Supporting the Arts in Western Massachusetts and Beyond

February 27, 2020

REVIEW: The Bushnell, Jesus Christ Superstar

The Bushnell, Hartford, CT
through March 1, 2020
by Sharon Smith

50 years is a long time for a show to be around, especially one that, for many, is so closely tied to the era in which it originated (1970-71.) But unlike the similarly themed “Godspell”, the music of which leans heavily on the sound of flower power, Jesus Christ Superstar relies on the power of rock, and that foundation opens up many more opportunities for reinvention.

It is Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber’s interpretation of the Gospel accounts of the last days of Jesus, told primarily from Judas’ point of view. This actually makes for a title character who is somewhat detached from the proceedings, and not nearly as magnetic as one would expect. After all, the tale is told by a detractor.

Fortunately, James Delisco Beeks, as Judas, is a powerful and effective performer. From questioning follower to outright betrayer, his passion and confusion are powerfully expressed in such numbers as “Heaven on Their Minds” and “Damned For All Time/Blood Money" and “Superstar.” Jenna Rubah, as Mary (Magdalene), has only one solo, the top-ten song “I Don't Know How to Love Him” but her presence and emotional connection to Jesus is felt throughout. As it is a show that is sung-through, without spoken dialogue, she gives an emotional performance through movement and physicality.

Since the music is so familiar, having been presented in multiple forms over the years, from concept album to (most recently) live TV, this production wisely chooses to let it stand on its own and concentrates on updating and reinventing the packaging. The choreography by Drew Mconie, and executed by the impressively large ensemble, is energetic, physical and modern, in numbers like “What’s The Buzz” and “The Temple.” Inventive use of props gives the dances an extra visual flourish.

The staging, set in an abandoned cathedral, has rock concert influences, and combined with the spectacular lighting, reinforces that impression. The choice to have Jesus and Judas play instruments reinforces the musical theater/concert hybrid. Some choices work better than others: the costuming is fairly contemporary and, in the case of a few fashion and style choices, slightly jarring and a bit distracting.

For those not familiar with the show, or the New Testament of the Bible, the visually stimulating staging, fast pacing and lack of dialogue may leave one a bit confused as to who is who and what is happening. But the constant throughout the night is the revolutionary score of Webber and Rice. In that regard, the show really is like a concert because one can sit back and enjoy the music and the sights, with little regard for the story, and still be entertained.

PREVIEW: Mt. Holyoke College, The Big Broadcast

Chapin Auditorium
Mt. Holyoke College, South Hadley, MA
March 7, 2020

The Jazz Ensembles of Mount Holyoke College present the 15th edition of The Big Broadcast! on Saturday, March 7 at 2PM & 7:30PM. Snow date is Sunday, March 8. Created and directed by Mark Gionfriddo, who is also onstage as “Matt Morgan”, The Big Broadcast!  is a re-creation of a live 1940's radio show featuring the Mount Holyoke College Big Band, Vocal Jazz, and Chamber Jazz Ensembles performing well-known tunes from the swing era and the American songbook. WWLP-TV meteorologist Brian Lapis is emcee “Fred Kelley” for his 13th consecutive season. Mount Holyoke alum, bassist and singer Caitlin Jaene Mercer, will join The Big Broadcast! as special guest. 

Mount Holyoke College music faculty member Mark Gionfriddo originally created The Big Broadcast! for a small cabaret group he directed, and incorporated it into the concert season at Mount Holyoke College. This year’s program will include: Benny Goodman's "All The Cats Join In"; "It's Been A Long, Long Time" by June Christy and Stan Kenton; the Glenn Miller classic “A String of Pearls”; Peggy Lee’s “Black Coffee”, and a rare radio rendition of “On The Atchison, Topeka, and The Santa Fe” by the Andrews Sisters, which was never officially released.

Tickets (general admission): $25 premium front and center seating, $20 regular seating. Senior Discounts: $10 in advance and $15 at the door. Students: $10.

For phone orders, call 413-545-2511. Doors open one hour prior to each performance.

Chapin Auditorium is fully accessible.

