In 1966, the Utah Symphony Orchestra made its first appearance outside of the American West. Its travels took it to Greece, Yugoslavia, Austria, England, and West Germany. Included in the tour was a performance at the annual Berlin Festival, which was very warmly received by the local audience and music critics as well. Up to that time very few American orchestras had performed in Europe: the Boston Symphony, the New York philharmonic, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony. But an orchestra from Utah? People here had perhaps heard of the Great Salt Lake and the Mormon Temple and vaguely knew the geographical location of Salt Lake City, but, they asked, is there really any "culture" out there to warrant maintaining a symphony orchestra? It turns out there was, and, in a judgment that may have come as a surprise to Americans, the West German daily newspaper Die Welt proclaimed on the orchestra's first tour: "The Utah Symphony is one of America's top orchestras."
This past September, twenty years later, the symphony made its third appearance in Berlin, and its second at the Berlin Festival. The musicians are generally young; only four or five familiar faces still remain from earlier days among the eighty-five members. Maurice Abravanel, the highly esteemed music director who for more than three decades molded and guided the orchestra like a loving father with painstaking skill, perseverance, and personality, is no longer there. Yet one still feels the indelible impression that he left on the orchestra, an impression preserved by the present music director, Joseph Silverstein.
Silverstein began his career as a violinist; in 1955 he joined the Boston Symphony Orchestra, advanced to concertmaster in 1962, and was named assistant conductor in 1971, holding both positions until he joined the Utah Symphony in 1983.
A superb concert opened the Utah Symphony's sixth international tour--a tour that would find it performing in West and East Germany, Yugoslavia, Liechtenstein, and Austria. Unique for this tour were the back-to-back performances in West and East Berlin on September 16 and 17, something that no other American orchestra has ever done.
The concert at the West Berlin Philharmonie, the magnificent home of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, opened with a presentation of Carl Maria von Weber's Overture to the opera Oberon. A standard work in the repertory of most orchestras, it was performed with precision and insight, flawlessly revealing its romantic character--something not often achieved by American orchestras.
The second work of the evening was the Violin Concerto in D, K.218, by Mozart. Silverstein appeared here not only as the conductor but also as the soloist, putting his baton aside and directing the orchestra with occasional nods and glances. The solo part was executed with a supple tone and an articulation well suited to Mozart. Occasionally, though, the delicacy of Silverstein's instrument and its tonal quality was submerged under the fullness of the orchestral tuttis. Of the five concertos for violin that Mozart composed in 1775, when he was only nineteen years old, the D-major work is the most popular. Mozart received his inspiration for this piece from a frequently performed concerto by his Italian contemporary Luigi Boccherini. Silverstein's relaxed interpretation revealed the charm of the piece in its entirety.
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