Yannick Nézet-Séguin treated Dvořák’s Symphony no. 9 “From the New World” as a concerto for orchestra last night in one of the Met Orchestra’s periodic off-the-leash outings to Carnegie Hall. More than that, as a love letter from conductor to musicians; had there been a cartoon-style thought balloon visible above Nézet-Séguin’s head, it would have said something like, “Can you believe how good these guys sound?”
And they did. In their elegiac moments, the low string sound was so warm I wanted them to read me a story and tuck me into bed. Pedro Díaz’ English horn solo in the Largo was gorgeous, but when the clarinet came in underneath it for the final phrases, I wanted to melt. Brass and woodwind choirs and chords were stunningly, perfectly balanced. The timpani supported without ever overwhelming. Every color the violins produced seemed the Platonic ideal of a string section, whether thrillingly melodic or aggressively percussive. The triangle part was meticulously, lovingly just prominent enough.
Nézet-Séguin did, of course, make interpretive choices, most notably some brisk tempos in the Allegro sections, and some deft and gripping builds into the outer movements’ climaxes. But nothing he did called attention to itself or took the focus off the musicians.
The Dvořák was the closer. I can’t speak quite as rapturously about the music earlier in the concert. Terence Blanchard’s orchestral suite from his opera Fire Shut Up in My Bones, a prominent part of the Met’s recent repertory, started off well enough with a passage from the opera’s opening, but it turns out that stripped of its dramatic context, most of the music simply isn’t that interesting, sounding like recycled film score tropes. Not all of it was re-conceived well as instrumental, either; in a couple of places it seemed as though a solo vocal line had simply been transcribed for trumpet or oboe and swapped in without any further thought.
The evening had opened with Gabriela Ortiz’ Antrópolis, a ten-minute ode to dance clubs, begun and punctuated by virtuosic timpani cadenzas, played here on a knife’s edge between groove and subtle phrasing by Parker Lee. The piece is a lot of fun, culminating in mambo-inspired territory familiar to classical music audiences from West Side Story. But it sometimes seemed muddy here, despite the careful calibration of the percussion section with the rest of the orchestra – certainly as compared to the Dvořák.
Leonard Bernstein’s Symphony no. 1 “Jeremiah” fared better in that same comparison. The first movement, Prophecy, showcased the same loving attention to coloristic detail and tonal clarity that made the Dvořák so special, as did the second, Profanation. The latter was so meticulous and precise in its constantly shifting irregular meters, though, that rather than any kind of old-Testament sinful abandon it evoked perhaps the joy of getting away with cheating on your taxes. Lamentation featured Met stalwart soprano Angel Blue (positioned in the middle of the orchestra). The texts are from the book of Jeremiah, and the vocal line deliberately cantorial, and thus not Bernstein’s strongest melodic writing. Blue’s buttery sound was very affecting on the softer, lamenting portions of the movement; she did not cut through the orchestra well for the louder, haranguing sections.
All cavils aside – yes, Maestro, these guys do sound great. It’s a treat to hear them center-stage.