REVIEW: South Windsor Cultural Arts, Alexi Kenney & Renana Gutman

Wood Memorial Library & Museum, South Windsor, CT
February 23, 2020
by Michael J. Moran

Alexi Kenney
The opening measures of Mozart’s rare two-movement Sonata, K. 304, told the capacity audience at South Windsor’s historic Wood Memorial Library that they were hearing a major talent in 26-year-old California-born violinist Alexi Kenney, eloquently supported by Israeli-American pianist Renana Gutman, his frequent recital partner since he first met her as a student ten years ago.

In helpfully engaging pre-concert remarks, Kenney had identified “lost love” as the unifying theme of this imaginative program’s five works. The recent death of his mother was palpable in Mozart’s somber opening “Allegro” and restrained “Tempo di minuetto.” The dark, rich tone of each musician’s instrument gave both movements tragic weight and solemn beauty.

The final movement, for violin and piano, “Praise to the Immortality of Jesus,” from Messiaen’s 1941 “Quartet for the End of Time,” written while he was a French prisoner of war in German captivity, next portrayed divine love for humanity, even to the point of death. Kenney and Gutman performed this ethereal music with luminous intensity.

Schubert’s Variations on “Trockne Blumen [Withered Flowers],” the eighteenth song in his cycle “Die Schone Mullerin [The Miller’s Daughter],” followed in an arrangement for violin and piano that Kenney had argued works as well as the original for flute and piano. The duo’s dramatic account of this virtuosic 22-minute showpiece, which traces a forsaken lover’s surrender in death to his beloved’s rejection, made it hard to disagree.

After Kenney’s post-intermission comments introducing the program’s second half, he joined Gutman in an evocative rendering of Stravinsky’s arrangement for violin and piano of a plaintive aria from his opera “The Nightingale” in which the bird restores his beloved master, a Chinese emperor, to life.

Enescu’s 25-minute third sonata, subtitled “in the popular Rumanian style,” depicts the composer’s love for his homeland as remembered forty years after his lost childhood. Kenney and Gutman played its three challenging movements with technical finesse, rhapsodic nostalgia, and deep sensitivity to its mystical rapture.

An encore performance of Clara Schumann’s first Romance, a tender birthday tribute to her composer-husband, Robert, shifted the concert’s focus from lost to found love and brought it to a ravishing close in the mellow Wood acoustics. SWCA, a nonprofit, volunteer-supported organization, has sponsored this free concert series for 39 years.

February 25, 2020

Review: Tales of Two Women: Lizzie and Jane

“Pride and Prejudice”
Playhouse on Park, West Hartford, CT
www.playhouseonpark.org
through March 8, 2020

“Jane Eyre”
Hartford Stage, Hartford, CT
www.hartfordstage.org
through March 14, 2020

By Shera Cohen

Lizzie Bennet and Jane Eyre are approximately the same age, intelligent and clever, and live in England, albeit a few decades apart, but that is really no matter in the productions of Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” at Playhouse on Park and Charlotte Bronte’s “Jane Eyre” at Hartford Stage, respectively.

Back-to-back performances in one weekend are a theatre-lover’s dream come true. The plays, obviously based on the famous novels of the same names, bring required high school English class assignments to life. Lizzie and Jane take steps off the page to the stage, seemingly with ease. If only Austen and Bronte could experience their works, having been adapted and molded by Kate Hamill (“Pride’) and Elizabeth Williamson (“Jane”) for today’s audience, they would be ecstatic. The authors of these two, now classic, 19th century books shunned the mores of their female peers; wanting more than a life of boredom, seeming content, and marrying up. In her own way, Lizzie and Jane demand respect.

Photo by Meredith Longo
The contrasts of the primary character, her setting, and those who surround each are distinctly opposite. Austen’s story of brightness and gaiety is oftentimes outright funny. The plot instantly reveals that Mrs. Bennet’s (well-acted by Maia Guest) sole mission in life is to find husbands for her four daughters, especially the single-minded Lizzie. While Mother Bennet sees no problem in marrying off Jane (the pretty one) and eventually Lydia (the young one), she has given up on Mary (the plain one, charmingly depicted by Jane Bradley). Lizzie becomes the challenge.

Except for two actors, the remaining six portray over a dozen characters with gender and age-switching fast and furiously behind the curtain, onstage, and in the aisle directly in front of the audience. Many times an actor dresses and speaks as one character on the right side of her body and the left side as the man. However, rest assured, there is never confusion as to who is who in this pseudo combination of any Shakespearian comedy and/or Moliere farce.

