BSO — 2023/04/29

WCRB gives us the basics, along with access to an interview with the soloist:

Saturday, April 29, 2023
8:00 PM

Encore broadcast on Monday, May 8

Renowned South Korean pianist Seong-Jin Cho is the soloist in Maurice Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G, and Andris Nelsons leads the Boston Symphony in Caroline Shaw’s meditative Punctum and Stravinsky’s Petrushka.

Andris Nelsons, conductor
Seong-Jin Cho, piano

Caroline SHAW Punctum
RAVEL Piano Concerto in G
STRAVINSKY Petrushka (1947 version)

To hear a preview of Ravel's Piano Concerto in G with Seong-Jin Cho, use the player above, and read the transcript below:

Brian McCreath I'm Brian McCreath at Symphony Hall with Seong-Jin Cho, the pianist who's back in Boston after a few years, it turns out that you were here in 2020, just before everything got locked down for the pandemic. Seong-Jin Cho, thank you so much for a little bit of your time today.

Seong-Jin Cho My pleasure. It's really great to be back

For more information, we can visit the BSO's performance detail page, and from there we can follow links to the program notes for each piece.

Acclaimed South Korean pianist Seong-Jin Cho returns to Symphony Hall for Maurice Ravel’s Concerto in G, one of the composer’s final works, which ranges from jazzy energy to poignant lyricism. Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer Caroline Shaw’s Punctum, is a meditation on a moment from J.S. Bach. Igor Stravinsky’s 1911 ballet Petrushka, the second of his great trilogy for the Ballets Russes company, depicts the hapless living puppet title character in gloriously scored scenes from a carnival fair.

Saturday evening’s performance by Seong-Jin Cho is supported by the Roberta M. Strang Memorial Fund.

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Andris Nelsons, conductor
Seong-Jin Cho, piano

Caroline SHAW Punctum
RAVEL Piano Concerto in G
Intermission
STRAVINSKY Petrushka (1947 version)

This wasn't part of my subscription, so I'll be hearing it for the first time along with you. Of course, I've heard the Ravel and Stravinsky on other occasions, and I can recommend them. As for "Punctum," I see it was premiered last summer on July 30 at Tanglewood, but I have no memory of it. The program note doesn't tell us a lot either. There is no review of this concert in either the Globe or the Intelligencer, but a Globe review from last summer has this to say:

Shaw describes her “Punctum,” originally a string quartet but presented on Saturday in a new incarnation for orchestra, as “an exercise in nostalgia” inspired by a moving passage from Roland Barthes’s “Camera Lucida,” in which the author finds a photo of his deceased mother as a child and discovers in its smallest details the essence of her entire adult being. “Punctum” was also inspired by Bach’s “St. Matthew Passion,” and Shaw plays ingeniously with the idea of tonal harmony as a kind of found object, a photograph of a loved one who has been lost, an artifact that may be savored on its own terms but cannot be separated from the ravages of time. Robust chords drift in and out of focus. Seemingly unified gestures are fractured over the orchestra as a whole. In order to actually see history, Barthes writes, we must stand apart from it. Shaw’s work seems by turns to flout and accentuate that distance from an idealized classical past.

It should be a good concert. Enjoy.

BSO — 2023/04/22

 This evening it's Sibelius, Mozart, Adès, and Sibelius live from Symphony Hall. Here's what we read on WCRB's page about it:

Saturday, April 22, 2023
8:00 PM

Encore broadcast on Monday, May 1

Anne-Sophie Mutter is the soloist in Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 1 and Thomas Adès’s Air, a work inspired by Sibelius, and Andris Nelsons leads the BSO in Sibelius’s Luonnotar, with soprano Golda Schultz, and Symphony No. 5.

Andris Nelsons, conductor
Golda Schultz, soprano
Anne-Sophie Mutter, violin

SIBELIUS Luonnotar (translation)
MOZART Violin Concerto No. 1
Thomas ADÈS Air, for violin and orchestra
SIBELIUS Symphony No. 5

To hear a preview of Thomas Adès's Air with Anne-Sophie Mutter, use the player above, and read the transcript below.

INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT:

Brian McCreath I'm Brian McCreath at Symphony Hall with Anne-Sophie Mutter, who is back with the Boston Symphony with a couple of pieces. Anne-Sophie, thanks a lot for your time today. I appreciate it.

Anne-Sophie Mutter Great pleasure, Brian.

Brian McCreath We're going to talk about Thomas Adès's Air, this new piece. But first, I want to ask you about Mozart and whether this concerto number one, the Violin Concerto No. 1, is a specific choice to accompany Thomas's piece, or if there's any other particular reason you chose it for this concert.

Anne-Sophie Mutter Yeah. This is a very good question, actually. 

TO go a bit more in depth, here's what you get at the BSO performance detail page (with links to the program notes):

Andris Nelsons leads superstar violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter in the American premiere of English composer Thomas Adès’ new Sibelius-inspired Air for violin and orchestra, a BSO co-commission written for Mutter. In her BSO debut, the young South African soprano Golda Schultz sings Jean Sibelius’ Luonnotar, a dramatic tone poem with voice based on Finnish creation myth. Though his Fifth Symphony was an enormous success at its 1915 premiere, Sibelius extensively revised the original four-movement work, completing the final three-movement version in 1919.

Friday afternoon's performance by the vocal soloist is supported by a generous gift from the Ethan Ayer Vocal Soloist Fund.

