Bravo! Vail Episode 4: These moments

[Being the fourth and last in a series of dispatches from the 2023 Bravo! Vail Music Festival, attended by yours truly as part of a delegation from the Music Critics Association of North America (MCANA)]

For the MCANA collective the final day at Bravo! Vail (Friday July 14th) began at 12:30 pm with a session with composer Anna Clyne, whose “This Moment” had its world premiere that night by the Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin. Unofficial activities started much earlier as the early risers in our group (i.e., not me) decided to take the scenic gondola ride to the top of Vail Mountain. At a little over 10,000 ft. (a good 2K above Vail) both the air and the views are rarefied and well worth the ticket price, as I would discover later in the day. One of our number actually walked up (there are multiple hiking trails for the more adventurous), but then he’s considerably younger than the rest of us.

Anna Clyne and Anne-Marie McDermott
Photo courtesy Bravo! Vail

In any case, we were all present and accounted for as we met with our official Vail PR contact (the priceless Managing Director of 8VA Music Consultancy Patricia Price, about whom I simply cannot say enough good things) for a brief but informative chat with Clyne.

Allow me to digress for a moment and state that I have been an admirer of Clyne’s music since 2012, when I first heard her “Within Her Arms” performed by David Robertson and the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra with choreography by the Hubbard Street Dance Theatre of Chicago. At the time I described it as “somewhat mysterious music, which at times seemed to harken back to Vaughn Williams or even Thomas Tallis.”

It was only later, as the SLSO began to perform Clyne’s music more frequently under current Music Director Stéphane Denève, that I realized what I was actually hearing was what Clyne described in our session as “layering,” a technique that involves combining instruments with contrasting timbres to achieve new and unusual sounds. “You might have an oboe playing a melody, but I’ll double that with both vibraphone and low clarinet,” she offered as an example. She’s in good company: Ravel (among others) was known to do the same thing (several times in “Bolero,” to pick an obvious example), although mostly as a “special effect” rather than a core compositional approach.

She put that to good use in “This Moment,” which was composed with its status as a “curtain raiser” for the evening’s performance of Mozart’s Requiem in mind. The title was inspired by a quote from the late Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh, who died last year at the age of 95: “This moment is full of wonder” (a sentiment which takes on more meaning the older I become). There are also quotes from the “Requiem: one from the “Kyrie eleison” and one from the “Lacrimosa.”

View from Vail Mountain
Photo by Chuck Lavazzi

That last one is especially poignant, since it was while dictating this movement to his pupil Franz Xaver Süssmayr that Mozart breathed his last. “And his life ended,” writes Jane Glover in “Mozart’s Women,” on an unresolved dominant chord.” Or, as Clyne said (paraphrasing Thich Nhat Hanh), “Yesterday’s tears are tomorrow’s rain”.

The conversation then went on to other topics such as working with Nézet-Séguin (“He really understands the spirit of my music”), the ways in which earlier generations of women composers and conductors have paved the way for Clyne and others (she cited Marin Alsop as a mentor; both have a strong Chicago connection), and upcoming projects with The Augmented Orchestra and the New York-based boundary-smashing ensemble The Knights.

Her final takeaway for those attending the evening’s concert? Approach new music with an open mind.

Which I did, but first it was time to play a bit of hooky and spend the rest of the afternoon hiking on Vail Mountain with my more outdoorsy wife, Sherry. She had gone up in the gondola the day before, spent a couple of hours climbing about, and came back enthusing about the gondola ride. Since this was our last day in town, I decided it was time to do something touristy, so up we went. At the top we grabbed a couple of hiking sticks courtesy of the Gondola One folks and spent the next hour or so accumulating “zone minutes” on our Fitbits.

I wore the wrong shoes, the wrong clothes, and brought a tote bag for our water bottles instead of the travel backpack I had packed specifically for excursions like this one, but it was worth it for the view.

L-R: Rosa Feloa, Jennifer Johnson Cano,
Issachah Savage, Kyle Ketelsen
Photo courtesy Bravo! Vail

A change of wardrobe, a light dinner, and it was off to the Ford Amphitheatre for our final concert: Clyne’s “This Moment” and Mozart’s Requiem  K. 626. True to her description of the work earlier that day, “This Moment” was the ideal opener for the Mozart. The quotes from the Requiem, while unmistakable, were also clearly delivered in Clyne’s own unique language. There was lamentation and conflict in the music but also, in the final analysis, a comforting sense of peace. “This Moment” is, indeed, “full of wonders.”

Then it was time for the Requiem itself.  It’s usually heard in Süssmayr’s completion—a choice which has not been without its critics over the years, including me. At least two other completions were done in the early 19th century and several musicologists have produced their own over the last four or five decades.

Nézet-Séguin opted for a 1971 edition by German violinist and musicologist Franz Beyer (1922–2018). Beyer used Süssmayr as a point of departure but cleaned up some of what Julliard’s Robert Levin called Süssmayr’s “infelicities” in the orchestration. “Franz Beyer took the Requiem to the dry cleaners and took the spots out,” said Levin. “He made it more transparent and simplified it.”

It had been a little over a year since I had seen a performance of the Mozart Requiem and that was in the more resonant environment of Powell Hall in St. Louis. The covered portion of the Ford has a markedly dryer sound, which makes instrumental details that much easier to hear, but it seemed to me that Beyer did, indeed, clarify the sound and, in his words, “color it with the hues of Mozart’s own palette.” The trombone solo in “Tuba mirum,” for example, was as clear as I have ever heard it.

How much of that was the work of Beyer vs. Nézet-Séguin, the Philadelphians, and the Colorado Symphony Orchestra Chorus, I can’t say, but this performance of the Requiem was certainly a stunner as far as I was concerned. It was dramatic, emotionally powerful, and just all-around compelling.

Choral director Duain Wolfe, Yannick
Nézet-Séguin, Philadelphia Orhcestra
and Colorado Symphony Orchestra Chorus 
Photo courtesy Bravo! Vail

For an amateur chorus, the CSO singers acquitted themselves extraordinarily well, even if they were (as a fellow critic pointed out) a bit shy in the tenor department. It helped that they were placed at the back of the orchestra on unusually high risers (the feet of the singers in the back row were literally above the heads of the those in the first) which enabled them to project with force and clarity. Vocal lines were impressively clear, even in fugal sections like the “Kyrie.”

The solo quartet consisted of soprano Rosa Feloa, mezzo Jennifer Johnson Cano (who sang the Requiem in St. Louis last year), tenor Issachah Savage, and bass-baritone Kyle Ketelsen. They were placed on risers downstage right, just behind the violins, which provided useful sonic separation from both the chorus and the orchestra. All four singers were impressive vocally, with Cano and Ketelsen showing the most dramatic engagement with the text.

The band, of course, played with the consummate skill that I had come to expect from them over the last few days. For his part, Nézet-Séguin’s substantial operatic experience was apparent in his ability to draw out the human drama in Mozart’s music without compromising the religious sincerity behind it.

