2020-02-10 The New Yorker

6 THENEWYORKER,FEBRUARY10, 2020

PHOTOGRAPH BY RENATO TOPPO / THE NADIA REISENBERG/CLARA ROCKMORE FOUNDATION

Whether you first encountered the theremin in Miklós Rózsa’s score

for Hitchcock’s “Spellbound,” in “Good Vibrations” by the Beach Boys,

or in one of countless science-fiction B-movie soundtracks, you never

forget the eerie wail this early electronic instrument produces when

human hands are waved near its metal antennas. “100 Years of Ther-

emin,” presented by Ambient Church at Bushwick United Methodist

Parish, on Feb. 8, features video projections mapped to the venue’s

contours and includes a tribute to Clara Rockmore (pictured above,

circa 1930)—the former violinist who became the instrument’s most

disciplined devotee and visible advocate—alongside performances by

the virtuoso soloist Dorit Chrysler, the New York Theremin Society

Orchestra, and other special guests.—Steve Smith

INCONCERT

Doric String Quartet

Weill Recital Hall

Last week, New York held the local première

of the Australian composer Brett Dean’s Cello

Concerto. Now here’s a chance to be among the

first listeners Stateside to hear Dean’s String

Quartet No. 3, subtitled “Hidden Agendas” and

inspired by our polarized, extremely online age.

The Doric String Quartet, the refined and ex-

pressive British ensemble for whom the piece was

written, performs it alongside standard works

by Haydn and Schubert.—S.S. (Feb. 6 at 7:30.)

“Agrippina”

Metropolitan Opera House

As Caligula’s sister and Nero’s mother, the

Roman empress Agrippina occupies an espe-

cially salacious chapter of ancient history, but

Handel’s opera uses the shifting personal and

political alliances of her story as an occasion for

pliant melodies and even some comedy. David

McVicar’s production, which has appeared in

Brussels and London, comes to the Met with

Joyce DiDonato, Kate Lindsey, Brenda Rae, Ies-

tyn Davies, and Matthew Rose; Harry Bicket

conducts. Also playing: Berlioz conceived “La

Damnation de Faust,” a work of swirling mu-

sical imagination, as a concert piece, and the

Met, owing to unexpected technical difficulties

in reviving Robert Lepage’s imaginative 2008

production, presents it in its intended form.

Even without Lepage’s chimerical tableaux,

the company has assembled a first-rate cast,

including Elīna Garanča, Ildar Abdrazakov, and

Bryan Hymel, who made a name for himself

earlier in his career with Berlioz’s grand “Les

Troyens”; Edward Gardner conducts. (Feb. 8

at 1.) Andrea Bocelli returns to the Met stage

with a concert of arias and scenes from Italian

opera (Feb. 10 at 7:30).—Oussama Zahr (Feb. 6

at 7:30 and Feb. 9 at 3.)

Caroline Shaw

Miller Theatre

Few composers seem to revel quite as joyfully

in the limitless possibilities of music-making

as Caroline Shaw. An accomplished singer and

violinist, Shaw became the youngest winner

of the Pulitzer Prize for music in 2013, por-

trayed herself on the Amazon comedy series

“Mozart in the Jungle,” and has collaborated

with Kanye West. Her “Composer Portrait”

concert features two ensembles with which

she shares solid working connections, Attacca

Quartet and Sō Percussion.—S.S. (Feb. 6 at 8.)

Danish String Quartet

Alice Tully Hall

In two volumes of a series titled “Prism,” re-

leased by ECM Records, the Danish String

Quartet has established itself as a force to be

reckoned with, taking on Beethoven’s enig-

matic, expressive late works and contextualiz-

ing them with pieces by forebears and follow-

ers. Here, in a six-concert series presented by

the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center,

the ensemble plays the composer’s sixteen

quartets in the order they were written, with

emphasis on continuity and evolution.—S.S.

(Feb. 7 at 7:30, Feb. 9 at 5, and Feb. 11 at 7:30.)

“The Mother of Us All”

Metropolitan Museum

The Met Museum’s American Wing preserves

the façade of Martin E. Thompson’s Branch

Bank of the United States, whose neoclassical

style echoes the stately entrance of the White

House. Against this backdrop, Juilliard and the

New York Philharmonic stage Virgil Thomson

and Gertrude Stein’s second operatic collabo-

ration, “The Mother of Us All,” a portrait of

the suffragette Susan B. Anthony painted in

splashes of musical Americana; Louisa Proske

directs, and Daniela Candillari conducts.

Throughout the week, the Philharmonic con-

tinues to celebrate the centennial of the Nine-

teenth Amendment, which granted women the

right to vote, with world premières by female

composers, including Nina C. Young (Feb. 5-11,

David Geffen Hall) and Paola Prestini, Joan

La Barbara, and Nicole Lizée (Feb. 10, Appel

Room).—O.Z. (Feb. 8, Feb. 11-12, and Feb. 14 at 7.)

John McCowen

Issue Project Room

The Brooklyn-based clarinettist John Mc-

Cowen views his instrument as an “acoustic

synthesizer,” focussing intently on the pris-

notion of duality from varying perspec-
tives. To open the concert, the vocalist
Charmaine Lee and the clarinettist Carol
McGonnell match extraordinary technique
with lightning-fast reflexes in structured
improvisation. Schoenberg’s thrice-famil-
iar “Verklärte Nacht” is contrasted with an
earlier germinal sketch, “Toter Winkel,”
and Erin Gee’s “Mouthpiece 29,” from 2016,
precedes the world première of a new elab-
oration, “Mouthpiece 29b.”—Steve Smith
(Feb. 5 at 7.)

“In C”

Le Poisson Rouge
The appeal of “In C,” the watershed 1964
minimalist work by Terry Riley, is not just
its ecstatic repetitions but also its radical
inclusiveness: the composition is open to
literally any musician able to navigate its
fifty-three brief melodic cells and willing
to bend to an ensemble’s collective will.
Here, the sixteenth annual presentation
of the piece by the nomadic curators of
“Darmstadt: Classics of the Avant-Garde”
brings together thirty prominent musicians
from New York’s contemporary-classical,
jazz, and experimental-music scenes.—S.S.
(Feb. 5 at 7:30.)