MSO was Plaintive, Passionate, Dramatic

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photo by Felix Broede

Guest conductor Joshua Weilerstein brought youth, talent and enthusiastic energy to his debut with Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra Friday evening. I had the feeling that the orchestra played with good will toward him.

Johannes Brahms’ Variations on a Theme by Joseph Haydn settled in as it went along. The instrumentation in this music is sometimes thick (common in Brahms) and wind heavy, especially in the early variations. Though they certainly played well, brass and woodwinds could have been a little more restrained in volume—to allow more balance with the strings. But this imbalance is in the writing itself and perhaps unavoidable. The performance became more refined as the piece progressed.

John Corigliano (b. 1938) has long been among the most prominent of American composers. Beyond writing concert works and opera, he has worked sporadically in film scoring, including The Red Violin (1998). The Red Violin: Chaconne for Violin and Orchestra is an adaptation of music from the film. The piece is alternatively plaintive and passionate, full of high contrasts and always dramatic. Soloist Frank Almond played with elegant panache, as perfectly in tune as he always is, even in an extended section of extremely high, exposed notes. This movie’s story—which begins with a violinmaker and his doomed, ill wife in 18th-century Italy—invited Italianate sounds in Corigliano’s composition. The melodies warmly emerged from the Stradivari violin Almond plays, with gorgeous simpatico tone. Weilerstein and the MSO were impressive in all the many splendid theatrical aspects of this beguiling score.

Weilerstein led Antonín Dvořák’s Symphony No. 7 in D minor, Op. 70 from memory, with freedom, fluency and a persuasive lyrical approach. The orchestra responded with colorful, rich, disciplined playing. A young-looking 20-something, Weilerstein seems a major conducting talent, a combination of ample technique, imaginative musical sensitivity, earnestness, taste and class. He comes across as someone who loves the music he is performing. He spoke about the music on the program—a likable speaker, but somewhat of a rapid-fire, music-geeky blur of details; if only he’d slowed down just a bit. Never mind that, though. Weilerstein’s is a career to watch.