The Substitute

In the musical world, there have been so many stories of artists gaining sudden fame when they step in to substitute for an ailing colleague. One thinks of the careers of Leonard Bernstein, Zubin Mehta, Andre Watts, among others, who became instantly known when they step into the spotlight in the last minute. Such an event took place in Vancouver on Saturday night, when conductor Perry So substituted for the originally scheduled John Storgårds. This past weekend, our city could claim to have discovered a major conducting talent.

The programme for the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra consisted of Dorothy Chang’s Strange Air, Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 1 in E Minor, and Jean Sibelius’s Symphony No. 1 in E Minor.

I do not know how much time Perry So had to learn Dorothy Chang’s score, one that is considerable in length as well as complexity. Suffice it to say that it was evident from the first note that he had assimilated the score, and was in full command of the orchestra.

Is there anything more difficult to conduct than Fryderyk Chopin’s two piano concerti? With a highly complex piano part, with runs and flourishes in the right hand, and considerable rubato by the soloist, a conductor must really listen in order to give a good performance of these works. Mr. So obviously listened well last night, and was in every sense an equal partner to Louis Lortie, the piano soloist. The orchestra, under So’s direction, gave a reading of great beauty and detail. Unlike some conductor, Mr. So obviously gives Chopin a lot of credit as an orchestrator, and brought out a lot of details often hidden in the score.

Louis Lortie is one of those musicians that, even if you disagree with everything he does, you’d have to acknowledge the fact that he is a major artist. Lortie rose far above Chopin’s technical and musical challenges and gave a magnificent performance of the score. I feel that he was trying to emphasize the heroic as well as the declamatory aspects of the first movement, but without sacrificing the poetry that is also called for. I was completely captivated by his playing of the Larghetto movement, which he played with a limpid and absolutely beautiful sound throughout. I had slight reservations about his interpretation of the third movement. I felt that his playing sounded quite heavy, and there were some harsh sound in the piano playing. I feel that the soloist missed the feel of a dance, and the Polish “feel” so inherent in this movement.

It was interesting that Lortie played on an Italian made piano that has been garnering a lot of attention around the musical world. I believe that the piano he played had, surprising, limited tonal range as well as a limited palette of sound colours. I think the soloist would have done much better had he chosen to play the Steinway, New York or Hamburg.

I have often felt that the music of Jean Sibelius, with its short, rugged, often heroic motifs, is also uniquely suited to our beautiful Canadian landscapes. Even in this first symphony, with its slight influence of Tchaikovsky, all the hallmarks of the composer’s later works are already there.

Perry So and the orchestra gave a stunning reading of this music, filled with gorgeous details in orchestral nuances, but at the same time with a clear sight of its goal. From the beautifully played clarinet solo that begins the work, to its intentionally, I’m sure, anti-climatic and enigmatic pizzicato ending, the musicians carried us through a magical ride through Sibelius’s incredible soundscape.

Mr. So, only 32 years old, has the ability, very rare among conductors, of inviting the musicians to participate in the process of music making, rather than imposing his will on them. His beat is quite interesting, for he does not merely subdivide his beat, but carries with it a lot of rhythmic nuances. Unlike some conductor who beats with both hands, Mr. So uses his left hand to cue, but also to convey a great deal of nuances about musical expressions.

At the end of the performance, during the well-deserved ovation, Mr. So, went around the orchestra directing the audience’s applause towards its various sections and soloists.

It was an auspicious debut by a hugely talented young conductor. The Vancouver Symphony is now searching for a new music director after Bramwell Tovey’s departure. They could do worse than to include Mr. So in their short list of candidates.

Arthur Rubinstein in Hamburg

I am a Youtube addict.

But when you have documentaries and legendary performances by Rubinstein, Horowitz, Richter, Gilels, Bernstein, Mehta, Ozawa, Abbado, Von Karajan, Menuhin, Stern, Ferras, du Pre and Ma at the click of the mouse, how can you resist? Recently, a kind soul posted an entry that I have enjoyed immensely. If you go into the Youtube site and type “Rubinstein in Hamburg”, you will be rewarded with a documentary, less than 30 minutes in length, about Arthur Rubinstein’s visit to the Steinway & Sons factory in Hamburg.

Because of the tragedy of the two world wars, and especially because of the atrocities committed by Germany during World War II, Arthur Rubinstein made the decision not to perform in Germany and Austria. To this end, the pianist even directed royalties from records sold in Germany towards helping victims of the holocaust. He did, however, made several trips to these two countries for personal and professional reasons. He went to Salzburg to attend a performance of Wagner’s Meistersinger, one of his favourite operas (he named one of his daughters, Eva, after the heroine in the opera), Frankfurt to promote his memoirs, and Hamburg on a couple of occasions to choose pianos.

The documentary I mentioned before is a record of one of Rubinstein’s visit to the Steinway factory, to try out one of his pianos sent there for repairs. In it, the pianist tried out the piano by playing snippets from various works in his vast repertoire, works by Chopin, Ravel and Schubert. In addition to the historical significance of the visit, the documentary once again reinforced in my mind the greatness of this particular artist, and the emotional impact of hearing Arthur Rubinstein live.

Watching Rubinstein at the piano is a lesson, not just about playing the instrument, but on an artist’s entire approach to music and to art. Moreover, viewing a Rubinstein performance gives us a revelation of healthy use of one’s body. According to Arnold Steinhardt of the Guarneri String Quartet, who frequently played and recorded with Mr. Rubinstein, music “was like food for him: he was living off the experience of making music. He wasn’t expending energy; he was getting energy.”

When Arthur Rubinstein plays the piano, he is intently listening to the music being made at the moment. When the pianist plays, he is not only playing an instrument, or even playing music, he is music. There is simplicity, as well as a complete naturalness and honesty in his playing, physically as well as musically, that I have witnessed in no other pianist. Daniel Barenboim commented that Rubinstein made it sound like someone who did no more than simply being willing to take the time.

I am grateful that such a moving documentary about Mr. Rubinstein exists and is available. In today’s musical world, where many artists are more concerned about what they wear on stage than the music they play, watching Arthur Rubinstein again reminds us of another time when music was a noble calling and not a mere “career”.