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| Robert Rÿker and the Manila Symphony Orchestra |
Featuring:
Manila Symphony Orchestra
Robert
Rÿker, conductor
Programme:
Claude Debussy Prelude to an Afternoon of a Faun
Claude Debussy Prelude to an Afternoon of a Faun
Igor
Stravinsky Petrouchka
Richard
Strauss Till Eulenspiegel's Merry
Pranks, Op. 28
Alfred
Reed El Camino Real
Guest
conductor Robert Rÿker already got his audience at the palm of his hands even
before the Manila Symphony Orchestra played a single note from their prepared
programme on the second of their two night concert with him. Rÿker won the
audience over thanks to his charm and ability to sell the pieces through his
brief introduction before playing them. It was unconventional as conductors rarely speak at classical music performances but it worked wonders for me.
Fast
becoming a frequent visitor to the country, Rÿker, the music director of the Tokyo Sinfonia, chose four pieces by
composers of different nationalities: Claude Debussy who is French, Igor
Stravinsky who is Russian, Richard Strauss who is German and lastly, Alfred
Reed who is an American. Each of these composers’ works, told a different story
and their music took the audience to different worlds while they remained
seated at the Philam Life Auditorium.
Before
he started with Claude Debussy’s Prelude to an Afternoon of a Faun, Rÿker
explained the concept of French music language by noting the floating quality
of the spoken French. And he mentioned that it is this quality that Debussy
tried to recreate with his music especially this Prelude with the popular flute
passages. I never thought of this before so I am glad that Rÿker pointed it
out. Igor Stravinsky’s Petrouchka on the other hand, is very different
from the Debussy. It had more intense emotions portrayed in the music like
anger. And it also had a very movement in The Shrovetide Fair that had so
many layers and elements that pushed the orchestra to their limits. Honestly, the only thing missing in this performance was the actual ballet.
Richard
Strauss’ Till Eulenspiegel’s Merry Pranks probably was the most conventional
piece in the entire concert. And again, Rÿker provided some back story
regarding this piece and it was at this moment that he might have taken over
the persona of a prankster since he was really in a good mood that night. But
the piece that I looked forward to most that evening was Alfred Reed’s El
Camino Real or the Royal Road. For the second time now, Rÿker has
introduced his orchestration of a Reed piece that was originally intended for a concert
band. And this one was a definite crowd pleaser with its Spanish rhythms. Like
what I’ve said, this was my second time to hear a piece by Reed, the
first being Hamlet, A Symphonic Suite
after Shakespeare which he also orchestrated from a concert band
arrangement. And it’s already pretty obvious that Rÿker has a certain affinity
for Reed’s works when he told the story of how he met the composer himself
before and proposed making orchestral arrangements of his works.
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| Conductor Robert Rÿker |
For
an encore, Rÿker performed another piece by Reed which was the very
entertaining Danza Caribe. He
introduced the piece by saying that if one felt like dancing, he or she could
just stand up and do just that. No one really danced but the members of the audience
as well as the orchestra were all smiles throughout this Caribbean
inspired piece. I won’t be surprised if I read an announcement of Robert Rÿker
flying here again to be the guest conductor of an orchestra. I guess that when
that time comes, it would just be a matter of which Reed composition he would introduce
to the Philippine audience.