And so the musical side of our visit to Vail came to an end. Most of our group retired to the patio at La Cucina, one of the two restaurants at our hotel (the exceptionally comfortable Lodge at Vail), for snacks, drinks, post-concert discussions, and friendly farewells. Some of us knew each other from previous MCANA events while some of us were meeting for the first time. We all got to know each other better during the week and were all better for having done so.     

“The soil of our mind,” wrote Thich Nhat Hanh,  “contains many seeds, positive and negative. We are the gardeners who identify, water, and cultivate the best seeds.” Four days of Bravo! Vail left us with a packet of Music and Friendship seeds. They’re always the best.

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

Symphony Review: John Storgårds's Beethoven Fourth warms up a chilly program

It was pleasantly warm inside Powell Hall Saturday night as John Storgårds led the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and violinist Leila Josefowicz in a program of works by Sibelius, Helen Grime, and Beethoven. For the first half of the evening, though, the musical climate was as chilly as the real one outside.

[Find out more about the music with my symphony preview.]

For me, the music of Jean Sibelius has always conjured up images of pines, snow, and brisk northern winds. His 1908 tone poem “Night Ride and Sunrise” certainly evokes a wintry nocturnal journey on horseback, as a repeated “galloping” motif eventually gives way to blazing themes in the brasses and strings that suggest the rising sun.

Storgårds, whose experience with the music of his fellow Finn is extensive, infused his interpretation with a strong sense of urgency and high drama. The rapid tempo of the opening set the stage admirably and built inexorably to those big chords at the end. It was a thrilling performance, enhanced by excellent playing all the way around, although Principal Horn Roger Kaza and the seven (!) other members of his section deserve a special nod.

The emotional temperature of Grime’s 2016 Violin Concerto, which had its American debut at last weekend’s concerts, is also rather chilly. Essentially a 22-minute assemblage of minimal variations on a brief melodic fragment, the concerto reminded me of Dorothy Parker’s famous quip tabout a Katherine Hepburn performance running "the gamut of emotions, from A to B.” The concerto is a work with a narrow emotive range that rarely goes beyond a kind of aggressive anguish. Even at its current length, it feels too long.

Leila Josefowicz
Photo: Chris Lee

It's also an absurdly difficult work. It was written in collaboration with and first played by the phenomenal Swedish violinist Malin Broman and was designed to showcase what Grime calls the “ferocity, power, and passion” of her playing. That being the case, I’d say Leila Josefowicz was the perfect match for this concerto since ferocity, power, and passion perfectly describe her fiercely committed performance.

Josefowicz attacked the music with an athletic intensity that sometimes made it feel like she was doing battle with it. Which seems only fair, given the hair-raising difficulty of the solo part. She tore into the rapid runs, widely spaced double stops, and other technical hurdles with the authority of the virtuoso she clearly is and got an enthusiastic ovation from the audience in return.

The concert closed on a far warmer note with Beethoven’s Symphony No. 4 in B-flat, Op. 60. Written during a stay at the lavish Silesian country estate of one of Beethoven’s major patrons, Prince Lichnowsky, during one of the composer’s rare spells of good health, the Fourth radiates good humor. And good humor is what it got from Storgårds and the band, along with a bracing sense of momentum. Even the lyrical Adagio second movement flowed along with a strong rhythmic pulse, and the final movement was downright celebratory.

The Fourth has more than its share of neat little solo moments for many of the first chair players, including Principal Flute Matthew Roitstein, Associate Principal Oboe Phil Ross, Principal Clarinet Scott Andrews, Associate Principal Horn Thomas Jöstlein, and Principal Bassoon Andrew Cuneo. Beethoven gives the bassoon some especially nice moments in this symphony, including a little musical joke in form of a quiet descending motif when you least expect it at the very end. Those moments were in good hands with Cuneo and fellow bassoonist Julia Paine.

Storgårds is, as I have noted in his previous appearances here, a magisterial presence on the podium whose readings display a compelling degree of energy and emotional commitment. Saturday night’s concert was very much in line with those earlier appearances. It sent me out into the chill “suffused with an incandescent glow.” What more could you ask for on an unusually brisk fall night?

Next at Powell Hall: Stéphane Denève returns to conduct the orchestra and members of the chorus in a celestial-themed program consisting of the world premiere of Guillaume Connesson’s “Astéria,” “Primal Message” by contemporary American violist/composer Nokuthula Endo Ngwenyama, James Lee III’s “Sukkot Through Orion's Nebula”, and Holst’s ever-popular “The Planets.” Performances are Friday at 7:30 pm, Saturday at 8 pm, and Sunday at 3 pm, November 18-20. The Saturday concert will be broadcast live on St. Louis Public Radio and Classic 107.3.

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

Symphony Review: Scottish snap and snappy Schubert with the SLSO

Prepandemic my wife and I traveled quite a bit. One of our favorite destinations for a time was Scotland. We haven’t been back in a while, but the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra (SLSO) concert last Saturday (November 20) summoned up, however briefly, memories of the gloomy, glorious land north of England.

[Find out more about the music with my symphony preview.]

The concerts opened the USA premiere of Anna Clyne’s brief and rowdy “Pivot.” Inspired by the composer’s experiences at the 2021 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, “Pivot” lives up to its title by constantly moving from one musical style to another. It starts with a very Celtic-sounding fiddle tune backed up by a bagpipe-like drone in the brasses and percussive slaps in the lower strings. From there it switches to a mix of other styles, including a woodwind melody that sounds distinctly Middle-Eastern. Sometimes multiple musical ideas clash in way that Charles Ives would probably have appreciated. But the music always returns, rondo-style, to that fiddle tune.

“Pivot” clearly demands precise playing and someone on the podium who can hold this brilliantly organized chaos together. In his SLSO debut, conductor David Danzmayr, the newly appointed Music Director of the Oregon Symphony, proved fully up to the task. The SLSO musicians played with exciting snap and physical energy, making this a perfect opening number.

The Scots theme continued with Max Bruch’s 1880 “Scottish Fantasy” for violin and orchestra.  Bruch’s experience of Scotland was literary rather than literal in that he never set foot on Scottish soil but, as Caitlin Custer points out in this week’s program notes, Bruch read “everything Scottish he could get his hands on.” In any case, he did a surprisingly good job of communicating the majestic windswept and melancholy beauty of the countryside. That’s especially the case in the wistful third movement, which makes liberal use of the traditional air “I’m A’ Doun for Lack O’ Johnnie”.

Simone Porter
Photo by Elisha Knight

In her SLSO debut, soloist Simone Porter proved to be a most persuasive interpreter of Bruch’s sentimental and appealing work. Fully engaged with both the conductor and the orchestra, Porter played with rich warmth in the lyrical first and third movements. In the latter, she played with so much tenderness that I felt a temptation (wisely resisted) to hum along with her. She had a brighter sound and more physically active stage presence in the cheerful second movement, based on the lively fiddle tune “The Dusty Miller”, and brought out the majesty and pride of the finale, which is based on “Scots Wha Hae”—Scotland’s unofficial national anthem, at least back in Bruch’s day.

