After 2 Years, Full Tifereth Israel Community Orchestra Plays Together Again

By Eileen Wingard

Eileen Wingard

LA JOLLA, California — What a special treat to hear the entire Tifereth Israel Community Orchestra (TICO) playing together again.

Under conductor David Amos, TICO undertook an ambitious All-Beethoven program for their first full-orchestra concert after COVID forced their suspension for some two years. Prior to this concert, they have had two strings-only programs (rehearsing and performing masked). This all-Beethoven program was performed Sunday afternoon, June 19, and Tuesday evening, June 21, in the Cohen Social Hall of Tifereth Israel Synagogue, with all four sections of the orchestra, the strings, woodwinds, brass, and percussion participating.

The program opened with the Coriolan Overture, opus 62, with some nice playing in the woodwinds and excellent dynamics in the strings. Unfortunately, the long silences at the end proved to be pitfalls, but I am sure that was corrected at the next performance.

Beethoven’s Eighth Symphony is one of the more seldom performed, even numbered symphonies, but no less challenging for the players and engaging for the audience. This glorious music is even more remarkable, given that Beethoven was totally
deaf when he wrote it. The first movement began at a good clip, marked Allegro Vivace e con Brio, as did the last movement.

The first violins were at their strongest. The horns were particularly good in the trio of the third movement.

After intermission, the orchestra returned to accompany local pianist, Karen Follingstad, in Beethoven’s 4th Piano Concerto. She heads the piano department at San Diego State University. A graduate of the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia, she received her MM from Indiana University in Bloomington and her doctorate from the University of Texas in Austin. She has soloed with orchestras such as the Minnesota Orchestra and played chamber music with artists such as Yo Yo Ma. She has also recorded for the Hessische Rundfunk and the Norwegian Radio.

The opening solo piano introduction immediately established her authority and high level of musicality. Her dynamics were stellar, her runs rippled off her fingers and her climaxes plumbed the depths of the nine-foot Baldwin grand piano. Her playing reminded me of that of the Polish-born, St. Petersburg Conservatory-trained pianist, Ignace Hilsberg, who helped our JCC Music Committee obtain this excellent instrument in 1970. His benefit concert, in collaboration with violinist Otto Feld, assistant concertmaster of the San Diego Symphony Orchestra and Milos Sadlo, Czech cellist, serving as principal of the SDSO, raised the first thousand dollars for the $5,000 it cost. Years later, when it needed renovation, JCC Music Committee member, Sally Sachs, donated $5,000 in memory of her husband, violinist Carl Sachs to accomplish that goal. In its current home at Tifereth Israel Synagogue, it continues to serve the orchestra as an instrument on which pianists, the caliber of Karen Follingstad, are happy to perform.

David and the orchestra did a commendable job accompanying the gifted Follingstad. Highlights of the first and last movements were the exquisitely executed cadenzas in which trills and arpeggios seemed to spring off the keyboard. Phrases were beautifully shaped.

Her performance could rival that of any great artist I recall accompanying during my 37 years playing with the San Diego Symphony Orchestra.

It is a tribute to conductor David Amos and the musicians of the orchestra that artists of this calibre perform with TICO. Follingstad and the orchestra were strongly acclaimed by the enthusiastic, although sparse, audience.

TICO’s next program, its Pops Concert, will take place Sunday, August 14, 3 p.m. at Tifereth Israel Synagogue.
*
Eileen Wingard, a retired violinist with the San Diego Symphony Orchestra, is a freelance writer specializing in coverage of the arts. She may be contacted via eileen.wingard@sdjewishworld.com