Stanislaw Skrowaczewski: Bruckner 8th

[Don]

I had to share a wonderful concert experience with you all:

"Why isn't the name Stanislaw Skrowaczewski at the top of the list of greatest conductors, except for nuts like us" I wondered out loud to Steve who I had met at the end of the concert.

"Well, he is not flashy and no one can pronounce let alone spell his name", Steve replied with a chuckle.

There is a lot of truth in that. An audience of only 750 was on hand at magnificent Powell Symphony Hall in St Louis to hear one of the great conductors perform one of his signature works, the mighty Bruckner Symphony #8 with the St Louis Symphony.

Skrowaczewski is, in my opinion, the pre-eminent Bruckner conductor of my time. At 85, he led an energetic, detailed, superbly shaped performance of this magnificent work from memory. The 9 horns (4 on Wagner Tubas), quadruple brass, triple woodwinds, 2 harps, full strings and percussion filled the gilded hall with deep organ like sounds (the beginning of the incredible slow movement for example), proud clarion calls (the beginning of the Finale), sweet glitter from the harps (making the slow movement as close to heavenly music making as possible) and delicate figures from the woodwinds, often buried in murky recordings. Never slacking but never rushed either, he brought out the soaring architecture of this demanding symphony, making it seem almost easy. Fully in command, Skrowaczewski only need look or wave a finger at a section to coax the most incredible sounds from the orchestra.

I could go on... but you get the picture. Every movement surpassed the previous one in intensity and beauty. The lady next to me thought I was nuts as I beamed, cried, sighed, conducted passages and rolled my eyes heavenward as the all too short 80 minutes flew by as if a second in time. Skrowaczewski was rewarded with a sincere and prolonged ovation from not only the audience but the orchestra as well.

The 500 mile, 8 hour round trip (similar, Steve quipped, to the story of Bach walking 200 miles to hear Buxtehude) was worth every penny, hassle and lost minute of sleep to hear music making this fine and this incredible.

Those empty seats missed a rare opportunity to hear some magnificent music making. Their loss.

PS: The Steve mentioned above is Steve Bugala (sbugala) a regular poster here. It was my pleasure to meet up with him for a brief conversation after the concert.

[sbugala]

Don, it was cool meeting you, too!

Saturday's concert was fantastic.  As much as I love the brass in this work, I walked away with an increased admiration for the woodwind writing in this work. There's some pretty nice oboe stuff, that Peter Bowman, longtime SLSO oboist, brought out with his customary elan.  And some cool stuff in the scherzo for the lower reeds.  Concertmaster, David Halen handled a gorgeous little violin solo in the Adagio so sweetly. 
But oh...those brass!
The so-called "annunciation of death" in the first movement was awesome, as was the restatement of the first movement motif that reappears near the climax of the fourth movement.

What I loved was the way Skrowaczewski subtly slowed down the tempi at certain points and milked some brass outburts. Yet, no strain was shown by the brass at these points. Phenomenal. 

I was moved, just as I was at Skrowaczewski's last appearance here, at how appreciative the audience was. I got the impression that they would've called him out for one more curtain call, but opted not to because Skrowaczewski had earned some rest after that majestic 85 minute work. 

The orchestra seemed just as appreciative. It's not rare for the orchestra to refuse to rise at a certain point to give a conductor his/her due.  However, usually the concertmaster (in this case Halen) will finally rise after some cajoling from the conductor. Halen fought every effort to give Skrowaczewski the maximum respect possible until finally relenting. 

I've heard some fine concerts with the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra over the years, and of course, this was just over the weekend. But I suspect this will go down as one of my favorites.

Afterwards, when discussing the concert with Don, some concertgoers in their early 20's asked me to take their group picture.  It struck me as ironic that while Bruckner isn't exactly the most popular composer, here was a group of people who probably never even heard of Bruckner before, yet they were pretty psyched afterwards. (I asked them how they liked the concert, and they said they loved it. Where were those Bruckner lovers when I was in MY 20's!) 


 

[barry guerrero]

Oh boy, Don; you'll get no argument from Dave Hurwitz. Dave told me that one of his very greatest "live" experiences was seeing Skrowaczewski conduct Bruckner 8 somewhere on the east coast (Baltimore, I think it was). Dave is a big admirer of his Ravel cycle on Vox Box as well. Anyway, thanks for bringing him up. I guess he doesn't do much Mahler (?).

Barry