concert review: San Francisco Symphony

[calimac]

So Semyon Bychkov is this Russian conductor who came to town a decade or two ago and led a performance of Shostakovich's Eleventh so dazzling and memorable that I've remembered it ever since. (Having filched a tape of the later radio broadcast, which I still have, helped.) Naturally I was curious when he came back to conduct the Tenth. (Maybe he'll keep going backwards, slowly. I hope to live long enough to hear his Eighth.)

And it was ... big. Epic. A massive performance, perceptively starting slow in each of the outer movements and building up, while remaining piercingly intense. The evolution of the DSCH motif out of a little piccolo march theme in the third movement was especially clear. This was Shostakovich conducted the way MTT conducts Mahler: with the stops out, grand, wide, and passionate without being a bit flouncy. A symphony with scale to it.

To the sublime from the ... well, Saint-Saens's Second Piano Concerto isn't ridiculous, quite, but despite its serious, neo-Bachian first movement it leaves the impression of fluffiness. This comes, no doubt, from the never-ending fast chatter in the solo piano part. I especially like the passage in the finale where the winds play a slow chorale while the pianist chitters with little trills up and down and all over the keyboard.

The tireless Jean-Yves Thibaudet was the pianist, and one might not again hear such a strong, heavy performance of such fast, flashy music. Quite amazing.

The concert began with 15 minutes of string players standing up, demonstrating Osvaldo Golijov channeling Astor Piazzolla in a piece called Last Round. He's got the sound down, he's got the style. Argentine music has come a long way from Ginastera, and that's fine with me.

Comments

[alanro.livejournal.com]

Interesting... I just ordered a CD of Bychkov conducting the West German Radio Symphony Orchestra in Shostakovich's Eleventh (the label is Avie if you are interested).

And last night, shikzoid and I attended a concert at Benaroya Hall. Valery Gergiev conducted the Kirov Orchestra in Tchaikovsky's First Piano Concerto (Alexander Toradze was the piano soloist), followed by Shostakovich's Eleventh. This performance was sufficiently intense that at the conclusion of the symphony, the auditorium was totally silent for several seconds before the first, tentative applause led quickly to a standing ovation. As for me, I felt like I had been nailed to my seat...

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Yrch. They were at Zellerbach on Monday of this week, doing the same program. I gave half a thought to going, wondering if the Shostakovich would be worth waiting through the Tchaikovsky for. (I dislike his First Piano Concerto, though not one tenth as much as I dislike the Second.) I guess it was. Oh well, I had an index to complete, and could never have got it out this week at all if I'd gone.

[asimovberlioz.livejournal.com]

More of a recording note -- recently I ordered (and today received) a CD of music by Anton Reicha, containing that funny little Overture in E-flat Major that you've written about. Well, it's funny (peculiar) not for being in that key, but for being in the time signature of 5/8, which is a tad unusual for a Beethoven contemporary. I had actually heard a bit of this in a radio broadcast a few months ago. It may even have been a delayed feed of the San Francisco performance that you attended and wrote about.

[kip-w.livejournal.com]

When I listen to the Saint-Saens second piano concerto, the thing that always strikes me is how the first movement opening reminds me of Beethoven's choral fantasy. I keep all five of his piano concerti on my mp3 player, and still #2 is the only one I'm really familiar with.