Symphony Review: "American Sounds" showcases musical and cultural diversity at the SLSO

This past Saturday, January 11^th, Opera Theatre’s Principal Conductor Daniela Candillari led the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra (SLSO) in a program consisting of “The School for Scandal Overture,” Op. 5, by Samuel Barber (1910–1981); the Symphony No. 9, Op. 95, “From the New World” by Antonín Dvořák (1841–1904); and the world premiere of the Accordion Concerto by contemporary American composer Nina Shekhar (b. 1995). As a powerful argument for the value of diversity, musical and otherwise, it was hard to beat.

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

Daniela Candillari
Photo courtesy of the SLSO

Written when Barber was still a student at the Curtis Institute in 1931, the “Overture” was intended not as a curtain raiser for a production of Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s 1777 comedy but rather as a stand-alone musical picture of the play’s themes. That made it an exemplary match for someone with Candillari’s extensive theatrical background. And, in fact, her reading strongly accented the emotional contrasts in Barber’s score, which ranges from the playful to the lushly romantic.

The strings and winds gave just the right pointillist punch to the spikey theme that surely represents the gossipy Sir Benjamin Backbite, while Cally Banham’s English horn warmly introduced the theme that reminds me of the May/December romance between Sir Peter and Lady Teazle. The Touhill’s concert hall doesn’t have a curtain, but this was nevertheless an excellent curtain raiser.

Shekhar’s concerto was up next. As Candillari told us from the podium Saturday night, this remarkable piece was the genesis of the entire program in that it’s the work of a young American composer (like Barber) that is strongly influenced by the music of a different culture (Bohemia, in Dvořák’s case). For Shekhar, a first-generation Indian American, that influence is the tradition of the musical form of the raga and the harmonium, a hand-pumped reed organ that is often used in Indian music. “I have always loved the accordion’s reedy timbre,” writes the composer, “particularly because it reminded me of the harmonium.”

Hanzhi Wang
Photo: Matt Dine

Given that Dvořák also wrote for the European harmonium (in his “Bagatelles,” Op. 47), that closes the circle.

The concerto opens with the unearthly sound of a wine glass stroked by wet fingers (the vérillon, the basis for Benjamin Franklin’s glass harmonica), backed up by bowed vibraphone. We hear the descending three-note motif (A-G-F) that will become the basis of the first half. This quickly becomes embedded in a musical mist reminiscent of Charles Ives’s “The Housatonic at Stockbridge.” Finally the accordion enters with elaborate riffs on the basic motif and everything slowly climbs one of several big orchestral summits before subsiding and finally going tacet to make way for a virtuoso cadenza for the accordion.

The music then shifts into a more anxious mood with a repeated motoric motif in the strings. The accordion picks it up, at which point it begins to sound not unlike the “train” sound so popular with blues harmonica players (not surprising, since both the accordion and harmonica produce their sound in essentially the same way). There’s another massive orchestral build that includes a variety of instrumental techniques (string harmonics, glissandi, tone clusters, etc.) once regarded as unconventional but that now seem to be part of every composer’s toolbox. It all fades away except for a sweet little duet for the accordion and viola (nicely done by Beth Guterman Chu), after which the concerto ends with accordion trills that slowly dwindle to silence.

Like many newer works for full, post-Wagner orchestra (80 players, more or less), the concerto makes major technical demands of the orchestra and conductor. Hats off to Candillari and the band for pulling this off with such assurance. The big climaxes still sounded, at least from my seat in the first floor boxes, like a Phil Spector “wall of sound” on steroids, so I can just imagine what a challenge it would be to both play and listen carefully in the orchestra.

A laurel wreath is also due soloist (and co-commissioner) Hanzhi Wang. Playing a high-end Pigini button accordion, she dazzled in the rapid solo passages and positively crooned in the more intimate moments. She and Shekhar worked closely on the development of the concerto so it’s perhaps not surprising that it fits her like a custom-tailored suit, but even so this was a stunning performance.

Nina Shekhar and Daniela Caldilari

As to the concerto itself, I’ll admit to initially finding it fascinating and even, in the more meditative first half, mesmerizing. The technical skill involved in creating the work was impressive, but it somewhat wore out its welcome for me before its 23 minutes (or thereabouts) were up. I would expect to see this making the rounds of many of the major orchestras for a while, but I’m not so sure of its long-term survival.

Like the Barber overture, Dvořák’s “New World” is a work of marked dramatic contrasts and here, again, I think Candillari’s operatic experience came in handy. Her change of emphasis for each appearance of the first movement’s lyrical second theme made it a kind of musical punctuation mark that added clarity to the symphonic structure. The Largo second movement, with its familiar English horn solo (nicely done by Cally Banham), had a strong sense of melancholic longing. The Allegro con fuoco finale was especially commanding, with a wide emotional range and fine playing all around.

The SLSO has a pretty solid history with the Dvořák Ninth in recent years, with world class performances by Stephanie Childress in 2022 and former Music Director David Robertson in 2014 and 2017. Candillari kept that tradition alive Saturday night.

Next at the SLSO: Music Director Stéphane Denève conducts an all-Ravel program Friday at 7:30 pm and Sunday at 3:00 pm, January 17 and 19. Kirill Gerstein is the soloist in the Concerto in G and the Concerto for the Left Hand. The orchestra opens the program with the “Mother Goose Suite” and concludes with the ever-popular “Bolero.” Performances take place at the Touhill Performing Arts Center. The Friday concert will be recorded for rebroadcast on Saturday, January 18, on St. Louis Public Radio and Classical 107.3.

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

Symphony Preview: New worlds, new sounds

The regular concert season of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra (SLSO)  resumes on this Friday and Saturday (January 10 and 11) as Opera Theatre’s Principal Conductor Daniela Candillari leads the orchestra in music by Dvořák and Samuel Barber, along with the world premiere of the Accordion Concerto by composer and multi-instrumentalist Nina Shekhar with Hanzhi Wang as the soloist.  The fact that this program is accurately titled “American sounds” tells you a lot about our nation's musical diversity.

[Preview the music with my Spotify playlist.]

The concerts open with the “School for Scandal,” composed by Samuel Barber (1910–1981) at the ripe old age of 21 (and finally performed two years later), when the composer was still a student at the Curtis Institute. Along with his 1935 “Music for a Scene from Shelley,” the overture established his reputation as an exponent of music that was “distinctive and modern but not experimental.”

Samuel Barber, photographed by
Carl Van Vechten, 1944
Public Domain

If you’re not familiar with the 1777 Sheridan comedy that inspired the music, fear not; the overture is an entertaining mix of sprightly and romantic themes that’s perfectly capable of standing on its own. Barber described it as “a musical reflection of the play’s spirit,” which is a mix of social satire, romantic misfires, and mistaken identities typical of late 18^th-century British comedies. The Encyclopedia Britannica has a plot summary for those interested.

