St. Louis classical calendar for the week of April 23, 2018

Erin Bode

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The Bach Society of St. Louis presents Bach and Jazz on Tuesday, April 24, at 6 pm. "One part Bach and one part jazz, shaken-not stirred. The ultimate composer's most familiar melodies presented in a unique jazz style! Featuring guitarist Steve Schenkel, pianist Kim Portnoy and vocalist Erin Bode. Presented by Centene Charitable Foundation as part of the 2018 St. Louis Bach Festival." The concert takes place at Jazz at the Bistro, 3536 Washington in Grand Center. For more information: bachsociety.org.

The Bach Society of St. Louis presents Bach's St. Matthew Passion on Saturday, April 28, at 2 pm. "Bach's St. Matthew Passion first moved audiences nearly three centuries ago in Liepzig, Germany. As the climax to our 2018 Bach Festival, experience the power and intimacy of this masterpiece through Bach's engaging account of the Gospel story. Guest soloists include: Steven Soph as the Evangelist, Stephen Morscheck as Jesus, soprano Mary Wilson, mezzo-soprano Kim Leeds, tenor Kyle Stegall and baritone Elijah Blaisdell. Presented in collaboration with Missouri Baptist University as part of the 2018 St. Louis Bach Festival, presented by Centene Charitable Foundation." The concert takes place at at the Pillsbury Chapel at Missouri Baptist University. For more information: bachsociety.org.

The Missouri Women's Chorus presents For All The Saints, "a concert featuring music by women saints, about women saints, and based on the texts of women saints," on Sunday, April 29, at 3 pm. The performance takes place at St. Gabriel the Archangel, 6303 Nottingham in St. Louis For more information: missouriwomenschorus.org.

Christian Tatzlaff

David Robertson conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra with violin soloist Christian Tetzlaff on Friday at 10:30 am and and Saturday at 8 pm, April 27 and 28. The program consists of the 2007 Violin Concerto by Jörg Widmann and Bruckner's Symphony No. 4, "Romantic." The concerts take place at Powell Symphony Hall, 718 North Grand in Grand Center. For more information: stlsymphony.org.

The Seldon Concert Hall presents the Perseid Quartet on Tuesday, April 24, at 7:30 pm. "Formed in 2013, the St. Louis based Perseid String Quartet has already generated acclaim for its polished, energetic performances and engagement with audiences. Members of the quartet serve as faculty members at colleges and community music schools, and their collective performing experience includes positions in regional orchestras and opera productions, historically informed performances on Baroque instruments, and playing in a rock band." The Sheldon is at 3648 Washington in Grand Center. For more information: thesheldon.org.

The Touhill Performing Arts Center presents the Equinox Chamber Players on Tuesday, April 24, at 7:30 pm. "Of all standard chamber music ensembles, the woodwind quintet gives composers the richest variety of tonal color with which to experiment. The Equinox Chamber Players will showcase this palette in works by Mary Jane Leach, Phillip Bimstein, Justinian Tamasuza, Frank Bridge and Zachary Cairns that explore the sonic and rhythmic worlds of the Kaibab Plateau, Uganda, St. Louis and the physicality of sound itself. The finale of the program will add the rich woodiness of the marimba to the ensemble in an exciting work by Zachary Cairns featuring Equinox friend Jeffrey Barudin." The Touhill Center is on the campus of the University of Missouri at St. Louis. For more information: touhill.org.

The Washington University Department of Music presents a Guitar Gala on Wednesday, April 25 at 8 pm. The concert takes place in Graham Chapel on the Washington University campus in University City. For more information, music.wustl.edu/events.

The Washington University Department of Music presents a Wind Ensemble Concert on Thursday, April 26, at 7:30 pm. The event takes place in the E. Desmond Lee Concert Hall at the 560 Music Center at 560 Trinity in University City. For more information, music.wustl.edu/events.

