AROUND NORTH AMERICA — Live music by its very nature is a collective experience — a group of human beings onstage and off sharing a moment that can never be recaptured or repeated. We crave such interaction, and we pine for the emotional rewards and intellectual challenges that a great performance can provide.
But along with the death and disruption that the COVID-19 pandemic has wrought during 2020, upending the livelihoods of thousands of musicians and threatening the future of many organizations, it has all but eliminated traditional concerts and operas. Darkened halls and theaters have added to our general sense of loss.
Still, symphony orchestras, opera companies, and other classical-music ensembles of all kinds are not giving up. They have found creative ways to keep the music coming by shifting their performances and other activities to the internet or by finding imaginative outdoor venues like baseball parks, drive-ins, and bandwagons.
Drawing on its continent-wide network of music critics, Classical Voice North America offers a sampling of the inventive projects that organizations have undertaken over the summer and are planning this fall, as well as some of the ways devised to raise money and keep paying their musicians:
View now! Your chamber music video will soon expire
Asheville, N.C. – In this western North Carolina enclave, just down the road from Biltmore, the esteemed Asheville Chamber Music Society – entering its 68th season – pondered the challenges of presenting concerts and sustaining revenue. Its innovative approach could serve as a model for cultural organizations everywhere. One can envision retaining some of its attributes post-COVID – including making these in-person events available after the fact for two or three additional days for the convenience of patrons (or for critics who want a second look).
The Asheville Chamber Music Series will present a roster of internationally acclaimed ensembles for its virtual 2020-21 season, including the Jupiter Quartet with pianist Michael Brown and the Frisson Ensemble. These recorded concerts will be streamed on the presenter’s website and YouTube. The board noted two goals: to bring its audience the chamber music it seeks and to keep everyone, including the artists, healthy. In a statement, the board said it wanted to support the musicians who have lost income this year because of COVID-19. The programs will be available only to series ticket holders. The board has agreed to provide this season without charge but urges people to donate. The suggested donation for an individual ticket is $40, or $175 for a season subscription. – John Lambert
Honk three times if you love us: Fine arts come to the drive-in
Birmingham, Ala. – While much of Alabama is riveted on whether college football survives the pandemic, Birmingham arts organizations are more concerned about the possible curtailment of fall events. To keep musicians and audiences engaged, the Alabama Symphony Orchestra, Opera Birmingham, and several others have been concocting creative ventures such as using drive-in theaters and video technology, together with a public plea to the U.S. Congress.
The Brookings Institution recently reported that 1.4 million performing arts jobs were lost between April and July. In response, on Sept. 1, the Alys Stephens Center and Alabama Theatre were lit by red spotlights to support passage of the RESTART Act (S. 3814), part of a nationwide #RedAlertRESTART campaign. The act would offer some relief and expand unemployment assistance.
The orchestra also partnered with the Alys Stephens Center, Red Mountain Theatre Company, Alabama Ballet, and WBHM for Birmingham Arts Drive-In, a revival of the nearly extinct outdoor venue. Two sold-out performances were projected on a large screen to lights-flashing, horn-honking passengers.
Meanwhile, the week-long Sidewalk Film Festival moved its annual event to the Grand River Drive-in in nearby Leeds. Opera Birmingham attempted an outdoor performance of ensembles and arias on Aug. 31, although the event was canceled because of passing thunderstorms in the wake of Hurricane Laura. – Michael Huebner
Opera singers, stay put! Your scenery’s coming to you.
Chicago, Ill. – To mark its 10th anniversary, Haymarket Opera Company is partnering with Chicago’s Resolution Studios to produce what Haymarket is billing as “new, state-of-the-art cinematic productions” of two Handel operas and one of his cantatas – Acis and Galatea, Oct. 30; Apollo and Daphne, March 5, and Orlando, summer 2021.
“Rather than wait and see what was going to happen,” said artistic director Craig Trompeter, “we just decided to commit to this online season and make it special in the Haymarket way.”
