Ricardo Multi

At one moment during the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s performance of the Verdi Requiem on Thursday evening, conducted by Riccardo Muti and streamed live from Orchestra Hall in Chicago, viewers could see the rosin glistening on a bow during close-up shots of the violinists. The performance, which had had a relatively low-key build-up, considering it was to be held in honour of the bicentennial of Verdi’s birth, was the first concert the orchestra has streamed live on its Website. lt was also viewable on Facebook and other sites and beamed to an outdoor screen at the Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park. Mr. Muti, widely admired as a Verdi interpreter, made his debut as the orchestra’s music director designate in 2009, with the Requiem. He has also impressed with his brilliant, incisive conducting of Verdi operas.

With all the hype and media attention over Thursday’s concert of Verdi’s Requiem, by Riccardo Muti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, on the composer’s 200th birthday. one wondered if there was any conceivable way the actual performance could transcend all the relentless build-up. Riccardo Muti is not a musician to fail to deliver on high expectations, especially where music of his compatriot, Giuseppe Verdi, is concerned. The concert, which was streamed live and free on the Internet to an international audience, provided a terrific example to the world of the remarkable partnership of Muti and the Chicago musicians, with this riveting and combustible performance of Verdi’s Requiem mass. Muti’s skill and deep sympathy and understanding of this music, has been a constant throughout his career. He has recorded the Requiem three times, most recently the acclaimed Grammy-winning Chicago Symphony Orchestra recording; that preceded his music directorship in 2009.

Riccardo Muti often has deplored stage directors who run roughshod over the intentions of operatic composers, such as his beloved Giuseppe Verdi. There was no danger of that occurring at Saturday’s long-awaited performance of Verdi’s Macbeth, by the maestro and his Chicago Symphony Orchestra, because there wasn’t a stage director within miles to distract attention from the music. And the musical glories of Macbeth, one of Verdi’s early masterpieces, came across vividly in this first of four concert performances the music director is conducting at Symphony Centre to honour the composer’s bicentennial. Today’s foremost Verdi interpreter commanded an impressive international cast of singers, such as any major opera company would envy, most of them younger artists he has worked with in Rome and Salzburg, Austria, and trusts to realise his musical specifications.

Who needs sets or costumes? The much anticipated Chicago Symphony Orchestra concert performance of Verdi’s Macbeth took place and, remarkably, exceeded even the high expectations for this event. Magnificently sung and played, and directed by Riccardo Muti, whose lifetime of Verdi experience and scholarship shone through every bar, this riveting Macbeth was one of the musical highlights of the year, and one of the great, memorable Chicago Verdi nights, even in a city with a long and rich history of Italian opera performances. It was also a testament to the crackling partnership between Riccardo Muti and the orchestra. The hair-trigger responsiveness, whipcrack climaxes, lyric delicacy, and sheer vitality of the playing were technically faultless and, often, astounding. This roiling, powerful Macbeth marks the finest achievement yet from Muti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, even surpassing the Othel/o performances of two years ago.