A special bravo to Matthew Krob as Miss Bingley (a zaftig gentile lady), Winkham (a slippery military officer), and Mr. Collins (a prissy preacher). Kimberly Chatterjee and Nicholas Ortiz, our flirtatious lovers bring Beatrice and Benedict of “Much Ado About Nothing” to mind, offering proof that the woman is of superior intellect and the male the well-meaning dullard.  Chatterjee and Ortiz create a nice match as they coquettishly play the game of teasing the other into an admission of their character’s love.

What makes “Pride” run like a well-wound clock are Kate Hamil’s adaptation and Jason O’Connell’s direction. The costumes, set design, English accents appropriately depict the early 1800’s. Ratcheting up the humor a few notches are the dance interludes between scenes; you know, those boring 30-seconds when sets are changed. Not at POP! The actors dance and audience stomp their feet to Bee Gees’ disco. “Pride and Prejudice” takes very little seriously.

Photo by T. Charles Erikson
For the most part, “Jane Eyre” lives in a dark, shadowy place with black silhouettes. The set is stark, and huge drawing room doors connote the many rooms and floors of the house. But darkness is even more than Jane Eyre would hope for. In few words, looks, and stances actress Helen Sadler, seated in a dark blue matronly dress at a small desk, narrates Jane’s story. It is a harder story to hear than for her to tell. Jane expects so little; anything can mean a lot. Yet Sadler slowly creates an intelligent and subdued wont in Jane’s demeanor and words, that she is due more than scraps of an existence.

“Jane Eyre” is a love story classic with a capitol “L”. Yet, trust is an equal partner for both lead characters. Chandler Williams begins his relationship with Jane as happenstance, then feigned gruffness, an awkward yearning, and eventually love. Williams is superb as the brooding, enigmatic Rochester. It doesn’t hurt that he is a Colin Firth look-alike and sound-alike.

The story is as much a mystery as it is a romance. Elizabeth Williamson directs her own adaptation of Bronte’s book in small bits and pieces strung together prudently with the sliding doors to create scenes.

“Pride and Prejudice” and “Jane Eyre” were written in the 19th century. These characters and stories are apropos today; women are recognized as stronger than even they thought they were. Standing up for oneself isn’t a concept; it is a conscious action.

REVIEW: Springfield Symphony Orchestra, Love on Broadway

Springfield Symphony, Symphony Hall, Springfield, MA
February 22, 2020
by Lisa Covi

The latest program, “Love on Broadway,” by the Springfield Symphony showcased four vocalists for an enjoyable evening of selections from the 1950s-2000s. It was nice to see that the orchestra section of Symphony Hall was crowded, but not quite full of appreciative music lovers. The setting was relaxed, with audience members eager for the return appearances of Emma Grimsley and Jane Rhodes performing with two “bari-tenors” new to the annual themed program: Stephen Mark Lukas and Nathaniel Hackman. Conductor Kevin Rhodes' usual enthusiasm included his personal touch since he is married to Jane Rhodes and first met Emma Grimsley as the infant daughter of opera singers performing in Switzerland.

The concert opened with the only purely instrumental piece of the evening, “Carousel Waltz” from Carousel. Unfortunately, the prominent percussion section was slightly out of time with the rest of the orchestra, especially considering the necessity for snare drum. In contrast, the orchestra blended well for most of the evening's 20 selections and sound levels allowed for the vocalists to prove their musical and dramatic flair.

Grimsley performed a variety of ingĂ©nue parts with a lyrical soprano voice. She delivered a soaring melodic interpretation of “I Could Have Danced All Night” backed by wind instruments that supplied an almost choral accompaniment. Jane Rhodes provided strong comedic renditions notably channeling Lucy to Kevin Rhodes' Schroeder from You're a Good Man Charlie Brown. This song was a late addition to the program but tied in neatly to this season's tribute to Beethoven's 250th birthday as the lyrics float on top of “Moonlight Sonata.”

