Princeton Symphony Orchestra. Rossen Milanov, conductor; Shai Wosner, piano. November 4, 2021.

Matthews Theatre, McCarter Theatre Centre, Princeton, NJ.  (Balcony A, CC109, $83)

 

Program

The Dream Deferred by Williams.

Piano Concerto No. 15 in B-flat Major by Mozart.

Symphony No. 4 in C Minor, D 417 by Schubert.

The most significant aspect of tonight’s event is that it’s our first in-person concert since we last saw an opera on March 9, 2020.  I attended it with mixed feelings.  After a lockdown – at different levels, some of which self-imposed – of over 18 months, I was surprised that my urge to attend live concerts (and travel, for that matter) has greatly subsided.  Looking over events and deciding on the ones to attend, the actual act of buying a ticket or a series, the logistics of getting to the venue are things I did with great enthusiasm; now I wonder if these chores are worth the effort.  This time the plus side was we got to have dinner with our friends Vivien and David, who alerted us to their attendance.  The somewhat snobbish in me also questioned if a PSO concert is worth the money it charges for their events – I can get a good seat at NJPAC or David Geffen Hall.  One has to dip one’s toe into the water …

The Princeton Symphony is a small ensemble; tonight there were fewer than 40 players, and I venture to guess they don’t have four horns in their regular roster.  In the relative confines of the Matthews Theatre, it sounds fine, with a few notable exceptions.

Evan Williams (b. 1988) is now composer-in-residence at the Detroit Symphony.  Loosely quoting the Program Notes, the piece was commissioned by “the activist orchestra” The Dream Unfinished for their 2017 season “Raise Your Hand.”  Milanov talked about how the piece describes “the school-to-prison” pipeline as an example of a dream deferred, and how the music devolves from hope to despair.  So those words set my expectation.  The music is not complicated, although (per David) the string players sometimes would bow in different directions.  I was trying to listen for this “hope to despair” procession and frankly didn’t hear it; there was little hope at the beginning.

Since my teen years I was told the basics of listening to Mozart are the dotted notes, the crispness, and lightness.  Other than the occasional splashes of inspiration, tonight’s performance missed on all three attributes.  I don’t recall having encountered this concerto in live performance before, so consider this a missed opportunity.

Wosner taking a bow after the Mozart concerto.  Notice the rather empty balcony section, the main auditorium had more people though.

Dinner at Dinky's before the concert.

Schubert wrote his fourth symphony, referred to as “The Tragic," when he was nineteen, but (per Wikipedia) the piece wasn’t performed until 1849, years after his death.  A characteristic of Schubert’s music is the ease with which he modulated.  For him to move from one key to an entirely unrelated key seemed effortless, either with brute force, or with a few intermediate chords.  I didn’t get that with this piece, again an unfamiliar one.  Whether it’s the orchestra or the music, I don’t know.  The third movement, titled Minuet and Trio, could well have been called Scherzo (and Trio?).  The orchestra didn’t take all the repeats, which was a wise choice given how it was performed.  The solo flute had quite a few lines, the clarify didn’t come through at all.  And that was against a small ensemble.

From a critic’s point of view, this had to be an unsatisfactory concert.  However, I found the evening a delight.  Dinner with old friends was certainly good, and being able to sit inside an auditorium turned out to more enjoyable than I thought.

 

In the middle of writing this blog entry, I bought tickets for tonight’s (Friday Nov 5) NJSO concert with Trifonov as the pianist.