All of which is a loquacious way of saying that it was a damn fine performance of a tremendously appealing work, by both Porter and Danzmayr. The latter chose his tempi and dynamic contrasts with great care—including the wise use of an extended moment of silence after the third movement. The orchestra was right there with him all the way. A special shout-out is owed to harpist Allegra Lilly, whose playing added another rich layer, especially in the third and fourth movements. It has been suggested that Bruch saw the harp as an essential part of the Scottish folk tradition. If so, he was wise to include it.

The audience clearly appreciated Porter’s work and insisted on an encore, And the one she gave us was lovely: the third movement (“Sarabanda”) from Bach’s Violin Partita No. 2. Porter prefaced it by describing her experience working with the SLSO as “joyous.” I think the audience would agree.

The concert closed with Schubert’s imposing Symphony No. 9 (or maybe 7 or 8) in C major, nicknamed “The Great” to distinguish it from his Symphony No. 6, the “Little,” C major. Unperformed during the composer’s brief life and ignored for many years afterwards, the symphony long had a reputation among many musicians and critics as repetitive, difficult to play, and simply too long. And while it’s now a regular part of the repertory, it’s still a work filled with challenges for both conductors and listeners, as Joshua Weilerstein recently noted in his Sticky Notes podcast.

The biggest challenge is simply bringing enough variety and sense of momentum to a work which, if one takes all of the composer’s repeats, can last fifty minutes or more. Personally, I believe they should be treated as optional, but not everyone agrees. I recall a critic on the long-defunct WQXR radio show "First Hearing” once referring to a recording that dumped the repeats in the final movement as the equivalent of “blowing a hole in the Sistine Chapel.”

Perhaps he was engaging in hyperbole.

David Danzmayr

In any case, Danzmayr apparently decided they were indeed optional, at least in the first and last movements. Omitting them, together with generally brisk tempi, clean high-level playing by the band, and an overall concept of the work that was both vigorous and subtle, produced a Schubert Ninth that was bursting with energy, sentiment, and drama.

I have about a page of notes in front of me on the many decisions by Danzmayr that made this performance such a standout, but I’m going to demonstrate adult restraint and limit myself to a just a few. To begin with, tempo choices in the first movement were ideal. The Andante opening was actually taken (as the term implies) at a “walking” pace—relaxed but not sluggish. The transition to the main Allegro ma non troppo body was dramatic, and the movement as a whole crackled with energy.

The second movement, Andante con moto, has always suggested a mysterious nocturnal procession to me, and Jelena Dirks’s oboe solo hit just the right mix of the enigmatic and mournful. The moment at which the main theme unexpectedly bursts forth in a shriek of terror was powerful, with the one-measure rest afterwards held just long enough to underline that feeling. When the pizzicato strings made their hesitant entrance, it felt like they were cautiously emerging from a bomb shelter.

The Scherzo third movement had just the right amount of contrast between the boisterous main theme and the more flowing trio section. And the Allegro vivace finale galloped along with an irresistible vitality, with a powerful coda that brought the house down. Seriously, this was one of the best Schubert Ninths ever and a real feather in Danzmayr’s cap.

And what spectacular playing by the SLSO musicians! Roger Kaza’s horns were in excellent form as were all the winds. Schubert gives most of the best stuff to the woodwinds and brasses in this symphony (one reason why string players disliked it so much at first), and ours have never sounded better.

Next at Powell Hall: Gemma New conducts the SLSO along with soloists Sasha Cooke (mezzo-soprano), Elizabeth Chung (cello) and David Halen (violin) in Jake Heggie’s “The Work at Hand,” Elgar’s “Sea Pictures,” and Rimski-Korsakov’s “Scheherazade.” Performances are Saturday at 8 pm and Sunday at 3 pm, November 27 and 28. The concerts are dedicated to the memory of the late St. Louis Post-Dispatch music critic Sarah Bryan Miller, who died last November 28th after fighting a long battle with cancer with courage and grace.

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

Symphony Review: Revolutionary Beethoven and Greig with Víkingur Ólafsson and the SLSO

If I were called upon to summarize the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra (SLSO) concert last Saturday night (November 13) in one word, it would probably be something along the lines of exciting, electrifying, or stunning. But maybe the best choice would be “revolutionary.”

[Find out more about the music with my symphony preview.]

That is, after all, what the concluding work on the program—Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5—was when it first saw the light of day back in December 1808, even if it probably wasn’t apparent at its disastrous premiere at the end of a four-hour marathon in the unheated Theater an der Wein. The symphony’s structure, its obsessive energy, and even (as Joshua Wallerstein suggests in a recent episode of his “Sticky Notes” podcast) its musical content were all revolutionary.

As Music Director Stéphane Denève pointed out in his pre-concert remarks, Beethoven once contemplated actually relocating to France. He never did, but his fifth symphony was nevertheless inspired by the French Revolution’s values of “liberté, egalité, fraternité” (freedom, equality, brotherhood). That’s still the national motto in France, in fact. Here in the USA, sadly, we seem to have recently decided that only the first word matters, so it’s good to be reminded of the principles that were at the heart of both their revolution and ours.

Stéphane Denève and the SLSO take bows
after the Beethoven Fifth

The Beethoven Fifth has become such a familiar work that it might seem impossible to do anything truly revolutionary with it. But, as Denève proved with his stunning Beethoven Ninth last February, “it ain’t necessarily so”—especially when you pay attention to Beethoven’s directions about tempi.

As Denève points out,  Beethoven was an early adopter of what was, in the early 19th century, a cutting-edge piece of technology—the metronome. Patented in 1815 by the composer's sometime friend Johann Nepomuk Maelzel, the device for accurately indicating a musical tempo was happily adopted by Beethoven. So much so that in 1817 he went back to earlier works like the Symphony No. 5 and added metronome markings to the score. Over the centuries, alas, many conductors decided that those tempi were unreasonably fast, with the result that the Fifth has sometimes lost the visceral thrill it was supposed to have.

Not so Saturday night. From that famous four note phrase at the beginning right through to the devil-may-care triumph of the coda (taken at the hair-raising speed the composer had in mind), this was a Beethoven Fifth that made critical niceties like taking notes virtually impossible. It was too compelling, too dazzlingly executed, and just too much fun to take time out to scribble in a notebook.

Highlights of this glorious performance include the superhuman precision of the lower strings in the rapid fugal passages in the third movement, Jelena Dirks’s brief but beautiful oboe cadenza in the first movement, and the truly epic sound of the brasses and Thomas Jöstlein’s horn section. Denève’s interpretation was filled with delicious details, including an Andante con moto second movement that was imbued with the spirit of the dance—something I haven’t always heard in this work.