Ms. Rhodes excels at the spoken passages of her musical numbers particularly the rhythmic bridal part of “Getting Married Today” from Company. Rhodes and Grimsley performed the favorite “A Boy Like That” from West Side Story which contrasted the strong distinct tones of each vocal line against Bernstein's lovely oboe lines. The men's duet “Agony” from Into the Woods was tuneful and humorous. Nathan Hackman demonstrated his rich chest voice with a resonant vibrato in “If Ever I would Leave You” from Camelot and “Lucky to Be Me” from On The Town. In his upper ranges, his voice was sometimes difficult to distinguish from the horn section. Hackman and Stephen Mark Lukas achieved an optimal blend on the unusual melody “Lily's Eyes” from Secret Garden. Lukas' comedic duet with Grimsley, “The Song that Goes Like This” from Spamalot, was the most entertaining performance of the evening and elicited laughs.

The sole detractor from a pleasant evening occurred in the audience. The pervasive odor of alcohol, the knocking over and stepping on plastic cups and a late-coming, early-leaving couple reeking of cannabis was reminiscent of the neglectful intemperance of an arena rock concert. However, the majority of the audience was friendly, personable and considerate of fellow audience members. The enthusiastic applause filled a quiet winter evening with love and happiness in Springfield's Courthouse Square.

February 18, 2020

REVIEW: Barrington Stage Company, The 9th Annual 10x10 New Play Festival

Barrington Stage Company, St. Germain Stage, Pittsfield, MA
through March 8, 2020
By Jarice Hanson

For the last nine years the annual theater extravaganza in the Berkshires has been kicked off by Barrington Stage Company’s “10 X 10 New Play Festival.” While these ten-minute plays are often fast-paced and favor comedy, this year’s festival may be one of Barrington’s best.

Cast of "Oy Vey Maria"
Photo by Emma Rothenberg-Ware
Since theater always shows us the funny side of the world in which we live, it’s not surprising that so many of the ten minute shows deal with the effects of living in a more technologized world. Gender issues and social change permeate a number of the plays, and the show concludes with an almost Borsht Belt treatment of the birth of Jesus. Situations veer from auditions for a five second play festival to Bob’s Discount Bungee Jump, to a serious and dramatically satisfying school Active Shooter drill.

The talented cast includes Doug Harris, Maya Loren Jackson, Peter Maclin, Keri Safran, Kenneth Tigar, and Peggy Pharr Wilson. Half of the plays are directed by Julianne Boyd, and the other half by Matthew Penn. The actors move sets on and off of the stage while lighting and music serve to signal transitions between plays, and while it was a little difficult to understand how the transitional music fit the tenor of the plays, the music keeps the mood light and the audience engaged.

The playwrights involved in this project have a wide range of backgrounds and theatrical experience; the number of awards they have collectively won boggles the mind. These are not first-time authors. Instead, they seem to be masters of the craft and the clever situations along with tight dialog. The writers know how to reach audiences with warmth and meaningful messages.

The “10 X 10 New Play Festival” also allows Barrington Stage Company to announce their summer seasons for both the St. Germain Stage, and the Boyd-Quinson Mainstage. This summer, expect to see two musicals (“South Pacific” and “Ain’t Misbehavin’”) on the mainstage along with two additional shows, and the St. Germain Stage will include five plays, one of which is a world-premiere co-conceived by Joshua Bergasse and Mark St. Germain, and a youth theater production of “The Supadupa Kid,” also a world-premiere. In short, look for a summer packed with song, dance, heavy drama, and lots of laughs at BSC.a

February 17, 2020

REVIEW: Hartford Symphony Orchestra, Romeo and Juliet

Hartford Symphony Orchestra, Hartford, CT
February 14-16, 2020
by Michael J. Moran

For the fifth Masterworks program of its 76th season, HSO assistant conductor Adam Boyles selected four works by three 20th-century composers and one 21st-century composer to observe Valentine’s Day weekend from diverse perspectives.

Like last month’s, this concert also opened with two HSO premieres. First came young Guyanese-British composer Hannah Kendall’s 10-minute 2017 tone poem “The Spark Catchers.” Inspired by Lemn Sissay’s 2012 poem of the same name, the title refers to how “matchgirls” in 19th-century London caught wayward sparks when making wooden matches.

The vivid score closely follows the poem’s text, printed in the program book, and Boyles and the orchestra captured its festive spirit with gusto (as the HSO continues innovating with technology, it was instructive to watch a frontal view of Boyles projected behind the Belding stage during this piece).

