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Conductor Giampaolo
Bisanti and violinist Ju-Young Baek deliver at Symphony Silicon
Valley
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The 2011-12 season is shaping up as a landmark for
Symphony Silicon Valley. After last month's dazzling presentation of Holst's "The Planets,"
the orchestra returned to the California Theatre Saturday night with dynamic, vivacious
performances of music by Stravinsky and Beethoven.
The program -- second in the orchestra's 10th anniversary season -- included Stravinsky's 1947
suite from his 1910-11 ballet score "Petrushka," and Beethoven's Violin Concerto in D major with
Ju-Young Baek as soloist. Saturday's event was repeated Sunday afternoon.
Much praise goes to guest conductor Giampaolo Bisanti, making his second appearance with the
symphony. (This orchestra functions without a permanent music director and employs guest conductors
throughout the year.) Bisanti made his debut here in December 2010, and was quickly engaged for
this return; Saturday, he made good on his initial promise and then some. The Milan native,
principal conductor of that city's Mozart Orchestra since 1995, is a forceful, charismatic
presence; he imparted considerable verve and insight to each work.
"Petrushka," which opened the concert, offered a shining example. Stravinsky's score, the second of
three composed for Serge Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, poses myriad challenges, but Bisanti launched
into the opening "Shrove-tide Fair" with brio and swagger, forging ahead fearlessly and
demonstrating a thorough understanding of the music's architecture. Throughout the
bustling carnival scene, the orchestra delivered crisp, vigorous playing, the strings producing a
warm, unified sound and the woodwinds fluttering alluringly. The brass, low strings and percussion
brought a dark palette of shadows into the mix.
The rest of the suite was just as arresting. The inner scenes, depicting the showdown between two
of the ballet's three puppet characters, Petrushka and the Moor, were mordantly etched; if
Bisanti's aim was to conjure the ballet's visual imagery, he did an excellent job. The extended
final tableau was also well shaped, with its rich harmonies, Russian folk tunes and bits of
Viennese waltzes coming across in big-boned, rhythmically propulsive statements. The sterling
soloists included flutist Michelle Calmotto, trumpeter James Dooley, concertmaster Robin Mayforth
and bassoonist Deborah Kramer.
After intermission, Baek joined the orchestra in Beethoven's Violin Concerto. She is clearly a
favorite with the audience, having performed concertos here in past season by Sibelius, Piazzolla
and Brahms, and an elegant, assured soloist. Her aristocratic approach to Beethoven's concerto
provided a cool contrast to Bisanti's fervent style. The combination was especially effective in
the concerto's outer movements, with Bisanti drawing an expansive, aptly heroic sound from the
ensemble. Baek played with sweet yet slightly terse tones, savoring Beethoven's long arioso
melodies and negotiating the fleet, folk-tinged passagework with agility. The central Larghetto was
pure spun gold. Bisanti supplied a cushion of lush strings and burnished brass, and Baek sailed
through the movement with beauty, delicacy and smooth, creamy legato.
She returned for a single encore, a luxuriant account of Vittorio Monti's "Czardas," playing with a
generous, velvety tone. Bisanti whipped up a small storm of orchestral sound. Traditionally, this
work is considered something of a trifle, but in this pair's hands, it sounded like serious
music.
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Georgia Rowe - Mercury
News
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Orphie & Eurydice
- Gluck/ Bisanti/ Teatro Comunale di Bologna
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Opting for the French-language version of Orpheus, David
Alagna was faced with the task of achieving an appropriately subtle adaptation. In a plot
transposed to the present day, Eurydice dies in a car accident on the day of her wedding and
Orpheus's quest for his beloved is a dream beginning and ending at the cemetery. No happy
ending in this interpretation, but a new approach to characterisation:Amore, sung by a
baritone, becomes a funeral parlour employee and Orpheus' guide. Orpheus, of course, loses
his loved one forever by turning to look back. World famous tenor Roberto Alagna throws
himself body and soul into this production. His incredible vitality, flawless timbre and
diction make him a great Orpheus. His partner, young Italian soprano Serena Gamberoni, is
simply stunning as Eurydice, while French baritone Marc Barrard is suitably terrifying as the
guide to the Underworld. The orchestra is conducted by Giampaolo Bisanti, who masterfully
brings out all Gluck's poetry, romantic melancholy and depth.
A co-production with the Montpellier Opera.
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Click here to view more details of the DVD and Blue Ray
production.
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| Il Giornale, December 2, 2007 |
| ... They were all lucky to listen to a wonderful and well-balanced orchestra, conducted
very attentively by the young Giampaolo Bisanti, who even takes control over the stage, and is
never insecure, inert, or banal, and who greatly enjoys Mozart. |
| Lorenzo Arruga |
“Positive confirmations and pleasant
surprises on the music scene as well.
