Southern Utah’s Own Tanglewood

By Bryce Christensen

A half century ago, the great American composer Aaron Copland recognized in Tanglewood and the music festival it hosts a critically important venue where “talented young musicians . . . gather.”  When such young musicians come together in such a setting, Copland believed, “their very presence . . . [can] act as a stimulus” to great music.  As the audience who gathered at the Heritage Center on April 18^th can attest, the Orchestra of Southern Utah’s Roy L. Halversen Young Artist Concert has developed into a Tanglewood-like opportunity for promising young musicians in this area.  Named for an outstanding teacher whose decades of selfless service inspired hundreds of aspiring young musicians at Southern Utah University and in the surrounding community, the Halversen Concert—like Tanglewood and its festival—gives rising young stars a chance to showcase and develop their talents.  Without question, the four young guest soloists and the young guest conductor who performed at this year’s Halversen concert created a potent stimulus to musical excellence.

During the evening’s first number—Franz Liszt’s Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2— the stimulus of young talent was most visible in on the conductor’s podium, where the twenty-two-year-old guest conductor Zheng Guo showed how remarkably well a young hand can wield the baton in eliciting a masterful performance of a difficult classical piece.  From the stirring opening trumpet notes to the kinetic conclusion of this richly-textured piece, Guo was in complete command, handling the quieter, reflective passages with tender sensitivity, but rendering Liszt’s kinetic eruptions with energy and passion.   Under Guo’s poised direction, OSU musicians melded their gifts in an irresistible interplay of winds, brass, strings, and percussion.  Particularly notable in this interplay were the memorable solos by trumpeter Adam Lambert, trombonist Michelle Lambert, clarinetist Sarah Solberg, and violinist LuAnne Brown—solos that stood out like shining gems embedded in an arabesque work of jewelry. Although not a soloist, OSU’s conductor and director Xun Sun did his part in this selection and in the evening’s final number by taking a seat in the violin section, as a hand that normally swings the baton skillfully applied a bowstring under the direction of a talented young guest.

For the second number, Summer by Vivaldi, Sun took his accustomed place on the conductor’s podium, where he again manifested the consummate musicianship that has now captivated Cedar City listeners for a decade.  But during this enchanting number, the limelight belonged not to Sun but to violinist Kristen Nielsen, one of four young soloists selected for this year’s Halversen’s Concert through competitive auditions.  Playing with the aplomb and self-possession of a seasoned virtuoso, Nielsen segued effortlessly from the languid opening notes of this Vivaldi masterpiece to the frenetic tempestuousness of the stormy later passages.  Though Nielsen unfolded much of her solo work against the broad backdrop of a tapestry spun out by the entire orchestra, she played some especially beautiful passages in tightly choreographed back-and-forth duets with her sister, Julie Davis, playing the cello.

In the concert’s third number the aria “Quando m’ en vo’” [“Musetta’s Waltz”] from Puccini’s La Bohème, the spotlight shifted to soprano Rylee Dalton.  From the moment she first opened her mouth, Dalton poured forth a stream of pure gold.  With impressive vocal gifts, Dalton made the famous aria luminous with the irrepressible desires of a beautiful and flirtatious woman, provoking the attention of all, but seeking the devotion of one.  Dalton displayed the marvelous richness of her voice to particularly good effect in the soaring conclusion of this number, as she effortlessly ascended her seemingly unbounded range.

The mood shifted markedly when cellist Michael Wager took over as soloist for the First Movement of Elgar’s Cello Concerto, a melancholy and brooding number.  With nuanced deftness of expression, Wager conveyed this dark composition’s deeply moving strain of pathos, a pathos born of Elgar’s deep distress over the carnage of World War I.  His performance poignantly complemented by the orchestra, Wager carried listeners from a subdued and reflective grief to a sense of mourning mounting to surprisingly majestic dignity.

The shadows of elegy gave way to the brilliance of celebration in Sibelius’ technically demanding Violin Concerto, as violinist Hillary Dalton took the stage as the last of the evening featured youth soloists.  Listeners could only marvel at the way Dalton performed the most daunting passages—passages requiring rapid movement through complex phrasings—not only with flawless technique but also with evident relish.  This was clearly a musician who positively enjoyed meeting musical challenges!   Though Dalton’s success in meeting such challenges was most obvious in the numerous feverishly dynamic sections of this number, her success was also evident in the more muted and pensive sections, sections Dalton rendered with liquid delicacy.

Though the parade of the Halversen soloists ended with the Intermission, the evening’s final number-- The Moldau by Smetana—reminded listeners that OSU need not bring in a young guest conductor from China to find a strikingly-gifted musician to take the podium whenever Master Sun wishes to employ his abilities in the violin section.  OSU Assistant Conductor Gerald Rheault indeed handled the baton for this last number with singular mastery, leading the orchestra in an artfully modulated performance of a many-hued musical evocation of the heart-stirring beauties of central Europe.  Named for a river that cuts through what was once Czechoslovakia, this Romantic treasure sparkles again and again as it transports listeners from Bavarian springs where the river originates, through valleys where it swells in volume and strength, and finally broadens into regal breadth on the plains near Prague.  Thanks to the interpretive deftness evinced by Rheault and the OSU musicians under his direction, listeners felt the natural growth of a brook augmented by tributaries, the turbulent cascades of a river fighting its way through a rocky gorge, the placid serenity of a mature river.  They also felt the echoes of human activities along the swelling river’s banks—the clamorous excitement of a hunt, the communal joy of a wedding, the proud glories of an aristocrat’s castle. 

As the emphatic last note of the Smetana number died away, listeners realized that another wonderful concert, another wonderful concert season, had ended.  But because of the way the Halversen concert—Southern Utah’s own little evocation of Tanglewood---fosters youthful talent, these listeners had every reason to hope that excellent music will continue to be a culturally enriching part of Cedar City for decades to come!