Lang Lang and NSO

Beethoven, Piano Concertos 1/4, Lang Lang, Orchestre de l'Opéra de Paris

Lang Lang, that famed piano superstar, is at the ripe age of 27 now, and over the hill, so to speak, in Wunderkind years. Friday night, in a one-night-only concert with the National Symphony Orchestra, An Evening with Lang Lang, he performed Beethoven’s Concerto No. 1 and Prokofiev’s Concerto No. 3. It goes without saying that his playing was beautiful and immaculately clean, but unfortunately, he still has not managed to evolve beyond the teenage breakout star that he once was, both in image and sound, and Friday night was no exception.

Guest conductor Andrew Litton, of Norway’s Bergen Philharmonic, shone just as brightly as the advertised star of the program. Litton's style was big and almost harried at times, but in the most exciting moments of the program, the orchestra’s sound was truly energized in a way that one doesn’t always hear with the NSO. At the same time, Litton managed to infuse the occasionally overblown with an amount of precision that, though it may not have kept the orchestra perfectly together, came admirably close. The opening work, Glinka’s Overture to Ruslan and Ludmila, was from the onset an exciting barrage of sound. When the entire string section of an orchestra plays rushing passage scales at a frenetic tempo, there are bound to be ensemble issues, but Litton worthily held the orchestra together in these moments. The listener was sufficiently primed for the main event at this point that it was unnecessary to present another introductory work, Weber’s Overture to Euryanthe, on the second half, pleasant though it was.

Lang Lang is the kind of performer whom musicians often love to hate, but during the first movement of the Beethoven, I was prepared to dispel this collective prejudice. The first movement was a very fine performance indeed: crisp and clean with the early Beethovenian hints of fire to come. The middle section was especially beautiful, in part because of his use of the pedal, which through delicate fluttering paid a clean, modern tribute to the classical style. Come the second movement, however, what should have been the Lang Lang of yesteryear reared his head. He is famous for his showmanship, of course, and during the second movement it was as if the rapture had descended upon him. True, the music was absolutely gorgeous, but it was also over-Romanticized to the point where it could have easily been confused with a work by Chopin and wholly inappropriate for early Beethoven.

Other Articles: Anne Midgette, Lang Lang and the NSO, trying to look beyond Beethoven's sunny phrases (Washington Post, November 16) Charles T. Downey, BSO Kicks Off the Season in Style (Washington Post, September 14) Jens F. Laurson, Ionarts at Large: Falla, Bartók and Tan Dun—Lang Lang enriched (Ionarts, April 12) Charles T. Downey, Lang Lang @ Kennedy Center (Ionarts, March 13, 2008)

The Prokofiev concerto was indeed an exciting close, but due mostly to the orchestra’s excellent playing and Lang Lang’s excessive movement at the bench. From the pianist’s first entrance, which consists of devilishly fast winding runs, his sound was immediately swallowed by the orchestra. This was obviously a combination of the writing itself and the orchestra’s sound, but also because Lang Lang’s playing simply didn’t have any bite. Prokofiev demands a sharp edge in his rhythmic sections, and Lang was perfectly round. His vertical technique also didn’t help, which is constantly up and up and up -- every note an upward exaggerated flourish instead of a rich downward sound. However, the second movement was truly beautiful; here, Lang’s skyward gazes of rapture, raised shoulders, and backward-leaning posture seemed less out of place. In the final movement, as expected, Litton led the ensemble to a rousing finish, which thrust the audience instantaneously to its feet. Lang Lang is certainly a thrilling pianist to watch, but is there anything underneath the bravado? It is always hard to tell.

The National Symphony Orchestra goes from superstar to superstar this coming week, with violinist Joshua Bell as the featured soloist, in a program of Lalo, Mendelssohn, and James Macmillan conducted by Hugh Wolff (November 19, 21, and 22).