Cortango

The Washington University Department of Music presents Celebrate Five Years of Cortango on Friday, April 27, at 7:30 pm. "Please join us for a very special evening to celebrate five years of Cortango. This show will share the story of Cortango from the very beginning until now, featuring the great dance and concert music of Tango, and with bonus selections by Joplin, Gershwin - and Prince! Cortango is a Tango, Classical and Jazz fusion concert and dance band featuring members of the Saint Louis Symphony. Founded and led by Cally Banham, a trained social Tango dancer, the band is named for her instrument, the 'Cor anglais', or 'English horn' - the atypical instrument in this otherwise orquesta tipica! Cortango's songbook comes entirely from original arrangements made by members of the ensemble, and by Argentine bandoneon player and Tango arranger, Julian Hasse." The event takes place in the E. Desmond Lee Concert Hall at the 560 Music Center at 560 Trinity in University City. For more information, music.wustl.edu/events.

The Washington University Department of Music presents a concert by the Washington University Symphony Orchestra on Sunday, April 29, at 7 pm. The event includes music by Borodin and Glinka and takes place in the E. Desmond Lee Concert Hall at the 560 Music Center at 560 Trinity in University City. For more information, music.wustl.edu/events.

Symphony Preview: Concerto Italiano

This article originally appeared at 88.1 KDHX, where Chuck Lavazzi is the senior performing arts critic.

Probable portrait of Vivaldi, c. 1723

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This weekend (December 8--10) the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra is continues its mini Baroque festival with the emphasis on the music of one of the most prolific composers of the period, Antonio Vivaldi (1678--1741). Unlike last week, when it was all Vivaldi all the time, this time around Antonio has some company: his fellow Venetian Alessandro Marcello (1669-1747) and a younger German guy named J.S. Bach. You might have heard of him.

The concerts will open with music by Vivaldi, though: the overture to his opera L'Olimipade, first performed in 1734. The libretto by Pietro Metastasio, whose work would prove so popular with composers in the 18th century, involves a lot of sturm und drang at the ancient Greek Olympics. The opera is rarely (if ever) performed today, but you needn't worry about that to enjoy the spirited overture.

The Bach piece (which comes next) is actually a late addition to the program, which originally included concertos by Corelli and Torelli, with British harpsichordist, organist, and conductor Laurence Cummings at the podium. But Mr. Cummings cancelled at the end of October, to be replaced by Chicago-born harpsichordist Jory Vinikour. Then, just a week ago, the Corelli and Torelli works were replaced by Bach's Italian Concerto, to be played by Mr. Vinikour.

The thing about the Italian Concerto is that it's neither Italian nor a concerto. It is, instead, a work for a two-manual harpsichord (i.e. one with two keyboards) "after the Italian taste" (as Bach described it), in which the different manuals of the instrument are used to represent the solo and tutti (orchestral) sections of a full concerto.

Statue of J.S. Bach in Leipzig

Bach wasn't the first composer to come up with this idea and he would be far from the last, but he was apparently one of the most skilled. Even Bach's pupil Johann Scheibe, who could sometimes be critical of his former teacher, had to admit, in a 1739 review, that Bach's was a "pre-eminent" example of the form: "Who is there who will not admit at once that this clavier concerto is to be regarded as a perfect model of a well-designed solo concerto? It would take as great a master of music as Mr. Bach to provide us with such a piece, which deserves emulation by all our great composers and which will be imitated all in vain by foreigners."

Scheibe, as you might have gathered from that last sentence, was a bit of German snob when it came to music, regarding the more ornamental Italian style of composition as overly complex and complicated. This was, in fact, his chief beef with Bach: his style of composition was too Italian.

That means Mr. Scheibe would probably not have appreciated the piece that closes the first half of the concert, Marcello's D minor Oboe Concerto. Not only is it very Italian, but it also, as Benjamin Pesetsky points out in his program notes, shows a strong operatic influence. "The first movement, Andante e spiccato," he writes, "could be a mid-tempo aria, while the Adagio is lyrical and mournful. The vigorous finale, Presto, resembles the "rage" arias of Baroque operatic heroes." In the solo spot for the concerto will be SLSO Principal Oboe Jelena Dirks.

The concerts will conclude with Vivaldi's popular The Four Seasons, in an unusual arrangement for mandolin and orchestra by the noted Israeli mandolin virtuoso Avi Avital, who will also play the solo part. That may sound a bit odd but, given that (as Mr. Pesetsky points out) the mandolin and violin share the same range and tuning, not as odd as you might think.

