The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra kicked off its 2024-2025 season — its third season with conductor Nathalie Stutzmann — on Thursday, September 19, with an evening of works by Robert Schumann and Gustav Mahler. It was an enjoyable evening despite its general lack of momentum.
The concert maintained the Atlanta Symphony’s tradition of opening the season with a performance of the national anthem. Under former director Robert Spano, this always conveyed a sense of intimidating grandeur. On Thursday, the piece felt more like a patriotic rendition of “Silent Night” than a majestic tribute to the nation’s founding.
Normally, a routine performance of the national anthem wouldn’t be important, but it set the stage for the restrained first half that followed. The program opened with Schumann’s Concerto in A minor for Cello and Orchestra, a work full of wistful charm but still one that lacks the sort of season-opening assurance that the ASO is back on its horse and riding fast.
None of this is to say that the musicians underperformed the piece itself. Far from it — the work was as warm and sonorous as ever and guest cellist Edgar Moreau emerged as the evening’s standout.
The Parisian-born cellist — whose credits include performances with the London Symphony Orchestra and the Royal Philharmonic — was commendable for his sense of restraint, which here was fitting.
Whereas many soloists treat it as their duty to unload a series of fiery embellishments, Moreau was gentle and conservative. Despite commanding the spotlight, his first attention was to the delicate nature of the piece at hand. In a work which treats the soloist as a calm oasis amidst the more involved explorations of the larger ensemble, that commitment to tasteful interpretation paid off.
Moreau’s sense of restraint manifested in a delightful and unexpected manner: The cellist chose to forgo the common classical concert practice of the guest soloist giving an unannounced encore at the end of the first half.
The evening’s second half was filled entirely by Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 in D Major (the work is often referred to as “Titan,” but Mahler himself only applied this name to early, incomplete presentations of the work, not the symphony as a whole.) It is one of Mahler’s most beloved pieces, but, in the context of the evening, it was another gentle stroll through tepid waters — well played and enjoyable but ultimately lacking the enthusiasm that should usher in a new season.
The piece opens with “Nicht zu schnell,” a hesitant, ambient affair that bears all the hallmarks of modernism in the word’s most pejorative context, even though Mahler himself preceded the advent of classical’s “modern” era by at least 50 years. Much modern classical composition feels as though it hovers awkwardly in a realm of sustained chords without ever committing to real melodic development.
This protracted introduction works fine within the larger context of the piece — the later movements are defined by eruptions of Tchaikovsky-esque bombast, and it’s clear that Mahler was stacking his deck in favor of the symphony’s second half with the opening’s slow build. But that makes for exhausting listening in light of an evening already barely moving.
Once the orchestra got to the second half of the Mahler, they burst forth like the grand, majestic and ravenous beast they have become under Stutzmann’s fiery command. They played with booming intensity like their lives depended on it. This was the furious passion that should have defined an opening night — not only concluded it.
Programs devoted to mellower material have their place in every orchestra’s season, but it’s in the cozy wintry months, not opening night. The ASO’s season promises to pick up soon with its epic performance cycle of eight of Beethoven’s symphonies (the ninth and final symphony will open next year’s season.) Until then, Mahler remains a prime focus with the upcoming September 26 and September 27 performances featuring selections from Des Knaben Wunderhorn as well as Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 6 in B minor.
Under Stutzmann, the Atlanta Symphony has developed a stunning capacity for thundering gravitas that is as emotionally arresting as it is acoustically balanced and technically precise. To not deliver a program with that aspect of the ensemble’s sound for the opening concert is a crime, no matter how solid the evening’s performance.
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Jordan Owen began writing about music professionally at the age of 16 in Oxford, Mississippi. A 2006 graduate of the Berklee College of Music, he is a professional guitarist, bandleader and composer. He is currently the lead guitarist for the jazz group Other Strangers, the power metal band Axis of Empires and the melodic death/thrash metal band Century Spawn.
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