, who also studied at Julliard, talked about arriving where his mother had long-ago told him he would, when he no longer is a “young lion,” and expressed his delight in employing the young Sands and Owens. Sands’ mentors include Billy Taylor and Oscar Peterson, who were represented in the set by Easy Walker and Hallelujah Shout. McBride dedicated his set-closing number, The Most Beautiful Girl in the World, to Phyllis Diller, telling the audience that she’d died that day “with a smile on her face.”

McBride’s set was so thoroughly satisfying that it seemed as if his trio format must be the essential and sufficient blueprint for jazz. We held onto that assessment with confidence during intermission and until about five bars into Marsalis’ set, when we could only laugh at how wrong we were. Easy to get carried away trying to describe the addition of trumpet and sax to piano, bass, and drums in a jazz band, but here goes: from the ability to laugh/cry to the ability to tell funny/heart-breaking stories.

John Williams’ 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood

John Williams’ 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood

August 18, 2012 performance; Dave Read.

Tanglewood rung up another glittering gala celebration, honoring the 80th birthday of Boston Pops Laureate Conductor John Williams with no less a musical luminary than soprano Jessye Norman serving as M.C. But to refer to John Williams as Boston Pops Laureate Conductor is like referring to Bob Dylan as a former Minnesotan.

Williams’ compositions, especially those written for movies, have global appeal and place him in the pantheon of popular art. As pointed out by Leonard Slatkin, who conducted several segments of tonight’s program, John Williams may have surpassed Beethoven in writing the world’s most familiar musical motif. Slatkin first sounded the four notes that open Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5, then declared that Williams beat him by two with the oh-so-familiar two notes from his Theme for Jaws.

Steven Speilberg, whose local ties include service on the board of the Norman Rockwell Museum, took the stage and noted that their collaborations have spanned half of Williams’ life. Other encomia were presented, fittingly, via the big screen. The festivities began with anchorman Brian Williams, no relation, appearing to do a fake newscast about Williams’ 80th birthday being celebrated at an “unknown location,” before zooming in via Google earth on Tanglewood. Another movie titan, George Lucas, also added his best wishes from a remote location.

Photos of John Williams’ 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood

Gabriela Montero, Gil Shaham, Jessye Norman, John Williams, Steven Speilberg, and Keith Lockhart (Stu Rosner photo)
Gabriela Montero, Gil Shaham, Jessye Norman, John Williams, Steven Speilberg, and Keith Lockhart at John Williams’ 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood; photo:Stu Rosner.
James Taylor and Owen Young with the Boston Pops at John Williams' 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood,
James Taylor and Owen Young with the Boston Pops at John Williams’ 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood; photo:Stu Rosner.
President Obama offers video tribute to John Williams during his 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood; photo:Stu Rosner.
President Obama offers video tribute to John Williams during his 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood; photo:Stu Rosner.
U.S. Army Herald Trumpets performed the Olympic Fanfare to open John Williams's 80th Birthday Celebration at Tanglewood;photo: Hilary Scott.
U.S. Army Herald Trumpets performed the Olympic Fanfare to open John Williams’s 80th Birthday Celebration at Tanglewood;photo: Hilary Scott.
Jessye Norman and Keith Lockhart with the Boston Pops during John Williams' 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood; photo:Stu Rosner.
Jessye Norman and Keith Lockhart with the Boston Pops during John Williams’ 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood; photo:Stu Rosner.
Yo-Yo Ma, Anthony McGill, Gil Shaham, Gabriela Montero at John Williams' 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood; photo:Hilary Scott.
Yo-Yo Ma, Anthony McGill, Gil Shaham, Gabriela Montero at John Williams’ 80th birthday celebration at Tanglewood; photo:Hilary Scott.

The initial musical salvo was delivered, in dramatic fashion, by the US Army Herald Trumpets, flanking the stage with their director conducting from the center aisle, playing Williams’s Olympic Fanfare and Theme, along with the Boston Pops under the baton of Keith Lockhart.

