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Russian Caviar and British Tangerines New York
Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center
09/18/2025 -
Anna Clyne: PALETTE
Sergei Rachmaninoff: Symphony No. 2 in E minor, Opus 27
Jody Elff (Orchestra Augmentation), Juilliard Orchestra, Stephanie Childress (Conductor)
A. Clyne/S. Childress (© Christina Kernohan/Karolina Heller)
“Lend your ears to music, open your eyes to painting, and stop thinking! Just ask yourself whether the work has enabled you to walk about into a hitherto unknown world. If the answer is yes, what more do you want?”
Wassily Kandinsky
“A painter paints his pictures on canvas, A composer paints his pictures on silence.”
Leopold Stokowski
In one of David Mamet’s classic lines, Danny DeVito screams to an associate in The Heist: “Everybody needs money. That’s why they call it money.”
To paraphrase, with no explanation, “That’s why they call it Juilliard.”
And for their first concert of the year, those young artists gave a near‑stunning evening in Alice Tully Hall. The world premiere of a work by the splendid British composer Anna Clyne, the New York premiere of Franco-British conductor Stephanie Childress and yes, the newly constituted Juilliard Orchestra.
Their program was not an easy one. Yes, Rachmaninoff’s Second Symphony is a popular one. But many listeners go through the hour‑long piece the way Aaron Copland described the composer: “All those notes, think I, and to what end?” Nor was British composer Anna Clyne easier. With an “amplified orchestra” picturing seven different...er, colors, or feelings or textures, the Juilliard Orchestra had to balance out the most subtle nuances with modal chords, medieval melodies.
Ms. Childress was up to the task. She is a most graceful conductor. Hardly idiosyncratic, she had an obviously natural relationship with the orchestra. And their response was visceral.
I frequently am reluctant to sit through that Second Symphony, but when played with freshness, when the melodies sing and the strings roll up and down effortlessly, the work is candy or caviar. Take your choice.
Ms. Childress gave her orchestra chances to shine. The long clarinet solo in the third movement was played lusciously by Yvonne Wang, along with all the intertwining winds. The brass provided the church‑like pedal points, and the conductor–while minimizing the rubatos–gave piece an engaging push.
More than push for the two Allegro movements. Yes, the composer called them Molto and Vivace, but the composer played with such feverish tempos in both movements, they could have been described Feroce. Yet, save for a few screaming moments in the finale, the Juilliard Orchestra followed the beats.
Ms. Cline’s work, PALETTE mixed colors with tones, for the composer is noted for her symbiotic adoration for both. Though one dare not say she is a synesthete. She is too careful, too meticulous, sometimes too English for mystical or chronic relationships.
However in PALETTE, she practices–like many a 14th Century composer–acrostics. In this case, the titular letters stood for seven five‑minute movements. “Plum,” “Amber,” “Lava,” “Ebony,” “Teal,” “Tangerine,” and “Emerald.” The stage walls changed colors accordingly.
One was thinking of the seven-movement Planets, but Holst had mythology on his side. Ms. Clyne tried her best. “Plum” was dark and moody, “Lava” had some shattering percussion, and the final “Emerald,” like its different shades of green, several shades of orchestra.
My favorite? “Tangerine,” which reminded me of Holst’s “Jupiter.” It was dazzling, a scherzo with moments of brass chorales. And like all the movements, the feelings changed throughout.
One had the choice, then, of “listening” to the noted titles, or simply listening to it as music. I half forgot the program after “Lava,” for Ms. Clyne is such a deft writer, who understands color and structure, that PALETTE by itself was an enchanting adventure.
Harry Rolnick
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