Music & Vision – The Classical Music Magazine
By Lawrence Budmen
Thursday – November 25th, 2010
The emergence of a major new regional symphony orchestra in South Florida has long been awaited. Since the demise of the Florida Philharmonic in 2003, several local ensembles have sprung up. The artistic quality of these organizations has been highly variable. Taking pride of place has been the Boca Raton Symphonia for its innovative programming and high musical standards. This season Phillippe Entremont becomes artistic advisor and principal conductor which can only enhance that organization’s reputation. Nevertheless the Boca Raton ensemble and the other orchestras in the area are basically enlarged chamber orchestras rather than full scale symphonic organizations.
The sixty-seven member South Florida Symphony opened an ambitious season in early October and appears to be the authentic article. (This writer attended the performance on October 9, 2010 at the Lincoln Theater in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.) Initially formed in 1998 as the Key West Symphony, the orchestra has expanded its concert schedule to embrace performances in Miami Beach, Ft. Lauderdale and West Palm Beach (as well as moving its offices north to Ft. Lauderdale). Under the dynamic direction of Sebrina Maria Alfonso, the ensemble is comprised of musicians from around the globe who gather several times during the season in South Florida.
A native of Key West, Alfonso is the first Cuban American conductor to return to the island to direct concerts with orchestras there. Her conducting itinerary has taken her to Prague, Sienna, Los Angeles, the San Francisco Bay area and orchestras in Michigan, Missouri and North Carolina. A lively presence on the podium, Alfonso impressed with her vigorous gestures and strong musicality.
The acoustics of the Lincoln Theater (home of the New World Symphony, Michael Tilson Thomas’s orchestral academy) are bright to the point of harshness. It took Alfonso and the South Florida Symphony musicians most of the program’s first half to adjust to this very live sound spectrum. (In January a new Frank Gehry designed hall will open nearby and the Lincoln Theater will become history.) Brahms’ Academic Festival Overture was a sprightly opener. Alfonso’s taut approach was undeniably effective despite some rough hewn ensemble playing. The crucial horns were pitch perfect, intonation and articulation strong and effective.
The Korean born violinist Chee-Yun was the brilliant soloist in Beethoven’s Violin Concerto in D Major, Op.61. This highly gifted and glamorous violinist(who has achieved rock star status in her native Korea) spun Beethoven’s noble opus with torrents of virtuosity and silken tonal allure. Chee-Yun was always first and foremost at the service of the music. Her performance never sacrificed deeply insightful musical richness for bravura flash. Taking an expansive tempo, she brought wonderful musical detail and accuracy to the opening Allegro ma non troppo. There was none of the fudged passage work that some violinists attempt to circumvent Beethoven’s fiendish string writing. Chee-Yun played the score to perfection, the intonation spot on. She imbued the Larghetto with fluid lyricism, beautifully supported by Alfonso and the ensemble. There was both elegance and robust dance like vigor in the concluding Rondo, the phrasing immaculately crisp. Chee-Yun’s choice of cadenzas was intelligent and provocative. For the first movement, she chose Nathan Milstein’s difficult, rarely heard display. In the final movement Fritz Kreisler’s rapid fire cadenzas was tossed off at top speed with élan. After a well deserved standing ovation, Chee-Yun dazzled in Kreisler’s rarely heard Recitativo and Scherzo-Caprice, a display of turbo charged speed and pyrotechnics so brilliantly realized that it brought the cheering audience to its feet instantaneously.
The concert concluded with a spacious, often eloquent traversal of Elgar’s Variations on an Original Theme – Enigma. Here the orchestra’s strings exhibited greater heft and depth. There was fine playing from all sections and tight, precise ensemble. Alfonso offered big boned Elgar, expansive in an eloquent Nimrod and blazing in the Allegro finale. Her refined sense of contrast in mood and dynamics brought the venerable masterpiece to soaring life. Here indeed this orchestra’s potential was abundantly clear. In an important debut concert, the South Florida Symphony exhibited strong professionalism and fine musicianship. This new ensemble is highly promising.
Violinist Laura St. John plays Mozart’s Violin Concerto No.3 on a program with Beethoven’s 4th Symphony on December 1, 2010 at the Tennessee Williams Theater in Key West, December 2 at the Amaturo Theater, Broward Center in Ft. Lauderdale and December 3 at the Lincoln Theater in Miami Beach. Pianist Barry Douglas is soloist in Brahms’ Piano Concerto No.2 and Sebrina Maria Alfonso conducts Vaughan Williams’ Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis and Khachaturian’s Masquerade Suite on January 28, 2011 (Key West), January 30 at the Kravis Center in West Palm Beach and February 1 (Ft. Lauderdale. )
The SIMA Trio joins South Florida Symphony musicians for sextets by Ellen Taaffe Zwilich and Brahms, Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No.3 also performed on March 2 (Key West), March 3 (Ft. Lauderdale) and March 7 (Miami Beach). The season concludes with Adam Golka playing Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No.1. Alfonso conducts Zwilich’s Symphony No.5 and Shostakovich’s Festive Overture on April 29 (Key West), May 1 (Ft. Lauderdale) and May 2 (Miami Beach). See www.southfloridasymphony.org.
