It's absolutely wonderful to encounter a piece that is so enjoyable that you can hear the players having fun with it.
For example: Airs and Dances by Christopher Theofanidis, the Arkansas Symphony's 2013-14 composer of the year, which he wrote for what is essentially the orchestra's entire double-reed section -- two oboes (Leanna Renfro and Lorraine Duso Kitts), English horn (Beth Wheeler) and two bassoons (Susan Bell Leon and Eric Killen) -- plus a percussionist (Rick Dimond).
In the six-movement suite-of-a-sort, which had its world premiere in the orchestra's River Rhapsodies chamber concert Tuesday at the Clinton Presidential Center in Little Rock, it's easy to distinguish the three dances, which Theofanidies explained in his pre-concert introduction, are neo-Renaissance (the players forming a double-reed consort with Dimond accompanying on hand drum and/or tambourine) from the airs, which take on a more modern air (with Dimond on vibraphone or cymbals).
It was impossible for the audience to listen to the work without smiling for the entire 15 minutes (the wind players' mouths, of course, were otherwise occupied). And it's a good thing that Theofanidies enjoyed his association with the orchestra to have stayed in touch.
Violinist Trisha McGovern Freeny and cellest Ethan Young, half of the orchestra's Rockefeller Quartet, joined pianist Tatiana Roitman Mann for a gorgeously nuanced performance of the Piano Trio in a minor by Maurice Ravel, marked by intense passion and superb attention to dynamics.
And the Quapaw Quartet -- Charlotte Crosmer and Eric Hayward, violins; Ryan Mooney, viola; and David Gerstein, cello -- standing up (well, Gerstein sat) to play the the String Quartet No. 9 in E-flat major by Dmitri Shostakovich lent a much welcome extra oomph to the performance. It particularly enhanced the third movement, one of the composer's trademark gallops.
Metro on 04/12/2017