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concert review: San Francisco Symphony
Mar. 26th, 2008 11:20 pmRichard Goode is a pianist who lives up to his name. He played Mozart's K.456 with light, crisp articulation, making a small gem of it. Alan Gilbert, music director-designate in New York, conducted. He led an almost excessively colorful little piece by Steven Stucky, and a quite adequately lusty version of Nielsen's Second.
This is I think the first time I've heard live this symphony that's been a favorite of mine on record since college or earlier. Nielsen was apparently the first composer to notice that the four disparate movements of a standard symphony fit the four traditional human temperaments: choleric, phlegmatic, melancholic, and sanguine, and he designated this work and its movements appropriately. Even when he's depicting phlegm or melancholy, Nielsen is a tremendously energetic composer. Prior to WW1, which seemed to leave him more shell-shocked than many soldiers, Nielsen's work is a thoroughly springy delight all the way through.
Note to self: Try not to attend future pre-concert talks by assistant conductor Benjamin Shwartz, who has one of the highest uh-to-word ratios, uh, ever, uh, heard.
My balcony box was filled with clean-cut, energetic teenagers who kept moving from seat to seat before the concert started. Having to get up a lot to let them by was a bit taxing. During intermission one of them said to me, "I've never been to one of these before. Why is everyone leaving?" "It's intermission," I said. "What's that?" she asked. I was not quite sure whether to believe this conversation was real, but I explained anyway. I would have liked to pursue this a bit further and learn her reaction to what was probably her first encounter with Mozart, but she pulled out a tiny device and began making whizzy movements on it with her thumbs.
This is I think the first time I've heard live this symphony that's been a favorite of mine on record since college or earlier. Nielsen was apparently the first composer to notice that the four disparate movements of a standard symphony fit the four traditional human temperaments: choleric, phlegmatic, melancholic, and sanguine, and he designated this work and its movements appropriately. Even when he's depicting phlegm or melancholy, Nielsen is a tremendously energetic composer. Prior to WW1, which seemed to leave him more shell-shocked than many soldiers, Nielsen's work is a thoroughly springy delight all the way through.
Note to self: Try not to attend future pre-concert talks by assistant conductor Benjamin Shwartz, who has one of the highest uh-to-word ratios, uh, ever, uh, heard.
My balcony box was filled with clean-cut, energetic teenagers who kept moving from seat to seat before the concert started. Having to get up a lot to let them by was a bit taxing. During intermission one of them said to me, "I've never been to one of these before. Why is everyone leaving?" "It's intermission," I said. "What's that?" she asked. I was not quite sure whether to believe this conversation was real, but I explained anyway. I would have liked to pursue this a bit further and learn her reaction to what was probably her first encounter with Mozart, but she pulled out a tiny device and began making whizzy movements on it with her thumbs.