The big screen unfurled again and there was President Obama adding his accolades, on behalf of a grateful nation. Aslo “live via videotape” were Gustavo Dudamel and Deborah Borda from Williams’s “hometown orchestra” the Los Angeles Philharmonic. His orchestral work Soundings was performed at the opening of their new home, Walt Disney Concert Hall in 2003, and also performed at Tanglewood a few years ago.

Video greetings from the Boston Red Sox entertained Williams and the huge audience returning to their seats, blankets, benches, and lawn chairs after intermission followed by Fanfare for Fenway, Williams composition for the ballpark’s 100th anniversary.

Another screen drop and here was Seiji Ozawa, filmed with a Red Sox tapestry in the background, looking and sounding fairly good considering his condition. With a heartfelt tribute to his friend, the Maestro seemed to be asking forgiveness for being absent, leaving his legion of fans hopeful for his eventual return to Tanglewood.

75th Tanglewood anniversary season

Whereas the Boston Pops hasn’t missed a beat since Williams handed the baton to Lockhart in 1995, the Boston Symphony Orchestra hasn’t been so lucky in the wake of Ozawa’s 29 year tenure. For all you can tell from the audience, though, that may be purely an administrative matter, because this 75th Tanglewood anniversary season has been a beauty.

The way this program progressed, patrons were guessing who’d appear the next time the video screen dropped. Some expected the Queen of England herself! Why not – given Williams’ Olympic Fanfare, London 2012, and her own Jubilee…? After all, a member of her court, Sir Paul McCartney, made a video appearance at James Taylor’s 60th birthday party at Tanglewood a couple summer’s ago. Nope, no Queen; but Bill Clinton did chime in, remember him?

Of course James Taylor was on hand, to sing You’ve Got a Friend, in a duet with BSO cellist Owen Young, and to speak of his affection and gratitude for Williams, who invited Taylor to play his first gig with the Pops 20 years ago. Williams also introduced him to “the love of my life, Caroline.”

Besides Ms. Norman’s rendition of This Song is You, a musical highpoint was the performance of Williams’ composition for the Obama inauguration, Air and Simple Gifts, performed by Yo-Yo Ma, cello, Gil Shaham, violin, Gabriela Montero, piano, and Anthony McGill, clarinet. Another was Three Concert Pieces conducted by Shi-Yeon Sung, former BSO assistnt conductor, which was made up of one movement from each of 3 concerti by Williams: for Oboe, with Keisuke Wakao soloing, for Horn, with James Sommerville soloing, and for Tuba, with Mike Roylance soloing.

Fitting tribute to the Wiliams’s genius in scoring movies came by way of Yo-Yo Ma and the Pops on Going to School from Memoirs of a Geisha; Gil Shaham and the Pops performing the Theme for Schindler’s List, and finally, the Main title from Star Wars, all conducted by Leonard Slatkin.

The grand finale of John Williams’ 80th Birthday Ceebration at Tanglewood was his own Happy Birthday Variations, with the Pops very ably augmented by the brass and woodwind players of the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra. That piece is great fun, seemng to sample the most memorable and exciting motifs from the composer’s oeuvre. Then a loud POP and streamers and confetti rained on the audience, as they stood to applaud Mr. Williams, now onstage with his friends and colleagues, having the time of his life.

Chris Botti at Tanglewood

  • Aug. 4, 2012 Article by Dave Read

Chris Botti put on a tremendous show in Ozawa Hall, which was packed to the rafters with lawn patrons given refuge from the rain. Botti is a versatile trumpeter, playing plenty of straight ahead jazz but also pop, rock, and classical in this genre-agnostic show that featured two guests along with a very impressive band. He’s pretty loquacious, too, unlike his hero Miles Davis, whose LPs Kind of Blue and Sketches of Spain were the sources for two numbers that were highlights of tonight’s program. In addition to Botti’s own virtuosity, they showcased the brilliance of Brazilian guitarist Leonardo Amuedo. Everyone in the band had plenty of opportunities to display their artistry: Billy Childs on piano, Tim Lefebvre on acoustic and electric bass, Billy Kilson on drums, and Andy Ezrin on keyboards and sythensizer. (Lefebvre and Ezrin are Massachussetts natives.)

