Memphis Symphony concert explores Mozart to contemporary
Robert Moody has been guest conductor for the Memphis Symphony Orchestra several times in recent years, but usually pops concerts. This weekend, however, the program is titled “Moody Conducts Mozart” for two performances.
“I wanted to reintroduce myself to the orchestra and reestablish the way in which we connect,” Moody said in an interview this week. “It’s important make sure in the eyes of fellow musicians and certainly the audience that I never get pigeonholed into a standard stereotype of a type of programming.”
Robert Moody
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This is also an audition for Moody who is one of four candidates bidding to replace the MSO’s retiring Maestro David Loebel. Moody is music director for the Winston-Salem (N.C.) Symphony, music director for the Portland (Maine) Symphony Orchestra and artistic director for Arizona Musicfest.
When Moody was chosen for the concert, part of the program was already in place. Guest artist Karen Gomyo — only 27 but with a impressive career — had been booked to perform the Sibelius Violin Concerto.
So Moody considered what would mix agreeably with the piece, coming up with Richard Strauss’ Suite from Der Rosenkavalier. “I connect well with Viennese-leaning music and Rosenkavalier is just a great homage to Vienna.”
Moody lived in Austria for three years and that influence brought him to the next selection.
“I realized a really nice pairing to the Strauss would be something like Mozart’s Symphony No. 35. The vast majority of Mozart’s life was in Vienna and I liked that thread of connection of the greatest genius of composition of all time, Mozart, writing the highest of classical styles. I love that pairing — the Mozart and the Strauss for the second half.”
But how to kick off the concert? With a contemporary infusion, of course.
“This piece I’ve come across lately is being played by orchestras all over the country now,” Moody said, referring to Christopher Theofanidis’ “Rainbow Body.”
“It’s an awesome piece,” he said, based on medieval themes but not really sounding medieval. “The theme is hauntingly beautiful, but then Theofanidis builds it in a very strong neo-romantic way,” Moody said. “It begins to sounds like Mahler at the end, honestly.”
You’ll note toward the end orchestra members actually cheering the piece. The composer, it seems, went to concerts at the Proms music festival in London and heard audiences uttering hurrahs before some of the pieces ended. Theofanidis wrote that into the work.
“When I first saw this in the score,” Moody said, “I thought man, is this a little bit contrived? But as you hear it and experience it in real time you realize it’s not at all. It adds this great blast of energy to an already powerful piece. I think the audiences will take to it and it’s a nice festive way to kick off this concert for us all to get to know each other.”
Memphis Symphony Orchestra, with guest conductor Robert Moody and violinist Karen Gomyo
Saturday at 8 p.m. at the Cannon Center for the Performing Arts, 255 N. Main; Sunday at 2:30 p.m. at the Germantown Performing Arts Centre, 1801 Exeter Rd. Tickets are $15-$78. Call 537-2525 or go to tickets.memphissymphony.org.
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