Alaska News

Review: Visuals trump music in Anchorage symphony's 'Legend of the Northern Lights'

The centerpiece of the Anchorage Symphony Orchestra's "Aurora Tales" concert Saturday night had more to offer visually than musically. "The Legend of the Northern Lights" featured a film by Jose Francisco Salgado accompanied by a score from Christopher Theofanidis. The first half of the 30-minute piece included a modern children's story -- not exactly a legend -- by Walt Terry of Canada, nicely recited by Jon Sharpe from a chair on a bit of a cabin set with a rug on which Ava Cook sat silently after giving a wee introduction. The film presented scenic shots, animals in the snow and sled dogs before getting to the main subject, spectacular video of the northern lights.

The music, glowingly orchestrated and well-played, was good documentary movie music, especially in the last half when the narration has ended. However, in contrast to Gustav Holst's "The Planets," which accompanied another Salgado film with the ASO a couple of years ago, I doubt that it will get much play without the video, its reason for existence. There's something like a five-note motif at the start that gets recycled halfway through and an evocative violin solo, but nothing you hum afterward -- like Holst's "Jupiter" or "Mars" -- or that sticks in the mind.

What is memorable are the fascinating pictures taken from outer space, looking at the aurora from the top. But if the film succeeds in being breathtaking in spots, it falls short in its promise of "fusing science with the arts."

"What are the northern lights?" Cook asks, kicking off the show. She's answered with a "scientists say" definition that does nothing to explain the phenomena in a way that provides insight to a general audience.

The real heavenly illumination on the program was the closing piece, Sergei Prokofiev's Symphony No. 7 with the original, subdued, ending. Conductor Randall Craig Fleischer skillfully managed both the overall shape of the big piece and the ever-shifting details. The percussion added color, but never overwhelmed the melodic aspects. The strings played beautifully and the performance rightly received the loudest applause of the evening.

The high quality of the string ensembles was also noted in Franz Schubert's "Unfinished" Symphony, which opened the program and for which Fleischer favored quicker, tighter tempos over a meditative approach, an alternative that he made work persuasively.

Perhaps the players are adjusting to how they hear each other in the new acoustic shell at Atwood Concert Hall, and Fleischer's reconfiguration of players -- violas to the front and basses in a line on risers at the back.

Mike Dunham

Mike Dunham has been a reporter and editor at the ADN since 1994, mainly writing about culture, arts and Alaska history. He worked in radio for 20 years before switching to print.

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