Peter Serkin, the son of famed pianist Rudolf Serkin, is one of the top pianists performing today. A champion of contemporary music, he provides a unique voice for today's music scene.  Serkin has commissioned or had dedicated to him, numerous works by contemporary composers. Friday night's concert featured one such work, Flying to Kahani by Charles Wuorinen. 

Wuorinen's opera, Haroun and the Sea of Stories, based on Salman Rushdie's novel of the same name, premiered at New York City Opera in 2004.  Wuorinen wrote Flying to Kahani soon thereafter and dedicated it to Peter Serkin.  According to Wuorinen's program notes, Kahani is the undiscovered second moon to Earth as described in Rushdie's book.  "The 11 year old hero and a companion mount a mechanical bird to fly to this hidden satellite. As they approach their destination, they come upon Kahani's vast sea. It is the 'Ocean of the Streams of Story,' from which all stories originate.

"For the purposes of Flying to Kahani, I prefer to think of this sea as the source of all compositions, of which Flying to Kahani is, of course, one. My opera has provided certain basic materials for the generation of the present work, but both in its form and its melos [i.e., melodic content], it is quite distinct from its sources. In fact, although some of the soloist's substance ultimately derives from vocal elements in the opera, most of it is newly conceived to fulfill at once a virtuoso and an integrative role."

All very interesting, but what does the piece sound like?  It is an 11-12 minute single movement piano concerto, or perhaps piano fantasy. I found it to be a disjointed series of random dissonant noises scattered throughout the orchestra and the solo piano.  Unlike a lot of modern music I have heard, this one lacked any apparent melody or motives that I could grasp. I kept thinking that the best aspect of this work was that it would be over in a few minutes.  You couldn't drag me to a performance of the opera upon which this piece was based.  The audience's polite applause barely allowed the soloist to exit the stage.

Following the sour of the Wuorinen piece, the sweet was Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 2, in B-Flat Major, Op. 19.  You know how you go to a fancy restaurant and are served a little scoop of sorbet prior to the entrée as a palate cleaner?  Beethoven served as an ear cleanser after the Wuorinen and before the Shostakovich of the second half.

Serkin chose the neglected stepchild of Beethoven's Concerti No. 2 to follow the Wuorinen.  I actually like No. 2 very much and find it delightful from its startling beginning to its fun rondo last movement.  At times, it sounds just like one of the great Mozart concerti, but just when you think you have it pigeonholed, Beethoven brings out a phrase or section that sounds just like ...Beethoven.

This is a transition piece from the classicism of Mozart to the stormy composer Beethoven would later become.  To me it was 70 percent Mozart, 25 percent Beethoven and 5 percent Haydn. Serkin played with a lovely delicacy.  The orchestra's texture was so transparent you could hear all the inner voices.  I would have liked a little faster tempo in the second movement but the third movement Rondo had all the pep and pizzazz one could ask for. 

Sidenote:  Following intermission, Maestro Stern made a kind few remarks about two retiring members of the Symphony.  (The audience applauded these retiring musicians louder, longer and with more passion than they did the Wuorinen piece.)  By coincidence, I had just watched the 1953 movie Tonight We Sing, which was a Hollywood version of the career of Sol Hurok.  In a nice cameo role, Isaac Stern portrayed the famous violinist Eugene Ysaye.  In his spoken dialogue, he sounded exactly like his son, Michael Stern.  For another Hollywood movie just full of classical stars, read my blog on KCMetropolis.org about the movie Carnegie Hall.

The second half of the concert was devoted to Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5.  This is probably Shostakovich's most popular work and certainly his most popular symphony.  It has been widely criticized as being bombastic and written only to please Stalin after Shostakovich got in trouble with his opera, Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk.  He was under considerable pressure from the Soviet government to toe the line and conform more to the Soviet heroic social realism style of composition.   As I listened to the piece, I was struck by how much Hollywood film composers of the 1950s and beyond were influenced by the harmonies and orchestrations of this symphony.  I was also struck by how sad and depressing the symphony is despite its seemingly triumphant ending. 

There has been more controversy concerning this work and, in fact, all of Shostakovich's works since the publication of Testimony by Solomon Volkov, a purported book of memoirs by Shostakovich in which he discussed his compositions and analyzed them.  If you are a big fan of Shostakovich, I would recommend further research in this area. 

I was seated just a few rows from the very back of the balcony, and the sound up there is marvelous.  The secret of the Lyric Theatre (and many theatres) is that the sound is usually better way upstairs than in the expensive seats down below.  Try it sometime.  The sound is right in your face and at times I felt pinned to the back of my seat by the sheer force of the wall of sound coming at me.  I could clearly hear all the excellent instrumental solos..  I thought Maestro Stern brought out all the anguish written into the Symphony as well as its irony and sarcasm. His tempos were just right and the entire experience was first rate.

The Lyric Theatre looked 90 percent or more filled in the balcony, which is a good sign for the financial health of the Kansas City Symphony.  The Symphony sounds great and is recording a new CD this week; the Performing Arts Center will open in a year or two and we are lucky to have Michael Stern as music director.

REVIEW:
Kansas City Symphony
Peter Serkin, piano
Friday, May 29  (Reviewed)
Saturday, May 30
Sunday, May 31
Lyric Theatre, Downtown Kansas City, MO
http://www.kcsymphony.org/

By Lee Goodman

Classical Contributor (Past writer)