Instead of traditional sets, these semi-staged productions will use projections on LED screens, and the singers will be stationary. “So, it will be a concert with scenery much like an oratorio might have been produced in the 18th century,” said Trompeter.
This approach to 2020-21 not only allows Haymarket to remain active and still generate ticket revenues during the pandemic, but also expands the reach of the company internationally to anyone with access to the internet and provides a lasting record of its work.
“I’ve come to think this is actually quite exciting,” said Trompeter, “because it’s something really different for us, and we’re just learning so much about how to approach things in a new way.” – Kyle MacMillan
It’s over, Valhalla. Gods punch their tickets on the down-ramp
Detroit, Mich. – Twilight: Gods, an adaptation of Wagner’s Götterdämmerung, will open the fall season of Michigan Opera Theatre Oct. 17-20. But not in the Detroit Opera House – rather in its parking structure. The “COVID-friendly production” is the brainchild of Yuval Sharon, the company’s recently named artistic director. Sharon, 41, joined the company Sept. 9 and succeeds MOT founder and long-serving general director David DiChiera, who died in 2018. (And this just in – the Lyric Opera of Chicago will be mounting Sharon’s production as well, dates to be announced.)
“Even as the performing arts face unprecedented challenges in this country, this moment offers an equally unprecedented opportunity for change – for artists and institutions to re-imagine the future of opera,” Sharon said. Noted for his experimental work in opera, he won a MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant in 2017. He founded The Industry in Los Angeles and offered Ellen Reid’s opera Hopscotch staged in 24 moving vehicles. Sharon has produced John Adams’ Doctor Atomic for Karlsruhe and Seville, John Cage’s Song Books for the San Francisco Symphony and Carnegie Hall, and Lohengrin for the Bayreuth Festival. Tickets, $79, michiganopera.org. – Nancy Malitz
Hollywood Bowl’s huge arena embraces LA Phil’s fall plans
Los Angeles, Calif. – Although the Los Angeles Philharmonic shut down its summer season, the orchestra has not been altogether out of action. As its summer project, the LA Phil is offering Sound/Stage, a series of nine programs in a “digital magazine format” that will appear online weekly, starting Sep. 25 and continuing through Nov. 20. The programs have been filmed outdoors in the Hollywood Bowl, which has an enormous stage that can accommodate social distancing.
Six of the programs feature music/artistic director Gustavo Dudamel leading members of the LA Phil in a wide-ranging repertoire from Beethoven and Gershwin to Peter Lieberson, Thomas Adès, and Arturo Márquez. Three more programs will have non-classical content from jazz saxophonist/composer Kamasi Washington, the multi-styled band Chicano Batman, and singer/songwriter Andra Day – Southern California artists all. Along with the music, there will be spoken essays, interviews, and artist playlists.
All of this diversity is right in line with Dudamel’s belief that many different genres of music can co-exist under a single roof. Also, with program titles like Power To The People!, Love In The Time Of COVID, and Salón Los Angeles, the Phil is trying to channel energy from the Black Lives Matter movement, reflect life under the coronavirus, and connect directly with the Mexican community. – Richard S. Ginell
L.A. youth virtuosi divide 110 by 32 to solve COVID math
Los Angeles, Calif. – It’s been heartening to see how the city’s youth orchestras have forged ahead in such difficult circumstances. On Oct. 3, Carlo Ponti’s Los Angeles Virtuosi will be streaming their fifth season concert opener, following strict COVID-19 guidelines. And music director Russell Steinberg has been moving his L.A. Youth Orchestra outside for socially distanced, masked rehearsals in small student groups. In August, LAYO took 110 student musicians, placed them in 32 smaller chamber groups, organized 12 separate rehearsal locations in parents’ backyards, and brought in 12 professional coaches to lead the rehearsals. These rehearsals culminate in a virtual concert and competition on Dec. 13. Necessity, as they say.
I also like the Delirium Musicum Chamber Orchestra‘s “Courtyard Concerts.” Early during the COVID-19 outbreak, director Etienne Gara got people out of their apartments and onto their balconies to hear live music. An organic blending of score and platform was David Lang’s 1992 Face So Pale for six pianos, given a lyrically haunting reading on Zoom by the six core pianists of LA’s Piano Spheres.