If this had been the only killer performance of the evening, that would have been enough. But we also got a Greig Piano Concerto that simply could not be beat. Soloist Víkingur Ólafsson made quite a stunning impression in his local debut with a performance that blended nuance and poetry with virtuoso flair. A veritable ball of physical energy, Ólafsson at some points bent so close to the keyboard that his face nearly touched the keys, yet at others seemed ready to leap from the bench in an explosion of passion.

His version of the famous first movement cadenza was a study in extremes, nearly coming to a complete halt before building steadily to the boiling power of the big restatement of the main theme. His concentration on both Denève and the orchestra was intense. And his playing overall was a model of clarity.

Víkingur Ólafsson and Stéphane Denève

Speaking of the orchestra, let’s not forget that the concerto includes a fair number of opportunities for individual players and sections to shine. Roger Kaza’s horn had a warm, lush sound in the second movement, for example, and Adam Sandberry’s flute solo in the third movement’s bucolic interlude was a gem. At the podium, Denève kept everything moving along smoothly, making it easy to forget how episodic Greig’s writing is (he was, let’s face it, not a master of the larger musical forms). Some readings of the concerto come across as disjointed. This one felt like a spontaneous outpouring of melody—which is presumably what the composer intended.

It was a fine piece of work and got an enthusiastic standing ovation from the packed house. That led to an encore that took us to an entirely different musical world: the Adagio from Bach’s Organ Sonata No. 4, BWV 528, in a transcription by the Bohemian virtuoso pianist/composer August Stradal (1860-1930). Here, again, I was impressed by the lucidity of Ólafsson’s playing and his ability to keep the various threads of Bach’s counterpoint clear.

The concert opened with “Fate Now Conquers,” written just last year by Carlos Simon, the new Composer-in-Residence with the National Symphony Orchestra. The composer says that this short (five minutes), animated work was inspired by “the beautifully fluid harmonic structure of the 2nd movement of Beethoven’s 7th symphony” but to my ears it felt more like a highly compressed version of the Fifth. Dominated by a short, driving motif first heard in the tympani and low strings, “Fate Now Conquers” pauses briefly in the middle for a lyrical cello solo (played with great feeling by Daniel Lee). The headlong rush returns, builds to a brassy finale, and then, in bit of Haydnesque wit, abruptly stops, leaving the final notes to the low strings.

It got a precise and exhilarating performance by the orchestra and was an ideal way to start the concert.

Next at Powell Hall: Conductor David Danzmayr makes his SLSO debut with Schubert’s Symphony No. 9 (“The Great”), the USA premiere of Anna Clyne’s “Pivot,” and Bruch’s “Scottish Fantasy” with violin soloist Simone Porter. Performances are Friday at 10:30 am and Saturday at 8 pm, November 19 and 20.

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

Digital Symphony Review: Denéve and the SLSO try a little tenderness

Available through September 25th, the latest digital release from the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra (SLSO) is from a series of concerts originally performed live this past Mother's Day weekend (May 7th through 9th) and reviewed by me back then.  On our way home from the May 8th performance, my wife commented that there was a noticeable warmth to Music Director Stéphane Denève's conducting. I’d say there’s also an affection for both the music and musicians that is well-nigh irresistible.

[Find out more about the music with my symphony preview of the original concert.]

"Songs My Mother Taught Me"

You can hear those qualities in the pair of works that open this concert, picked specifically in honor of Mother's Day: settings of the poem "Songs My Mother Taught Me" by Antonín Dvořák and Charles Ives.

Written for voice and piano, the songs are heard here in arrangements by Michi Wiancko for string orchestra, with a single wind instrument taking the vocal line. Principal Clarinet Scott Andrews is the soloist in the Dvořák and Associate Principal Flute Andrea Kaplan in the surprisingly sentimental Ives. Both use their instruments to sing with a kindheartedness that was a perfect match for the music.

In the original live performance, the placement of Andrews and Kaplan towards the rear of the stage occasionally allowed the accompaniment to overwhelm them. The video overcomes that with a sound balance that makes them more clearly heard (despite the overall lack of audible stereo separation), as well as with close-up shots that allows you to see them playing in a way that could never be achieved in the concert hall. Alicia Revé Like (the narrator for "Peter and the Wolf") reads the English translation of the simple, sentimental poem in between the two performances, which is a nice touch.

Alicia Revé Like

Next is that venerable favorite, Prokofiev’s “Peter and the Wolf,” which has made regular appearances in SLSO programs since 1939, only three years after its first performance by the Moscow Philharmonic. Like’s take on the role of the narrator is a perfect balance of theatricality and simplicity—fun to watch without drawing focus from the many wonderful solo performances by the members of the orchestra. Here, again, the video makes it possible to see each soloist at work with a clarity you can't get any other way—and to get a better look at Like's entertaining performance as well.

Speaking of the soloists, here’s a shout-out to Kaplan’s virtuoso performance as the little bird, with all the rapid “flighty” passages delivered with assurance. Percussionists Alan Stewart, Tom Stubbs, and Will James are particularly fearsome as the hunters, Andrews is a sinuous cat, Principal Bassoon Andrew Cuneo a comically pompous grandfather, and Principal Oboe Jelena Dirks an elegant and, in the end, somewhat mournful duck.

Denève’s interpretation shows his usual fine sense of balance and ability to bring out some of the more interesting details of the score, including Prokofiev’s periodic dips into dissonance. In his introduction to the video, Denève describes the work as being "very dear to me..a lesson of creativity, courage, and freedom for listeners of every generation." That affection for the work is both visible and audible here.

Concluding the festivities is the suite Stravinsky prepared in 1922 from the score for his 1920 ballet “Pulcinella.” The suite takes a collection of tunes by the short-lived (1710-1736) Italian Baroque composer Giovanni Battista Pergolesi (along with a few ohters what were mistakenly attributed to him at the time) and dresses them in the light, transparent style of Stravinsky’s early “Neoclassical” period.

"Pulcinella" Suite

Most of the performances I’ve heard in the past have given this music the kind of bright, nose-thumbing cheer associated with the ballet’s titular commedia dell’arte clown. In the program notes, though, Denève is quoted as describing the suite as “such tender and charming music,” so it’s no surprise that his approach  more on the lyrical side.

Which, as it turns out, works just fine. The wider range of tempi allows movements like the opening Sinfonia to really breathe and makes energetic movements such as the Tarantella-Toccata and the Vivo (with its comic solo delivered with appropriate swagger Principal Trombone Timothy Myers) that much more exhilarating. Denève insures that the many solos can be clearly heard while still maintaining a cohesive ensemble sound.

There is, in short, much to love in this program.

The SLSO Mother's Day program is available on demand through September 25th at the SLSO web site. You can also watch the video version of the concert from the week before the Mother's Day series there through September 4th, along with information on the orchestra's fall series of live concerts, which begins with a special preview concert on September 19th.

