Seattle Times review of last night's concert

A few weeks ago I wrote about my first rehearsal with the Seattle Symphony Chorale. The experience has continued to be energizing, well worth the commute and homework. Last night was my first performance with this organization. What a privilege to sing to a full house with such accomplished musicians, especially under the direction of Carolyn Kuan. Click More for Melinda Bargreen's Seattle Times review.



Mozart's Requiem: No better salve for soul
By Melinda Bargreen
Seattle Times music critic

An evening of well-played Mozart is like a balm to the soul -- an instant antidote to a world of grim headlines and traffic jams. This doesn't mean that Mozart's music is unremittingly jolly; indeed, his Requiem is as serious as music gets. But there is an incredible rightness about Mozart, a sense of order as beautiful as the perfectly synchronized turns of a school of fish or a flock of birds in flight. This is music that restores your faith and your optimism.

Take the middle Adagio movement of the Clarinet Concerto, for example. It is simplicity itself, especially when it's played as subtly and elegantly as the first-rate soloist Jon Manasse played it in Thursday's all-Mozart Seattle Symphony program. But the simple rise and fall of each phrase in the Adagio is so beautifully crafted that there has really never been anything to surpass it.

All the music on the Symphony's program is very late Mozart, written within months of his death in 1791. Conductor Carolyn Kuan opened with the Overture to "The Magic Flute," continuing with the Clarinet Concerto and finally the Requiem. It also was a program that definitively showed what Kuan, the orchestra's busy associate conductor, can do. She is an adroit leader, a capable and sensitive accompanist (in the concerto), and a multitasking whiz who was completely on top of the Requiem score -- cueing (and singing with) the Seattle Symphony Chorale, and leading the orchestra with taut, punchy gestures that conveyed the music's energy and urgency.

The Chorale, prepared by Joseph Crnko, sang with power, feeling, and accuracy. The four vocal soloists were all well chosen, particularly the seraphic soprano Harolyn Blackwell and the superb tenor Karl Dent. (Blackwell will be replaced in Sunday's performance by Holly Boaz.) The repeat performances are well worth a trip to Benaroya Hall.

Melinda Bargreen: mbargreen@seattletimes.com