Finnish footprints in San Francisco: Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts Sibelius

The finest of Finland set foot in San Francisco’s Davies Hall this week. Esa-Pekka Salonen, well-known Finnish composer, conductor and Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony, conducted an all-Sibelius program. It was satisfying, inspiring and occasionally glorious. The musical landscape resounded with the well-loved Violin Concerto and the paean to his northern landscape, Finlandia, as well as the First Symphony, which balances innovation and the classical.

Finlandia was the perfect opening to the concert: bold, determined, definitive, beginning in a characteristic Sibelian way with a single sound, as if from a distance, then increasing the instrumentation and dynamics, and Salonen’s striking downbeat. As soon as the timpani entered, the dark, deep dimension was enriched, book-ending the whole. The orchestral scope continued, at times fiery and then reverent in the famous hymn-like centerpiece.

Lisa Batiashivili performed the Violin Concerto in D minor with power, command and control. Salonen built the orchestral texture around her exceptional sound; however, Batiashivili remained the centrifugal force, precise and assertive. She and Salonen layered the sound with exactness, creating a deliberate design that seemed spontaneous, the timpani grounding the whole. Short elongated violin calls accented frequent rhythmic shifts with fresh color.

A percussive bridge announced the Adagio di molto second movement. The violin, however, continuing to spin out the love Sibelius, who himself yearned to be a concert violinist, showered on the instrument. Batiashivili lightly deployed her bow to create both present and other-worldly tones. Again, the brass shouted but Batashivili’s flow of sound never faltered in the extraordinary movement of ascending scales coupled with the shivering cello which followed. Exquisite, deft, distinct, the finale brought more timpani and dance-like rhythms to the violin sweep, with brass becoming more integrated. Skipping woodwind motifs alongside the strings’ lyric flow produced rhythmic energy, while Salonen’s careful tempo kept everything fused.

The Symphony no. 1 in E minor was Sibelius’s early attempt at the grand scale. Solo instrument, this time the clarinet, opens the work with a plaintive call. Salonen moved like a sprightly dancer, keeping the wide range of instrumental tonalities visible yet contained.

The second movement Andante is like a song with accompaniment, sonorous bassoon and oboe but striped by trombones and percussion. Orchestral variety increased, but then measures of unanimity created an interlude in the symphonic fabric. Salonen held the orchestra in attentive exploration, moments of aching beauty piercing the busy-ness of winds, strings and brass. Perhaps Sibelius’ motifs sprang from Wagnerian ones, but he used them for his own distinctive palette, sans Wagner’s developmental style.

The Scherzo followed, skipping, dancing, hopping. Fugal brass resounded then led us to another monochromatic islet, distinct from Sibelius' darting drive. By the final´, we were caught in another rhapsodic, somewhat old-fashioned sweep, but again not bombastic, the chords, through a surprising lento, pulling the variegation into a clean cessation.

However, the news that Salonen will be leaving the San Francisco Symphony at the end of his tenure – a clash of vision between Salonen and the Board stated as the reason – cast a pall over both orchestra and audience, despite the standing ovation, floral tributes and a lot of emotion at the end.