St. Louis classical calendar for the week of January 9, 2017

Gil Shaham

Share on Google+:

David Robertson conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and violin soloist Gil Shaham on Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m., January 13-15. "Gil Shaham performs Korngold's Violin Concerto. First premiered by the STL Symphony in 1947, the work by the cinematic composer will astound with its lush melodies and technical pyrotechnics. The concert comes to a stunning conclusion with Dvorák's beloved "New World" symphony, an audience favorite for its musical depiction of the American spirit." The concert takes place at Powell Symphony Hall, 718 North Grand in Grand Center. For more information: stlsymphony.org.

The World Chess Hall of Fame presents a program of the music of Dvorák on Thursday, January 12, at 7 pm. "Dvorák is the best known Czech composer of the Romantic era. Beloved for his use of Bohemian folk elements, his music is deeply beautiful and sparkling with vitality. Featuring members of the St. Louis Symphony, this program explores Dvo_ák's chamber music for strings; including his famous Quintet No. 2 for two violins, viola, cello and double bass." Performers are Jessica Cheng, violin; Angie Smart, violin; Kathleen Mattis, viola; Melissa Brooks, cello; Sarah Hogan Kaiser, bass. The performance takes place at the World Chess Hall of Fame, 4652 Maryland Avenue. For more information: worldchesshof.org or call (314) 367-9243.

Symphony Preview: Something old, someone new

Nathalie Stutzmann

The St. Louis Symphony program this weekend (April 22-24, 2016) consists entirely of well-known classics: Mendelssohn's The Hebrides (Fingal's Cave) overture, Sibelius's Violin Concerto, and one of my favorites, Dvořák's Symphony No. 7.

These pieces are popular for good reasons, not the least of which is the way each one conjures up a particular time and place. Mendelssohn's overture powerfully summons up the wild and brooding Scottish islands that the composer visited in 1829, the year before he wrote the overture. Sibelius does the same for the dark, brooding landscapes of his Finnish homeland in his concerto from over seven decades later. And for the nature-loving Dvořák, whose 1884 symphony brought him international acclaim, the Bohemian countryside is an ever-present character in his music.

This is, in short, a big weekend for musical travelogues.

While the music will be familiar, though, the figure on the podium will likely be considerably less so for local audiences. That's because this weekend's guest conductor, Nathalie Stutzmann, is not only new to St. Louis but relatively new to conducting as well. Born in 1965 in the Paris suburb of Suresnes, she showed talent as a singer at an early age, studying first with her mother, soprano Christiane Stutzmann, and then at the Nancy Conservatoire and later in Paris. Remarkably for a singer, she also studied piano, bassoon, and -- most remarkable of all -- conducting.

And she didn't study with just anyone. Her primary teachers have been the noted Finnish conductor and composer Jorma Panula (whose students include Esa-Pekka Salonen and Simon Rattle) and the legendary Seiji Ozawa. She even founded her own chamber orchestra, Orfeo 55, in 2009. The group plays both Baroque and modern instruments, and Stutzmann herself has said that, as a conductor, she feels a real affinity for "le grand repertoire" of the Romantics like Beethoven Brahms, Tchaikovsky, and Strauss.

Although Ms. Stutzmann has only been conducting professionally since 2008, she has already made quite an impression on the critics. For example, Em Skow, reviewing her US conducting debut -- Handel's Messiah with the National Symphony Orchestra -- waxed positively rhapsodic at DC Metro Theater Arts:

The evening's program notes summarized her as rigor and fantasy embodied in a conduct and I have to agree. It would do her a disservice to say she just connected to the layers of the work, or even to say that she moved others to do the same. The piece shown through her, radiating from her fingertips, dancing through her toes, bouncing through her arms, shoulders, and legs to the floor where even she had to hold on to the rail to steady herself at times. For her, three dimensions weren't enough to conduct with and her level of passion was truly an honor to witness.

