Salvador Brotons is a conductor who likes new challenges. That may have been one of the reasons for him to lead his orchestra, the Vancouver Symphony, in its first-ever performance of Sergei Prokofiev’s Fifth Symphony on Saturday afternoon (November 12) at the Skyview Concert Hall in Vancouver, Washington. In his introductory remarks to the audience, Brotons noted that this performance also marked the first time that he had conducted this orchestral work. Then he went to the podium and proceeded to direct it from memory.
The orchestra played the Prokofiev with great fervor, and Brotons marshaled its forces to make big fortes and forceful statements. Their performance embraced a see-saw of emotion with the percussion battery contributing expertly, the strings turning from sorrow and anguish to joyful and triumphant, the brass adding heft – especially during the bombastic ending, and the woodwinds peppering it all with commentary. The orchestra didn’t play flawlessly (there were a lot of suspect pitches), but principal clarinetist Igor Shakhman did. Shakhman expressed a wild variety of sounds superbly. In particular, his softest sounds were hauntingly beautiful and seemed to vanish into nothingness.
Even though Ferdinand David was a violinist, he uncorked one of the most popular pieces ever written for trombone and orchestra, the Trombone Concertino. Guest soloist Henry Henniger explored every nook and cranny of this short work (around ten minutes) with panache. He could make beautiful tones that soared and then lower them suddenly to a murmuring hush. He also executed spot on trills and conquered lots of tricky passages that skipped along very quickly. Henniger created a warm, singing tone that expressed the many moods of the piece: from the sorrowful to the joyous. His playing was well-supported by the orchestra, which delivered dramatic crescendos and cut-offs.
Rossini’s Overture to La scala di seta (“The silken ladder”) opened the concert on a light-hearted note. The Vancouver Symphony’s strings and woodwinds nimbly negotiated the fleet passages, but they could’ve tightened up the intonation a bit more. Still, the musicians whipped up plenty of fluff and froth to channel into the spirit of Rossini and extend a pleasant welcome to the audience.
James Bash writes articles for a variety of publications, including magazines such as Opera America, Open Spaces, Opera, MUSO, International Arts Manager, American Record Guide, Symphony, Opera Canada, and PSU Magazine. The newspapers include Crosscut, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, The Oregonian, The Columbian, The Portland Tribune, The Register-Guard, and Willamette Week. James has also written a number of articles for the Oregon Arts Commission and contributed articles to the 2nd edition of the Grove Dictionary of American Music. James was a fellow to the 2008 NEA Journalism Institute for Classical Music and Opera. He is a member of the Music Critics Association of North America (mcana.org) and lives in Portland, Oregon with his wife, Kathy.
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