Concerts: Rachmaninoff's Vespers; Nordic Cool with Sibelius, Grieg, Vilmarsson, etc.
I have been working on a huge, finance-related case, which has been eating away most of my free time. However, every once in a while I've been able to attend a concert. One was in February, when my good friend A--- took me to the National Cathedral to hear the Cathedral Choral Society perform Rachmaninoff's Vespers, a work that was too austere for my tastes.
But then the Kennedy Center hosted its Nordic Cool Festival, celebrating the performing arts from Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, and Iceland. At the beginning of March the National Symphony, led by Eschenbach, performed Sibelius' Night Ride and Sunrise, Lindberg's Violin Concerto, Saariaho's Orion, and Sibelius' Symphony No. 7. Pekka Kuusisto played the violin. I had gone for the Sibelius works but made a point of giving Lindberg and Saariaho another try, since they seem to be so respected among contemporary classical music aficionados, but their works continued to leave me cold.
A week later I heard the Iceland Symphony Orchestra perform Thorvaldsdottir's AERIALITY, Grieg's Piano Concerto, Vilmarsson's bd, and Sibelius' Lemminkäinen Suite. The first piece was a typically boring, creepy contemporary work that made me wish I had been listening to Lutoslawski instead. The Grieg piece, played by Garrick Ohlsson on the piano, just completely, completely blew me away, so that by the time we were at the last movement I was in tears. Vilmarsson, who I can't find on either iTunes or Spotify, was commissioned to write his piece specially for this concert, and it turned out to be surprisingly clever and playful for a contemporary work. Out of all the works performed, it turned out that the Sibelius suite was the most boring; with the exception of The Swan of Tuonela, it seemed to lack direction and often fell on various tropes that Sibelius used a great deal to better effect in other works.
But then the Kennedy Center hosted its Nordic Cool Festival, celebrating the performing arts from Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, and Iceland. At the beginning of March the National Symphony, led by Eschenbach, performed Sibelius' Night Ride and Sunrise, Lindberg's Violin Concerto, Saariaho's Orion, and Sibelius' Symphony No. 7. Pekka Kuusisto played the violin. I had gone for the Sibelius works but made a point of giving Lindberg and Saariaho another try, since they seem to be so respected among contemporary classical music aficionados, but their works continued to leave me cold.
A week later I heard the Iceland Symphony Orchestra perform Thorvaldsdottir's AERIALITY, Grieg's Piano Concerto, Vilmarsson's bd, and Sibelius' Lemminkäinen Suite. The first piece was a typically boring, creepy contemporary work that made me wish I had been listening to Lutoslawski instead. The Grieg piece, played by Garrick Ohlsson on the piano, just completely, completely blew me away, so that by the time we were at the last movement I was in tears. Vilmarsson, who I can't find on either iTunes or Spotify, was commissioned to write his piece specially for this concert, and it turned out to be surprisingly clever and playful for a contemporary work. Out of all the works performed, it turned out that the Sibelius suite was the most boring; with the exception of The Swan of Tuonela, it seemed to lack direction and often fell on various tropes that Sibelius used a great deal to better effect in other works.