United States Various: Chicago Symphony Orchestra / Riccardo Muti (conductor). Cal Performances, Zellerbach Hall, University of California Berkeley, 17.1.2026. (HS)
Brahms – Symphony No.4 in E minor, Op.98
Stravinsky – Divertimento (Suite from The Fairy’s Kiss)
Ravel – Boléro
Encore: Verdi – Overture to Nabucco
Riccardo Muti, music director of the Chicago Symphony from 2010 to 2023, now carries the title of Music Director Emeritus for Life, with the emphatic ‘for Life’ reflecting the long-standing communication the 84-year-old conductor and this orchestra have shared. Watching and listening to their performance in Berkeley, part of their 12-day tour on the West Coast, was not quite what one might have expected.
The coherence was evident in Brahms’s Symphony No.4 in E minor which occupied the first half of the program, rather than the post-intermission slot the big symphony of the evening usually gets. Without some lighter fare for the piece to play against, the weight and seriousness of the first movement was a study in the sonorities for which this orchestra is renowned. The strings created full-throated richness, and the woodwinds blanketed the space around them. The Chicago musicians also seem able to translate Muti’s array of unusual gestures which I have not seen other conductors use
That is the good news. On the other hand, Muti started things off at a slow pace, barely a Moderato rather than the Allegro non troppo Brahms calls for. The conductor also micro-managed the phrasing, which had the effect of halting the flow. The whole movement felt like a series of incidents, each impeccably framed but not linked to what was around it.
Even the lovely second movement, marked Andante moderato, trudged along at a stately speed, favoring resonance over movement. The third, Allegro giocoso (literally ‘joyful’), jogged a bit slowly, with little bounce. In the finale, the ‘energico’ and ‘passionato’ marked in the score went missing. For me, these sedate tempos would have been ideal for following an open score and learning from it. What it did not do was energize a good part of the audience.
Things improved in the second half of the concert, which began with Stravinsky’s Divertimento, a suite that distills music from the ballet The Fairy’s Kiss. This homage to Tchaikovsky has a distinct Romantic-era aura, as opposed to the composer’s Neoclassical music which was rooted in the Baroque and early Classical eras, and the rhythmic snap is of a softer type. That fit Muti’s slow-paced approach better than the Brahms did. Best was the last movement, Pas de deux, a delicate nocturne fashioned from the ballet’s pas de deux. Where the Danses Suisse and Scherzo movements tilted this way and that, the love music in the finale came off as exquisite.
To finish things off, principal percussionist Cynthia Yeh took a seat near the front between the second violins and the violas to play the seemingly never-ending and ever-so-gradually crescendoing snare-drum phrases of Ravel’s Boléro. For his part, Muti coaxed a sashaying Spanish flavor in the rhythms as the volume increased with additional instruments. The tune circulated among more than a dozen soloists (so many that Muti had to consult with concertmaster Robert Chen to remember to give them each a bow at the end).
For an encore, Muti leaned on his years as a brilliant opera conductor to lead a rousing Overture to Verdi’s Nabucco. It had all the swashbuckling vitality that the music required, and then some.
Harvey Steiman
Featured Image: Riccardo Muti leads the Chicago Symphony at Berkeley © Todd Rosenberg