October 5, 2024

For some time now, over a century at least, there has been a lot of fuss made about when to clap at a classical music concert. This, along with what to wear, have apparently been two obstacles for people to enter the concert hall audience for the first time. None of us on stage are happy about that. We just want you to come and enjoy the music, wear what you want, clap when the spirit moves you.
 
Thursday night was the Lansing Symphony’s season opener, our 95th!. On the program was Mozart’s Symphony No. 31, the “Paris.” One of my favorite anecdotes about that work is that, at the Paris premiere, the audience actually started clapping during the music after passages they found especially exciting. That’s an engaged audience! Mozart was surprised and pleasantly so.
 
When our guest artist for the evening, the Cuban-American cellist Tommy Mesa launched into his encore, a famous movement from a Bach cello suite, the audience cheered in recognition after the first few notes. I loved that. It was like a rock concert, just as when a crowd who has come to hear Neil Young starts cheering as soon as he plays the first few notes of “Harvest Moon.”
 
Speaking of Tommy, the encore was much deserved. He had just delivered a captivating and soulful rendering of Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations. My love for that work grows with each engagement with it. Tommy found the sweet spot in each of those variations. He is a deeply expressive musician, and his joy of music making can be felt in the back row of the balcony. His star is rising.
 
The notion of variations was the unofficial theme of the whole concert. Tchaikovsky’s Rococo was preceded by Mozart’s Paris which is one of the composer’s symphonies written in the Rococo style. Mozart was Tchaikovsky’s guiding light as a composer, and the Rococo Variations were written as something of an homage to his idol of a century earlier, so that was a nice connection to make and made for a nice flow to the evening.
 
More variations followed after intermission, Elgar’s masterful Enigma Variations. For as familiar as it is, this warhorse is unique in the orchestral canon, and it’s easy to forget that. I don’t know another work quite like it.
 
For starters, there is the “people” element…I should say the “people and one dog” element. It’s a work about relationships, each variation a tribute to a friend or family member. Some are touching, some are clever, some whimsical…all brilliant.
 
Then there is that element of cleverness and mystique…what is the enigma? Certainly it extends beyond the easily decipherable initials with which the composer identifies each movement. It’s work full of quirks, musical and otherwise. Why is there a quote (in actual quotation marks ) from Mendelssohn’s Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage Overture. Why are some seemingly innocuous passages indicated to be played prominently? What other mysteries does the work hold? Much ink and breath has been spent on that topic, but some secrets went to the grave with Mr. Elgar, leaving us to contemplate and speculate.
 
Then there is the purely musical element. It takes a special compositional skill to make the theme and variations form work. The challenge lies creating a work where the listener’s experience of the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. While each variation of Elgar’s are beautiful on their own, it’s the arc of the work that puts it into the “masterpiece” category.
 
Gala Flagello’s “Bravado”, which opened our program, is also built on a variation idea. This engaging work presents a theme, rich in bravado itself, that then undergoes a series of transformations over the course of the piece…each exploring a different flavor of bravado. The audience clearly resonated with this work and responded with great enthusiasm. I was wonderful to have Gala with us in rehearsal and concert as well. She is one to watch.
 
Next up
 
November 1, 2024
 
Lansing Symphony Orchestra
Willis Delony, piano
Wharton Center for the Performing Arts
East Lansing, Michigan
7:30 p.m.
 
 
William Grant STILL    Symphony No. 2 “Song for a New Race”
Greg YASINITSKY         Jazz Concerto for Piano and Orchestra
GERSHWIN                  Rhapsody in Blue
 
#tommymesa #galaflagello