Serena McKinney and Lisa Fischer perform with Chris Botti, Ozawa Hall, Tanglewood, Aug. 5, 2012.
Serena McKinney and Lisa Fischerperform with Chris Botti, Ozawa Hall, Tanglewood, Aug. 5, 2012; Hilary Scott photos.
The special guests were Lisa Fischer, longtime vocalist with the Rolling Stones, and the young classical violinist Serena McKinney, each of whom added exciting and beautiful facets to the show (while wearing high heels that could pierce your heart!).

Botti is more engaged with his audience than any musician we’ve seen at Tanglewood, more so even than James Taylor and Garrison Keillor. Not only did he descend from the stage to play in the aisle, in a duet with Ms. Fischer, who sang The Very Thought of You while seated in the lap of a patron, but also he invited a young girl on stage to play drums on the final number, Nessun Dorma, the aria from the last act of Puccini’s Turandot.

In this celebratory 75th anniversary season at Tanglewood, the first in over a decade not to be followed by a Labor Day weekend jazz festival, jazz fans have not been overlooked! Even before the arrival of the BSO, there was Diana Krall in the Shed folowed the next night by the very jazzy Silk Road Ensemble with Yo Yo Ma in Ozawa Hall. Next up will be another Ozawa Hall jazz concert bill headlined by the Wynton Marsalis Quartet, with opening act Christian McBride Trio on Aug. 20, followed on Aug. 26 by the Chick Corea and Gary Burton Hot House Tour, with the Harlem String Quartet.

Tanglewood 75th anniversary concert

Tanglewood 75th anniversary concert

July 14, 2012 performance; Article by Dave Read

Tanglewood threw an impressive party in recognition of its 75th anniversary as the summer home in the Berkshires and educational component of the Boston Sympony Orchestra. The Tanglewood Medal was instituted and shortly after intermission of the 3 hour program, Boston Pops conductor laureate John Williams presented it in abstentia to Seiji Ozawa, whose acceptance message was read by Yo Yo Ma.

Ozawa’s 29 year tenure as BSO music director was followed by the ill-fated term of James Levine, acknowledged tonight as the orchestra’s first American-born music director, but also unable to attend. Boston Pops conductor Keith Lockhart doubled as MC to start the program, addressing not only the 18,000 in attendance but also the world wide audience who will see the version that PBS plans to air on August 10 (check your local listings).

Boston Pops play Copland and Bernstein

Lockhart led the brass of the Boston Pops in Fanfare For the Common Man, by Aaron Copland, who headed the composition faculty of the Tanglewood Music Center for twenty five years. It was followed by excerpts from TMC alumnus Leonard Bernstein’s On The Town, which seems to represent the quintessential Pops repertoire, with its variety of memorable melody, rhythm, and musical whimsy.

James Taylor sings Ol’ Man River with Boston Pops

Next up was James Taylor, the esteemed pop culture chameleon, BSO patron, and intentional Berkshireite, who performed a three song set celebrating the Great American Songbook, along with the Pops under the baton of John Williams. It was an impressive performance by JT, who nails the final lines of Ol’ Man River in the following clip:

Inaugural Tanglewood Medal presented to Seiji Ozawa

Seiji Ozawa on video recieving inaugural Tanglewood Medal during BSO's 75th Anniversary Gala concert at Tanglewood July 14, 2012.
Seiji Ozawa on video recieving inaugural Tanglewood Medal during BSO’s 75th Anniversary Gala concert at Tanglewood July 14, 2012 Hilary Scott photo.
By intermission, the attendant throng had been presented with an exceptional musical sampler. For Tanglewood regulars, it was typical fare; for first-time or infrequent Tanglewood visitors, it was an opportunity to scratch several items off their musical bucket list. Whether the program was chosen for the general familiarity of the selections, or for their suitability in displaying the virtuosity of the soloists, the result was thrilling. Thirty minutes of Tanglewood’s 75th anniversary celebration ran from James Taylor, John Williams and Boston Pops sampling the Great American Songbook, to Emanuel Ax playing Haydn’s Piano Concerto in D with Stefan Asbury conducting the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, to Yo Yo Ma playing Tchaikovsky’s Andante Cantabile with the TMCO, followed by Anne-Sophie Mutter, whose performance of Sarasate’s Carmen Fantasy, with Andris Nelsons leading the TMCO, nearly blew the roof off the joint.

UPDATE May 18, 2013: Andris Nelsons named Music Director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

After Nelsons’ leading the BSO in Ravel’s La Valse, and the presentation of the inaugural Tanglewood Medal by John Williams to Seiji Ozawa, in abstentia, the stage was set for the program’s grand finale, Beethoven’s Fantasia in C minor for piano, chorus, and orchestra. It was performed by Peter Serkin, an annual guest soloist, David Zinman leading the Boston Symphony Orchestra along with the Tanglewood Festival Chorus and current and former Tanglewood Music Center vocal fellows, John Oliver conducting.

Tanglewood 75th anniversary photos

Yo Yo Ma and Tanglewood Music Center fellows performing at The Tanglewood 75th Anniversary Gala concert July 14, 2012.
James Taylor and Boston Pops performing at The Tanglewood 75th Anniversary Gala concert July 14, 2012.
Anne Sophie-Mutter performing at The Tanglewood 75th Anniversary Gala concert July 14, 2012.
All musicians who performed at The Tanglewood 75th Anniversary Gala concert July 14, 2012.
BSO 75th anniversary at Tanglewood concert July 14, 2012; photo Dave Conlin Read.
BSO 75th anniversary at Tanglewood concert July 14, 2012; photo Dave Conlin Read.
Tanglewood 75th anniversary concert July 14, 2012 lawn scene.

BSO opens Tanglewood season with 1937 all-Beethoven program

BSO opens Tanglewood season with 1937 all-Beethoven program

July 6, 2012 performance review by Dave Conlin Read

Christoph von Dohnanyi leading the BSO at Tanglewood on Opening Night July 6, 2012;
Christoph von Dohnanyi leading the BSO at Tanglewood on Opening Night July 6, 2012; photo: Hilary Scott
Despite all the attendant publicity – and publicity’s essential theme tempus fugit, I got a sense of timelessness at the opening concert of the Boston Symphony Orchestra‘s 75th anniversary Tanglewood season. Conducted by Christoph von Dohnanyi, the program was a replication of the first concert Serge Koussevitzky led in the Berkshires on Aug. 5, 1937, Beethoven’s Leonore Overture, his Symphony No. 6 and then Symphony No. 5 after intermission.

It is the genius of Beethoven and his ilk to compose scores that can be brought to life by an orchestra. Once animated, the symphony occupies a gap in time where a listener can repose, affording him a respite in eternity, without the inconvenience of dying.

Alternate metaphor: We live, if not precisely minute to minute, then moment by fleeting moment. Listening to the work of such a composer as Beethoven, I get a sense that, because these scores of musicians are so keyed into time, exquisitly so, that time itself loses its grip on me.

Watching Maestro von Dohnanyi go about his business, his gestures looking so casual (so not arty) that I imagined an overnight custodian somewhere air conducting to the radio. But he clearly was keyed in and with such a masterful grasp of timing that the smallest, quietest passages were beautifully apparent tonight. Good choice for the BSO to have the former Tanglewood Music Center conducting fellow to lead the first of several anniversary-themed programs this summer.

Since ending his 20 year tenure as Music Director of the Cleveland Orchestra in 2002, Maestro von Dohnányi has kept busy. This season, he leads subscription concerts at the Boston and Chicago symphony orchestras, and at the New York Philharmonic. Last season he became Honorary Conductor for life of the Philharmonia Orchestra; this season he leads the Philharmonia in Madrid, Cardiff, in a Brahms symphony cycle at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris, and at London’s Royal Festival Hall.