Next, it’s the world premiere of the Accordion Concerto by contemporary American composer Nina Shekhar (b. 1995). Commissioned for accordionist (and this weekend’s soloist) Hanzhi Wang by Young Concert Artists and The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, the work runs around 23 minutes. “Writing this concerto,” says the composer, “was an exciting opportunity to learn more about this amazing instrument and allow its unique sound world and extensive technical capability to enrich my own musical vocabulary.”

To me, that vocabulary looks fairly rich already. Her official biography describes her as “a composer and multimedia artist who explores the intersection of identity, vulnerability, love, and laughter to create bold and intensely personal works.” A quick glance at her past projects reveals an artist with a wide range of interests and a willingness to embrace unorthodox techniques.

To pick just one example, her “Mad Libs,” commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic Youth Orchestra, adapts the “fill in the blanks” format of the vintage party game of the same name. The performers were given short stories and musical settings that contain “blanks.”  The students then filled in the story blanks with words of their choosing and came up with sounds that represented those words. 

Nina Shekhar
Photo: Shervin Laniez

Closer to home, her “Turn Your Feet Around” (2021), written for the new music group Alarm Will Sound and the Mizzou International Composers Festival (where the group is the ensemble in residence), deconstructs Gloria Estefan’s “Get on Your Feet.” Check out the video and don’t let yourself be fooled by the unexpected uses of silence.

Closing the concerts is the Symphony No. 9 in E minor, op. 95, (“From the New World”) by Antonín Dvořák. The Czech master wrote it during a visit to America in the early 1890s, and while he never explicitly quotes any American folk material, there's still something about this music that strongly suggests America. From the flute theme in the first movement that seems to echo "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," to the second movement Largo that has (at least for me) always evoked the majestic solitude of the plains (Dvořák said he wrote it after reading Longfellow's "Hiawatha"), to the "bluesy" flatted seventh chords of the finale, Dvořák "New World" symphony just shouts "USA"—even if it does so with a strong Czech accent.

Some critics have complained about the symphony's structural weaknesses and its episodic nature.  In an essay published posthumously in "The Symphony" (Penguin Books, 1967), English composer/conductor Julius Harrison noted that the work "has come in for considerable criticism as being mainly a succession of enchanting and virile tunes…presided over or helped out by a strongly rhythmic phrase bundled into each movement whenever Dvořák found himself wondering how best to proceed."

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

I beg to differ. As conductor Joshua Wallerstein pointed out in the episode of his “Sticky Notes” podcast dedicated to the Ninth, that “strongly rhythmic phrase” is not just something tossed in whenever Dvorak wasn’t sure what to do. In combination with the pentatonic scale on which it’s based, it is in fact the tiny acorn from which the mighty oak of the symphony grows. It's embedded in every single melodic idea (starting with the main theme of the first movement) and is the major unifying factor of the symphony. “[T]his piece is not only a heavily traditional symphony,” observes Wallerstein, “it’s practically through composed from its very first notes.”

Dvořák gets more respect than he used to these days. As a long-time fan of his music, I’m happy to see that.

P.S. This week’s playlist doesn’t have the Shekhar concerto since but it does have fine recordings of the Barber and Dvořák, both by the SLSO conducted by Leonard Slatkin.

The Essentials: Daniela Candillari conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra Friday at 10:30 am and Saturday at 7:30 pm, January 10 and 11. The program consists of Samuel Barber’s “The School for Scandal” Overture, the world premiere of Nina Shekhar’s Accordion Concerto with soloist Hanzhi Wang, and the Symphony No. 9 in E minor, Op. 95 (“From the New World”). Performances take place at the Touhill Performing Arts Center on the University of Missouri St. Louis campus. The Saturday concert will be broadcast live on St. Louis Public Radio and Classic 107.3

UPDATE Friday, January 10th: Due to the cancellation of the Friday morning concert, a second performance has been added on Saturday the 11th at 10:30 am. Details at the SLSO web site.. Check the web site for details.

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

Symphony Preview: Distant drums

In Act I, scene 1 of Shakespeare’s comedy “Much Ado About Nothing,” Leonato, the Governor of Messina, plays down his niece Beatrice’s insulting description of Benedick, saying that there is “a kind of merry war betwixt Signior Benedick and her. They never meet but there’s a skirmish of wit between them.”

[Preview the music with the SLSO's Spotify playlist.]

You can hear that wit in the opening measures of the work that opens the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra concerts this Friday and Saturday (March 22 and 23) as Music Director Stéphane Denève leads the band in a performance of the overture to Hector Berlioz's 1862 operatic treatment of “Much Ado About Nothing,” "Béatrice et Bénedict.” The short, playful opening theme immediately calls to mind the thrust and parry of the verbal duel that invariably begins when Beatrice and Benedick meet.

Berlioz in 1832
Painting by Émile Signol

Berlioz wrote the libretto himself (even though he neither spoke nor read English all that well), considerably condensing the original "battle of the sexes" comedy in the process. Huge swathes of plot were axed, along with great comic characters like Constable Dogberry to create what the composer called “a caprice written with a point of a needle.” Written just after the monumental “Les Troyens,” the opera had great success at its Baden-Baden premiere as well as in Weimar a few months later. There was no French performance until 1890, though, and "Béatrice et Bénedict.” has never really made it into the standard repertoire.

The overture has fared better in concert halls. It gets high marks for the skill with which Berlioz uses themes from his score to create a kind of vitamin pill version of the opera, with all the comedic and dramatic ingredients combined into a single eight-minute tone poem. “Though drawn from no less than six different arias or ensembles,” writes Michel Austin at The Hector Berlioz website, “the music is seamlessly fused by Berlioz into a coherent symphonic whole, much as Weber had done in his overtures to Der Freischütz, Euryanthe, and Oberon."

Julia Wolfe
Photo: Peter Serling

Up next is the local premiere of “Pretty” by contemporary American composer Julia Wolfe (b. 1958). A co-commission by the SLSO, Berlin Philharmonic (where the world premiere took place last June), Houston Symphony, and the Philadelphia Orchestra, the work’s title is frankly ironic. One might even say that it’s at war with the actual music which, based on the brief excerpts I’ve heard at the Berlin Philharmonic’s Digital Concert Hall, is a high-energy jamboree that’s anything but “pretty” in the conventional sense.

“The word ‘pretty’ has had a complicated relationship to women,” writes the composer on her website.  “It implies an attractiveness without any rough edges, without strength or power…My Pretty is a raucous celebration – embracing the grit of fiddling, the relentlessness of work rhythms, and inspired by the distortion and reverberation of rock and roll.”

War pops up once again as the backdrop for the work that concludes this weekend's concerts, Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 in E-flat major, op. 73 (“Emperor”). Indeed, the concerto was composed under the cloud of war and occupation.

When Beethoven was writing the concerto in 1809, Vienna was not so much the fabled “City of Dreams” as a metropolis of nightmares. The French laid siege to it with shelling so fierce that at one point the composer took refuge in his brother's house and covered his head with pillows to escape the din. The royal family—including Beethoven's friend and patron Archduke Rudolf—fled, along with many of the notable families with whom the composer had become close.

