More Fabulous Weekend Music (and Dance)

[MSFixR]

This was another fantastic weekend as far as entertainment goes.

Friday night we attended the symphony. The program was devoted to dance and featured the Hubbard Street Dance Chicago company. To accommodate the dancers, the stage had been expanded toward the audience by a few feet and the orchestra was situated at the rear on a platform raised above the level of the front by about three feet. The first dance sequence was set to the music of J. S. Bach (selections from his Brandenburg Concertos No. 1 and 3, Bourree 1 and 2 from Suite in E-flat major for solo cello, and the Prelude in E minor from Eight Short Preludes and Fugues for solo harp). The dancing was superb. The dancing while not ballet was not overly athletic but graceful and fluid. Daniel Lee was fantastic on cello and Ayako Watanabe enthrawed on the harp.

After a lengthy reset of the stage, the orchestra played Stravinsky’s Three Pieces for Clarinet featuring Scott Andrews on clarinet.

The second dance set was to the music of Leonard Bernstein, Prelude, Fugue and Riffs. The dance set to this music seemed to be mainly a lot of jumping up and down and was less enjoyable than the first set.

Again the stage was reset so that the orchestra could assume its usual position at the front of the stage. Stage manager Mike Lynch hopped to and fro assisted by a crew of ten. The final piece on the program was Ravel’s Bolero played with exquisite control and enthusiasm.

If you are in Chicago or have the opportunity to catch the Hubbard Street Dance Chicago company on tour, I highly recommend you do so.

Hubbard Street Dance Chicago

Saturday afternoon, the Metropolitan Opera broadcast Giacomo Puccini’s Madama Butterfly via satellite as part of its Met in HD series of broadcasts. This production was by the late Anthony Minghella and featured a minimalistic set designed by Micheal Levine with direction and choreography by Minghella’s wife Carolyn Choa. The part of Cio-Cio San (Butterfly) was sung by Cristina Gallardo-Domas, Suzuki by Maria Zifchak, Pinkerton by Mircello Giordani, US Consul Sharpless by Dwayne Croft and Goro, the wedding broker, by Greg Fedderly. What made this version of Madama Butterfly unique was the use of the Japanese form of puppetry known as Bunraku for the part of Butterfly’s son and puppeteers to manipulate Butterfly’s stage-long sash and various lanterns and floral arrangements.

Example of Bunraku puppetry



Cristina Gallardo-Domas "Con onor muore" Butterfly' Death