Scott McIntosh
Next up was French composer Henri Tomasi’s exuberant but rarely heard 1948 Trumpet Concerto. HSO principal trumpet Scott McIntosh made dexterous use of two mutes to shade his rich, clear tone from bright to smoky in the mercurial opening “Allegro & cadenza,” bluesy “Nocturne,” and rambunctious “Finale.” Conductor and ensemble offered lively accompaniment.   

McIntosh then took a looser, jazzier approach to Walter Gwardyak’s lush arrangement of “My Funny Valentine,” from the 1937 show “Babes in Arms,” by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart. His opening duet with principal bass Edward Rozie, Jr. was especially fun.

The program closed after intermission with a brilliant account of excerpts from Prokofiev’s 1935 ballet “Romeo and Juliet.” Unlike many other conductors who present this music, Boyles followed the sequence of movements in the full ballet rather than reshuffle their order for dramatic effect. His selection was also far more generous (a full hour) than usual.

This was easily the finest performance yet led by Boyles since he began his HSO tenure three years ago and one of the best ever by all the musicians, with whom he has clearly established a deep and warm rapport. They responded to his clear, dynamic leadership with playing of technical polish and profound emotion. Highlights among the 18 selections were: an ardent and sensuous “Balcony Scene;” a viscerally terrifying “Duel” (between Tybalt and Mercutio); and a meltingly compassionate “Juliet’s Death,” with its perfect closing notes of consolation and hope.

February 11, 2020

REVIEW: Springfield Symphony Orchestra, Mozart’s Concerto for Flute & Harp

Springfield Symphony Orchestra, Springfield, MA
February 8, 2020
by Michael J. Moran

In a pre-concert talk, SSO music director Kevin Rhodes said he’d been planning this “dream” program around Mozart’s flute and harp concerto, showcasing two instruments rarely given featured roles, since 1984. In the fifth concert of the SSO’s 76th season, two rising stars also performed three solo works among five pieces “with more variety and styles of music,” according to Rhodes, than the orchestra has ever offered in one concert.

First up was a true rarity by Beethoven, a 10-minute suite with the improbable title “Music for a Ballet on Horseback.” Commissioned for a 1791 production in his native Bonn, the eight brief numbers already show the 20-year-old composer moving in new directions, like the commanding horn fanfares of the “Hunting Song” and the tender “Romance” for pizzicato strings. The musicians performed it with affectionate flair.   

Emmanuel Ceysson
Next came a radiant account of Debussy’s lovely 1903 “Sacred and Profane Danses,” with guest harpist Emmanuel Ceysson adding delicacy and shimmer to the lush SSO strings. The French-born soloist had just travelled to Springfield from New York after playing that afternoon in the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, where he is principal harpist. This hectic schedule never ruffled his professional poise.  

Guest flutist Denis Bouriakov then joined Ceysson for a magical rendition of Mozart’s concerto. Now principal flutist of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Crimea-born soloist has worked with Ceysson in the Met Orchestra and as a duo. Their close rapport produced a lively opening Allegro, a hushed Andantino, and a rollicking final Rondeau-Allegro, enthusiastically seconded by conductor and ensemble.

Two rarely heard 20th-century masterpieces completed the program after intermission. Bouriakov was dramatic and incisive in Leonard Bernstein’s “Halil” for flute and orchestra, a rhapsodic tribute to a 19-year-old Israeli flutist killed in action during the 1973 Yom Kippur War (with whom two current SSO members had performed, Rhodes revealed). Ceysson was protean and riveting in Alberto Ginastera’s colorful, evocative 1964 harp concerto.

Standing ovations for the accomplished virtuosity and youthful energy of both 30-something soloists, an enchanting flute-harp encore of the “Dance of the Blessed Spirits” from Gluck’s opera “Orpheus and Eurydice,” and many post-show audience comments like “one of the best ever” confirmed that Rhodes had finally realized his 36-year-old dream.

February 9, 2020

REVIEW: TheaterWorks, The Lifespan of a Fact,

TheaterWorks, Hartford, CT
through March 8, 2019
by Jarice Hanson

Every once in a while what is seen on stage mimics real-life so closely that an audience member feels it necessary to either laugh, or curl up in a fetal position. In the very clever, “The Lifespan of a Fact,” now playing at TheaterWorks, the emphasis is on the laughter, but the honesty of the theme does elicit some cringes. However, in the hands of a talented production team and three excellent actors, this play definitely resonates with today’s preponderance of “alternative facts,” “misinformation,” and “true-ishness.”