Left alone and, once the French occupation began, in difficult financial circumstances due to rapid inflation, Beethoven had little else to do but compose. The fifth concerto is probably the most famous work to emerge from this difficult period, although the Op. 81a piano sonata (“Les Adieux”) is probably a close second. Both were dedicated to Rudolph.

Beethoven
As if you didn't know.

Much has been written about the Concerto No. 5 and, in fact, the program notes this week (based on earlier notes by Paul Schiavo and Yvonne Frindle) provide quite a good map of the composer’s stunning musical landscape. The magisterial first movement, the wistful second, and the jolly concluding rondo all show Beethoven at his best.

The soloist this weekend is Tom Borrow (b. 2000), a 2024 Artist-In-Residence with the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra and winner of the Terence Judd-Hallé Orchestra Award 2023. His big professional break came in 2019, when he was called in at the last minute (the last 36 hours, to be precise) to replace Khatia Buniatishvili in a series of twelve concerts with the Israel Philharmonic. "Tom Borrow is already a star,” wrote Yossi Schiffman of the Israel Broadcasting Corporation, “and we will all surely hear more about him."

I was unable to locate anything by Borrow on Spotify but he does appear in several videos on YouTube, including the second and third movements of Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G major from that legendary 2019 concert.

The Essentials: Stéphane Denève conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and soloist Tom Borrow in the Piano Concerto No. 5 (“Emperor”) by Beethoven, along with the overture to "Béatrice et Bénedict” by Berlioz and the local premiere of “Pretty” by Julia Wolfe. Performances are Friday at 10:30 am and Saturday at 7:30 pm at the Touhill Performing Arts Center on the UMSL campus. The Saturday concert will be broadcast live on St. Louis Public Radio and Classic 107.3 and will be available for streaming for a limited time afterward at the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra site.

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

Symphony Review: A bright, sunshiny day at the opera with the SLSO

We’re still nearly three months away from opening night at Opera Theatre of St. Louis, but last Sunday (March 3) Stéphane Denève and the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra decided to “spring ahead” with a consistently entertaining afternoon of opera’s Greatest Orchestra Hits.

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

The program jumped into high gear immediately with the attention-grabbing fanfare of the “Toccata” from “L’Orfeo” by Claudio Monteverdi (1567–1643). It’s generally regarded as the first true opera, a musical genre that (in the words of Maestro Denève) “unites different cultures—which is what music does best.”

From there the concert proceeded more or less chronologically, starting with a pair of overtures to operas based on plays by the multi-talented playwright Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais (1732–1799): “The Marriage of Figaro” by Wolfgang Mozart (1756–1791) and “The Barber of Seville by Gioachino Rossini (1793–1868).  

“Figaro” is, as Denève pointed out, an international work. “Figaro” has a libretto adapted from a French play by Lorenzo da Ponte (born in Venice, died in New York) and music by an Austrian composer; and although it was first performed in Vienna, it became an actual hit in Prague. The fleet-footed reading of this lively work Sunday combined the SLSO’s big sound with the kind of grace and precision that you’d expect from a Mozart-sized orchestra.

Melissa Brooks
Photo courtesy of the SLSO 

The ”Barber” overture was just as brisk and bright. Both works had nifty solo passages by, among others, Jelena Dirks (oboe), Andrea Kaplan (flute), Thomas Jöstlein (horn), Andrew Cuneo (bassoon), and Erin Svoboda-Scott (clarinet). The strings lightly tripped through their parts like Fred Astaire.

Next was the Intermezzo from "Manon Lescaut" Giacomo Puccini (1858–1924. In it, we hear the journey of Manon to the gloomy prison at Le Havre, where she and other disgraced women are being exiled to New Orleans. Opening with quiet solos for cello and viola (played with great sensitivity by Daniel Lee and Beth Guterman Chu, respectively), the work rises to a despairing cri de cœur for full orchestra that, in Denève’s hands, conveyed a powerful emotional impact. It was a reminder that Denève began his career on the operatic stage and has retained his exceptional ability to tell musical stories.

After the first of several stage changes (which Denève humorously described as “the violins going on strike”), Associate Principal Cello Melissa Brooks took center stage for an arrangement for cello and orchestra by (I think) Mathieu Herzog of “Casta Diva” from “Norma” by Vincenzo Bellini (1801–1835). Brooks handled the vocal line’s ornamentation with grace and a singing tone. She even dressed for the role with a flowing white top and matching pants that suggested the robe a priestess of the Druidic moon goddess like that which Norma might wear.

The first half of the program concluded with the familiar strains of the “Dance of the Hours” from “La Gioconda” by Amilcare Ponchielli (1834–1886). If you can block out the animation from Disney’s “Fantasia” and/or the voice of Alan Sherman, it’s possible to appreciate what a skillfully constructed and unfailingly melodic work it is. From the delicate violin figures of the opening “Dawn” section to the invigorating con brio of the concluding “Night,” Denève and the band delivered the delightful goods, including many great moments for the high winds.

The second half of the concert opened with another overture, this time to the 1866 opéra comique “Mignon” by Ambroise Thomas (1811–1896). Denève pointed out that in its time “Mignon” was one of the three most popular operas in France, the other two being Gounod’s “Faust” and Bizet’s “Carmen.” These days “Mignon” is remembered only by this lyrical and vivacious overture.

There are extended solos here: clarinet, flute, horn, and harp expertly rendered by, respectively, Scott Andrews, Matthew Roitstein, Roger Kaza, and Katie Ventura. They’re all highly “exposed” (i.e., little or no orchestral accompaniment), so they only work when played with the kind of skill we heard Sunday afternoon.

Next it was a nod and a wink from the podium followed by a spirited “Les Toréadors” from the first of the two orchestral suites assembled by Ernest Guiraud from the score for the aforementioned “Carmen” by Georges Bizet (1838–1875). Then there was another “violin strike” to set the stage for the program’s second soloist, SLSO Associate Concertmaster Erin Schreiber.

Erin Schreiber
Photo courtesy of the SLSO

She was there to perform the 1883 “Carmen Fantasy” for violin and orchestra by the Spanish violinist/composer Pablo de Sarasate. A performer of legendary skill, Sarasate stuffed this mini concerto with technical challenges, including an elaborately ornamented version of the famous “Habanera” and the insanely fast finale, based on the Act II “Danse bohème.” Schreiber has performed this with the SLSO twice in the past (most recently in 2021) but this time was different in that she was using her new violin.

In a talk-back session after the concert, Schreiber related that she had been looking for a new instrument for around five years. Her old violin had served her well for two decades, but she felt that she needed something “a little more powerful.” Last summer she found it: a 1753 Carlo Landolfi. “The moment I played a few notes on it,” she recalled, “I just knew that it was the one.”

