Hartford Symphony opens first live season since COVID with a bright, breezy burst of Beethoven
The Hartford Symphony Orchestra wisely avoided anything too downbeat for its grand return this weekend. For its opening concert of the symphony’s first Masterworks series concert of the season — not to mention its first full indoor orchestra concert in 18 months — the players seemed downright giddy.
The program had its first performance Friday night, followed by concerts Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m. in the Belding Theater at The Bushnell.
This concert, anchored by Beethoven but also featuring a modern audience-participation composition by Clarice Assad and a rumbling run through Rossini’s “William Tell Overture,” was a harmonious homecoming. Nobody sounded rusty. Nobody looked skittish. They came to play together.
It helped that the guest conductor was Joseph Young, a spirited, enthusiastic leader who likes to wave and point fingers at the musicians as if it’s his turn in a game of charades. There’s nothing remotely somber in his approach.
Young is also amiable and talkative. The first half of the concert felt like a Pops concert, with fun introductions to the Rossini and Assad pieces.
There’s an old Dave Berg “Lighter Side” cartoon from Mad Magazine where two kids are watching a stern classical conductor on TV who orders the tykes to listen to Rossini’s “William Tell Overture” without once thinking of “The Lone Ranger” TV show (which used the end of the overture as its theme song). The kids are concentrating intently, beads of sweat forming on their brows, only to have their father gallop drunkenly into the room screaming “Hi-yo, Silver!”
Joseph Young had none of that snooty seriousness. Introducing the “William Tell Overture,” he said “I like to start these programs with a little bit of nostalgia,” fully accepting that the audience may know Rossini’s music best from hearing it in Looney Tunes cartoons or on an episode of “Seinfeld.” Calling the overture “a miniature tone poem,” he let it build gradually to a state of bliss. The trombonists in particular seemed to be enjoying themselves. Played at a peppy pace, leaning heavily on the brass and woodwinds, a real feel-good attitude formed.
The lightheartedness continued with “É Gol! For Orchestra and Audience Members,” which featured its composer Clarice Assad leading the audience in rounds of singing and sounds that range from “do-re-mi” to “whooshes,” hums and beatbox effects. For the sixth and final section of the multi-styled work (a tribute to Brazilian women’s soccer star Marta Vieira da Silva), Assad let the audience take a break and handled all the vocals herself, in a jazzy style modulated by microphone effects.
Dressed a sheer red shirt over a flowing black outfit, Assad was a transfixing figure, endearing and amusing. But her presence, plus projected text throughout most of the piece (“Do you know where you are? You’re at The Bushnell,” one message reads), plus the orchestra often providing rhythmic and tonal effects similar to what the audience is already doing, plus Joseph Young conducting the orchestra while Assad conducts the audience, created a lot of distraction from the actual composition.
There are some fine moments in “É Gol!” A section titled “Morning Run” really sounds as if the sun is rising. Overall, the piece is not as gimmicky as it sounds. Being a participant may even make you feel the music more deeply in the moment. But it can also make it hard to appreciate the flow and the style and the athletic themes.
After such a chatty, interactive first half, Ludwig van Beethoven needed no introduction and didn’t get one. The orchestra returned from intermission and headed straight into the composer’s seventh symphony without comment. It’s in keeping with conductor Young’s earlier take on the “William Tell Overture”: brisk, bright, fresh and airy, a soft breeze. Anything stuffier might kill the overjoyed-to-be-back mood in the room. The half-hour symphony flew by.
Young has a knack of letting the sounds of violins and flutes rise above the rest of the orchestra so you can almost see the cloudlike layers. The instruments get introduced cleanly and clearly as if they are new characters entering the stage.
The orchestra leapt into the last movement. Young whipped the violins into a fury until they sound like a swarm of wasps. The sound was bold without being messy or oppressive, grand without being overbearing.
Friday’s performance ended with the same sort of lengthy good-to-be-back ovation that occurred at the beginning. This time, the orchestra got to applaud long and loud right back at the audience as well.
Orchestral harmony is live and well at The Bushnell.
Christopher Arnott can be reached at carnott@courant.com.
