Actually, I attended the second-to-last concert - Saturday's (5/24). The
Sunday 25 matinee will have been the absolutely last performance - barring
any construction disaster acorss the street at Disney Hall.  The exterior
is pretty much complete there - with its acute waves of silver metal,
it's an impressive sight.  How it will wear on the eyes, only time will
tell.

Pierre Boulez conducted trhe last performance, which was to feature
Mitsuku Uchida in a Messiaen piece and Strauss's "Burlesque." The latter
had replaced the originally scheduled Ravel Concerto in G - why that
substitution was made, I don't know.  I'd loved to have heard it.  At
any rate, the Strauss wasn't performed either, as Uchida cancelled due
to illness.  Instead Boulez led the Phil in Ravel's "Valses nobles et
sentimentales" - a near-perfect performance, I thought too. This opened
the second half of the performance.

For the first half, we had a Bartok piece I don't remember hearing of
before - "Four Orchestral Pieces." This is from early in the great man's
career, and I'd like to hear it again.  Some moments in the first piece
sounded a bit like Ravel/Debussy, though with a bit more edge.  I lost
the thread somewhere in the third piece, and by the time my wandering
mind refocused, the piece was over.  Certainly interesting music, but
perhaps an odd choice for a final concert on an occasion such as this.

For the Messiaen, Gloria Cheng stepped in for Uchida to play
Messiaen's "Oiseaux exotiques." She played from a score, so I assume
this is not a piece she has firmly in her repetoire.  There would be no
way for me to judge if that was reflected in her performance - it seemed
enormously secure and assured to me, but I also thought this was the
dopiest music I have heard from Messiaen.  I have the "Turangalia," and
like it well enough, and recently I acquired the Nagano "St. Francois."
I missed the San Francisco Opera performances, and the recording made
me regret again that I had. It is a long score, but it held my interest
with the variety of its shifting textures.  Last night's piece, translated
as "exotic birds," never really evoked bird song to me, and I thought
there was little integration betwen the small orchestra and the piano,
leading to a fragmented feeling.  Despite the lack of a tonal center,
the piece doesn't strike me a particularily avant-garde.  Many phrases
are repeated for the audience's benefit - I suppose that is in the nature
of bird calls - and the piece ends with everyone banging away at one
note.  Woodpecker?  Who knows.  Dopey, is all I thought.

So the first half was a mixed suceess, and as I suggested about the
Bartok, perhaps not the ideal programming for a big crowd drawn to the
Chandler partly for sentimental reasons.  The sentimentality was also
underscored by a short film which started the concert, with orchestral
members reminiscing about the hall.  Nothing especially memorable there,
except that it's nice to not only see the faces but hear some voices.

After intermission and the Ravel, Boulez and the orchestra played Haydn's
"Farewell Symphony." This has a brillaint, minor key opening movement,
and then two rather pokey middle movements (although the third has a
wonderfully abrupt ending).  The last movement famously ends with orchestra
members leaving the stage as the music winds down.  In Haydn's day, the
players would blow out music stand candles.  Last night, the stage was
dimmed and each stand had an electric light which the players audibly
"clicked" off.  They also made a fair amount of bustle getting off,
and this, combined with the wry chuckles of audience members, somewhat
interfered with the beautiful musical effect Haydn conceived.  When we
were finally down to the 2 string players and Boulez, the sweet nostalgia
of the music came through, and the final "lights out" was quite touching.

A nice evening, but the concert I will remember from this last month at
the Dorothy Chandler was last week's with the Berg violin concerto and
Bruckner 9.

Finally, at the pre-concert lecture, Ernest Fleischmann made an
interesting remark.  Reminiscing about all the great soloists who
have played the Dorothy Chandler (Heifetz, Horowitz, etc.), Fleischmann
strongly suggested - I regret I cannot offer his exact words - that
there are no longer soloists of the same caliber on the stages of concert
halls today.  Now I agree, the legends are in the past, but that is where
legends usually reside.  Is Uchida to be dismissed?  Or Gil Shaham,
Brendel, or Perahia, all of whom will play at the Disney Hall next year?
Will Hilary Hahn be a legend in forty years?

Well, the man has the right to look back over a golden era and feel
nostalgic.  But I have a feeling he spoke for many people.

It will be late October, after a series of galas, before the first Disney
Hall season really gets under way.  Five months!  Oh well.  A lot of the
fun in life is in the anticipation.  So I'll think of it as five months
of fun.

C Mullins
Redondo Beach