Pinchas Zukerman Chamber Concert @ Dallas Symphony Orchestra
—Review by Gregory Sullivan Isaacs
A scant few days after hearing chamber music in an elegant home, its original birthplace, there was an opportunity to hear it played in a large concert hall—the Meyerson Symphony Center. In order to scale down the space to something ideal for more intimate music-making, the stage itself became the concert venue. The players faced the back of the stage, the audience was seated in the Choral Terrace (with some additional chairs added on the stage), and the rows and rows of “usual” seats were empty.
This unusual arrangement allowed the audience to be close to the players while utilizing the acoustical beauty of the entire concert hall. And because the program offered the same Brahms piano quartet heard at Blue Candlelight Music Series last week, I had the opportunity to experience and compare the more “present” sound in the private home to the resonance that the “Meyerson Gloss” adds to performances.
The star of the program was the legendary violinist/violist/conductor and Grammy Award winner, Pinchas Zukerman. He has a busy and distinguished international performance career as soloist and chamber musician. He is on the faculty at the Manhattan School of Music and is the head and founder of the Zukerman Performance Program. His many honors include the King Solomon Award, the National Medal of Arts (presented by President Reagan in 1983), the Isaac Stern Award for Artistic Excellence, and an honorary doctorate from Brown University. He is a long-time DSO collaborator and holds the title of Artistic & Principal Education Partner.
The eclectic program featured a combination of two works for string ensembles and piano, as well as one for piano and wind instruments. The artistic merits of the performances exceeded all expectations, no surprise when considering the array of world-class performers who participated. With Zukerman were cellist (and spouse) Amanda Forsyth and pianist Shai Wosner, who both (in addition to their own stellar careers) perform with Zukerman in his eponymous chamber ensembles. From the SMU Meadows School of the Arts faculty came violist Pierre Lapointe, and players drawn from the Dallas Symphony included Meredith Kufchak (viola), Gary Levinson (violin), Matthew Sinno(viola), Jolyon Pegis (cello), Willa Henigman (oboe), Stephen Ahearn (clarinet), Tom Fleming (bassoon), and Alexander Kienle (horn).
The program opened with a concert rarity, the Sextet For Strings extracted from Richard Strauss’ final opera, Capriccio. This is a subtle drawing-room opera, set in 1775, and consists of only one act, although it lasts over 2 1/2 hours. Briefly, here is the plot. The Countess is in a quandary: which of her two suitors shall she select? One is a poet and the other is a composer. This rather obvious opera-about-opera scenario mirrors the eternal competition between words and music in musical theater works.
(She decides, wait for it, not to decide.)
The sextet opens the opera. We soon discover that it was written for the Countess by her composer suitor. With a bow to the era in which the opera is set, Strauss wrote it in a post-Wagnerian, harmonically slippery style reminiscent of his early works.
The ensemble gave the piece a richly delicious crème bavaroise of a performance. The audience seemed entranced, perhaps not only by the music’s approach to the sublime, but because many were hearing the work for the first time—a memorable concert experience.
Next followed Beethoven’s Quintet in E Flat Major for Piano and Winds, whose lilting opening melody may be oddly familiar—if you’ve ever been put “on hold” in the UT Southwestern health care system.
On first hearing, you might guess Mozart, and you wouldn’t be far off; the piece is thought to be modeled on Mozart’s Quintet, K. 452. Beethoven was only 26 when he wrote this quintet, and he was not particularly thought of as a composer. Instead, his growing reputation rested on his appearances as a pianist and improviser. Mozart’s somewhat similar piece must have seemed a likely touchstone to use for reference. As a novice composer, Beethoven crafted the first movement as an “I know what I am doing” musical resume. The ensemble played it in an appropriately studious yet heartfelt manner; its treatment pleased the DSO audience, and surely would have passed muster with the young Beethoven.
But it was the lovely second movement that caught everyone’s undivided attention. Impressive guest pianist Shai Wosner (whose early training in Israel was enhanced by his work with Emanuel Ax at The Juilliard School) set the mood as he sensitively introduced the tune. When the winds entered, playing as a group with perfect intonation, the beauty of Beethoven’s melody was revealed in full.
As the movement progressed, each of the DSO’s players had a chance to “sing” what is one of the composer’s most beautiful melodies. Oboist Willa Henigman was a particular standout as she turned a simple scale into something far more. In another high point (in what is usually just a simple ritard and transition), Wosner’s passage that returns us to the opening music became a bridge from one section to another. Clarinetist Steve Ahearn and bassoonist Tom Fleming matched the mood as they took their turns. Also of note, in addition to a brassy yet smooth sound, French Hornist Alex Kienle displayed an impressive subito piano.
The final movement is a jolly rondo, a form much like a song. It opens with a refrain, which constantly returns after a series of different and contrasting musical sections. The ensemble kept the mood happy, without ever letting it bubble over into parody. Of particular note, Wosner’s virtuosic patterns on the piano were exceptionally smooth, as his nimble fingers effortlessly ran up and down the keyboard.
Brahms’ Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor brought the string players back on stage. This work is often called the “Werther Quartet” because it refers to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s epistolary novel, Die Leiden des jungen Werthers (The Sorrows of Young Werther). Jules Massenet wrote a lushly romantic opera based on the same book. The tale is a study of the disastrous effect of unrequited love on a young and impressionable man. This was also Brahms’ situation: although he was old enough to know better, he fell hopelessly in love with Clara, the wife of his mentor Robert Schumann.
This quartet is a serious and emotional work that opens with a descending two-note pattern that sounds like “Clara" when said with a sigh. That pattern becomes part of the musical network threading throughout the work. Further, the four-note “Clara Theme” composed by Robert Schumann also found its way into Brahms’ sorrowful quartet.
The ensemble set the melancholy mood with the very first “Clara” statement. They gave the two-note pattern a decrescendo that was more emotional than sonic. Like Beethoven, Brahms loved to write variations, and he uses that technique, on a warmer theme, as a middle section.
The players charged into the second movement, a stormy scherzo, with a flurry of rosin dust, and the usually contrasting, calmer trio section continued the tempestuous mood. The cellist opened the slow third movement with an exquisite melody played in the upper reaches of the instrument.
The final movement finds Brahms borrowing again, this time from the opening of Felix Mendelssohn's Piano Trio in C minor, Op. 66. Zukerman opened the movement Wosner, violin and piano skillfully establishing separate melodic identities. The violin tune is hesitant while the piano part is more animated. The ensemble changed that mood dramatically with a roaring launch into some new material. At the end, the players created a farewell decrescendo, but brought things to a close with two sudden and loud chords—an “Amen,” perhaps?
Led by Zukerman, who curated the program, directed, and performed, this chamber concert was an altogether satisfying, and sometimes transcendent, evening of music.
