Boulez, CSO fascinate and experiment

May 05, 2001|By John von Rhein, Tribune music critic.

Extending the traditional boundaries of musical sound has been a primary concern of Pierre Boulez's throughout his career. It was one of the central ideas behind his founding in 1971 of IRCAM at the Pompidou Center in Paris, an electronic and acoustical research institute where he and other composers have pursued his ideal of liberating sound, redefining tone color and the concert spaces in which sounds are produced.

Apart from Boulez's own "Repons," few durable works have come out of that investigation. But Thursday's Chicago Symphony Orchestra concert under Boulez's direction brought us a new and important score in that line -- "Concertate il suono" by one of his protigis, the Frenchman Marc-Andre Dalbavie.

Co-commissioned by the CSO and the Cleveland Orchestra (which gave the world premiere one year ago) to honor Boulez's 75th birthday, this is a contemporary concerto grosso that divides the orchestra into a large ripieno and four smaller concertino groups that are scattered throughout the hall, literally surrounding the audience with sound. The spatial concept goes back as far as 16th Century Venice but it seldom has been realized as imaginatively or on such an imposing scale as here.

As its Italian title suggests, "Concertate il suono" brings a gradual coming together of different impulses from different groups of musicians. Waves of rapid repeated notes sweep from the top of the gallery to the two balcony ensembles to the stage and back again, creating a quasi-electronic effect. Sonic "afterimages" merge with the original sound sources. A series of grand pauses signals consolidation and unification.

The music -- which is itself in a state of constant flux -- changes character considerably depending on where you are seated in Orchestra Hall. Hearing it in a largely empty auditorium in rehearsal and later with an audience present almost made me think I was experiencing two different pieces. Dalbavie's tonally oriented harmony, which draws on both Stravinsky and minimalist repetition, makes his music accessible to even the most conservative listeners. If the piece seems somewhat protracted at 25 minutes, its mixes of instrumental timbres fascinate the ear as they engage the mind, introducing us to a remarkable new voice in today's music.

Boulez organized this complex apparatus with typical vigor, incisiveness and control, earning the performers as well as Dalbavie a long ovation.

The CSO's virtuosic performance stood at the center of an exceptionally interesting program that included two contrasting classics from the 20th Century, Ravel's G-Major Piano Concerto and Bartok's complete "Miraculous Mandarin."

Much the same qualities that make Mitsuko Uchida one of our greatest Mozart pianists are the qualities that make her such a winning interpreter of Ravel's Mozart-inspired concerto. Boulez is an old hand at the Bartok score and he drove its angular rhythms and colorful timbres with due animation, weight and intensity.

The program will be repeated at 8 p.m. Saturday, 3 p.m. Sunday and 7:30 p.m. Tuesday; phone 312-294-3000.