Chattanooga Pulse

Written by Vincent Howard
Wednesday, 05 November 2008 14:20

“Legends”, the title of the CSO’s next bill, is an obvious reference to the three featured composers. And for those with a mind toward double entendres, it’s also a nod to their respective works. But Robert Bernhardt, CSO’s resident conductor, suggests one shouldn’t stop there in teasing meanings out of this program’s suggestive designation.
“It’s actually a triple-entendre,” he told me in a recent conversation, his tone erudite but playful. “Each piece is also associated with a literary legend.”

The program will begin on November 6 with Suite 1 of Peer Gynt, Edvard Grieg’s incidental music for the verse drama by Henrick Ibsen (1876). Ibsen’s Gynt is a Norwegian Everyman who returns home to his love after a long voyage. Gynt’s peripatetic quest for self-discovery recalls Homer’s Odysseus. His mantra, “One should try all things and choose the best,” evokes the search of Voltaire’s Candide for “the best of all possible worlds.”