Herbert Blomstedt, the former Music Director to San Francisco Symphony, where I first encountered him, is still a force to be reckoned with, even at 95 years of age.
Never an incredibly demonstrative conductor, he still has the unique capability to convey a complex set of orchestral cues that elicit richly layered performances. A recent all-Dvorak subscription program featuring the young Romanian cellist Andrei Ionita with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra was such an experience.
Ever since he broke a leg last summer, Blomstedt has had to be escorted on stage. He conducts while seated on a piano bench. Although his approach to the podium is somewhat tentative, once he adjusts his bench, he has all the control and balance of a skilled equestrian.
Ionita is without question one of the most brilliant cellists on the current world concert stage. Wielding his mighty cello, created In Brescia, Italy by the famed craftsman Giovanni Battista Rogeri in 1671, it is on loan to the prodigious artist from the German Foundation for Musical Life, where he is a scholarship holder. Their investment in him is well utilized.
His performance of Dvorak’s evocative Cello Concerto in B minor captured the bold, adventurous spirit of 1892 America. At that time, Dvorak was the most famous musician in the world. As head of wealthy patron-of-the-arts Jeannette Thurber’s National Conservatory of Music of America, Dvorak composed some of his best work, including the Cello Concerto and the Symphony of the New World, one of the landmark works of the symphonic nomenclature.
Blomstedt forged the orchestra into a cohesive unit with occasional sweeping angular arm movements and intricate twirling patterns executed from his right hand. Precisely aimed pointed fingers signaled the dramatic entry of the trumpets and French horns. A flutter of fingertips brought in a subtle emergence of flutes and woodwinds. Gently plucked violas and double bass loomed in the background to stunning effect.
A sudden wingspan of expressive arms urged the orchestra to an urgent crescendo. The dance-like mood of the Adagio ma non troppo created a turgid melodic platform for Ionita’s electrifying virtuoso performance.
Blomstedt’s approach to Dvorak’s majestic Symphony No. 8 in G Major was far and away one of the triumphs of this subscription season. His was a performance that, while understated, showed Blomstedt’s ability to weave an intricate tapestry of sound with a simple wave of the hand. It was a transcendent experience.
The Dvorak revealed all the intricate Swiss watch-like inter-workings of dominant and sub-dominant themes, which Blomstedt conveyed to the orchestra with a subtle flick of the wrist.
Blomstedt has the ability to build the orchestra to crescendo in ways that elicit chills emerging involuntarily from somewhere deep within.
I missed an opportunity to see Blomstedt conduct Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring with the New York Philharmonic through no fault of my own. Still, I regret missing the opportunity. However, his conducting of the Dvorak in Chicago, presented a rare opportunity to see him in full frontal view from the second-row center of the Gray Terrace. It was a thrill to be able to visually savor every nuanced gesture of his meticulously measured performance.
Maestro Blomstedt is not letting any grass grow under his feet. He will conduct the Chamber Orchestra of Europe in Koln, Germany on May 24, and the Unser Ehrendirigent in Bamberg in June. If you’re planning a European trip this summer, I’d advise a side trip to either of those picturesque locales to see one of the towering orchestral figures of our time.
Upcoming CSO concerts include Coleridge-Taylor, Copland, and Dvorak 9 with Thomas Wilkins at the podium thru March 26 and an Evening with multi-Oscar winning film composer John Williams on Friday, March 24. Visit cso.org for more information.
Dwight Casimere is the food and entertainment reporter.