In photo: Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra Concertmaster Stefani Matsuo, Principal Viola Christian Colberg, Principal Cello Ilya Finkelshteyn, and Pianist Michael Chertock, in black masks, perform Mahler’s Piano Quartet in A Minor at Music Hall, May 16, 2020. Photo by Janelle Gelfand
“It was unlike anything we’ve seen in our lifetime. On May 16, the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra conducted a forward-looking experiment on what would have been its 125th anniversary season finale,” writes Janelle Gelfand in Tuesday’s (5/19) Cincinnati Business Courier. “Music Director Louis Langrée and five musicians presented a 25-minute concert, livestreamed digitally from an empty Music Hall…. It was both moving and somewhat eerie to watch. Onstage, four players—concertmaster Stefani Matsuo, principal viola Christian Colberg, principal cello Ilya Finkelshteyn and pianist Michael Chertock—wore black masks as they performed Mahler’s Piano Quartet in A Minor … a work of soaring romanticism, a gem in just one movement. The performers communicated its warmth and expressive beauty even through my iPad’s screen. At its conclusion, they stood quietly, still masked, and looked up at the empty hall. To open, principal oboist Dwight Parry stood alone in the balcony to perform the world premiere of a new fanfare … Matthias Pintscher’s vibrant vitres (fragment…) … the first of more than a dozen one-minute fanfares commissioned by the CSO as a response to the global pandemic. The event was … a message of hope that eventually our arts and culture will re-emerge.”
