SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Berio, Berlioz, and Stravinsky: Susan Graham (mezzo soprano) Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Pierre Boulez (conductor) Symphony Center, Chicago 2.2.2008 (JLZ)

Berio -   Quatre dédicases: Fanfara, Entrata, Festum, Encore
Berlioz -   Les nuits d'été : Villanelle, Le spectre de la rose, Sur les lagunes, Absence, Au cimetière (Claire de lune), L'îsle inconnue
Stravinsky -   Petrushka (1911 version) : The Shrovetide Fair, In Petrushka's Room, The Moor's Room. The Grand Carnival


On a crisp winter evening Berlioz's Les nuits d'été transported the Chicago audience to another world through the compelling performance of Susan Graham, accompanied by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under  Pierre Boulez' the direction. The nuances and inflectionds that Ms. Graham brought to the performance demonstrated her command of the music and sensitivity to Gautier's texts. Through posture, gestures, glances, and other body language, she added to the polished diction and phrasing that made each song not only clear, but comprehensible. As she colored her tone, Ms. Graham also blended with orchestra to arrive at a unified expression with Boulez's discreet and fitting accompaniment. With "Le spectre de la rose," Ms. Graham gives the apostrophized flower appropriate expression in her personal interpretation of this almost moving song. She had clearly internalized the text so well,  that both words amd musical context were communicated perfectly. With "Sur les lagunes,"  each repeated refrain varied in detail, and this added to the increasing intensity with which Ms. Graham contributed to the verses. As such, "Sur les lagunes" resembled a soliloquy in an  opera, a kind of scena for the performer to personalize, and Ms. Graham did so compellingly. The other songs also benefited from her mastery of the music. The tempo for "Absence" allowed for the clear expression of text, and "Au cimetière" was an opportunity for some particularly effective exchanges between  orchestra and voice. The interplay with the cellos worked marvellously at the verse that begins "On dirait que l'âme éveillée," and  the solo violin at the end of the next verse added even more meaning to the piece. The final song, "L'îsle inconnue" offers a glimpse of the world of our imagination, and the freshness and sense of wonder that Ms. Graham exhibited in this piece brought the cycle to a fitting conclusion, reminding the audience of the enrgy of the "Villanelle" with which the work began.

Boulez preceded Les nuits d'été with a short work by Luciano Berio, the Quatre dédicases, which Paul Roberts assembled into a suite while evaluating  materials as the composer's assistant. The Fanfara is related to music in Berio's opera Un re in Ascolta (1984), while Berio included Festum and Encore in Compass. Yet in the context of Quatre dédicases, the pieces have in common the fact that each is a miniature and, as such benefit from the compression of ideas found in them. Like some of the shorter orchestral pieces by Berg or Schoenberg, they represent musical concision. In the hands of Boulez, these pieces received a masterful presentation. The pointilliste sounds of the Fanfara were brilliantly timed, while the Entrata was intriguing for the rhythmic play that is integral to its structure. While these pieces, as well as Festum include some prominent wind and brass sonorities, the rich string textures of Encore set it apart. Placed at the beginning of the prorgram, this collection of short pieces offered an engaging opening to the concert.

The entire second half of the program was devoted to the 1911 version of Stravinsky's Petrushka, a work that followed quickly after Le sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring) premiered the previous year. Not as shocking or scandalous as Le sacre du printemps, Petrushka contains its own challenges. Notable for its use of polytonality, the score of Petrushka includes sudden shifts suggesting the cross-cuts associated with film in the decades that followed. To express the story of the puppet Petrushka, Stravinsky evokes both popular-sounding music in this score, as well as suggested the the hurdy-gurdy and other sounds in the tableaux  depicting the street fair. When the composer revised this work in 1946, he used a smaller orchestra, and the 1911 version has the qualitative difference of larger and more colorful scoring.

That stated, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performed the work masterfully. With characteristic élan, the Chicago Symphony rendered the Petrushka  the opening of the score with  polish, and the tutti passages of the Shrovetide Fair were palpably massive. As the orchestration shifted under Boulez's clear direction, the large orchestra responded immediately, as if it were a chamber ensemble. When the thinner orchestra of the second and third tableaux involved smaller numbers of players, the ensemble remained tight and keen. Among the performers, the solo flute of Mathieu Dufour was singularly prominent in the extended solo passages. Later in the piece, in the tableau entitled "In the Moor's Room," the solo trumpet played by Christopher Martin was virtually flawless in one of the more virtuosic passages in the repertoire for the instrument. Such strong solo performances blended well into the nicely balanced ensemble, which also requires a percussion section sensitive to the sudden shifts of instrumentation. All in all, the orchestra responded beautifully to Boulez, who brought out the various details of the score without sentimentalizing it. Given the sometimes saccharine elements of the popular music in Stravinsky's score, skilfull expression allowed these idioms to fit into the musical narrative intended for this ballet. Performed without breaks between the four parts, Petrushka was also exciting, as Boulez built the intensity which depicts the tragic conclusion and its ironic finish. The audience responded with justifiable enthusiasm to this piece, which concluded one of the Chicago Symphony's finer concerts of the season.

James L  Zychowicz


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