In its original form The Four Seasons was composed around 1720 (as with many aspects of Vivaldi's life, dates are foggy) and originally published as part of a set of twelve concertos titled Il cimento dell'armonia e dell'inventione ("The Contest Between Harmony and Invention"). Each of the four three-movement concertos describes--often very vividly--aspects of a particular season. They were even accompanied by sonnets (anonymous, but probably by Vivaldi himself) that provide narratives for each concerto. You'll find English translations in this week's SLSO program notes.

Alessandro Marcello
Painter unknown

Combine that almost cinematic tone painting with Vivaldi's gift of melody and you have music that was destined to be popular. And it was, at least during Vivaldi's time. After his death, though, that all changed. Interest in his work faded, and copies of his music became scarce.

That began to change in 1926 when a boarding school in Piedmont discovered a huge cache of old manuscripts, including hundreds of works by Vivaldi. It aroused the interest of scholars and conductors, including Bernardino Molinari (1880-1952), who was then the conductor of the Accademia di Santa Cecilia.

He was also, as it happened, about to become a guest conductor at the St. Louis Symphony.

In January of 1928, Molinari brought the four newly rediscovered concertos that make up The Four Seasons to St. Louis for what would turn out to be their first American performances. He stretched the four concertos out over an entire month--"like the magazine serial stories," as the Post-Dispatch music critic, Thomas B. Sherman, wryly observed in his review of the first set of concerts. "Spring" was performed in a pair of concerts on Friday and Saturday, January 6 and 7. "Summer" was the following week, and the final two concertos were performed in concerts on January 27 and 28.

Mr. Sherman loved the SLSO performances, in any case, calling them "ingratiating, warm, and transparent" and describing the strings as "rich and unified." The Four Seasons would not appear as a unit on an SLSO program until 25 years later, when Vladimir Golschmann conducted them on February 20, 1953.

Interesting footnote: the Vivaldi was somewhat overshadowed in the January 27-29 concerts by the piano soloist. It was the "young Russian pianist" Vladimir Horowitz, who had arrived in the USA just two weeks before and had already created a sensation with the New York Philharmonic under Sir Thomas Beecham. Mr. Sherman loved Horowitz ("a powerful tone and a sparkling and expertly controlled technique") but hated the piece he played, Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3, calling it "as dull a thing as the noted Muscovite expatriate has ever done." History has rather overruled him that one.

The essentials: Jory Vinikour conducts The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra with soloists Avi Avital, mandolin, and Jelena Dirks, oboe, on Friday at 10:30 am, Saturday at 8 pm, and Sunday at 3 pm, December 8--10. The performances take place at Powell Hall in Grand Center.

Review: All Bach, all the time with Bernard Labadie and the St. Louis Symphony

This review originally appeared at 88.1 KDHX, where Chuck Lavazzi is the senior performing arts critic.

Bernard Labadie
Photo: François Rivard

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It was all Bach all the time this weekend at the St. Louis Symphony as Bernard Labadie returned to conduct all four of the composer's orchestral suites. Working without a score, Mr. Labadie gave us lively and nuanced interpretations of these works, and he got excellent playing from the orchestra.

Like many of the great composers of his time, Bach often worked for the government. Three of the four orchestral suites, in fact, were most likely written originally for the court of Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen (where Bach was the resident composer and music director from 1717 to 1723) and then revised for the Leipzig Collegium Musicum (a semi-professional ensemble that the composer directed from 1729 through 1741). The fourth (the Suite No. 3, BWV 1068) was written expressly for the Collegium.

All four are essentially dance suites, a form that was highly popular in Bach's day. Each of the suites begins with a short "French overture" (the name possibly refers to the fact that the form first appears in the operas of Jean Baptiste Lully) consisting of majestic opening followed by a fast fugal section. That's followed by collection of popular dances of the period -- Courante, Gavotte, Menuet and so on.

If some of the recordings of the Bach suites in my collection are any indication, it's easy to treat this music as weighty stuff. Even in his "light" music, after all, Bach couldn't stop being a genius at counterpoint. But Mr. Labadie's fleet-footed and engaging interpretations never allowed us to lose sight of this music's terpsichorean roots.

Each of the four suites had its share of delightful moments. In the Suite No. 1 in C major, for example, I was very taken with the wonderfully precise work from oboists Jelena Dirks and Michelle Duskey and bassoonist Andrew Cuneo in the "Overture" and "Bourée" of the first suite. I loved the whirling energy of the "Fourlane" movement as well.

