Another Updated List

On October 23, 2008, I made a list of the opera performances Andrew and I had attended between February 2006 and October 2008. That list revealed that we had attended eleven opera performances during the period.

This particular list is very easy to update. We have attended only one opera performance since October 2008:

Peter Illich Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, performed by The Metropolitan Opera

I can take or leave opera. Indeed, I would be happy to go years without hearing another opera performance.

Lucky for me, Boston is not an opera town. The city has two small opera companies, neither highly-regarded, and Andrew and I are happy to skip their presentations. Our lone experience last year with one of the Boston companies was exasperating.

Next season, the two Boston companies will offer productions of Strauss’s “Ariadne Auf Naxos”, Bizet’s “Carmen”, Offenbach’s “The Grand Duchess Of Gerolstein”, Mozart’s “Idomeneo”, Rossini’s “Tancredi”, Britten’s “The Turn Of The Screw” and Zhou Long’s “The White Snake” (a world premiere).

As things stand now, I think Andrew and I plan to skip them all.

The only opera performance in our near-term future will be next month, when we will attend a performance of Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” at Theater An Der Wien in Vienna. “Don Giovanni” at Theater An Der Wien will be a new production, with an international cast, and I actually look forward to it.

Updating My Lists . . .

I am a maker of lists, and I have decided that the summer months present a good opportunity to update my lists.

On December 14, 2008, I listed the ballet performances Andrew and I had attended from February 2006 through mid-December 2008. The list was not a long one—we had attended only seven ballet performances during that period, a period that covered almost three years—but our pace of ballet attendance has increased significantly since we moved to Boston in August 2008. Indeed, three of the seven ballet performances that appear on my list from December 14, 2008, occurred after our temporary relocation to Boston.

Since December’s list, we have attended another six ballet performances, almost as many as we had attended the previous three years. In fact, we almost attended a seventh ballet performance in the last few months, but we had to skip Boston Ballet’s “The Sleeping Beauty” owing to my study schedule.

Boston has a fine ballet company, while Minneapolis does not. Consequently, Andrew and I have decided to continue to take advantage of our presence in Boston by attending as many Boston Ballet programs as we can.

Next school term, we plan to catch four programs by Boston Ballet: “Giselle”; “The Nutcracker”; “Coppelia”; and an all-Balanchine program.

It is possible that we may catch one or two New York City Ballet programs next term, too.

Below are the ballet performances Andrew and I have attended since my earlier list.

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New York City Ballet
New York State Theater
New York

Chiaroscuro (Francesco Geminiani/Lynne Taylor-Corbett)
Papillons (Robert Schumann/Peter Martins)
Concerto DSCH (Dmitri Shostakovich/Alexei Ratmansky)
Brahms-Schoenberg Quartet (Johannes Brahms-Arnold Schoenberg/George Balanchine)

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Miami City Ballet
City Center
New York

Square Dance (Antonio Vivaldi-Arcangelo Corelli/George Balanchine)
Rubies (Igor Stravinsky/George Balanchine)
Symphony In C (Georges Bizet/George Balanchine)

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New York City Ballet
New York State Theater
New York

Swan Lake (Peter Illich Tchaikovsky/George Balanchine)
The Steadfast Tin Soldier (Georges Bizet/George Balanchine)
“Romeo And Juliet” Balcony Scene (Sergei Prokofiev/Sean Lavery)
Slaughter On Tenth Avenue (Richard Rodgers/George Balanchine)

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Boston Ballet
Wang Theatre
Boston

Emeralds (Gabriel Faure/George Balanchine
Rubies (Igor Stravinsky/George Balanchine)
Diamonds (Peter Illich Tchaikovsky/George Balanchine)

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Boston Ballet
Wang Theatre
Boston

The Prodigal Son (Sergei Prokofiev/George Balanchine)
Spectre De La Rose (Carl Maria Von Weber/Mikhail Fokine)
Afternoon Of A Faun (Claude Debussy/Vaslav Nijinsky)

[By design, Andrew and I skipped the final work on the program, a new staging of “The Rite Of Spring”.]

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The Royal Ballet
Kennedy Center Opera House
Washington

Manon (Jules Massenet/Kenneth MacMillan)

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I’m not sure I even like ballet, but I certainly like some of George Balanchine’s work, and I certainly appreciate the level of artistry at New York City Ballet, a company that can dance rings around every other company I have seen.

A week ago, when I saw The Royal Ballet for the first time, I was dumbfounded how SLOW and HEAVY and IMPRECISE the dancing was. The Royal Ballet was the very antithesis of New York City Ballet, a pack of mules compared to thoroughbreds.

Happy Fourth!

Childe Hassam (1859-1935)
Allies Day, May 1917
1917
National Gallery Of Art, Washington

Oil On Canvas
36 1/2 Inches By 30 1/4 Inches

DAG-Haus

Hamburg’s DAG-Haus is the edifice of The German Workers Union (“Deutsche Angestellten Gewerkschaft”).

DAG-Haus is considered to be one of the great buildings of the world. It is one of the few buildings in Germany to use “Chicago School” architecture.