 “Violinists,” it has been said, “have special relationships with their instruments, almost like marriages.” Based on Schreiber’s drop-dead stunning performance Sunday, I’d say she has found the right musical partner.  The “Habanera” was seductive, the harmonics crystal clear in the Lento assai vocalise that is Carmen’s teasing response to her arrest, and the frenetic “Danse bohème” was a virtuoso fireworks display. The applause, not surprisingly, was thunderous.

Like Melissa Brooks, Schreiber came costumed for her role. In her case, it was the same long, high-necked red Spanish-style lace dress that she wore in 2021. What could be more appropriate for Carmen?

All too soon, it was time for the finale: a double scoop of Jacques Offenbach (1819–1880): the “Barcarolle” from his “Les contes Hoffmann” (“The Tales of Hoffman,” left unfinished at his death) and selections from the last four numbers from the 1938 ballet “Gaîté Parisienne,” assembled from Offenbach’s operas by French composer/conductor Manuel Rosenthal (1904–2003).

The “Barcarolle” was sweet and lilting, but the selections from the ballet were the real hit, concluding as they did with the “Galop infernal” (a.k.a. “The Can-Can”) from Offenbach’s first hit “Orfée aux enfers” (“Orpheus in the Underworld”) from 1858. Based on this amuse bouche I’d love to hear Denève conduct the complete ballet someday, but meanwhile this was a delightful way to bring the afternoon to a close. Denève encored the “Can-Can,” encouraging the audience to clap along the way the Viennese do to the “Radetzky March” on New Year’s Day. Only a true curmudgeon could fail to join in.

It is, perhaps, somewhat unreasonable to expect music to unite our culturally fragmented world. But after a concert like this one, it at least felt possible. The way things are going these days, I’ll settle for that.

Note: The concert was recorded and will be broadcast on Saturday, March 9, at 7:30 pm on St. Louis Public Radio and Classic 107.3. It will also be available for a limited time afterwards at the SLSO web site.

Next from the SLSO: Anthony Parnther conducts the orchestra for a showing of the Disney film “Encanto” Saturday and Sunday at 2 pm, March 9 and 10. The regular season returns Saturday at 7:30 pm and Sunday at 3 pm, March 16 and 17, as Stéphane Denève conducts the orchestra in “Picture Studies” by contemporary American composer Adam Schoenberg and selections from the ballet “Romeo and Juliet” by Prokofiev. The Big Muddy Dance Company will perform choreography created for the occasion by Kirven Douthit-Boyd. Both programs take place at the Sifel Theatre downtown.

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

St. Louis classical calendar for the week of January 27, 2020

Music for a variety of different ensembles is available for your listening pleasure this week, from a trombone group to the full orchestra with piano soloist.

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The Chamber Music Society of St. Louis

The Chamber Music Society of St. Louis presents Mozartiana, a concert of chamber music by Mozart, Monday and Tuesday, January 27 and 28 at 7:30 pm. The performances take place at the Sheldon Concert Hall in Grand Center. For more information: chambermusicstl.org.

The Community Music School of Webster University presents the Young People's Concert Orchestra on Sunday, February 2, at 2 pm. The Community Music School is at 535 Garden Avenue on the Webster University campus. For more information: webster.edu/cms.

The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra presents a Pulitzer Series concert on Tuesday and Wednesday January 28 and 29, at 7:30 PM. The concert features contemporary chamber works performed by members of the string section of the SLSO. The performance takes place at the Pultzer Center for the Arts, 3716 Washington. Note that the January 28 concert is currently sold out. For more information: stlsymphony.org.

Pianist Saleem Ashkar

Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider conducts The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, along with pianist Saleem Ashkar on Friday at 10:30 am Saturday at 8 pm, January 31 and February 1. The program consists of Schmnann's Manfred Overture, Mendelssohn's Piano Concerto No. 2, and a suite from Tchaikovsky's Sleeping Beauty ballet. Performances take place at Powell Symphony Hall in Grand Cente. For more information: stlsymphony.org.

Second Presbyterian Church presents The Trombones of the St. Louis Symphony on Sunday, February 2, at 4 pm. "The Trombones will present works they have commissioned from composers with strong St. Louis roots including Caleb Burhans (Alarm Will Sound) and Adam Maness (The 442s). They also will perform their own arrangements of works by Giovanni Gabrieli, Sergei Prokofiev, and others." The church is at 4501 Westminster Place in the Central West End. For more information: secondchurch.net.

The Sheldon Concert Hall presents St. Louis Symphony Principal Flute Mark Sparks, along with cellist Valentina Takova and pianist Peter Henderson, in a chamber music concert on Wednesday, January 29, at 8 pm. The program includes music by Bach, Phillippe Gaubert, and Verne Reynolds. The performance takes place at the Sheldon Concert Hall in Grand Center. For more information: thesheldon.org.

The University City Symphony Orchestra presents Slavic Soul on Sunday, November 24, at 3 pm, with a pre-concert talk at 2:15 pm. "Please join us in celebrating Slavic cultures with Russian violist Ivan Numerov. Mr. Numerov will excite audiences as he performs Niccolò Paganini's Violin Concerto No. 4, arranged for viola by E. Petrov. Also on the concert will be Ludwig van Beethoven's overture to The Creatures of Prometheus, and Wind Serenade by Antonín Dvorák” The performance takes place at the 560 Music Center, 560 Trinity in University City. For more information: ucso.org.

Pianist Aaron Diehl

The Department of Music at Washington University presents pianist Aaron Diehl in a concert of music by American composers on Friday, January 31, at 7:30 pm.   The program includes works by Copland, Gershwin, James P. Johnson, Duke Ellington and Jelly Roll Morton, and takes place in the E. Desmond Lee Concert Hall at the 560 Music Center, 560 Trinity in University City. For more information: https://music.wustl.edu/events.

The Department of Music at Washington University presents contemporary chamber group Alarm Will Sound on Saturday, February 1, at 7:30 pm.  "The program includes music by A. Pyper and Lucrecia Dalt as well as Hexactinellida by Chelsea Komschlies. A. Pyper joins Alarm Will Sound as singer and violinist for the world premiere of her new work, Descansos. Descansos are roadside memorials that mark where a loved one has died. Pyper’s work reflects on the composer’s own life experience growing up as a gay woman in a Mormon family, and trying to mark and move on from those spots in life where loss and trauma have occurred." The concert takes place in the E. Desmond Lee Concert Hall at the 560 Music Center, 560 Trinity in University City. For more information: https://music.wustl.edu/events.

Review: New kids on the block

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

Karina Canellakis
Photo: Chris Christodoulou

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This weekend's St. Louis Symphony Orchestra concerts gave us some notable local debuts, both on the stage and on the page.

