Let\u2019s start with the \u201cGracias Gustavo\u201d merch: T-shirts, hoodies, tote bags, fridge magnets, posters, etc. There was the daylong \u201cGracias Gustavo\u201d block party at Beckmen YOLA Center in Inglewood that included a performance by rapper D Smoke. Tuesday night it was \u201cGustavo\u2019s Fiesta\u201d at Walt Disney Concert Hall, a Los Angeles Philharmonic gala that raised a cool $5 million in donations for the orchestra, extravagantly closing out the first three love-fest weeks of Dudamel\u2019s final season as the musical and artistic director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic.<\/p>\n
And over the weekend, there were four soul-searching performances of Mahler\u2019s Symphony No. 2 during which Dudamel warranted any accolade (or donation) you may care to toss the orchestra\u2019s way.<\/p>\n
Mahler wrote this audacious, eveninglong symphonic epic \u2014 known as the \u201cResurrection\u201d \u2014 as an act of suicide prevention, a death-haunted quest to find the meaning of life. We live; we love; we suffer; we die. What\u2019s the point?<\/p>\n
At 28 and the start of a career as celebrated conductor and misunderstood composer, Mahler questioned everything. He had necessarily converted to Catholicism the year before to get ahead in 1880s antisemitic Vienna, and in his Second Symphony gave what for him was a new, desperate notion: Give heaven a whirl.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s in Dudamel\u2019s upbeat nature, however, not to dwell in doubt but to find answers. In a program note to his performances of Mahler\u2019s Second, Dudamel wrote that playing the symphony as a kid violinist of 13 or 14 in Venezuela\u2019s El Sistema music education program was \u201cthe closest thing \u2026 to being with God.\u201d He was 17 when he conducted the first movement, a half-hour paroxysmic funeral march of such intensity that Mahler asks for a five-minute pause before moving on to the second of the 90-minute work\u2019s five movements. But by that point, Dudamel says he had already arrived in heaven.<\/p>\n
Conductor Gustavo Dudamel poses for pictures during a \u201cGracias Gustavo Community Block Party\u201d at the Judith and Thomas L. Beckmen YOLA Center.<\/p>\n
(Etienne Laurent \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n
When Dudamel was 34 \u2014 the age Mahler was when he finished his Second \u2014 he led a an unbelievable <\/u>performance<\/u><\/a> of the symphony with a 175-member-strong Sim\u00f3n Bol\u00edvar Symphony Orchestra in Disney as part of his Mahler Project, an unprecedented enterprise of performing all nine completed Mahler symphonies in under three weeks in L.A. and Caracas.<\/p>\n The sonic extravagance of the gargantuan Bol\u00edvar Second in sonorous Disney Hall became a massive and perhaps overwrought Mahlerian drama of passing from one fraught world, though sentimental remembrance of life\u2019s little and very big things, to another world, with a firestorm of orchestral brilliance and a large chorus proclaiming, \u201cRise again, yes, you will rise again \u2026 in the twinkling of an eye.\u201d<\/p>\n Dudamel unleashed a more mature and surprisingly effective performance of the symphony with the L.A. Phil at the Hollywood Bowl six years ago<\/u><\/a>. In February 2022, he led the Berlin Philharmonic in a beautifully somber performance dedicated to all the people affected by Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine (it is archived on the orchestra\u2019s Digital Concert Hall<\/u><\/a>).<\/p>\n As Dudamel, now 44, prepares his exit from the L.A. Phil to take the mantel of the storied New York Philharmonic, his Mahler is neither overly exuberant nor constrained by grief and Berliner decorum. This performance heralds a new Dudamel, conductor of prophetic grandeur.<\/p>\n That was apparent from the Second\u2019s opening notes, in which trembling violins and violas sound as if startled awake, ushering in cellos and basses who have begun moving the furniture. There was a depth to the sound that came close to that of an out-of-body experience.<\/p>\n By the end of the performance, which included the mighty Los Angeles Master Chorale and superb vocal soloists Chen Reiss and Beth Taylor, \u201crising again\u201d was not a matter of choice. Rather than a standing ovation, the response felt like an outside power lifting listeners from their seats. The ovation had the character not of high-pitched cheering but of an involuntary low-pitched invocation of wonderment, even disbelief.<\/p>\n Although Dudamel remains with the orchestra though the summer (his next Disney appearances are in February), these first three weeks feel like a victory lap. Appearance after appearance, he soaked up the love from adoring crowds. He gave performances fuller, richer, more masterful, more fulfilling than any I have heard from him over the past two decades, here or with dozens other orchestras and in venues in three continents. He is freer, more expansive, more Dudamel with the L.A. Phil in Disney than anywhere else.<\/p>\n The Mahler was preceded by a mostly Stravinsky program. The \u201cFirebird\u201d Suite blossomed in a rainbow of extravagant orchestral color, while Dudamel brought a new sumptuousness to \u201cRite of Spring.\u201d He also introduced John Adams\u2019 \u201cFrenzy\u201d to the U.S. In a recent broadcast<\/u><\/a> of Adams conducting his exciting new short symphony with the Lahti Symphony in Finland, \u201cFrenzy\u201d lived up to its title in a gripping, rhythmic performance. Dudamel added suavity.<\/p>\n Conductor Gustavo Dudamel directs YOLA students as they perform \u201cBatuque\u201d by Oscar Lorenzo Fernandez on stage during a \u201cGracias Gustavo Community Block Party\u201d in Inglewood.<\/p>\n (Etienne Laurent \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/figure><\/div>\n His busy schedule included a visit to the YOLA block party, with its live music and food trucks. Perhaps Dudamel\u2019s proudest L.A. accomplishment is the Frank Gehry-designed Beckmen YOLA Center for Youth Orchestra L.A., which has grown to serve 1,700 young musicians from the community receiving after-school music education at no cost. In a public conversation with D Smoke, the rapper (who taught music and Spanish at his alma mater, Inglewood High School) spoke of music education as a kind of liberation. \u201cI feel exactly the same,\u201d Dudamel replied.<\/p>\n For the gala, \u201cGustavo\u2019s Fiesta,\u201d Dudamel brought 17 advanced YOLA players to Disney joining the L.A. Phil in the last movement of Dvorak\u2019s \u201cNew World\u201d Symphony. The program consisted of five short finales and looked, on paper, as the least imaginative gala in at least the last three decades. In the flesh, it was a triumph.<\/p>\n The movements lasted between six and 12 minutes, each an augur, a rising up not in the Mahlerian spiritual sense but in a more quotidian just-saying that however raw the world we\u2019re in, we\u2019ve still gotta dance.<\/p>\n The exultation of Falla\u2019s \u201cFire Dance\u201d from \u201cThe Three-Cornered Hat\u201d was tempered by a propulsive but darkly tinged last movement of Beethoven\u2019s Seventh Symphony. The \u201cNew World\u201d with YOLA proved a centerpiece of pride in the future. The ending of Ravel\u2019s \u201cMother Goose\u201d Suite glowed with sweet enchantment, while Mexican composer Silvestre Revueltas\u2019 \u201cNoche de Encantamiento\u201d from \u201cLa Noche de los Mayas\u201d offered ritualistic enchantment.<\/p>\n![\"Conductor](\"https:\/\/ca-times.brightspotcdn.com\/dims4\/default\/2bb5176\/2147483647\/strip\/true\/crop\/7500x5000+0+0\/resize\/320x213!\/format\/webp\/quality\/75\/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcalifornia-times-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F90%2F04%2Fa231b0fc4e2eaac2655edca61feb%2F1525595-et-gustavo-dudamel-fiesta-review-53.jpg)
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