Music Reviews

Mar 13, 2007 - The Reno Chamber Orchestra's exceptional concert of exciting and exotic music

By By Jack Neal

Classical music can be exciting and vital and should be. Just challenge listeners and they'll cash in on the colorful world of symphonic music. And that is what Theodore Kuchar, the extraordinary and musically intelligent maestro of the Reno Chamber Orchestra, is doing for every concert his orchestra plays.

Kuchar - now in his third season with the orchestra, has a curiosity for new works and a flair for unusual programming that challenges and stretches an orchestra's musical and technical skills. The results are an orchestra that's playing better than ever and a growing audience that's enjoying – and learning – more than ever.

Saturday's concert (3/10/07) at Nightingale Concert Hall was even more unusual and spectacular than ever. Didgeridooist William Barton was one of the soloists, playing the world premiere of George Warren's Concerto for Didgeridoo and Orchestra. Pianist Jiyang Chen, this year's RCO college concerto winner was the other soloist, playing Brahms's Piano Concerto No. 2. Barton also collaborated with the orchestra for the American premiere of Australian composer Peter Sculthorpe's "From Ubirr." This eclectic mix was polished off with several passionately brought off Brahms Hungarian Dances that out rhapsodized all else on this brilliantly conceived and played program.

The didgeridoo is hardly a household word, although Barton is such a master of this exotic native Australian musical instrument and such a charmer, when he's on board promoting what the didgeridoo can do it could become a household word. A low vibrating sound is the instrument's foundation for a myriad of sounds reminiscent of indigenous Australian wild life. For an idea of how this interesting instrument sounds, add a mild percussiveness and mix well. The results are a warm sound that's astonishingly musical. Happily, Barton is as magnetic in explanation as he is virtuosic in performance.

"From Ubirr," for didgeridoo and strings, is a lush, haunting work that's entirely accessible for listeners used to much more traditional fare. Sculthorpe's blending of strings with the didgeridoo is seamless and provides "From Ubirr" with an ethnic charm that captivates.

Warren's Concerto for Didgeridoo and Orchestra, is a mildly serial work of pastel textures and subtle harmonies. The concerto's harmonic structure uses the low sounds of the didgeridoo as a foundation for a work of unusually lovely lyricism enhanced by the exotic antics of the didgeridoo's attachment to the sounds of nature. The world premiere of the Warren was a triumph for all concerned – composer, solo artist, conductor and orchestra. It was a challenging collaboration, and a superb one.

Remarkable, too, was the performance of Brahms's difficult and lengthy Second Piano Concerto. The young pianist Jiyang Chen, a sophomore at the Eastman School of Music, was technically assured. His evolution as a concert artist will become even more exceptional as he matures. Not that there was anything amiss with his performance, other than a much more unabashed Brahmsian rapture the concerto really must have to be completely realized.

Kuchar's take on the Brahms Hungarian Dances was nothing less than dance and romance personified. These superlatively rubato performances lacked only the presence of superb dancers to make the illusion complete. March Madness may be about basketball, but the real excitement in Reno this March was in the concert hall, not on the basketball court.

All Reno Chamber Orchestra subscription concerts are played at Nightingale Concert Hall, 900 North Virginia Street, Reno. NV. The orchestra's March concerts were played March 10 and 11 (2007). The orchestra's next series of concerts, April 14 And 15 (2007), will feature the music of Salieri, Mozart, Martinu, and Handel. With violinist Phillip Ruder and violist Theodore Kuchar. Theodore Kuchar will conduct. For information call 772-348-9413.