Glorious Gershwin

Last night I attended my first every Toronto Symphony Orchestra performance. Now, I'm not normally one to leave the house, but the double-bonus of a 50% off promotion valid for the night of Gershwin was worth the effort. I've been subscribing to the Canadian Opera Company for the past few years, and always found the TSO's prices a bit too high in comparison, but WOW; that performance made me rethink the concept of "value"!

The opening selection was a piece by Milhaud, wonderfully introduced by the wonderful conductor, Jeffery "Wonderful" Kahane. As you may have guessed, the conductor's wonderfulness (wonderfulicity?) added a lot to the proceedings. He was rumpled, animated and witty (all wonderfully so), and for some reason reminded me of Bugs Bunny (it was likely just me harkening back to the old Looney Tunes "Leopold!" episode, though the bald guy with the gun who kept chasing him offstage twigged my subconscious too...) I was disappointed to learn he was only a guest conductor; Full-time status would have guaranteed a season ticket purchase from me. (Instead, I'm scoping real estate in Santa Rosa.)

Anyway, back to Milhaud - Jeffrey ("W") Kahane mentioned in his intro that he should be recognised as the first true fusion of old classical and new jazz techniques; Gershwin has usurped the honour, but he also usurped a lot of Milhaud's sound. Midway through the piece, the "Gershwinisms" (heavy on the oboe, bombast and verve) were so plentiful that only the occasional atonal passages threw me into doubt about which composer I was hearing.

The Milhaud piece was followed by Gershwin's Piano Concerto in F, which was conducted and played wonderfully (how else can he do it?) by Jeffrey Kahane. It's obviously a technically demanding piece for pianists, yet his hands flew so quickly and lightly over the keys that my sister and I, reluctant former piano students, were astonished. At one point, Kerry leaned over to me and whispered, "You've either got it or you don't, and we obviously didn't have it." I think she took heart, though, knowing, even amongst the professionals, very, very few have that. Gershwin music makes me smile all on its own, and when accompanied by such a, won... (ahem) FANTASTICALLY joyous performance, I was grinning like an idiot through most of the night.

I say "most of the night", unfortunately, as the middle section of the bill contained two flute pieces, one solo. I would explain my disappointment by saying that I hate the flute, but in truth, it's more that I hate flautists. And, Emmanuel Pahud, the smarmy jerk they'd brought in to solo on both of the pieces did not do anything to change my attitude. At the end of the first piece, a solo for flute, he held the instrument so long to his lips after the final note that many thought there must be a second movement about to begin. When it became clear that this was not to be, people began coughing and rustling; still he didn't move. He must have been standing there for about 45 seconds after the piece ended - I have never witnessed arrogance like that on stage before, and I hope never to again; I refused to applaud him - the last thing this guy needs is more confidence.

I had another reason to want smarmy-pants rushed off the stage of course; the final piece was An American In Paris, which is the reason I'd considered the tickets in the first place. Suffice to say, (I'm sorry for this, but I'm going to have to use the W word again, albeit in context) 's wonderful. What a blast. Even my sis, who had never really heard much Gershwin before, was humming along with me as we left.

The experience has me thinking about dropping my opera subscription (maybe just scaling back to the big-name operas I know I want to see) in favour of a couple of TSO tix per season. I enjoy opera, but compared with the symphony, the audience seems a lot less polite - lots of talkers, whisperers, and other noisemakers. I wonder(ful?) how much of that is due to the light levels? The COC turns the house lights off during performance, but the TSO had a fair amount of low-level light maintained throughout the show. Oh well, this will be the perfect week to compare and contrast; I've got La Bohème next Saturday!

**UPDATE** Wow, here's a BIG push in the direction of the TSO: Some fantastic benefits for subscribers above and beyond what the COC offers. C'mon, COC, I'm awaiting your counter-offer!