SOUNDS OF AMERICA P H O T O G R A P H Y R O S E N B E R G T O D D © : P H O T O G R A P H Y of ensemble richness most countries can be but envious of. Ravello’s sound is first-rate without being spectacular. Guy Rickards ‘Breve’ Álvarez Metro Chabacano Bolcom Graceful Ghost Rag Gershwin Lullaby Mozart Adagio and Fugue, K546 Piazzolla Four, for Tango Puccini Crisantemi Schubert Quartettsatz, D703 Shostakovich The Golden Age – Polka Turina La oración del torero, Op 34 Webern Langsamer Satz Wolf Italian Serenade Euclid Quartet A inat (AF2401 • 70’) Celebrating their 25th anniversary, the Euclid Quartet’s new recording showcases contrasting musical gems. All of them are favourite encores and some have backstories such as Schubert’s Quartettsatz which, first violinist Jameson Cooper admits, ‘beat us up pretty badly on our second-ever concert as students – and still is really tricky!’ No problem 25 years later; their command is exhilarating in its silken breadth and sleek virtuosity, and their phrasing of the magical second theme yields only to the incandescent performance by the David Oistrakh Quartet released last year on Praga. Recorded in the Louise E Addicott and Yatish J Joshi Performance Hall at Indiana University South Bend, the dynamic energy of the bows biting into strings from the opening salvoes of Mozart’s Adagio and Fugue is stunning; its clarity and pinpoint sense of directionality bring you into the music with a powerful embrace. Our monthly guide to North American ensembles Kansas City Symphony The most contrasting part of the recital consists of a wonderfully lilting reading of William Bolcom’s Graceful Ghost Rag, a raucous take on the Polka from Shostakovich’s The Golden Age, a streetsmart serenade in the form of Gershwin’s Lullaby and a tour de force performance of Javier Álvarez’s relentlessly teasing Metro Chabacano, written to be played during an exhibition of kinetic sculptures in the Mexico City station. The rest of the programme is equally attractive: Puccini’s Crisantemi, Wolf’s Italian Serenade and Webern’s lush Langsamer Satz are played sumptuously if not occasionally lush; in Piazzolla’s Four the quartet are especially alert to the tang in ‘Tango’; and they throughly immerse themselves in the sad heroic romanticism of Turina’s recently very popular La oración del torero. Laurence Vittes Founded 1982 Home Helzberg Hall, Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts Passing the baton seems like a particularly appropriate way to describe this season at the Kansas City Symphony. The tenure of music director Michael Stern is coming to an end this June after 19 formative and indeed transformative years, and that of Matthias Pintscher will begin when the fall season opens later this year. There’s much buzzing excitement in the concert-going public, and a tinge of bittersweetness. Stern has been at the helm for such a long time, and is a beloved figure. He it was who in 2011 guided the Symphony from the Lyric Theater into their new home at Helzberg Hall in the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts. That must have been a night-and-day difference for the ensemble; the acoustics of the Moshe Safdie-designed Hall are uniformly excellent, and no seat is more than 100 feet from the stage. Stern has chosen Mahler’s Second Symphony as his final orchestral salute in mid-June. In spring 2023, when the Symphony was discerning a fit among guest conductors, I happened to be at the concert conducted by Pintscher. It was electric as he brilliantly teased out the knottiness of a Ligeti and Scriabin programme. I’m told by an inside source that there was unanimous agreement among the players about who they wanted as their next director. Happily, no knotty San Francisco polyphony among the musicians. Perfect homophony is surely a better place to start a new musical relationship. This March I was at the first concert Pintscher conducted since the news was announced. The excitement was palpable among the packed concert-goers, and I found it particularly fitting that they performed some of the works that they will be taking on their European summer tour, such as Leonard Bernstein’s Symphonic Dances from West Side Story (1957) and Charles Ives’s Three Places in New England (1911-14). Again, his trademark energy and musical intelligence were plentifully in evidence. It is their first such venture abroad, and they will perform at the Musikfest in Berlin, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg and the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam in late August. This is, clearly, a big moment of maturation for the ensemble, a kind of coming of age. Pintscher is certainly not easing into his role slowly, but boldly seizing the initiative. An energetic man, he is ready for the challenge. ‘It’s a time for exploration’, he says. ‘We are … eager to demonstrate how American musicians perform at the highest level.’ As well as Bernstein’s and Ives’s works, they will also perform Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue and Copland’s Symphony No 3, an almost entirely American repertoire, except for Ravel’s Rapsodie espagnole, which they will perform in Amsterdam. Next season we have lots to look forward to, not least Pintscher’s rolling out of the novel idea of a ‘symphonic piazza’, a seven-concert series which will open on to discussion and mingling over cocktails between conductor, musicians and audience. One musician said to me recently: ‘Young people are looking for an experience, not just a concert these days’, and I suspect he was right. I’m curious to see how the Symphonic Piazza may be part of a whole new way of experiencing classical music in the city, tapping into a community’s social and cultural energies. Hilary Stroh gramophone.co.uk GRAMOPHONE JUNE 2024 V