It speaks well for Denver’s progressing classical-music scene that audiences could choose Friday evening between competing orchestral concerts.
The Pro Musica Colorado Chamber Orchestra deserves kudos for taking on an appealingly adventurous and ambitious program of modern and contemporary Latin-American music, with the regional premiere of Osvaldo Golijov’s “Oceana” as its centerpiece.
In the end, though, the concert at Beth any Lutheran Church was arguably too ambitious for this nascent Lafayette ensemble. While the group, teamed with the Boulder- based Ars Nova Singers, did provide a sense of “Oceana,” it was unable to convey the amazing work’s full power and complexity.
The 26-minute hybrid cantata, composed in 1996 and revised in 2004, uses a poem by Pablo Neruda. Like all the works by the Argentinian-born Jewish composer, it transcends the bounds of classical music, and draws on other traditions, including samba and jazz.
The seven-section work, which alternates between the siren call of a lone vocal soloist and kinetic choral sections, evokes on one level the many moods of the ocean but also plunges more deeply, alluding to universal themes of past and future, hope and loss.
As hinted earlier in the concert with an unremarkable version of Mozart’s Divertimento, K. 136, music director Cynthia Katsarelis is a sound conductor, but she offers little in the way of interpretative flair.
While it is imperative to accurately execute the tricky rhythms and other intricacies of Golijov’s score, it is also essential to capture the music’s essential spirit and dynamism, letting it unfold and breathe in a natural, organic way.
Ars Nova performed with their usual precision but did not fully convey the urgency and force required in the choral sections. Mezzo-soprano Maya Hoover is a fine singer, but she did not go beyond the notes on the page to make the music distinctively her own.
Not helping matters was the sub-par amplification, which made it hard to hear the African and Latin drummers and did not help Hoover’s singing.
The concert will be repeated at 3 p.m. today in Lincoln Center, 417 W. Magnolia St., in Fort Collins.
Kyle MacMillan: 303-954-1675 or kmacmillan@denverpost.com
