ORCHESTRA: Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra

CONDUCTOR: Arild Remmereit

SOLOIST: George Vosburgh (trumpet)

DATE: February 1, 2007

WORKS PERFORMED: (1) Carl  Nielsen Symphony No. 1 in G minor, op. 7, (2) Johann Nepomuk-Hummel Concerto in E major for Trumpet and Orchestra and (3) Edvard Grieg Suite No.1 and No. 2 from Peer Gynt.

Note: I attended this concert and never published this review, but today one year later I have decided to start this blog with this review and continue with reviews for all the concerts I will attend from now on. Better late than never…

To begin with, Carl Nielsen’s first symphony originates from a composer who never took a music composition class in his life. This symphony has been largely ignored by the musical world since its inception though it clearly manifested some of Nielsen’s personal proclivities which later on would see the light in his other symphonies and various other orchestral works. With this symphony he demonstrated that it was possible to carry on with coherent symphonic structures and attractive tonal characters without falling into neo-classic formats, and, still not borrowing formats taken from the late Romantic tradition.

Just like Gustav Mahler, Nielsen employs a progressive tonality: the work begins in a determined tone and progresses to finish in another tone. At the end of the 19th. Century and beginning of the 20th. this type of musical composition was considered an error which attended against the unity of any musical work. Consequently this piece was and is seldom performed given its demanding instrumentation and orchestration, and when it is performed, on those rare occasions rarely does justice to its musical value. On this concert Remmereit’s realization and the PSO’s accomplished performance of the work took this symphony from the category “dreadful bore” to that of emotionally charged as well as inspiring. The aesthetic acoustic qualities of this work were beautifully realized with a memorable performance by all…a reference for all others to follow indeed.

As to the second work performed: Hummel’s trumpet concerto it suffices to say that George Vosburgh (Principal Trumpet) under the minimal, very controlled and free of histrionics very wise direction of Remmereit, with a minimal orchestra formation (as it should be) reached with his beautiful and technically demanding cadenzas a level seldom seen anywhere…a masterful realization by all involved.

The last work perfomed: Remmereit’s own arrangement from Grieg’s Suite 1 and 2 from Peer Gynt moves me to say that under most circumstances it’s very difficult to write about music and music making. However, on rare occasion one finds elements during the performance whence combined make that performance a whole lot more than just a memorable live concert, and then one writes about that…which is what I am about to do.

The many existing arrangements of Peer Gynt we know about offer the whole gamut of accolades, again, from “dreadful bore” (most of the time) to just “glorious” (seldom). Here, the marvelous union of the PSO, an incredible gifted conductor (Remmereit) and an inspired reading of the work took us the audience to an evident and palpable emotionally charged state of being seldom seen…the glorious applies here. We discovered through the inspired reading of the work romanticism, mystery, lyricism and mysticism in a perfect union. This performance had a life of its own specially in the Ase’s Death and Solveijg’s Song episodes. The silvery sounds of the PSO’s string choir (ah! those marvelous ppp E flats and As) were far beyond anything I had ever heard in my life from any orchestra, period.

These feelings which were also shared by many in the audience around me was that we had just seen a “reference” performance for the ages. One that contained everything I am sure Grieg wanted to convey in terms of expression and sensitivity that he as a human being was capable to express in musical form. There was nothing baroque (of course), nor romantic or post-romantic, or formally modern with this performance. It should be noted that Grieg reportedly did not like at all to undertake the scoring of this work for the Peer Gynt play but in the end he gave to it the best of him.

A glorious day that was for the orchestra, the conductor and us the grateful audience. I believe Remmereit belongs to a very young and select small group of conductors of the “future” which are ready to show us the shape of things of come.

Final words: the PSO, that is, the members of the orchestra, make this an orchestra to envy by all. Their sound…the silver sounds of the strings and the superlative wind and brass sections, backed by an extraordinaire timpani have no equal in the world.

My opinion of course ~ Cimbasso.