THE HANGOVER REPORT – Marin Alsop leads the NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC in a beautifully balanced program including Barber, Corea, and Prokofiev

Marin Alsop conducts the New York Philharmonic at the David Geffen Hal in playing Chick Corea’s Trombone Concerto featuring soloist Joseph Alessi (photo by Chris Lee).

This weekend at David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center, I attended a performance by the New York Philharmonic. The concert was led by the great Marin Alsop, who conducted a beautifully balanced program that included a rarely performed work by a young Samuel Barber, the U.S. premiere of a Chick Corea trombone concerto, and a beloved ballet score by Sergei Prokofiev.

The performance commenced with Barber’s seldom played Symphony No. 1 (in One Movement). In a compact yet expansive twenty or so minutes, Barber (who was only 25 years old when he composed the piece) packs in four movements worth of goods into a single movement, running the gamut from gentle playing by the philharmonic’s string section to bursts of excitement from the brass players. Throughout, Alsop brought out the symphony’s ample color and detail with precise leadership from the podium.

Then came the U.S. premiere of Concerto for Trombone by jazz composer Chuck Corea (who passed away in 2021). Led by expert trombonist Joseph Alessi, the work comfortably and confidently exists between the worlds of jazz and classical music, creating a vibrant musical vocabulary distinctly its own. The piece has been deftly orchestrated by longtime Corea collaborator John Dickson, who was also featured on piano. For an encore, Dickson and Alessi played a moving duet in commemoration of Corea.

The concert concluded with an incisive rendition of selections from Prokofiev’s animated Romeo and Juliet ballet score (namely, Suite Numbers 1, 2, and 3). In Alsop’s muscular and astute reading, the drama of Shakespeare’s ubiquitous tragedy sprang to life with vigor. Indeed, under Alsop’s baton, the New York Philharmonic played with intent and focus, their sound in turn driving and expansive in its poetry.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC
Classical Music
David Geffen Hall
Approximately 2 hours (with one intermission)
Closed

Categories: Music, Other Music

Leave a Reply