ISO Classical Series: New American music consorts with Brahms

The issue of whether to segregate new music by dedicating concerts to it has been settled in favor of putting it shoulder to shoulder with acknowledged classics. That seems to reflect a "both-sides-now" marketing at the symphony-orchestra level, the perpetual mainstay of public presentation of classical music.

Thus, there are Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra programs like this weekend's "Brahms and the

Alexander Shelley was a welcoming host and advocate.

American Spirit," which I heard Friday night and will be repeated this afternoon at Hilbert Circle Theatre. It is presided over with the useful attitude of salesmanship by guest conductor Alexander Shelley. Attendance seemed sparse, which might indicate that this sort of blended programming is no guarantee it will draw relatively better than conventional programming without a conspicuous mixture of old and new. Shelley, an affable communicator both in the Words on Music presentation and remarks from the podium just before the music began, embraced the program's diversity by holding up the word "optimism."

The performance of Brahms' Symphony No. 1 in C minor certainly maximized the emergence of triumph in the piece. The dark atmosphere of conflict that pervades the first movement had a kind of brisk turmoil to it. We received a hint that these troubles aren't meant to last.  Gentle breezes wafted over both of the middle movements. The self-questioning mood, so characteristic of Brahms, began to lift. 

It was recalled usefully in the finale. The mysterious pizzicato rumination in the introduction was deftly brought off by the strings. The radiant quality of the horn melody burst forth gloriously from principal Robert Danforth.  

I can't dissociate a brief television memory from this tune, which I already knew from an LP of the symphony I had as a teen: I was doing homework in my room when I heard it come from downstairs, where my parents were watching "Bonanza." I rushed down and got a glimpse of Dan Blocker as Hoss looking out over the Ponderosa as the show's underscoring borrowed that moment from Brahms. So, for me, optimistic vistas are indelibly associated with the melody. Everyone expected that things would always turn out well for the Cartwrights.

The movement's main theme, whose distant evocation of "Ode to Joy" it annoyed Brahms to have pointed out, strode purposefully toward the end. Especially magical, under Shelley's guidance, was the relaxation of tension and the deepening and thickening of the texture — what Michael Steinberg once referred to in a critics' seminar as "those stomach rumblings in Brahms" — before the final rush toward the double bar line. It was perhaps the most deliberately didactic performance of the Brahms First I've ever heard, but it was still exciting.

The concert opened with a piece that skirted monotony over its five-minute length.  But Joan Tower's "Sixth Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman" varied its metronomic signature effectively in this performance. Outbursts near the start hinted at the fanfare tradition, but the brass also presented jazzy figures that were celebratory in a different manner. 

The variety skillfully woven into the tapestry suggested that women, uncommon nor not, are better than men at multitasking. This was not one of those peppy new curtain-raisers for orchestra in the recent tradition of John Adams' testosterone-rich "Short Ride in a Fast Machine." The sweep of glissandos near the decisive end was a clever culminating touch. Cherchez la femme! Friday's performance seemed assured from end to end.

ISO soprano soloist Janice Chandler-Eteme

A newer piece brought to the stage this weekend's other two guest artists: soprano Janice Chandler-Eteme and narrator Joshua Thompson. Adolphus C. Hailstork's "JFK: The Last Speech" uses John F. Kennedy's speech in tribute to Robert Frost at Amherst College the month before the era-shattering assassination. Sixty years ago last Thursday Kennedy spoke magisterially about the importance of the arts and what the recently deceased New England poet represented to American artistic achievement. 

Frost had spoken at Kennedy's inauguration in 1961, the first poet ever included in this patriotic ritual. "Summoning artists to participate / In the august occasions of the state / Seems something artists ought to celebrate" is how the poem  Frost intended to recite begins. But the glare of winter sunlight forced him to draw on his memory to say his old patriotic poem "The Gift Outright."

Hailstork's orchestra writing gives color and pulse to expressions of hope and special moments in our

Joshua Thompson

history, neatly folded into one another. It opens with a demanding fanfare-like trumpet assertion, well played Friday by acting assistant principal Allen Miller. After Thompson's first debonair, urgent delivery of Kennedy's words, I caught recognizable snatches of Frost in Chandler-Eteme's soaring soprano. Without text, long phrases from high voices are often hard to discern, and I wondered if Hailstork's option of a tenor soloist should have been taken. Chandler-Eteme sounded thoroughly invested in her task, however, and brought it off well. 

The scoring seemed competent and attentive to the words of both Frost and Kennedy. It never held any surprises, though. The last lines of "Stopping by Woods" wrap up the vocal contribution, as solo oboe, then flute, over tremolo strings, lead to a soft landing for the ensemble. Earlier, JFK's words about the artist's duty follow upon the harp-accompanied "Acquainted With the Night," then a cello solo. 

The work is like a museum diorama or the picturesque arrangement of buildings, trees, and terrain for a Lionel toy-train display. Everything is in its place, complementing its surroundings. But it's overloaded with reverence, and turns the wary stance of Frost into something too all-embracing: "The Road Not Taken," one of the poems Hailstork quotes, tends to be misinterpreted as self-confident about fateful choices, when it is in fact doubtful about what "all the difference" between the two paths really is.

The path that the ISO and many American orchestras have taken about programming similarly might not yield a definitive answer. "Brahms and the American Spirit" fits the desired juxtaposition of old and new music as well as today's diversity trend. Further experimentation is warranted.