From the Canton Symphony Orchestra, Dazzling Fluency in Three
Vernaculars
By Tom Wachunas
The thematic and
formal diversity of the March 3 MasterWorks program from the Canton Symphony
Orchestra (CSO) was a compelling reminder that the sounds emanating from an orchestra
constitute a language. Like any spoken language, those sounds can articulate a
distinct vernacular - the parlance of a specific time and/or place. Here in
Umstattdt Performing Arts Hall, the marvelous expressivity of the CSO was
transportive, taking us from America’s Texas plains, then to the mid-20th
century jazz era, and finally journeying back to the pinnacle of 18th
century European classicism.
The first work on
the program was Snakebite, originally
written for chamber orchestra by Stephen Montague in 1995 while he was guest
professor of composition at the University of Texas at Austin. This complex,
adventurous piece of sonic mischief, rarely performed live, is largely built
around the traditional Texas fiddle tune, “Dusty Miller,” and a fascinating
story. As told to Montague by an old cowboy, when Plains Indians were bitten by
a rattlesnake, they would quickly lie
down on the ground, shut their eyes, and will their heartbeats to slow until
the poison dispersed – a process lasting sometimes up to 18 hours.
It was clear from
the outset that Maestro Gerhardt Zimmermann heartily embraced the raucous
spirit of this work. His enthusiasm was infectious as the orchestra proceeded
to take a walk on the wild side. Once the jaunty fiddle melody emerged, variations
of it were passed back and forth between various instruments throughout most of the
work. Meanwhile, a substantial part of this musical narrative was left to the
strings to enunciate. Accordingly, they poured out an onomatopoeic,
entertaining array of strange squeaks and rattlings, percussive pluckings,
cascades of bent and banged notes, all conjuring a picture of the coiled
snake-in-waiting and its vicious bite. At one point, the music came to a
screeching, brassy halt, followed by an eerily solemn passage. Here, the
orchestra slowly gathered itself into a swirling, aleatory cacophony of colors
and textures. After this haunting exhalation of venom, as it were, the jaunty
fiddle tune was resurrected, building in tempo to a gleeful, boot-stomping
finale.
Randy Klein, CSO
principal clarinetist, was the featured soloist for the second work on the
program, Aaron Copland’s Concerto for Clarinet and Orchestra. Copland composed
this two-movement piece (played without pause) in 1950 for Benny Goodman, the
“King of Swing.” The instrumental accompaniment for the concerto was
unconventional. As Copland explained, “The instrumentation being clarinet with
strings, harp, and piano, I did not have a large battery of percussion to
achieve jazzy effects, so I used slapping basses and whacking harp sounds to
simulate them.”
At the beginning of
the work, the harp briefly set the mood and tempo as the clarinet entered into
an ethereal dialogue with languorous violins. The simple melody was a gorgeous,
sensual expression, somewhat like a lullaby, evoking a pastoral serenity tinged
with melancholy, and blended seamlessly with lower strings and harp as they
sustained a quiet pulse. Klein’s cadenza - a dramatic and melodic link to the second
movement - was quite literally breathtaking, though maybe ‘breath-giving’ would
be more apropos to describing his
riveting virtuosity. This was a dazzling gem of technical and aural control imbued
with soaring, lyrical sensitivity. He brought that same brio to the second
movement, injecting its spiky, Brazilian-flavored rhythms with dashes of bright humor, and all ending
with a Gershwinesque clarinet glissando (or in jazz-speak, “smear”), sliding
easily from the lowest register up to high C.
Of course we
clamored for an encore, and Klein obliged with a beautifully piquant
instrumental rendition of “Nature Boy,” a song first recorded (and made famous)
by American jazz singer Nat King Cole in 1948. Throughout Klein’s mesmerizing
performance, which at times had all the spontaneous feel of an improvisation, CSO
principal cellist Erica Snowden bowed a single, low note. It was a poetic drone,
at once doleful and seductive, and counterbalanced by Klein’s deft trills and
arpeggios punctuated with flashes of bluesy swag. The moment resonated with me
through the intermission in a haunting way, as if somehow foreshadowing the
subjective breadth of the program’s final selection – Mozart’s magnificent
Symphony No. 40.
To this iconic work Maestro Zimmermann brought
every bit of his uncanny interpretive prowess, along with a deep reverence for
the soulfulness of Mozart. In turn, there was a brisk, gripping air of urgency
in the way the orchestra delivered an altogether poignant and stunning performance.
Mozart’s Symphony No.40 is a sublimely ordered,
emotionally potent, and wholly unforgettable statement in a language born at
the apex of his creative genius. More than just a singular European dialect indigenous
to the Classical era, however, we have come to rightly revere it as a
transcendent music, spoken in the patois
of timelessness itself. Fittingly enough then, on this occasion it was an
eminently inspired CSO that spoke so eloquently in tongues.
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