OSM tour program sounds ready for the road

OSM tours are not what they used to be. This axiom applies not only to frequency but to content. On Saturday evening, Kent Nagano led a ready-for-export program that looked more like something the Vienna Philharmonic would play for a hometown crowd than a calling card for an orchestra once famed for French repertoire.

The big item was Brahms’s Fourth Symphony. Playing from all sections was strong.

Nagano, prancing around the podium with arms constantly in motion, sought and acquired an intense performance.

This is not to say that it had a personal stamp: Nagano is a conductor more inclined to present emphatically what already is in a great score than to add something new. But voltage was high toward the end of the first movement and the momentum in the finale picked up impressively after the flute solo (thank you, Tim Hutchins).

Violins (and there were plenty of them) acquired warmth and depth in the Andante. Their tone in the

Nagano … sought and acquired an intense performance.

first movement was bright for Brahms. Woodwinds and brass distinguished themselves throughout.

There could be no complaints about colour in Liszt’s Piano Concerto No. 2. Woodwind chorales at the beginning were exquisite. Serhiy Salov, a Montrealer of Ukrainian birth, brought bold and velvety sounds out of the Steinway and played with the poetic exuberance of a born Lisztian.

Technique? You could not ask for more sparkle in the right hand or thunder in the left. Dialogue with the orchestra was a meeting of equals. Brian Manker furnished a ravishing cello solo.

Add Salov’s long hair and you might expect a big ovation. Sure, a few people stood, but there action was curiously reserved by OSM standards. I predict a better response next week in São Paulo.

This concert in the Maison symphonique started with Wagner’s Tannhauser Overture in the Paris version. I took my Wagner at Pollack Hall, where Annamaria Popescu sang the Wesendonck Lieder with the McGill Symphony under Alexis Hauser.

This Montreal-born mezzosoprano should try more Ger- man repertoire. Her sound in this arch-romantic cycle was rich, dark and urgent. She seemed to have a knack for making music out of words like Allvergessen and Eingedenken.

Looking every ounce the diva, Popescu found the right pose of wide-eyed wonder at the end of Traume. The student woodwinds were spiky: the blend was best in the string-driven Im Treibhaus. Hauser applied a faultless sense of Wagnerian flow.