Davies Symphony Hall, San Francisco. Tier 1 Premium (Seat D101, $84).
Program
La Tombeau de
Couperin (1919) by Ravel (1875-1937).
Violin Concerto No. 3 in G major, K. 216 (1775) by Mozart
(1756-1791).
Symphony No. 2 in D major, Op. 43 (1902) by Sibelius
(1865-1957).
Anne and I are on a one-week trip to Northern
California. We missed the opportunity to
attend an SFS concert when we were here in January, so I was happy to get
tickets for tonight’s concert, even though two of the three pieces on the
program didn’t particularly appeal to me.
We heard La Tombeau
de Couperin recently performed by the New Jersey Symphony. I was quite disappointed at that
performance. I have trouble appreciating
the music, and for that performance the way it was played didn’t help. I still have trouble understanding the music
after tonight, but at least the orchestra’s playing was clean and the lines –
such as they were – were brought out well by the various instruments.
The San Francisco Symphony brought out a very clean sound for Ravel's La Tombeau de Couperin.
One thing I learned was that last year was Couperin’s 350th
birthday anniversary (he was born in 1768), that may explain the popularity of
the French baroque composer. It is also
interesting that I have heard more music patterned after Couperin’s than music
actually composed by Couperin; the latter only once, in a pre-concert recital
at a Mostly Mozart event.
To me Tetzlaff is better known for using this modern
violin made by Grainer than his violin playing.
To be fair, the few times I heard him he was great. Tonight was no exception, the way he played
was technically flawless, the sound was pure, the spiccato passages just
bounced neatly off his strings, and the violin’s tone was exquisite, balancing
well with the orchestra (which was quite large).
Mozart’s violin concertos were composed when he was
around 20, and are considered by many to be “light-weight” compared to Mozart’s
later works. Indeed the five violin
concertos are usually learned by the violin student rather early in their career. In my case, the way I learned it is how the
concerto should sound to me, and Tetzlaff had some distinct interpretations
that I was not familiar with, including what notes he tended to emphasize, and
what notes to hold. Nothing wrong with
that, but these instances would end up interrupting my appreciation of the flow
of the music. [Note: we heard a recording
of this concerto by Perlman, it conformed to my preconceived notion, and it
sounded great.]
Tetzlaff acknowledging the audience's applause after performing Mozart's Third Violin Concerto.
I would have enjoyed Tetzlaff using his talents on a more
“thrilling” composition. After all, the
first time I heard him play was a Shostakovich violin concerto, a performance I
described as “jaw-dropping.”
The most memorable aspect of Sibelius’s Second Symphony
is this melody that takes its time in showing itself completely. It gets used again and again, together with a
couple of other themes in the finale, until – if the composition is played well
– everything turns dark and gray, and every listener gets depressed.
Today’s performance was good, but somehow the melody
happened on me more suddenly, without the aching anticipation I had heard other
times. And the large orchestra sometimes
had a bit of precision issues - MTT doesn’t conduct “on the beat,” but one
would think this group knows him well.
A large orchestra was used for Sibelius's Second Symphony.
I really enjoyed the acoustics in this hall. The sounds it produces are clear, but doesn’t
suffer from the “clinical sterility” I sometimes attribute to Carnegie Hall
(Stern auditorium). The orchestra was
large (I counted 14 first violins, 12 second violins, 10 violas, 8 cellos, and
6 basses) but still sounded crisp most of the time.
It seats a bit over 2700, about the same as David Geffen
Hall, but the more spacious seats translate to a larger auditorium.
One staircase is used to connect two levels. This staircase looks spacious when there are few people, but is jam packed at the end of the concert.
One can have a nice view of the area from the Hall. Here in the background is City Hall.
The shiny panels above the orchestra are acrylic reflectors that can be adjusted depending on the need. Also notice the large organ in the back.
As mentioned in a previous blog, the music world may
indeed be quite small. We heard the
Ravel piece last on March 2 on the East Coast.
Salonen will be replacing Thomas in 2020. And we found out today the SFS and the New
York Phil use the same annotator. Both
and I agree that the SFS Program Notes say more about the music than the NY
Phil Playbills.
The SFS-recommended garage was full, we were lucky to
find someone pulling out a block from that garage. It was in a rather safe area, and we saved a
few dollars.
It was a 45-minute drive back to our hotel in Livermore.
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