Music Director Stéphane Denève conducts the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra at Forest Park, September 22, 2021. Photo: Christian Gooden
“After a year missed because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the weather was comfortable, the atmosphere was festive, the music was wonderful and there was no admission fee” at the St. Louis Symphony’s annual fall concert at Forest Park, writes Fred Blumenthal in Friday’s (9/24) St. Louis Post-Dispatch (MO). “Repertoire [included] music by Ludwig van Beethoven, Richard Wagner and Jacques Offenbach [and] music by Igor Stravinsky, John Williams, Leonard Bernstein and W.C. Handy, including ‘He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands,’ sung by soprano Nadia Maddex. Music director Stéphane Denève conducted and served as a charming, charismatic narrator, dressed initially in Cardinals red and later changing to hockey blue…. A few people took in the concert from boats on the Emerson Grand Basin…. Performing outdoors and with amplification poses challenges… Only a small portion of the audience would have been able to hear if it weren’t for the amplification, and the audience was quite capable of shouting ‘mambo’ at the indicated moments in the ‘West Side Story’ excerpt…. Florence Price’s contemplative and lovely ‘Adoration’ for strings furnished an interesting contrast with the mostly up-tempo other music….. Sousa’s ‘Stars and Stripes Forever’ [was] followed by a generously proportioned fireworks display.”
