Today is my last day in Lenox, there are no music performances, the play I wanted to go to is sold out, and outside, the humid heat is like a sauna…in other words, the perfect day for blogging…
One of the reasons I came up here at this particular time of the concert season was the annual (43rd) Festival of Contemporary Music at the Tanglewood Music Center (scroll down), with performances by the TMC Fellows, faculty, and guest artists, which concluded last night. Stefan Asbury was the Festival Director, and John Harbison the Festival Adviser. Over five days, there were numerous concerts, and I did not go to all of them, partially because there is such a thing as musical overload, like three concerts in one day, and over the weekend I was joined by a friend who is not interested in contemporary music, so we did other things, like visiting the wonderful Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Massachusetts. However, I certainly caught some of the highlights of the festival and will individually blog forthwith.
Music was by Abrahamsen, Babbitt, Boulez, Campion, Carter, Chasalow, Druckman, Felder, Ford, Gustavson, Hindemith, Jaffe, Jolas, Ligeti, Martino, Norman, Ruders, Staud, Stravinsky, Taylor, and Turnage. Don Martino had been commissioned to write a violin concerto, but unexpectedly passed away while working on it: only a 90 seconds fragment is available, which was performed. Ligeti was added because he too had recently died and was commemorated. Unfortunately, I missed that performance, I like Ligeti’s music very much.
Here is a summary from the NYT (permanently available only to TimesSelect customers).
Most TMC concerts are perfomed in the Ozawa Hall. The lawn behind the hall slopes upwards, so one can easily hear the music.
Click on the images for larger size
