Deerhunter @ Neumos
Previously, I have talked at length about Orchestra Seattle and the needed diversity they bring to Seattle’s classical music scene. It isn’t so much that the orchestra is playing composers and pieces outside of the mainstream, but they are playing works that are mostly ignored by other orchestras.
George Shangrow, the orchestra’s music director, makes a point of programming concerts that are diverse and always include at least one piece that utilizes the Seattle Chamber Singers. Glancing through the 2008/2009 season, this trend continues.
Bach lovers have plenty to be happy about. The orchestra performs its annual cantata concert in November which will feature the Missa Brevis along with two of the Master’s cantatas. There is also a performance of Bach’s Christmas Oratorio and in the spring the Saint John Passion. The orchestra should give both of these large works refined and thoughtful performances. Shangrow’s studied approach to Bach shows in performances played under his baton.
If Bach isn’t your thing, or if you are like Shangrow and prefer more variety in a concert, then there are concerts for you too. The first such concert is September 16th, when the ensemble launches its season with a gala concert at Benaroya Hall. Shangrow has snatched an up and coming violinist – Chuanyun Li – to perform two pieces with the orchestra. The violinist will play the Butterfly Lover’s Concerto followed by Aram Khachaturian’s Violin Concerto. In typical Shangrow fashion, Brahms Academic Festival Overture is thrown in to make things even more interesting.
March’s concert mixes Vaughan Williams, Stravinsky, and Beethoven. RVW’s Serenade to Music will pair nicely with Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony, the famous Pastoral Symphony. Vaughan Williams is showing up more than usual this season. Andre Previn conducts the Fifth Symphony with the Seattle Symphony and Adam Stern leads the Seattle Philharmonic in the Sixth – my favorite of the nine symphonies.
Finally, there is the season finale. Dvorak’s Czech Suite and Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto frame the concert. Local composer Robert Kechley’s Folks Songs for Chorus and Orchestra fill the middle of the concert. The versatile Mark Salman plays the Rachmaninoff. Last season Salman joined Shangrow and the Seattle Chamber Singers in a performance of Brahms’s Gypsy Songs. During Salman’s time in the Northwest, he has performed the complete Beethoven Piano Concertos with Shangrow and Orchestra Seattle and also Beethoven’s 32 Piano Sonatas on KING-FM.
Shangrow’s annual Messiah (regarded by many as the best in town) and Johannes Brahms’s German Requiem are the other major pieces for chorus and orchestra this season. The German Requiem is performed in October and The Messiah returns in December.
A season like Orchestra Seattle makes my mind race with other possibilities. When there are no rules for how and when to program choral works with orchestral pieces, and when lengthy passions, oratorios, and masses can be programmed without worry, all of classical music becomes available for performance.
Orchestra Seattle routinely gives us a chance to hear music rarely performed live. I haven’t lived in Seattle my whole life, and my musical memory doesn’t go back thirty years or more, but I can’t fathom Bach’s Christmas Oratorio has been heard live too often in Seattle. It’s likely Orchestra Seattle is the only local orchestra to ever perform the oratorio just like they are the only orchestra to ever perform Monteverdi’s 1610 Vespers. If there is a piece of music you’ve always wanted to hear but don’t think it can or will ever be performed, if you stick around long enough Orchestra Seattle and the Seattle Chamber Singers will pull the score out and play it.