United States Various: Johannes Moser (cello), San Francisco Symphony / Dalia Stasevska (conductor). Davies Symphony Hall, San Francisco, 16.5.2025. (HS)
Vaughan Williams – Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis
Anna Thorvaldsdottir – Before we fall (SFS commission)
Sibelius – Symphony No.5 in E-flat major
As the house lights dimmed before the San Francisco Symphony presented the world premiere of a new cello concerto, we heard the recorded voice of Icelandic composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir. Her tiny, breathy voice described Before we fall as a musical example of ‘teetering on the edge’, the feeling of ‘balancing on the verge of a multitude of opposites’.
There was absolutely nothing soft about the music, however. The bass clef instruments growled in subterranean shifts that felt like lumbering monsters, and percussion rat-a-tated with raps and thumps while other instruments huffed and fluttered. Dense harmonies clustered throughout the orchestra, out of which emerged highly stylized bravado playing from the solo cellist. The immensely dexterous Johannes Moser, for whom the piece was written, handled all the extended techniques with aplomb.
If this was music ‘on the edge’, it went beyond that to wallow in it. Except for occasional attempts by the cellist to introduce some beauty, the music often favored a nasty component. The extended introduction rumbled seismically in the orchestra, music that could serve as the background for a horror movie. When the cello would pick up on some of the lighter aspects of the music, the orchestra often responded with abrupt, quick chords or simply clacks. If these elaborations led to an orchestral development, the cello would interject its own jabs and gestures.
It was fascinating how the soloist and orchestra interacted this way. It became a conversation rather than the usual adversarial structure of classical concertos, but it was a dark dialogue, wreathed in thunder clouds and relatively little discernible sunshine.
There’s no denying the composer’s command of form, structure and orchestral color. The piece created unique combinations of texture and sonority, even if it seemed to be heading inexorably for some sort of disaster. In the end, as the energy subsided, the cello had the last word, which sounded more like a softly played question than a landing point.
Guest conductor Dalia Stasevska led the proceedings with authority, using big physical gestures to hold all of the moving parts together. She coaxed out powerful intensity here, more refinement there, bringing out details in the mass of sound.
Stasevska was at her best, however, with the concert’s opener, Ralph Vaughan Williams’s Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis. It made sense to program it alongside the new concerto, as both rely on layering familiar orchestral sounds to create something unexpected. For Vaughan Williams it was separating out a string quartet and another, smaller string ensemble to make a string orchestra sound like a cathedral organ at some points and suggest a large stone building’s echo from pure instrumentation.
The fantasia unfolds with variations on a theme by the sixteenth-century Tallis that Vaughan Williams had converted into a hymn. It became a Good Friday fixture in the Church of England. Apart from these gorgeous sounds, the conductor found a natural pace and created moments ranging from joy to religious ecstasy. It was fifteen minutes of glorious music that expressed a balance which was as uplifting as the concerto was perilous.
Sibelius used some of the same techniques of stacking up big, broad ensembles to create his Symphony No.5 in E-flat major. All of the conductor’s outsized gestures, which brought such clarity and balance to the first two pieces, led to an unfortunate lack of subtlety in the Sibelius. That was a surprising outcome from a conductor educated and trained in Finland, which has produced more than few of the world’s leading baton-wielders (among them Esa-Pekka Salonen, the music director of the San Francisco Symphony, who has four more programs here before leaving the job).
The Sibelius began well. Its exposition flowed through the orchestra deliciously, and the various gestures felt natural. But as the first movement raced to its climax, the brass blared so much that it left no room for the finishes of the finale to top it. The second movement Andante was better, showing some restraint and savoring the gentleness of the finish.
There were some good moments in the finale, especially the way the brass sneaked in the big tune about halfway through. But then, unharnessed, they overreached the rest of the orchestra rather than weaving through it. The second time around, they also reached the same decibel reading too soon. The famous final six separate chords, however, were spaced just right and finished with a bang.
Harvey Steiman
Featured Image: Dalia Statevska conducts the San Francisco Symphony in Sibelius’s Fifth Symphony © Kristen Loken