Mark Sparks

Next was the Suite No. 3 in D major, which included an impressive solo by Concertmaster David Halen in the fast section of the "Overture" and solid work by Mike Walk and the other members of the trumpet section. The famous second movement "Air" got a loving, almost Romantic treatment from Mr. Labadie, which made for a nice contrast with the brisk "Overture" that preceded it.

After intermission, Principal Flute Mark Sparks took the spotlight for the Suite No. 2 in B minor. Scored for strings, harpsichord, and solo flute, the suite feels more like a concerto and offers plenty of opportunities for the soloist to strut his stuff -- which Mr. Sparks did with great authority. The intimate "B" section of the "Polonaise," with Mr. Sparks backed up only by the continuo (harpsichord and cello), was especially lovely, and the "Badinerie" finale, taken at a somewhat faster tempo than usual, was a real tour de force.

The evening came to a rousing conclusion with the Suite No. 4 in D major. With added oboes, trumpets, and tympani it is, as Paul Schiavo writes in his program notes, "the most lavishly scored of his four suites." Encountering it at the end of an evening of works scored for smaller ensembles (and immediately after the far more intimate second suite), it was easy to understand how it might have sounded to an eighteenth-century audience: big, bold, and festive. Mr. Labadie and the band gave it an appropriately energized and appealing treatment, with great playing all the way around.

Next at Powell Hall: Stéphane Denève conducts the orchestra along with piano soloist Steven Osborne in Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 1 and Richard Strauss's massive Alpine Symphony on Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m., March 10 and 11. The concert takes place at Powell Symphony Hall, 718 North Grand in Grand Center.

Symphony Preview: Celebrity soloists glitter at the Red Velvet Ball on Saturday, October 18

Lang Lang
stlsymphony.org

As I wrote in a previous post, it's a musical doubleheader at the St. Louis Symphony this weekend: the regular series concerts on Friday and Sunday with Leonard Slatkin, the orchestra, and violin soloists Celeste Golden Boyer and David Halen; and the annual "Red Velvet Ball" fundraiser concert on Saturday night with David Robertson conducting and international celebrity pianist Lang Lang in the solo spot. Here's a preview of the latter.

The Red Velvet Ball concert is only part of a formal fundraising event that includes premium seating, pre-concert cocktails, hors d’oeuvres, dinner and post-concert cocktails, dessert, and dancing. It's a dressy (and pricey) affair in which the orchestra and a fair percentage of the audience are decked out in their best formal attire. It always features a big name soloist, and superstar pianist Lang Lang is all that beyond a doubt.

Described as "the hottest artist on the classical music planet" by the New York Times, the 32-year-old Chinese pianist says he was inspired to learn the piano when he saw the classic Tom and Jerry cartoon "The Cat Concerto" at the age of two. By the age of five he was already appearing public recitals. He won the Xing Hai Cup Piano Competition in Beijing in 1994 and the International Tchaikovsky Competition for Young Pianists in Japan the following year. Since then his unique mix of technical proficiency, artistic taste, and charismatic performance style have made him an international, genre-crossing superstar—the "the J. Lo of the piano," in the words of the great keyboard virtuoso Earl Wild.

Tchaikovsky in 1906
en.wikipedia.org

Mr. Lang will be playing Tchaikovsky's "Piano Concerto No. 1," an enduring chestnut that always gets a warm response. The lively melodies (some appropriated from Ukrainian folk sources) and flashy piano part never fail to appeal. It has had plenty of exposure at Powell over the last few years, with splendid (and very different) performances by Kirill Gerstein (September 2013) and Yefim Bronfman (April 2011). What will Mr. Lang do with it? I don’t know, but based on his work to date it's likely to be compelling.

The concert will open with J.S. Bach's "Suite No. 2 in B-minor," BWV 1067, which features a prominent role for the flute. It was, like many of Bach's works, written for the government—specifically, for the court of Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen, where Bach was the resident composer and music director from 1717 to 1723.

The prince was fond of what symphony program annotator Paul Schiavo (in his notes for a performance of the Bach "Suite No. 1" in October 2012) described as "lively secular instrumental music", and Bach filled the bill nicely with an appealing site of six dances preceded by a short "French overture" (the name possibly refers to the fact that the form first appears in the operas of Jean Baptiste Lully) with its characteristic majestic opening followed by a main section.

