Review: Conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen burrows into Bartók with the CSO

Chicago Tribune

07-02-2025

It's been too long since we've seen Esa-Pekka Salonen on the podium.
The conductor-composer, a youthful 66, had to bail on his annual Chicago Symphony booking last season to receive the Polar Music Prize, one of Scandinavia's highest cultural honors. Based on the pointed cheers during his Jan. 30 and Feb. 6 concerts — Salonen routinely stays for a minimum of two concert cycles — he was much missed. One especially craves Salonen's out-of-the-box programming in these long CSO seasons between music directors, which, thus far, have felt creatively rudderless.
To wit, Salonen brought two nights of assiduously played cornerstones by Béla Bartók: the Concerto for Orchestra and an immersive concert version of the one-act opera 'Bluebeard's Castle.' He also programmed a piece of his own, 2022's 'Sinfonia concertante for organ and orchestra'; Latvian organist Iveta Apkalna, one of the dedicatees, soloed. In a reversal of the usual fortunes at 220 S. Michigan, the two slam-dunk repertory pieces invited along for the ride — Richard Strauss's 'Don Juan' and Beethoven's Symphony No. 2 — came off workmanlike in comparison.
Salonen's Sinfonia concertante, programmed for the Jan. 30 concert cycle, turns the organ's austere timbres futuristic, like an alien anthem. In written comments, Salonen says he intended for the piece to live up to its 'sinfonia concertante' title — in other words, the organ is on equal footing with the orchestra, not above and apart from it.
That much is clear. The Sinfonia's best moments nail the handoff between organ and orchestra — Apkalna inheriting a line from the piccolo at the beginning, or locking in with the low brass on the pedalboard, the organ's foot-operated keyboard. At the very end, the organ hangs over the orchestra's final B-flat chord with a quiet D-flat-minorish chord, a sonority plucked from another world.
Salonen's orchestra writing, however, isn't his best — it's often blocky and meandering. On Thursday, it wasn't played with much phrasing or zhuzh from the strings, either.
The best part of his 'Sinfonia concertante for organ and orchestra' is, in fact, the organ. Salonen had apparently never composed for the instrument prior to the commission, and his exuberant writing brings us right into the sandbox with him.
With any luck, we'll hear more from Apkalna, too. She ended with a pealing, cascading toccata on the chorale 'Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr,' composed by fellow countryman Aivars Kalējs. The curtain-closer let Apkalna settle into her lyrical side rather than the stacked dissonance of the Sinfonia's cadenzas, her wrists elegantly rolling and flowing between manuals.
Hearing Salonen conduct his own work is always a pleasure, but Bartók was unequivocally the man of the hour for both concerts. On Jan. 30, a resplendent Concerto for Orchestra carried all the DNA of the CSO's long relationship with the piece — the 1955 Reiner recording helped usher it into the repertoire — and embraced a dramatic pacing that eluded the Strauss.
One can't heap praise on this performance without shouting out specific members of the orchestra — it's right there in the 'concerto' title. Stefán Ragnar Höskuldsson's flute solos were always passionately phrased, as was oboist William Welter's aubade-like solo in the first movement. Even sections that have seen some fitful performance in recent months sounded sterling, trombones led commandingly by Michael Mulcahy and horn solis sounding well-blended and clarion.
Salonen's 'Bluebeard' on Feb. 6 managed to raise the bar still higher. Tasteful lighting design by Keith Parham plopped us right into the heart of Bartók's disturbing tale: Judith marries the reclusive duke Bluebeard, only to find out his castle — and he, by extension — is cursed. Against Bluebeard's pleas, she finds successive horrors and splendors behind seven doors. At the opera's climax, the last door opens to reveal all of Bluebeard's previous wives. 'Jane Eyre's' Mr. Rochester looks like a Teletubby in comparison.
What doesn't work nearly so well in a concert version: having Bartók's thick orchestration surge directly behind the singers, rather than being curbed by a pit. Balances tended to be on the very edge of legibility. It didn't help that 'Bluebird's' singers had very different projection to begin with.
Christian Van Horn was more easily heard over the din. He was a natural Bluebeard, his powerful, sepulchral bass-baritone softened by a seductive warmth. One easily understood why Judith fell in love with such a morbid figure to begin with. As his opposite, mezzo-soprano Ekaterina Gubanova had a narrower, milder vocal palette but convincingly evoked Judith's mounting horror, gasping through jagged consonant clusters. Breezy Leigh — also the narrator in Salonen's recent 'Bluebeard' at the San Francisco Symphony — intoned the poetic, introductory text with the right amount of gravitas, the hall darkened save for a single spotlight illuminating her at stage right.
'Bluebeard's' libretto is crammed with references to specific color: blood-red, blue-green, ghostly white. Parham illuminated the terrace level behind the stage with colored light throughout, sometimes lifting hues directly from the text. Other times, he set out to create his own based on the scene's feel. (That said, with the audience facing rows of closed doors on the terrace and stage level, it felt like a lost opportunity to incorporate at least some of those into the staging, however on-the-nose it might have been.)
In the libretto, the opening of the fifth door casts 'bright light' into Bluebeard's darkened castle, accompanied by organ and auxiliary brass in the gallery. At that glorious, triple-forte moment, as Salonen turned to conduct the brass up above, Orchestra Hall itself flooded with light, brightening the faces of an astonished, awe-struck audience.
Moments like these are what music is made of — treating the audience as part of, not mere witness to, the spectacle. Salonen understands that. Too few do.
Also worth noting:
Attend CSO concerts this week or last, and you'll notice two substitute first trumpets: Cincinnati Symphony principal Anthony Limoncelli and Pittsburgh Symphony assistant principal Conrad Jones, in that order. CSO principal trumpet Esteban Batallán remains on leave to play in the Philadelphia Orchestra, with a looming end-of-month deadline to decide whether he will return to his seat or remain in Philly.
On Friday, the CSO also announced that concertmaster Robert Chen will withdraw from concerts Feb. 20–22 as he continues to recover from rotator cuff tendinitis. Solo violinist Stella Chen — a California-born Queen Elizabeth Competition winner — takes over.
While we're talking principal players, a note of appreciation to oboist William Welter, a CSO member since 2018. His solo in Jan. 30's 'Don Juan' was one for the ages: almost imperceptibly quiet at first, and never losing its delicacy and humanity as it crested. It was pure musical magic, no visuals necessary.
Hannah Edgar is a freelance critic.
The Rubin Institute for Music Criticism helps fund our classical music coverage. The Chicago Tribune maintains editorial control over assignments and content.
Originally Published: February 7, 2025 at 2:23 PM CST