An evening of Brahms and Bartók

Wednesday evening the IU Philharmonic Orchestra performed its first concert of the semester, and what an interesting concert it proved to be. \nAll of the pieces featured on the program were relatively obscure to the casual listener and all featured rather interesting takes on musical tradition. \nAlso, the program was quite obviously dominated by a Hungarian theme, which, if not intentional, was quite appropriate, for the conductor of that evening was Imre Palló.\nThe concert began with the last five of the 21 Hungarian Dances arranged by the famous German composer Johannes Brahms (1833-1897). These pieces were short, lively, and delightful. \nBrahms's colorful orchestration and excellent ear for melody were well represented in these short pieces, which made them instant crowd-pleasers as well as musical masterpieces. And, moreover, each dance had its own particular character, which lent them great personality. \nIt was also nice to hear some of the lesser-known Hungarian dances. Most people are familiar with number 5 and numbers 1 and 6 are relatively famous also, but numbers 17-21 are not as well-known, so their performance was much appreciated. Overall, the choice of these Brahms pieces as concert openers was an excellent one.\nNext on the program was an unknown piece by an obscure composer. It was the Harp Concerto by Reinhold Glière (1874-1956). One truly did not know what to expect of this piece. Fortunately for the listeners, expecting the good turned out to be the right expectation. \nThe harpist, Nai-Wei Hung, demonstrated a skill on par with any piano virtuoso in her deft executions of glissandi and many other tricky points of harp technique, and, more importantly, she gave character to a piece that demanded one. \nThe piece itself was quite emotional, almost reminiscent of Rachmaninov in its sentimentality. But it did not lose any melody or harmony in its effort to display that. Its deep, didactic character made it an excellent contrast to the sprightly, pleasant concert openers.\nThe ballet score "The Miraculous Mandarin" by the Hungarian composer Bela Bartok (1881-1945) was the final concert piece and remained something of an enigma. \nThe piece proved an interesting contrast to the Brahms pieces. Whereas Brahms (and Liszt before him) took Hungarian melodies and "civilized" them in their music, Bartók used pure, unadulterated Magyar rhythms \nAs interesting as this may be, the piece had an extreme lack of character. It wandered aimlessly for more than a half hour and led to a sudden and inconclusive ending. \nThere were some enjoyable parts, it is true, but they didn't fit together properly, nor had a discernable melody. The orchestration was the most inflated ballet score ever written. I see no use for a piano, an organ, and a celesta in the same piece. Furthermore, a chorus was far too much to add to an already-packed orchestra, especially when they only sing a few chords. \nAll of this just for a piece of incidental music! The piece would have been more acceptable performed as it was intended: as a ballet. The music would have made more sense with respect to the dancers and would have been more enjoyable merely as a background piece. The piece was monstrously long for a mere concert piece and was coarse and intrusive, which, though Bartók's style, tends to wear down on an audience after a while. That is why the term "tolerable" is a generous term for this piece.\nIn any case, the musicianship in all three pieces was phenomenal; a true credit to an ensemble that has only had a few weeks to prepare for the concert as well as a way to start this musical semester on the right foot.