As for fundraising, the conductorless Kaleidoscope Chamber Orchestra continues its annual call for scores, benefiting both composers and the ensemble, which has premiered many of the new works. Led by artistic director Benjamin Mitchell, Kaleidoscope launched a musician relief fund to support artists in need during the pandemic. Applications have been reviewed monthly and to date the organization has been able to fund over a third of applicants. – Rick Schultz
New World Symphony tunes up in Miami Dolphins’ stadium plaza
Miami, Fla. – Wallcasts are a beloved trademark of the New World Symphony, the elite post-graduate orchestral training academy in Miami. These are concerts played inside the Frank Gehry-designed New World Center and simulcast in HD on the building’s 7,000-square-foot projection wall facing SoundScape Park. Crowds of more than 2,000 gather to enjoy the music and picnic during a night out in South Beach.
For now, because of public health restrictions due to COVID-19, Wallcasts aren’t on the agenda, but New World Symphony is opening its season Oct. 17 with a zany substitute: a Drive-in-Cast taking place at the Dezerland Park drive-in movie theater in North Miami, with patrons taking in the concert from their cars. A month later, the orchestra will do a similar presentation at an open-air theater on the plaza of Hard Rock Stadium, home of the NFL’s Miami Dolphins. “The programming will be from our Wallcast archives, and we’ll bring some of the players along – we may have strolling musicians,” said Howard Herring, president and CEO of the academy. – John Fleming
Public TV, radio join streaming to bring Minnesota Orchestra into homes
Minneapolis, Minn. – After testing their return to concertizing with a series of successful outdoor chamber concerts for small audiences at Peavey Plaza in the heart of downtown Minneapolis, the Minnesota Orchestra is taking its music back indoors.
Music director Osmo Vänskä will be on hand to kick off a partnership between the Minnesota Orchestra and Twin Cities PBS for six Friday night concerts beginning Oct. 2. The music can now be experienced three ways: live television viewing, live listening over Minnesota Public Radio’s 46-station network, and streaming (live or on-demand) via the orchestra’s website and social media outlets.
Although an Orchestra Hall audience will not be allowed inside throughout the fall, up to 25 players may appear onstage at the same time in hour-long broadcast concerts that have been re-imagined in response to health and safety measures. Vänskä expressed pride in the orchestra’s adaptive spirit and promised “new repertoire and new combinations of players that can showcase the (orchestra’s) versatility.”
Less than a third of the orchestra can appear onstage at any one time because of COVID restrictions, but the list of chamber orchestra works that could fill such a bill is enormous, including gems by major composers. Programming for the fall concerts is forthcoming.
Vänskä will conduct as the redesigned season commences Oct. 2, with additional Friday concerts slated for Oct. 23, Nov. 6 and 20, and Dec. 4 and 18. The orchestra has deferred most of its originally planned repertoire to 2021. – Nancy Malitz
Bruckner, Holst, Mahler with 50 players? It’s the new normal
Montreal, Quebec – Montreal stands out in the fall of 2020 for its relative normality as a musical city, because both the Montreal Symphony Orchestra (now entering a post-Kent Nagano interregnum) and the Orchestre Métropolitain (under Yannick Nézet-Séguin) are performing live public concerts in the Maison symphonique and elsewhere.
Musicians are limited to about 50, which for the MSO creates the option of splitting into alternating squads, known internally as Orchestra A and Orchestra B, that have almost no players in common. The system is familiar from the Beethoven, Brahms, and Schubert festivals led by Nagano in recent seasons.
Modest forces might seem hard to reconcile with Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony (Oct. 19) and Mahler’s Tenth (Oct. 22), but these scores will be heard in arrangements (as conducted by John Storgårds). Even that great MSO specialty, Holst’s The Planets, under another Finn, Susanna Mälkki, is given in a reduced version (Oct. 1). Nézet-Séguin and his orchestra offer two performances on the same day (Sept. 20) of the Schoenberg/Rainer Riehn chamber reduction of Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde. – Arthur Kaptainis
Teen composers collaborate with self-generating tracks on Zoom
New York, N.Y. – During this pandemic-provoked intermission, concert organizations have delivered two responses: vaulting to digital platforms to reproduce the concert hall experience or pausing and reinventing the encounter.
