André Watts held a couple of hundred people spellbound tonight at Lincoln Center. No, not while seated at the piano – that starts Wednesday. Tonight he sat down with WQXR's Jeff Spurgeon in the middle of the Rubenstein Atrium to speak about his life, career, and music.
Currently a Professor of Music at Indiana University where he holds the Hamlin Endowed Chair, the 66-year-old Watts has a 50-year relationship with the New York Philharmonic that began when Leonard Bernstein selected him to perform in the famously televised Young People's Concerts. Ah, those were the good ole days.
Tonight he shared anecdotes and musings from his career. An audience member asked him if he recalled any "magical moments" in performances with any of the great conductors or musicians with whom he has performed. That elicited a lengthy and fascinating lecture about how it isn't the artist's job to go out on stage and fill himself with emotion or feel magic with the other performers. The job is to make the audience feel the magic and emotion by working as hard as possible to stay on track with the conductor and be unselfishly responsive when a musician in the orchestra wavers off course. He kept using the example of the horns being late, for some reason.
Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday, and next Tuesday, André Watts will perform Rachmaninoff's impossibly beautiful Piano Concerto No. 2 with the NY Phil. This is one of Haglund's most favorite pieces of music, and he enjoys a recurring fantasy of an Alexei Ratmansky ballet to this music for Veronika Part, Stella Abrera, Sarah Lane, Yuriko Kajiya (and some of the guys, too) in which the ladies are costumed in this:
A feller can dream, can't he? Haglund will be dreaming at the NY Phil on Wednesday and Thursday nights, and maybe Tuesday, too.
12 responses to “On Haglund’s Calendar – André Watts & Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2”
Oh, goodness, the Piano Concerto No.2. I also follow figure skating and a lot of people complain that it’s been overused (well, not as much as Carmen, which is ubiquitous), but I think it’s just a lot of mediocre routines not living up to the gorgeous music. It’s Rachmaninoff. Surely it’s on Ratmansky’s bucket list?
Oh, goodness, the Piano Concerto No.2. I also follow figure skating and a lot of people complain that it’s been overused (well, not as much as Carmen, which is ubiquitous), but I think it’s just a lot of mediocre routines not living up to the gorgeous music. It’s Rachmaninoff. Surely it’s on Ratmansky’s bucket list?
Hi, Kit.
Ah, ice skating – and what it can sometimes do to the classics.
There is a lot of extraordinary classical music that has never been used for ballet, because it’s probably just too beautiful and choreographers know that whatever they come up with won’t live up to the music. Worse, some have tried to make bad comedy of it.
But the Rachmaninoff PC No. 2 is wonderfully danceable, and I hope Ratmansky will take a crack at it.
Hi, Kit.
Ah, ice skating – and what it can sometimes do to the classics.
There is a lot of extraordinary classical music that has never been used for ballet, because it’s probably just too beautiful and choreographers know that whatever they come up with won’t live up to the music. Worse, some have tried to make bad comedy of it.
But the Rachmaninoff PC No. 2 is wonderfully danceable, and I hope Ratmansky will take a crack at it.
“Ah, ice skating – and what it can sometimes do to the classics.”
Oh, I know this all too well. For every Torvill and Dean ‘Bolero’, or Gordeeva and Grinkov ‘Moonlight Sonata’, there are a ton of programs that are veritable train wrecks. And ballet scores are quite risky to pull off, because unlike opera or other classical music, it already has choreography associated with it. And Swan Lake is the most iconic (and most perilous) of all. 😀 Audiences expect a certain quality of movement from skaters using ballet-specific music.
There IS one piece I should think skaters would interpret reasonably well–Les Patineurs. 😉
“Ah, ice skating – and what it can sometimes do to the classics.”
Oh, I know this all too well. For every Torvill and Dean ‘Bolero’, or Gordeeva and Grinkov ‘Moonlight Sonata’, there are a ton of programs that are veritable train wrecks. And ballet scores are quite risky to pull off, because unlike opera or other classical music, it already has choreography associated with it. And Swan Lake is the most iconic (and most perilous) of all. 😀 Audiences expect a certain quality of movement from skaters using ballet-specific music.
There IS one piece I should think skaters would interpret reasonably well–Les Patineurs. 😉
There are so many great Rachmaninoff pieces that need to be choreographed. Le sigh.
There are so many great Rachmaninoff pieces that need to be choreographed. Le sigh.
Hi Koji. You’re oh-so right. Perhaps you might convey to Alexei Ratmansky how you would like to take the No. 2 for a whirl if he would be so inclined to choreograph it.
Mr. Watts was mighty fine on both Wednesday and Thursday nights. I’m going back on Tuesday and would probably be there Saturday night, too, except that a certain Ms. Veronika Part beckons from BAM.
Hi Koji. You’re oh-so right. Perhaps you might convey to Alexei Ratmansky how you would like to take the No. 2 for a whirl if he would be so inclined to choreograph it.
Mr. Watts was mighty fine on both Wednesday and Thursday nights. I’m going back on Tuesday and would probably be there Saturday night, too, except that a certain Ms. Veronika Part beckons from BAM.
Glad to hear Watts is doing and sounding well–he’s unfortunately from time-to-time suffered from arm problems, but has been an artistic figure I’ve admired since a child. And he’s a wonderful human being on top of it.
Glad to hear Watts is doing and sounding well–he’s unfortunately from time-to-time suffered from arm problems, but has been an artistic figure I’ve admired since a child. And he’s a wonderful human being on top of it.