November 11, 2006 7:30 pm
Great Hall, GBPAC, Cedar Falls
Courtenay Budd, vocalist
Bach – Orchestral Suite, BWV 1069
Barber – Knoxville: Summer 1915
Mahler – Symphony no. 4
WCFSO performance fitting for top composers
By George F. Day
Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier
November 15, 2006
Three well-known composers were featured in a recent concert by the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Symphony Orchestra: Bach, Barber and Mahler. The excellent program in the Gallagher-Bluedorn Performing Arts Center was conducted by Jason Weinberger. Courtenay Budd, soprano, appeared as guest soloist.
The program opened with about two dozen players performing Bach’s Orchestral Suite in D Major. The piece has five movements preceded by an overture. Each of the movements is a kind of dance, all sprightly and very pleasant. It is easy to think of Bach as the composer of only great religious works: cantatas, the Mass in B minor, the St. Matthew’s Passion, etc. But this genius wrote some splendid lighter music as well, as these lively, happy dances easily demonstrate. The suite provided a perfect introduction to the night’s program, and the ensemble played it with precision and vigor.
Next on the program came Samuel Barber’s musical version of James Agee’s prose essay 'Knoxville: Summer 1915,' a wonderfully nostalgic passage that opens the author’s autobiographical novella 'A Death in the Family.' In it the author vividly describes a moment in his childhood when, on a soft, warm, summer evening, he and his parents are reclining on a quilt in their backyard. Barber's musical recollection is neither sticky sweet nor tragic in tone. The words and the music evoke the timeless innocence of a child, warm and safe in a loving family.
Budd sang the words to 'Knoxville' in a lovely, lilting, conversational manner. She and the orchestra, in perfect harmony, created just the right impression, a little jewel of musical experience.
The entire second half was devoted to a performance of Gustav Mahler’s Fourth Symphony. Although it is less complex and uses fewer players than other Mahler symphonies, it is still quite complicated, even chaotic. But within the startling and incongruous sound patterns are passages of great, even romantic, beauty. The Fourth was played superbly by the orchestra – Weinberger’s direction was impeccable, and we heard especially fine performances by Budd, Beth Hoffman [violin], Jacquelyn Venter [harp] and Dan Malloy Jr. [horn].
Note: All reviews are edited for length and spelling.