Issue #43
Last Update December 24, 2005
Arts Tanglewood 2004 by Dave Sear Tanglewood's 2004 season promises to be one of its strongest seasons in years. Tchaikovsky, Brahms, Mendelssohn and Beethoven violin concertos, lots of Mozart, including his piano concertos, two Baroque concerts (mostly Bach, including the Brandenburg concertos), Haydn, Dvorak, Beethoven symphonies ... this partial list is only a hint at the richness of the programming this summer. Renaud Capucon will perform the Mendelssohn concerto, and Itzhak Perlman will perform the Beethoven. The season will close with the Orchestra and the hundred-plus voices of the Tanglewood Festival Chorus doing Beethoven's Ninth, always a highlight of the Tanglewood experience.
The programs are skillfully balanced. The season got off to a spectacular start with Kurt Masur leading the Boston Symphony in Glinka's overture to Ruslan and Ludmila. The Russian folk melodies of this exciting piece, played by the strings joined by the gorgeous blend of woodwinds and punctuated by tympani, called up visions of Moiseyev dancers in their colorful costumes leaping over the orchestra.
The Glinka was followed by Midori in one of the most romantic performances of a Tchaikovsky violin concerto that this reviewer has ever heard. Her dynamic range went from ultra-soft pianissimos that drew the audience out of their seats to fortes soaring above the orchestra. The hand-off of themes between Midori, the woodwinds and the orchestra was beautifully executed. Even the Boston Symphony's resident starling, high in the rafters above the orchestra, was on pitch and in rhythm. Midori's brilliant cadenzas demonstrated her technical virtuosity and wide emotional range or warmth and excitement and were a high point of her performance. The audience accorded the performance a thundering standing ovation.
It is interesting to note that Midori is on the violin faculty of the Manhattan School of Music (my old alma mater) and works to further the musical education of young people as I did for years with Young Audiences.
The concert ended with Dvorak's Ninth Symphony, From the New World. Again the gorgeous folk themes, especially Going Home (taken from the Afro-American spiritual), introduced by the haunting sound of the oboe, were a treat to the ears of this folk singer/reviewer.
Another early season concert featured Joshua Bell in the Brahms Violin Concerto with the Orchestra of St. Luke's, directed by Donald Runnicles. Bell's self-composed cadenzas were strong and well-performed. The Brahms does not stand up to the violin concertos of Tchaikovsky, Mendelssohn and Beethoven when it comes to beautiful themes, but the last movement was an exception and we still have the other concertos to look forward to.
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