This concert by the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra under its Music Director, Manfred Honeck, was dedicated to the memory of Sir Andrew Davis, one-time artistic advisor of the PSO. It consisted of two big works from the Romantic era – one famous and the other something of a rarity.
Some consider Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 3 in D minor to be the composer’s greatest; certainly the scale of the work makes it his most imposing. Not only is it technically difficult, it’s one of surprising maturity considering that Rachmaninov was just 35 years old when he composed it. The formidable technical challenges of the music were easily dispatched by Leif Ove Andsnes, a pianist who is well-familiar with this piece; he’s played it for years had has made two commercial recordings. His deep understanding of the score clearly showed in a performance that was polished, lyrical and elegant. It wasn’t an interpretation that emphasized “flash and dash”, but instead the poetry and pathos inherent in the music.
Andsnes’ playing was note-perfect, particularly notable for wonderfully nuanced phrasing, but thrills came as well in the first movement cadenza. As artistic partners, Honeck and the PSO delivered everything that could be asked, with the slow movement particularly convincing. As an encore, the pianist treated the grateful audience to a Chopin mazurka.
Following intermission, Honeck returned to the podium to present a landmark work of the Romantic era – but one that’s more “heard about than heard”. Franz Liszt composed his large-scale Dante Symphony in 1857, roughly in tandem with A Faust Symphony, his other multi-movement orchestral work. The Dante Symphony has never broken into the mainstream symphonic repertoire; to wit, only two reviews of the piece have been published by Bachtrack before now. (This was also its first outing with the Pittsburgh Symphony.)
The Inferno movement opens with menacing low brass notes -- completely in character for Liszt. At the Gates of Hell the full panoply of the “Pittsburgh Sound” was on display, the fevered drama being punctuated by harsh ejaculations from brass and percussion. “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here” indeed! Liszt reserves poignancy for the story of Francesca and Paolo – akin to what Tchaikovsky would do in his symphonic poem Francesca da Rimini 20 years later. Clarinets and English horn passages in this section were magical. The ternary nature of Liszt’s Inferno is similar to Tchaikovsky’s tone poem, with the fire and brimstone returning as Dante and Virgil re-emerge from Hell; Honeck and the musicians played up the dramatics as if they were on steroids.
The second movement Purgatorio is also ternary in structure. First a quiet entrance, with a gorgeous solo horn presenting the opening theme over muted strings and harp. The beatific nature of the opening gave way to a kind of lamentation of increasing agitation, clearly representing the pleading of penitent souls. In this music Liszt gives us a foretaste of what would become the strikingly modernistic harmonic characteristics of his later compositions. The ending Magnificat was sung ethereally by women of the Mendelssohn Choir of Pittsburgh – with the voices hidden from the audience as directed in the score. Wisely, Honeck elected to use Liszt’s first ending – the quiet one with the music fading away to nothingness.
In sum, this was a deeply moving performance of a piece that needs more advocates, and presentation made it clear that Honeck is just the conductor for that.
