After reading the BMInt interview [HERE] in which the violinist from Monaco placed himself in a direct line from Ysaÿe, Wieniawski, Kreisler and Heifetz, one’s expectations were certainly set a-quivering for the Cherry Orchard Festival-sponsored concert last night at Symphony Hall. Rooted to the stage, Vengerov gave somewhat diffident, under-inflected accounts of the works in the first half; the second half told an altogether different story. The elegant and nuanced pianist Polina Osetinskaya showed engagement, freshness of approach, and fearlessness throughout the evening.

Because Prokofiev’s Five Mélodies (for wordless singing) Op. 35 (1920) met with little success, (I bet they would have worked later on the Theremin), the composer repurposed them in various forms including the variously quietly reflective and virtuosically demanding violin-piano duets we heard. The set began with a slow build from a very innig, and small-scale place (indeed Vengerov supported and projected ravishing ppp moments at all registers including hyper-perfect harmonics), became briefly insistent, then relaxed once again into an intimate salonishness. The piano introduced Number Two with coloristic flair, calling forth the violin’s singing tales of remembered moments, which became identifiably Prokovian and angular. Osetinskaya’s silken sheen diaphanously screened Vengerov’s very steady diminuendo. In the third song, Vengerov pleaded with some urgency, though within the terms of his aristocratic restraint; he never attempted to sell anything to us. The duo summoned simpler times in the fourth song, with dappled highlights suffusing. For the closer, we imagined ourselves in a birch forest or cherry orchard, as the piano carried us away with the first statement. The duo engaged in a bouncy conversation before the exquisite ppp fadeout.

We have heard many strong traversals of the Prokofiev Second Sonata over the years, both on the originally intended flute and the later-approved violin. The best of them have proved equal to the drama of the composer’s larger works from the turbulent year 1943. Vengerov sounded reserved in his introduction, adopting a faster than expected Moderato tempo, never stinting on forward motion, even when some relaxation may have been wanted. A few surprising vagaries of intonation materialized, and rarely did he project a large tone. But his wit never wilted. Osetinskaya complied with precise filigree. Of course Vengerov sovereignly dispatched all the technical challenges, but we desired more force and rubato. In the Presto of the second movement, the excesses of speed propelled irrepressibly. In this contest, both players won. For Poco più mosso portion Osetinskaya’s honey-in-the hive deliciousness opened amber jars of forceful swirl from both players which elicited early cheers. The tragically operatic Andante finally found Vengerov indulging in some juicy slides as the piano commented insouciantly. Though we reveled in the piano’s wistful gloss, the jazzy, off-kilter second section sounded a bit too pretty, (why not some digging in here?), and the entire affair felt a bit like dried flowers under glass. A happy carnival ensued with much side-show action in the very back-and-forth closing movement. Ah those infallible octaves from the piano, and finally some urgency from the violin. Back to the opulent sweetness of the initial theme. More bigness from the piano…then lots of momentum, but Vengerov could have calibrated the schizziness with stronger differentiation.  

Beginning the second half with Brahms’s Scherzo from the F. A. E. Sonata, Vengerov emerged a changed man. He showed us all the requisite qualities of the masters whose mantles he has assumed. We heard urgent, operatic pleading, varieties of inflection, total commitment, surging emotions, big tone, and astonishing velocity. It was as if the violin stood in for Clara while Robert and Johannes went to war over her on the piano. Yes, the sun shone briefly, but then Osetinskaya’s rapid-fire militancy drove a furioso Vengerov to join her in a bravo-inducing coda.

Then there’s the Franck Sonata, one of the cornerstones of the piano-violin repertoire (and I write piano first because of the demands and pleasures of the part), and one that can sometimes sink of its own weight. But on this night, it began to float on Osetinskya’s mysterious tones. The murderous moments she dispatched with ease. At times she seemed to recede behind a metaphysical veil, only to step forward as a molten toreador. Indeed, we might have been very pleased if she had played the sonata as a solo. But Vengerov also caught fire and allowed himself to revel in an expressive vocabulary that included copacetic warmth and inflection, very long, fluid lines with legato connections across bow changes, delectably teasing gooey portamenti, and profound vocal lamenting. There were too many moments to call out in this savage-yet-romantic encounter of equals.

Though Vengerov told us to think of Ravel’s Tzigane as French rather than Gypsyetical, the extended solo violin introduction perforce evoked images of Romani people at a blazing campfire. Vengerov dug in, often abandoning mere beauty of tone for stage-worthy passion. And OMG, those perfectly floated harmonics which filled the hall, not to mention spiccati, pizzicati and all those other catis! Then Osetinskya came in, as if a lute-carrying troubadour, and suavely transported us to Paris. The duo partnered in a slow-fast dance with a dangerously irresistible obsession as if locked into Red Shoes.

The shoes didn’t release them until after they delivered three well-earned, surefire encores with smiling, grand manner generosity: Kreislers’s Liebesfreud, Rachmaninoff-Paganini Variation 18, and the March from Prokofiev’s Love of Three Oranges.

The concert reprises at Mechanics Hall Worcester on Sunday. Tickets HERE.

Lee Eiseman is the publisher of the Intelligencer