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

Symphony Review: Spring is a holiday for strings with Leonard Slatkin and the SLSO

Virtuosity both individual and collective was on display in the concert last Friday, April 23, as SLSO Conductor Laureate Leonard Slatkin led the orchestra in works that, as Mr. Slatkin noted in his spoken introduction, are really hard to play: Britten's "Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge" for string orchestra, Ravel's "Tzigane," and Ginastera's "Variaciones concertantes."

[Find out more about the music with my symphony preview.]

Leonard Slatkin and the SLSO strings

The three works in question have more in common than their technical difficulty, however. All three are also examples of the popular musical form theme and variations, in which a simple theme becomes the basis for increasingly elaborate changes and transformations. They are otherwise three very different pieces, having originated in three different countries and embracing three very different musical styles.

The concert opened with a tribute by the young Benjamin Britten to the life and work of his teacher and mentor Frank Bridge (1879-1941). Written in only three months in 1937 when Britten was just starting to make a name for himself, “Variations” is both a brilliant work of musical architecture and an exciting showpiece for the string ensemble.

Mr. Slatkin and the SLSO strings delivered a wonderfully varied and technically brilliant realization of Britten’s genius Friday night. There were fine individual performances, to be sure, such as Concermaster David Halen’s incisive solo in the acerbically satirical “Bourée classique” fifth variation, but on the whole this was yet another excellent demonstration of the depth of talent in the SLSO string pool. You could hear that the week before in Associate Conductor Stephanie Childress’s killer rendition of Respighi’s “Ancient Airs and Dances,” and you can hear it on-line through May 8th in Music Director Stéphane Denève’s “The Heart of the Matter” digital concert.

This has been, in short, a great spring for strings.

Speaking of great string playing, Assistant Concertmaster Erin Schreiber knocked everyone out with her impassioned and nuanced performance of the next work on the program, Ravel’s "gypsy" pastiche “Tzigane.” Inspired by dazzling bit of Roma-esque improvisation by Hungarian-born classical violinist Jelly d’Arányi, “Tzigane” is rather like Sarasate's "Zigeunerweisen" on steriods. It demands emotional commitment in the long, soulful a cappella opening as well as serious technique in the many virtuoso passages that follow.

Erin Schreiber

Ms. Schreiber has demonstrated her mastery of her instrument many times in the recent chamber music series and she did it once again Friday night. She did it again Friday night, wearing a flowing bright red gown and playing her characteristic dark red violin with fire and finesse. The standing ovation she got was honestly earned and well deserved.

The concluding work, Ginastera’s 1953 "Variaciones concertantes," is essentially a “concerto for orchestra"—a work in which each section of the ensemble gets an opportunity to take the spotlight. The SLSO performed this vital and entertaining piece in 2014, and many of the soloists from back then reprised their excellent work Friday night. That includes (but is not limited to) Andrea Kaplan in the “Playful variation for flute,” Scott Andrews in the “Scherzo for clarinet,” and Beth Guterman Chu in the “Dramatic variation for viola.”

In the “Variation for oboe and bassoon,” Principal Bassoon Andrew Cuneo and oboist Xiomara Mass sounded like a pair of old friends in easy conversation. Allegra Lilly played the main theme with elegance, her harp imitating the “open strings” of a strummed guitar in a duet with the smooth cello of Melissa Brooks, and David Halen once again dashed off the rapid-fire “Perpetual motion” variation with the kind of apparent ease that comes only with serious work.

Mr. Slatkin wove all these strands together into a seamless tonal tapestry that felt perfectly balanced and was capped by an energized run through the final variation based on the malambo, a dance form that originated with Argentine gauchos and which crops up in other works by Ginastera.

Next at Powell Hall: Stéphane Denève returns to conduct Richard Strauss’s “Serenade for Winds” and Mozart’s “Gran partita” serenade Friday at 11:30 am, Saturday at 7:30 pm, and Sunday at 3 pm, May 1-3. Only 300 tickets will be sold for each performance, and strict health protocols will be in place. For more information, visit the SLSO web site.

Meanwhile, the SLSO’s digital concert series continues with on-demand performances of “The Heart of the Matter,” through May 8; and a concert from last fall’s chamber music series featuring works by Debussy, Ravel, and the mightily underrated Germaine Tailleferre through May 22.

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

Review: Stephanie Childress makes her SLSO conducting debut with a spring in her step

“Spring work,” wrote famed naturalist John Muir, “is going on with joyful enthusiasm.” By that standard, there was over an hour of spring work on display at Powell Hall last weekend (April 9-11) as the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra’s newly appointed Assistant Conductor Stephanie Childress led the SLSO strings in a cheerfully blooming program of music for strings by Britten, Dvořák, and contemporary British composer Sally Beamish.

[Find out more about the music with my symphony preview.]

As Ms. Childress noted in her introductory chat with the audience, the common thread among the three works was childhood. Britten used tunes recycled from his youthful compositions (he began writing at the age of 5) in his “Simple Symphony”; Dvořák’s “Serenade for Strings” was inspired, in part, by the birth of his first child; and Beamish dedicated “The Day Dawn” to her friend Christine McKemmie, whose daughter Zoe had just died. “[T]he piece symbolizes new beginnings,” she wrote, “recalling the sense of calm Chris felt on the day of the funeral, dawning bright after a week of rain.”

Originally written with student ensembles in mind (and when the composer himself was only 20), Britten’s symphony is, in indeed, simple enough for both young audiences and performers, but it’s also sophisticated enough to appeal to adults. And in the hands of a polished professional ensemble like the SLSO strings, it yields delightful details of wit and nuance that might escape less experienced players.

Stephanie Childress
stephaniechildress.com

This was very apparent in Ms. Childress’s interpretation, which brought out the rambunctious fun of the “Boisterous Bourrée” first movement, delivered delicate and cheerful precision in the “Playful Pizzicato” second, and was sweetly nostalgic in the “Sentimental Sarabande.” A lively romp through he “Frolicsome Finale” brought the entire business to a most successful conclusion. Indeed, the echoes of that last movement continued to frolic in my memory for days afterwards.

Beamish’s “The Day Dawn” is a more serious affair for a larger ensemble (around 40 players, twice the size of the Britten symphony) and with a degree of musical detail that made me glad I was seated close enough to the band to hear it all clearly. Opening with an early spring sunrise in the low strings followed by a pop-up thunderstorm and a return to sylvan tranquility, it’s a richly evocative piece that conjures up images of the Scottish highlands and the Shetland islands that provided the work’s titular folk tune.

That tune is heard most clearly in the dramatic central section and again at the very end, played simply and sweetly by violinists Celeste Golden Boyer and Erin Schreiber, but it seems to me that it lies at the heart of the sonically layered and richly contrapuntal body of the work as well. The orchestra played it with heart and polish under Ms. Childress’s sympathetic direction.

Dvořák’s Op. 22 “Serenade” concluded the program. It’s a work that has always been a favorite of mine and, based on her pre-concert comments, a favorite of Ms. Childress’s as well. Certainly her reading of it was loving and finely shaded—clearly the product of someone attuned to the sunny springtime mood (the work was completed in May 1875)—that permeates the serenade’s five melody-saturated movements.

