Tuesday 23 March 2010

Bard Festival 2010 "Berg" ?

This year's Bard Festival theme has been announced: "Berg and his world". Big feature is the first US production of "The Distant Sound" also known as Der ferne Klang, possibly Franz Schreker's best-known opera. Although Berg is the theme, the music presented will be much more diverse. There'll be a performances of Oscar Straus's operetta The Chocolate Soldier. My father loved Nelson Eddy films, we used to watch the 1941 film version, which was "so bad it was good". There'll also be a series of G W Pabst films and a performance of Franz Schmidt's Book of the Seven Seals. The publicity material reveals an agenda, but it probably only reflects the difference between US and European approaches to music. But if it brings anyone in the audience closer to other "obscure" composers of the time, it's not entirely a bad thing. Wait till they find out more. But why not simply use a theme "Music of the 20's and 30's" ?

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