Schoenberg: Pelleas and Melisande, with Alan Gilbert's talk. New York Phil, live Sept 25, 2009

A great performance, with preconcert walkthough of 

Arnold Schoenberg's Opus 5.

"My music is not modern, it is merely badly played."- A. Schoenberg

Arnold Schoenberg

Opus 5, Pelleas Und Melisande

Johannes Brahms

Opus 77, violin concerto

Alan Gilbert, conductor

New York Philharmonic

Frank Peter Zimmermann, soloist (Brahms)

Avery Fisher Hall, NYC

September 25, 2009

Wondrously placed stereo In-house recording

(coughing humans fall silent quickly enough)

This is my rapproachement with Schoenberg, in the recognition that he always sounds detached to me, somewhat alien. Some performances bring him in though, close, a stark wee-hours stare into the bathroom mirror, if you will. Last time I felt Schoenberg was with the Arditti Quartet's take on the second and third string quartets, and before that his Starry Night (an easy entryway to this composer).

The real reason, besides the performance and the front row acoustic feel, is the inclusion of one of first few talks that Alan Gilbert is giving during the performances- immediately before, not an hour before curtain. You may know that he is the young new mainstay for the New York Philharmonic, and where its previous head honcho, "...Lorin Maazel had no interest in using the Philharmonic music director’s platform as a teaching tool. Mr. Gilbert is good at it...", as The New York Times opined.

It's a great talk and made me feel good to hear an involved maestro and audience here. So I had to share.

the whole NY Times article about this performance is here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/26/arts/music/26phil.html?_r=1

also included is the rest of the program that morning, the Brahms violin concerto. Frank Peter Zimmermann played Joseph Joachim's cadenza.

**Mil gracias to well, you know who you are, for this!**

Enjoy, 

You will not sell this at all anyway anywhat anyhow, but spread it far, wide and go to a (non-free) concert soon!