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Every appearance feels like a portent.
And thats where the wondrousness ended.
Lang Lang can make even short pieces seem long-long.
Hes a paradoxical player whose quick fingers and doggedly dramatic interpretations produce dull performances lacquered in glamour.
Its the in-between gradations he skims over, which is too bad because thats where the music is.
Alberto GinasterasFour Dances from Estanciahave beena Dudamel calling card since his earliest days with the Venezuelan Youth Symphony.
(The same orchestra of teens performed it over the summer as part of Carnegies World Orchestra Week.)
The language is earthy, the setting rural, and Castillos delivery pleasantly hyperbolic.
Then, as now, a global connection of nationalists taught each other how to be chauvinistic.
Thats not the ensemble that showed up at Carnegie Hall.
Things improved on the second night of a three-concert stint.
A week later it brought the same program to New York, now road-tested and tightened.
I suspect the players were grateful for another crack at this glittering, complex, and ornate score.
I would appreciate one myself.
The Mayan title translates tocenote, a reference to the bewitching, watery caverns sprinkled throughout Yucatan.
Somehow, it all comes together into a dizzying panoply.
Theahacame after intermission, when Dudamel conducted Mendelssohns incidental music forA Midsummer Nights Dream.Thats what I was thinking of!