Mark Sparks
stlsymphony.org

If some of the recordings of the Bach suites in my collection are any indication, it’s easy to treat this music as weighty stuff. Even in his "light" music, after all, Bach couldn’t stop being a genius at counterpoint. Still, I would expect Mr. Robertson to deliver a performance that remains true to the suite’s terpsichorean origins.

The solo flute role will be taken by SLSO Principal Flute Mark Sparks. It's not the first time he has been in the spotlight. As recently as last March he performed the Christopher Rouse "Flute Concerto" with the symphony and has appeared as a soloist with orchestras all over the world. Great as it is to have an international celebrity like Lang Lang playing with the orchestra, it's at least as gratifying to see a member of the orchestra take center stage.

The essentials: David Robertson conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and soloists Lang Lang, piano, and Mark Sparks, flute, in Bach's "Orchestra Suite No. 2" and Tchaikovsky's "Piano Concerto No. 1" Saturday, October 19, at 8:30 p.m. The concert is part of the annual Red Velvet Ball formal fundraising event and takes place at Powell Symphony Hall, 718 North Grand in Grand Center. For more information, visit the web site.

Passion on tap

The artistic directors of The Chamber Project

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When, just over a year ago, I published a post on this here blog about the innovative programming being done by The Chamber Project St. Louis, I never would have guessed that I might become part of that programming thirteen months later.

I guess it's a good thing it was a positive article!

Those of you who know me might be a bit surprised to learn that I'm appearing as a guest soloist in a classical chamber music concert. Yes, I played a number of instruments in my feckless youth, but none of them very well and none of them at all now. And while I'm a fixture (not of the plumbing variety) on the local cabaret scene, I do not have anything remotely like a classically trained voice.

I do, however, have plenty of experience as an actor, and it's in that capacity that I made my debut with The Chamber Project last night (September 11, 2014; the concert repeats on September 18) in Kenji Bunch's "Sonnet 128" for narrator, cello, and percussion. This haunting and charming little work (around seven minutes long) is part of a longer evening titled "Passion" which, according to the group's web site, explores "the passion makes the heart sing and that keeps us going through thick and thin."

The evening opens with the prelude to Bach's "Cello Suite No. 1," which segues straight in to the Bunch. It's a dramatically smart move, and the leap from the 17th century to the 21st ("Sonnet 128" premiered at Tanglewood in 2003) feels remarkably seamless to me.

A short break for a stage re-set and audience discussion is then followed by "And Legions Will Rise" for violin, clarinet, and marimba by St. Louis native Kevin Puts. The composer says the work "is about the power in all of us to transcend during times of tragedy and personal crisis. While I was writing it, I kept imagining one of those war scenes in blockbuster films, with masses of troops made ready before a great battle. I think we have forces like this inside of us, ready to do battle when we are at our lowest moments." The fact that it was written just a few months before the 9/11 attack is one of those "you can't make this stuff up" real-life coincidences.

The concert closes with Beethoven's "String Trio, op. 9 no. 1" In G major, a lively and engaging work from the point in the composer's life when he was just beginning to hit his musical maturity. His first symphony was still two years away when he wrote the three trios of his Op. 9, but you can hear the beginnings of the revolutionary changes he would bring to the forms of the 18th century structural and harmonic models in this music.

The essentials: The Chamber Project of St. Louis, with yours truly as special guest, repeats their "Passion" program at 7 p.m. on Thursday, September 18, at the Schlafly Tap Room, 2100 Locust. The performance is part of their "On Tap" concert series at local imbibing establishments where you can consume the libation of your choice along with the music—much as audiences often did back in Beethoven's day. For more information on this and other Chamber Project projects, check out their web site.

A Leipzig Christmas

The Symphony Chorus in full holiday mode

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It has been a heavy month or so for the St. Louis Symphony Chorus. On November 16th they performed Britten 's dramatic Peter Grimes at Powell, followed by a repeat performance at Carnegie Hall on November 22nd, Britten 's centenary. At the same time they were rehearsing the first three cantatas of Bach 's 1734-35 Christmas Oratorio for concerts this Friday and Saturday (December 6 and 7) with David Robertson and the orchestra.