"Her experience as a Romantic musician and her knowledge of older genres allow her to tackle Vivaldi and Mozart as well as Beethoven, Wagner or Brahms," writes Brian Fowler in a profile for medici.tv. "Her approach, both loose and rigourous, her science of phrasing and the emotional intensity of her interpretations, her exceptional mastery in the service of the passion she conveys: these are some of the elements that make her so popular in the eyes of her audience and the musicians she conducts."

If you'd like to experience her work before this weekend's concerts, Ms. Stutzmann has a YouTube channel with videos of her singing and conducting both Orfeo 55 and other notable orchestras.

Karen Gomyo

Karen Gomyo, the soloist for the Sibelius Violin Concerto, has come in for her share of critical praise as well. "A first-rate artist of real musical command, vitality, brilliance and intensity," wrote John Van Rhein at the Chicago Tribune in 2009, while the Cleveland Plain Dealer's Zachary Lewis called her "captivating, honest and soulful, fueled by abundant talent but not a vain display of technique" in 2011.

Even more to the point, though, Ms. Gomyo has gotten some raves for recent performances of the Sibelius concerto. Reviewing her appearance with the San Diego Symphony last December, for example, the San Diego Reader noted that the audience "was locked on Ms. Gomyo from start to finish because her performance brought us into those dark woods into which Sibelius, and all of us, have wandered from time to time." A 2013 performance with the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra under Christopher Seaman made such an impact on the audience that the end of the first movement, as Anthony Bannon wrote for the Chautauqua Daily, "pulled several in the Amp to their feet for impulsive applause, eager to affirm the miracle of what was just heard."

All of which bodes well for the weekend. These are concerts filled with vital, compelling, and wonderfully dramatic works. It will be interesting to see what Ms. Stutzmann and Ms. Gomyo make of them. Performances at Powell Hall are Friday at 10:30 a.m. (a Krispy Kreme Coffee Concert with free coffee and doughnuts), Saturday at 8 p.m., and Sunday at 3 p.m., April 22-24. Check the St. Louis Symphony website for details.

Symphony Preview: Ecstasy without agony Saturday and Sunday, February 7 and 8, 2015

Share on Google+:

The theme running through this weekend's St. Louis Symphony concerts, as Daniel Durchholz writes in his program notes, is "ecstatic expression". Specifically, "the sensual delights of Debussy, the religious rapture found in the deep devotion of [Scottish composer James] MacMillan, and Dvořák’s reveling in the country comforts of his homeland." I think he's on to something there.

Debussy in 1908
en.wikipedia.org

I haven't heard the MacMillan piano concerto that concludes the first half of the concert, but there's not much doubt that ecstasy figures prominently in both the works that open and close the concert. First performed in 1894, Debussy's "Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune" ("Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun") is a languorous evocation of the landscape of Classical mythology while Dvořák’s "Symphony No. 8" from 1890 takes its cue from the thoroughly unmythical Bohemian countryside. Both show how much their respective composers were inspired by the natural world.

Granted, in Debussy's case the immediate inspiration wasn't so much nature as it was an elliptically erotic 1876 poem by Stephane Mallarmé, whom Debussy greatly admired. "The poem's languorous sensuality is subtly shaded," wrote Boston Symphony music librarian Marshall Burlingame for the SLSO's 1982 recording of the piece, "as the faun's conscious observation of two nymphs in the sunlight drifts into erotic fantasy." Mallarmé apparently agreed. "I have just come out of the concert deeply moved," he wrote to the composer. "The marvel! Your illustration of the Afternoon of a Faun, which presents a dissonance with my text only by going much further, really, into nostalgia and into light, with finesse, with sensuality, with richness. I press your hand admiringly, Debussy."

In Debussy's music, the faun is personified by the flute, which is featured prominently throughout its roughly ten-minute length. In fact, the opening flute solo is probably one of the best-known moments in the classical repertoire. It's haunting and dreamy, and it expertly conjures up the voluptuous, summery world of the poem. "The piece is avant-garde, revolutionary," observes SLSO Principal Flute Mark Sparks in the program. "The idea is personal for Debussy. He owns the idea of what happens harmonically: ambiguity, consciously taking the traditional Germanic sense, Wagner especially, and throwing it out the window."