A powerful, dark, 13-story building with a brick façade, DAG-Haus was constructed between 1921 and 1930 (construction was halted in 1923 because of Germany’s post-war financial crisis and did not resume until 1929). The main portion of the building was completed in 1922, while the tower-like structure alongside the main building was not completed until 1930.

The most interesting detail of the building is the row of bronze athlete figures arising on the tower facade.


No doubt inspired by ancient Greece’s use of caryatids in architecture, the athlete figures attached to DAG-Haus bear a distinct resemblance to sculptures from ancient Greece. However, the figures on DAG-Haus serve a purely decorative function, while Greek caryatids served both structural and decorative functions (and were, of course, female, not male).

At the back of DAG-Haus is the so-called “elephant rider”, a statue of a youth riding an elephant.


Given that DAG-Haus is headquarters for The German Workers Union, such decorative features as statues of athletes and elephant riders make no sense—until one learns that DAG-Haus was originally constructed to serve as headquarters for a long-disbanded German conservationist society.

Levantehaus

Hamburg’s largest Counting House (”Kontorhaus”) situated outside the Counting House District (“Kontorhausviertel”) is Levantehaus.

More than two blocks long, the magnificent Levantehaus fronts Hamburg’s primary shopping street, Monckebergstrasse, the long promenade that connects Hamburg’s Rathaus with the city’s Central Train Station.

Built in 1912 and 1913, Levantehaus in its original form was a very ornate building, intended to evoke the aura of the city’s ancient Hanseatic tradition.

Levantehaus was seriously damaged during World War II. Its post-war reconstruction was in a substantially modified—and greatly simplified—form.

Yet another round of major modifications occurred in the late 1990’s, when Levanthaus was gutted and completely rehabbed. It is in its late-1990’s reincarnation that Levantehaus may be seen today.


The interior of Levantehaus now serves as both a luxury shopping mall and a luxury hotel.

The main entrance is marked by blazing flames erupting from brass bowls, highlighting a giant bronze centaur over the entrance doors.

Inside, the first two floors are occupied by luxury shops in an elegant shopping arcade, complete with grand stairwells, skylights and a cupola. Life-size sculptures are everywhere.


The upper floors house a 5-star hotel, one of the finest in the city.

We stayed at Levantehaus while we were in Hamburg. It was the finest hotel I have ever visited.

The level of comfort and service was extraordinary. The rooms were spacious, beautifully-designed and richly-appointed. Each floor had its own concierge. The main hotel restaurant, serving particularly fine continental and American cuisine, was exceptional. The hotel had a large swimming pool under a beautiful Romanesque roof, and we used the pool daily. Everything about the hotel was absolutely first-class in every possible way.

I would like to stay there again.

Broschek-Haus

In addition to Chilehaus, architect Fritz Hoger created for Hamburg a second great example of 1920’s Architectural Expressionism, Broschek-Haus.


Named for the publishing firm that commissioned the building, Broschek-Haus was completed in 1927.

Broschek-Haus is a pure contemporary of Chilehaus. Like its counterpart, Broschek-Haus is marked by intricate brickwork. Indeed, the brickwork of Broschek-Haus is far more detailed and complex than the brickwork of Chilehaus. The patterned brickwork is the building’s chief exterior adornment.


Into the intricate brickwork are embedded hundreds of triangles made from gold. The triangles are supposed to shimmer in sunlight, creating the illusion of a ship bobbing in water.

Broschek-Haus was never fully completed as the architect intended. Among missing decorative elements is a steeple for the layered roof.

The Broschek publishing firm was long ago acquired by Schott. The building now serves as a hotel.

Zippelhaus

At the edge of Hamburg’s Counting House District (“Kontorhausviertel”) is Zippelhaus, one of the last of the old-style Counting Houses (“Kontorhauser”) of Hamburg. Zippelhaus, seen on the right in the photograph above (with Saint-Katharinen-Kirche in the background), was built in 1890 and 1891.

Before the 20th Century, Hamburg’s Counting Houses were little more than modern variants of the old Merchant House, in widespread use since the 13th Century: a multi-story townhouse with shop/office space on the first floor or two, above which were several levels of living quarters.

Zippelhaus was one of the last of Hamburg’s old-style Counting Houses, modeled on the Merchant House and built to serve both commercial and residential purposes.

A few years after Zippelhaus was completed, the form and function of Counting Houses changed—they were to become the modern-day office building, pure and simple. After 1900, Counting Houses were built to serve purely commercial purposes, and were placed in purely commercial zones.

Zippelhaus is an unusual architectural mixture, borrowing features from the Renaissance and Baroque periods and refracting those features through the prism of the Hanseatic style.


As such, Zippelhaus reflects both architectural changes and social changes within The City Of Hamburg. Zippelhaus was one of the last buildings built in the Kontorhausviertel to use overt Renaissance and Baroque architectural elements, and one of the last buildings in the Kontorhausviertel to include residential living space. Only a few years after the completion of Zippelhaus, new zoning regulations prohibited construction of similar buildings in the Counting House District.

