Teatime at the NY Phil with Beethoven and Strauss
The Friday-matinee symphony concert is a curious instiution that somehow manages to persist at most major orchestras in the U.S., despite the fact that they take place when most folks are still at work. Originally designed for the ladies-who-lunch set, they're now generally patronized by octogenarians and the occasional student who favor the early start times, sometimes as early as 11 a.m.
For music hounds like me, the chief benefit of the Friday matinee is that it leaves my evening open to attend a second concert, which is precisely what brought me to Avery Fisher Hall yesterday for a program of Beethoven and Strauss led by veteran conductor Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos. My other rationale for attending yesterday's matinee was that I thought it would be far less crowded than a typical evening concert. Not so: I was surprised to see Avery Fisher Hall filled all the way to the third tier.
Frühbeck, who turned 80 in September, has developed a warm relationship with the Philharmonic over the past several decades, to the point where they seem to implicitly trust his instincts, no matter how unconventional. "He's basically a poet in the way he gets certain colors out of this orchestra," concertmaster Glenn Dicterow remarked in a feature about Frühbeck. "It's like working in black and white, then all of a sudden having a million colors available."
Frühbeck's unconventionality was on display right from the start in Beethoven's Eighth Symphony, ignoring Beethoven's hyper-fast metronome markings in favor of a slow, grand pace that drew out the symphony's rich colors and textures, maximizing the swell from bitter darkness to joyous sunburst. Conducting without a score and with a minimum of gestures, Frühbeck seemed like some kind of shaman on the podium, coaxing an otherworldly sound from the orchestra without sacrificing clarity. It was an eye-opening performance, making a strong claim for this often-maligned stepchild as perhaps Beethoven's most radical symphony.
Following intermission, the Avery Fisher stage was overflowing with the full Philharmonic to perform Richard Strauss' Ein Heldenleben (A Hero's Life). It's challenging for me to evaluate the Philhamonic's performance, given the fact that the first two times I heard this epic tone poem was with the Vienna Philhamonic, whose technical perfection and artistic passion were on full display right from the drop of the first bass chord. Here, the Philharmonic's weaknesses were unfortunately exposed: the brass were wobbly and uncoordinated, the winds scattered and uncertain, with several audible wrong notes. Rather than sounding seamless, the Phil sounded like they were struggling much of the time.
That's not to take away from what did work, namely the spot-on percussion, or the lush, romantic string playing. And, hearing the full Phil rise in soaring, sonic majesty was as thrilling as anything I've ever heard in Avery Fisher.
Special mention goes to Dicterow, who dispatched the fiendishly difficult violin solo with all the polish and panache of a veteran soloist. I haven't always been a big fan of Dicterow's onstage histronics (when he is onstage, that is), but with his retirement from the Phil after 34 seasons quickly looming, it's nice to see the old guy still has his chops.
As Strauss' monumental tone poem drew towards its close, in the section named "The Hero's Retirement from this World," I couldn't help but think of Nelson Mandela, whose long and momentous life was marked by equal parts strife and glory before finally passing away last week at the age of 95. At the end of Heldenleben, Dicterow and the horns played a final, plaintive duet before yielding to a brass fanfare and massive crescendo by the full orchestra. How better to portray the passing of a great leader who saw his improbable dream come true?
More pics on the photo page.