Vail – In the shadows of Vail Mountain and the distant Gore Range, the New York Philharmonic and pianist Lang Lang pulled off something extraordinary.
The legendary orchestra concluded its third annual residency with the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival last week with sold-out back-to-back performances that highlighted Lang Lang’s bottomless talent. The fusion of fine musicmaking with the sights and sounds of a natural setting resulted in an aesthetic experience beyond the typical concert hall event.
Staged in Vail’s open-air Gerald R. Ford Amphitheater, Thursday’s program proved the Chinese virtuoso’s velvet reputation in a fresh take on a recognizable classic – Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Concerto No. 1 in B-flat minor. Oblivious to the unfortunate ambient disturbances of passing traffic, not to mention whistles and hollers from a nearby soccer field, Lang Lang’s Bravo! debut shaped the tuneful, dramatic work with its odd rhythms into a high-voltage signature piece uniquely his own.
Keeping step with the soloist was his Chinese compatriot Xian Zhang, newly appointed associate conductor of the Phil. The occasion marked their first musical collaboration.
In what was also her Bravo! debut, the 32-year-old maestra demonstrated tremendous control on the podium. Her assertive and forthright musical style left no doubt about how she beat the odds to assume a top post with one of the world’s foremost musical institutions in a historically male-dominated field.
Yet Zhang’s arguably heavy-handed approach to the sweeping, lyrical score lacked the pianist’s emotional communicativeness and surprising moments of spontaneity.
Lang Lang then indulged the sold-out crowd with Franz Liszt’s “Liebestraum,” the same encore with which he wowed a Denver audience at the Newman Center for the Performing Arts last winter. The tender melodies and soft, shimmering transitional passages were delivered with an impossibly light touch that was nevertheless clearly articulate and audible as a whisper in the ear.
The 100-plus members of the Phil shone in the evening’s opener, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Scheherazade.” The symphonic suite, while based on Arabian tales, maintains a Russian essence that Zhang and the first-rate orchestra captured in a full-voiced rendition of the ebbs and flows of the rich, narrative score. Of special mention among the superb soloists were the soaring violin passages played by the Phil’s longtime concertmaster Glenn Dicterow.
Friday’s “Festive Classics” program brought more Rimsky-Korsakov and more Tchaikovsky, as well as Chopin, Delibes and Offenbach under the masterful direction of Bramwell Tovey. The British conductor delighted another sold-out audience with his charming wit, not to mention his seamless artistry and easy command of the corps of musicians.
After an enchanting reading of the “Waltz of the Flowers” from Tchaikovsky’s “Nutcracker,” Lang Lang joined Tovey onstage for a mentally and emotionally connected delivery of Chopin’s poetic and expressive Concerto No. 1 in E minor. The two men were perfectly matched in their interpretation of the work’s variegated intonations.
Remarkably, Lang Lang seemed a prism by which the music diffused itself, as if he had little to do with the magic that floated his fingers effortlessly through knotty technical passages and exquisite melodic phrasings of the pleasing work. His energetic mannerisms and emotive facial expressions captivated listeners through another encore, this time a breathless, brilliant dash through Rimsky-Korsakov’s perpetual-motion “Flight of the Bumblebee.”
What is perhaps most exciting about the undeniably gifted and likable 22-year-old pianist is that his star has only begun to rise. His native, already sophisticated, musicianship is sure to be refined further as he continues honing his art.
The 18th season of the Bravo! festival runs through Thursday. For information, call 877-812-5700 or visit vailmusicfestival.org.
