{"id":10676,"date":"2013-04-11T17:27:33","date_gmt":"2013-04-11T21:27:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/?p=10676"},"modified":"2013-04-28T21:17:20","modified_gmt":"2013-04-29T01:17:20","slug":"the-bso%e2%80%94helmless-but-not-helpless","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/?p=10676","title":{"rendered":"The BSO\u2014Helmless but Not Helpless"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Sedgwick Clark<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Boston Symphony Orchestra has taken its time in replacing James Levine, who stepped down as music director two years ago due to a back injury. While two years without a captain at the helm is hardly optimum, at least the orchestra has avoided Philadelphia\u2019s precipitous mismatch of Christoph Eschenbach (2003-2008). Last week in the two concerts I heard of the three it performed at Carnegie Hall, the BSO demonstrated that it remains close to the top of its game, with its traditional warmth, tonal elegance, and ease of virtuosity firmly in place.<\/p>\n

Wednesday\u2019s concert (4\/3), under Rafael Fr\u00fchbeck de Burgos, the orchestra\u2019s favorite guest conductor and Musical America<\/em>\u2019s 2011 Conductor of the Year, is close to my favorite program of the season. The BSO \u201cowns\u201d two of these works, both commissioned by its enterprising music director from 1924 to 1949, Serge Koussevitzky. The first, Hindemith\u2019s Concert Music<\/em> for Strings and Brass<\/em>, Op. 50, deserves to be heard more often. It was one of several works the Russian conductor commissioned for the orchestra\u2019s 50th anniversary in 1930\u2014others being Stravinsky\u2019s Symphony of Psalms<\/em>, Roussel\u2019s Third Symphony, Hanson\u2019s Second Symphony (\u201cRomantic\u201d), Prokofiev\u2019s Fourth Symphony, Copland\u2019s Symphonic Ode<\/em>, and works by Honegger, Respighi, and himself (anonymously). After hearing Koussevitzky reprise the Concert Music<\/em> eight years later, Hindemith wrote in his journal, \u201cI was pleasantly surprised by the piece, for I hardly remembered it. It is serious and very fresh, and not at all ugly.\u201d He adds that the BSO is \u201cthe best orchestra in the world,\u201d and one imagines that Fr\u00fchbeck\u2019s energetic, witty, deeply felt performance would only have bolstered the composer\u2019s estimation.<\/p>\n

The second BSO commission on the program, Bart\u00f3k\u2019s Concerto for Orchestra<\/em>, needs little comment. It may be the last large orchestral work to enter the basic repertoire. Fr\u00fchbeck received notably impassioned playing from all concerned, with especially pungent contributions from the woodwinds. Only at the very end did the orchestra come a cropper. Many conductors on record, beginning with Reiner, broaden the tempo at bar 616 for the climactic brass fanfare; Bernstein, Boulez, and others too numerous to mention wrong-headedly (in my humble opinion) follow suit, devitalizing the ending. That old literalist Leinsdorf in his 1962 recording\u2014his first as the BSO\u2019s music director\u2014slams the coda home in tempo as Bart\u00f3k indicates, which never fails to blow the roof off. Fr\u00fchbeck\u2019s players couldn\u2019t seem to agree, and what should have been electrifying short-circuited.<\/p>\n

Sandwiched between the Hindemith and Bart\u00f3k works was another conservative 20th-century masterpiece, Rachmaninoff\u2019s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini<\/em>, played expressively by Garrick Ohlsson and partnered in kind by Fr\u00fchbeck. While some might prefer more sec <\/em>articulation and a slightly quicker pace to evoke the diabolical composer of the title, Ohlsson\u2019s pianism was no less satisfying than in his performance with Atlanta and Robert Spano two seasons ago of the composer\u2019s Third Piano Concerto.<\/p>\n

All was right with the world as I left Carnegie after Daniele Gatti had led the second Boston concert (4\/4) in Mahler\u2019s Third Symphony (the following night he would lead an all-Wagner program). I was amazed at how easily I was able to suppress my usual Mahlerite niggling and surrender to the glories that Gatti accomplished.\u00a0I\u00a0was\u00a0especially moved by\u00a0the last movement, which flowed naturally\u2014inevitably\u2014and had just the right \u201csaturated, noble tone\u201d of the\u00a0brass on the final page\u00a0that Mahler demands. On the other hand, I felt that the tempo for the third-movement posthorn solo was a bit brisk to achieve the ideal nostalgia.\u00a0Moreover, many quiet details such as the percussion in the first movement’s introduction\u00a0were not audible because Gatti took pp<\/em> marks too literally; recordings can ensure audibility, but live performance in a large space is something else entirely. Overall, however, the Bostonians\u00a0sounded absolutely resplendent, and one cannot close without noting Anne Sofie von Otter\u2019s\u00a0evocative singing in the fourth-movement “Midnight Song” from\u00a0Nietzsche’s Also sprach Zarathustra<\/em>\u00a0and the superb violin solos from second\u00a0Assistant Concertmaster\u00a0Elita Kang\u00a0in this and the previous evening\u2019s Rachmaninoff. A Mahler Third on such a high interpretive and technical level at Carnegie Hall makes life worth living.<\/p>\n

Looking Forward<\/strong><\/p>\n

My week\u2019s scheduled concerts (8:00 p.m. unless otherwise noted):<\/p>\n

4\/11 at 7:30. Avery Fisher Hall. New York Philharmonic\/David Robertson; Pierre-Laurent Aimard, piano. Messiaen: Les Offrandes oubli\u00e9es<\/em>. Mozart: Concerto No. 23. Tristan Murail: Le D\u00e9senchantement du monde<\/em>. Beethoven: Symphony No. 2.<\/p>\n

4\/11 at 7:30. Avery Fisher Hall. New York Philharmonic\/Alan Gilbert; Joshua Bell, violin. Christopher Rouse: Prospero\u2019s Rooms<\/em>. Bernstein: Serenade (after Plato\u2019s \u201cSymposium\u201d)<\/em>. Ives: Symphony No. 4<\/p>\n