James Taylor at Tanglewood July 2 – 4, 2012

James Taylor at Tanglewood July 2 – 4, 2012

by Dave Read.

Tanglewood audience July 4th James Taylor concert.
Tanglewood audience July 4th James Taylor concert; photo: Dave Conlin Read
The Koussevitsky Music Shed at Tanglewood is a holy place in the minds of legions of classical music lovers, sort of a chapel to the cathedral – Symphony Hall in Boston. Over the past decade or so, the BSO has instituted a way to ready the place for the returning congregants, inviting lay ministers Garrison Keillor and James Taylor to hold services that are certain clear the dust from the rafters and get the aisle-wardens, parking-assistants, concessionaires, and ticket-takers into mid-season form.

Keillor, an annual Tanglewood attraction since 2000, can now be counted on to append nearly a whole show of audience sing alongs to his 2 hour live broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion. And James Taylor, who has played 40+ times at Tanglewood since 1974, has taken to scheduling little series of shows, often with special guests. This year’s 3 night run included one with Taylor Swift, the young country-pop sensation who was named after him. She appeared late in the first set of the July 2 show for a duet on Fire and Rain, and sang her own hits Ours and Love Story in the 2nd set. Ms. Swift’s entrance caused an eruption of shrieks from the youngsters in the sold-out audience that reminded us of the reception afforded the youngsters from Liverpool when they were introduced by Ed Sullivan in 1964.

Tanglewood lawn scene,July 4th James Taylor concert.
Tanglewood lawn scene,July 4th James Taylor concert photo: Dave Conlin Read
The Beatles get a mention at all James Taylor concerts, when he talks about his luck in getting signed by them to record his first album on their Apple label. The album included Carolina in My Mind with appearance by Paul McCartney and George Harrison, and Something in the Way She Moves, which inspired Harrison to write Something. This season’s version of Taylor’s band was missing singer Arnold McCuller but included long-time collaborator Larry Goldings on keyboards and Dean Parks on pedal steel, each of whom added serious and searing oomph to the proceedings.

We attended the 1st and 3rd show; together the series attracted somewhere in the neighborhood of 53,000 fans. Mr. Taylor is also on the program for the Gala 75 Anniversary concert July 14, which features Boston Symphony, Boston Pops, and Tanglewood Music Center Orchestras, plus special guests John Williams, Keith Lockhart, Andris Nelsons, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Yo-Yo Ma, and Peter Serkin.

A Prairie Home Companion at Tanglewood summary

  • July 3, 2012 Article by Dave Read
Just as Tanglewood is important to the Berkshires, so too is it important to Garrison Keillor, who told the audience in 2000 during the first live broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion at Tanglewood that it was where he and his wife had their second date. Keillor and his nonpariel radio crew have come back every year since, putting on shows in the Koussevitsky Music Shed on the Saturday before the Boston Symphony Orchestra arrives for their summer residency.

It is an aspect of Garrison Keillor’s genius that he can basically do the same thing week after week year after year for decades and have each program feel like a singular work of art. The lineup for the 12th annual broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion at Tanglewood hasn’t been announced, but it takes only a glance at a list of guests from the first eleven shows to be assured that it will be a winner. Follow the links to see our review, plus photos and/or video from that show.

Tanglewood picnic with Garrison Keillor and Andrea Suchy

This video clip of Garrison Keillor and Andrea Suchy serenading Tanglewood patrons minutes before the start of the June 28, 2010 live broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion at Tanglewood shows an element of the show unknown to the radio audience.

