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Counterpoint for Christmas

 




There was a moment when I was standing on the platform at Grand Central having just missed the train I needed, doors shutting as I came down the stairs, seeing the sign that it would be 19 minutes until the next train, and for that moment I wondered why I wasn’t in my own living room, in front of a blazing fire, a libation to hand, lots of CDs of baroque music to choose from. But once I was in Alice Tully with the Chamber Music Society players performing, I had no further doubts.  Only the cellist and harpsichordist are seated. All the other musicians, strings, winds, brass remain standing, leaning into each other as the music suggests or demands. This is the Christmas season, and baroque music is  rich in counterpoint, otherwise defined as conversation between and among the instruments. I love it.

New York has many holiday traditions: the Rockettes at Radio City; the magnificent tree at Rockefeller Plaza accompanied by the skaters; lavishly decorated windows in the Fifth Avenue stores although my favorite, Lord and Taylor, is gone; Alvin Ailey at City Center. The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center traditionally presents a cornucopia of baroque pieces one week and all the Bach Brandenburg concertos on the same night a week later. 

This was the first of the two and included works you wouldn’t often hear: Albinoni, Telemann, Locatelli, Tartini, Vivaldi, and of course Bach. 

Yes, I could have stayed home and listened to CDs or to the radio, but what I heard and witnessed last night went way beyond anything I could have listened to.  You had to see it.  This was musical theater at its best.  Watching the interactions among the artists more than doubled the pleasure in listening for the polyphony, the musical dialogues, the counterpoint.  Most especially in the Telemann where the viola—not a violin for once—was wooing the flute.  It added to the drama that the flautist was an exquisitely lovely young Korean woman, Sooyun Kim, in a luscious yellow off the shoulder gown.  The violist was the unique and wonderful Paul Neubauer, definitely middle-aged if not a little beyond, balding, but absolutely irresistible in this pas de deux, flirtation, romantic dance between the two instruments.  It could have been Marivaux at his best. The artists played up to it, smiling at each other, Sooyun Kim swaying as in a dance, Neubauer leaning in to her.  It was magical. 

The wonderful oboeist, Stephen Taylor, also attempted musically to woo the flute, but was definitely left out of this enchanting duo performance.  I don’t believe I’ve ever seen so evocative a performance.  I can only thank Telemann and thank the three soloists.  Perhaps back in the 18th century with three male bewigged musicians playing in someone’s parlor for semi-attentive guests my reaction would have been completely different.  But last night was pure magic and nothing that I could have found on any CD, radio, or other purely auditory medium could measure up to it. The other five pieces were also pure delight, although that romantic duo is my takeaway for the evening.

What it means to go to Alice Tully rather than stay comfortably at home is parking at the local train station in New Rochelle; gambling on how many hours parking to pay for; taking the train for 42 minutes (used to be 35; I’m wondering why the trip is now longer?); then the shuttle from Grand Central to Times Square; then the #1 train uptown just three stops to 65th Street and Lincoln Center.  If you catch all the trains just on time, it’s a trip of an hour. Miss any one of the trains and the time can almost double.  But is it worth it?  Absolutely. Next week the complete Brandenburgs.  I will be there.

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