Bernstein: A Quiet Place

Gordon Bintner, Orchestre Symphonique De Montreal, Choeur de l'Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, Lucas Meachem, Kent Nagano, Joseph Kaiser, Claudia Boyle

Released on 6/1/18 by Decca Music Group Ltd.
Main artist: Kent Nagano
Genre: Classical
Distinctions: Qobuzissime

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Why yes, it is still possible to discover Bernstein scores, or in this case the chamber version of A Quiet Place, adapted by Garth Edwin Sunderland, conducted and recorded for the first time by Kent Nagano, at the Montreal Symphony House. The final stage score by the American composer, first performed at the Houston Grand Opera in 1983, it was revisited by the librettist Stephen Wadsworth, and the composer who added several fragments from the one-act piece Trouble in Tahiti, from 1951; this addition would see two new performances (the Scala in Milan, and Washington). Another draft – this one definitive – was performed at the Vienna Opera House, conducted by the composer, in 1986. Fascinating in more ways than one, rather like a modern-day Intermezzo by Strauss, the work depicts American society by way of an existential crisis faced, first by one couple, (Trouble in Tahiti) and then by one family. Bernstein borrowed from Mahler for the structure, with a final movement whose "grave nobility" recalled the final movements of the Third and NinthSymphonies by his much-admired forebear. As is often the case with this composer, Bernstein's mix of styles (jazz, chorale, Broadway, Mahler, Berg, Britten, Copland…) provides an explosive cocktail, which has about it more of a musical conversation than grand opera – and, paradoxically, that's what makes this work so unique... And so charming. This is well worth a re-discovery, this time under the baton of Bernstein's faithful former pupil, Kent Nagano, at the head of top-flight solo singers, who point the way to that "quiet place", where "love will teach us harmony and grace". © Franck Mallet/Qobuz

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Bernstein: A Quiet Place

Kent Nagano

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A Quiet Place - Ed. Sunderland / Act 1 (Leonard Bernstein)

Prologue "The path of truth is plain and safe”

Claudia Boyle

00:03:37

Leonard Bernstein, Composer - Orchestre Symphonique De Montreal, Orchestra, MainArtist - Kent Nagano, Conductor, MainArtist - Martin Sauer, Producer, Recording Producer - Joseph Kaiser, Tenor, MainArtist, AssociatedPerformer - Choeur de l'Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, Chorus, MainArtist, AssociatedPerformer - Daniel Belcher, Baritone, MainArtist, AssociatedPerformer - Christopher Johns, Recording Engineer, StudioPersonnel - John Tessier, Tenor, MainArtist, AssociatedPerformer - Stephen Wadsworth, Author - Steven Humes, MainArtist, AssociatedPerformer, Bass (Vocal) - Carl Talbot, Producer, Associate Producer - Claudia Boyle, Soprano, MainArtist, AssociatedPerformer - Jack Kelly, Asst. Recording Engineer, StudioPersonnel - Lucas Meachem, Baritone, MainArtist, AssociatedPerformer - Rupert Charlesworth, Tenor, MainArtist, AssociatedPerformer - Stéphane Brochu, Asst. Recording Engineer, StudioPersonnel - Gordon Bintner, Baritone, MainArtist, AssociatedPerformer - Annie Rosen, Mezzo-Soprano, MainArtist, AssociatedPerformer - Maija Skille, Mezzo-Soprano, MainArtist, AssociatedPerformer - Nicola Lombardo, Asst. Recording Engineer, StudioPersonnel - Edwin Garth Sunderland, Contributor, Work Editor