‘Boulanger, Rachmaninoff, and Shostakovich’ @ Dallas Symphony Orchestra
—Wayne Lee Gay
This weekend's concerts of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra and Latvian guest conductor Andris Poga opens quite promisingly, with Lili Boulanger's six-minute D'un matin de printemps. Boulanger composed this miniature masterpiece at the age of 24, shortly before her tragically early death in 1921. Here, she creates a perfect balance of form, orchestration, and structure, something to delight any listener. Little surprises crop up, but with perfect logic; this work could only have been written by a French composer. What could she have accomplished with just a few more years!
Unfortunately, guest piano soloist Behzod Abduraimov follows up on the program with a brutal man-handling of Rachmaninoff's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. In 1934, resigned to exile from his beloved Russia, Rachmaninoff produced this elegant, often passionate showpiece that has been a mainstay of the concerto repertoire for eighty years. Uzbekhi-born Abduraimov badly misreads the possibilities of the piece, racing thoughtlessly from one jack-hammered loud passage to the next. Even the brilliantly lyrical and deservedly beloved eighteenth variation comes across with the grace of a tornado in this rendition. Abduraimov successfully shows off his ability to create very loud noises at the piano, but fails to present any understanding of Rachmaninoff's genius.
Rachmaninoff never met his Russian contemporary Shostakovich, and the two apparently shared a mutual disdain for each other's music. This is all the more reason that the juxtaposition of their music on a single concert is basically a good idea.
In this instance, Abduraimov's heavy-handed interpretation of Rachmaninoff's Paganini Rhapsody makes a bad start for the pairing. Shostakovich's Symphony No. 15 is not a particularly easy piece to sell. There are some amazing moments in this four-movement, 45-minute-long work—not the least of which are the two simple chime-tones from a glockenspiel that open it. (When he composed the piece in 1972, Shostakovich would have had no idea that half a century later many in the audience would reach for their cell phones, thinking they had received a text message.)
On the whole, though, the mood of Shostakovich's Fifteenth, written as the 68-year-old composer faced failing health, is pessimistic. The repeated quotes from Rossini's Overture to William Tell in the first movement are an oddity that we'll leave to Shostakovich experts to explain; quotes from Wagner in the Finale feel less jarring and more organic.
Difficult, exposed instrumental solos abound, all performed beautifully. Principal cellist Christopher Adkins in particular performs his challenging extended solo in the second movement magnificently. There is an overwhelming sense of a kind of structured musical stream-of-consciousness at work here, with dark ideas fleeting across the orchestra. Still, conductor Poga holds the complex score together neatly in this rarely performed work by one of the high priests of twentieth-century musical modernism.
WHEN: May 16-19, 2024
WHERE: Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center, Dallas
WEB: dallassymphony.org