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| Giampaolo Bisanti creates balance with a secure hand,
sensitive to the dynamics of the score with pertinent choices and an excellent taste for
interpretation; his attention to the stage, which the young conductor never loses sight of, is
admirable.” |
| Alessandro Cammarano |
Salerno, November 24,
2007
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| Verdi Theatre in Salerno delirious about the tenor Neil
Schicoff |
| Padova: at the Teatro Verdi, once again warm applause for
the undissolvable binomial “realist” |
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Cavalleria Rusticana and
Pagliacci
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By a lucky flight that took off from Verona where he
had been occupied with Don Giovanni by Mozart, the young conductor Gianpaolo Bisanti fleetingly
arrives to replace maestro Daniel Oren, absent for family reasons, to conduct the orchestra at
the “Verdi” theatre.
The orchestra, conducted by the aforementioned maestro Bisanti, demonstrated brilliance in the capacity
for an ever---increasing quality of performance which could masterfully blend with the precision of the
young conductor, destined to be talked about. |
| Antonio Nocentini |
L'Opera, 16 October
2005
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| Love Means Jealousy |
| Padova: at the Teatro Verdi, once again warm applause for
the undissolvable binomial “realist” |
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Cavalleria Rusticana and
Pagliacci
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| At the podium of the Orchestra Filarmonia Veneta “G.F.
Malipiero”, Giampaolo Maria Bisanti descended to “delays” of tradition, and in some moments
didn’t renounce the instrumental emphasis. He did, but with good taste, without falling into the
rhetoric of low profile and without losing view of the occurences the softened dynamics, the
gradations, the legato. He obtained, in other words, a balance between incandescence and
lyricism. |
| Roberto Mori |
| Il Giornale della Toscana - 11 September
2005 |
| The Concert |
| Nocentini and the ORT (Tuscan Regional
Orchestra) |
| Neapolitan Serenades Between Applause and Curtain
Calls |
| Ready, effective, even if a bit uniform, the ORT was
conducted by Giampaolo Bisanti: a young Milanese director, who was among other things, trained at
the courses of the Chigiana in Siena held by the late lamented Ahronovich; we already appreciated
him in Siena for his musical talent, the clearness of his ideas and his secure gestures. His
giftedness was confirmed on this occasion also, because Bisanti with his interpretation was able
to guarantee a stringent coherence, vigor and determined looseness. |
| Francesco Ermini Polacci |
| Il Gazzettino - 29 August 2004 |
| Giampaolo Bisanti Concedes an Encore of “Va
Pensiero” |
| Extraordinary “Nabucco” by Verdi at the
PalaBassano. Public fascinated by the production. Repeat performance this
evening. |
| Giampaolo Bisanti directed the Veneta Philharmonic
Orchestra with precision and competence, leaving free space for the voices, as is strictly
necessary in an opera such as this. Under his guidance the success of Nabucco has been
full and warm. |
| Matteo Delle Fratte |
| Messaggero Vento: Album - 8 August
2004 |
| Pieces by Tchaikovsky and Brahms well directed by
Bisanti. |
| Participation of the actor Vincenzo Bocciarelli. Great Music for
Peace. Medea applauds Stefan Milenkovic and the Sarajevo Orchestra. |
| The International Orchestra of the martyr city of
Sarajevo working well together, prepared in every section and directed with clear and eloquent
gestures and with participative and communicative musicality by maestro Giampaolo Maria
Bisanti. |
| Renato Della Torre |
| Corriere del Teatro - Jan-Feb-Mar 2003 |
| Bassano del Grappa - Teatro Astra |
| The Barber of Seville |
| The City Choir of Padova and the good Filarmonia Veneta
were under the efficient and resolute guidance of Giampaolo Bisanti, a still young but definitely
valuable musician that – step by step – confirms his authoritative personality; attentive
investigator of the scoring and with a good directorial wrist, it seems to me he was able to
render all of the transparency and the richness of colors of the gaudy Rossinian
machine. |
| Gilberto Mion |
| L'Opera - 14 October 2003 |
| Ernesto and Norina, poor but beautiful |
| Spoleto: in the forthy edition of Don Pasquale, proposed
by the Sperimentale at the Teatro Nuovo, the years of pink neorealism are relived |
| The OTLIS (Orchestra del Teatro Lirico Sperimentale)
changes every year a large number of its elements: the formation of this year appeared
particularly good, also because it encountered directors capable of spurring it on and of pulling
back on the reins, like Giampaolo Bisanti, who in fact loves the strong sensations of rhythms and
sonorousness but who also is able to concede pauses at the right moment and above all respects
the voices. |
| Mauro Mariani |
| Il Tipo - 10 October 2000 |
| The debut this past Saturday; convincing and moving; La
Bohème as interpreted by Giampaolo Bisanti |
| Applause from the public of Bohème confirmed the
success of the opera in its Pavian debut. La Bohème directed by Giampaolo Bisanti was
rich in moments of pathos that, already present in Puccini’s score, have their culmination at the
end of the second act and in the finale of the opera. The arrangement of Bisanti, much applauded
director of Handel’s Messiah last spring, was not betrayed, at least by most of the vocal
company, as a group at a good level. |
| Fiorenza Bianchi |
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