Despite glitches, BSO benefit recital well-played

The Olympic Games are the talk of the town, as well as the state and the nation. The media coverage is so pervasive that all things seem colored by events in Athens. Swimming, volleyball, and fencing participants win not only medals, but the hearts and minds of the American public.

After watching hours of strictly competitive activity, one is tempted to score every human activity as if it were an Olympic event. The young woman bagging groceries gets a 9.2 for speed, but loses a few points when she drops a can of corn. This review will get an 8.1 for style, but only a 6.34 for getting to the point.

The point is that sometimes there is just too much competition, too much winning and losing. And that’s when going to hear live music can heal your soul.

Now, although there certainly are official music competitions, and while there is quite a bit of competitiveness among musicians, the interactive event that we call a concert or a recital is actually more like a connection between performer and audience, more like a dance, more like being in love.

Saturday evening’s recital by violinist Xiao-Lu Li, pianist Phillip Silver, and cellist Noreen Silver at the G. Peirce Webber Campus Center at Husson College was like that. As a benefit for the Bangor Symphony Orchestra, this concert, featuring the orchestra’s director Xiao-Lu Li as a violinist rather than as a conductor, felt like an unofficial opening of the 2004 BSO season.

Seating themselves under the cathedral ceiling and surrounded by nearly 180 degrees of Maine vista, as seen through the room’s large windows, the audience welcomed Bangor Symphony Orchestra Executive Director Susan Jonason, who in turn introduced violinist Li and pianist Silver.

Without further ado, Li and Silver began the first piece on the program, Beethoven’s Sonata No. 5 for piano and violiniol in in F major, op. 24. Written between 1800 and 1801 in four movements, this piece is appropriately known as the “Spring” sonata, for its sprightly, fresh character.

As Li moved through the lovely opening melody, two things became evident. It was a case of a bad violin bow in a good room. The unexpectedly clear acoustics of the campus center space allowed every nuance of the music to be perceived, including the mushy bowing of Maestro Li. While Li’s left-hand fingering technique was generally excellent throughout, each attack, that moment when horsehair bow meets gut string, was problematic. Fairly clean sounding in the slower parts of the second movement, Li’s bowing became positively squeaky in the quick notes of the Scherzo. Despite the extraneous noise, however, one could understand Maestro Li’s gift for conducting an entire orchestra, as his sense of rhythm and dynamic range surged through the sonata. Both Li and Silver played with great musical sense, phrasing the music naturally, with intelligence, delicacy and playful flair.

Before beginning the next piece, Li addressed the audience, thanking Husson College President Dr. William Beardsley and Husson College Public Affairs Director Julie Green for helping make the concert possible. Li, with a good deal of humor, then went on to explain some of the technical difficulties that were plaguing his performance. Reminding the audience of the torrential rains that were just ending, Li held up his bow and demonstrated that it was impossible to tighten it further, as the humidity had caused the horsehair to swell. Hence the loose and mushy sound of Li’s bowing.

The second and last piece of the evening was the Trio for Piano, Violin and Cello, No. 1 in B major, op. 8, by Johannes Brahms. This piece was the first music of Brahms to be heard in the United States. In fact it was given its premiere in New York on Nov. 17, 1855. However, at the end of his career, nearly 35 years later, Brahms rewrote nearly all of the B-major trio, leaving only the scherzo remaining untouched.

As Silver and his wife, cellist Noreen Silver, joined Li, the windows behind the piano became illuminated by one of the most beautiful sunsets possible to imagine as streaks of storm clouds reflected brilliantly in violet, orange and gold. As Phillip Silver later said, “It was a perfect Brahms sky.”

The Brahms Piano Trio is a love song, written in youth and rewritten with wisdom. It should be played with passionate intensity, as well as poignant regret. These three musicians did just that, allowing the voices of their instruments to meld in thick harmonies yet voice eloquent solo passages that intertwined and resonated against each other. Particularly lovely were the unison melodies of violin and cello during the grandly autumnal slow movement. Also wonderful was the dark, slightly distorted, giddy waltz. It was evident that this ensemble enjoyed playing this piece, and the audience responded to their enthusiasm in kind.

After a standing ovation, the musicians returned to the stage to briefly revisit the Brahms waltz, and then the concert was over. The light was gone from the sky, and the clouds were moving out to sea. The audience smiled, chatted and left, and not once had there been much thought of competition or of sports.

Admittedly, the performance was less than technically perfect. Yet the team hung tough, pulled together and played with real passion, winning the day with a pair of silvers and an overall gold.

Helen York is a writer and artist living in Ellsworth. She can be reached at heyork@hotmail.com.