@cincysymphony continued its 2026-27 season with a program of Romantic and 20th-century works perfect for the fall, under music director Cristian Măcelaru. The orchestra opened with an outstanding Cincinnati premiere of Lamia, a tone poem by English composer Dorothy Howell based on the tale of the titular Greek nymph living in the forests of Crete who desires to become human, as adapted into a narrative poem by John KeatsThe work’s harmonic language called to mind similar tone poems of the era by Richard Strauss and Edward Elgar, with lyrical, full-throttled string writing and meditative winds and low brass as well as occasional flashes of castanets and cymbals.
Rising young Moldovan violinist Alexandra Conunova, making her Cincinnati debut, joined for an exciting and energetic performance of Aram Khachaturian’s Violin Concerto. Dating from 1940 and dedicated to David Oistrakh, Conunova brought a outstanding sense of passion and flair to her performance, particularly in the extended solo cadenza in the first movement and the musical pyrotechnics of the third movement, with the orchestra and maestro Măcelaru being great, well-balanced partners throughout. As an encore, Conunova played an invigorating new work commissioned for her by American composer Martin Hebel titled For Common Purpose, a reworking/fantasy on Aaron Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man.
The May Festival Chorus, under the direction of Matthew Swanson, closed out the program with performances of two short works by Johannes Brahms, Nänie and Schicksalslied, composed roughly a decade apart between 1868 and 1881. Both were very nicely balanced and suited the revamped acoustics of Music Hall surprisingly well, having been performed quite successfully as a pair in 2015 prior to comprehensive building renovations the next year. The chorus was in excellent form in both works, as expected, particularly in the meditative opening of Nänie, and the central faster section of Schicksalslied, as they followed Măcelaru’s sense of shape and line with lyrical grace and dramatic heft. What’s joy it is to have this outstanding chorus back with the CSO for the first time this season.
Bravi tutti!
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