Chicago Classical Review

When was the last time a classical concert was imperiled by leg injuries to the conductor and soloist alike?

Conductor Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider bailed out of this week’s Chicago Symphony Orchestra concerts after an unexplained leg injury last week “that doesn’t allow for international travel.” He was replaced on short notice by David Afkham, a regular CSO podium guest.

And when Martin Helmchen, the evening’s soloist, came out on stage at the top of the evening, the German pianist was limping and using an arm crutch due to a ruptured Achilles tendon.

Fortunately, neither circumstance adversely affected the largely excellent music-making, particularly Brahms’ Piano Concerto No. 1, which opened the concert Thursday night.

Since making an impressive CSO debut a decade ago with early Beethoven, Helmchen has delivered consistently fresh and individual Mozart performances in his return visits. On Thursday night, the pianist ventured into the heaviest repertory he has tackled locally to date with Johannes Brahms’ heaven-storming Concerto in D minor.

Brahms famously struggled with finding the right form for this work, his first for orchestra, casting it initially as a sonata for two pianos, then a symphony, and finally the Op. 15 concerto we know today.

Premiered in 1858 with the 25-year-old composer as soloist, the 50-minute concerto is something of an outlier. There is a fury and emotional intensity in the vast opening movement that is unique in Brahms’ oeuvre. Something of the young Brahms’ close friendship with Robert Schumann and his mentor’s descent into madness and early death seems to be reflected in the concerto, along with Brahms’ tender yet conflicted feelings for Clara Schumann. 

Based on Helmchen’s previous lightish CSO rep, as well as his current limited mobility, one wondered whether the soloist would be up to the daunting physical demands of Brahms’ concerto. And the answer was largely an emphatic “yes.”

One would have liked greater piano sonority and weight at times in the first movement, which also might have benefited from a bit more fire and intensity overall. But for the most part, Helmchen proved an impressive Brahms advocate, and this was a commanding, deeply felt performance of this epic work. 

Afkham launched the proceedings with a roiling account of the dramatic introduction, eliciting forceful playing from the orchestra. Helmchen showed that he clearly has the technical facility as well as the emotional temperament for this score and put across the restless drama with firm impact. The pianist’s initial playing of the consolatory section was brisk but as the work continued, he brought out the wistful, reflective qualities of Brahms’ contrasting sections amid the upheavals and turbulence. Afkham too drew out the lingering moments of repose while keeping the large movement on track.

Likewise in the Adagio, Helmchen was clearly attuned to the stoic introspection of the slow movement, musing with an intimate, almost otherworldly quality, with Afkham and the orchestra providing equally sensitive support.

Helmchen tackled the finale with determined drive and bristling energy, as if to forcefully banish the dark shadows of the preceding movements. Here, as throughout, the soloist surmounted all of the daunting technical challenges and cadenzas en route to a thrilling and majestic coda with Afkham and the orchestra equally full-blooded partners in this superb performance.

Four curtain calls brought the limping soloist out until he favored the audience with an encore. Schumann was the apt choice with Helmchen offering a witty and delicately nuanced encore of “Vogel als Prophet” from Schumann’s Waldszenen.

With a pair of waltz-imbued showpieces for large orchestra on the second half, one feared the worst based on Afkham’s most recent, unsubtle CSO stand, where he too often leaned on a garrulous approach and unremitting volume.

As it turned out, Afkham’s direction was more focused and dynamically restrained and this proved one of the conductor’s more successful CSO appearances.

Richard Strauss’s high-stepping Suite from Der Rosenkavalier got off on the wrong foot with a horn splat in the opening fanfare. Viennese charm was mostly in short supply—apart from principal oboe William Welter— yet Afkham led a lively and brilliant performance, leaning into Baron Ochs’ inveigling waltz, and rounding off Strauss’s confection with a rousing coda.

If Strauss’s Rosenkavalier is the final apotheosis of the Viennese waltz, Ravel’s La valse provides its darkest deconstruction. Here Afkham—who also led the CSO’s last  La valse in 2023—was in sync with Ravel’s affectionate yet clear-eyed tribute to the dance form as well as the biting irony in this “choreographic poem for orchestra.” With vital and committed playing, Afkham led an organic performance with nimble rhythmic point, fluent flow between sections, and a dervish buildup to the coda’s fin de siècle crash and burn. 

The program will be repeated 1:30 p.m. Friday, 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 3 p.m. Sunday. cso.org

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