Deutsch, Richard Strauss, and Ravel at Severance Hall

Music director Franz Welser-Möst opened The Cleveland Orchestra’s 2025-2026 season with works from the 20^th and 21^st centuries.

The concert began with the United States premiere of Bernd Richard Deutsch’s work for chorus and orchestra, Urworte (Primal Words), co-commissioned by The Cleveland Orchestra.  Cleveland is no stranger to Deutsch’s works, as his work for organ and orchestra, Okeanos, was premiered here in 2019.  This new work is about 55 minutes in length and uses poems from Goethe’s late cycle, Orphic.  As with Okeanos, Deutsch creates vast expanses of sound, using every instrument imaginable – not just the standard orchestral complement of strings, winds and brass, but also wind machine, flexatone, and bamboo wind chimes.  Each of the work’s five movements – Demon, The Accidental, Eros, Necessity, and Hope – had its own flavor.  The orchestra played the work with a polish and commitment that could lead one to believe they had been playing it for many seasons.  In particular, a sensual flute solo from Joshua Smith remains in my mind’s ear.

Composer and orchestra following the performance.

Following intermission Welser-Möst returned to conduct two shorter works.  The first was Dance of the Seven Veils from Richard Strauss’s opera, Salome.  I’ve long wished that the orchestra would present the complete opera; it’s relatively short and easy to stage.  As it was, Welser-Möst cannily held the orchestra in check, milking the rhythms and orchestral colors until the last minute when the piece becomes quite wild. 

The concert came to a resounding close with Ravel’s ever-popular Boléro.  One can question how much goes into interpreting a work which depends primarily on a steady tempo and dynamic control.  Neither on recordings nor in concert have I ever heard this piece begun so quietly – barely audible.  From there it steadily grew in a crescendo which never sacrificed balance or tonal beauty.  All three works on tonight’s program were well received, but the roar from the audience that erupted at the end of the Ravel was as enthusiastic as I’ve ever heard at a Classical music concert.