The digital experiences that have succeeded are looking past the present. In 2020, Grammy-nominated recording artist Nathalie Joachim was scheduled to create a concert project with 10th-graders at Kaufman Music Center’s Special Music School. But when lockdown came to New York, the contemporary music flutist, singer, and composer redefined her project. She conceived a collaborative recording, developed over Zoom and created with digital music software.
The result is an album of electronic, ambient tracks derived from a sound bank of self-generated acoustic and electronic samples. The effect is continuous transformation.
New York’s National Sawdust has also taken the pause-and-recalibrate route to produce its exceptional Digital Discovery Festival – a suite of masterclasses, performances, and musings by artists from Robert Wilson to Rafiq Bhatia. – Xenia Hanusiak
Classical bandwagon, musicians aboard, rolls by for surprise serenades
New York, N.Y. – The unstoppable New York Philharmonic has been in continuous operation through the Civil War, World War I, the influenza pandemic of 1918, World War II, and any number of financial and other crises since its inception on Dec. 7, 1842. Through it all, the organization has proven itself to be nothing if not resilient, ever bringing professional live music to New York audiences.
Its recently inaugurated nine-week initiative, the NY Phil Bandwagon, continues this tradition. In the age of COVID-19, audiences can’t come to Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center, but the musicians can come to audiences. Since the end of August, small ensembles have been bringing live classical music by composers from the 17th to 21st centuries. Produced by effervescent Metropolitan Opera countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo (who also appears in some concerts), the continuing series will “pull up” to a surprise location at a surprise time somewhere in one of the five boroughs eight times a week. This is one bandwagon worth jumping on! – Joanna Barouch
Logistical challenge: Only 25,500-seats. Where to sit?
Orlando, Fla. – The Orlando Philharmonic has had to make more changes and short-notice decisions than perhaps any other performing arts organization in the region. When it was announced in late July that the opening of the new $606 million Steinmetz Hall had been postponed until some unspecified time in 2021, and that the Bob Carr Theater was to be out of commission indefinitely because of poor air circulation within the nearly century-old concert hall – a dealbreaker for health safety regulations – the Philharmonic was essentially left with no home for their Classics Series main programs.
So for the new season’s opening night on Sept. 26, rather than taking the show online or limiting it to an audience of just a few, music director Eric Jacobsen and the Philharmonic are taking it to a bigger outdoor venue that will allow for social distancing on both sides: the new 25,500-seat Exploria Stadium for soccer. With amplified sound, special seating arrangements on a stage mounted on the soccer pitch, and a socially distanced audience limited to 2,000 on the stadium’s first level, this will be a first for the orchestra.
The program also underwent several changes, understandably: from The Rite of Spring — supported by selections by contemporary composers Anna Clyne and John Adams — and later changed to Debussy’s La mer as the main course for the night, and finally to a safe and risk-free Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony and Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto with soloist Simone Porter. – Esteban Meneses
Modern watch party: Olde tunes with sackbut, shawm, carillon
Philadelphia, Pa. – Though Piffaro, The Renaissance Band might normally be playing in the early music festivals of Europe this time of year, the 40-year-old group instead turned its Philadelphia-based lockdown into a four-concert streaming video season that could never happen in conventional venues. For starters, the six-member group brought its shawms, recorders, sackbuts, and much else to the Miraculous Medal Shrine in the Germantown section of Philadelphia to play duets with the building’s 23-bell-plus carillon in a September video shoot scheduled for streaming starting Oct. 30.
Repertoire is by Jacob van Eyck (1590-1657), who was an Utrecht-based expert in all things bell related and played recorder in the Cathedral of Utrecht courtyard. Though “Eyckie” (as he was nicknamed) was blind, his melodies were transcribed (140 folk songs, psalms, even improvisations) in a collection titled The Flute’s Garden of Delights, which Piffaro drew on for its own carillon duets.
