FORT WORTH — The veteran British conductor Jane Glover made her name in music of the baroque and classical periods, although she also does music composed up to the present day. That background may have prompted her appointment as principal guest conductor of the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, to cultivate the orchestra’s sense of style in 18th- and early 19th-century music. She will take take up the position in the 2025-26 season, succeeding Kevin John Edusei.
In a foretaste of that appointment, she led Friday night’s FWSO concert at Bass Performance Hall. Each half included a Mozart work, each paired with a 20th-century composition drawing inspiration from earlier music.
For my money, the best of the concert happened in the second half, which opened with as elegant a performance of Ravel’s Le tombeau de Couperin as you’ll hear anywhere.
Literally “The Tomb of Couperin,” Ravel’s title essentially means “A Couperin Tribute.” It alludes to a multigenerational family of French organists and composers, but especially François Couperin, who lived from 1668 to 1733.
Inspired by the dance-based movements of French baroque harpsichord suites — François composed 27 suites! — Le tombeau originated as six movements for piano. Ravel subsequently orchestrated four of the movements.
To my ears, Glover’s tempos in the Prélude, Menuet and Rigaudon were just a hair too pressed to let the music dance as gracefully as it can. But she and the orchestra made the whole performance a marvel of colors and textures delicately nuanced and fastidiously balanced.
Phrase after phrase was lovingly tapered, principal oboist Jennifer Corning spinning out particularly eloquent lines. But there was plenty of flash and sparkle when called for.
Concluding the concert, Mozart’s Paris Symphony (in D major, K. 297/300a) was no less suavely shaped and sprung. No crystal-and-lace Mozart, though, it was red-blooded stuff that could flex a bit of muscle when appropriate, but never too much.
Does it mark me as a philistine that I find a lot of Mozart’s piano concertos pleasantly uninteresting? That was my thought during Friday’s performance of No. 25 in C major (K. 503).
Angela Hewitt was the nimble-fingered pianist, and she delivered a tastefully inflected performance. Glover and the orchestra were responsive partners, although even with slightly reduced string sections, some fortissimos were more aggressive than necessary. The audience obviously loved it all.
Benjamin Britten composed his Suite on English Folk Tunes, subtitled “A time there was,” in 1974, in the wake of serious heart surgery. As with the Ravel, it looks back at the past, but here actual folk tunes are sometimes well camouflaged in tangy timbres and harmonies. Glover led boldly characterized performances of the contrasting movements, although the orchestra wasn’t always at its tidiest.
Once again, the FWSO did its audience no favors with program notes in print so minuscule as to require a magnifying glass. Even the program page was in small type.
Details
Repeats at 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday at Bass Performance Hall, Fourth and Commerce, Fort Worth. $26 to $99. 871-665-6000, fwsymphony.org.
