LA Phil is roughly at mid-point of their Shostakovich symphony cycle -
three a year until the cycle completes on some anniversary, the composer's
birth centennial, as I recall.

Salonen has conducted all but one in previous seasons (I believe he
passed on the Sixth).  He was scheduled to conduct the Seventh, but
begged off due to a pressing need to complete a composition for a June
premiere.  I was going to make some sarcastic comments about how much
time it takes to create music about "orchestral sound in space" with a
metaphor-driven structure ("it's like a germ that infects an organism...")
and texture contrasts and other post-modern serious music cliches.  But
I'll just sound like an old fuddy-duddy, so I'll skip that.

Vassily Sinaisky stepped in on sudden notice, and he did a fine job.
As with all other performances in the cycle, the pre-lecture featured
a performance by Phil string players of the respective string quartet.
The seventh, written much later than the symphony, is a dark but not
foreboding work - it seemed to go by quickly; I am not sure of its actual
length.

Shostakovich - if you were to look at my CD shelf, you'd guess he
was one of my favorite composers.  For one reason or another, I have a
comparatively large selection of his works.  And yet, I am not sure why.
Other than the overplayed (but understandably so, I feel) Fifth symphony,
little of his music stays with me well.  I'll play a CD and enjoy it,
and yet have little sense memory from previous listenings.  Scherzos
or allegros I tend to enjoy most, whether in concertos or symphonies.

Of course, the huge opening movement of the Seventh stays with me - at
least that famous "Bolero"-like march.  I have heard a recording on the
radio where it came across as stupid (as Bartok supposedly felt it was),
but live it felt right - a distant sound, vaguely threatening and yet
perhaps innocuous, gradually turning into a tumult of crushing power.

Yet the narrative power of the symphony overall, instead of overwhelming
me, tends to deaden my response.  As awful as the history is (and it
doesn't make much difference to me how much of the symphony is about
the Nazis or Stalin), I don't truly come anywhere close to reliving the
horror while listening.  I am just trying to follow a symphonic argument.
And it gets tiresome after a while.

Tiresome also is the umpteenth debate about whether a "triumphant"
Shostakovich ending is really triumphant or not.  Our rather good pre-
concert lecturer, a Prof. Fink from UCLA, beat that dead horse for a
while. In the end, all that matters is that there's a firestorm of brass
and percussion, and the audience leaps to its feet as an audience is
meant to.  I saw a couple orchestra players putting cotton in their ears
before the march in the first movement.  I guess this is one work that
has spawned that recent news story about "noise pollution" violations
in the concert hall.

So, sure, the performance excited and thrilled when it should have.
Perhaps Salonen would have delivered more of the chill in some of the
less energetic moments.  Hard to say.

Last night I thought of some recent posts about the different appeal
of listening at home versus in a concert hall. I do go to concerts a
fair amount, but I usually find it very difficult to lose myself in the
music, as I can easily do at home.  Sometimes I close my eyes, even
though I am neurotic enough to worry that my rowmates will think I am
taking a nap.  The seats at Disney Hall, at least in balcony, tend to
be seismically sensitive - if anyone in the row shifts, the neighboring
seats feel it.  Add to that the usual throat-clearing and stage-whispering,
and the annoyances can wear on one.  But I still go.  The magical moments
when one forgets about all that as the music goes palpably vibrating
through one's system - they are worth it.

Next week is Symphony 9, with Matthias Goerne singing the baritone
selections (duh) from "Das Knaben Wunderhorn." Salonen conducts.  Then
a week from Monday, Goerne and Brendel offer "Winterreise." That next
weekend, Zinman conducts Brendel in Beethoven pno cto 3 and Shostakovich
8 - a symphony I would have bet Salonen would keep to himself.

And next season, Salonen will only lead the 10th, leaving the 11th and
12th for conductors whose names escape me at the moment.  I wonder if
he'll take on all the spectral eerieness of the last three himself in
the final year...

For the curious, at laphil.org one can see all next season.  Some special
concerts, I'd say.  But getting your hands on the tickets - that's another
story.

C Mullins (who loves classical.net but would really like to read more
reviews of live concerts - we need reminding that this music lives and
breathes, and there are audiences out there for it)