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

On stage, Saturday night's concert (January 19, 2019) was a triumph for guest conductor Karina Canellakis, the newly appointed Chief Conductor of the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra. In her first appearance with the orchestra, she showed an impressive grasp of a wide range of music, from Mozart's 1775 Violin Concerto No. 5 ("Turkish") to Paul Hindemith's 1944 "Symphonic Metamorphosis on Themes of Carl Maria von Weber." In his own local debut, Ray Chen (a last-minute substitute for an ailing Renaud Capuçon) made an equally strong impression as the soloist in the Mozart.

On the page, the new kid in town was Richard Strauss's "Symphonic Fantasy from Die Frau ohne Schatten." First performed in 1919 but making its first appearance with the SLSO, this 22-minute orchestral synthesis of scenes from the composer's massive fairy tale opera neatly captures the drama and fantastic atmosphere of the original. It's a typically Straussian exercise in orchestral excess, with over 100 musicians (including an expanded percussion section and an organ) delivering a captivating kaleidoscope of orchestral color.

It was all beautifully played and conducted with great authority by Ms. Canellakis, whose interpretation provided a cohesive view of this potentially very episodic work. In an interview for the SLSO program, she describes the music of "Die Frau ohne Schatten" ("The Woman Without a Shadow") as "unbelievable, impressive, and beguiling." You could hear that happy enthusiasm for the music in every minute of this stunning performance.

Ray Chen
Photo: John Mac

I heard and saw that same joy and sense of fun in the way both she and Mr. Chen delivered the Mozart concerto. The last of the composer's violin concertos, the Fifth is filled with unexpected turns of phrase, including the so-called "Turkish" interlude of the finale in which the cellos and basses strike their strings, col legno, to produce an exotic percussive effect. This was an interpretation that bubbled over with sheer delight in music making, and it was impossible not to smile in response. A violinist herself, Ms. Canellakis clearly had a strong connection with both this work and with Mr. Chen.

Enthusiastic applause moved Mr. Chen to return to the stage and play an encore: Paganini's Caprice No. 21--a nice contrast to the Mozart and expertly played.

The concert opened with a performance of Beethoven's "Lenore Overture No. 3" that covered a wide emotional range, from the hushed introduction to a coda that crackled with energy. Ms. Canellakis's conducting was incisive, with neatly shaped phrases and a fine sense of the drama of this very theatrical work. Associate Principal Tom Drake provided the authoritative offstage trumpet.

The evening ended with a virtuoso romp through the Hindemith "Metamorphosis." Originally intended (but never used) as a ballet score, the four-movement work is, like the Strauss piece that preceded it on the program, a riot of vivid orchestral color. Hindemith's transformations on Weber's original themes is striking in its originality and filled with great solo moments, performed with great polish here by (among others) Principal Flute Mark Sparks, Principal Oboe Jelena Dirks, and Principal Clarinet Scott Andrews. The brass section was in fine form, as was the percussion section, most notably in the "Chinoiserie" of the second movement, based on themes from incidental music for Schiller's play "Turandot."

It's always a pleasure to see new, young performers at Powell Hall. Based on their strong showing Saturday night, I would think both Ms. Canellakis and Mr. Chen would be strong contenders for more appearances with the SLSO in the future.

Next at Powell Hall: Gemma New conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra in "Star Wars: A New Hope in Concert" Thursday through Saturday at 7 pm, and Sunday at 2 pm, January 24-27. Performances take place at Powell Hall in Grand Center. At this time, only "limited view" tickets are available.

Symphony Preview: Known unknowns

Beethoven by Joseph Karl Stieler, 1820

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It's an all-German program this weekend (January 18 and 19, 2019) as guest conductor Karina Canellakis leads the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and violinist Renaud Capuçon in an evening of music by Beethoven, Mozart, Richard Strauss, and Paul Hindemith. The names are familiar to most music lovers, but some of the program might not be.

The concerts open, appropriately, with an overture. Specifically, it's the second of four overtures Beethoven wrote for his opera "Fidelio" (originally titled "Lenore") so, naturally, it's known as the "Lenore" Overture No. 3.
Allow me to explain.

With a libretto adapted from Pierre Gaveaux's 1798 opera "Léonore, ou L'amour conjugal," Beethoven's opera is the story of Lenore's efforts to free her husband Florestan from a political prison by disguising herself as a guard named Fidelio. In fact, management at the Theater an der Wein, where the opera was first performed, insisted on changing the name from "Lenore" to "Fidelio" to avoid confusion with the earlier opera.

With each production, "Fidelio" got a new overture. The overture now labeled "Lenore" No. 2 was actually the one performed at the first production in 1805. An 1806 revision got the overture we'll hear this weekend, "Lenore" No. 3. A planned performance in Prague in 1808 never happened, but the revised overture was discovered after the composer's death and labeled "Lenore" No. 1 on the mistaken belief that it was his first attempt. These days when the opera is performed, it's in the 1814 revision.

Of the four overtures, "Lenore" No. 3 gets the most attention, primarily because it's the one that best encapsulates the story of the opera. As Michael Steinberg writes in notes for the San Francisco Symphony, it's "too strong a piece and too big, even too dramatic, to be an effective introduction for a stage action, something that Beethoven realized almost at once. It does, however, stand as one of the great emblems of the heroic Beethoven, a potent and controlled musical embodiment of a noble humanistic passion." In short, what works as a concert opener doesn't necessarily work as an opera opener.

Mozart, ahead of his time

Up next is Mozart's Violin Concerto No. 5 ("Turkish"), performed by Ray Chen. It's a late substitute for the originally scheduled Schumann Violin Concerto due to the illness of the original soloist, Renaud Capuçon. The last and most sophisticated of Mozart's violin concertos, the fifth is, as Blair Johnson points out at Allmusic.com , a forward-looking piece "very nearly in line with the instrumental concerto of the next century":

Though the piece itself is clearly within the Classical chamber concerto tradition, its scale (better than 25 minutes, usually) and the degree of its technical demands mark the work as something new for the violin. Many pieces with equal or greater raw physical demands had already been composed by the time of the Concerto No. 5, but none of them has survived the test of time, and certainly none is as formidable a piece of music -- it is not without reason that this is the only one of the five to regularly receive as much attention from musicologists and historians as do the crown jewels of Mozart's piano concerto catalog. A warhorse of the student repertory and a staple of the professional's diet, this may well be the most frequently played violin concerto ever written.

Regarding this weekend's soloist, Ray Chen began to attract attention when he won First Prize in the 2008 Yehudi Menuhin and 2009 Queen Elisabeth Competitions for young violinists. Since then he has appeared with orchestras in Europe, Asia, and North America. This season his schedule includes the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Singapore Symphony Orchestra, and the Barcelona Symphony Orchestra.

Richard Strauss in 1938

Up next is Richard Strauss's "Symphonic Fantasy from Die Frau Ohne Schatten" composed in 1946 and based on themes from his 1919 opera "Die Frau Ohne Schatten" ("The Woman Without a Shadow"). Like "Fidelio," the opera has a troubled history. The complex fairy tale libretto by Strauss's frequent collaborator Hugo von Hofmannsthal tended to leave audiences cold, and the serious technical demands of the work placed it outside the capabilities of all but the most well heeled companies.

