Carnegie Hall: Orpheus Performs Handel, Mozart and Fine

After having been on Friday evening to a recital of Baroque music given by students at Mannes, it was interesting to hear Orpheus open yesterday evening's concert at Carnegie Hall with music by Handel.  The Concerto Grosso in F, Op. 6, No. 2 is one of twelve that Handel composed in London in 1739.  In these pieces, the composer deliberately set out to move his work in a new and more financially viable direction following a series of reversals he had experienced during the 1737 season.  It was at this time that Handel for the most part gave up writing Italian opera and instead concentrated on the production of oratorios to be performed in English.  The Op. 6 concerti were intended to be played during intermissions at the same concerts as the oratorios.  It was a reflection of popular taste among the English that Handel used as models for these works the older concerti formats of Corelli rather than those of Vivaldi.

Following the Handel, Orpheus performed the Clarinet Concerto in A, K. 622 (1791), the first of the two Mozart pieces on the program.  It was primarily to hear this piece that I attended the concert.  Even among Mozart's late works, the concerto stands out as one of the composer's greatest compositions, especially when performed on the basset clarinet designed by Anton Stadler for which it was originally written.  My own favorite recording is that of David Shifrin (with Gerard Schwarz conducting the Mozart Festival Orchestra) using this extended range instrument.  The soloist yesterday evening was Martin Fröst whom I had never before heard perform.  According to his website, Mr. Fröst has just released his second recording of this concerto.  He is an extremely talented musician and gave an impassioned performance that earned a huge round of applause from the audience.  He then returned to the stage and gave an encore, Klezmer Dances arranged by Goran Fröst.

The first piece following intermission was Serious Song: A Lament for String Orchestra by Irving Fine, a composer best known today for his association with Leonard Bernstein.  Together with several other composers, they made up the Boston School whose neo-classical style of music was heavily influenced by that of Stravinsky.  This particular piece seemed to me more an academic exercise than anything else.  Though polished and technically adept, it never really came alive even in the hands of an ensemble as talented as Orpheus.

The final item on the program was Mozart's Symphony No. 29 in A, K. 201 (1774).  Unlike the Clarinet Concerto, this was a very early piece, written when the composer was only 18 years old.  Though a pleasant enough work, it lacks the sophistication of Mozart's more mature compositions and would have been better placed on the program as an introduction to the concerto.  As it was, the performance was somewhat anticlimactic and provided a weak ending to the concert.