by Scott Cantrell, Dallas Morning News
One of Jaap van Zweden's happiest contributions as Dallas Symphony Orchestra music director has been the ReMix concert series. In the more intimate setting of Moody Performance Hall, with usually smaller complements of musicians, and a more relaxed atmosphere, the programs have included music unlikely to be heard in the main season at the Meyerson Symphony Center.
Beginning a three-week farewell to the DSO before he takes over the New York Philharmonic, van Zweden was in charge of Thursday night's ReMix concert. The program included Alban Berg's Violin Concerto, which the DSO hadn't done since 1992, framed by easy-listening pieces by Tchaikovsky and Mozart. Four expert musicians from the orchestra were featured as soloists.
The so-called Second Viennese School of composition, which flourished in the first decades of the 20th century, has been minimally represented around here. We've had performances of Arnold Schoenberg's early Verklärte Nacht, essentially supersaturated late romanticism, and the Dallas Opera did Berg's Wozzeck in 2000. Have I missed something else?
At its extremes, the Second Viennese School abandoned conventional tonality in favor of free-range chromaticism. The cadential resolutions familiar in most concert music – those "amen"s –aren't to be expected. The music can be constructed by elaborate technical schemes, but rare's the listener who will hear them.
Read Full Review
