Venue(s):
Academy of Music
Conductor(s):
Carl Bergmann
Event Type:
Orchestral
Status:
Published
Last Updated:
30 May 2020
“Philharmonic Rehearsal.—The second rehearsal of the Philharmonic Society drew another immense house to the Academy yesterday, every seat being occupied. The rehearsals of this favorite musical body have now become as attractive, if not more so, than the regular concerts, for the ladies are largely in the majority in the afternoons. The programme for the second concert comprises a symphony by Raff, Berlioz’s overture to ‘King Lear’ and Weber’s Jubilee overture, with Chopin’s concerto in F minor as a piece de resistance for the favorite pianist, Mr. S. B. Mills. It would be unfair to criticise [sic] the performance of a rehearsal, and we shall only say a few words about the music itself. The concerto is well known to musicians here, having been played before by Mr. Mills. It is a characteristic creations [sic] of the poet of the piano, in which his exuberant imagination, fantastical ideas and nobility of style are shown to advantage. The opening maestoso displays rare grandeur of thought, and the larghetto, which is so like a similar movement in the Liszt concerto of the last concert, is a tone poem, an idyl, such as Mozart or Mendelssohn would linger over with delight. In the finale allegro vivace we find the Polish spirit of the composer displayed in his appropriating some of the bizarre melodies of his native land, polishing up those rough diamonds and giving them a glorious setting of his own, until their radiance became blinding in the rapid flashes of quaint melody and harmony, which scintillate beneath the fingers of the pianist. It is a glorious work and one which will be sure to please better than any of the extravagances of the modern school of pianism.”