PPO I: Orchestral Fireworks

Conductor Olivier Ochanine

Featuring:

Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra

Olivier Ochanine, conductor

Programme:

Dmitri Shostakovich Suite for Variety Orchestra

Carl Nielsen Aladdin Suite FS 89

Sergei Rachmaninoff Symphonic Dances, Op. 45

With the Cultural Center of the Philippines’ Tanghalang Nicanor Abelardo (CCP Main Theater) still being used as a certain Phantom’s lair, the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra had to contend with having their opening concert for their 30^th Season at the Philam Life Auditorium. While most patrons and supporters of the orchestra find this change of venue a bit of an inconvenience, serious orchestra music lovers welcomed this change because of this venue’s superior acoustics. To match the hall’s excellent acoustics, principal conductor and music director Olivier Ochanine chose three pieces that fit the concert’s title Orchestral Fireworks which also marked the first time for him to conduct the PPO in this venue.

The programme started with a piece that I find very cute and amusing, Dmitri Shostakovich’s Suite for Variety Orchestra. This piece, which is one of the lighter works of Shostakovich, is a huge contrast to Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring that closed out last season’s concert. The suite consisted of short movements like the opening march, three waltzes, two dances, a polka and the finale which could be played in any number or any order during a concert. But I was stunned when I realized that my favorite movement, Dance 1, was skipped entirely. This made so rattled that I wasn’t able to pay full attention when the orchestra played Carl Nielsen’s Aladdin Suite FS 89. This was rather unfortunate since I like this Nielsen piece a lot better than the Inextinguishable which the orchestra played last January and that I struggled with listening to it. The Aladdin Suite is a bit like the Nutcracker by Tchaikovsky where there are a set of exotic dances: Hindu, Chinese. How authentic these dances’ music from their place of origin I couldn’t tell. The Marketplace at Ispahan movement is a complicated tapestry of textures with sections playing independently of each other yet forming an image of bustling activity. The excellent acoustics of the venue enabled this section to come across as crisp and not a murky puddle of sound. The Festival March, a sensual procession that opened the suite remains my favorite section of the whole piece.

During the intermission, I learned something that eased my mind considerably and that regained my composure when the concert resumed for the last piece which was Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Symphonic Dances, Op 45. I admit that I am not really familiar with most of Rachmaninoff’s pieces for the orchestra so it wasn’t easy for me to get the snippets of his other works that he included in this one. But I did get the Dies irae he snuck in the latter movements of the piece. But what I learned during the intermission made me want to fast forward this piece so that they could end the concert proper and move on to the encore. While majority of the audience didn’t know what they had in store, I figured out that they would play for their encore, the omitted Dance 1 from Shostakovich's Suite for Variety Orchestra. This movement was what I came to the concert for and if they completely skipped that part, Olivier would know how disappointed I would be. The happiest movement in the suite, Dance 1 combined the sheer joy and youthful vigor of his Festive Overture, Op. 96 and his Piano Concerto No.2 in F major, Op. 102.

Since Olivier and the PPO played the best for last, I came out of the concert a happy camper and ready for the rest of the season. The next concert will be back in their normal performance space at the CCP Main Theater and will feature pieces that I suggested for this season.