Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Barbara Hannigan — Rossini, Mozart, Ligeti, Fauré

To be sure, there are pianists who also conduct, and concert masters who lead their orchestra from the violin desk. But a star soprano who coordinates a large instrumental ensemble while at the same time negotiating the trickiest coloratura singing is something entirely new. That is, until Barbara Hannigan came along to reveal this remarkable skill with such high-profile orchestras as the Berliner Philharmoniker and the Accademia di Santa Cecilia. “I was never afraid,” said the Canadian ‘artiste étoile’, “but now, with this weird conducting thing, I’m really on a path that’s my own. It’s like walking on virgin snow: there are no footsteps where I’m going.” For Ligeti’s Mysteries of the Macabre she performed onstage, decked out in an S&M-style leather bodice and temporarily unable to maintain eye contact with the orchestra. How exactly did that work? It’s all a matter of psychology…