That's quite a schedule. Interviewed in the symphony program, chorus director Amy Kaiser notes that the Britten and the Bach "are diametrically opposed to one another. Peter Grimes had 130 singers, singing all that passion and drama in full voice. Then to go to a group of 80 singers, where the precision of every 16th note is critical. We would rehearse Britten from 7 to 9, take five minutes for a drink of water, and then Bach. It is more than a mental and physical shift—you need to shift your entire idea of sound and language." This weekend's concerts, in other words, will give you a feel for just how versatile these singers really are.

Hearing only the first three of the six cantatas that make up the Christmas Oratorio doesn't mean you're getting an incomplete work, by the way. Although the cantatas do have key signature relationships that mark them as part of a larger whole, they were intended to be performed separately, as part of church services on the first through third days of Christmas (December 25-27, 1734) at the St. Thomas and St. Nicholas churches in Leipzig, where Bach was the Cantor at the Thomasschule. So each one stands alone as a dramatic entity. Indeed, the first three parts were written and performed an entire year earlier than the last three.

The first cantata deals with the birth of Christ, the second with the adoration of the shepherds, and the third with the circumcision and naming of Christ. The first and third are more dramatic while the second, as befits its subject matter, is more pastoral. For details on the cantatas, along with some solid musical analysis, I refer you to Paul Schiavo's excellent notes in the program.

Interestingly enough, the Christmas Oratorio cantatas almost weren't written at all—or at least, not at Leipzig. Bach was dissatisfied with the way his duties as a teacher detracted from his work as a composer, as well as with the way some of his compositions were received. The high drama of his St. Matthew Passion, in particular, was apparently met with bewilderment. By October of 1730, things had deteriorated to the point where Bach was seriously seeking another job. "Unfortunately," he wrote to his friend Georg Erdmann, "I have discovered that (1) this situation is not as good as it was represented to be, (2) various accidentia relative to my station have been withdrawn, (3) living is expensive, and (4) my masters are strange folk with very little care for music in them." He went on to complain of "constant annoyance, jealousy, and persecution" and asked Erdmann if he might know of opening in Danzig.

J. M. Gesner, our pal

Fortunately for Western music, most of these issues were cleared up with the appointment of a new rector (and therefore Bach's boss) at the Thomasschule, Johann Matthias Gesner. Gesner had met and befriended Bach when Gesner was the librarian and vice-principal at Weimar. He appreciated Bach's genius and supported his work as a composer in ways that his predecessor had not. As a result, we got not only the Christmas Oratorio but also—nearly 10 years later—the titanic B Minor Mass as well. We owe Mr. Gesner a lot, it seems.

When you see the concerts this weekend, note the way the strings are arranged. First violins will be on David Robertson's left, second violins on the right, and cellos and violas in the center. The double basses will be behind the cellos. That will enable some interesting antiphonal effects that would be less clear if the violins were all on one side, as is often the case with later music.

Baroque oboe d'amore

You'll also get to her the oboe d'amore in action. It's slightly larger and has a somewhat richer tone than the regular oboe, with a range in between that of the oboe and the even darker-sounding cor anglais (English horn), with which it shares a characteristic pear-shaped bell. The oboe d'amore was relatively new in Bach's time (it was invented in 1717 or thereabouts) and Bach used it often. In this weekend's concerts Cally Banham and Phil Ross will be playing the oboe d'amore, with Barbara Orland and Michelle Duskey doubling on regular oboe and English horn.

To recap: Parts 1 through 3 of the Bach Christmas Cantata will be performed by the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and Chorus under David Robertson this Friday and Saturday, December 6 and 7, at 8 PM at Powell Hall. The vocal soloists are Dominique Labelle, soprano; Kate Lindsey, mezzo-soprano; Nicholas Phan, tenor; and Stephen Powell, baritone. The Saturday concert will be broadcast on St. Louis Public Radio, 90.7 FM and HD 1, as well as via the station web site. For more information: stlsymphony.org.

Electric shocks

Who: Pianist Yefim Bronfman and The St. Louis Symphony conducted by John Storgårds
What: Music of Bach/Webern, Schumann, and Brahms
Where: Powell Symphony Hall
When: November 2 and 3, 2012

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Yefim Bronfman at Carnegie Hall
Photo by Jennifer Taylor for The New York Times

There are few things I love more than hearing a familiar work from the standard concert repertoire—one I’ve heard dozens of times in the past—performed in a way that makes it sound fresh and new. That, for me, is great music making. And that’s what I heard from John Storgårds and the St. Louis Symphony in their dramatic and electrifying reading of Schumann’s Symphony No. 4. From the majestic introduction to the fiery finale, this was a Schumann Fourth that just crackled with energy and theatricality.

