Chin/Mahler: New York PO/ Gilbert ***
Kari Krikku
© Marco Borggreve
Avery Fisher Hall, New York, 23rd September 2014
Sounds of nature rustling magically to life are evoked in the opening pages of Mahler’s First Symphony, with its dawn chorus of bird calls. Ornithologists in Avery Fisher Hall last night for the opening of the New York Philharmonic’s subscription season may also have been twitching in the concert’s first half, featuring the US première of Unsuk Chin’s Clarinet Concerto. Soloist Kari Kriikku, perched on a stool for much of the second movement, tackled a role full of trills and fluttering multiphonics. Swooping, darting movements, like a secretary bird spearing a serpent, accompanied much of his playing.
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