Concert Review: ‘Stravinsky & Ravel'

Susan Platts Dazzles In French And Russian

Sunny, spring weather brought more than the usual number of walk-in music lovers to Kleinhans Music Hall Friday morning (March 14, 2025) to hear Canadian Mezzo-Soprano Susan Platts perform Ravel and Stravinsky.

They heard a fascinating, 20th Century Modernist program filled with escapist fantasies inspired by stories from the Islamic Golden Age, the Renaissance, and Hans Christian Andersen.

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Trader Vic’s, a Polynesian themed restaurant and “Tiki Lounge,” first opened in 1960.

Ravel’s Shéhérazade

Canadian Mezzo-Soprano Susan Platts brought Ravel’s 1904 song cycle “Shéhérazade” to life. The three songs, “Asie,” “The Enchanted Flute,” and “L’indifférent,” are escapist fantasies with the charm of the unknown.

Exoticism has a long history in western culture, from Richard Burton’s 1888 translation of The Arabian Nights to the tiki bars of mid-century America (above).

Actress Anna Karina in the 1963 film, “Shéhérazade.”

Shéhérazade tells the story of a tyrannical monarch who married and executed a young woman every day for 1000 days before he was presented with Shéhérazade, whom Burton describes as follows:

Shéhérazade had perused the books, annals and legends of preceding Kings, and the stories, examples and instances of bygone men and things; indeed it was said that she had collected a thousand books of histories relating to antique races and departed rulers. She had perused the works of the poets and knew them by heart; she had studied philosophy and the sciences, arts and accomplishments; and she was pleasant and polite, wise and witty, well read and well bred.

Shéhérazade avoided execution on her wedding night by telling him a spellbinding story. One story on one night led to a thousand stories in a thousand nights until the king’s hard heart softened and he made her his queen.

Susan Platts with the JoAnn Falletta and the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra performing “Shéhérazade” at Kleinhans Music Hall March 14, 2025. Photo by the author.

In “Asie,” our heroine repeats “je voudrais voir” (“I would like to see”), imagining “Damascus and cities of Persia where light minarets pierce through the air,” “plump mandarins sitting under umbrellas, and princesses most lithe,” promising that “later then I’ll return home to share my adventure with curious young dreamers.”