The Chief Conductor of the Helsinki Philharmonic, Mr. Storgårds is a big man with an expansive but precise style at the podium. This does not, however, appear to be the self-conscious theatricality of (say) a Stokowski but rather the result of a passionate commitment to and intense concentration on this music itself.

This serves him well in both of the other works on this weekend’s program, the Brahms Piano Concerto No. 2 and Webern’s typically kaleidoscopic orchestration of the great six-part fugue (the Ricercata) from Bach’s Musical Offering.

There’s an interesting story behind that fugue. Bach wrote it on, essentially, a dare from Frederick the Great of Prussia. At a meeting in 1747, the king presented Bach with a long and highly chromatic theme (supposedly his own, although he may have lifted it from Handel) and challenged him to use it as the subject for a three-voice fugue. A skilled improviser, Bach did so on the spot, at which point the king, in what might have been an attempt to teach this wise guy a lesson, upped the ante to a six-voice fugue. Two months later Bach replied with his Musical Offering—two ricercars, ten canons, and (for good measure) a sonata all based on that theme. Game, set, and match.

The king’s reaction has been lost to posterity.

Anton Webern’s orchestration from nearly two centuries later raised the ante even further by making this mid-18th century piece sound entirely new. An advocate of Klangfarbenmelodie—the practice of breaking a melodic line up and distributing it to individual instruments a few notes at a time—Webern shattered and re-assigned the individual voices in ways that sound the way a kaleidoscope looks.

The result can be disorienting but makes for fascinating listening. The rapid shifts in instrumental color are nearly hallucinatory at times and must pose a stiff challenge to the players. There’s no place to hide here; every note must be perfect and every entrance precise. Friday night’s performance was stunning in its precision and a credit to all concerned.

Brahms’s Piano Concerto No. 2 poses substantial difficulties of its own, at least for the soloist. A pianist of no mean skill, Brahms wrote the piece for himself, and even he acknowledged its technical difficulty when he referred to it (somewhat jokingly) as “the long terror”. It’s not the sort of piece a pianist takes on lightly.

If you’re a regular listener to Public Radio International’s Symphonycast, you know that Yefim Bronfman unquestionably has the chops for this music. His performance with Sir Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic (still available as a podcast for a limited time at the Symphonycast web site is nothing if not impressive. His performance Friday night was no less spectacular. He handled the most demanding passages with ease, but the reading of the concerto overall felt less compelling than I had hoped. The excitement of the Schumann wasn’t there for me, although the Andante third movement was truly lovely.

I don’t want to make too much of that, though. This is, after all, a matter of taste and it might sound entirely different to you. The orchestral playing was, without a doubt, of its usual high caliber, with an especially beautiful cello and oboe duet from Daniel Lee and Peter Bowman in the third movement. And there’s no question that Mr. Bronfman fully deserved his standing ovation.

The next regular season concert combines Mozart’s Requiem with Schoenberg’s Freude auf Erden (Peace on Earth) and Haydn’s D major Cello concerto. Jun Märkl conducts with Daniel Lee as the soloist in the Haydn. Performances are Friday and Saturday at 8 and Sunday at 3, November 9th through 11th. For more information: stlsymphony.org.

Shall we dance?

Who: The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra conducted by David Robertson with Hubbard Street Dance Chicago
What: Music of Mozart, Corelli, Scarlatti, Bach, Anna Clyne, Stravinsky, and Martinů
Where: Powell Symphony Hall, St. Louis
When: February 17-19, 2012

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View a segment about Hubbard Street's performance from "Show Me St. Louis" on KSDK TV.

The symphony was super-sized this weekend, with a longer than usual program. The two and one-half hour concert had a decidedly Baroque/Classical/Neoclassical orientation, with music ranging chronologically from Baroque to contemporary and stylistically from Mozart to Martinů. Add in the dynamic dancing by Hubbard Street Dance Chicago and you had a pretty good bang for your entertainment buck.

