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Jang displays
violin virtuosity

Concertmaster Ignace Jang and the Honolulu Symphony present Beethoven's Sixth: Repeat performance 7:30 p.m. today, Neal Blaisdell Concert Hall. Preceded by a 6:30 p.m. pre-concert conversation. Tickets $15-$55; call 792-2000

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By Ruth O. Bingham
Special to the Star-Bulletin

Beethoven always draws an audience, but the real star of Sunday's concert by the Honolulu Symphony was solo violinist Ignace Jang, the symphony's concertmaster. Jang performed Chausson's lyrical Poème and Ravel's fiery Tzigane (Gypsy), complementary works often paired in concert.

Jang interpreted Poème, a piece overflowing with Romantic melancholy and longing, with an affinity that perhaps hearkens back to the years he spent growing up in France. His emotional depth and wonderfully warm sense of line brought the work alive.

On its own, Poème is a lovely work for violin, but on Sunday it suffered in comparison with works by the master orchestrators: Berlioz's Corsaire overture opened the program, Ravel's Tzigane followed Poème, and Beethoven's Sixth Symphony closed the program. All three works are striking: in fact, the opening notes of Tzigane all but obliterated any memory of Poème.

With Tzigane, Jang delivered his tour de force. Virtually a compendium of violin techniques (harmonics, double-stopping, two-handed pizzicato, intricate bowing ...), Tzigane was passionate, dynamite, exhilarating ... Jang well deserved his standing ovation.

For an encore, Jang chose a transcription of Chopin's C-sharp minor nocturne. As often happens with encores, Jang's playing became even warmer and freer. He transformed Chopin's slow, bittersweet melody into something truly exquisite.

Harps often serve somewhat as musical footnotes in orchestral music, but not this time: harpist Constance Uejio, nestled front and center among the violins, contributed prominently and brilliantly to Tzigane and provided a sensitive accompaniment to Jang's encore.

To his credit, conductor Samuel Wong balanced the orchestra beautifully, delivering a transparent sound that highlighted the numerous internal solos.

Wong devoted the second half of the concert to Beethoven's Sixth Symphony. Under Wong's baton, Beethoven's Pastorale became pastoral in the extreme, even bucolic. The first movement began slowly, deliberately, exuding Austrian gemütlichkeit (pleasantry), which can be wonderful. Then the work got slower for the second movement, extending an already long movement.

The temptation is to say that the second movement was too slow, but that tempo is possible with such a large, modern orchestra, and the breadth that tempo affords is enormously appealing. The difficulty lay with its context: such breadth needs contrast.

Wong chose deliberate tempos for the third and fifth movements as well, speeding up only intermittently, as in the dance passages. The fourth movement, the storm, was especially effective largely because of its brisker tempo and more spirited playing.

Throughout those slow tempos, the orchestra had difficulty maintaining its focus and intensity, although the musicians played with exceptional clarity.On one level, Wong's reading was magnificent but that breadth cost the piece its power and impact.

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