The evening began with music of fire and ended with music of ice. But throughout the performance the orchestral playing remained hot.
Daniel Hege was guest conductor as The Hartford Symphony Orchestra continued its 2014-2015 Masterworks Series in the Belding Theatre at the Bushnell Center for the Performing Arts. Hege is currently conductor of the Wichita Symphony Orchestra, and is also known for his work with the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra. He won the audience in Hartford over even before the concert began with insightful observations about how to listen to Sibelius during the preconcert lecture.
The concert itself began with fire: The “Ritual Fire Dance” from El amor brujo by Manuel de Falla opened in trills that were colored in vibrant sound by the strings. Hege conducted with compact, contemplative gestures, but this gave him the possibility to communicate emphasis with even the subtlest of motions. He is musical, and it was thrilling to hear how the orchestra responded to his ideas.
Concertmaster Leonid Sigal was violin soloist in two special and infrequently heard works to close the first half of the program. The first was “Poeme,” a work for solo violin and orchestra, by Ernest Chausson. Chausson (1855-1899) wrote a small but sweet collection of works before a tragic bicycle accident killed him at the height of his powers.
One of many delightful surprises in this work is the entrance of the solo violin — playing alone for about a minute — in an extended soliloquy. Sigal focused our attention with mesmerizing lyricism. After the delicate complexities of this work the “Carmen Fantasie” by Franz Waxman was the perfect contrast.
Like many talented musicians and composers, Waxman (1906-1967) fled pre-war Germany and came to settle near Hollywood. The blossoming film industry needed classically trained composers who were both musically flexible and who could work quickly, and Waxman’s first American success came with his score for the “Bride of Frankenstein.” During his long film career, Waxman collaborated four times with Alfred Hitchcock, but is better known for his score to “Sunset Boulevard” which won an Academy Award in 1950.
The music of this “Fantasie” elaborated upon many of the most well-known tunes from the infamous opera by Bizet, and Sigal played the compendium of virtuosic violinisms in the work with stunning accuracy and thrilling expression. As is his habit, he rejoined the orchestra as concertmaster for the second half of the program — he is inspiring.
After intermission we heard the music of Sibelius. The northern, icy sounding textures, and the rich layers of differently paced music unfolding simultaneously, contrasted with the music on the first half of the program and brought darker colors from the orchestra. We heard “Finlandia” followed by the Symphony No. 5 in E flat Major. Hege indicated tempo changes with clear gestures and had a clever plan for the ways that tempo relationships and pulse in general related across the movements of this symphony. He had a sense for how to organize its rich textures, preventing the narrative from becoming lost within drones and ever-buzzing accompaniments. He was successful in helping the orchestra to find the limits of quiet sound, as in the bassoon solo in the first movement, and the “misterioso” passage in G-flat major in the finale, and yet the end of the first movement and the finale burned with the full intensity of the HSO with the volume knob turned all the way up.
Hege was able to bring fire to the music of ice, and worked with the orchestra to make the fiery music sound cool. He was able to fuse opposites.
The Hartford Symphony Orchestra Masterworks Series continues through Sunday, Jan. 18, in the Belding Theatre at The Bushnell, 166 Capitol Ave., Hartford. Concerts are 8 p.m., Friday and Saturday; and 3 p.m. Sunday. Tickets are priced $32.50-$67.50. Student tickets are $10. On Saturday, Jan. 17, $25 tickets are available for patrons age 40 and under. To purchase tickets call 860-987-5900 or visit www.hartfordsymphony.org.
