Word: orchestra
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Friday, April 22. “Bach Society Orchestra with Bradley Balliett.” Paine Hall. 8 p.m. $8; students and seniors. $6 Tickets available at the Harvard Box Office...
When the cello section of the San Francisco Symphony finished a particularly tricky passage in Ellen Taaffe Zwilich's new Symphony No. 2 during rehearsal last week, the rest of the orchestra burst into applause. What provoked the collegial accolade was a daring cadenza for ten instruments playing as one, a high-wire act that is one of the emotional peaks of Zwilich's aptly subtitled 'Cello Symphony. The musicians' reaction was not surprising: Zwilich, 46, who in 1983 became the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for music, has for some time been regarded by fellow professionals...
...outside the music business had heard of the Miami-born composer, for Taaffe Zwilich (rhymes with safe hillock) was a woman in a field that has historically been dominated by men. But after she won the Pulitzer for her Symphony No. 1 (also known as Three Movements for Orchestra), her pieces suddenly began popping up on programs everywhere. Today Zwilich is that rarity, a composer who makes her living entirely from commissions, performance fees and royalties, without having to rely on teaching or grants to ensure a modest but adequate income...
Zwilich's new symphony is a 24-minute, three-movement, fast-slow-fast essay that daringly transforms the cello section into a collective soloist, a throaty protagonist locked in combat with the rest of the orchestra. Hard driving and explosive, the piece erupts from a single rhythmic idea that propels the music forward relentlessly. Even the moody slow movement cannot dilute the restless surge, which continues undaunted right to the final bar. Under Conductor Edo de Waart, the San Francisco players gave the 'Cello Symphony a committed, accomplished performance...
...show is a musical, a discussion of the music and its performance by the orchestra...