Isaac Stern Auditorium, Carnegie Hall. Balcony. (Seat H121, $44).
Nezet-Seguin and Trifonov after Gershwin's Concerto in F.
Program
Piano Concerto in F by George Gershwin (1898-1937).
Symphony No. 7 in C Major, Op. 60, "Leningrad" by Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975).
Artists: Alumni of the National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America
I have not had time to do a lot of research on NYO, and the description in the Playbill is quite sketchy. It has been in existence for a little over a decade, the ensemble goes through an intensive practice during the summer, and then does a Carnegie Hall performance and an international tour. For the current year the conductor will be Marin Alsop. Tonight's orchestra consisted of about 100 of the alumni. Many are now members of professional orchestras, some are associated with universities and conservatories, and several are free lance musicians.
Both the conductor and the solo pianists are of course superstars in the classical music world. This concert would be in high demand.
Yet I got an email a couple of weeks ago saying there were still seats available, and when I checked a few days prior to the concert, sections of the balcony were completely empty. By the time of the performance, the auditorium was pretty filled up, except for the upper balcony.
I didn't have a chance to look at the program carefully, and erroneously thought the piano concerto would be Ravel's F major. It was only after the starting few measures that I realized it wasn't Ravel. Gershwin of course sounded very different from Ravel, and his music has a definite American feel to it. Scattered among the three movements were passages requiring the highest level of virtuosity, which as usual Trifonov dispatched with ease. Most of the time it was easy to pick out the piano, but there were instances the piano was drowned out by the large orchestra. The three movements are Allegro; Adagio - Andante con moto; and Allegro agitato.
A substantial orchestra was deployed for the piano concerto, drowning out the piano at times.
For encore Trifonov played a piece based on the popular song "When I Fall in Love." [Note added 3/19. Carnegie Hall now lists the encores on their webpage, indeed it was YOUNG / HEYMAN "When I Fall in Love" (arr. Bill Evans).
I heard Shostakovich's Leningrad symphony before, in 2018, performed by the NY Phil, conducted by van Zweden. There I expressed the feeling (or tried to) that the description of the piece made it sound intriguing, but the actual music was much less so. Tonight I got a similar feeling. Many different interpretations of the piece were offered, mostly about whether Shostakovich was being sincere or cynical when he composed the music. The Annotator Jack Sullivan even allowed that the current interpretation is affected by today's culture. Which is well and good, but I have to ask how would a different culture - mainland Chinese, for instance - interpret it?
For me the more basic question is, what did Shostakovich have in mind when he wrote this? I find the following quote in the Program Notes, attributed to Shostakovich, puzzling: "I have nothing against calling the Seventh the 'Leningrad' Symphony, but it's not about Leningrad under siege, it's about the Leningrad Stalin destroyed and Hitler merely finished off." Did I get the chronology wrong? I thought Stalin was after the Nazi's.
Perhaps more encounters with this piece would make me appreciate it more. From tonight I got to appreciate how the "invasion theme" was built up at the beginning of the movement, and how the repeated snare drum pattern reminded me of Ravel's Bolero. The movements of the symphony are: Allegretto, Moderato (Poco allegretto), Adagio, and Allegro non troppo.
An even larger orchestra was used for the Shostakovich symphony. Notice the much larger brass section (orchestra's rear right). If one looks carefully, the concertmaster is switched. As far as I could tell, the one who led the Gershwin was now sitting in the back of the second violin section. Seating for other members were changed also. Nezet-Seguin's shoes had soles with sequins, making a strong reflection that at times looked like small light bulbs.
Nezet-Sequin gave his all when conducting this music, I could even hear his shout at some point. And from the balcony the orchestra movements looked quite interesting at times.
The Gershwin piece was about 30 minutes, the Leningrad 75, so with a late start and an encore the concert didn't end until 10:35 pm or so. The 11:18 pm train got me to South Amboy after midnight; Anne picked me up.
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