Anton and Anna Dvořák in London, 1886
en.wikipedia.org

I don't know what Dvořák thought of Debussy. He probably would have found the younger composer's whole approach odd. But, like Debussy, he was often inspired by nature. Written at a time of great happiness in the composer’s life, the "Symphony No. 8" in G major, Op. 88, overflows with good humor. Dvořák composed it at his newly acquired country home and filled it with celebrations of rustic life. There are twittering birds, cheerful village bands, wandering violinists, and even, at one point, a section that has always made me think of a sudden thunderstorm. This is the joy of living, wrapped up in the Czech master’s characteristically infectious melodies and dance-inspired rhythms.

Like the Debussy, the Dvořák abounds with lovely solo passages for the winds, as does so much of his music. The last time the SLSO performed this symphony—October of 2010, under Gilbert Varga—I was very taken with the orchestra’s flute, piccolo, and single and double reed sections. Needless to say, I'm looking forward to a repeat of that this time.

Interestingly, the Dvořák Eighth has something in common with the Beethoven Eighth that we heard  a couple of weeks ago. Like the Beethoven, it’s an unpretentious and genial piece that stands in marked contrast to the more dramatic and more often performed symphonies on either side of it. Beethoven’s Eighth tends to get less attention than his propulsive Seventh or his grand Ninth. Dvořák’s Eighth has the same problem compared to the darkly dramatic Seventh and the wildly popular Ninth, “From the New World.” And yet both symphonies have much to recommend them. It’s good to have the opportunity to hear them almost back-to-back.

I’d like to close by giving you my impressions of the new work on the program this week, the “Piano Concerto No. 3” (subtitled “Mysteries of Light”), written in 2007-2008 by James MacMillan, the contemporary Scottish composer best known for "Veni, Veni, Emmanuel," his 1992, percussion concerto closely identified with Evelyn Glennie. Unfortunately the piano concerto, which had its premiere in April of 2011 with the Minnesota Orchestra, doesn’t appear to be available on recordings yet. Fortunately, the composer has given us a fairly detailed program at the web site of his publisher, Boosey and Hawkes.

James MacMillan
boosey.com

"My 3rd Piano Concerto," he writes, "attempts to revive the ancient practice of writing music based on the structure of the Rosary. The most famous example of this is the collection of the Rosary (or Mystery) Sonatas for violin by Heinrich Biber, written in the late 17th century. These consist of 15 movements based on the Joyful, Sorrowful and Glorious Mysteries. In 2002 another set of meditations were introduced by John Paul II, the Luminous Mysteries, and these are the basis of the five sections of this concerto... However, the music here is in no way geared towards liturgy, or devotional in any accepted, traditional sense. Rather, each image or event becomes the springboard for a subjective reflection, and proceeds in quasi-dramatic fashion, not too distant in concept from the musical tone poem. The fusion of symphonic poem with concerto forms has long been a favourite pursuit of mine in earlier works. The music is in one single, continuous span, comprising five distinct portions."

If the examples of MacMillann’s work that I have been able to find are any indication, you can expect music that, while obviously contemporary, is nevertheless very accessible and free of the kind of dry, academic abstraction that seems typical of so many compositions over the last few decades. “For polemical as well as practical purposes,” writes Joe Staines in “The Rough Guide to Classical Music” (Penguin, 2010), “MacMillan has often stood against ‘the old guard of the avant-garde’ who ‘are deeply suspicious of any significant move towards tonality, any hint of pulse that is actually discernible, and any music which communicates successfully with a non-specialist audience.”

At the piano for the concerto will be the man who first performed it, Jean-Yves Thibaudet. A highly regarded performer with an international reputation, Mr. Thibaudet has a wide-ranging repertoire that includes 19th, 20th, and 21st century masters and even jazz. His playing can be heard in the cinema as well, on the soundtracks of films like "The Portrait of a Lady," "Bride of the Wind," "Pride and Prejudice," "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close," and "Atonement." His last appearance with the SLSO was back in 2001.

