Dvořák’s Cello Concerto: Radiant Warmth by the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra Was Exceptional at Stifel Theatre

–by Thomas Schmidt

The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra held two performances of Dvořák’s Cello Concerto: Radiant Warmth on Saturday and Sunday at Stifel Theatre, and the execution was beautiful.

The concert was conducted by guest conductor Ruth Reinhardt.  Overall, the orchestra performed well under the direction of Ms. Reinhardt.  She masterfully led the orchestra through some very complex pieces and intricate works.  She and Andrei Ionita, the featured cello soloist, blended well together.

The first piece on the program was Grazyna Bacewicz’s Concerto for String Orchestra.  While this was not a concerto grosso, or concerto of decades and centuries gone by, it did have the varying soloists from the string section answering back and forth.  The first movement was marked “Allegro” and Reinhardt kept this at a wonderful clip.  The off-beat pizzicatos were very exacting and precise.  The second movement had beautiful sonorous melodies supported by rich harmonies underneath.  The third and final movement had a wonderful theme repeated throughout that was easy to recognize each time it was played.

The next work on the program was Paul Hindemith’s Mathis der Maler (Mathias the Painter) Symphony.  This is broken into three movements: “Engelkonzert” (Concert of Angels), “Grablegung” (Entombment), and “Versuchung des heiligen Antonius” (Temptation of St. Anthony).  These three movements are a musical representation of panels in the Isenheim Altarpiece, which was painted by the famed German Renaissance artist Matthias Grunewald.

The first movement begins with big block chords, with the theme given in the trombones.  Following this introduction, it is light and lively, for the most part, ending with strong chords from the brass section.  The second movement is quiet and subdued, as one might expect, given the painting it represents.  The orchestra masterfully gives us this image through sound.

Speaking of images through sound, the third movement is by far the most atonal and dissonant out of the entire piece.  The music gets loud and antagonistic.  One can imagine the demons tempting and torturing St. Anthony.  At last, the movement ends with the triumph of St. Anthony and the defeat of the devil with strong and bold block chords given to us primarily by the brass and percussion section.

Finally, the program concludes with Antonin Dvorak’s Cello Concerto in B Minor.  The soloist was Andrei Ionita.  Between Ionita and Reinhardt, the back and forth between soloist and orchestra was flawless.  The intonation was impeccable, and the balance was perfect.  The first movement began with a lengthy introduction by the orchestra (almost three minutes in) before we heard a note from the soloist.  But when Ionita finally made his entrance, it was brilliant and flashy with the phrasing and the executed triple stops.  As mentioned before, the intonation was perfect.  He mimicked the theme perfectly given by the orchestra before in B Minor.

The second movement, in G Major, has somewhat of a cadenza, with the cello playing double stops and accompanies himself with left hand pizzicato on the remaining opening strings.  Ionita played this flawlessly and was accompanied shortly thereafter by the woodwinds playing in thirds to harmonize with him.  The third movement returns to B Minor and ends with a flourish after stating the original theme in B Major.  There were times when Ionita felt the music so much he didn’t look at Reinhardt.  Reinhardt kept the orchestra together and in perfect time with the soloist.

Reinhardt had much to keep together with all the works on the program.  They were involved, had much instrumentation going back and forth, with varying tempos and meter changes.  She led and took charge of leading the orchestra to a flawless interpretation of the music.

After the applause, Ionita came back out and performed two encores as solos.  The first one was a Swedish composer.  It was difficult to hear the name of the composer and the piece, but he mentioned that it had American elements in it.  It seemed like it had a flavoring of Aaron Copland’s “Rodeo” in it.  The second encore featured him performing the Bouree I and II of J.S. Bach’s Cello Suite #3 in C Major.