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Three Rousing Hurrahs! New York
Isaac Stern Auditorioum, Carnegie Hall
08/05/2024 - & August 8 (Montevideo), 10 (Buenos Aires), 12 (Rio de Janeiro), 14 (São Paulo), 2024
Samuel Barber: Symphony No. 1, Opus 9
George Gershwin: Rhapsody in Blue (Orchestrated by Ferdé Grofé)
Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherazade, Opus 35
Jean-Yves Thibaudet (Piano)
Musicians from the Polyphony Ensemble, National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America, Marin Alsop (Conductor)
USA Youth Orchestra (© Samuel A Dog)
“I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear.”
Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
“The role of music and art is to nourish and sustain people. The day of American leadership has dawned, and it is necessary for we artists to become spiritual leaders.”
John Alden Carpenter
Last night’s World Orchestra Week offering was–like all their other offerings– far far more than a concert. Carnegie Hall’s walls were decorated not only with WOW medallions, but moving quotes from members of all the orchestras. And while American Youth Orchestra included over 100 players from all over the country, they also included a dozen‑odd members of the Polyphony Ensemble, an orchestra of Jewish and Arab members from the Middle East.
Yes, the audience was predominantly American. But interspersed were artists from the other orchestras performing this week. The Chinese Youth Orchestra, tonight’s (Tuesday, August 6) European Youth Orchestra. And garnering the loudest applause of all, the Afghan Youth Orchestra (yes, living outside that hellhole), performing here Wednesday, and–in the Kennedy Center, compered by Renée Fleming–on Thursday.
Add to that conductors which any orchestra would salivate for. From Dudamel to Marin to Iván Fischer, all of these legendary figures obviously never treated their young artists as children, but as artists worthy of the name.
I’ve been unable to attend all the concerts, but those I’ve heard exhibited damned good instrumental technique–and the kind of disciplined enthusiasm one almost never finds in our usual metropolitan orchestras.
Last night, Marin Alsop contributed her genius to the (take a deep breath) National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America, augmented by the Polyphony Ensemble. The one overwhelming adjective for the evening was “rousing.”
No, not Sousa marches or Ives pictures (though I feel they could have easily handled both.) But an early rarely played loud one‑movement symphony by Samuel Barber, an orchestral phenomena showing off all their players with Scheherazade, and–after Rhapsody in Blue–a singular symphonic epic by the great great James P. Johnson.
M. Alsop/J.-Y. Thibaudet (© Grant Leighton/Elizabeth Karen)
One sometimes quails at the superimposed, almost pleonastic jazz by non-Americans (Lang Lang comes to mind), Jean‑Yves Thibaudet, though, has lived in California long enough to know that Rhapsody has its own expandable meaning.
The original Paul Whiteman was “white‑man’s big‑band music”, which is still an antediluvian treasure. At the other end is Mr. Thibaudet. A superb concert-artist, he turned the piece into a virtual cadenza, a Rachmaninoff concerto without a hint of schlock or shmaltz. Rather, he bounced through his role, allowed himself to be overcome by Ms. Alsop’s orchestra, then returned to his picture of a 19th Century concerto filled with riffs, syncs, huge virtuosity and–Mr. Thibaudet being a showman when necessary–an innate love of the piece and its varied meaning.
Even better, no matter the expertise of the first two‑thirds, one dreads the mawkish main theme. Mr. Thibaudet skipped through and continued with what seemed breathless improvisation.
Breathless was also the word for James P. Johnson’s encore. This was big‑band, big-piano-big-sync-big-solos. And like Rhapsody, a work of its own genre. I had only known the composer for his Jelly Roll Morton “stride piano.” Obviously he was far more. Ms. Alsop championship of his symphonic works is worthy of laudation.
The opening Barber one-movement Symphony showed a brilliant young composer whose métier seems a bit old‑fashioned today. That is unfair. He was a master of the emotional; crescendo (right: Adagio for Strings), and this noisy but well-constructed work showed the American youth orchestra mastering the complex rises and falls, scholarly counterpoint, and that final somewhat overpowering passacaglia.
If the Barber Symphony showed the orchestra as a grand ensemble, Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade was a showpiece for almost all the soloists. Starting with violinist Enzo Baldanza. Technically fine, this splendid artist knew that the violin was the courtesan herself, so his tone was oh‑so‑sweet, on the cusp of saccharine. The others in the orchestra–flute, clarinetist Tyler Anderson (who also shone in the Gershwin), the whole brass and cello section–wove their tales, gave Ms. Alsop’s energy to the music and proved both exciting and radiant.
Harry Rolnick
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