That said, there were times when I found her approach perhaps a bit too loving and lyrical. I would have preferred a brisker tempo in the Moderato opening movement, for example, and a bit less lingering over the poetic trio section of the Tempo di valse second movement. There was, on the other hand, a bracing energy to both the Scherzo and the final Allegro vivace as well as real beauty in the sentimental Larghetto, so on the whole I can’t complain. It was a fine performance, and perfectly played by all concerned.

This was Stephanie Childress’s debut as a conductor (she appeared as a violin soloist with the orchestra March 26-28), and it was intriguing to watch her at work. Her podium style was elegant and precise, neither flamboyant nor overly reserved. I had the sense that she felt great confidence in the expertise of her orchestra and was content to simply keep them moving in the direction they had already carefully rehearsed.

London Symphony violinist Hugh Bean once opined that conducting “is the strongest evidence I’ve yet seen that telepathy, in one form or another, exists.” Seeing Ms. Childress in action, I’m inclined to agree.

Next at Powell Hall: Ms. Childress returns Friday at 11:30 am, Saturday at 7:30 pm, and Sunday at 3 pm, April 16-18, to conduct Luigi Boccherini’s “Overture in D major,” Mozart’s “Sinfonia concertante” (K.364), and the third of Respighi’s “Ancient Airs and Dances” suites. Only 300 tickets will be sold for each performance and strict health protocols will be in place. For more information, visit the SLSO web site.

Meanwhile, the SLSO’s digital concert series continues with on-demand performances of “Night Music” (which I reviewed on March 31) through April 24 and “The Heart of the Matter” through May 8.

Review: Strangers on a train

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

Cary Grant dodges the law in Grand Central Station

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I don't know whether Alfred Hitchcock's 1959 thriller North by Northwest ever played Powell Hall back when it was a movie theatre. If so I doubt that Bernard Herrmann's score ever sounded as good as it did this past Saturday (February 24, 2018) when the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra performed it live to accompany a showing of the movie.

Herrmann had a long and productive relationship with Hitchcock, scoring seven of the director's films, including hits such as Vertigo, Psycho, and the 1956 remake of The Man Who Knew Too Much. His score for North by Northwest is remarkable, though, for its economy. There are basically only three themes: a triple-meter "action" theme first heard in the main title sequence and repeated whenever the tension ratchets up; a lyrical love theme that could almost have been written by Richard Strauss; and a short "suspense" motif that shows up primarily in low strings and brass now and then. Some of the most memorable sequences have no music at all, such as the famous "crop duster" chase scene in which besieged New York advertising executive Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant) is pursued by a biplane with murderous intent across an Illinois cornfield. The score doesn't kick in until the very end, when a giant orchestral crash underscores the explosion of the plane.

Herrmann gets a lot of mileage out of those themes, making small changes in orchestration and tempo to mirror the action in the film. A notable example is the way he changes the love theme. We first hear it when Thornhill, on the run from mysterious thugs and from the police for a murder he didn't commit, encounters Eve Kendall (Eva Marie Saint) on the 20th Century Limited to Chicago. In that first version, it's played mostly by a single clarinet and then later by solo oboe and flute. Later, when Kendall is apparently getting ready to betray Thornhill to spy Phillip Vandamm (James Mason), the orchestration is darker. It's subtle but effective.

Herrmann's orchestra is also economical, at least in comparison to the massive ensembles that have become typical of suspense/adventure films in the last few decades. North by Northwest has a beefed-up brass section, a contrabassoon, and two harps, but on the whole it's a band that wouldn't look out of place in the late 19th century.

Gemma New

Resident Conductor Gemma New was at the podium, delivering a crisp reading of the music, which was performed with the virtuosity that I have come to expect from the SLSO musicians. The brass section had impressive power and the woodwinds delivered the love theme with a swooning beauty. Ms. New looked entirely comfortable with the daunting process of conduting in synch with the film, just as she was with the orchestra's Jurassic Park showing last November.

I have been to most of the SLSO's film evenings since they started showing silent movie classics many years ago, and have nearly always fond them to be vastly entertaining. They seem to attract sizeable crowds, which is certainly good for the orchestra's bottom line. My only complaint remains the tinny sounds of film dialog tracks on Powell Hall's sound system. I'm starting to think that the companies that produce the prints for these live film events might want to give serious consideration to adding captions.

Next at Powell Hall: Christian Arming conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and piano soloist Rémi Geniet in works by Smetana, Tchaikovsky, and Schumann on Friday and Saturday at 8 pm March 2 and 3. Gemma New conducts the St. Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra on Sunday, March 4, at 3 pm in Britten's Soirées musicales, Tchaikovsky's Capriccio Italien, and Sibelius's Symphony No. 2. Members of the SLSO will also perform chamber works by Miyoshi, Britten, and Takemitsu Tuesday and Wednesday at 7:30 pm, February 27 and 28.

Review: The big sing

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

The St. Louis Symphony Chorus

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[Find out more about the music with my symphony preview post.]

It was a gala festival of the human voice this past weekend (February 9 - 11) at Powell Hall as Bramwell Tovey conducted the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, Chorus, and Children's Chorus in two great 20th century works for chorus and orchestra--one of which is by a composer whose centenary the music world is celebrating right now.

That composer is Leonard Bernstein. Born in 1918, the famed conductor, composer, and media personality didn't produce a huge catalog of works, and not all of them have aged well. But when he was at the top of his game, he produced appealing music of tremendous power. And he was definitely at the top of his game when he wrote the opening work in last weekend's concerts, the 1965 Chichester Psalms.

Scored for "treble" voice (boy soprano/contralto or countertenor), solo quartet, choir, and orchestra, the work is quintessentially Bernstein with its yearning melodic lines, theatrical flourishes, and just enough dissonance to add spice without assaulting one's ears. It's a beautiful and moving plea for peace that feels every bit as timely now as it was over sixty years ago.

In her pre-concert remarks, SLSO Chorus director Amy Kaiser noted that the Chichester Psalms presents significant linguistic and musical challenges. The psalms are sung in Hebrew (not a language often encountered in the classical world) and the music uses unconventional time signatures like 7/4 and 10/4, which create a sense of urgency but can be difficult to sing. Her singers handled it all beautifully, though, with a seamless sonic blend and all the power a person could wish for. The brief SATB (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) quartet section towards the end was wonderfully clear, as was the lovely a cappella finale.

Amy Kaiser

Vocal soloist Devin Best's voice had an ethereal clarity in the second movement, with its setting of the well-known 23rd Psalm ("The Lord is my shepherd"), but even with amplification it was sometimes difficult to hear him.

A former student of Bernstein, Mr. Tovey conducted with an impressive feel for the theatricality of this music, and the orchestra responded with expert playing. The string sound, in particular had a wonderful richness, and there were lovely solo moments from Associate Concertmaster Heidi Harris along with cellists Melissa Brooks (the Associate Principal) and Anne Fagerburg.