Zippelhaus survived World War II intact. Adjacent buildings were destroyed by bombs or fire—even nearby Saint-Katharinen-Kirche was leveled—but Zippelhaus suffered nothing more than smoke damage.

Zippelhaus now houses a first-class restaurant, also named Zippelhaus. It is one of the three or four finest restaurants in all of Germany. Its reputation is known all over Europe.

We did not eat at Zippelhaus.

We examined a menu posted near the front entrance of Zippelhaus, and we thought that the restaurant’s prices were too high.

There But For The Grace Of God . . .

Some persons were placed on earth in order to encourage everyone else to feel superior.

One such example—and a very prime one it is, indeed—is America’s most unappealing gay couple, Caleb Cross and James Van Dellen, hailing from Denver, Colorado.


Genuinely, one could not envision two more unattractive, unappealing creatures.

I’ve never seen such clear cases of “chromosomes gone awry” or “genetics gone haywire” in my life.

Are these the two most conspicuous examples of “white trash in its purest form” of all time?

These two goons look like they need to be walked through a car wash, although I am confident they would emerge from the carwash still unclean.

The gross, bulbous nose of the one on the right would, I believe, be most at home in a carnival sideshow. Indeed, it very well might be able to take on a life of its own unattached from the human body.

Whatever motivated these morons to post and circulate such embarrassing pictures of themselves? It is frightening to contemplate whatever must have been going through their witless minds.

One would think that their parents would be mortified over what they have wrought.

However, something tells me that the parents probably have tattoos, too.

The admonition of Justice Holmes lives on.

Afrika-Haus

One of the most interesting buildings in Hamburg’s Kontorhausviertel is Afrika-Haus.

Afrika-Haus was built in 1899 to a design by Martin Haller, architect of Hamburg’s Laeiszhalle and HAPAG-Lloyd headquarters. The building was commissioned by the Woermann Trading Company, a firm that made a fortune in African trade during Germany’s brief colonial period. Afrika-Haus is still used by the Woermann firm as its headquarters.

The street façade shows a marked Jugendstil influence, which I believe is rare in Haller’s work. At the very least, I do not recall any Jugendstil influences upon other Haller buildings in Hamburg.

The Woermann flag is depicted on the ceramic tiles on the building’s street façade.


The street entrance features a statue of an African warrior.


Through the street entrance, the visitor enters a large courtyard, at the other end of which lies the main entrance to the building proper. Two giant bronze elephants greet visitors at the entrance.


We went into Afrika-Haus and walked around, primarily because we had been told that interesting company mementos lined the stairwells.

We found this to be true.

Of most interest to us were historic photographs of the many company ships that Woermann used on its Hamburg-Africa route. Photographs of the ships lined the stairwells of Afrika-Haus from the first to the top floor.

We spent an hour examining the old photographs, and no one at Woermann seemed to mind our presence in the least.

Kontorhausviertel

The enormous Chilehaus, massive as it is, is not even the largest Counting House (“Kontorhaus”) within Hamburg’s Counting House Quarter (“Kontorhausviertel”).

That distinction belongs to Sprinkenhof, a truly monstrous building built in three stages between 1927 and 1943. Sprinkenhof, like Chilehaus, is the work of architect Fritz Hoger.

In the photograph below, Sprinkenhof is in the lower right-hand corner. It almost dwarfs nearby Chilehaus—indeed, it almost dwarfs the entire Counting House Quarter—and it is hard to walk around the Counting House Quarter without bumping into Sprinkenhof again and again.


I did not appreciate Sprinkenhof—it stuck me as a large, unattractive office building, nothing more—and no one else liked it, either. Andrew and his mother thought it was an eyesore.

We were surprised, therefore, when we learned that Sprinkenhof appears on UNESCO’s list of protected World Heritage Sites.

In fact, Hamburg’s entire Counting House Quarter has been deemed a World Heritage Site owing to its status as “the first dedicated office district on the continent of Europe”. Of the Quarter, UNESCO has this to say:

The special identity of this Kontorhaus District, which is among Germany's most impressive cityscapes of the 1920s, is due in part to the fact that the ground plans of the buildings coincide with the outlines of the blocks, to make full use of the available land - an approach chosen deliberately in view of the purely commercial purpose of the buildings. The proportions of the buildings are designed to make use of the maximum height, adding further height by means of stepped-back upper storeys. The formal language of the major buildings is a variant of the "New Construction" style of the 1920s, characterised by their proportions and the use of decorative sculptural elements, with a more restrained version of this style used in the 1930s. The combination of the building material used, that is dark-coloured, hard-fired brick (clinker), and use of the Kontorhaus construction style, results in an overall complex that is characteristic of Hamburg, and is not found anywhere else even in related form. The Kontorhaus District includes heritage buildings of the highest calibre within a small area.

Those are strong claims, and surely not everyone accepts them. I submit that most persons, including most architects, that walk around Hamburg’s Counting House Quarter would be quite surprised—perhaps even stunned—to learn that they were traversing an area now under historic preservation protection.

In the U.S., such buildings would have been replaced no later than the 1980’s, and no one would have given a second thought to their passing.

I wonder whether Eero Saarinen would agree that the Kontorhausviertel deserves protected status.