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Norway’s innovative orchestra, with its Artistic
Director for Classical & Baroque music at the helm, made its first North
American tour performing Mozart’s “Linz” symphony, Haydn’s 2nd Violin Concerto,
Bach’s Suite No. 4, and Vivaldi’s Concerto for Dresden Orchestra.. The orchestra
is at the forefront in renewing the goals, vision and profile for orchestras in
the 21st century - with co-artistic directors, satellite concerts of smaller
ensembles promoted alongside the symphonic series, and a new concert hall to be
ready in 2012. Next season the orchestra adds nine new full time positions –
definitely on the upswing! Look for their return to North America in future
seasons.
Fabio Biondi, Artistic Director for Classical and
Baroque Programming, has a busy, multi-faceted career as a violin soloist,
leader of his own Europa Galante chamber orchestra, and as a conductor on
symphony stages in the opera pit. Mr. Biondi appears at major halls around the
world including La Scala in Milan, Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall, Disney Hall
in Los Angeles and Tokyo’s Suntory Hall.
Biography
Stavanger Symphony Orchestra (SSO) has gained an
international reputation for its quality and interesting profile in addition to
its creative programming. The combination of a commitment to early and
contemporary music, together with unusual cross-over projects and an extensive
programme of CD-recordings of Norwegian 20th century music, has contributed to
the orchestra’s development and reputation.
The SSO is adopting a satellite model for its
operations, i.e. promoting concerts with smaller ensembles alongside series of
symphonic concerts.
The orchestra played an important role as
Stavanger held its position as European Capital of Culture in 2008. In two years
it will move into a brand new concert hall in Stavanger, specially designed for
acoustic, symphonic music. The SSO appointed the American conductor Steven
Sloane as Chief Conductor to lead the orchestra through these events and to
further develop the orchestra’s artistic standard and international reputation.
Simultaneously, the Italian violinist and conductor Fabio Biondi will be
responsible for the orchestras specializing in early music interpretation.
By, in 1990, sharing the repertoire between two
different artistic leaders, the SSO was at the forefront of establishing what
was then a new model for artistic leadership. Conductors such as Frans Brüggen
and Alexander Dmitriev in the 90s, followed by Philippe Herreweghe and Susanna
Mälkki, raised the standard to an international level.
The orchestra tours regularly within Norway.
Internationally the orchestra has performed in Scandinavia, The Baltic states,
Spain, The Netherlands, Belgium, UK, Germany, Ireland, Czech Republic, Slovakia,
Poland and Japan. It has participated at the Edinburgh Festival,
Schleswig-Holstein Festival and the Prague Autumn Festival.
The orchestra has released over 30 recordings the
last 20 years, receiving excellent reviews in international music magazines.
Complete series of the orchestral music of Norwegian 20th century composers
Harald Sæverud, Geirr Tveitt and Fartein Valen have been released on the highly
profiled Swedish company, BIS Records.
The Norwegian Oil Company Statoil has been the
SSO’s main sponsor since 1990.
Stavanger Symphony Orchestra is under the Royal
Patronage of HRH Crown Prince Haakon.
Program
Vivaldi Concerto for the Dresden orchestra
Bach Suite no 4
--intermission--
Haydn Violin Concerto no 2 for Violin and Strings in G major
Mozart Symphony no 36, “Linz”
Reviews
Norwegian Ensemble
Flaunts Its Bows and Body English
Hiroyuki Ito for
The New York Times
The violinist Fabio
Biondi, standing, led the Stavanger Symphony
Orchestra of Norway at Carnegie Hall on Wednesday.
By JAMES R.
OESTREICH
Published: March
24, 2011
In December, when
Carnegie Hall set up an outpost of the Risor Chamber
Music Festival, a summer event on the southeast
coast of Norway featuring the pianist Leif Ove
Andsnes, it supplied little local color. On
Wednesday evening, when the Stavanger Symphony
Orchestra appeared at Carnegie under the patronage
of Crown Prince Haakon, the weather gods left
nothing to chance, conjuring an atmosphere — literal
and figurative — appropriate to early spring in a
city on the southwest coast of Norway: a
full-fledged sleet storm. (This sat oddly alongside
the cherry-blossom motif in Carnegie’s lobby for its
current festival, JapanNYC, but that’s another
story.)
Actually, the
Stavanger Symphony was represented by only 39 of the
87 members listed on its Web site, along with a
harpsichordist and a lutenist: its early-music
contingent, led by Fabio Biondi, its artistic
director for Baroque and Classical repertory. Mr.
