Bachtrack reviews NJSO’s ‘Don Juan’ program

Bachtrack writes:

The afternoon got off to a rousing start with Don Juan, the symphonic poem often credited with launching the reputation of Richard Strauss as a composer at the young age of 25. Based on Nikolaus Lenau’s verse drama, this is a sympathetic account of the serial philanderer as idealist rather than sinister misogynist, as in Mozart’s Don Giovanni. The New Jersey Symphony’s Don Juan was more ebullient than swaggering; more tragic than despicable. The airy gleam of the horns made up for the impoverished strings, and the oboe and solo violin in the episodes depicting the hero’s amorous conquests were voluptuously flirtatious …

[Debussy’s Fantaisie for Piano and Orchestra] does break new ground. For a start it throws new light on the relationship between soloist and orchestra; it also incorporates fresh and quaint Oriental sonorities. Jean-Efflam Bavouzet clearly understood Debussy’s intentions. Although the piano part had plenty of room for virtuosic display, his playing was almost like a leaf floating on the orchestral pond, as it were, never being in front enough to grab attention. The duets with oboe and cello were particularly delightful. The orchestra, in the meantime, laid a fluid underpinning for the soloist, always moving but never creating waves that roiled him …

With finely balanced control and stamina, Susanna Mälkki eased the orchestra into the incisively anguished and sustained sound wall, mainly on strings, in the subdued opening [of Messiean’s Les offrandes oubliées]. After a violent torrent of body-blows in the middle section, plaintive atonement on strings wrapped up the consignment to eternity in a whirring weep that tapered into a whisper. She brought out all the details of the rich score, leaving nothing in doubt about the deeply evocative meaning of the work.

The concert closed, as it had begun, on a high note – with another work by Strauss. Tod und Verklärung (“Death and Transfiguration”) is a snapshot of the end of an artist’s life. Perhaps paranoiac that his work might be misunderstood, Strauss asked his friend Alexander von Ritter to write poetry to illustrate the events.

Syncopated strings, bassoon and timpani in the opening simulate the dying man’s cardiac arrhythmia as he struggles to keep breathing. Urgent string and woodwind chord progressions lead to a lyrical interlude on oboe, harp, flute and violin, as the affirmation of life takes on the glory of Wagnerian proportions in the transfiguration theme. The end, however, is a mere wistful sigh. While all sections of the orchestra had their moments, as they did in the previous three works in the programme, the lower strings in this work stood out in their clarity and emphasis.

Kudos to the New Jersey Symphony and Susanna Mälkki for an afternoon of variety delivered with great finesse.

Read the full review at bachtrack.com.