"If ever an opera was weighed down by its creators' joint ambition," writes John Shirley in a review of the Royal Opera's 2014 production, "it is Die Frau ohne Schatten." Strauss and Hofmannsthal saw the work as their masterpiece but "it turned into a complex and unwieldy embarrassment of riches, albeit a glorious one. The charge that this enormous fairy tale represents the librettist and composer at their most pretentious and overblown is difficult to refute."

The "Fantasy," in any case, captures the drama and fantastic atmosphere of the opera in a mere 22 minutes and without the need for elaborate scenery. Besides, Tim Munro's program notes provide a handy breakdown of the themes used and their placement in the opera. The music requires a great orchestra but, of course, we already have that.

Paul Hindemith, age 28

A great orchestra is also a requirement for the last work on the program, Paul Hindemith's "Symphonic Metamorphosis on Themes by Carl Maria von Weber." Originally intended as a ballet for the dancer and choreographer Léonide Massine, the work became a purely symphonic piece when Hindemith and Massine were unable to agree on its final format.

The Weber originals transformed by Hindemith are three piano duets and, in the second movement Scherzo, the overture to Schiller's play "Turandot," an Italian translation of which would later become the basis for Puccini's opera of the same name. Hindemith's reworking of this relatively modest material is striking and colorful. As D. Kern Holoman of the University of California at Davis writes:

The Weber originals serve as mere starting points for Hindemith's invention. Both the first and the last movements are marches, by turns whimsical and rambunctuous; both begin simply with Weber's tunes and transform themselves -metamorphose -into intricate display as the role of Hindemith's countermelodies grows ever more significant. The lovely Andantino, based on a Weber siciliana, consists of increasingly ornamented treatments of the melody first begun in the clarinet; the restatement is dominated by an obbligato for solo flute. The big movement, however, is the Chinese scherzo, where the simple tune works itself into a perpetual motion, ever grander in dimension. The wind and percussion work is for a time in the style of the Turkish band, with brash trills in the woodwind, snare drum, and triangle. When the percussion take over completely it is as though some huge musical clock has come unsprung, the last section discombobulating into irregular cycles of the constituent parts in multiple meters.

Not surprisingly, the percussion section of the orchestra will be a large one for this work, with six musicians (including Principal Tympani Shannon Wood and Principal Percussion William James) banging away at timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, small cymbals, triangle, tambourine, small gong, wood block, tom-tom, glockenspiel, and chimes. Back in the day, this work was a favorite for audio enthusiasts looking to show off their stereo systems.

The Essentials: Karina Canellakis conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and violinist Ray Chen Friday at 10:30 am and Saturday at 8 pm, January 18 and 19. The concerts take place at Powell Symphony Hall, 718 North Grand in Grand Center.

Review: London pride

Conductor Michael Francis
Photo by Marco Borggreve

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It has been a few years since my wife and I have been to London, but I feel like we took another visit there Friday night (November 23) with that wonderfully evocative performance of Vaughan Williams's "A London Symphony" by the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra under the baton of guest conductor Michael Francis.

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

A native of Great Britain and a former double bass player with the London Symphony Orchestra, Mr. Francis presumably knows well the city that inspired Vaughan Williams and, in fact, his short pre-performance talk was both entertaining and enlightening. It hadn't occurred to me, for example, that the march theme in the final movement might have been inspired by the sight of British troops marching off to war, but given that the work was first performed in 1915 it makes sense.

Vaughan Williams went to some lengths to point out that while "A London Symphony" was suggested by London it was not literally descriptive of it. "The title A London Symphony, he wrote, "may suggest to some hearers a descriptive piece, but this is not the intention of the composer. A better title would perhaps be 'Symphony by a Londoner'". Even so, I can't hear it without thinking of both my visits to the city itself and the misty paintings Monet did of it (and which the composer likely knew).

Performances of "A London Symphony" usually run around 45 minutes, but Mr. Francis's take on the piece was so well paced and compelling that it seemed to fly by. This was one of those performances during which I took almost no notes because I was so swept up in the experience. It was as though Vaughan Williams were speaking to us directly, without an intermediary.

The high quality of the orchestral playing had something to do with that, of course. The string sound was solid as always and there were notable solos by Cally Banham on English horn and Beth Guterman Chu on viola. The trumpets under Associate Principal Thomas Drake and the horns under Principal Roger Kaza were also in fine form.

The concert opened with an equally vivid reading of Elgar's "In the South (Alassio)," a lavish, sweeping tone poem that is the composer's love letter to Italy in general and in particular to the Italian Rivera town where he and his wife were vacationing in the winter of 1903-1904. The leaping opening theme, which Elgar described as "Joy of living (wine and macaroni)," bubbled with good cheer, the lumbering march inspired by "strife and wars" was suitably ominous, and the evocation of the Neapolitan popular song in the central viola tune was rendered beautifully by Beth Guterman Chu.

Joshua Bell

Mr. Francis conducted with big, fluid gestures that mirrored the wide dramatic range of his interpretation. This was a bold and varied performance that perfectly captured the many moods of this colorful work.

Sandwiched between these two large-scale works, Bruch's 1866 Violin Concerto No. 1 felt like a piece of more modest charms, but no less appealing for all that. It's warm, heartfelt, and utterly irresistible music, and it got an intense and very physically demonstrative interpretation from superstar violinist Joshua Bell.

Mr. Bell made his Carnegie Hall debut performing the Bruch concerto with the SLSO back in 1985 at the tender age of 17, so Friday night's performance had a special resonance. It was certainly an exuberant one, in which the space set aside for the soloist at the conductor's left seemed barely able to contain Mr. Bell's extroverted approach. The music combines virtuoso flash with heartfelt emotion, and Mr. Bell found plenty of both in his technically flawless presentation. Multiple curtain calls led, inevitably, to an encore: a short, flashy selection from John Corigliano's score for the 1998 film "The Red Violin."

The concert repeats tonight at 8 pm and Sunday at 3 pm (November 24 and 25). Next weekend, John Storgårds conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and pianist Ingrid Fliter Friday at 10:30 am and Saturday at 8 pm, November 30 and December 1. The program consists of Mendelssohn's Piano Concerto No. 1 and Bruckner's Symphony No. 9. All performances take place at Powell Hall in Grand Center.

Symphony Preview: Mozart in sunshine and shadow

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David Robertson

It's another big all-Mozart weekend at the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, with two completely different programs: one for the 10:30 a.m. "Coffee Concert" (with Krispy Kreme doughnuts!) on Friday the 29th and another for Saturday at 8:00 p.m. and Sunday at 3:00 p.m., September 30th and October 1st.

David Robertson will conduct both programs, which will feature the same soloist as last weekend, the redoubtable Emanuel Ax. That means that piano concertos will again be prominently featured.. Expect four of them this time: No. 14 in E-flat major, K. 449 on Friday; No. 16 in D major, K. 45 and No. 17 in G major, K. 453 on Saturday and Sunday; and No. 20 in D minor, K. 466 on Friday.

