This year marks the 300th anniversary of one very imaginative job application.
With 'Brandenburg Concertos' the SPCO revels in what has become a holiday tradition
The performances combine old-school genius and contemporary instrumental prowess.
For the Minnesota Star Tribune
December 10, 2021 at 5:00PM
Seeking new employment, Johann Sebastian Bach sent six concertos for various instruments to the Margrave of Brandenburg in hopes that he could latch on as a court composer. But Bach received no reply, and what came to be called the "Brandenburg Concertos" weren't discovered until a century after his death.
Today, they're regarded as the peak of baroque-era instrumental music, and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra has made a December tradition of performing them. This year, the task is divided into two programs, with the first through third Brandenburgs this weekend, the fourth through sixth next week.
On Thursday evening, the 300th birthday party for the Brandenburgs got underway at St. Paul's Ordway Concert Hall, and it proved an inspiring intersection of old-school creative genius and contemporary instrumental prowess. While not technically pristine, it was a concert with a scintillating spirit and an infectious energy ideal for an audience braced for snow.
Things kicked off with the most famous of the six concertos, the Second, a work known for its piercing piccolo trumpet and electrifying exchanges between instruments. While Lynn Erickson smoothly executed the soaring trumpet lines, flutist Alicia McQuerrey and oboist Cassie Pilgrim proved equally impressive, especially in their halting dialogues during the slow movement.
While the Second is customarily the ultimate adrenaline rush of the six concertos, that honor went to the Third on this night. Bursting with vigor, it was like a high-energy battle of the bands between three trios. The three violins initiated themes that cascaded downward through the three violas, then landed in a thunderous threesome of cellos. It proved to be 10 minutes of furious bowing and thrilling musical chemistry. While it may have been fun to hear harpsichordist Timothy Lovelace improvise a second-movement cadenza, the lack of a break kept the excitement flowing.
The largest ensemble to take the stage all evening was the group of 13 musicians assembled for the First Brandenburg. Here, French horn players James Ferree and Denise Tryon sang out lines as catchy and captivating as what Erickson's little trumpet delivered on the Second. But it also contained the evening's most emotionally involving slow movement, to which Pilgrim's oboe brought weighty pleas of sadness and longing, lines echoed admirably by bassoonist Adrian Morejon.
While the solo violin of Maureen Nelson too often became buried in the mix, it did stride forth flamboyantly when the final minuet became a duel between strings and winds. Who won? Well, Bach gave the concerto's most ebullient phrases to the horns, and Ferree and Tryon did marvelous things with them.
Between this weekend's first three Brandenburgs and next weekend's final three, SPCO artistic partner Rob Kapilow joins the musicians 7:30 p.m. Dec. 16 for one of his "What Makes It Great?" concert lectures on the Second Brandenburg, a work that, since 1977, has been serenading any outer space life forms encountered by the Voyager spacecraft. For those not wanting to venture out into winter's onslaught, the Saturday night concerts are livestreamed.
The St. Paul Chamber Orchestra
What: J.S. Bach's "Brandenburg Concertos."
When: Nos. 1-3, 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday; Nos. 4-6, 11 a.m. Dec. 17, 8 p.m. Dec. 18 and 2 p.m. Dec. 19.
Where: Ordway Concert Hall, 345 Washington St., St. Paul.
Tickets: $5-$50, available at 651-291-1144 or thespco.org.
Rob Hubbard is a freelance Twin Cities classical music critic. Reach him at wordhub@yahoo.com.
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