STEAMBOAT SPRINGS — The Strings Music Festival took a big leap forward this season with a $4.3 million concert hall, which opened June 28 and has been used for all its summer events since.
No, it’s not Carnegie Hall or anything close to it. But the 543-seat Strings Music Pavilion provides exactly what this small, enterprising festival needs: a handsome, wood-lined facility with first-rate acoustics and a tasteful mountain feel.
The hall got its biggest test to date Saturday evening with the finale of the classical portion of the festival’s multifaceted season. The event featured a 47-member orchestra — the largest Strings has ever presented — packed onto the pavilion’s compact stage.
The ensemble ably showcased the hall’s acoustics, which are warm and resonant but not too bright. The sound is consistent from the high frequencies to the low, making it possible to hear the bassoons and double basses just as clearly as the violins.
The all-Beethoven program opened, appropriately enough, with the composer’s infrequently heard overture, “Consecration of the House,” written for the 1822 dedication of a theater in Vienna.
Next came the evening’s centerpiece, the famed Piano Concerto No. 5 in E flat major, Op. 73, “Emperor,” with guest soloist Yaron Kohlberg. Born in Israel in 1983, he has won several prizes,including the silver medal at the 2007 Cleveland International Piano Competition.
Kohlberg showed himself to be a poised, self-confident artist with abundant technical facility, but there was little that distinguished his playing from that of dozens of other top pianists of a similar age who populate today’s talent-rich classical world.
The orchestra, composed of musicians from across the country, was effective enough. But the assortment of skill levels was obvious, and it was hard not to wish some of the players were stronger.
Though better known as a violinist, Andres Cardenes proved to be a fine conductor. He drew a surprising level of cohesion from the free-lance orchestra and demonstrated a strong feel for Beethoven, bringing suitable spiritedness and upbeat tempos to the program’s three works.
The evening ended with the Concerto for Violin, Cello and Piano in C major, Op. 56, “Triple Concerto,” with Cardenes, cellist Anne Martindale Williams and pianist David Deveau as soloists.
Kyle MacMillan: 303-954-1675 or kmacmillan@denverpost.com