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Andris Nelsons, conductor
Anne-Sophie Mutter, violin
Golda Schultz, soprano

SIBELIUS Luonnotar
MOZART Violin Concerto No. 1
Intermission
Thomas ADÈS Air, for violin and orchestra (American premiere; co-commissioned by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Andris Nelsons, Music Director, through the generous support of the New Works Fund established by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency and the Arthur P. Contas Commissioning Fund.)
SIBELIUS Symphony No. 5

There is a favorable review in the Globe and a very favorable and detailed one in the Intelligencer.

I enjoyed my evening in Symphony Hall on Thursday. Jeffrey Gantz in the Intelligencer put it very well when he wrote, "Air (think also “Aria” and perhaps Shakespeare’s Ariel) is 15 minutes of slow spirals and concentric circles." There was nothing offensive in any of it, and I thought the soprano did very well in Luonnotar.

So give it a listen, and don't forget the rebroadcast.

BSO — 2023/04/15

 This week we're back to live music from Symphony Hall. WCRB, which will be broadcasting the concert, gives us the essentials:

Saturday, April 15, 2023
8:00 PM

Encore broadcast on Monday, April 24

French cellist Gautier Capuçon takes center stage with the Boston Symphony for the American premiere of Thierry Escaich’s new work for cello and orchestra, and Andris Nelsons conducts Ravel’s Alborada del gracioso and Rachmaninoff’s romantic Symphony No. 2.

Andris Nelsons, conductor
Gautier Capuçon, cello

RAVEL Alborada del gracioso
Thierry ESCAICH Les Chants de l’Aube, for cello and orchestra
RACHMANINOFF Symphony No. 2

To hear a preview of Thierry Escaich's Les Chants de l’Aube with cellist Gautier Capuçon, use the player above, and read the transcript below.

TRANSCRIPT:

Brian McCreath I'm Brian McCreath at Symphony Hall

You can listen to the interview via a link on their page or read the transcript there, if you wish.

And here's the BSO's own performance detail page, with iits customary links to program notes etc.:

Music Director Andris Nelsons leads the American premiere of a new work for cello and orchestra by French organist-composer Thierry Escaich, written for soloist Gautier Capuçon. Maurice Ravel’s exuberantly orchestrated Alborada del gracioso is tinged with Flamenco rhythms and Spanish flavors. Sergei Rachmaninoff’s by turns lush and exuberant Symphony No. 2 closes the program.

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Andris Nelsons, conductor
Gautier Capuçon, cello

RAVEL Alborada del gracioso
Thierry ESCAICH Les Chants de l'aube, for cello and orchestra (American premiere; co-commissioned by the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig and by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Andris Nelsons, Music Director, through the generous support of Catherine and Paul Buttenwieser.)
Intermission
RACHMANINOFF Symphony No. 2

The Boston Musical Intelligencer gives a highly favorable review of the concert. The Boston Globe's review concentrates on the cello concerto, and +is similaryly favorable.

I was there for the Thursday evening performance, and thought it was all very okay. The Ravel was snappy. The Escaich was pleasant enough. I noticed that at many points the flute was echoing the cello, and szo was the clarinet. I didn't really catch the elements which the composer and program annotator referred to as represented in the music (dtained glass, dance, etc.) but it wasn't hard to listen to. And the Rachmaninoff symphony, for all its length, didn't seem over-long. In other words, this wasn't a piece where I found myslef thinking, "Enough, already!" Still, none of it struck me as "must listen" music. I will try to catch the cello conceerto again during the rebroadcast (my brother's phone call will be when it's being played this evening) and I'll have the radio on this evening.

So you might as well tune in, if you're free.

P.S. I was busy last Saturday and never posted about the concert that evening. I'll see if I can pull something together before the rebroadcast onApril 17.

B BSO/Classical New England — 2023/04/01

 This evening we get an "encore broadcast" from WCRB, the concert performed on February 12, 2022. Herewith their blurb:

Saturday, April 1, 2023
8:00 PM

In an encore Boston Symphony broadcast, Philippe Jordan makes his BSO debut conducting an all-Russian program of Borodin, a suite from Prokofiev’s "Romeo and Juliet," and Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3 with soloist Yefim Bronfman.

Philippe Jordan, conductor
Yefim Bronfman, piano

BORODIN Overture to Prince Igor
RACHMANINOFF Piano Concerto No. 3
PROKOFIEV Suite from Romeo and Juliet

This concert was originally broadcast on February 12, 2022 and is no longer available on demand.

Hear Philippe Jordan describe his own suite from Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet, the differences between conducting ballet music for a ballet and in concert, and the complicated history of Borodin's Prince Igor Overture with the audio player above, or in the tab below. Read the transcript in the tab below.

Hear Yefim Bronfman describe the challenge of returning to Rachmaninoff's Third Piano Concerto after being away from it for many years, the value of hearing the composer play it, and the mysteries of choosing the right instrument to play it on, using the audio player in the tab below. Read the transcript in the tab below.

Interview With Philippe JordanInterview With Yefim Bronfman

I posted about it back then. I hope the links to the reviews and performance detail page still work. As you see, there are links on the WCRB page to interviews with the pianist and the conductor. It's all pretty standard stuff. So enjoy.

Since this is an "encore" there apparently won't be a chance to hear it again on April 10.