Jonathan Biss James Levine and The MET Orchestra

The last concert of the 3 the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra played in its Carnegie Hall series was held Thursday 5/22. It was in the familiar format of a contemporary piece followed by a concerto by a noted soloist and a universally loved war horse after the intermission. Still with the contemporary composer being Levine favorite Eliot Carter and the soloist being the hot 28year old Jonathan Biss led to an exceptional evening. The scalpers and people looking for tickets in the crowed out front proved that there was some buzz too.

Eliot Carter’s Variations for Orchestra from the mid-1950s has obvious references many earlier composers: Ives, Schoenberg and Berg were obvious to me and I’m sure others caught more influences in the 10 variations. That said it was more Cater than anything else, like all worthwhile composers he is mostly himself. Carter was born in 1908 and has seen a lot of styles and has been influenced by many of them. The Met players played the variations well although they are difficult but after all they are used to playing a different style each night at the opera house, they are stars at adapting.

Jonathan Biss is well known already, although he is young, I was anxious to hear him play for myself. I was very happy with what I heard. His playing of the solo parts of the Schumann Piano Concerto were very mindful the works Romantic period but played with intelligence and feeling never with unnecessary flash. We may have come to a glorious time in performance history where intelligence is held in higher regard than gloss, or perhaps I’ve just been lucky lately. Levine and his forces also played in a restrained intelligent way, a perfect match.

The season started Oct 1^st with Lucia di Lammermoor, since then its been 7 operas a week, with the occasional Sunday for Carnegie Hall performances. For a last piece maestro Levine gave them Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4. This gives most of the musicians a chance to play all out and they seemed to have fun doing it. Not the most subtle music ever written but it gave each section a chance to strut itself. The audience loved it. At the end Levine asked each section to stand starting with the woodwinds and each section got a huge ovation. Levine got a larger ovation than and section and the whole orchestra the greatest ovation of all. It was fun for the audience too; it gave us a chance to thank them for a nice concert and a great season.

Met Orchestra, Modeste Mussorgsky – Gergiev, René Pape

With the Metropolitan Opera season having just finished The Met Orchestra has the time for the last 2 of it 3 concert series at Carnegie Hall. Sunday’s concert was the last in the Carnegie Hall Perspectives: Valery Gergiev series which has lasted all season and presented Mr. Gergiev with both his own Kirov Orchestra and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. Mr. Gergiev decided to program a concert of work by the most purely Russian composer of all - Modeste Mussorgsky.

The first piece on the program was St. John’s Night On Bald Mountain was played here in its rare original form by Mussorgsky not the more common version by Rimsky-Korsakoff. This version is perhaps more ragged but retains a greater feeling of a Russian legend – full of awe and wonder and almost child-like. Gergiev played it with great feeling that the audience loved and I suspect Mussorgsky would have approved of.

The next pieces featured the great German bass-baritone René Pape. The first Songs and Poems of Death joined wonderful coloration from the orchestra with the pure tone of Mr. Pape. The impressionistic orchestration was quite a contrast to the straight forward singing. After intermission Me. Pape sang the more familiar Monologue of Boris from Act II of Boris Godunov. It was once again performed in its original version and again it was a pleasure to note the unapologetically pure Russian style. Mr. Pape got several curtain calls – perhaps there will be a Met Boris in his future, at least a woman we met on the subway going home had a strong desire for a Pape Boris.

Mr. Gergiev saved the most popular piece for last, Pictures at an Exhibition as orchestrated by Ravel. This seems to be a crowed pleaser no matter how its played. The last time I heard it Esa-Pekka Salonen and the New York Philharmonic played it fast and rather light and people gave a standing ovation that lasted a good five minutes. Mr. Gergiev and Met Orchestra played a much slower and moodier take on it but the result was the same – a long ecstatic ovation. Gergiev’s version might not have been as much fun, people did not leave the hall whistling it, but it made us feel and think more. I think it was more Russian and more Mussorgsky.