On the podium will be Stéphane Denève, a young (age 43) French conductor who impressed me mightily when he made his SLSO debut back in September of 2003 with a program of Britten, Tchaikovsky, and Haydn and again in 2011 when the program featured Ravel's "Daphnis et Chloe". On the podium he’s an impressive figure: tall and commanding without appearing overbearing and with a bit of the late Leopold Stokowski’s flair. He seemed to be in close communication with the musicians at all times when I saw him here, and they appeared to enjoy working with him. And they're obviously not alone. Mr. Denève is Chief Conductor of Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra, Principal Guest Conductor of the Philadelphia Orchestra, and will become Chief Conductor of the Brussels Philharmonic and Director of its Centre for Future Orchestral Repertoire from September 2015. Previous conducting gigs include orchestras as diverse as the Orchestre de Paris, the Suisse Romande Orchestra, the National Symphony in Washington, along with numerous opera orchestras.

The Essentials: Stéphane Denève conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra with piano soloist Jean-Yves Thibaudet on Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m., February 7 and 8. The concerts take place at Powell Symphony Hall, 718 North Grand in Grand Center. For more information: stlsymphony.org.

All the hits, all the time

Steven Jarvi

Share on Google+:

The St. Louis Symphony's regular subscription season ended a month ago with a bang-up performance of Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 5 the weekend of May 9th. But they've got a final encore concert for you this Saturday.

In fact, it's kind of a meta-concert in that it's an encore program consisting of works often played as encores or (in at least one case) curtain raisers. They're calling it "Bravo! An Evening of Classical Favorites." And so it is.

Here's what's on the program, along with a few brief comments from me.

Berlioz: Roman Carnival Overture, op. 9 - This was actually an attempt by Berlioz to salvage something from his failed 1838 opera Benvenuto Cellini. It includes some themes from the opera's carnival scene, hence the title. Considered radical in its time and technically challenging, the opera has rarely been performed.

Faure: Pavane, op. 50 – Originally an 1887 solo piano piece, the Pavane was later orchestrated Faure for a small ensemble with optional chorus. There's no chorus listed on the program, so presumably you'll get the orchestral version. Faure thought this haunting and stately little piece "elegant, but not otherwise important." It turned out to be one of his biggest hits.

Morton Gould

Gould: "Pavanne" from American Symphonette No. 2 – American composer Morton Gould's "Pavanne" couldn't be more different from Faure's if it tried. It's jazzy and jaunty—very much in keeping with the overall mood of the American Symphonette No. 2, which Gould wrote for radio in 1939.

Grieg: "In the Hall of the Mountain King" from Peer Gynt – This five-act epic verse drama by Henrik Ibsen is (unlike many of the great Norwegian dramatist's other plays) rarely seen outside of his native land. The music Grieg wrote for the premiere production, though, has proved immensely popular. There's an optional choral part for this piece as well.

Dvorák: Selections from Slavonic Dances, op. 46 – Dvorák wrote two sets of Slavonic Dances (Op. 46 in 1878 and Op. 72 in 1886) as pieces for two pianos. They were so popular he was obliged to orchestrate them—and those versions proved even more popular. Every one of these works is a little orchestral gem, representing a different type Czech dance.

Open-air performance of The Bartered Bride
at Zoppot Waldoper, Danzig

Smetana: "Dance of the Comedians" from The Bartered Bride – Smetana's 1863 comic opera had a rocky beginning, but has gone on to achieve popularity world-wide. Performances of it aren't as common here in the USA, but the overture and orchestral excerpts like this one are invariably crowd pleasers. The "Dance of the Comedians" also pops up in "Road Runner" cartoons, as I recall.