The plot is based on a true story involving an author and the young intern assigned to fact-check a 15-page magazine essay. The play uses the names of the real duo who engaged in the controversy which took place over a seven-year period, though the play compresses the time to five days. The writer, John D’Agata, played by Rufus Collins, and the intern, Jim Fingal, played by Nick LaMedica, are the odd couple who contrast in both appearance and belief. Though the script was adapted from the co-authored book by the real D’Agata and Fingal by Jeremy Kareken, David Murrell, and Gordon Farrell, a third actor to play the fictional magazine editor, Emily Penrose, was added to heighten the contrasts among belief, journalism, honesty, and fictional interpretation of the “facts.” In this role, Tasha Lawrence has the difficult but very effective role of representing both the harried editor and the audience, all of whom are necessary to interpret the events as they fold into each other and the stakes are raised.

The pace of the 75-minute story continually builds to a suspenseful conclusion in part to Tracy Brigden’s wonderful direction as well as the skill of these actors who are fully committed to the difficult dialog and passion of the characters. Obadiah Eaves’ sound design incorporates split -second timing of cell phone and computer sounds to seemingly regulate the heart-beat of the piece reflecting the passage of time.

This show captures contemporary reality and reminds us that whether something is fact or fiction—there can be many ways to tell a story to make an impact. Each decision has weight and the ultimate interpretation, no matter how controlled, is less than certain. The humor in this play is sincere and honest, but the meaning is heavy and it packs a wallop. Kudos to this cast and production team for brilliantly interpreting a show of depth, in a way that reminds the audience every person plays a part in understanding the “facts.”

February 2, 2020

REVIEW: Hartford Symphony Orchestra, Joshua Bell & Alessio Bax

Hartford Symphony Orchestra, Hartford, CT
www.hartfordsymphony.org
January 31, 2020
by Michael J. Moran

Bell & Bax
Only a handful of classical superstars can attract arena-size audiences, and violinist Joshua Bell is one of them. This may explain why he appeared with rising Italian-American pianist Alessio Bax in the Bushnell’s Broadway-size Mortensen Hall, rather than in its smaller Belding Theater. But this larger-than-life duo made the bigger hall’s acoustics sound surprisingly intimate.

Their concert opened with a dazzling account of Schubert’s lively 1826 Rondo Brillante in B minor. Bell shaded his tone from silken in the quiet Andante introduction to almost rough-hewn in the following dancelike Allegro. Bax echoed Bell’s every tonal shift, right through the 15-minute piece’s closing mad dash.

Next came a mercurial performance of Cesar Franck’s 1888 Sonata in A Major. The duo captured the varying moods of this 28-minute masterpiece’s four movements with unerring accuracy, from a radiant opening Allegretto, a turbulent Allegro, a lyrical Recitativo-Fantasia, to a jubilant closing Allegretto.

Intermission was followed by a bracing rendition of Bach’s 1723 fourth violin sonata. Here Bell produced a lighter tone appropriate to the Baroque period of the work’s origin. An affecting Siciliano preceded a brisk Allegro, a lush Adagio, and an intricately fugal closing Allegro, voiced with passion and precision by both players. 

The final work was Ernest Bloch’s 1923 suite “Baal Shem,” subtitled “Three Pictures of Hassidic Life.” In spoken introductory comments, Bell translated the titles of its three movements as “Contrition” (Vidui), “Improvisation” (Nigun), and “Celebration” (Simchas Torah). The duo played this rhapsodic work with drama and finesse, Bell bringing opulent intensity to the sinuous Nigun. 

A standing ovation from the enthusiastic audience brought the musicians back on stage for two encores. Exuding the same boyish and self-effacing charm as when he launched his career as a teenager over 30 years ago, Bell introduced them by identifying legendary Belgian violinist-composer Eugene Ysaye (for whom Franck wrote his sonata and who taught Bell’s teacher Josef Gingold) as the inspiration for this program. 

The duo brought youthful brio to Wieniawski’s showpiece “Scherzo-Tarantella” (also written for Ysaye) and touching tenderness to Bell’s own arrangement of Chopin’s lovely E-flat-Major Nocturne, Opus 9.