Tanglewood, Lenox, MA
July 15, 2013
by Michael J. Moran
No more convincing proof could be required for the high
quality of training offered at Tanglewood than this concert, in which an
orchestra of emerging professional musicians, including two conductors, who
have worked together for only a few weeks performed several rare and demanding
works with consummate technical and interpretive skill.
Members of the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra played two
pieces by Britten in celebration of his centennial year and one by
Shostakovich. The composers were born and died within a few years of each
other, and their music shared what Hugh MacDonald, writing about Britten in the
program book, calls ”a powerful message, usually concerning the exploitation
and vulnerability of weaker souls.” Their mutual admiration was shared by such
great musicians as cellist Mstislav Rostropovich and his wife, soprano Galina
Vishnevskaya, for whom both composers wrote several pieces.
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| Ciaran McAuley |
Irish conductor Ciaran McAuley opened the concert leading
the orchestra in the “Pas de Six” from Britten’s 1957 ballet “Prince of the
Pagodas.” McAuley’s minimal but precise gestures drew a fiery account of the
virtuosic music, which featured an inventive set of variations that made
particularly fierce demands on the sterling brass players.
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| Alexadre Bloch |
French conductor
Alexandre Bloch took the helm for Britten’s song cycle for soprano and string
orchestra “Les Illuminations” to poems by Arthur Rimbaud. Singing in French, TMC
fellow Laura Strickling brought ravishing tone to these brilliantly varied
pieces, and Bloch’s full-body technique elicited a colorful and well-balanced
account from the orchestra.
 |
| Stefan Asbury |
A dazzling performance of Shostakovich’s eleventh symphony,
“The Year 1905,” followed intermission under British-born conductor and
longtime TMC faculty member Stefan Asbury. Dedicated to the victims of an
abortive Russian Revolution, the symphony places huge demands on all sections
of the orchestra, which were unfailingly met with professional rigor and
youthful brio by the players.
Asbury’s conducting style was more animated than McAuley’s and less
flashy than Bloch’s, but the musicians were equally responsive to his
leadership.
The acoustics of Ozawa Hall allowed an impressive level of
detail to be heard in all three pieces, and the large audience applauded enthusiastically
after each one.