Bizet: "Farandole" from L'Arlésienne – Alphonse Daudet's 1872 drama (usually translated as "The Girl from Arles") wasn't well received in its day and has pretty much disappeared since. Bizet's incidental music, though, continues to be popular. The "Farandole" incorporates a traditional French Christmas carol, "The March of the Kings."

Glinka: Ruslan and Lyudmila Overture - Glinka's 1842 fairy-tale opera isn't done very often. The overture, though, one of those pieces that used to crop up often as “filler” on classical LPs—a function it still serves on classical radio stations today. Its alluring melodies and neat little solo tympani part are irresistible.

Fred, Ginger, and canine companion

Gershwin: Promenade – This perky little tune started out life as the accompaniment for a dog-walking sequence aboard an ocean liner in the 1937 Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers vehicle Shall We Dance. In 1960 it was published as "Promenade." There are many recordings of it out there, including one by the St. Louis Symphony as part of its complete Gershwin orchestral works set.

Gliere: "Russian Sailors' Dance" from The Red Poppy – This 1927 ballet has would up on the ash heap of history, largely (I assume) because of the heavy-handed Soviet propaganda that constitutes its scenario. Individual numbers are still popular, though—especially this typically rousing dance that starts majestically and builds to a wild climax. I recall playing this in the school orchestra. The trombone part gets pretty hectic towards the end.

Tchaikovsky: "Waltz" from Sleeping Beauty, op. 66 – Here's one of those famous classical pieces that became the basis for a popular song: Jack Lawrence and Sammy Fain's "Once Upon a Dream" from the 1959 animated Disney film Sleeping Beauty. In its original 1890 form it's a typically sweeping Tchaikovsky waltz.

Brahms: Hungarian Dance No.5 in G minor – It's only appropriate that this should be on the same program as the Dvorák Slavonic Dances since it was, in part, the success of the Brahms dances that moved Dvorák to compose his. Although Brahms is the composer of record for the 21 Hungarian Dances, most of them actually used existing folk melodies. The fifth dance, in fact, uses a melody composed by Béla Kéler, which Brahms, apparently innocently, took for a folk tune. Copyright law was less fierce in those days.

Grieg: "Last Spring" from Two Elegiac Melodies – The Two Elegiac Melodies for string orchestra from 1880 were inspired by poems of Aasmund Olafsson Vinje. "Last Spring" is wonderful mixture of joy and sadness, with some final bars that will melt the hardest heart. Bring a hankie.

El sombrero de tres picos
by the Spanish National Ballet

Falla: "Final Dance (Jota)" from El sombrero de tres picos (The Three-Cornered Hat) – I can't think of anything better to bring you back from the melancholy of "Last Spring" than this joyous final dance from Manuel de Falla's 1919 comic ballet. First performed at the Alhambra Theatre in London, El sombrero de tres picos boasted choreography by Léonide Massine and costumes by some guy named Picasso. The great Ernest Ansermet conducted. Not shabby.

The essentials: Steven Jarvi conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra in "Bravo! An Evening of Classical Favorites" on Saturday, June 7, at 7:30 PM at Powell Symphony Hall, 718 North Grand. For more information: stlsymphony.org. Note that Circus Flora is set up on the Powell Hall south lot, so parking could be at a premium.

Invitations to the dance

Who: Pianist Sarina Zhang and The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra conducted by Ward Stare
What: Music of Dvořák, Saint-Saëns, Gershwin, Bernstein, and Ravel
Where: Powell Symphony Hall, St. Louis
When: May 18, 2012

Share on Google+


Sarina Zhang and friends play the Saint-Saëns Dance Macabre

It was a lively and entertaining evening at Powell Hall last night with a dance-infused program that included three of Dvořák’s popular Slavonic Dances, Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, Bernstein’s still-amazing Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, and an appropriately hallucinatory reading of Ravel’s death knell for the 19th century, La Valse. There was also a performance of the "Bacchanale" from Saint-Saëns’s Samson et Dalila with a highly charged coda.

