Passion and precision from the Berlin Phil at Carnegie Hall

On Sunday afternoon, Kirill Petrenko walked so unassumingly onto the stage of Carnegie Hall that when the members of the Berlin Philharmonic stood to greet him, he momentarily disappeared among their numbers. His modest demeanor and economical manner on the podium don’t immediately suggest the intensity and rigor that earned him the top spot on a Bachtrack critics’ poll of the world’s greatest conductors last year. But the proof came in the performance, as Petrenko enlivened a series of well known classics with fresh eyes and precise playing. No wonder the New York audience clamored for tickets again, just two years after this ensemble’s last visit stateside.

Under Petrenko, a deep, muscular and forward sound emerged from the Berliners, but not at the expense of levity when needed. This was evident in Dvořák’s Symphony no. 7 in D minor, a journey through various moods that can seem maudlin without a unifying sense of structure. Petrenko took the Allegro maestoso and Finale at full tilt, anchored by an insistent string tone that he maintained at a high volume that never turned overbearing. This was Dvořák the tragedian, beginning and ending in bursts of darkness. Yet the inner movements dripped with stirring detail, especially in the lush horn solos played by Yun Zeng in the Poco adagio and the delicate woodwind sonorities. The Scherzo was bright and feathery – a momentary reprieve before funereal despair crept back in. Petrenko’s Seventh felt as if it encapsulated life itself: sadness and joy coexisting on the same plane.

The brilliant cohesion of the Berliners was also on display in the concert’s opening work, Rachmaninov’s The Isle of the Dead. Petrenko controlled volume as if simply turning a dial up or down – the brilliance of German engineering on display. But neither his persona nor the playing ever seemed martinet-like. The hush of the opening bars created a mood of foreboding danger, a sense of impending doom that only grew as the music worked its way to a crashing climax. The strings carried the day with a wine-dark tone, especially the synchronously bowing violas, whose sound seemed to emerge from the pits of the earth. Again, though, Petrenko never shunted detail: weighty brass, charging timpani and spindly harp came across with the same gravity here.

Hilary Hahn, still recovering from a double pinched nerve, canceled her participation in Korngold’s Violin Concerto in D major last week. The Berliners fielded Vilde Frang at short notice. Although the work has gained in reputation in recent decades, it’s still not as common as Bruch or Sibelius and it places a heavy load on the soloist. Not only must she leapfrog between registers at a breakneck pace, but the composer also entrusts her to introduce nearly all of the work’s themes. Frang dispatched these responsibilities with virtuosity, though occasionally without the lush tone one desires in this unapologetically Romantic piece. Her journey into the violin’s highest register sometimes turned squally, and Petrenko was not always perfectly attentive here to her volume in orchestral passages. Still, it’s a treat to hear this wonderful score receive its due from a great outfit, and Frang impressed mightily in her encore, the Giga from Montanari’s Violin Sonata in D minor.