Tag Archives: The Tenor

Two World Premiere Opera Recordings

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Teaching a conducting master class last week for the Eotvos Foundation at the beautiful and highly functional Budapest Music Center was demanding and a lot of fun. This week had been busier than I expected. On Monday composer Peter Eotvos and producer Laszlo Goz (owner of BMC) and myself had a chance to officially listen to the recording we made this January. I am happy to report, that “Paradise Reloaded (Lilith)” now has a rich in details, beautifully mastered reference recording. Mr. Eotvos will put a few finishing touches on the final version before the end of this year. This World Premiere opera recording will be available as part of the Budapest Music Center Eotvos series sometimes soon in 2015.

I had two days to rehearse the comic opera of Ernst von Dohnanyi
http://www.britannica.com
again (the one I premiered at the Erkel Theater this fall). We are taking this opera into the studio. Starting tomorrow (Sunday) I will be driving almost every day to
http://www.phoenixstudio.hu
where the wonderful singers and the musicians of the Hungarian State Opera will be my partners in crime to record the first ever uncut version of this delightful 20th Century comic opera. The recording will be part of the discovery CD series of Hungarian operas by the Hungarian State Opera
http://www.opera.hu
I am hoping to see the final product on the shelves as soon as February 2015.

Just to take a small break from the recording process (OK we do have a planned day off) I am driving to Vienna, Austria on Tuesday.
I’ll be meeting opera singers Rebecca Nelsen
http://rebeccanelsen.eu
and Tamara Gallo
http://www.tamaragallo.com
to do two pre-rehearsals for the February World Premiere of my Comic Opera of the Modern South, Georgia Bottoms. Sometimes in the second half of December I will be meeting stage director David Gately
http://www.davidgately.com
in the US to discuss details about the February World Premiere in Huntsville, AL.

I wish You All a Happy Holiday Season! Come back here after Christmas time to read about my New Year’s Eve concert with the Huntsville Symphony! See you Soon!

The Luxury of Composing

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After a successful run of The Tenor by Ernst von Dohnanyi and before a crazy busy October (more later!) I managed to do something unheard of. I squeezed in a week (or so) time for composition only. Since completing ‘Georgia Bottoms, A Comic Opera of the Modern South’ I have finished a 3 minute long piece for piano solo entitled ‘sol-Etude’. The piece is dedicated to Peter Kiss who will be playing it twice in the US along with piano compositions by Kurtag, Ligeti and Eotvos.

http://www.pickstaiger.org/event/peter-kiss-piano-oct8

http://arts.uchicago.edu/event/piano-recital-peter-kiss

After completing ‘sol-Etude’ I started working for Edition Schott for a very special project. Peter Eotvos has asked me to do the English language adaptation of his newest opera called ‘The Golden Dragon’. The work was premiered in German in Frankfurt. The next production of it takes place in Cardiff and they want to do it in English. I have done something like this before with another Eotvos work. I’ve got to tell you, that it is a lot of fun and a great challenge to try to understand the composer’s thinking and to try to stay true to the work and the musical needs of the English language alike. Since Edition Schott wanted to publish one particular aria during this calendar year as a stand alone piece, I started my work by doing the English version of a soprano aria called “Ballade”.

After completing “Ballade” I immediately started working on my newest composition (world premiere in February, 2015 in Budapest) called ‘Drums Drums Drums’. This work is a special kind of triple concerto for three percussion players and orchestra. I am going to have three top notch soloists for the premiere: Zoltan Racz and Aurel Hollo from the famous percussion group, Amadinda on Timpani and Bass Drum, Gergo Borlai on drum-set.

http://www.amadinda.com

http://www.drumguru.com/artists/gergo-borlai/

Btw I did download the iPad app ‘Drum Guru’ and it is an amazing tool not only for drummers but for composers like myself who are writing for drumset and want to learn about the intricate details about playing drums in different styles. I promised to put the solo parts of Drums Drums Drums under the Christmas tree for my amazing soloists. No time to waste. Another intense few months of composition are ahead of me. I am loving it!