The first three, like the last week's Concerto No. 19, date from 1784, an immensely productive year in Mozart's life when he was celebrated and a rising young composer and pianist in Vienna, while No. 20 was written the following year. He knocked out the 14th through 17th concertos in two months, in fact-between February 9th and April 10th. Even for a composer who famously dashed off music as though (to cite an image from Peter Shaffer's Amadeus) he were taking dictation from God, that's pretty impressive. "Composing," as John Suchet notes in a new Mozart biography, "was Mozart's way of breathing."

And they're really, really good concertos to boot. "While no man can accurately be referred to as the inventor of a musical form," write Brockway and Weinstock in Men of Music, "Mozart did such a perfect job of fusing and adapting certain elements he found at hand that the classical concerto for piano and orchestra may be regarded as his achievement." He created works that were simultaneously entertaining and insightful, despite the fact the only two years earlier he had dismissed the entire genre a letter to his father as requiring music that was "either so simple a coachman could sing it, or so unintelligible that audiences like it simply because no sane person could understand it."

For me, the giant among these four concertos is No. 20. It's gripping, menacing, and filled with the kind of high drama that audiences would come to love so much in the ensuing decades of the 19th century. Beethoven loved this concerto, performing it often and composing two cadenzas for it, Mozart's own having been lost to history. It is, in fact, sufficiently "modern" for its time that Viennese audiences might have been put off by it, had it not been the work of a man who was at the peak of popularity. "The composer-pianist was at the time still the idol of Viennese society," writes former Los Angeles Times music critic Herbert Glass, "his audiences willing to accept anything that flew from his pen, even so uncharacteristic a score as the Concerto in D minor-if Mozart were also the performer."

The final work on the Friday's program-Mozart's Symphony No. 39 in E-flat major, K. 543-is the first of a set of three that the composer dashed off in the summer of 1788. Nobody is really certain of the source of what Arthur V. Berger (in a New York City Symphony program note) called the "sudden efflorescence of inspiration" that produced Mozart's last and, in the estimation of many writers, greatest symphonies, but the results speak (or rather sing) for themselves.

K. 543 gets less attention than the other two, much as a normal human being would be less noticed standing next to a pair of NFL linebackers, but that doesn't make it any less a great composition. "This symphony," writes musicologist Andrew Firmer, "is...a prime example of the composer's genius that he is not only able to conjure up melodies, but weave them with apparent contradictions that seem to connect with impossible ease." Those contradictions include Mozart's assimilation of the contrapuntal techniques he got from the music of Bach and Handel. "It was this synthesis of 'learned' style with the clean clarity of classicism," writes Brian Robins at allmusic.com, "that caused so much trouble for Mozart's contemporaries, to whom his late style became increasingly 'difficult.'" Today, with over two centuries of hindsight, it's clear that this "difficult" music is both ingeniously complex and wonderfully clear.

Concluding the Saturday concert is the second member of that titanic trio, the Symphony No. 40 in G minor, K. 550. Like the Concerto No. 20, it's urgent and forward-looking, which may be one reason why it's one of the composer's most popular works. It has also produced a wide variety of responses from critics and Mozart biographers. Some, like Charles Rosen in his legendary tome The Classical Style, have emphasized its obvious dark and brooding moods while, others have noted what Robert Schumann called its “Grecian lightness and grace.” Personally, I tend to come down on the “dark and brooding” side. Like Mr. Rosen, I see it as "a work of passion, violence, and grief."

Interestingly, the noted early music authority Nikolas Harnoncourt is of the opinion that Mozart ultimately intended his last three symphonies to be heard as a single, twelve-movement work. He recorded them that way in 2014, in a two-disc set that The Guardian's Andrew Clements describes as "thrillingly well played." Hearing all three over the course of two weekends (the orchestra did No. 41 last weekend) might not be quite the same as encountering them back to back, but it's something to consider when you go to Powell Hall this weekend.

Each of the upcoming programs opens with an opera overture. Friday it's the lively opener for the 1790 comedy Così fan tutte (an idiomatic phrase that roughly translates as "they're all like that") about a pair of soldiers who decide to test their fiancées' fidelity, with embarrassing results all the way around. Saturday and Sunday it's the more weighty overture to Don Giovanni from three years earlier. Mozart supposedly dashed it off at the last minute, but you'd hardly know that from the neat way it shifts the mood from portentous drama to skipping comedy in its seven-minute length.

The Essentials: David Robertson conducts The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, with pianist Emanuel Ax, in an all-Mozart program Friday at 10:30 a.m., Saturday at 8:00 p.m., and Sunday at 3:00 p.m., September 29 - October 1. The Friday concert features the Piano Concertos Nos. 14 and 20 and the Symphony No. 39. Saturday and Sunday the program will feature the Concertos Nos. 16 and 17 and the Symphony No. 40. The Performance takes place at Powell Hall in Grand Center. For more information: stlsymphony.org.

Review: A gripping performance of Shostakovich's final symphony by Andrey Boreyko and the St. Louis Symphony

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

Conductor Andrey Boreyko
Photo: Richard de Stoutz

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

“It's not where you start”, runs a Dorothy Fields lyric from the 1973 musical Seesaw, “it's where you finish. It's not how you go, it's how you land.” If the fifteenth and final symphony by Dmitri Shostakovich is any indication, the great Russian composer's own landing was bleak and despairing, but this past weekend's performance (Saturday, January 21) by the dynamic Russian conductor Andrey Boreyko and the St. Louis Symphony was gripping nevertheless.

That's impressive because Shostakovich's Symphony No. 15 in A major-written in 1971 from a hospital bed as the composer was being treated for the lung cancer that would kill him four years later-is not easy music for the listener or the performers.

For the musicians, the Shostakovich fifteenth consistently calls for nothing but the best playing. That's because, although written for large orchestra with a massive percussion section, the symphony contains long stretches of delicately scored passages for solo instruments or small ensembles. There's nowhere to hide for musicians who aren't top drawer.

For the listener, the challenge is to accept the music's many outpourings of anguish without being overwhelmed by them. This was the final big statement by a man who had survived all the horror the Soviet Union could throw at him, and it's filled with remembered desolation. Uplifting socialist realism is nowhere to be found.

Fortunately, the musicians of the St. Louis Symphony were more than up to the challenges Shostakovich created. Under Mr. Boreyko's skilled baton-or just his hands, for the more delicate passages-they played their hearts out in flawless, virtuoso performances.

There was wonderful work here by Principal Flute Mark Sparks (most notably in the first movement), Principal Clarinet Scott Andrews, and Principal Bassoon Andrew Cuneo. Ditto Principal Trombone Timothy Myers in his long second movement solo. In that same movement, Principal Cello Daniel Lee brought out all the anguish in the solo that pushes the instrument to the very top of its range. Concertmaster David Halen demonstrated his skill in multiple passages, as did Principal Bass Erik Harris.

