UTAH SYMPHONY, Abravanel Hall, Nov. 22; second performance Nov. 23, 8 p.m., tickets at 801-355-2787, 888-451-2787 or www.utahsymphony.org
On Nov. 22, 1963, the world lost a great statesman when John F. Kennedy was assassinated. This weekend the Utah Symphony paid a musical tribute to a beloved president with their program, “Remembering JFK.”
While the program did, indeed, include elegies to JFK, it also included two pieces by Benjamin Britten – who was a contemporary of Kennedy, and whose 100th birthday is also November 22.
In fact, the night started with Britten’s An American Overture – an appropriate beginning, since it (sort of) ties the two together.
Carl Nielsen’s Symphony No. 4, The Inextinguishable, filled up the rest of the first half. Under the baton of Thierry Fischer, the orchestra gave a clean, strong performance. Particularly notable was their ability to articulate the various contrasts in the music, mood and texture. From the vigorous, vibrant sections to the more sparse, chamber-like passages, Fischer led the audience on a musical journey with diversity and variety.
In some ways, the concert – and this piece in particular – was an argument for live performance. At the end of the Nielsen symphony, two timpanists “face off” against each other on opposite sides of the stage. Experiencing “dueling timpani” in person and in stereo is something that gets completely lost in the translation to CD.
Two elegies to JFK followed intermission – one by Stravinsky, who wrote the piece as a protest against the country moving on too soon after JFK’s death, and the other by Peter Lieberson, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of JFK’s inauguration.
Both pieces were slightly more musically challenging than typical symphony programming. The Stravinsky elegy was an art song with only a mezzo-soprano (Abigail Levis) and three clarinets. It was nicely done and enhanced with a screen with the words to the song and pictures of JFK.
The Lieberson elegy featured a narrator – in this case, Edward Herrmann – reading selections from JFK’s speeches against a backdrop of music. The composition itself took an unconventional approach to pairing narration and music in that the music was somewhat complex and thoughtful, and used somewhat contemporary harmonic language. As a result, the ideas in the music frequently competed with the words of the narrator – it was sometimes hard to figure out which one to pay attention to.
Herrmann’s performance was serious and a bit stoic. And when it came time for the big line, “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country,” he was so dark and emphatic that it conveyed a rather different tone than JFK’s original delivery.
However, Herrmann’s demeanor changed completely for The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra. Suddenly warm and personable, his delivery matched the dry wit and humor of the text. In fact, he enjoyed himself so much, he could occasionally be heard humming along with the orchestra.
While the Young Person’s Guide seems on the surface to be an odd pairing with the rest of the program, its extreme approachability provided balance for some of the other more serious, thoughtful or challenging pieces. But more importantly, its vigor, humor and energy gave a life-affirming tribute to both JFK and Britten.