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Very enjoyable night, despite my memory issue...

We started the night with 10 minutes of drive time toward downtown, when my wife asked, "do you have the tickets?". "Crap!", I blurted. I had to drive another 3 miles to turn around on the interstate and then return to the house to print the tickets. I didn't know if we could get in without them, but after finally arriving, the ticket office said we could have gotten in with a simple check-in. So, now I know.

That "little" delay cost us enough time that we couldn't eat at our favorite "before symphony" restaurant, so we had to settle for some bad bar food with lousy drinks. Oh well, and as my wife said, "It's all about the show, anyway."

OK, so on to the show...

We hadn't heard any of these pieces before, so we didn't know what to expect.

The first Ravel pavane was absolutely lovely and, as usual, well played. However, after the bad dinner we needed a little orchestral fireworks to lift our spirits.

Ravel's Piano Concerto in G was, to say the least, unexpected. I would describe it as a cacophony of sounds, rhythms and phrasing with a beautiful melody stuck in the middle. My wife would look at me occasionally when particularly discordant notes were struck during the first and third movements as if to ask, "What the hell was that?".

Simon's playing was awesome as his hands flowed over the entire keyboard and he blended so well with the orchestra when such was called for. I certainly don't have anything to compare his performance to since the music was so unusual, but an immediate, and I mean immediate standing ovation by the entire audience (the place was packed) pretty much told me what I needed to know. After he appeared for the 4th time during the ovation, he played an absolutely lovely piece by Chopin, but from our nose-bleed seats, I couldn't hear as he announced the piece. I only caught Chopin's name.

Our overall opinion on the piano concerto? Awesome, even with the modern atonal, discordant sounds that we usually do not get along with. This one worked for us.

Last but not least was Shosty's 10th. We both just love big Russian symphonies, and this was no exception. The ups and downs of the first movement, the composer's percussive musical description of Stalin in the second, the beautiful, melodious third and then the final amped up finish of the fourth, all had us completely involved. We love this stuff!

Conductor Krzysztof Urbanski is definitely interesting to watch. His movements are very soft and flowing, sometimes forming into complete body movements that looked like he was dancing. We've not seen anyone like him before. I caught my wife mimicing his movements several times during the concert without realizing she was doing it.

Again, a superb performance by the Indianapolis symphony orchestra. They are the one really great thing about being located in Indiana for a few years.

That's it for this report. As usual, any recommendations for recordings of these pieces would be welcome. I prefer vinyl, but CD recommendations are good, too. I bought 5 pieces of really excellent vinyl based on recommendations after our last symphony thanks to you folks.

Chao!


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