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University Centre Auditorium
March 2, 2007
By the late 1930s, the symphony had largely been abandoned by European composers. Nielsen was dead, Sibelius silent; apart from a handful of composers - Vaughan Williams, Bax and Brian in England, for example - the symphony was moribund.
But not in the Soviet Union, where the form flourished to the extent that even today we are still discovering unknown Soviet symphonists (some of whom, it must be said, are better left unknown).
In 1937 Dmitri Shostakovich - now, by common consent, the greatest of all composers who worked under the Soviet regime - was at a crossroads, both musically and personally. He had composed four symphonies to this point: the prodigious and witty first, two political potboilers in the semi-choral second ("To October") and third ("The First of May"), and the withdrawn, sprawling fourth.
A great deal, therefore, was riding on Shostakovich's Fifth Symphony even aside from the political risks he was running.
It is surely a measure of Shostakovich's genius that his Fifth Symphony managed to get him off the hook with the Soviet authorities, while at the same time speaking directly to his suffering fellow countrymen; not only that, but the work lies squarely in the great symphonic tradition and confirmed Shostakovich as a major symphonist.
It also remains his most popular orchestral work.
The reasons for this were made manifest in the magnificent performance of the Fifth which ended Friday evening's Russian concert from the UVic Orchestra and János Sándor.
Sándor directed a superbly controlled and contoured performance, the kind of performance that can only work with an orchestra as good as the current UVic band.
The first movement maintained a quite extraordinary level of tension (as, indeed, did the entire performance) and throughout its span the audience was rapt: nary a single cough nor rustle.
All sections of the orchestra gave of their best - and their best is very good indeed. There was admittedly the occasional problem with ensemble or intonation, but these were few and far between and did not detract one whit from the effectiveness of the performance.
Certainly the orchestra is capable of producing a huge, rich and resonant sound; the climaxes were shattering in a way that no recording can ever reproduce. And I can think of few more sinister moments in music than the beginning of the development section - those low piano ostinatos, string pizzicatos and growling horns, not to mention the ominous sight of all four percussionists rising to their feet.
The scherzo - perhaps the most Mahlerian of all Shostakovich's symphonic movements - lumbered along at a robust tempo and featured some marvellous rumblings from bassoon and contrabassoon.
The largo is Shostakovich's first real symphonic slow movement and (again, like Mahler in his third) it is masterly. The strings - frequently playing divisi - were particularly fine here. Once more Sándor's shaping of the music was immaculate and the climax was of almost unbearable intensity.
Whatever the "true" meaning of the finale, it is a noisy, brash and energetic piece of music and was played to the hilt by the young musicians. I was on reminded more than one occasion that the work was premiered by the Leningrad Philharmonic under Yevgeny Mravinsky and, while the UVic trumpets may not be "capable of killing at a hundred paces" - as was famously remarked of the Leningrad trumpeters - I'm sure they could nonetheless inflict a pretty nasty injury.
As the final, massive chords died away the audience was apparently, at first, too stunned to respond. Then, from somewhere to my left, came a single "Wow!", followed by a storm of applause and the (apparently obligatory but for once thoroughly deserved) standing ovation - in which I felt compelled to participate (an event rare enough to mention).
Shostakovich's wonderful and inimitable orchestration provided too many opportunities for excellent solo work for me to list them all. I cannot but mention Megan Dalke's excellent violin solo in the scherzo, Kathy Rogers's flute in the slow movement (did anyone ever write with more emotion for the instrument?) and harpist Rosemary Beland, also in the slow movement.
I must have heard this symphony at least three times here in Victoria in the last decade and a half. This was not only clearly the finest performance, it was a performance of no little stature, than which, I'd venture to suggest, you'd have to go a long way to hear finer.
Sergei Prokofiev's incidental music to Lieutenant Kijé was an unalloyed pleasure. The music is replete with memorable melodies and brilliantly orchestrated.
Once again Sándor directed a marvellously characterful and well-paced performance, adorned with sterling work from Crystal Yang (piccolo), the lower string principals (Marissa Deans, Alastair Crosby and Michael Cox), cornet player (both on and offstage) Tim Quinlan - and perhaps the most characteristic sound of the piece - the deliciously louche saxophone of Alex Miller.
The concert opened with an excellent performance of the overture to Glinka's Russlan and Ludmilla. Sándor wisely declined to make the music into a downhill bicycle race and the resulting precision was far more exhilarating than sloppy ensemble at breakneck speed would have been.
An altogether outstanding evening.
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