Biondi is best known for his work with the
period-instrument ensemble Europa Galante, which he
founded in 1990, but he and the orchestra here used
instruments modernized to a greater or lesser
degree.
Mr. Biondi
conducted from the violin, using a lot of body
English. In the opening number, a G minor concerto
by Vivaldi (RV 577), he left the extended violin
solos to the more-than-capable concertmaster,
Francesco Ugolini, and joined him in duet passages.
Mr. Biondi himself played the rest of the solos:
brief ones in Bach’s Orchestral Suite No. 4 and
Mozart’s Symphony No. 36 (“Linz”), and the lead role
in Haydn’s Violin Concerto No. 2 (Hob. VIIa:4). Mr.
Biondi’s cadenzas in the concerto’s Allegro moderato
and its Adagio were Haydnesque in their spirited
quirkiness, and he added further twists to that of
the Adagio when it was repeated as the evening’s
encore.
Playing
everywhere with his usual fire and expressiveness he
also drew stylish and committed playing from the
orchestra, which mostly shunned vibrato. Two
woodwind principals — Kjersti Dahle, oboist, and
Matthew Taylor, bassoonist — introduced themselves
in the spare opening of the Vivaldi slow movement
and provided joy throughout, especially in the
Mozart.
Five movements from
the Swedish composer Johan Helmich Roman’s “Music
for a Royal Wedding at Drottningholm” 0f 1744 filled
out the program. Roman is mostly forgotten; having
plied early-music waters devotedly, I hadn’t
encountered him since the release of a recording of
the complete wedding suites by Polar Music in 1982
under the title “The Drottningholm Music.”
Less than a decade
younger than Bach, Roman sounds considerably more
modern, more even than Handel. The music is pleasant
enough; you wouldn’t expect more of wedding fare.
But if there is to be any kind of Roman revival, it
will need a firmer basis than this.
Nor can I say that
I left the hall with any real sense of the Stavanger
Symphony as a whole. But at a time when symphony
orchestras have ceded so much Baroque and even
Classical repertory to period-instrument
specialists, it was refreshing to discover how one
ensemble has chosen to retain and cultivate early
music. |
From Musikk
med vidd og vits (Music with wit and witticism)
By Arnfinn Bø-Rygg,
Stavanger Aftenblad February 2nd, 2009
Concert in Stavanger Concert Hall
(…) It is a rare
occurrence when we see Fabio Biondi without a violin
in hand, but this happened during the opening
number, Haydn’s last symphony (nr. 104). It was an
exceptionally fine performance. Biondi senses the
elements of surprise, brilliance, wit, humour, and
yes – witticism - in Haydn’s music. These are
qualities that are embedded in the music itself,
objectives of the structural design. Contact with
the listener is inevitable, composed into the music.
I would have preferred a sharper and more vivid
timbre in the opening chords of the first movement.
These chords should shine like rays of light, in
contrast to the mystical atmosphere that
characterizes the rest of the adagio section.
However, the andante was performed with exquisite
sensitivity, the minuet played with gusto, and the
finale was right on target.
(…)
Translation:
E. Maine |
From Forrykende
presist (Tremendously precise) by Magnus Andersson
Morgenbladet, March 3rd, 2007
Concert in Oslo Concert Hall
(...) The orchestra
played with fervour and intensity that was the
result of more than just goodwill or a desire to
express something. They played with a precision
which lifted the music up to a level that is usually
only attained by the Oslo Philharmonic in Norway.
The use of vibrato was tasteful; many of the
exceedingly soft sections would have lost their
transparency with a ‘standard’ vibrato. This magic,
gentle sound, free of vibrato, was the precondition
that enabled Biondi to avoid conjuring up a more
bombastic sound in order to build a climax.
The orchestra was
exquisitely balanced. The lead instruments were
always audible, while at the same time the
accompanying voices were never insignificant but
present in the music with another own integrity.
(...) The sum of
all this is not only a good performance – the
orchestra has, together with its leader, a unique
narrative, a secret, and a distinctive
characteristic to share with us listeners.
(...) Biondi also
appeared as soloist, and from the standpoint that
musical gesture is important his music should be
given note. One could criticize him for exaggerating
(gesture) and letting it affect the musical pulse
and drive, bit I rather regard his playing as a
tremendously creative frolic with form.
(…) The Stavanger
Symphony Orchestra delivered one of the most
memorable concerts that I have ever heard with a
Norwegian Orchestra.
M.A.
Translation: E.
Maine |
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