On Thursday the 28th, after a strenuous two weeks of rehearsals, the big list of hard-hitting repertoire was ready for show and the University Symphony Orchestra had an exciting concert in front of them.
The usual time. 8pm.
Beethoven’s Overture to the Consecration of the House, op.124, opened. A warming work until the conductor, Kenneth Kiesler became so entrenched in emotion that he knocked over the stand and off the music of the concertmasters! The second of the two first violinists, in shock, managed to catch the stand before it hit the ground yet the music drifted to the floor. Pause. What a moment of historically hierarchical tension: who would pick up the music sprawled across the stage floor? The concertmaster and elected leader of the Orchestra, the second concertmaster and leader of the second portion of the show, or the artistic head-honcho and man on the podium, the conductor who committed the act? With the gasp of tension evaporated, the conductor bent while trying to maintain the beat for the Orchestra and the second of the concertmasters bent to grab a sheet. The concertmaster played through the fiasco from memory, charging and digging in more, assuming full responsibility for the group. In a moment of blind luck, the two managed to pick up just the right sheets and the students were able to finish out the piece with the ink in front of them.
Schumann’s Cello Concerto in A Minor, op.129 was played magnificently by Nathaniel Pierce, the 2013 concerto competition winner and a graduating senior at the SMTD. Through the technical virtuosity required, he still managed to brandish his bow above his head like a sword upon the battlefield. In moments of rest, he’d lean down with his elbow on his knee, ducking his head – out of breath from the pace and the vigor of playing all from memory with ease. Resident cellists of the seats around me were in shock, holding their breath through muffled chuckles of delight.
Now, I hate to be the sour critic, but during the first movement of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring aka Le Sacre du Printemps, and at many moments of climax, things simply weren’t feral or intense enough. It needed a higher decibel count. The id and rabid primal nature of Stravinsky’s writing seemed like it had been stuffed into foam, muffled from the audience. It never reached fever pitch. Anything short, in my book, is interpretively offensive. Never should a work of this stature be played like an audition excerpt. The piece asks the orchestra to channel an irreverence, a heathen-istic, and sacrificial ferocity similar to the naive audacity of the Sex Pistols.
It just felt too “inside”. By that I mean both not-outside as in the wild of nature, but also the metaphoric inside, the institution walls as opposed to the real world. The first movement was just over-thought, meta-cognitive, and drilled to a point of boredom. Just play the music, never mind the mistakes and let go, be free from performance anxiety and be open to wild abandon. Now, it is possible that I’m too much on the inside and that my ears have been temporarily deafened as well. But for a group this excellent in both accuracy and flare, they sure held back.
I give such harsh criticism because it was truly so close. The second movement – all its sections of quiet, or intentionally subdued intensity were spot on. To my ear, most were stylistically perfect. The solos were wonderfully thought out and executed. Fever pitch hit, and there were punches thrown leaving blood on the floor.
It’s odd but regardless of my qualms, my heart throbbed throughout. It’s a feeling I only get around the pieces for which I play music. I found myself foaming at the mouth not for the conductor, the soloists, or the interpretation, but for the ink, all on its own. And ya, that’s a not a common thing for me. I like to think and have often found myself asking if string players really feel this way for the ink of Mozart, Brahms, Haydn, and so on.
Ok.
Thanks for the read.
H.C.
