Multitalented? Lee Shirer will show you multitalented.
When not sitting principal horn with the Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra, Chicago Sinfonietta and Camerata Chicago, Shirer is an inventor and crafter of prosthetics, running his own company in the south suburbs. Somehow, he’s also found time to polish up Mozart’s demanding Horn Concerto No. 4, performing it with the IPO last Saturday at Trinity Christian College’s Ozinga Chapel in Palos Heights.
Shirer’s performance evinced his long history with the ensemble, which he first joined as third horn in 1984. His flowing sound blends beautifully with the IPO’s, even in this rare solo context, and the beginnings and endings of notes were gracefully tapered, as though operated by a volume dial.
After the pastels of the first two movements, Shirer went for a splashier, more heroic sound in the springy Rondo finale. His performance wasn’t completely faultless — the concerto’s sixteenth-note runs were a persistent bugbear — but it was singular. (A highlight: an original, offbeat first-movement cadenza Shirer wrote himself, which started with spidery, low multiphonics and ended in the rafters of his range.)
Apparently, being a patent holder isn’t Shirer’s only hidden talent. For his encore, Shirer reemerged sans horn to sing a live rendition of British comedy duo Flanders and Swann’s “Ill Wind” (1963), a pattering sendup of the concerto’s Rondo. It was a bold choice, but Shirer — a surprisingly secure baritone, with a just-right deadpan delivery — pulled it off most affably.
Leading the orchestra in the Rondo’s encore-reprise, IPO music director Stilian Kirov joined in the silliness from the podium. During the cadenza, Kirov jokingly crouched, waiting to spring into the orchestral tutti. When Shirer stretched it out, Kirov deflated in mock exasperation.
Under Kirov’s leadership, the IPO has climbed in quality in recent seasons, with a resplendent, handsomely changeable string section and strong woodwind and percussion voices. Classical-era repertoire, with its premium on gesture and purity of tone, can be a proving ground for an ensemble’s excellence. In Haydn’s familiar Symphony No. 104, “London,” and Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges’ less-so Symphony No. 1, the IPO more than met that challenge, its sound finely balanced, resonant and stylistically unified.
That last asset promoted Saturday’s performance from “good” to “superb.” Strings used vibrato judiciously, cutting it out — to great effect — in the second movement of the Bologne. As the program chestnut, the “London” symphony was, unsurprisingly, the most meticulously executed piece on the program, its mercurial shifts emphasizing color over caricature. The IPO horns faced some disquieting moments in both symphonies, but even they ended Saturday victorious, the last two movements of the Haydn seeing some of their best playing.
As a conductor, Kirov has energy to spare, with a high-elbowed, lively beat. But the young Bulgarian conductor taps into those reserves wisely, giving nary an extraneous gesture on Saturday night. He handled cadences and cutoffs with unharried poise, strings hanging just enough over (the consistently impressive) Simón Gómez Gallego’s timpani strokes. Tempos never deviated from convention, but why reinvent a wheel that runs this smoothly?
The night began with a world premiere, yet another test of an orchestra’s mettle. “No last days, only more tomorrows,” by IPO composer-in-residence Oswald Huỳnh, calls upon the musicians to pass off hissing exhalations, as though a gust of wind is scattering leaves across the stage. Stopped horns introduce a Doppler-ish effect eventually taken up by other sections, turning this uneasy pastoral uneasier. The atmospheric introduction builds into a grand sweep, but the arrival is fleeting. After the crack of Bartók pizzicatos (strings snapped against the fingerboard), the piece migrates into a section evoking Krzysztof Penderecki’s apocalyptic “Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima,” strings buzzing like wasps before wafting away.
Despite orchestrational riches aplenty, “No last days, only more tomorrows” hangs on a disjointed structural skeleton. Huỳnh seems to have planted the seeds for two, maybe three different pieces in “No last days’” 10-minute container. Fortunately, Huỳnh is such a gifted writer for orchestra that one wants to hear all of them. The IPO’s debut performance was loosely knotted to start, with intonation near-misses and fleeting rhythmic hesitation, but it cinched up powerfully well before the piece’s end.
The Illinois Philharmonic concludes its 2023-24 season with “Joyful Voices: Shaw & Beethoven” at 7:30 p.m. May 18 at Ozinga Chapel at Trinity Christian College, 6601 W. College Drive, Palos Heights. Tickets are $15-$84; more information at ipomusic.org
