A Psychedelic Symphony Evening

By Patricia H. Kushlis

Or more accurately, a psychedelic evening at the symphony? Or was it a psychedelic Alice at the Kennedy Center? Or could it have been a not so subtle musical statement about the inanities of the past seven years of the Bush administration with the Queen shrieking “Off with her Head!” Dick Cheney/Donald Rumsfeld style near the end? After all, Alice in Wonderland has multiple interpretations.

But the political satire and parody on the inanities of mid-nineteenth century British politics should not be lost – despite the fact the two reviews (Anne Midgette of the WaPo and Michael Lodico of IonArts) and the one preview (Stephen Brookes in a special to the WaPo on May 8) I read ignored the obvious political dimensions of Alice in Wonderland entirely. (Note to readers: I'd include links to Midgette and Brookes articles, but the WaPo site is crashing my computer.)

Michael Lodico of the music critics blog IonArts, at least focused on the true musical highlight of the evening, violinist Hilary Hahn’s performance of Paganini’s Violin Concerto No 1 in D Major, Opus 6, a lovely performance that was not psychedelic at all.

A peculiar sort of program

In reality, this was one of the stranger combinations of symphonic works on a single program in my experience as a member of audience of numerous classical music concerts over the years and someone who still attempts to play the oboe thanks to an indulgent oboe teacher.

Normally, twentieth century music is played pre-, not post-intermission so the audience doesn’t escape en masse before the work or soloist most came to hear – in this case the 28 year old virtuoso violinist Hahn. This, however, was not the case at the most recent program of Washington’s National Symphony Orchestra. Hahn was sandwiched between a mediocre rendition of Verdi’s “Overture to I vespri siciliani” which Midgette’s critique got mostly right. It was sloppily performed. What she missed, however, was that the orchestra also had intonation problems. This was particularly evident in the Verdi.

I too went to hear Hilary Hahn who performed beautifully. But the last half of the program was devoted to the 64 minute or so uncut version of contemporary composer David Del Tredici’s “Final Alice,” the first time it has been staged uncut in over a decade or longer. With good reason.

Hahn was worth the price of admission.

Whether or not one likes this particular Violin Concerto – or considers it fluff as did Midgette, Hahn performed it spectacularly. Perhaps the two men seated in front of me knew something I didn’t know, but they escaped at half time, I mean intermission, after Hahn’s performance and before the hour plus of “Final Alice” began.

Stephen Brookes , however, had led me to believe in his special to the WaPo concert preview that Del Tredici’s “Final Alice” was a throw-back to pre-Schoenberg tonality. As it turned out, only partially.

Yes, Del Tredici broke with the atonal tradition who-cares-about-the-audience attitude at the time he wrote it 32 years ago – but he seems not to have made up his mind whether the work should have been tonal or not – and the transitions between the two were, so to speak, jagged en extremis.

Not my cup of tea

Let's just say that “Final Alice” was not my cup of tea – or maybe it was the NSO’s performance of the work that was not. Or maybe it’s that this rather peculiar work would have been better presented as an opera, not a symphonic production. Del Tredici seems to have spent much of his adult composing life writing, revising and regrouping various versions – longer and shorter – of Alice. And from his perspective, almost parroted by Brookes in his pre-concert review probably taken from the Program Notes or an NSO pre-concert press release, with emphasis on Reverend Charles Lutwidge Dodgson’s aka Lewis Carroll’s apparent unhealthy fetish for young attractive girls.

I, however, prefer the political mayhem interpretation of Alice in Wonderland. This IS Washington, DC after all: this country’s Rome. And the Bush 43 administration has certainly exhibited some of the numerous questionably sane attributes reminiscent of the rulers of the British Empire at its height.

Or maybe, Leonard Slatkin’s decision to include “Final Alice” on the program represented a kind of primordial scream of his own since – I’ve been told – this is his last year as NSO Music Director – and not of his own volition. Or perhaps he was doing a composer friend a last ditch favor. I have no idea.

But back to the NSO’s rendition of Alice: I found it impossible to hear most of the lyrics over an orchestra in which the string section had been doubled and all sorts of non-traditional instruments, including a police siren (theremin), were having at it at decibels way beyond the threshold for the onset of deafness. Lodico suggested in his review that the problem was with the microphone used by singer/performance artist Hila Plitmann.

The microphone could have been part of the problem, but I fail to understand why a mammoth string section was required. Now I’m not opposed to strings – but from where I was sitting – I could barely hear the folk band which took over the front row of the orchestra let alone the reeds somewhere back center stage except for the piccolo and a lone bassoon on occasion - or maybe that was in the Verdi. Del Tredici also scored Alice for three oboes and an English horn – but from what I heard or actually didn’t hear, they might as well have stayed home and saved us all money. The numerous clarinets could have disappeared at intermission as well.

Now whether this variations-on-a-New-York-Subway-scene-at-rush-hour was what the composer wanted, since the lyrics were nonsensical anyway, or whether this was how the NSO was instructed to perform it, beats me. Intentional or not, that’s what happened. Oh and, by the way, it was too dark from where I sat – first balcony, second row center - to follow the script included in the special insert that came with the program. Ah, the Washington insanity of it all.

Program note: The program, sponsored by the Mars Family and Mars Family Foundation, was performed at the Kennedy Center May 8-10, 2008.