Salonen Maintains Momentum in Second Concert at the Bowl

The second night of the L.A. Philharmonic’s Hollywood Bowl season has in the past often been something of an anticlimax. But not Thursday night, when the orchestra, led by Music Director Esa-Pekka Salonen, delivered a high level of energy, accomplishment and burnished beauty.

The program was a 1950s kind of agenda, the sort we might have called in those days Music of Northern Masters. The better-than-an-overture was the Suite No. 1 from Grieg’s music to “Peer Gynt”; the centerpiece, the same composer’s ubiquitous Piano Concerto; and the climax, Sibelius’ First Symphony.

Perhaps because of the happy relationship between conductor and orchestra, or a new, unobtrusive Bowl sound-delivery system, or just good luck and fortuitous humidity, the Philharmonic sounded fresh, tight and handsomely balanced throughout this performance. The only caveat: too-high volume in the two final movements of the Sibelius work, which added an air of unreality to what had seemed admirably natural earlier in the evening.

In any case, the listener was placed in the fortunate position of being able to admire the music, not just the performance, because leader and players produced logical and sweeping statements and never overrode the composer’s fluent rhetoric. Sibelius’ First brings out the best in the quietly authoritative, never flamboyant Salonen; he lets it speak, and it speaks clearly. This time, the orchestra’s separate choirs and individual soloists created a lustrous reading in what must have been limited rehearsal time.

They also elegantly caressed the wondrous world of “Peer Gynt,” and brought unjaded expertise to the familiar Piano Concerto.

Spotlighted in the latter was 23-year-old Finnish pianist Laura Mikkola, making her Bowl debut. She turned out to be a pleasant, bland and efficient soloist, one untroubled by an excess of temperament but blessed with plenty of keyboard technique. Mikkola’s lack of panache hardly mattered in this piece, which in any case never needs hard-selling. Play it straight--as she did--and it still works.