Leon Fleisher isn’t one to fall victim to adverse circumstances.
When he suffered a disabling malady in his right hand about 46 years ago, the venerable pianist wasn’t about to end his career.
Rather, he focused on repertory for the left hand only, shaping a new path as a soloist, conductor and educator. And at Boettcher Concert Hall on Friday, Fleisher — now 82 — proved that he still has the chops to turn in a rousing performance.
With maestro Douglas Boyd conducting, Fleisher and the Colorado Symphony Orchestra delivered a well-paced and resonant reading of Maurice Ravel’s Piano Concerto for the Left Hand in D Major.
The approximately 20-minute piece is performed sans pause, yet Fleisher gave full expression to the work’s distinct sections of varying keys and sometimes overlaying tempi.
Upon the lush opening arpeggios from the double basses and a low-pitched preamble by Michael Sundell on contrabassoon, Boyd directed the rest of the orchestra in a deft presentation of the concerto’s thematic material, on which Fleisher then elaborated.
The virtuoso was especially skillful in his construal of fluid, jazz-influenced harmonies and mildly agitated rhythms.
For Fleisher and the CSO, the audience response was decidedly warm.
Also on the all-French program was the CSO’s wonderfully docile, dreamy conception of Claude Debussy’s “Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun” and Hector Berlioz’s five- movement “Symphonie Fantastique.”
The Romantic-era symphony is a vivid and familiar representation of so-called program music that relies on the composer’s ability to convey a story: in this case, the life of an artist who submits to a tumult of passions that ultimately bring on his diabolical demise.
With visceral conviction, Boyd led the orchestra in a boisterous, yet elegant reading of the work’s asymmetrical melodies, including a particularly coarse, transfixing interpretation of the grotesque “Dream of a Witches’ Sabbath” finale.
Also of note was the smoothly inflected duet between principal flutist Brook Ellen Schoenwald and principal oboist Peter Cooper, along with fine playing by principal clarinetist Bil Jackson.
The concert repeats today at 2:30 p.m.
