Felix Mendelssohn has had a bit of a rocky road over the last two centuries. Celebrated in his time as a great prodigy—Goethe said he was even more gifted than Mozart—he has seen his star wax and wane due to shifting tastes and prejudices. Wagner condemned him for his Jewish roots, the early modernists dismissed him as a lightweight.
At Friday morning’s Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra concert, there was a sustained frontal assault on the naysayers (though for many, he was never really “dead”). Scholar and Mendelssohn biographer R. Larry Todd—part of an expanded “Behind the Notes” series of pre-concert talks–made a strong case for the depth of his work and genius. The orchestra, under the baton of Gilbert Varga, found touches of dramatic shadow amidst the familiar sunshine of some of his most popular work. And Concertmaster Frank Almond found touching delicacy and tenderness in the much-loved and familiar Violin Concerto.
After Varga and the orchestra’s sonically rich reading of The Hebrides Overture, Almond stepped in for the concerto, his casual manner carried over into the beautiful and loosely-phrased opening strains. He handled the technical challenges effortlessly. In fact, this concerto wasn’t about showmanship at all—instead Almond crafted the piece into a wonderful dramatic journey. In the first-movement cadenza, for example, the mood was surprisingly tender, playing the bravura arpeggios with a touching sense of vulnerability as the section progressed to its resolution. The gorgeous melody of the adagio became a time for further searching introspection, which made the joyful exuberance of the finale all the more exciting.
Varga lead Mendelssohn’s “Italian” Symphony with infectious buoyancy—from the familiar charged rhythms of the opening movement right through to the end. In fact, the breakneck pace of the final movement sacrificed some of the piece’s detail. The “tarantella” rhythms are supposed to suggest a crazed dance—but this tempo pushed the music a little too far. In other sections, the Adagio in particular, Varga shaped the melodies and the inner voices beautifully. It was a lovely opening to another promising MSO season, which will be repeated Saturday night and Sunday afternoon.
