Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony played music on the
level of a "personal best" Saturday evening, with a stunning performance
of Berlioz's "Romeo et Juliette."
There have been many highlights in their eight-year-long collaboration,
but there was something truly special about the MTT/SFS partnership
tonight, acknowledged by one of the most sincere and enthusiastic standing
ovations in Davies Hall history.
The success of the performance was especially notable because, after
all, it was of a work by Berlioz, one of the most difficult composers
to "get right." With its dizzying combination of both power and bombast,
intimacy, sweeping, unbridled passion and luminously delicate passages,
"R&J" poses a challenge for even otherwise great conductors and orchestras.
Tonight's performance was on the level of the finest interpreters of
Berlioz today I've been lucky to hear in person, perhaps less abandoned/
manic than Simon Rattle's approach, different from Colin Davis' majestic,
cathedral-like structures, but brilliant throughout, without weak spots
or neglected portions.
In fact, beyond the mighty sound of Vance George's expanded SFS Chorus,
the most memorable moments of the performance came in passages not among
the usual highlights, here transformed into something extraordinary.
For example, the chorus of the Capulets in the Funeral Cortege scene,
with its manifold repetitions, instead of remaining static, ended quietly,
in a kind of pure light, chorus and orchestra producing a transparent,
ethereal sound that took the listener's breath away.
Strings (particularly the violas and cellos), woodwinds (all of them!),
the brass and, again, the chorus performed flawlessly throughout, MTT
pulling it all together without a single false note.
Monica Groop and Samuel Ramey were the impressive soloists, Matthew
Polenzani sang the Queen Mab aria well, but the evening belonged to MTT,
the chorus and the orchestra. And Berlioz.
Janos Gereben/SF
www.sfcv.org
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