Betsy's View

This weekend, the Utah Symphony performs Wagner, Bruch and Elgar, and brings back a young soloist who first performed with the Utah Symphony when he was a mere 9 years old, Violinist Will Hagen.

On Friday night, the symphony opened with Wagner’s Prelude to Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg.  It’s not a terribly long piece, I enjoyed it, and I look forward to learning more about this work and hearing it again.

The highlight of the evening was 17-year old violinist Will Hagen.  Any time an artist graces the stage at such a young age, there is surely something spectacular, and with his first performance with the symphony at age 9, he must have some great talent.  I was really looking forward to hearing how good this kid was!

I’ve never heard Bruch’s Violin Concerto No. 1 live, and as Hagen raised his violin and bow, I closed my eyes, anticipating... Such a beautiful entrance, and what I heard in those few opening notes was more compelling than what I’d heard in my two most recent violin concertos combined.  It was a little piece of heaven.

Hagen played the Bruch Violin Concerto exquisitely.  To my ears, he was technically flawless and some moments were absolute perfection.  Hagen is confident and not arrogant, and he collaborated with the orchestra beautifully.

Hagen’s talent is on par with the finest violinists today and he has a very promising future ahead.  I love that at 17, he has more poise and ability than I’ve seen from some violinists who have been soloing for years.  I look forward to watching him emerge as an international solo artist!

The second half of the program was dedicated to Elgar’s Symphony No. 2. It’s a long piece.  Long isn’t bad, but when the work isn’t that great, then long is long.  I did not love this piece.  There were parts of this symphony that I did absolutely love, but they were fleeting.  This piece seemed to go on and on,  jumping all around. To me, it seemed disjointed, lacking continuity.

Even though I didn’t love the piece, I still respected it.  As long as it was, the musicians played hard and they sounded great.  Throughout the piece, there was a bit of repetition between instruments, and I enjoyed watching the musicians and honing in on specific instruments to hear each part they played.  All in all, for me the piece was more educational than enjoyable.

Abravanel Hall has amazing acoustics.  Hearing 80+ musicians on stage produce such incredible sound is really what it’s all about.  When you are in a good hall the music just envelops you and there is nothing like it. I love this hall!

It was another great evening at the symphony.  It had its high points and it's not-so-high points, but even when I don’t enjoy something as much as I would have liked to, I can’t ever say I had a bad time.  Going to the symphony is a wonderful experience and if I could do it every weekend I would!  There is so much to learn about music, musicians, composers, and conductors, so it’s always a great evening.  With music, sometimes you love it, sometimes you don’t.  But you can’t ever not respect it or the musicians who give their all to share it with you.

Can’t wait till the next time!

Photo courtesy WillHagen.com