Pity it was only one night because it drew a large and (as far as I could tell) somewhat younger than usual crowd, at least some of whom apparently weren’t symphony regulars. That’s a good thing; maybe they’ll come back for the 2013 season.

Dvořák’s Slavonic Dances, while popular on classical radio stations and in the record and CD collections of music lovers, aren’t heard all that often in live performances, in my experience. For Friday’s concert Mr. Stare chose a nice trio of them: a lively Serbian kolo (Op. 72, No. 7), a graceful sousedská (Op. 46, No. 4), and a brilliant furiant with an elegiac trio (Op. 46, No. 8). Mr. Stare’s reading was particularly effective at bringing out the lyrical side of these colorful works and reminded me once again of how effectively Dvořák turned these original dance tunes into little symphonic fragments. They’re filled with lovely bits of orchestral detail as well—all brought out nicely by the orchestra players.

There’s not a lot that needs to be said about the colorful “Bacchanale” from Saint-Saëns’s 1876 opera Samson et Dalila, except to note that the composer was a dedicated world traveler who took inspiration from the places he visited. How much of his 1874 trip to Algiers wound up in the lush exoticism of the Act III orgy scene in the Temple of Dagon is hard to say, but it certainly packs a great dramatic punch, especially when the performance is as intense as this one was. From Phil Ross’s polished opening oboe solo to the fierce tympani and horn duel of the finale, this was a winner.

The Gershwin Rhapsody in Blue was, I expect, the big draw for the evening and it didn’t disappoint. Although she’s only fifteen, pianist Sarina Zhang nevertheless had her own unique take on the piece instead of the cookie-cutter approach one might expect from a young prodigy still learning her craft. Her technique was solid—not surprising, given the awards she has already earned as both a pianist and cellist—but so was her grasp of the jazzy inflections that are not fully spelled out. The same was true of Mr. Stare and his players, particularly in the famous opening clarinet and “wah-wah” trumpet solos (Scott Andrews and Tom Drake, respectively).

If your only exposure to the dance music from Bernstein’s West Side Story is via the film or touring productions of the show, you might not be aware of just how brilliantly scored it is. Theatrical pit bands rarely have enough players to do it justice, which may be why the composer created the Symphonic Dances in 1961. It’s a remarkable piece, filled with tricky polyrhythms, dissonance, flashy orchestration (including an expanded percussion battery), and a raft of other touches that remind us of how effectively Bernstein bridged the worlds of concert hall and Broadway theatre.

This is not easy stuff to perform and, in fact, the performance seemed a bit scrappy in places but overall it was really very solid.

The evening concluded with Ravel’s La Valse, a work that began in 1911 as (to quote the composer) “a piece in the style of the earlier Strauss, not Richard” entitled simply Wein (Vienna). Before it could be completed, however, World War I (in which the composer served as a driver) intervened, and by the time La Valse was completed 1919, it had become “an impression of a fantastic whirl of destiny leading to death”. I can’t hear it without envisioning a huge, ornate machine spinning faster and faster until it hurls itself to pieces—as the complex structure of 19th-century Europe did in the so-called “war to end all wars”. Mr. Stare gave us a highly dramatic reading, complete with an appropriately hallucinatory finale.

The last time I saw Mr. Stare conduct a full program with the symphony (December 2nd of last year), I was impressed by the clarity of his communication with the orchestra and the intensity of his focus. This time around I was also struck by his very visceral style on the podium. He got quite an aerobic workout from this program and generated plenty of musical excitement in the process.

The post-season season at Powell Hall continues through June 22nd. Highlights include a James Bond film music program with vocalist Debbie Gravitte and conductor Michael Krazewski on June 2nd, and Classical Mystery Tour: A Tribute to the Beatles on the 22nd. For details on these and other “one of” events, you may visit stlsymphony.org.

