“Welcome back,” cooed the ushers as audience members streamed into Orchestra Hall on Friday night, for a season finale that highlighted the multiple talents of music director Osmo Vänskä. Three specific talents were on display as Vänskä played clarinet, debuted a new composition, and conducted.
It all happened less than a mile from Hennepin County Courthouse on the day Derek Chauvin, who was convicted of murder and manslaughter in the death of George Floyd, was sentenced to 22.5 years in prison. Outside Orchestra Hall, children played in the water feature at Peavey Plaza. There was a quiet calm to the beautiful summer evening.
Inside, musicians and a limited audience seemed glad to be gathering in person. All wore masks.
First on the program, performed without a conductor, was Nonet in F minor, Opus 2 by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor. The British Black composer was active in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and Nonet premiered in 1894. The four string players faced off with the oboe, clarinet, bassoon and horn players, with Mary Jo Gothmann on the piano in between them, acting as a syncopated intermediary between the two sides.
Vänskä was unassuming with his clarinet. He’s a poetic player with a lyrical quality, but he didn’t show off.
Coleridge-Taylor’s cinematic work began with the playful Allegro moderato movement, where one at a time instruments danced into focus before sashaying into the background. This was followed by the gently majestic Andante con moto, dotted with somber tones and adorned with searching pizzicato. The third movement, Scherzo: Allegro, sneaked and crawled impishly, and was followed by the Finale: Allegro vivace, a sprightly movement with surprising high notes on the piano.
Next up was the premiere of Vänskä’s Overture, a piece he composed as a companion to Kurt Weill’s Concerto for Violin and Wind Orchestra, Opus 12, which followed it on the program.
Overture vacillated between dissonance and dreaminess, and in so doing acted as an apt bridge between the airy Coleridge-Taylor and the darker Weill work. Composed during the COVID-19 pandemic, the work carried a gravitas that spoke to the enormous weight the world has been carrying these many months. The 14 percussion instruments were featured prominently in the score, including cowbell, bongos, glockenspiel and wind chimes. The moment featuring the groaning lion’s roar stole the show.
Vänskä conducted Overture as well as the final piece on the program by Weill, a Jewish composer who began his career in Germany before fleeing to the U.S. in 1933. Like his playing, Vänskä’s conducting holds a focused intensity and deep connection with the musicians. He led not with flourish but with steady clarity and an easy give and take. Yes, there were moments where Vänskä used his whole body to bring the music to crescendo, but at other times he loosened things up, with the use of his wrists gently guiding the five-movement concerto along.
Concertmaster Erin Keefe, meanwhile, displayed ferocity as the soloist. With utter confidence, she attacked the strings and shifted easily between vigorous fast notes to soaring melody. Unsurprisingly, she lost a few bow hairs by the end of the piece.
Weill is perhaps best known for his theatrical scores, especially those made in collaboration with Bertolt Brecht, like “The Threepenny Opera.” Composed just three years before that musical, in 1925, Concerto for Violin and Wind Orchestra, Opus 12 has a much more discordant sound. In the hands of the Minnesota Orchestra musicians, it stormed and romped in its cacophonous beauty.
It was a riotous end to an evening that took quite a journey, one that built toward a triumphant, frenzied finish.
FYI
- Who: The Minnesota Orchestra with conductor Osmo Vanska
- What: “Season Finale: A Summer Prelude”
- When: 2 p.m. Saturday
- Where: Orchestra Hall, 1111 Nicollet Mall, Minneapolis and online
- Tickets: Free recorded livestream at minnesotaorchestra.org
- Capsule: Osmo Vänskä displays his artistic versatility in the Minnesota Orchestra’s season finale.
Sheila Regan is a Twin Cities based journalist and arts writer. She has covered dance for the Star Tribune and written for City Pages and Minnesota Monthly, as well as national publications including the Guardian, the Washington Post, and American Theatre. You can also hear her arts stories on KFAI’s Minneculture.
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Classical music review: Minnesota Orchestra’s Osmo Vanska: Triple threat - TwinCities.com-Pioneer Press
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