Press praise Sarah Chang performances

Press reviews Sarah Chang performances:

The Star-Ledger writes:

Sarah Chang leaned back, a platform heel kicking out from under her emerald green gown as she tore through a furiously spiraling run of Bruch’s Violin Concerto No. 1. Her seemingly endless bravado suited the music excellently — and her precision was stunning.

Chang’s performance was gratifyingly assured. The concerto is a standard piece of music, but Chang made it sound as tailor-made for her as her bold, formfitting dress.

As the guest soloist with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra under music director Jacques Lacombe, Chang gave a thoroughly impressive and entertaining performance Thursday at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center that showed off her virtuosity.

Chang, who made her debut with the New York Philharmonic when she was 8, showed her authority in the concerto’s moody opening and its gypsy-tinged finale. She maintained the music’s exciting initial build-up as she seamlessly integrated trills and double-stops and impeccably dispatched vigorous passages. Lacombe and the NJSO matched her energy and strong pulse with playing that was taut and rich in character.

Chang’s presence was dramatic and her approach often muscular, with a confident sense of attack. She also employed a lush sound in her lower range, crystalline top notes and a nice focus in the work’s lyrical portions.

Read the full article and view photos from the performance at nj.com.

Superconductor writes:

Thursday’s matinee concert at the New Jersey Performing Arts center opened with the Good Friday Spell an instrumental arrangement of a scene from the third act of Wagner’s final opera Parsifal. Starting with a fanfare and flourish, the NJSO woodwinds and horns blended with a luminous sound, evoking the peace and tranquility of Wagner’s stage picture. One could almost hear the voices as the tone poem wound forwrd, conducted with purpose by Mr. Lacombe.

Ms. Chang joined the orchestra for the Bruch concerto, that composer’s best-loved and most popular work. She plaayed [sic] the first notes with a singing, aspiring tone, lending poetry to the notes of the cadenza that starts the concerto before being answered by the full power of the orchestra. The soulful, folk-inspired main theme had warmth and heft.

...

Playing Bruckner’s demanding brass parts are the true test of any orchestra. Here, the NJSO players launched into the ascending theme in the horns over a lush tremolo of strings. The horn-call was answered by a surge of low brass and percussion. Mr. Lacombe proved adroit in navigating the repetitions of the opening movement, building each of Bruckner’s sonic structures with increased energy, density and spiritual commitment.

The slow movement proved ideally suited to this orchestra, with an eloquent opening for plucked strings giving way to a majestic climax. The Scherzo, with its “hunting horn” theme was played with clarity and rhythmic grace, with Mr. Lacombe leading his players expertly into the eloquent central Trio. The finale assembled all of the previous themes (plus a reference to the funeral march from Act III of Parsifal) into a furious assault of sound, staking Mr. Lacombe’s claim as a Bruckner conductor to be reckoned with.

Read the full article at super-conductor.blogspot.com.