The month of March has had the intriguing distinction, as far as the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra is concerned, of being both Cello Month and Guest Conductor Month. That intersection began with the earlier Chamber Classics Series which enjoyed an impressive appearance by guest conductor Michelle di Russo leading the Chamber Orchestra in a program that included Vivaldi’s Concerto for Two Cellos in G minor. That concerto was handled magnificently by two KSO cellists, Sarah Senn and Adam Ayers.
For this weekend’s Masterworks concerts, guest conductor Vinay Parameswaran had the podium for a program in which Dvořák’s Symphony No. 8 and a work by the young composer Quinn Mason bookended two works for cello and orchestra. Cellist Tommy Mesa was on hand for Dvořák’s hauntingly beautiful Silent Woods (Waldesruhe) and Tchaikovsky’s Variations on a Rococo Theme, Op. 33.
Mesa, a much-heralded and awarded young Cuban-American cellist, found both the forest and the trees in Silent Woods, painting his sound with thoughtfully considered details rather than long, unbroken brushstrokes. Something of the opposite seemed to be true in the Tchaikovsky Rococo Variations, where Mesa treated the individual variations as specific characters and sought to illuminate the idiosyncrasies of each with intriguing tone and technique. And, following the seventh variation, when one’s lyrical attention begins to drift amid a strange orchestral sameness of texture, Mesa stoked the fire for a heart-stopping Coda that is Tchaikovsky at his most exciting—one that spiritedly yanks the audience out of whatever reverie they had settled into. In both works, Mesa made it clear that both marvelous technique and captivating interpretation are a part of his musical storytelling ability.