By Daniel Buckwalter
It is true — attendance for microphilharmonic’s season opener on Oct. 12 was always going to have some competition in this football-saturated community, what with Ohio State coming to town to play Oregon at Autzen Stadium on that same day.
Yet the hardy souls who ignored the second half of the game and showed up Saturday night at The Shedd Institute were rewarded with a dynamic and precise performance that was a treat to hear in the chamber ensemble’s salute to Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev.
Call it a win-win for everyone.
And if you missed the Saturday night performance, hopefully you caught microphilharmonic’s repeat matinee show on Oct. 13 in The Shedd’s Jaqua Concert Hall. It was a pleasure to hear and absorb.
The program opened with the exquisite pairing of pianist Hung-Yun Chu and violinist Alice Blankenship playing Prokofiev’s lyrical and elegant four-movement Violin Sonata No. 2 in D Major, which he composed in 1943. It alternates between flowing brush strokes and up-tempo play that is stirring.
The composer’s Quintet in G Minor was next up, a clashing six-movement piece that was played crisply from start to finish. It opens with the high-pitch clarity of the oboe — played by oboeist Tom Nugent, who performs mostly in the Northern California area — followed by the rumbling voice of the contrabass played by Jason Schooler. Schooler, who performs with the Oregon Symphony and the Oregon Bach Festival, among others, expertly demonstrated the wonderfully agile capacity of the contrabass. It was one of the highlights of the concert.
The concert concluded with Prokofiev’s celebratory and festive Overture on Hebrew Themes, a piece composed in 1919 specifically for the Zimro Ensemble, a group of Russian Jewish musicians which toured Asia and America to support the establishment of a conservatory in Jerusalem, from 1918 to 1921, when it was dissolved.
Overall, it was a winning way to end the weekend.
