LumenoCity Encore Thrilling
Mary Ellyn Hutton
Posted: Aug 2, 2014 - 3:06:03 PM in
reviews_2014
The rain held off. The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra
provided the glorious sound. The visuals were spectacular.
LumenoCity 2014 held Cincinnati in its grip Friday night for
the first of three shows in Washington Park downtown. It may be fairly said
that the free event, inaugurated last summer to welcome new CSO music director
Louis Langrée, is a phenomenon unique to Cincinnati for its alliance of technology
and a live symphony orchestra concert. (No other orchestra in North America and
perhaps the world has attempted such a thing.)
As the orchestra played, ten laser projectors, each weighing
463 lbs. and producing a combined 400,000 lumens, beamed images onto the façade
of Music Hall from across the park on Race Street. In effect, the building
became the “canvas” for a gigantic sound and light show, “a melding of creative
expression,” said CSO president Trey Devey. The technique, called projection
mapping, involves creating digital animations, mapping them to a given surface
-- here the façade of Music Hall -- and “choreographing” them to music. The
project was completed by the creative design and production company, Brave Berlin,
headed by Steve McGowan and Dan Reynolds.
As they did last
year, a crowd turned out, an estimated 12,500 for Friday night and 6,000 for
the July 31 dress rehearsal. (When the request line for tickets was opened in
June, event capacity was filled in just twelve minutes and additional tickets
had to be issued, including tickets for the dress rehearsal. There were over
300,000 visits to the lumenocity2014.com web site, according to CSO officials.)
People began staking out spots well in advance. To engage
them, there was pre-concert entertainment at the gazebo in the center of
Washington Park. There was food and
drink – even a special Pale Ale brewed by Moerlein Brewery for the event – plus
exhibits and shopping in LumenoCity Village on the south end of the park. A
LumenoCity Guide, with map, program and detailed information, was distributed to
attendees to help sort it all out.
As in 2013, Cincinnati Pops conductor John Morris
Russell opened the concert before dark with a classy program by the Pops (the
CSO’s alter ego), joined by stars of Cincinnati Opera’s just-completed summer
festival and members of Cincinnati Ballet’s Second Company (CB2). First up was what has become the rallying cry for the current
campaign to renovate both Music Hall and nearby Union Terminal, Cameron Butler’s
“Hey Yo (Save Our Icons).” (This is an effort that can only be furthered by
events such as LumenoCity, by the way.)
Dancers
from CB2 joined Russell and the Pops for Harold Arlen’s “Get Happy,” and
Russell previewed the upcoming Pops season with excerpts from Stephen Collins
Foster’s “The Social Orchestra,” arranged by Tim Berens.Soprano Alexandra Schoeny took a star turn with “Glitter and
Be Gay” from Bernstein’s “Candide,” as did the Encore Summer Strings, a youth
ensemble from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, in “Kumbaya.”
Henry Mancini’s “Joy” (based on Bach’s “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring”) received
a rousing performance, and Schoeny, tenor Aaron Blake, bass Nathan Stark and the
May Festival Chorus (by remote) joined in the finale from “Candide,” “Make Our
Garden Grow.”
With darkness gathering, the CSO and audience took a break
before the main act, LumenoCity itself. It was quite a show, led with zest by Langrée. He opened
with another Cincinnati “icon,” Aaron Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man,” commissioned
and premiered by the CSO in 1942. Accompanied by random faces of Cincinnati people, it gave the program a decidedly upbeat beginning.
John Adams’ “Short Ride in a Fast Machine” had a velocity of
swiftly changing patterns and colors to accompany it. Alexander Borodin’s “Polovtsian
Dances” featured wildlife in the style of and in tribute to Cincinnati-based
artist Charlie Harper (1922-2007). It was a charming bestiary of images,
including fish, mammals, birds and insects.
A special moment during the concert was “Nimrod” from Edward
Elgar’s “Enigma Variations,” which featured a projected film of Cincinnati
Ballet principal dancers, Janessa Touchet and Cervilio Miguel Amador in a
sequence choreographed by Johanna Bernstein Wilt. It was supremely touching to
watch them dance three stories tall on the Music Hall façade while watching
them dance live and life-sized on the Music Hall balcony below.
Langrée closed with Tchaikovsky, as he did in 2013, this
time the stirring finale from his Symphony No. 5. The projections, abstract and
rapidly changing, gave added emotional impact to the music, which as with all of the LumenoCity music, was beautifully performed by the CSO. In notes in
the printed program, there were references to CSO concerts during the upcoming
season that will include composers and works heard at LumenoCity 2014.
LumenoCity 2014 repeats at 8:30 p.m. tonight and Sunday in
Washington Park. Tickets are fully distributed, but views of the show from the
perimeter and other vantage points in Over-the-Rhine and downtown should be
available. WCET channel 48 will telecast the show live tonight. There will be live
access on LED screens at Riverbend and on Fountain Square Sunday and live
webcasts on the Internet for each concert. For further information, see www.musicincincinnati.com/site/news_2014/Lumenocity_2014_to_be_Widely_Accessible.html
