Another review of my Philadelphia performances of Bartok and Mendelssohn.
“[Ignat Solzhenitsyn’s] qualities of technical precision, impassioned eloquence, and profound stylistic insight were already familiar.
I have always loved the “Scottish” Symphony, but it was Solzhenitsyn’s performance that made me realize more vividly than ever before quite what a towering masterpiece it is.
The revelation Solzhenitsyn provided was a direct product of the risks he took. In contrast to Wagner, Mendelssohn was noted as a conductor for his tendency to set fast tempos. That predilection is reflected in his metronome marks for this symphony, especially in the scherzo. It was Solzhenitsyn’s characteristic distaste for any kind of artistic compromise that dictated the devil-may-care exhilaration he brought to that movement, abetted by Doris Hall-Gulati’s brilliantly feather-light clarinet solos. Comparable passages elsewhere in the work were equally thrilling, while the slow third movement, though in no sense hurried, was done with a consuming sense of irresistible forward motion.”