An extra benefit from attending the live broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion are the encores, such as these from the 2009 show posted to our Youtube channel:

  • Video of Steve Martin & The Steep Canyon Rangers playing Orange Blossom Special
  • Arlo Guthrie plays City of New Orleans




    Review A Prairie Home Companion at Tanglewood, June 30, 2012

    • July 2, 2012 Article by Dave Read

    The 13th live broadcast from Tanglewood of A Prairie Home Companion, with Garrison Keillor, featured the familiar guests Arlo Guthrie, Heather Masse, and The DiGiallonardo Sisters, as well as the Guys All Star Shoe Band and the Royal Academy of Radio Actors, Tim Russell, Sue Scott, and Mr. Fred Newman.

    The show got off to a fast start with the DiGiallonardo Sisters harmonizing on a hilarious Berkshires version of George M. Cohan’s Give My Regards to Broadway:

    “Give My Regards to Stockbridge, Remember me To Lenox and Lee;
    …
    Oh how my heart is yearning, to see the Koussivitsky Shed;
    Give my regards to Tanglewood, We’re gonna try to knock’em dead.”

    Arlo Guthrie, Garrison Keillor and Guys All Star Shoe Band at Tanglewood during after June 30, 2012 broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion
    Arlo Guthrie, Garrison Keillor and Guys All Star Shoe Band at Tanglewood during after June 30, 2012 broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion
    Arlo Guthrie and Garrison Keillor at Tanglewood during after June 30, 2012 broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion
    Arlo Guthrie and Garrison Keillor at Tanglewood during after June 30, 2012 broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion
    Arlo Guthrie and Heather Masse at Tanglewood during after June 30, 2012 broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion
    Arlo Guthrie and Heather Masse at Tanglewood during after June 30, 2012 broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion

    By the time the live broadcast closed with City of New Orleans, Arlo Guthrie at the grand piano leading a vast chorus of singers, Mr. Keillor had once again delivered a thoroughly entertaining program, comprised of a perfect blend of heartfelt and hokey singing and humorous skits with pan-o-sonic effects. Then there’s the News from Lake Woebegon, which always has a poignancy because its denizens and their misadventures, for all their odd particularities, are pretty much like the people we know, some of whom we miss now.

    Sometimes at Tanglewood, the 2 hour radio program can feel like a pretty fancy warm up to the best event of the day – the on-stage after party concert and sing-along that today lasted well past 9PM. We left the Shed during the enchanting Swing Low Sweet Chariot, which is great fun to sing as a member of an ad hoc choir of thousands.

    Thirty minutes earlier we sang along with Arlo on Home on the Range; watching him singing that song and wearing a handsome cowboy hat, we remembered that Arlo Guthrie was named for Davy Crockett!

    Yo Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble June 24, 2012 concert review

    June 24, 2012 Article by Dave Read

    Yo-Yo Ma with musicians from the Silk Road Ensemble, Ozawa Hall, Tanglewood.
    Yo-Yo Ma with musicians from the Silk Road Ensemble, Ozawa Hall, Tanglewood.; photo: Hilary Scott.
    Yo Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble got the BSO’s 75th anniversary season at Tanglewood off to a rousing start with a pair of concerts in Ozawa Hall June 22 and 24. Whatever Maestro Koussevitsky had in mind when he established the orchestra’s retreat and training center in the Berkshires, not even a visionary of his stature would have forseen a concert opening with a green haired gaita player wending her way through the audience.

    As the musicians assembled on stage and settled into an improvisation called Wandering Winds, Christina Pato, a raven-haired Spaniard (streaked with Kelly green), strolled through the audience on the lawn playing the gaita, the bagpipe of the Galician people of Spain. She is the second Galician bagpiper I’ve seen in concert, after Carlos Nunez, who toured with the Chieftains years ago. He drew references to Jimi Hendrix for the novelty his style and flair bore in comparison to highland pipers.

    Galician bagpiper Christina Pato

    Although fresh and original to all appearances, Ms. Pato is anything but a novelty act. She has a Doctorate from Rutgers and briefcase full of other academic credentials, leads her own touring band, and is a member of the Silk Road leadership council. The prominence of her role in this report is a function of my predilections; the show was so varied and full of treats that one couldv’ve focused on a dozen other elements.

