At the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, conductor Lahav Shani, composer Mason Bates, and piano soloist Daniil Trifonov. Photo by Todd Rosenberg.
In Friday’s (6/21) Chicago Classical Review, Tim Sawyier writes, “Daniil Trifonov is one of today’s luminaries at the keyboard, and will be a Chicago Symphony Orchestra artist-in-residence for the 2024-25 season. Thursday he appeared with the orchestra and conductor Lahav Shani in the thrilling local premiere of Mason Bates’ Piano Concerto in the final program of the CSO season. Bates, the CSO’s Mead Composer-in-Residence from 2010-15, completed the concerto for Trifonov in 2021, the result of a co-commission from the Philadelphia Orchestra and San Francisco Symphony. Since debuting the work with the Philadelphians in January 2022, Trifonov has made it something of a calling card, offering the West Coast premiere with San Francisco … Bates’ new score is a technicolor barnstormer. With advocacy such as Trifonov offered Thursday, it is easy to imagine this new work entering the slender catalogue of major American works in the genre … Shani presided solidly over Bates’ … often whirlwind writing … The evening began with another local premiere … Tzvi Avni’s Prayer, a ten-minute work for string orchestra. Avni wrote the work in 1961, revising it in 1969 … Prayer is not the peaceful meditation one might expect, and more clearly reflects spiritual struggle and grappling.” Also on the program was Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6.
