May Fest Masterful with Mahler

(first published in The Cincinnati Post June 1, 1992)

Couch listeners take note: If you think a compact disc beats a live concert, you should have been at Saturday night's May Festival performance of Mahler's "Resurrection" Symphony.

Masterfully conducted by music director James Conlon, it made grown men cry - as attested in the Music Hall foyer after a prolonged ovation.

No canned substitute could have matched being there, hearing - and seeing - in the perfect space created for the festival, the May Festival Chorus and Youth Chorus, vocal soloists, choirs from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and the Cincinnati Symphony in the finale of the monumental work.

Scrupulously attentive to detail, Conlon played its tragic and tender turns to maximum effect. The wrenching opening funeral march yielded to a dream-like Andante, its sunny pizzicato broken by a savage blow on the timpani as the Scherzo began. The pace grew dizzying then euphoric, sardonic, a stab of cold terror followed by hints of resignation near the end.

Mezzo-soprano Nancy Maultsby's dark, soothing voice captured the eternal hope of the brief "Urlicht" movement. Then, with an impact like a drawerful of cutlery dropped on the floor, the finale began.

Conlon's pacing was superb here, and the CSO worked marvelously with him, from offstage effects to shattering crescendos. Randolph Bowman's flute was touchingly sweet in earth's last bird calls, but the moment was the whispered entrance of the chorus on aufersteh'n ("arise").

The 1992 May Festival has scored on both the box office and artistic fronts. Soprano Kathleen Battle, matchless in Haydn's "Creation," opened the festival to a sold-out house. Friday night's Viennese evening with soprano Roberta Peters also drew over 3,000, the Mahler finale 2,900.

With 2,433, Weber's "Oberon" was hardly a bust, and offered a stunning debut by soprano Deborah Voigt. It took some persuading by Conlon - "Oberon" has relatively little chorus and unfamiliar music causes hives hereabouts - but no arts group worth its salt can cleave to the same rep all the time.

Helping to assure the festival's continued artistic growth, both Conlon and chorus director Robert Porco have signed automatically renewable contracts.

Although it's too soon to predict the bottom line, said board President Gust Totlis, the organization doesn't project a deficit. But like recession- plagued arts groups everywhere, contributions are down. According to another board member, one former corporate sponsor declined to participate this year because of a commitment to the new performing arts center.