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Michael Tilson Thomas has decided to devote this June's annual San Francisco Symphony summer festival to the music of Sergei Prokofiev. Why, I wonder. Prokofiev isn't a composer MTT has been specially associated with, unlike Stravinsky and Mahler (subjects of past festivals). He tends to get overshadowed in fame by his younger contemporary Shostakovich (whose centennial was last year, and who did not get an SFS Festival).
But despite that overshadowing, Prokofiev is a tremendously popular composer. According to the people who keep track of these things, he's been at least the 12th, sometimes as high as the 7th, most played of all composers by American symphonies in recent years, often ahead even of Stravinsky. I think back to forty or fifty years ago, when the neglect of contemporary music in concert halls was often tutted over. Those people might have been happy if told that some contemporary composers were on their way to top-ten popularity, but if told those composers would be Prokofiev, Shostakovich, and Sibelius, they would have been appalled.
Prokofiev himself identified his musical secret as a careful balancing of the classical and the innovative, the lyrical and the toccata. And maybe that balance explains his popularity, because though he's often praised for his melody, he didn't write the kind of lush tunes that got turned into 1940s pop songs, as Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff did. Much of his best music is dramatic, even harsh and brutal. But he also had great wit, as opposed to Shostakovich who was almost always dour and who couldn't give a genuine smile in his music, only a grimace. Prokofiev could smile.
The first two of four programs were given this week. One was presented only once, on Saturday, so the SFS must not have been expecting it to be very popular. Indeed, one of its three pieces, a short American Overture, I'd never heard. It's scored for a chamber battery of winds, brass, and percussion, plus two double-basses and a cello. MTT came out on stage, looked around as if in puzzlement as to who he was supposed to shake hands with in the absence of a concertmaster, and chose the cellist.
I didn't have a strong reaction to this piece, but the Symphony No. 3 that followed is an old acquaintance, if not a friendly one. It's a loud, anguished, Expressionist work based loosely on music from a lurid opera that failed to out-grotesque Strauss's Salome, though it tried. I like the Third a great deal (the early Prokofiev symphony that's too much for me is the Second), but I didn't like this performance. The sound was loud and brilliant, but the interpretation wasn't crisp: it was soggy. That's fatal in Prokofiev.
Much the same with the Piano Concerto No. 2. This is supposed to be his largest, loudest, toughest, most brutal concerto. But strange, when it before this concert sat / So mild was it as any pussy cat. Again, great sound, but lack of sinew, and Vladimir Feltsman, the soloist, tinkered placidly away through the whole thing.
I wondered why MTT was showing so little empathy with this music. Could it be because Prokofiev was a mentally cool composer without the introspective anguish of MTT's specialties, Mahler and Shostakovich? No, that couldn't be the answer, because there's no more emotionless and cerebral composer than Stravinsky, and MTT does wizardry with him.
Whatever happened, it made me rather nervous about the Sunday concert, which had already been played on Thursday and Friday and gotten a review calling the first half dull and passionless, while Romeo and Juliet in the second half woke up and was fun. For whatever reason, I found on Sunday almost the opposite, and was pleased that I could file a review in much more cheerful tones. Not that R&J was dull, but it was dry and somber, while The Love for Three Oranges Suite was comedic and chipper, and the Piano Concerto No. 3 with the fabulous Yefim Bronfman was a continuous delight. Though I know the piece well, I was glad I brought a score along, as reference to it crystallized a few details for me.
Three more piano concertos, Cinderella, Lieutenant Kije (and I have some news about that: later), and the ne plus ultra of all Prokofiev's harsh primitivism, the Scythian Suite, next week. Let's see which pattern they follow.
But despite that overshadowing, Prokofiev is a tremendously popular composer. According to the people who keep track of these things, he's been at least the 12th, sometimes as high as the 7th, most played of all composers by American symphonies in recent years, often ahead even of Stravinsky. I think back to forty or fifty years ago, when the neglect of contemporary music in concert halls was often tutted over. Those people might have been happy if told that some contemporary composers were on their way to top-ten popularity, but if told those composers would be Prokofiev, Shostakovich, and Sibelius, they would have been appalled.
Prokofiev himself identified his musical secret as a careful balancing of the classical and the innovative, the lyrical and the toccata. And maybe that balance explains his popularity, because though he's often praised for his melody, he didn't write the kind of lush tunes that got turned into 1940s pop songs, as Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff did. Much of his best music is dramatic, even harsh and brutal. But he also had great wit, as opposed to Shostakovich who was almost always dour and who couldn't give a genuine smile in his music, only a grimace. Prokofiev could smile.
The first two of four programs were given this week. One was presented only once, on Saturday, so the SFS must not have been expecting it to be very popular. Indeed, one of its three pieces, a short American Overture, I'd never heard. It's scored for a chamber battery of winds, brass, and percussion, plus two double-basses and a cello. MTT came out on stage, looked around as if in puzzlement as to who he was supposed to shake hands with in the absence of a concertmaster, and chose the cellist.
I didn't have a strong reaction to this piece, but the Symphony No. 3 that followed is an old acquaintance, if not a friendly one. It's a loud, anguished, Expressionist work based loosely on music from a lurid opera that failed to out-grotesque Strauss's Salome, though it tried. I like the Third a great deal (the early Prokofiev symphony that's too much for me is the Second), but I didn't like this performance. The sound was loud and brilliant, but the interpretation wasn't crisp: it was soggy. That's fatal in Prokofiev.
Much the same with the Piano Concerto No. 2. This is supposed to be his largest, loudest, toughest, most brutal concerto. But strange, when it before this concert sat / So mild was it as any pussy cat. Again, great sound, but lack of sinew, and Vladimir Feltsman, the soloist, tinkered placidly away through the whole thing.
I wondered why MTT was showing so little empathy with this music. Could it be because Prokofiev was a mentally cool composer without the introspective anguish of MTT's specialties, Mahler and Shostakovich? No, that couldn't be the answer, because there's no more emotionless and cerebral composer than Stravinsky, and MTT does wizardry with him.
Whatever happened, it made me rather nervous about the Sunday concert, which had already been played on Thursday and Friday and gotten a review calling the first half dull and passionless, while Romeo and Juliet in the second half woke up and was fun. For whatever reason, I found on Sunday almost the opposite, and was pleased that I could file a review in much more cheerful tones. Not that R&J was dull, but it was dry and somber, while The Love for Three Oranges Suite was comedic and chipper, and the Piano Concerto No. 3 with the fabulous Yefim Bronfman was a continuous delight. Though I know the piece well, I was glad I brought a score along, as reference to it crystallized a few details for me.
Three more piano concertos, Cinderella, Lieutenant Kije (and I have some news about that: later), and the ne plus ultra of all Prokofiev's harsh primitivism, the Scythian Suite, next week. Let's see which pattern they follow.
