Shelley and Pacific Symphony Excel in a Program of Light Classics

Timothy Mangan
15 hours ago
4 min read

REVIEW: The new music director designate rejuvenates Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Scheherazade.”

Alexander Shelley, on the podium, takes a bow with the Pacific Symphony. Photo courtesy of Pacific Symphony/Doug Gifford

Alexander Shelley’s first concert with the Pacific Symphony as its artistic and music director designate, held Thursday evening in the Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall, was a rather light affair. The agenda could have served nicely as a summertime pops concert. Not that it wasn’t good music. Some of it was, and some of it wasn’t. But by the end of the concert, a listener felt a certain lack of substance in the meal, like it had been happy hour and not a full dinner.

There’s a formula these days in classical programming (actually, it’s pretty longstanding) that if you’re going to play a piece of new music by a living composer, get it out of the way right at the start. This leads living composers who want to have their music played to write short, splashy pieces that will serve as concert openers, written in a style that won’t scare the innocent.

Alexander Shelley conducts the Pacific Symphony. Photo courtesy of Pacific Symphony/Doug Gifford

These pieces are surprisingly interchangeable (or perhaps unsurprisingly) because they all have the same aim, namely, to make a quick impression and get off the stage. Thursday night it was American composer Jessie Montgomery’s “Starburst” (in its arrangement for full orchestra), which romped and sparkled and country fiddled and motored and somersaulted through some syncopations for all of four minutes. Not long enough to offend, not long enough to make much of an impression. Whoop de do.

The concerto followed next, of course, but here we departed from formula: It wasn’t by Rachmaninoff but by yet another (living) composer, the Mexican Arturo Márquez. Famous for his popular orchestral work Danzón No. 2, Márquez wrote this latest work, the Concierto Mistico y Profano, for guitar and orchestra, for the Spanish virtuoso guitarist Pablo Sainz-Villegas, who was on hand for this local premiere.

Pablo Sainz-Villegas performs with the Pacific Symphony. Photo courtesy of Pacific Symphony/Doug Gifford

The piece, in three movements and lasting about 30 minutes, is perfectly pleasant, but I can’t say I heard much of anything original in it. Perhaps that’s not its intention. It relies heavily on certain tropes (you might even say clichés) of Mexican and Spanish music and presents them more or less straightforwardly. It is delicately and sensitively scored so that the guitarist can be easily heard over the small orchestra. It gives the soloist plenty to do but nothing too strenuous. The soloist can shine melodically and rhythmically without strain.

The outer movements are lively dances, but the central slow movement, entitled Serenata Piadosa (Pious Serenade), is the loveliest and most memorable. Soft, sustained strings and a distant chime underlie a gentle guitar motif which interacts with a dreamy clarinet solo. It might be two people meeting on a still and starry night in an old churchyard.

Sainz-Villegas played the whole thing with easy flair; Shelley and orchestra supported comfortably. The guitarist offered an encore: the “Gran Jota de Concierto” by Francisco Tárrega, which provides the soloist with all sorts of fireworks and effects (including an uncanny imitation of a snare drum) with which to display his wares, and which Sainz-Villegas performed with considerable aplomb.

As in previous appearances, Shelley went to an old standby after intermission, in this case Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Scheherazade,” and as before, played the lights out of it. This is becoming a pattern with Shelley. If it’s a warhorse, he’ll do it up right.

“Scheherazade” is a masterpiece, of course, but it’s not exactly deep. It’s full of great tunes and invigorating rhythms and is probably orchestrated more brilliantly than any piece up to that time not composed by Berlioz. But it is fairy tale music and certainly not soul searching or spiritual. One didn’t leave this concert pondering deep thoughts. That’s OK. It’s just an observation.

Concertmaster Dennis Kim performs a solo with the Pacific Symphony. Photo courtesy of Pacific Symphony/Doug Gifford

Shelley’s reading recalled the old days, when conductors like Reiner, Beecham and Monteux conducted “Scheherazade” like they meant it, no holds barred. Melodies gushed, rhythms zinged, phrases were coaxed with great sensitivity and nuance. Shelley did it all without a dictatorial hand, inviting the orchestra to join him in the fun. He gave plenty of room for his soloists to shine, clearing away instrumental underbrush, and enabling concertmaster Dennis Kim, clarinetist Joshua Ranz, bassoonist Rose Corrigan and flutist Benjamin Smolen, among others, to do their impressive things, unhurriedly.

The orchestra sounded like a million bucks, too, enthused and drilled to perfection. Instrumental balances were such that the brilliant orchestration was beautifully rendered. It was something else. Welcome, Alexander Shelley. Now how about some Mahler?