Tonight I was in the mood to hear some classical music, so I headed over to the Tent for the Aspen Concert Orchestra concert. The Festival has… four different orchestras? Maybe five? I’m not sure, and I work here. Anyway, this was the first time I had heard the Aspen Concert Orchestra, and I was really impressed. Looking at the group, I don’t know if there was a musician out of their teens. There was one kind in the violin section that looked to be maybe thirteen. There was one bass player with a beard, but otherwise, these were definitely young musicians.
They performed three pieces, Fiesta! by Jimmy Lopez, the Schumann Cello Concerto, and Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, all under the direction of Miguel Harth-Bedoya. He’s a Peruvian conductor who has been conducting in Forth Worth for a couple years, and does a lot of guest conducting gigs around the country.
>>Side note. There’s definitely a trend right now for young, South American conductors. Harth-Bedoya, of course Dudamel, Ben-Dor, etc. But trends aren’t necessarily bad. I have been very impressed with the young, Latin conductors I’ve seen, and I love seeing some youth up on the stage.
So the first piece, Fiesta! was really fun. Harth-Bedoya is friends with the composer, so he gave us a nice introduction and background to the piece, and it was a great composition. With a title like Fiesta! I was expecting it to be a little hokey, but it was a great opening piece.
Next up was the Schumann Cello Concerto. The School has concerto competitions all summer long, and tonight was the cello winner. Unfortunately I don’t have the program with me, so I can’t remember his name. Wait. Gabriel Cabezas. I think. But don’t quote me. Anyway, like the orchestra, he was probably in his late teens. And he rocked. He did such a great job. For all I know, he’s performed this concerto with fifty other orchestras, but his technical skill was right on, his interpretation was good, and at the end, I was so proud of the guy.
After the intermission, the orchestra performed Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony in C minor. The Fifth has almost become a cliché of orchestral music. Everyone on the planet knows the Du-Du-Du-DUN, theme that opens the work. So when you think about the piece it’s easy to just think of that theme and not be too excited. But the piece is so much more than that theme, and it’s a different experience to hear the entire movement, and then the entire symphony.
One thing I love is that the four-note theme is not just the basis for the first movement… it pops up throughout the rest of the piece to move things along, and add cohesion to the entire work. I really enjoy Harth-Bedoya’s interpretation. Some performances of the Fifth just plod along and seem to get bogged down by making the performance serious. But this performance just kept driving along and had a wonderful urgent intensity the whole time.
The performance was great. The audience was clapping and on their feet before the orchestra had even finished the final chords, and it got me thinking that Beethoven’s Fifth is one of those great rock anthems of classical music. Beethoven’s Fifth to a classical music fan is like Rock and Roll All Night to a KISS fan. When you think about the song in your head, it’s a little bit cheesy, but as soon as you hear it live, you’re on your feet and clapping and loving every minute of it.