Lee's summit

Who: Cellist Daniel Lee and The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra conducted by Peter Oundjian
What: Music of Smetana, Dvořák, and Tchaikovsky
Where: Powell Symphony Hall, St. Louis
When: April 20-22, 2012

[Download the complete St. Louis symphony program notes in PDF format]

If St. Louis Symphony Principal Cello Daniel Lee isn’t feeling extraordinarily pleased with himself right now, it must mean that his virtuosity is exceed only by his modesty. Certainly the spontaneous applause that burst forth after the first movement of the Dvořák Cello Concerto and the standing ovation at the end are the sorts of things guaranteed to gladden the heart and increase the self-esteem of any performer.

For that matter, Peter Oundjian can feel pretty proud of his impassioned reading of Smetana’s Šárka from Má vlast and a snappy Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 2 (Little Russian). It all made for an entertaining evening of late-19th century music with, to quote symphony program annotator Laurie Shulman, “an emphasis on native rhythms, harmonies, and melodies composed at a great distance from the music capitals of London, Paris, and Vienna.”

The cello doesn’t appear in the symphonic spotlight that often. It’s not that there aren’t concerti out there (although far fewer than for violin or piano), it’s just that most of them are relatively obscure. The Dvořák A minor concerto is probably the most popular—right up there with the Elgar—and justifiably so. Written during the composer’s final year in America, it’s a mature and deeply felt work of genuinely symphonic proportions. It’s also technically challenging without being superficially flashy. There are no cadenzas, for example, and the demands on the soloist’s technique arise naturally out of the concerto’s dramatic narrative.

To play this concerto well, then, you need not only nimble hands but also a warm heart. This is music of deep sorrow and overflowing joy. The soloist had better be open to all of it.

Mr. Lee has all that and then some. Sure, his performance on Friday night was technically proficient. But more importantly it was emotionally genuine. You could see the play of Dvořák’s feelings echoed on his face and in his body. He was, as we say in the theatre, completely in the moment and in tune with not only the music but with his fellow players as well. I have always loved this concerto, and Mr. Lee’s exemplary performance reminded me why.

The concert began and ended with a pair of virtuoso orchestral works. The opener, Smetana’s Šárka, is perhaps an unusual choice. It’s based on an incident from the legendary twelfth-century “Maiden’s War” in which the titular heroine seduces the warrior Ctirad and then, with the help of her fellow Amazons, slaughters him and his men in their sleep. Smetana’s tone painting is fairly literal (even including a snoring bassoon as the men fall asleep) and concludes with a particularly violent orchestral outburst. Mr. Oundjian’s interpretation made the most of the composer’s dynamic contrasts, with an especially hair-raising coda. I’d love to hear him tackle the entire Má vlast.

The evening concluded with Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 2, nicknamed the “Little Russian” for its use of folk material from the Ukraine (a.k.a. “Little Russia”). Tchaikovsky’s first three symphonies don’t get nearly the respect they deserve, in my view, so it was delightful to hear this one at Powell Hall for the first time in nearly twenty years.

The symphony abounds in flashy writing, especially for the winds, and the orchestra’s players were more than up to the task. Even Mr. Oundjian’s breakneck pace in the finale posed no challenge. Everything, including the cheerful little piccolo solo, came through with perfect clarity.

Mr. Oundjian, as I have noted in the past, appears to run a tight musical ship. His podium style is less aerobic than Mr. Robertson’s and more traditional in approach, with the right hand mostly keeping time with the baton and the left cueing soloists and shaping dynamics. The dynamic contrasts he shapes can be extreme, but to my ears they always make sense and serve the music well. He appears to have an excellent rapport with the musicians, which may be one of the reasons he has appeared so often here—and will be returning May 4 and 5.

Next at Powell Hall: The much-heralded “Rach Fest” Friday through Sunday, April 27-29, with Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 1 (Friday morning at 10:30) and Piano Concerto No. 2 (Saturday at 8 and Sunday at 3) along with Shostakovich’s youthful Symphony No. 1 and Rimski-Korsakov’s Op. 29 Skazka (“Fairy Tale”). Hans Graf is at the podium with Stephen Hough at the keyboard. For more information you may call 314-534-1700 or visit stlsymphony.org.