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SYMPHONY REVIEW
September 29, 2003
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By Heuwell Tircuit
With all the bad news dominating the headlines these days, something encouraging turned up in Berkeley Monday evening as the spiffy Berkeley Symphony opened its season celebrating its 25th under Kent Nagano's directorship. Zellerbach Auditorium on the University of California campus was as close to packed as I've seen it, the large orchestra playing up to very high standards during a fun program and the audience cheering to the echo. To cap the celebrations, superstar Frederica von Stade was there as soloist in Ravel's masterful Shéhérazade songs.
Nagano opened the evening with an assertive, polished performance of Beethoven's First Symphony, Op.21. Following intermission he led the first complete performance of Naomi Sekiya's Sinfonia delle Ombre (Symphony of Shadows) and to round off with a smile, Shostakovich's First Symphony, Op 10. Of the three First Symphonies, Beethoven's clearly rules the roost. Nagano performed it using the new Urtext edition edited by Jonathan Del Mar and, later this season, will offer Beethoven's Second and Fourth from this same source.
Sekiya, the orchestra's newly appointed Music Alive Composer-in-Residence, wrote her Symphony of Shadows between 2001 and 2002, completing a revised version last winter; the first movement was premiered by the Warsaw Philharmonic in that city during September 2001. The last two movements were first heard by members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic at USC, Sekiya's alma mater. Born in Tochigi prefecture a bit northeast of Tokyo, Sekiya is still quite young. Inspired by Dante's Inferno, her symphony is scored for large and very noisy orchestra. The audience loved it, giving the composer three curtain calls along with salvos of cheering.
Lasting a tad over 25 minutes, the three movements are all scored in concertante style featuring much writing for chamber groups and first desk musicians, especially the string principals, within the mass. True to its storm-and-stress origins, the large percussion group tended to be overbearing and frankly, crude. Sekiya apparently wanted to appear as macho as possible. The first movement is a free sonata form in toccata style, opening with blazes of brass fanfares and tons of ostinatos. That was followed by a rather erotic slow movement, and a shorter toccata-type finale. What I heard standing in Sekiya's shadows were the ghosts of Lutoslawski, Penderecki and Henze, plus the occasional genuflection toward Stravinsky's Sacre du Printemps. Oddly, there was nothing remotely suggestive of Japan, which might be a good thing. Sekiya clearly intends to leave her past well behind her. Von Stade, radiant as ever, is famous for her elegant French and as near-owner of Ravel's Shéhérazade. It's as much a part of her reputation as "Nessun dorma!" is of Pavarotti's. The three songs Ravel created for this set amount to one of his masterpieces, filled with astounding coups. He used the orchestra as a partner to the singer rather than mere accompaniment. The orchestra underlines darker meanings of thought below the text being sung. In that sense, without his intention, there's a touch of Wagner in Ravel's technique. Above all, Ravel managed to come up with superb pictorial sounds. The singer begins almost chanting "Asia, Asia, Asia..." and fantasizes about traveling there. Just before she begins "I would like to take a schooner...," Ravel gives us a splash of gently rolling sea music so perfect that one can almost smell the salt air. The score brims with such moments, all colored as the singer lists all the things she would like to see. But for sheer magic, I know of nothing in music to match Ravel's setting of "I would like to see Persia and India and then" (after a moment's pause, in ecstasy) "China," whereupon the orchestra breaks into a terse bit of Chinese sonic brocade, all delicate and glimmering. Magic, sheer magic... goose-bump magic!
Von Stade's ability to master these songs, so dangerous in terms of control throughout the vocal range, was terrific. Her phrasing and projection, even at the softest levels, were ideal. Her voice remains as luscious as ever, no matter what the dynamics or range of the moment. Her artistry is such that, even in the big full-voiced climaxes, the sound never shattered. Following that, Nagano presented a cogent account of the too-often diffuse Shostakovich. It's a fun piece, but it sounds as though made up of bits and scraps. The first movement, for instance, consisted of a sarcastic scherzo opening, a march, and a parody of the Romantic waltz, none sounding related. Still, it is an extremely effective work, one that I've loved since my mid-teens. Nagano, recently appointed chief conductor of Munich's Bavarian State Opera, showed his usual tempo sensibility and style. Every work came through as polished, with each of these widely varied composers served as a matter of pride. The Berkeley Symphony usually plays well, but on Monday they played brilliantly. Another bit of good news was that this season's concerts are being recorded by KALW-FM (91.7) and will be broadcast beginning January 11. The series will follow as Sunday afternoon broadcasts, between 3 and 5 p.m. So you shall be able to hear this program for yourself. It will make a handsome addition to the local airways.
(Heuwell Tircuit, composer, performer and writer, was chief writer for Gramophone Japan and for 21 years a music reviewer for the SF Chronicle, previously for the Chicago American and Asahi Evening News.)
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Frederica von Stade
Naomi Sekiya