Shostakovich gives an important role to the percussion section, mostly notably in the enigmatic coda in which castanets, snare drum, wood block, xylophone, and triangle clatter away in what sounds to me like a reference to the hospital machinery that was probably in the background as the symphony was written. Principal William James and the rest of his crew brought it all to life brilliantly.

For his part, Mr. Boreyko—who made such a strong impression here in 2012 and 2014—pulled everything together in an absolutely riveting interpretation that honored both the sound and the silence of Shostakovich's enigmatic sonic tapestry. The pain, the nostalgia, and the sarcasm all came through powerfully. So did the dark humor of the first movement (originally subtitled "The Toyshop") with its not-quite-funny quotes from Rossini's William Tell Overture. And the final percussion toccata was appropriately chilling. Mr. Boreyko paused at the end just long enough for everyone to hear the silence.

Pianist Till Fellner
Photo: Ben Ealovega

The concerts opened with a positively dynamic reading of that Rossini overture, distinguished by a fine cello solo from Daniel Lee and an especially fiery coda that accelerated to a breakneck finish. I think it must be difficult to put one's own stamp on a piece as famous (and frequently parodied) as the William Tell Overture, but Mr. Boreyko did so nevertheless.

Between the Rossini and Shostakovich, Mr. Boreyko and soloist Till Fellner gave us a delightfully crisp and graceful performance of the Piano Concerto No. 2 in B-flat major, Op. 19, by Beethoven. Written before but published after the Concerto No. 1, it marks the beginning of Beethoven's dual careers as pianist and composer of concerti for his instrument of choice. The influences of Mozart and Haydn are easy to hear, but ultimately it's all Beethoven. That's particularly obvious in the dramatic cadenza, written around 14 years after the concerto.

Soloist Till Fellner did especially well by that cadenza, positively burning up the keyboard. He and Mr. Boreyko were every bit as compelling in the rest of their performance, which included a heartfelt Adagio and a glittering, jolly Rondo finale. Mr. Fellner's program bio refers to his "scrupulous musi¬cianship, purity of style, and sparkling key¬board command" and, while it's usually best to take such things with a grain of salt, I have to say I heard all of those qualities in this very gratifying reading.

Next at Powell Hall: David Robertson conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and trumpet soloist Håkan Hardenberger on Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m., January 27-29. The program consists of Beethoven's Seventh Symphony, Copland's Appalachian Spring Suite, and the local premiere of Fisher King (Trumpet Concerto) by contemporary Norwegian composer Rolf Wallin. The concerts take place at Powell Symphony Hall, 718 North Grand in Grand Center.

Review: Nan-Ha Chang lights up an all-Russian program

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

Han-Na Chang

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In a laudatory review of Han-Na Chang's Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Op. 64, with the Oslo Philharmonic earlier this year, critic Lars O. Fyldal called her "one of this generation's most exciting conductors." Having heard her interpretation of the Fifth with the St. Louis Symphony this past Friday (November 5, 2016), I'm inclined to agree.

Like the symphonies that bracket it, the Fifth deals with the composer's obsession with fate and his attempt to find happiness despite his depression and the stress of being gay in Czarist Russia. It's less structurally coherent than the sixth or (especially) the fourth symphonies, but its triumphant final pages have a power that can't be denied. Under Ms. Chang's baton, this familiar music came to vibrant and electrifying life.

Ms. Chang, who made her SLSO debut this weekend, seems to be particularly fond of the Fifth, having often performed it in the past. She conducted without a score and had clearly internalized the music so thoroughly that she was able to bring out nuances that I hadn't heard before, starting with the opening Andante statement of the "fate" motif on the clarinets, played with great sensitivity by Scott Andrews and Tina Ward. Ms. Chang had held the opening downbeat for a moment or two in order for the audience to settle in and become almost completely silent, so the melody began in a slow, reverential hush. When the allegro con anima of the movement kicked in, the marked contrast generated real excitement.

In fact, "real excitement" effectively describes the entire performance. Ms. Chang knows how to build Tchaikovsky's big climaxes effectively, making them feel more inevitable and less episodic than they sometimes do. She also allowed some of the more lyrical moments to really "breathe"—the second subject of the first movement was a good example—which heightened the sense of drama overall.

Her second movement, with the famous horn solo gracefully rendered by Thomas Jöstlein, was expertly paced. The third movement waltz was beautifully fluid. And the Allegro vivace of the finale dashed along with exhilarating speed. Tchaikovsky concludes the movement by playing "can you top this" with himself multiple times, but Ms. Chang made each big moment feel both necessary and inexorable. The standing ovation that followed the final chords was immediate and entirely justified.

If you missed her Tchaikovsky Fifth this weekend, by the way, you can catch her complete 2014 performance with the Qatar Philharmonic at the 2014 Proms on YouTube.

Jan Mrácek

The other big piece on the program this past weekend was Prokofiev's Violin Concerto No. 1 in D major, op. 19. The soloist was another newcomer to the Powell Hall stage, the young Czech violinist Jan Mrácek. Like Ms. Chang, he also made a very strong impression, with an intelligent and fiercely committed performance of this technically and artistically challenging music.

You could hear that commitment immediately in the gentle, singing tone he brought to the opening of the first movement. Marked sognando (literally "dreaming") it has the soloist playing softly over tremolo strings, and both Mr. Mrácek and Ms. Chang gave it a properly haunting feel. The Vivacissimo second movement was both fierce and controlled, and the tricky ascending trills at the very end of the piece came off flawlessly. Mr. Mrá_ek threw himself into this music with complete abandon, with very satisfying results.

The concerts opened with brisk and energizing romp through the overture to Mikhail Glinka'a 1842 fairy tale opera Ruslan and Lyudmila. The opera itself hasn't gotten much traction outside of Russia but the overture is 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.

Ms. Chang's tempo was snappy and the orchestra's playing was clear and precise all the way through, with Shannon Wood doing the honors on the tympani. Here, as in the rest of the program, Ms. Chang's podium style was fascinating to watch, combining big gestures with precisely executed individual cues and a very neat and eloquent use of the baton.

It's always fascinating to see new performers on the Powell Hall stage and watch how the audience responds to them. If the warm response at Friday night's concert is any indication, we have not seen the last of Ms. Chang here. I certainly look forward to her return.

Next at Powell Hall: Leonard Slatkin conducts the orchestra with piano soloist Olga Kern in Barber's Piano Concerto, Copland's Billy the Kid Suite, Gershwin's Porgy and Bess: Symphonic Picture for Orchestra (arranged by Robert Russell Bennett), and Slatkin's own composition Kinah. Performances are Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m., November 12 and 13. Get an in-depth look at that music in my symphony preview.

Mr. Slatkin will also conduct a performance of Wagner's Meistersinger Prelude as part of a St. Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra conert on Friday, November 11, at 8 p.m.