Pasadena POPS Opener Something for Everybody
REVIEW…
The new band shell erected by the Pasadena Symphony and and POPS for its new location for 2010 POPS Summer Series creates a great backstop to an otherwise dreary location, Lot H, outside Pasadena’s Rose Bowl. The tables with white linens turned the grass area into a festive party-like atmosphere for the estimated 2000+ that showed up for the opening concert of the Pasadena POPS Orchestra summer series to watch the two-hour event that included a sharp sounding orchestra, a vaudeville juggling and acrobatic dance group, video close-ups of stage action on large screens at both sides of the band shell, and a wonderful fireworks display at the end. There was something for everybody.
Conductor Rachael Worby selected a program of music of familiar classical favorites that could have come right out of a 1950′s Time-Life or Reader’s Digest compilation recording. There were pieces of Bizet’s Carmen Suite No. 1 and 2; Tchaikovsky’s “Nutcracker” ballet and the Scherzo from his Symphony No. 4 and “Swan Lake”; Borodin’s “Polovtsian Dances” from his “Prince Igor”; two Khachaturian numbers including, of course, “Sabre Dance” from the “Gayuneh” ballet suite; Respighi; De falla; and finally Stravinksy’s finale to the “Firebird” suite.
The music was colorfully punctuated with members of the Cirque de la Symphonie, a group of acrobats, jugglers and strongmen—a circus/vaudeville act of six that presented adroit feats and body-bending routines that left most of the audience in giggles. Their work was seen up-close by the audience on two large video screens book-ending the band shell.
The video screens also provided a nice looks at orchestra members performing and the sound
system was absolutely terrific and well-balanced—that is, the best balanced sound was heard from the rear of the fenced off event area, the area designated for sand-chair and blankets. Worby extolled the virtues of attendance at live musical performances to the audience. But, the truth is that all the audience heard was the amplified sound of the on-stage performers. The mic-ing was so close to prevailing studio recording techniques that members of the percussion section of the orchestra could be seen wearing headphones when the large videos screens focused on them.
The orchestra performed under Worby’s athletic conducting style with eagerness and exactness. There appeared to be significant changes in orchestra personnel, including the assignment of Assistant Concertmaster Amy Hershberger as concertmaster of the evening rather than the Symphony’s Amy Kreston. No exact list of personnel was provided but many throughout the stands seemed younger. A pretty spectacular round of fireworks display was set off to an almost out-of-control speed-y version of Sousa’s “Stars and Stripes Forever” to end the evening.
The evening was pleasant and entertaining. But a warning: the bottom of the Arroyo Seco gets chilly even before the sun goes down. We think even the next concert, Saturday, July 17, could require an extra sweater even though the music will be hot. Rachael Worby brings the orchestra, singers Doug La Brecque, Lisa Vroman and The Donald Brinegar Singers, to the Lawn Adjacent to the Rose Bowl with “I ♥ New York”. Tunes by Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Frederick Loewe, Mancini and Gershwin on the Pops side and a small taste of Aaron Copland and Antonin Dvorak on the classic side, and more. Gates open for picnicking at 5:30 p.m., concert is at 7:30 p.m. Information: (626) 793-7172.
Text and Photos by Bill Peters
Leave a Reply
