This past weekend marked the beginning of the end of the Gustavo Dudamel era at the Los Angeles Philharmonic. The orchestra’s outgoing Music & Artistic Director kicked off his final season at Walt Disney Concert Hall with a banger of a pairing: An Alpine Symphony by Richard Strauss and world premiere performances of Earth Between Oceans by Ellen Reid. The two works share many commonalities despite being separated by over a century of compositional time: they both use huge orchestras, have geographic journeys as explicit programmatic themes of people experiencing different aspects of nature through triumphs and travails, and give musicians an opportunity to strut their stuff.
Sunday’s performance was phenomenal. The concert in its entirety — the complementary juxtaposition of new piece and warhorse, played with the highest technical mastery and musical grace, and conducted with interpretive subtlety and maturity — represented the LA Phil and Mr. Dudamel at their collective best.
Earth Between Oceans, a commission by the LA Phil and dedicated to Mr. Dudamel, is a four movement quasi-symphony featuring a large orchestra, moderately sized chorus, and occasional recorded samples of beach sounds played via drum pad. Ms. Reid named each movement after one of the four classical elements, yet going beyond the inherent natural symbolism to include geographic references and psychographic inspiration from locations in New York and Los Angeles. The movements were played mostly without pause, with a breath held between the third and final movements.
“Earth” represents a NY streetscape in winter that eventually thaws into spring. Unlike the frenetic shivering of Vivaldi’s Winter or the ominous, often violent, opening movement of Mahler’s 3rd Symphony, Reid’s vision of the seasonal transition is initially spare, with just piano, harp, and percussion setting the mood. Soon, the music gets chunkier, blooming both texturally and rhythmically. The chorus sings unintelligible syllables in a jumble before finally unifying at the movements climax.
The second movement, “Air,” is a purposeful contrast. Inspired by the notion of being in the clouds amidst Manhattan skyscrapers, it begins calmly and spaciously before eventually swirling. The strings and chorus dominate, some of the singers whistling to add texture and mood, before pivoting to the third movement, “Fire.”
In the program notes. Ms. Reid specifically mentions having begun this movement on January 7, 2025, “the same day devastating wildfires broke out in Altadena, the Pacific Palisades, and across Southern California.” Pulsing rhythms reminiscent of Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring dominate, with an elegiac “refrain of loss” making important appearances as well. The effect is one of sonic turbulence leading to tense inevitability.
After a few measures of rest, the weighty churns of “Water” provide a welcome catharsis. If the 3rd movement is a play on rhythm, the last movement is a study of varying textures and dynamics. Blocks of sound crest and trough like the Pacific Ocean waves that inspired Ms. Reid. Eventually, unabashedly sunny melodies take over. The piece closes with a huge major-key chord that, if my ears didn’t deceive me, hid the slightest bit of dissonance, echoing the “sense of optimism — even if it feels out of reach” with which the composer ended her description of the piece.
The overall result was majestic. Ms. Reid’s music is evocative without resorting to gimmicks or cliche, She relies instead on expertly crafted structure, flow, and timbre to make her points throughout the roughly 30 minutes required to traverse the sonic journey. Most of the work was dissonant yet direct, with the textures never becoming muddy even at their thickest. She knew where she was going, judged the right amount of time it should take to get there, and how to tell her story along the way without dumbing anything down.
It’s exactly the kind of new music at which Mr. Dudamel excels: full of musical gestures that are complex without being so intricate as to make it difficult for him to communicate with the orchestra or audience. Where sometimes he can seem like he’s holding on for dear life when conducting new music, this felt as organic as any Romantic staple of his repertoire. The orchestra responded with precision, musicality, and athleticism. Most importantly, they sounded great. The singers of the Los Angeles Master Chorale, here prepared by Artistic Director Grant Gershon, were their usual resplendent selves, overcoming technical hurdles with seeming ease and maneuvering the mix of sounds asked of them with subtly.
Let’s hope they all perform it again soon. And record it.
(L to R: Ellen Reid, Gustavo Dudamel, Grant Gershon)
After intermission, Mr. Dudamel’s interpretation of An Alpine Symphony showed how much he’s matured. Early in his tenure, he would’ve have gone for exaggerated contrasts in dynamics and tempi, favored thicker textures, and tried to achieve it by jumping in the air at least three times while conducting to elicit his desired results. No longer.
Mr. Dudamel’s rendition of the Strauss masterpiece this time around eschewed gimmicks or showy effects in favor of the long line. It was was big-boned without being bloated. Each of the musical swells up and down the titular mountain felt earned and organic, never forced, with the thunderstorm during the descent being the clear dramatic climax instead of yet another splashy moment among many. And though his conducting gestures were expressive and energetic, his feet never left the podium.
The orchestra played spectacularly for him. Strings were as precise and clean as they’ve ever been, but with the warmth Mr. Dudamel has infused into their sound. Woodwinds and brass were burnished, with elegant phrasing in exposed moments by principals Denis Bouriakov (flute), Ryan Roberts (oboe), Boris Allakhverdyan (clarinet), Whitney Crockett (bassoon), Andrew Bain (horn), and Tom Hooten (trumpet). Percussion was in great form, punchy and atmospheric as appropriate.
If Mr. Dudamel’s entire final season is like this, we’re in for a treat.
Random other thoughts:
- As mentioned in a prior post, Yoonshin Song was the guest concertmaster. This was the first concert in her month-long trial with the orchestra.
- Playing English horn was Lelie Resnick, frequent LA Phil guest, Principal Oboe of the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, and solo English horn of the Pacific Symphony. First bassoon during the Reid and third bassoon during the Strauss was Carin Miller, Principal with the Oregon Symphony.
- Among the augmented strings was Lyndon Johnston Taylor, retired Principal Second Violin, playing in the second violin section.
- A surprising number of seats were empty. Just eyeballing it: at the beginning of the concert, the Front Orchestra and Orchestra sections were only about 60-65% full, with Orchestra East and West and Terrace closer to 75-80%, and top Balcony and the View sections behind the orchestra mostly full. Some of those empty seats were filled after intermission.
Los Angeles Philharmonic: September 28, 2025; Walt Disney Concert Hall
Gustavo Dudamel, conductor
Reid: Earth Between Oceans (world premiere performances)
Strauss: An Alpine Symphony (Ein Alpensinfonie), Op. 64
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- Comings and goings at the LA Phil (Fall 2025 edition, pt. 1): a potential new Concertmaster given a trial, plus other news with the strings (Sept 25, 2025)
- EXCLUSIVE: Comparing new SFS and LA Phil contract numbers (and current contracts of other orchestras) (Sept 16, 2025)
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Photo credits: courtesy of the Gustavo Dudamel Facebook page
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