The Oregon Symphony wrapped up its 2022-2023 season with a well-balanced concert of music by Mozart and Mahler (June 10) at the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall. The orchestra’s principal flutist Martha Long delighted the audience an outstanding performance of Mozart’s Flute Concerto No. 1, which was followed by a thoroughly heart-stopping and inspiring Mahler Fifth Symphony under the baton of Music Director David Danzmayr.
The mellifluous and smooth sound that Long fashioned for the Mozart concerto was absolutely perfect, and she excelled in shaping each phrase. Even as the first movement (Allegro maestoso) perked along, she gracefully etched its passages with lovely dynamics. She even delivered the downhill and uphill runs of the cadenza with an enchanting poetic arc. The lyrical nature of the slower second movement (Adagio non troppo) suggested light breezes and the third (Rondo: Tempo di menuetto) made me imagine a bird fluttering from branch to branch. Such was the evocative playing of Long. It was able to take this listener out of the concert hall.
In response to the sustained, enthusiastic applause that followed her performance, Long was joined by her colleagues, assistant principal flutist Alicia DiDonato Paulsen and piccoloist Zachariah Galatis, in an encore, the bright and bubbly last movement of “Flutes en Vacances” (“Flutes on Vacation”) by Jacques Casterede. That got everyone into the mood for a picnic, and it brought down the house a second time.
The stage at The Schnitz was stuffed wall-to-wall with musicians. The super-sized ensemble included 7 horns, 12 violas, 10 cellos, and 8 double basses. With Danzmayr ardently urging the assemblage onward, the result was a thrilling rollercoaster of a ride that took listeners very high, very low, very near, very far, and everything in between. In short, the performance was spectacular.
From the get-go with Jeffrey Work’s trumpet calls, orchestral outbursts, and sounds of trudging and pleading – the orchestra put listeners through an emotional wringer in the Trauermarsch. The sudden attack into the Stürmisch bewegt, mit grösster Vehemeng section announced by huge cry from the violins and delved into a seesaw of mood swings – sometimes introverted, sometime extroverted – before delving into a big melodic line from the cellos as if to assuage things – but couldn’t. The following Scherzo lightened up the situation a tad, but that section continued to express a mixture of bombastic surges and intimate withdrawals. The impeccable playing of Jeff Garza, principal horn highlighted the movement, and it ended with a wild explosion of colorful sound that would have signaled the end of most symphonies – but not Mahler. With his solemn and heavenly Adagietto, the orchestra dished up delicious helpings of longing that were layered with dynamic contrast, and it all finally wound down and subsided quietly into the double bass section. That left the Rondo – Finale with its fugue and sprawling lines and ecstatic, barn-burner of an ending. The last measures of the piece transported patrons with a joyful, glorious soundscape that just lifted them out of their seats with spontaneous ovations.
The comprehensive and emotive leadership of Danzmayr made the journey through the wilderness of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony a complete and resounding success. Given his terrific handling of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony a month earlier, Danzmayr is turning into a master of Mahler’s expansive and very demanding visions, and that helped to make the concert a life-enhancing experience. Maybe Mahler’s Sixth will be coming up for Danzmayr and the orchestra in the near future.
The concert was also marked at the very beginning by an acknowledgement of members of the orchestra for their years of service. Joseph Berger, associate principal horn, has clocked his 35th year with the ensemble.
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