This and the season’s three other 60-minute segments will begin their streaming period in watch-party style, starting at 7:30 p.m. EST on Fridays with an audience/performer live chat, and week-long availability.
The subscription model is worth noting: Though each of the four concerts is available for $15, a $60 all-season subscription allows concert outtakes and other “nerd-out” opportunities for Renaissance music admirers. “Like membership in a club,” explains the website. “We’re figuring this out as we go along.” (Who isn’t?) – David Patrick Stearns
Riddle for troubled times: How can we get these musicians paid?
Portland, Ore. – Portland Baroque Orchestra has, of course, gone virtual as well as changed the number and types of concerts to accommodate smaller groups of musicians. But what the group has done best is to figure out how to pay its musicians with the creation of a digital concert hall called “Great Arts. Period.”
The program, which the orchestra’s executive director Abigail McKee called a game changer, was designed to “ensure that our artists, and artists around the community continue to be paid for their work. When arts partners work with Great Arts. Period., one of the key tenets is that the artist must be paid. Our goal is to ensure the arts remain relevant, responsive, creative, and solvent.”
Portland Baroque Orchestra paid cancellation fees to every musician who lost work this spring. Many patrons donated their tickets to canceled concerts instead of requesting refunds, so musicians could be paid for concerts that didn’t happen. – Angela Allen
Season dark, but movie clubs and tent talks keep an opera vibe
St. Louis, Mo. – Like virtually every other performing arts organization, Opera Theatre of St. Louis had to cancel all its scheduled events after March due to COVID-19. Since the company’s performances take place in May and June, that meant cancelling its entire 2020 season.
The Opera’s energetic young general director Andrew Jorgensen and its board and staff didn’t let it go at that. They rallied to produce a “virtual season” that still celebrated opera, the artists, and the year’s planned productions.
The first order of business was to raise money to pay every contracted member of the company one-half of what they would have earned, calling on board members, donors, and patrons to contribute; at a time when most were citing force majeur and simply letting people go, that was a tremendous gift. Jorgensen and director of development Linda Schulte also enlisted other arts groups to join in a “virtual benefit” to raise money for other artists in the region.
Then came the well-considered, well-executed “virtual season.” There were online master classes led by soprano Patricia Racette, artistic director of the young artists program. There was a Monday night Opera Movie Club: Watch an opera or relevant film online, and then discuss it. For the Spotlight on Opera series, introductions to each opera, usually given in May, appeared on what would have been opening nights: Bizet’s Carmen, Johann Strauss II’s Die Fledermaus, Tobias Picker’s Awakenings (on what was to have been its world premiere), and Carlisle Floyd’s Susannah.
There were Tent Talks, a Friday afternoon series exploring aspects of the field with people who live it. (My favorite: Hearing Susan Graham and Denyce Graves, both Opera Theatre of St. Louis veterans, talk about their very different repertoire – and its pitfalls – as mezzo-sopranos.) There was even a virtual Opera Camp for the younger set. – Sarah Bryan Miller
On the orchestra’s playlist: Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come”
St. Louis, Mo. – Powell Symphony Hall may be dark, but the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra has found multiple ways to stay in touch with its audience during the pandemic, via both its web site and its YouTube channel.
Take the orchestra’s most recent project, Songs of America. It’s a regularly updated playlist of new videos of American classics ranging from George Walker’s Lyric for Strings to Sam Cooke’s A Change Is Gonna Come recorded at Powell Hall and landmark sites. Performers include St. Louis Symphony members and local soul, jazz, and pop musicians.
The #SLSOatHome series features orchestra musicians playing from (of course!) their homes. Highlights include symphony chorus member Susan Patterson with an English translation of Dvořák’s “God Is My Shepherd” and orchestra horns Thomas Jöstlein, Tod Bowermaster, and Tricia Jöstlein playing a brief trio for alphorns.