It has been almost 16 years since the SLSO has tackled the Chichester Psalms, but I hope we don't have to wait that long to hear it again.

For most of the audience last weekend, I expect, big draw was the second work on the program, Carl Orff's 1936 "scenic cantata" Carmina Burana. It's a piece that has been performed many times here over the past several years, most recently in a fully staged version by the Nashville Ballet in 2015. The SLSO last did it in May, 2014 with Carlos Izcaray on the podium.

Mr. Tovey's was possibly the most unabashedly theatrical interpretation of the piece yet, and while I'm not convinced that all of his decisions were the best ones, there's no denying that this was a very exciting and entertaining Carmina Burana overall. He made smart use of dramatic pauses and wasn't shy about playing with tempos here and there. He brought out more of the bawdy humor in some of the poems than some conductors have in the past, most notably in the "In Taverna" (In the Tavern) section, and had the baritone and soprano soloists play a steamy love scene at the conclusion of "Cour D'Amours" (Court of Love).

That could have come across as artificially stagey, but the soloists made it work. Baritone James Westman and soprano Tracy Dahl clearly had great fun with their romantic scene, and Ms. Dahl handled the absurdly difficult upward glissando in "Dulcissime" with easy elegance. Mr. Westman's comically inebriated abbot in "Ego sum abbas" was a real crowd pleaser as well.

The tenor has only one number, but done properly "Olim lacut colueram"--a macabre number sung from the point of view of a roasted swan about to be eaten--is a neat little musical horror show. The melody lies at the very top of the tenor range, often forcing the singer into his falsetto, but Benjamin Butterfield sounded completely at ease with it. I'm not persuaded that playing the piece mostly for laughs, complete with avian shakes of the head and arms, really does the text justice, but Mr. Butterfield did it extraordinarily well.

The bulk of Carmina Burana, though, is carried by the chorus, which has to sing in Latin, Middle High German, and Old Provençal, and do it consistently for an entire hour. When we heard them Friday night, their articulation was crisp and clean and the sound well balanced. The Children's Chorus was in fine collective voice as well.

Next at Powell Hall: Singer/songwriter Rufus Wainwright performs with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra on Friday, February 16, at 7:30 pm. Then Matthew Halls conducts the orchestra and clarinet soloist Scott Andrews (SLSO Principal Clarinet) Saturday at 8 pm and Sunday at 3 pm, February 17 and 18. The program consists of Schubert's Symphony No. 3, Carl Maria von Weber's Clarinet Concerto No. 1, and Mendelssohn's Symphony No. 1 (written when the composer was 15). The concerts take place at Powell Symphony Hall, 718 North Grand in Grand Center.

Review: A Holly Jolly Holiday Celebration

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

The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra
and Holiday Festival Chorus

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What with one thing and another, I haven't been feeling much in the holiday spirit lately, a situation not helped by seeing people walking around in t-shirts a week before Christmas. If that's the New Normal, get me a time machine, please.

Friday night (December 15th, 2017), though, the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra came to the rescue with its annual holiday show. What with the festive music, the seasonal décor at Powell Hall, and the potent Poinsettia Punch served at the bar, I soon started feeling like a right jolly old elf.

Things got off to an exuberant start as SLSO Resident Conductor Gemma New led her forces in a lively and nuanced performance of Leroy Anderson's Christmas Festival, an ingeniously arranged collection of classic carols that I have loved ever since I played the trombone part in my high school orchestra. I dare anyone not to smile at the finale, which combines "Adeste Fideles," "Joy to the World," and "Jingle Bells" in clever counterpoint.

This was my first chance to see Ms. New when she wasn't playing second fiddle to dinosaurs, and I have to say I was very taken with her elegant and fluid style on the podium and her charm as the evening's MC. Not every conductor is comfortable with a wireless body mic, but she seemed right in her element.

Resident Conductor Gemma New

Up next were a couple of traditional carols arranged by Mormon Tabernacle Choir music director Mack Wilberg and performed, as is the case every year, by the Holiday Festival Chorus, composed of singers from area high schools. Ms. New conducted "Ding! Dong! Merrily on High" and then yielded the baton to chorus director Kevin McBeth for "Still, Still, Still." The kids sounded great, as they always do, and thanks to some fairly tasteful amplification they also were easier to hear than has sometimes been the case in the past.

Guest vocalist Doug LaBrecque took the stage next for engaging performances of "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" (combined with "The Christmas Waltz") and "White Christmas." Mr. LaBrecque's theatrical background guaranteed a strong connection with the lyrics, and his strong tenor made his microphone a bit superfluous.

Ms. New brought the focus back to the orchestra with three all too brief selections from The Nutcracker. It was nice to have the "Dance of the Sugar-Plum Fairy," with an impeccable celesta solo as well as solid counterpoint from Diana Haskell and Tzuying Huang in the clarinet section, but I really wish we could have had the "Waltz of the Flowers" as well.

The Holiday Festival Chorus brought the concert's first half to a rousing conclusion with Mr. Wilberg's "Carol to the King," with its lively "fife and drum" interchanges among the flutes, trumpets, and snare drums.

The pop orientation of the concert continued in the second half, starting with a suite from Alan Silvestri's music for the film Polar Express (arrangement by Jerry Brubaker, Chief Arranger of the US Navy Band for 13 years). That was followed by something I hadn't heard before: the "Christmas Lullaby" by contemporary English composer John Rutter, who seems incapable of writing a Christmas song that isn't irresistible. If you've heard his "Donkey Carol" or Shepherd's Pipe Carol," you know what I mean.

Doug Labrecque

Mr. LaBrecque returned as well to give us smooth takes on a couple of Great American Songbook standards and to take on the narrator role in Randol Alan Bass's cinematic treatment of "The Night Before Christmas," which he did with real theatrical flair. Backed by the chorus, he also turned in a performance of Adolphe Adam's "O Holy Night" that showed off his solid low notes and wide range.

Whit Richert's irrepressible Santa made his usual appearance, bringing out a child from the audience to "conduct" the orchestra in "Sleigh Ride," and the evening concluded with "A Holly Jolly Sing-Along." It was, in short, a program as bright as the blinking lights Roger Kaza and his fellow horn players attached to their instruments and as cozy as a red Christmas sweater (which, of course, I was wearing).

Sponsored by the Mercy Health System, the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra Holiday Festival continues Sunday at 2 pm, December 17, at Powell Hall in Grand Center. It's a bit less classically oriented this year than it has been in the past, but brimming with good cheer as always.

Seasonal events continue at Powell Hall, with the Bach Society's Christmas Candlelight Concert on December 19, The Music of John Williams (with David Robertson back at the podium) on December 21-23, Dreamworks Animation in Concert December 29 and 30 and, of course, the New Year's Eve Celebration (Mr. Robertson's last one as Music Director) on the 31st. They're now selling standing room tickets for that last one, which will give you some idea of how popular these holiday concerts can be.

