Boston Classical Review

Seong-Jin Cho performed Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with Andris Nelsons conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra Thursday night. Photo: Hilary Scott

Fitchburg, Massachusetts doesn’t loom large in the annals of music history. But the town in the Commonwealth’s north-central region has at least one claim to fame: it witnessed the first Boston Symphony Orchestra performance of Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 in 1883. On that occasion, the ensemble assayed just the concerto’s first movement—and in an incomplete version.

There were no cuts, however, on Thursday night when the collective took up the full score at Symphony Hall for the first time since 2023. Seong-Jin Cho was at the keyboard, with BSO music director Andris Nelsons on the podium.

Tchaikovsky’s evergreen hit was the culminating item on the second program of the orchestra’s month-long E Pluribus Unum festival. As the concert’s oldest number and the only one not written by an American (the night’s other music was by Allison Loggins-Hull and Leonard Bernstein), it was also the evening’s outlier.

Yet its presence reminded of the sometimes-unexpected role of the United States in the development of the repertoire as well as the country’s long tradition as a place of refuge: the concerto’s premiere, after all, took place just a couple miles from Symphony Hall at what is now the Orpheum Theatre. Its first soloist, Hans von Bülow, was then in the midst of a comeback tour following a retirement brought about by the aftereffects of his former wife, Cosima, leaving him for Wagner.

No comparable backstage drama was manifested Thursday. What obtained, instead, was akin to the return of an old friend whose personality is irresistible.

Over the last several seasons, Cho has established himself as one of the BSO’s go-to collaborators. His technique is dazzling and his rapport with Nelsons and the ensemble obvious. So is his affinity for the Romantic canon, as was emphasized both in the night’s Tchaikovsky performance and the pianist’s encore of Chopin’s C-sharp-minor Waltz (Op. 64, no. 2).

Though it took a few minutes for the tone of Cho’s Steinway to settle, on Thursday all the necessary cylinders were firing. The music’s sweeping lyrical passages unfolded with nobility and color. Its playful spots snapped, especially the Andante’s deliciously elfin middle part.

What’s more, there was an inviting sense of shape to the Seoul native’s reading, both of the sprawling, slightly discursive opening movement and of the larger work. As a result, various little allusions—like the finale’s seeming feints towards themes and rhythms heard in previous sections—emerged subtly.

Cho’s capacity for dynamic extremes, notably at the higher end of the spectrum, also impressed, not least in the finale’s apotheosis, where his playing carried over the orchestra at full volume without sounding harsh.

Nelsons has led some fine Tchaikovsky performances with the BSO over the years and this was another of them. Tempos were purposeful, balances thoughtful, and the orchestra’s responsiveness to Cho turned on a knife’s edge. For character, too, there was much to admire and a couple of theatrical liberties the conductor took at the ends of the first and third movements paid off.

Flutist Lorna McGhee performed Allison Loggins-Hull’s Rhapsody on a Theme by Joni Thursday night. Photo: Hilary Scott

Only time will tell if the night’s newest selection, Loggins-Hull’s Rhapsody on a Theme by Joni, has the staying power of Tchaikovsky’s showpiece. Regardless, this fifteen-minute-long meditation on Joni Mitchell’s “My Old Man” has a lot going for it, including a highly virtuosic solo flute part and some striking adaptations of its source material (particularly the chorus’s lurching keyboard progressions).

Thursday’s soloist was BSO principal flautist Lorna McGhee, who nailed her line’s swirling runs and arpeggios. She also brought glowing warmth to its reflective moments.

Nelsons has long been a reliable advocate for new music and he presided over a reading that captured the bright sense of space the score evokes. Some out-of-balance woodwinds and brasses periodically covered McGhee, but the Rhapsody’s lean, Coplandesque tone and inviting plays of color—Loggins-Hull’s sparing use of percussion is especially effective—emerged vitally.

Much the same can be said for the night’s traversal of Bernstein’s Chichester Psalms. Written in 1965, this setting of six biblical Psalms (fully or partially) stands as one of the composer-conductor’s most satisfying and timely compositions.

On Thursday, Nelsons led the BSO and Tanglewood Festival Chorus in a performance that channeled the dancing essence of Bernstein’s style in the first part and touchingly mined the humanity at the core of the Psalms’ undulating finale.

While some ponderousness crept into the “Lamah rag’shu” episodes in the central section and the last movement’s instrumental prelude lacked a measure of electricity, the TFC was in strong voice throughout and boy soprano Edward Njuguna brought a sweet tone to his Davidic recitations.

The program will be repeated 7:30 p.m. Friday (minus Chichester Psalms) and 8 p.m. Saturday. bso.org

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