Success across the board for the arrival of the Orchester de Paris and its conductor Klaus Mäkelä at the Maison symphonique on Tuesday evening. A concert hosted by the Montreal Symphony Orchestra that will go down in Montreal’s history.
The metropolis can be pleased to be part of the current North American tour of the Orchester de Paris, which had not crossed the Atlantic since 2003, when it went to New York with its conductor then, Christoph Eschenbach.
Much has flowed since then under the Parisian bridges, and it is now the young Finnish prodigy Klaus Mäkelä who is at the head of this prestigious phalanx founded in 1967 by Charles Munch. At 28, the musician combines the direction of the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra and the Paris Orchestra, in addition to being an “artistic partner” of the Amsterdam Concertgebouw Orchestra, of which he will be conductor in good and due form from 2027.
For this four-stop tour (Montreal was preceded by New York, Boston and Ann Arbor), the ensemble retained the valuable services of another phenomenon, more recent, but just as dazzling: the Korean pianist Yuncham Lim, who turns 19 today. He literally sawed the legs off the musical world two years ago by winning the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition with consummate skill.
If it is with the Concertoo 3 in D minor, op. 30, from Rachmaninov that Lim had distinguished himself in the final, this time he rather set his sights on the very popular Concertoo 2 in C minor, op. 18, by the same composer.
From the initial chord, which he subtly arpeggiates in a sound evoking some confidence, the young pianist grabs us and draws us into the whirlwinds of this volcanic work.
The first movement is just electric enough (some performers go overboard), and the second sings well as an “adagio sostenuto” should.
The understanding with the conductor and the orchestra is supreme. The pianist listens to every detail and blends in like the best chamber musician, without always pulling the rug on his side. The only nuisance to report: a do frighteningly off-key high notes throughout his performance.
No wonder in this case that the pianist, acclaimed as we rarely see him, chose as an encore the famous Study, op. 10,no 3by Chopin, whose tonality mid major ensures that the disputed note is avoided most of the time…
We had previously heard the orchestra alone in the Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun by Debussy, who surprises with his not very vibrant solo flute (but why not?) and enchants with his broad and flexible tempo. It was, however, infuriating, after such a sonic miracle, that the very gentle final chord was interrupted by a thunderous telephone ringing. With the multiple repeated warnings on this subject over the past twenty years, it has become downright unforgivable.
To continue in this Franco-Russian vein, the Orchester de Paris offered after the break the complete Fire Bird by Stravinsky, created in the City of Lights in 1910. A work that he has just recorded for Decca.
No wonder then that the musicians have the score so much in their fingers, notably the principal horn Benoît de Barsony, whose eloquent intervention in the “Supplications of the Firebird” will remain engraved in our memory.
It is no exaggeration to say that Mäkelä is an authentic magician of sounds, as evidenced by the magnificent slow and mysterious introduction to the ballet, but also a very touching “Lullaby”, of hypnotic languor.
Hats off!