July 15, 2007
Burnaby's Symphony in the Park
The Vancouver Symphony played its annual, no-charge Symphony in the Park at Burnaby's beautiful outdoor concert venue at Deer Lake Park this evening. It was warm and sunny with enough dramatic clouds to set off the perfect setting for an outdoor concert.
Even though we arrived nearly an hour before show time, the grassy slope overlooking the serene lake was already filling up. The VSO played a crowd-pleasing program, as usual. Shostakovich's Festive Overture was the short, sweet, lead-in, followed by Borodin's melodic In the Steppes of Central Asia. The first half concluded with Rachmaninoff's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, ably performed by the 19-year-old Melody Quah on piano.
The second half began with a rousing, hyperdrive fast rendition of Williams's Star Wars Suite 1. Main Title. That was followed by Conway Baker's Through the Lion's Gate: 3. Mountains, a lovely piece I'd never heard before. It celebrates the north shore mountains near the concert venue, and the composer was present and received a standing ovation. In a serendipitous touch, a Great Blue Heron overflew the crowd in the midst of the performance. Only in Canada, eh?
That was followed by Rachmaninoff's Vocalise, in the version for violin, charmingly performed by the VSO's Associate Concertmaster Joan Blackman. When the short piece ended, Yumi and I simultaneously sighed and said we wanted more... Then came a few well-known selections from Grieg's Peer Gynt, and the concert wrapped up with Tchaikovsky's thunderous 1812 Overture.
In conclusion, being of Ukrainian descent, and noticing the preponderance of Slavic composers represented in the program, all I can say is: Slavs Rock! :-)
