S.F. Symphony review: Tetzlaff fascinating
Published 4:30 pm, Thursday, May 15, 2014
As he moves closer to 50, the violinist Christian Tetzlaff is becoming an ever more fascinating and engaging artist. The austerity of his youth - in particular, an acerbic string tone that could border on the severe - has relaxed into a warmer and more communicative approach without losing any of his fierce intelligence.
The evidence of this shift was in evidence during Sunday's all-Bach mini marathon and again in Davies Symphony Hall on Wednesday night when Tetzlaff joined Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony for a superb performance of Bartók's Second Violin Concerto. This was a virtuoso display of technical bravura and emotional eloquence, all wrapped into one beautifully integrated package.
The Second Concerto - which was last heard here in 2002, also with Tetzlaff as soloist - calls for just that combination of virtues. The first movement begins with thrumming harp chords that are so sweet as to seem almost satirical, and it returns repeatedly to that rhapsodic vein - though the effusions are punctuated by astringent outbursts from the soloist. The slow movement, a set of variations that form the essential core of the concerto, includes some of Bartók's most lushly lyrical writing, as well as some of his most ferocious.
Tetzlaff seemed to have all of these tonal shifts directly at his fingertips, moving from one mood to another with effortless ease - and, more important, helping the listener hear the connections among the concerto's disparate strains.
The first movement in particular unreeled with a wonderful sense of formal freedom, almost as if Tetzlaff, Thomas and the orchestra were collaborating on some sort of impeccable group improvisation. Arching melodies took wing alongside athletic bursts of violin passagework, and the interplay between soloist and orchestra was never less than responsive.
In the slow movement, Tetzlaff rose to even greater heights, probing the melodic contours of the main theme in ways that made each successive variation sound both surprising and logical. The finale, in which the orchestra plays its most important role, brought the concerto to a close in a flurry of showmanship.
The Bartók alone would have been enough to make Wednesday's concert a success, but Thomas followed it after intermission with a performance of Brahms' Fourth Symphony that stands among his most brilliant efforts in this repertoire. This was a rendition full of vivacity and rhythmic life, and scrubbed free of the kind of stodginess and pomp that so often doom performances of the piece.
Thomas established the tone from the opening measures, launching the first movement with a sinuous fluidity that made Brahms' music sound dancelike, even erotic (imagine that: sexy Brahms). The second theme, when it arrived with its crisply placed two-against-three rhythms, became a figure of firmness by contrast.
The slow movement, inaugurated with an ardent horn solo by Bruce Roberts, sounded suitably mysterious and dark hued, but more approachable than it often can, and the scherzo came on the scene with a burst of ebullient wit. "Lemminkäinen's Return," from Sibelius' "Four Legends From the Kalevala," made a short, sharp curtain-raiser.