    Such as the finale, Turceasca, from the Romanian gypsy tradition. It allowed all 17 musicians to seem to solo simultaenously, until a duet/duel developed between Wu Tong and (oops!) Ms. Pato. Wu Tong plays the Chinese sheng with the verve and personality one remembers from Dizzy Gillespie.

    Besides the role of host/MC, Yo Yo Ma was largely an ensemble player, except on Qasida, premiered on the 22nd. A Silk Road commission by Dmitri Yanov-Yanovsky, from Uzbekistan, it was written for MA to play with Kayhan Kalhor on the ancient Persian kamancheh.

    There were 20-30 minutes of encores, which resulted in as upbeat and cheerful an exiting audience as I’ve ever seen. They are sure to regale their friends about this event, a concert by the Silk Road Ensemble, at Ozawa Hall where Yo Yo Ma founded it in 2000. Depending on their predilections, they may focus their reports on the pipa, or the tablas, or the jang-go.

    Diana Krall at Tanglewood June 23, 2012 review

    Diana Krall at Tanglewood

    June 23, 2012 performance reviewed by Dave Conlin Read

    Diana Krall performing at Tanglewood, June 23, 2012
    Diana Krall performing at Tanglewood, June 23, 2012; photo: Hilary Scott
    Miss Diana Krall gave a bravura performance in the Shed on the opening weekend of 75th season of concerts at Tanglewood. The show featured a crackerjack combo Anthony Wilson (guitar), Robert Hurst (bass), and Karriem Riggins (drums) in support of an almost wierdly diverse setlist that visited many provinces of the jazz empire. While it wasn’t the sort of program Miss Mary Aspinwall Tappan had in mind in 1936, when she laid the family cottage (and 210 sylvan acres) on Maestro Koussevitsky (and the BSO), it was the sort we locals have become accustomed to while the BSO has become an increasingly important element of life in the Berkshires*.

    Since her first Tanglewood apearance years ago, on a bill as Tony Bennett’s guest, when “show-stealing siren” could’ve been an apt description, Miss Krall has become a full-fledged star with a commanding stage presence and an easy rapport with the audience. That was especially evident during the solo portion of her two hour set when she led into several numbers with references to her parents; and talked about her 5 year old twins. (She made a surprise appearance just before their birth during husband Elvis Costello’s performance on Marian McPartland’s Piano Jazz during the 2007 Tanglewood jazz Festivl).

    Miss Krall’s artistry is a melding of her voice and the piano; combined with her personality and musical sensibility, tonight’s two hour concert thouroughly satisfied. Her band was equally brilliant, bass and drums blending in primarily supportive roles, but bassist Robert Hurst had some prominence, including one passage where he brought a song home with descending notes until perfect silence was made to reverberate.

    Guitarist Anthony Wilson alternated between solo and support all night, as well as being Miss Krall’s go-to guy in deciding the setlist. He played several leads and riffs that excited the audience, and altogether produced the perfect complimentary sound to Miss Krall’s.

    setlist: Fats Waller, Nat King Cole, Peggy Lee, Sergio Mendes, Tom Waits …

    Her setlist drew from the work of Fats Waller, Nat King Cole, Peggy Lee, Sergio Mendes, Tom Waits, and Bob Dylan and included a stunning rendition of John Lennon’s Come Together. Since Quiet nights was released in 2009, Krall has performed on four continents, produced Barbra Streisand’s Love Is the Answer, contributed Simple Twist of Fate to the charity album Chimes of Freedom: The Songs of Bob Dylan Honoring 50 Years of Amnesty International and performed on Paul McCartney’s new album, Kisses On The Bottom.

    Opening the show were the Canadien duo Denzell Seymore and Devon Thompson; really tasty music, but just too much patter for an un-familiar opening act.

    *We overheard a conversation – someone was bemoaning the Berkshires remoteness from the ocean or the great lakes – her interlocutor said true enough, but can’t you imagine Tanglewood as a sort of ocean where wave after wave of great music washes ashore?

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