I don’t know about you, but the first question that came to my mind when I learned that this weekend’s guest artists were a full ballet company was "where are they going to put everyone?" The answer is that you put the dancers on a temporary stage covering the front half of the regular stage and extending over the first row or two of seats. The orchestra is moved back and onto a platform a foot or two above the regular stage. The arrangement was ideal from our perch in the dress circle boxes and offered great sound and a clear view of the dancers.

Normally, of course, the conductor of a ballet orchestra would have the dancers above and in front of him instead of below and in back. The latter arrangement required David Robertson to frequently look over his shoulder, but both he and the musicians appeared to take it all in stride. Even with the new piece on the program—Within Her Arms by Chicago Symphony Orchestra composer in residence Anna Clyne—I saw no indication that the dancers and the orchestra weren’t always on the same page (literally or otherwise). Yet another reason why we love our St. Louis Symphony.

The program opened with an impeccably played Le nozze di Figaro overture by the orchestra alone, after which the Hubbard Street dancers, in simple deep mauve leotards, took to the stage for the first ballet, Nacho Duato’s Arcangelo. Originally created for Madrid’s Compañia Nacional de Danza in 2000, Arcangelo uses music from seven of the concerti grossi published in 1714 by one of the masters of the form, Arcangelo Corelli, along with a somber coda set to an aria (sung with great feeling by countertenor David Stephens) from Alessandro Scarlatti’s oratorio Il primo omicidio (based on the story of Cain and Abel). Mr. Duato’s choreography seamlessly blends modern and classically inspired movement—everything from a small flick of the wrist to athletic leaps—into a harmonious whole that handsomely complements the music. Until Friday morning’s concert, I didn’t know what Corelli’s music looked like. Now I do.

The first half closed with Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 as a kind of palate cleanser. It was another fine performance, with a tip of the powdered wig to Peter Henderson’s sparkling harpsichord and concertmaster David Halen’s brief but beautiful second movement cadenza (the printed score has no second movement as such, only a single measure of two chords, so in performance a violin or harpsichord cadenza is often inserted there).

The second half opened with twice (once), in which Hubbard Street’s Rehearsal Director Terrence Marling turns Anna Clyne’s Within Her Arms—written as an elegy for the death of the composer’s mother in 2008—into a kind of balletic memory play. The fluid movement of dancers in flowing white costumes mirrored the somewhat mysterious music, which at times seemed to harken back to Vaughn Williams or even Thomas Tallis. Soloist Jessica Tong appeared to embody the spirit of the departed in a work that ends, courageously, with no music at all.

The rest is silence, to quote the dying Hamlet.

Next, another break for the dancers as the orchestra gave us Stravinsky’s 1938 homage to Bach’s Third Brandenburg, the "Dumbarton Oaks" concerto. Even though the work is from Stravinsky’s neo-classical period and therefore emotionally restrained, the composer still can’t resist some jolly writing for the winds (especially the clarinet and bassoon) and the symphony players did a fine job with it.

Bringing the concert to a brilliant close was As few as 3000 by Hubbard Street Resident Choreographer Alejandro Cerrudo, set to Bohuslav Martinů’s 1947 Toccata e due canzoni. There was so much going on here in terms of both music and dance that it was, to some extent, a case of sensory overload. Martinů’s score, with its rhythmic drive, clever reinterpretation of Baroque styles, and prominent piano part (another nod is due to Mr. Henderson there), is so interesting all by itself that it often threatened to draw focus from the dancers’ spectacular performance of Mr. Cerrudo’s inventive and often whimsical choreography. There were elements there of classic athletics—especially running and swimming—as well movement reminiscent of aquatic and insect life. There was even a mock levitation, complete with a magician in top hat and cape. Remarkable stuff, really, but it might work better with more familiar music.

To say that this program is ambitious would be an understatement. The fact that it all came off so well is a tribute to both our orchestra and Chicago’s dancers, and I congratulate them all.

Next at Powell Hall: Jaap van Zweden is on the podium along with pianist Martin Helmchen for Johan Wagenaar’s Cyrano de Bergerac Overture, Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 25, and Brahms’s Symphony No. 4. Performances are Friday and Saturday at 8 PM and Sunday at 3 PM, February 24-26. For more information you may call 314-534-1700 or visit stlsymphony.org.