The St. Louis Symphony also has launched a series of Lunch and Learn Zoom webinars, featuring music director Stéphane Denève, chorus director Amy Kaiser, and other members of the organization discussing plans for the future.
Educational outreach programs have gone digital as well, with a series of downloadable at-home learning opportunities for families and educators, including an online “instrumental playground.” – Chuck Lavazzi
Trailer allure: Don Giovanni on the prowl via pick-up truck
Sarasota, Fla. – To cope with the coronavirus, Sarasota Opera is going old school with its OperaMobile, which presents singers with a pianist performing from a trailer pulled by a pick-up truck. The initial test drive took place in July, when soprano Hanna Brammer and baritone Alex Boyd, with Jesse Martins on piano, sang selections from Don Giovanni, Carmen, La Rondine, Faust, and La Wally.
The OperaMobile will return to the streets Nov. 9 and 10 with artists, amplified to encourage social distancing, in brief concerts around the Gulf Coast city. In addition to the OperaMobile, a live-streamed concert by singers from the Sarasota Opera House is planned for Nov. 13, as well as a pair of outdoor performances Nov. 17 and 19.
The company’s fall production of Don Giovanni and the Sarasota Youth Opera production of The Hobbit were withdrawn because of the pandemic. “Despite our disappointment in having to cancel our mainstage activities, we do not plan to be silent,” executive director Richard Russell said. “Our intention is that opera remains in the hearts and minds of our supporters, our audience, and our community through this difficult time.”
The Sarasota Opera winter festival of four productions – Tosca, The Daughter of the Regiment, The Pearl Fishers, and Attila – remains on the calendar from Feb. 6 through March 21. – John Fleming
Rigoletto in a stadium: The Duke is already on first base
Tulsa, Okla. – Baseball and opera are not typically mentioned in the same breath. But Tulsa Opera is determined to change all that. The company will embrace the most American of sports when it opens its 2020-21 season Oct. 9 with a semi-staged, baseball-themed version of Verdi’s Rigoletto.
That’s already unusual enough, but the company’s derring-do doesn’t stop there. To properly abide by COVID-19 guidelines and still be able to accommodate 2,700 people, the opera will be presented outdoors in socially distanced fashion at Tulsa’s minor league baseball stadium – ONEOK Field. “Challenging times call for creative solutions,” said Ken McConnell, the company’s general director and CEO.
Artistic director Tobias Picker re-envisioned this classic opera, cutting its run time to 85-90 minutes without intermission and using a small accompanying ensemble that consists of two violins, viola, cello, bass, and piano. Stage director James Robinson and conductor Steven White will be responsible for tying it all together.
“Our new ‘baseball’ Rigoletto taps into the fascinating, but little-known history of the cultural intersection between baseball and opera in the USA,” Picker said. “This Rigoletto takes the ‘socially distanced’ baseball diamond as its stage – positioning the singers at different bases and baseball positions throughout the opera.” Obviously, everyone is hoping for a musical and theatrical home run. – Kyle MacMillan
Timely “Isolation Commissions” and “Waltzes for the Distanced”
Vancouver, B.C. – Gatherings of more than 40 remain off the table for the foreseeable future, although Vancouver was spared some of the more draconian aspects of lockdown in the early spring. Many organizations, including the Vancouver Recital Society and Early Music Vancouver, have turned to high-quality streaming to keep stakeholders connected.
Several smaller groups have exhibited nimble responses designed for niche audiences. The innovative Little Chamber Series was right on the mark with a series of “Isolation Commissions,” by which a patron could sponsor a short online performance by a solo musician for a modest honorarium. The project is just winding down after an astonishing 130 individual episodes.
The Blueridge Chamber Music Festival tried something less intimate Sept. 19 with 19 Waltzes for the Distanced. Interpreting a piece by John Cage, the participants assembled in 57 outdoor locations across, to use Blueridge’s phrase, “the area colonially known as Vancouver.” Festival co-director Dory Hayley explained that various musicians, dancers, actors, writers, artists, and photographers created micro-events around the city, all combining into one big performance: The project “puts them into a new relationship with the city we occupy.” – David Gordon Duke