Review: "Disney in Concert: Tale as Old as Time" is powerful entertainment for all ages

Conductor Aram Demirjian
Photo: David Bickley

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For some time now, the last weekend in December has been the time for the St. Louis Symphony to present a family-friendly concert--often with a cinematic theme--designed to pull in big audiences and contribute to the economic bottom line.

This year was no exception with Disney in Concert: Tale as Old as Time. A production of Symphony Pops Music, the concert package provides clips from animated Disney films, both classic and contemporary, accompanied by live music played by the SLSO and orchestrated by a regular army of arrangers. Also included are a scripted narrative and a quartet of singers to deliver that narrative along with a cornucopia of songs from the movies.

The result, as the Thursday night (December 29) concert clearly demonstrated, was an entertainment powerhouse, in which the lively and precise performance by the SLSO musicians under the baton of guest conductor Aram Demirjian (Associate Conductor of the Kansas City Symphony) was more than matched by the theatrically on-target work of the singers. I often found myself more drawn to their smart and well-choreographed stage show than to the film clips which, after all, were already familiar to many of us in the audience.

As was the case with The Magical Music of Disney (the last Symphony Pops production I saw at Powell back in 2012), the featured singers were all experienced and engaging musical theatre professionals who were always completely in the moment and in character.

Whitney Claire Kaufman, who has appeared as the guest soloist in previous SLSO holiday concerts, once again demonstrated an impressive combination of vocal power and theatrical conviction in songs like "When Will My Life Being" (Tangled) and "Reflection" (Mulan). Lisa Livesay was also a sparkling presence in Randy Newman's "Almost There" (The Frog Prince), among others. She and Ms. Kaufman did an excellent job sharing the various princess roles throughout the evening.

L-R: Aaron Phillips, Lisa Livesay, Andrew Johnson
Whitney Claire Kaufman

Andrew Johnson and Aaron Phillips displayed great versatility as well in a wide variety of male roles, from dashing princes to evil magicians. Mr. Johnson's "Under the Sea" (The Little Mermaid) was lively fun and his "Friends on the Other Side" (The Frog Prince) deliciously evil. He was also a powerful presence in the "The Circle of Life" (The Lion King), an unlisted but obviously scheduled encore that brought the audience to its feet for the second standing ovation of the evening--the first having been generated by the rousing medley of tunes from Frozen that finished the official program.

Mr. Phillips had some of the best character songs, including the lyrically flashy "Friend Like Me" (Aladdin) and "Be Our Guest" (Beauty and the Beast). He did some of the best character voices, which is what you might expect from an actor with so many animation and voiceover credits.

All too often the phrase "family entertainment" equates to "suitable only for preschoolers." Not so with Disney in Concert: Tale as Old as Time. This was a program that entertained all three generations in our party but, judging from the response, the rest of the standing room only crowd as well. The opening "Disney Memories Overture" was especially moving for me, with its musical and visual clips from classics like Snow White and Seven Dwarfs, Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland, and Fantasia. For a few moments, I was once again that enraptured child who made his long-suffering Italian uncle sit through three successive showings of Lady and the Tramp.

Now there's some movie magic for you.

The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra is taking a much-deserved break right now, but the regular season returns the weekend of January 13 when David Robertson conducts Dvorak's Symphony No. 9 ("From the New World") and the Korngold Violin Concerto with Gil Shaham as the soloist.

Review: Steven Jarvi puts his own stamp on a festive holiday concert with the St. Louis Symphony

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

SLSO Resident Conductor
Steven Jarvi

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Although it's usually a heavily attended event, freezing drizzle and the resulting treacherous streets put a major dent in the turnout for the Mercy Holiday Celebration at the St. Louis Symphony Friday night (December 16, 2016). And that's a shame, since conductor Steven Jarvi really put his stamp on the evening, with an intelligent selection of music that included more than a few works I'd never heard before.

For a pops concert that usually sticks to the tried and true, that was a delightful and welcome surprise. Morton Gould's arrangement of "Jingle Bells'" for example, was ingenious and whimsical, with icy harmonics from the violins, a plaintive oboe, muted horns, and a quiet finale that gave the whole thing a kind of pointillist delicacy. The orchestration of "Carol to the King" by Mormon Tabernacle Choir music director Mack Wilberg featured lively "fife and drum" interchanges among the flutes, trumpets, and snare drums. And the "Refried Farandole" by composer/performer/producer Sam Hyken brought the concert to an appropriately rousing conclusion. This virtuoso expansion of the "Farandole" (from Bizet's incidental music for L'Arlesienne, which includes the traditional Provençal carol "The March of the three Kings") was completely new to me and it was tremendous fun, especially when performed with such precision.

Kevin McBeth

Perhaps the most beautiful selection of the evening, though, came from Kevin McBeth's Holiday Festival Chorus, composed of singers from area high schools. For an a cappella performance of the "Ave Maria" by twentieth-century German composer Franz Xaver Biebl, the choir was split in half, with singers and soloists both on stage and upstairs in the dress circle. Heard from our seats on the orchestra floor, this gave the music a wonderful antiphonal quality that called to mind the works of Gabrielli and the other Venetian Renaissance polychoral composers. Mr. Jarvi conducted with a look of real joy that was, I'm sure, shared by many of us in the audience.

The chorus also distinguished itself in more traditional selections like "The First Nowell" and, most notably, in the decidedly non-traditional "South African Gloria" by William Bradley Roberts, Professor of Church Music at Virginia Theological Seminary. With its syncopated percussion and lively foot stomping from the chorus, this was music guaranteed to bring a smile to the face and joy to the heart. It also sounded tricky to perform, so kudos to Mr. McBeth and his singers for doing so well by it.

That's not to say that the usual trappings of this annual holiday event weren't in place. The concert opened with a swinging, brassy arrangement of "Winter Wonderland." St. Nick (played with engaging jollity by Whit Reichert) showed up for his usual visit and arranged for a child from the audience to "conduct" the orchestra in Leroy Anderson's "Sleigh Ride." And there was a guest appearance by a singer from the world of Broadway and TV: Nicole Parker.

Nicole Parker

Ms. Parker is probably best known for her work on MADtv, but she also has extensive musical theatre credits, including the plum role of Elphaba in the first North American tour of Wicked. She had some great moments, including a charming "White Christmas" with the orchestra and chorus and a funny "My Favorite Things" with impersonations of Ellen DeGeneres, Julie Andrews (eerily accurate), Diane Keaton, and Celine Dion (complete with an absurdly ornamented vocal line). Her "Defying Gravity" might not have had much to do with the holidays, but it certainly soared. So, icy streets not withstanding, it was an evening as festive as the holiday decorations in the Powell Hall lobby and as cozy as a red Christmas sweater.

Seasonal concerts continue at Powell Hall with the Bach Society Christmas Candlelight Concert on Thursday, December 22nd, and Disney in Concert on the 29th and 30th. The orchestra will round out the year with the annual New Year's Eve gala on the 31st. Visit the SLSO web site for details.