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Beethoven and Sibelius – excellent from start to finnish at San Diego Symphony
But I ended up regretting wearing shorts
Leonard Bernstein conducting this Sibelius symphony in 1988
I attended my first morning concert by the San Diego Symphony on Friday, February 28. The concert started at 11 am, and I was happy to have the day free in order to attend. I’ve reached an age where a daytime concert is more attractive than an evening concert. I took full advantage of the 72-degree weather and wore shorts. I parked a good half a mile away and enjoyed a brief stroll through sunny downtown San Diego. This was the ultimate San Diego winter experience – shorts at the symphony in February.
The concert started with Jean Sibelius’s mighty yet enigmatic tone poem Tapiola. Sibelius described the work to his publisher: “Wide-spread they stand, the Northland's dusky forests, ancient, mysterious, brooding savage dreams;
Within them dwells the Forest's mighty God,
And wood-sprites in the gloom weave magic secrets.”
Officially, I resist the idea of programmatic music but that’s a program I can get behind. The performance, conducted by Osmo Vänskä was exemplary. This piece works much better in a concert hall than on a recording. Recordings don’t capture the full dynamics that are at play in Sibelius’s music.
The next piece was Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5. After the gnarled and tangled Northland, Enlightenment Era Vienna felt clean and focused. This concerto is, obviously, a masterpiece. If you’ve never heard Beethoven before, this piece is a perfect encapsulation of his genius. The opening movement is stately and heroic. The middle movement is delicate and introspective and the final movement is sheer optimism and joy.
The performance by pianist Paavel Jumppanen was ideal. His phrasing was perfect for my understanding of this music. He wasn’t indulgent or heavy-handed with the pathos in the middle section. He didn’t try to set any speed records in the final movement. He played the piece as written and all the details were in place. You will not hear a finer performance.
The concert concluded with Sibelius’s Symphony No. 5. For those who get caught up in such things, this is considered to be the greatest fifth symphony ever written. That’s saying something because there are a lot of great fifth symphonies. I don’t know if I can go there as a Brucknerian but symphonic savants swear by Sibelius’s Fifth.
Video:
Sibelius Symphony N° 5
Leonard Bernstein Wiener Philharmoniker 1988
I do love this piece of music, and the performance turned in by The San Diego Symphony and maestro Vänskä was a Norse Saga in three movements. Near the middle of the final movement, the strings achieve a pianissimo that I did not think was possible. It was a stunning effect as the music consolidated itself before opening up into the final stretch and what a final stretch is was. Maestro Vänskä had been on the brisque side with the first two movements but in the final section, he paid it back with a broad and expansive account. The final orchestral blows of Thor’s hammer that conclude the piece sounded magnificent in the new hall.
As I left the concert, I started to regret wearing shorts. A stern wind whipped down Seventh Ave. I realized that this performance had invoked Thor, the storm god, and he responded.
Here's something you might be interested in.
Beethoven and Sibelius – excellent from start to finnish at San Diego Symphony
But I ended up regretting wearing shorts
Beethoven and Sibelius – excellent from start to finnish at San Diego Symphony
But I ended up regretting wearing shorts
Leonard Bernstein conducting this Sibelius symphony in 1988
I attended my first morning concert by the San Diego Symphony on Friday, February 28. The concert started at 11 am, and I was happy to have the day free in order to attend. I’ve reached an age where a daytime concert is more attractive than an evening concert. I took full advantage of the 72-degree weather and wore shorts. I parked a good half a mile away and enjoyed a brief stroll through sunny downtown San Diego. This was the ultimate San Diego winter experience – shorts at the symphony in February.
The concert started with Jean Sibelius’s mighty yet enigmatic tone poem Tapiola. Sibelius described the work to his publisher: “Wide-spread they stand, the Northland's dusky forests, ancient, mysterious, brooding savage dreams;
Within them dwells the Forest's mighty God,
And wood-sprites in the gloom weave magic secrets.”
Officially, I resist the idea of programmatic music but that’s a program I can get behind. The performance, conducted by Osmo Vänskä was exemplary. This piece works much better in a concert hall than on a recording. Recordings don’t capture the full dynamics that are at play in Sibelius’s music.
The next piece was Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5. After the gnarled and tangled Northland, Enlightenment Era Vienna felt clean and focused. This concerto is, obviously, a masterpiece. If you’ve never heard Beethoven before, this piece is a perfect encapsulation of his genius. The opening movement is stately and heroic. The middle movement is delicate and introspective and the final movement is sheer optimism and joy.
The performance by pianist Paavel Jumppanen was ideal. His phrasing was perfect for my understanding of this music. He wasn’t indulgent or heavy-handed with the pathos in the middle section. He didn’t try to set any speed records in the final movement. He played the piece as written and all the details were in place. You will not hear a finer performance.
The concert concluded with Sibelius’s Symphony No. 5. For those who get caught up in such things, this is considered to be the greatest fifth symphony ever written. That’s saying something because there are a lot of great fifth symphonies. I don’t know if I can go there as a Brucknerian but symphonic savants swear by Sibelius’s Fifth.
Video:
Sibelius Symphony N° 5
Leonard Bernstein Wiener Philharmoniker 1988
I do love this piece of music, and the performance turned in by The San Diego Symphony and maestro Vänskä was a Norse Saga in three movements. Near the middle of the final movement, the strings achieve a pianissimo that I did not think was possible. It was a stunning effect as the music consolidated itself before opening up into the final stretch and what a final stretch is was. Maestro Vänskä had been on the brisque side with the first two movements but in the final section, he paid it back with a broad and expansive account. The final orchestral blows of Thor’s hammer that conclude the piece sounded magnificent in the new hall.
As I left the concert, I started to regret wearing shorts. A stern wind whipped down Seventh Ave. I realized that this performance had invoked Thor, the storm god, and he responded.
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