The concert was given by the Hunter Symphony with the pianist Abbey Simon. It was presented at 7:00 pm on Wednesday, March 18, 1998 at the Hunter College Auditorium. The pieces played by the orchestra were Overture to the Barber of Seville by Gioacchino Rossini, Pictures at an Exhibition by Modeste Mussorgsky, and Piano Concerto No. 2 in F Minor, Op. 21 by FrTdTric Chopin. The overture to the opera presented a great number of contrasts of tone and meter with themes that were repeated and resolved in the conclusion. The Chopin piece was played by Simon and the orchestra together.
The Mussorgsky piece was written as a commemoration of an artist friend of the composer. It was inspired by a visit to an exhibition of the dead friend's paintings and consists of musical versions of some of the pictures in the exhibition. A piece called the Promenade, which depicts the composer moving from one piece to another, recurs in between most of the early pieces--though it is played very differently in each case. In the example of the Promenade that passes from the rather mournful Il vecchio castello (The Old castle) to the more lighthearted Tuileries the orchestra comes in boldly following the dying notes of the previous piece (and a brief pause). The sound is sad at first, echoing the tone of the previous piece. But as the layers of sound are built up the mood changes, in only a few bars, to one of triumph and the main theme, as played by the whole swelling orchestra is reiterated several times, diminishing in intensity until, almost comically, it is repeated by the lone harp. This leads the way from the sad "picture" to the lighthearted one that follows.
The section called Tuileries refers to a picture of a Parisian park called Tuileries. In the picture children, accompanied by their nurses, are playing and fighting with each other. The musical depiction of this piece consists of variations in the conversations among the strings ...