Weekend arts: NY Philharmonic
January 21st, 2010 at 12:49 am ETThis weekend was a double portion of arts-’n-culture for me — Saturday night at the New York Philharmonic, and Ruddigore Sunday matinee with the New York Gilbert & Sullivan Players. First, the Philharmonic — believe it or not, the first time I’d ever seen the NY Phil and the first time I’d ever set foot in Avery Fisher Hall. (I was on the Lincoln Center campus once before for a business meeting, a year or two back when all the construction was going on.)
Avery Fisher Hall — what an incredible building, and visually interesting, especially from the inside. The way the concert hall is suspended inside a shell that reads as “transparent” to the occupants at night — open to the whole city outside, from high high up — that’s the kind of grand experience that is the right setting for a trip to the Philharmonic. I was in the nosebleed section, on the third tier, but it didn’t matter — the building itself is momentous.
The concert itself was well composed — Haydn’s Symphony No. 49, John Adams’ setting of “The Wound-Dresser,” Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony, and Alban Berg’s Three Orchestral Pieces.
The other works were interesting in their way, but the Berg (dedicated to his mentor Arnold Schoenberg) was spectacular — reassuring and haunting at once, thunderous and grand but with little flourishes like the triangle (who writes for the triangle nowadays?). This was my first real adult encounter with twelve-tone music, which I’m now going to research and learn about and experience a lot more of.
It imparted the feeling of the moment in which it was made — composed 1913-1915, as an old world was falling away but the world that would replace it wasn’t yet quite conceived; premiered in two parts, in 1923 in Berlin (in that uncertain time just after the war) and in 1930 in Oldenburg (as the very earliest stirrings of the disorder that was to follow in Europe were beginning to be felt). The Phil has more Berg on the program in March, and I’ll definitely be there. (Speaking of which, thanks for the superb program notes, James M. Keller!)
Side note, intended seriously: at a couple of points in the Berg I felt this difficult-to-explain desire to go home and listen to Peter and the Wolf. I have no recording of that handy, but when I dig one up I’ll listen to the two works together and see if I can figure out what the hell my mind was talking about.
Bonus Lincoln Center photos coming tomorrow…
Image credit: Avery Fisher Hall; Triangle in public domain; both via Wikipedia
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Rich Mintz blogs on online fundraising and social media, American history and culture, bicycling and urbanism, food, technology, and other topics. Professionally, he's an expert in fundraising, constituency development, and social media for nonprofits, cultural organizations, cause-related marketers, and corporations. He is based in New York, where he serves as Vice President, Strategy, for 
