MTT Brings Engaging Beethoven to SFS

 

Michael Tilson Thomas taking a bow with soprano Angel Blue, mezzo Tamara Mumford, and SFS Chorus Director Jenny Wong (Concertmaster Alexander Barantschik to MTT's right) (photograph by Stefan Cohen, courtesy of SFS)

Last night San Francisco Symphony (SFS) Music Director Laureate Michael Tilson Thomas (MTT) returned to Davies Symphony Hall. He led a program devoted entirely to Ludwig van Beethoven’s most monumental symphony, his Opus 125 (ninth) in D minor. This has become known as his “choral” symphony, since the final movement incorporates text from Friedrich Schiller’s “Ode to Joy” poem sung by a full four-part chorus and four vocal soloists. The evening also marked the first appearance of Jenny Wong, the new SFS Chorus Director. The vocal soloists were guest artists soprano Angel Blue (making her Orchestral Series debut), mezzo Tamara Mumford, tenor Ben Bliss, and bass Dashon Burton (also making his Orchestral Series debut).

My guess is that there were few, if any, in the audience that were not familiar with Opus 125. Nevertheless, even with his ongoing health issues, MTT delivered one of the most memorable sit-up-and-take-notice events that I have encountered in Davies, if not in all my concert-going throughout the city of San Francisco. This was the work of a conductor who not only knew the significance of every note on the score pages but also molded that significance into a “terrain” of contrasting episodes. This was a performance in which the metaphor of journey could not have been more appropriate, and MTT knew how to endow each passage through that journey with its own distinctive denotations and connotations.

That freshness extended to Wong’s preparation of the Chorus, keeping the attentive listener as attuned to the choral polyphonic interplay as (s)he was to the many subtle changes in instrumentation that keep changing the colors of the many familiar musical themes. In that context, the solo vocal work is relatively modest. Burton had the responsibility of introducing the “Ode to Joy” theme, and he managed to deliver an account with all the freshness of a new discovery. Bliss delivered the “march” stanza, which required him to soar up into the stratosphere while the orchestral accompaniment kept getting louder and louder. The quartet accounts of the other verses made a convincing case that this was Beethoven’s approach to the vocal genre at its finest. However, it was the full force of the Chorus that gave this symphony its almost revolutionary impact; and MTT’s leadership of instrumental and choral resources last night may well have left an impression that will remain with the attentive listener for some time to come.

This program will be given two more performances, the first at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, October 21, and the second a 2 p.m. on Sunday, October 22. MTT’s direction clearly delivered an event to remember. Those without tickets for the remaining offerings will probably appreciate getting some before they have all been sold.