REVIEW: ANCHORAGE SYMPHONY

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Posted: April 12, 2009 - 12:36 am

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By Maia Nolan

I’ve seen a lot of standing ovations in the Atwood Concert Hall over the years, but usually the audience holds off until end of the performance. I’d never seen a standing ovation following an opening piece, and I’d definitely never witnessed one between movements — never, that is, until Saturday night’s Anchorage Symphony Orchestra concert.

The opening selection, Danzon No. 2, a contemporary, Cuban-inspired piece by Mexican composer Arturo Marquez, was easily the most polished piece of the evening, although there were some notable intonation issues among the high woodwinds. The Marquez was a nice palate teaser (and I’m a fan of anything that requires a tuba player to use a mute; it’s a lot of fun to watch) for what promised to be an enjoyable evening.

Guest conductor Robert Moody may have contributed to the enthusiasm nearly as much as the musicians themselves; his conducting was more like dancing at times, and he appeared almost to flirt with the orchestra as he led the way through the Marquez.

The remainder of the first half of the program, unfortunately, was not as tasty. The Marquez was followed by a disappointing Handel’s Suite No. 2 in D Major from “Water Music,” which lacked crispness and polish. The French horns in particular sounded muddy and indistinct, although that subsided somewhat when the brass players stood toward the end of the final movement. Even Linn Weeda’s sparkling trumpet didn’t make up for the Handel’s general listlessness.

The final piece before intermission was Hindemith’s “Symphonic Metamorphosis of Themes by Carl Maria von Weber,” which was less listless than the Handel, but still missed the mark. The andantino movement in particular sounded less complex than just kind of unfocused. After the crowd-pleasing Marquez, both Handel and Hindemith seemed phoned in.

Following intermission, the orchestra was joined by concert pianist Juliana Osinchuk for Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1. Here’s something else I’ve observed in the Atwood: The Anchorage Symphony tends to rise to the occasion when playing with a featured soloist. Perhaps the presence of a virtuoso brings out the players’ competitive streaks. Maybe the bar is just raised. Whatever the reason, the orchestra always brings its A game when welcoming a guest artist, and it didn’t make an exception for Osinchuk just because she’s a local.

The Tchaikovsky is a thick, meaty, satisfying steak of a concerto, and although it wasn’t played perfectly Saturday night (even Osinchuk wasn’t entirely accurate, particularly in the first movement), it was played with feeling. So much feeling, in fact, that a fair number of concertgoers got carried away and delivered a standing ovation after the first movement.

After the Tchaikovsky (which was rewarded with a by-then-predictable standing ovation), Osinchuk returned to the stage to play an original composition: variations on the theme of the Alaska Flag Song, dedicated to the memory of Anchorage Times editor Bill Tobin, who died last week. Osinchuk’s encore, which explored and expanded upon the flag song’s beautiful, simple melody without going to unwieldy extremes, was a highlight of the evening.

To the audience’s credit, the encore got a standing ovation, too.

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