Avery Fisher
Hall at Lincoln Center, Orchestra (Seat S108, $64.50.)
Program
Iscariot (1989)
by Christopher Rouse (b. 1949).
Concerto for
Violin and Orchestra, Op. 14 (1939-40/1948) by Barber (1910-81).
Symphony No. 2
in E minor, Op. 27 (1906-08) by Rachmaninoff (1873-1943).
Due to various
unforeseen circumstances, including an unplanned, last-minute trip to Hong
Kong, it had been a while (relatively speaking, it’s not quite three weeks)
that we went to a concert. Having just
gotten back to NJ after essentially a two-week absence, my mind hadn’t quite
swung back to “routine” yet. Thus I
never got to read up on the program notes until I got the Playbill at about
7:30 pm. There was not a lot that I
could gleam from the notes that would help in my understanding of the music,
although the annotator did put the compositions somewhat in context, which at
least got my curiosity piqued.
Rouse is
finishing up his last (of three) years as composer-in-residence at New York
Philharmonic. While his music is
generally accessible on the first hearing, it is seldom – if ever –
exciting. That it began on a Mahler
Sixth-like quintuple-f certainly was unusual, and the loud beat made by the
bass drum (and hammer, per Playbill, although I couldn’t tell) certainly caught
everyone’s attention. It is not always
that I can correlate the music with the sketch in the Playbill, but for this
piece it was actually quite easy – from the Parsifal-like strings and the
clock-chiming harmonics. I do not know
much about some of the other musical references though, and these include “Es ist
genug” in a Lutheran chorale used by Bach, Madame Press Died Last Week at
Ninety by Feldman, and Unanswered Question by Ives. The most puzzling, however, are the references
to the terms “strophe” and “antistrophe.”
Now I know the terms refers to sections of an ancient Greek chorale ode,
but neither Anne nor I could figure out what the terms meant during the
concert. This recalls a similar
situation on Thursday: we went to MoMA to look at Matisse’s cutout exhibit, and
the term “maquette” was used all over the exhibition, and we had no idea what
it meant. At least we could google it in
real time and found out it meant a scale model.
I could make
some remarks about the music. While
pleasant and interesting enough (these are relative terms, of course,) I
couldn’t quite understand how the different strophes and antistrophes are
linked together to describe Judas Iscariot.
The images that the name evokes are most likely betrayal, death,
greed, and disappointment. Many of these
can be associated with the music, but taken as a whole I suspect Iscariot isn’t
the title that the ordinary listener will come up with. The music is by-and-large tonal, but there
are sections that the bowing in the strings is not the same for some members of
the sections. That is a technique used
by Karel Husa in some of his works, and Rouse studied under Husa for a while.
We had heard the
Barber violin concerto once before (at least,) and I remember the soloist as
Gil Shaham. The Playbill does say it was
last performed by Shaham in December, 2012; we were out of town during that
time. A search of this blog clears it
up: Shaham also played this in 2010. (Of
course that begs the question of why.) I
will go back and look at my entry later, but after four or five years I don’t
have much recollection of it; if I had to guess I would say it was not
particularly memorable. Barber provided
a commentary, quoted in the Playbill, that was very helpful in following the
performance.
Today’s
performance by Batiashvili (also artist-in-residence at the Philharmonic, as it
happens) was quite enjoyable. From what
I could tell, the first two movements (Allegro and Andante) are not particularly
challenging technically, but the last movement (Presto in moto perpetuo) calls
for such speed that you root for the soloist not to slip. Other than some minor intonation problems,
she didn’t have trouble at all. Per
Playbill she plays the 1739 “del Gesu” Guarnerius which has a rich and deep
sound on the G-string. I was impressed
with how well it sounded overall against a large orchestra (although described
as moderate-sized by Barber.)
[After having
finished the above I went back to my blog entry on the 2/27/2010 concert. My impression was quite different: among
other things, the Program Notes had more interesting things to say about the
“controversy” of the work, and that Shaham’s Stradivarius was sometimes
overwhelmed by the orchestra.]
The name
Rachmaninoff usually makes one think of romanticism, nice melodies, complex
harmony, and virtuosity. For some reason
the second symphony doesn’t quite elicit those comments from me. Not that it was boring, it was just not as
exciting as some of the composer’s other works.
This is a rather long symphony at 65 minutes, and the four movements are
(i) Largo – Allegro moderato; (ii) Allegro molto – Meno mosso – Tempo I; (iii)
Adagio; and (iv) Allegro vivace – Adagio – Tempo precedente. (That begs the question, what is the
difference between Tempo I and Tempo precedente?) Of course the Adagio movement is quite
popular. Anticipating it is like looking
forward to Nessun Dorma by sitting through the entire Turandot; the Adagio is
at least 15 minutes or so long.
The New YorkTimes reviewer is very positive on all aspects of the concert. While I didn’t find Zinman’s interpretation
particularly compelling, she used words such as exuberant, deft, and passion in
her description of his conducting.
During
intermission I notice an email from New York Philharmonic announcing the
resignation of Alan Gilbert after the 2016/17 season. That caught me by surprise. I looked up the on-line news items: most
repeat the same basic facts, with Gilbert saying if he doesn’t leave after the
16/17 season, then he will probably have to stay through 2021 to provide
continuity through the Avery Fisher Hall renovation. The only article that raised the possibility
of palace intrigue is the one in Washington Post; the writer has a rather low
view of Gilbert.
I have been
going to New York Philharmonic concerts for many years, these times have been
the most tumultuous. I do hope the
organization emerges stronger because of them.
It has been very
cold this season, so traffic was lighter than usual. Our ride into town was uneventful until we
got to the West Side. Many local streets had
at least one lane blocked because of snow, which made traffic very slow. We ended waiting at one of the “free after 7
pm” spots on Amsterdam. Our ride back
was quick.
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