DUDAMEL CONDUCTS BRAHMS 2

Gabriela Ortiz is a prominent Mexican composer, who in 2022 became the first woman composer inducted into El Colegio Nacional, the honorary academy of Mexico’s most esteemed artists and scientists. Her piece Kauyumari is inspired by the “blue deer” that serves as a guide to the Huichol people of central Mexico, a being imagined as part of peyote-inspired spiritual practices.

Gonzalo Grau’s Odisea spotlights the cuatro, a relative of the guitar that is the national instrument of his native Venezuela. The concerto imagines a trip from the east coast of Venezuela into its center, referencing the hometowns of soloist Jorge Glem and conductor Gustavo Dudamel, and drawing from the diverse musical traditions of Venezuela.

Johannes Brahms’s Symphony No. 2 is almost invariably described as “sunny,” and it was written quickly and easily after he toiled for decades over his First Symphony. From the first three notes, Brahms generates a miraculously varied first movement. The second movement’s stern opening changes almost immediately into a glorious melody of enormous length and breadth. The Allegretto grazioso that follows is Brahms at his most lighthearted, and the finale makes for a heroic transformation.