The Russians are coming, the Russians are coming!: ISO shines in Rimsky-Korsakov, Prokofiev

We can easily dismiss as a matter of coincidence the presence of two Russian masterworks on an Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra program introduced on the day the prospect of the United States becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of Putin's Russia burst onto the scene.

So much for world politics, I hope. It does seem unusual, however, that the ISO is returning to Rimsky-Korsakov's "Scheherazade" in just under three years. Both times have featured female guest conductors, as the ISO joins a trend encouraged by pioneering maestra Marin Alsop. It's no longer rare to see a woman on the podium of a major symphony orchestra. In 2022, Ruth Reinhardt conducted "Scheherazade" here; this weekend it's Valentina Peleggi, an Italian trained in Europe and now music director of the Richmond (Virginia) Symphony Orchestra. 

Valentins Peleggi makes local debut this weekend.

Both reconnect the ISO with Rimsky-Korsakov's tone poem inspired by the "Arabian Nights" device of a series of linked tales spun by the title character. She is successfully forestalling the fate handed out to a sexist sultan's previous wives: execution after one night of marital bliss. When storytellers fascinate their audiences, bingeing may be the result. "Basically, she invented Netflix," Peleggi quipped before the performance.

Toxic masculinity is a trendy topic nowadays, so the fabled Sultan and his wily new wife fit right into the 21st  century. Like many of his composing contemporaries, Rimsky-Korsakov was of two minds about programmatic subtitles, but these have stuck because what he created is so deucedly vivid. "Scheherazade" will never be heard as abstract music. When it is, it frankly becomes a little tiresome.

Rimsky-Korsakov's suite focuses on several tales, and his score is among the the most successful of picturesque works for orchestra. He wrote the book on orchestration, directly influencing Igor Stravinsky. Here the orchestration is masterly, and the parade of instrumental solos provides a delightful display, chiefly the violin solos that unite the storytelling thrust of the piece. As he was in 2022, concertmaster Kevin Lin was the star in that capacity Friday night.

Other ISO  principals got deserved solo bows at the end, as did whole sections, eliciting shouting ovations from an audience swelled by the attendance of student groups from three area high schools. 

Peleggi conducts with broad, detailed gestures. She showed herself to be fond of eliciting plangent sonorities from the bass end of the spectrum, and such thrills were forthcoming from the cello and bass sections as well as the lower brass. The level of responsiveness from the ISO adhered to its current high-level norm.

She was first seen without obstructed view in the concert-opener, "Masquerade" by Anna Clyne, a British composer who can boast absorbing eclectic influences across the arts. The five-minute piece is splashy, thickly but not muddily scored for full orchestra. It draws on country dance and the promenade concerts of the 18th century. Clyne thus falls into a tradition popular among British composers, notably Ralph Vaughan Williams. "Masquerade" had a throat-clearing value for the orchestra, and was bracing to listen to.

Joyce Yang connected with Friday's audience.

With the Steinway grand moved into place, concentration moved toward the guest soloist for this program, Joyce Yang. The South Korean pianist distinguished herself 20 years ago by winning the silver medal in the 2005 Van Cliburn Competition. Rapport with the audience and her colleagues for the evening was immediate.

Fortunately, her expression of happiness just to be there had tremendous follow-through in her performance of Prokofiev's Piano Concerto No. 3 in C major. Her facility was top-drawer, a quality that was called upon almost to a perpetual-motion extent. She was also fond of the bass register on her instrument, just as Peleggi was with the orchestra in "Scheherazade,"  and Yang's sound across the keyboard was invariably well-balanced.

The work is notable for some abrupt changes of pace and theme that soloist and orchestra always matched with each other. The finale shows off Prokofiev's penchant for coming up with a beautiful melody when it's most welcome, the way his countryman Rachmaninoff was wont to do. Yang didn't sell any part of the fascinating concerto short. For an encore, she spread magical moonbeams across Earl Wild's arrangement of George Gershwin's "The Man I Love." Audience response was rapturous, as it had been in the concerto and continued to be after intermission.